4 - The Michigan Daily - Friday, December 9, 1994 (Ittw cbigun&rg 420 Maynard Ann Arbor, MI 48109 Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan Jessie Halladay Editor in Chief Samuel Goodstein Flint Wainess Editorial Page Editors Unless otherwise noted, unsigned editorials reflect the opinion of a majority of the Daily's editorial board. All other articles, letters, and cartoons do not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Michigan Daily. 'Birth Control Matters presents a really balanced overview of what's out there. I think a lot of people's knowledge hasn't progressed beyond birth control and condom usage.' - Maureen Mc Cormick, Marsha Brady on the TV series "The Brady Bunch" P -- - -- 0 tC~~4rJV~'A(. How to get smarter in 12 easy months Nowhere to turn 0 Neither the Code nor restraining orders work After being found responsible under the Statement of Student Rights and Respon- sibilities (otherwise known as the Code) for harassment and physical assault and battery against ex-girlfriend Darcy Niven, Aaron Fekete is being accused of not complying with the "no contact provision" of the sanctions imposed upon him as a result of last year's hearing. Whether his recent actions can be considered violations of the sanction is unclear - but Fekete is not satisfied with the process, claiming he is "getting screwed" as he ex- pected the process to remain confidential. And Niven feels unsafe on campus under the nebu- lous definition of"no contact." This case pokes yet another hole in the flimsy document called the Code, demonstrating its failure in dealing -with student affairs, specifically in cases of -harassment. The Code's definition of harassment is quite generic, making little distinction between physical and verbal harassment. The lack of strict guidelines for determining if there is "enough evidence" for a hearing leaves the matter frighteningly open-ended for the ac- cused party. Moreover, any sanctions imposed upon the person found responsible are en- .forced through the judicial advisor's office, with the student "checking in" to ensure that the sanctions are being followed. It seems fairly impossible to ensure a "no contact" sanction via regular procedure. Notcomplying with sanctions is considered a further violation of the Code - therefore a new hearing needs to take place. It would seem that the burden of reinitiating the process falls on the complain- ant, as in Niven's case. Ultimately a student can be expelled for violating the Code - but .the number of repeat violations until expulsion is not stated, a situation which is potentially harmful for both the complainant and the ac- cused. And the Code is only viable when the accused is a student. Unfortunately the Code is one of the better recourses currently available in cases of ha- rassment involving another student. Student Legal Services can advise students only if the accused is not also a student at the University. Sexual Assault Prevention and Awareness Center (SAPAC) will advise students of their two choices: go under the Code or go straight to the Ann Arbor Police Department to obtain a stalking injunction order - essentially a restraining order - as stalking is illegal as of Jan. 1, 1993. However, this procedure has its own short- comings. While it is relatively easy to fill out the request form, it includes a $72 filing fee to insure against frivolous actions. After filing the complaint has to go to court and this process takes up to two weeks. The stalking injunction order requires that the complainant prove two unconsented contacts - but the term "unconsented" is not specific, leading to a gray area. Proof includes witnesses, re- corded answering machine messages or even unwanted flowers delivered to the complain- ant. Nevertheless, it is difficult to prove that it was made clear to the accused that the con- tacts were not wanted. SAPAC suggests a paper trail - calling the police for every single incident - as well as a personal docu- mentation of each contact to further substan- tiate the claim. In Niven's case, it is very conceivable that she would have been able to obtain a restrain- ing order. Still, the process for obtaining re- straining orders needs to be streamlined. Evi- dently no student-friendly alternatives cur- rently exist for protection against harassment; no process is clear in the matter of protecting the rights of both the accused and the com- plainant simultaneously. Student resources are limited in their capabilities to help people in this situation. Whether the Code is im- proved upon, or restraining orders become more easily obtainable, clearly aprocess needs to be designed which meets the needs of the students so that they may live in a free and safe academic environment. Students deserve dignity in the bathrooms To the Daily: "Those engaged in illegal activities will be prosecuted." Oh thanks, you see I thought that people got prosecuted for legal activities but now the meaning of the law is much clearer. Since even straight people would like to go the bathroom with privacy, I must admit that I find the new bath- rooms all around campus to be ludicrous. So let me see if I get this straight - in order to pre- vent "lude people" from en- gaging in "lude bathroom sex", the doors will be lowered so much that the only person who can't see in while one goes potty is Tattoo from Fantasy Island.Thank God forthe DPS. Here's a suggestion for the next Allow Aaron in Angell Hall To the Daily: We have known Aaron for 4 years, since we lived on the same floor in Mary Markley Hall. We're not going to speak about the events leading up to the agreement reached between Aaron and Darcy. Regardless of what happened, both agreed to settle the dispute by the pro- cedures outlined in the student code. Aaron accepted respon- sibility and chose to let the system decide. He didn't want to bring further distress or worsen the situation and he was assured that the proceed- ings would be kept incomplete confidence by the parties in- volved. Since this time, Aaron has fully abided by the decision reached. By his own decision, he participated in counseling. In addition, he has avoided Darcy. On only one such occa- sion has their paths crossed since the agreement was reached, as stated in your ar- ticle yesterday. Aaron was working on a paper in the An- gell Hall computing site, and Darcy arrived. To suggest that Aaron should be forced to leave Angell Hall merely because Darcy wanted to do some work is ludicrous. The purpose of the order was to keep Darcy and Aaron at a distance so that further hostilities would not oc- cur, not to impose unreason- able and unfair restrictions on Aaron. At this point, it's difficult to tell who is harassing who. Daniel Cohen Mark Zadvinskis Jim Edenfield LSA and Engineering seniors improvement - put video camera's in each and every stall and have loud speakers from which the Orwellian security guards can remind you to flush. Everyday we lose civil lib- erties because a mechanism of the state tells us it's in our best interests. If I want to go to the bathroommilitary style, I'll call up the ROTC but until then I think most people would ap- preciate just a tad bit more dig- nity. Maybe they should just equip each stall with tazers behind glass labelled "Break if approached for bathroom sex". Come on, have our homophobic fears become so inflated that we really think that they are prowling around campus bathrooms at night looking forinnocent undergrads to molest? And in our intense fears of these crazed bathroom sex maniacs, how far will we go? Will DPS hire additional men to stand in each stall? Maybe they should only allow one person in at a time? Anyway, I'm an LSA se- nior and next year I'll be using the bathroom in the unemploy- ment office so I shouldn't re- ally care, right ? Yeah, but I hate to think about all my friends who aren't seniors or the people who will come to this school in years to come. Is this the type of paranoia that we will allow them to inherit? Adam Rodriguez LSA senior All signs indicate that there will be no more new months this year; after December, we're going to plunge straight into January. That makes this a good time for reminisc- ing about the past year. Herewith (I think that's a word) is my list of... WHAT I LEARNED THIS YEAR: (in numerical order) 1. Don't urinate in your discus- sion section. Lecture, OK, but not discussion. 2. If you see a 300-pound guy walking down the street muttering curse words to himself, don't yell, "Watch your language, fatso!" 3. Spelcheck. 4. Contrary to popular opinion, drinking a fifth of Jack Daniel's is not likely to improve your score on your Poli Sci final. 5. Don't leave a football stadium when the score is 26-21 with six seconds left. 6. When asked, "What do you think of the President's perfor- mance?" don't assume that the ques- tion is necessarily about your sex life. 7. If someone calls you "a com- plete idiot, a complete jerk and a complete fool," be proud that you are such a well-rounded person. 8. If you think a sign says "RUSH THE TAXI," it probably really says "RUSH THETA XI." 9. Buy adog and name it "Peeve." Then when people ask, "What's your pet peeve?" you can respond, "a dog." 10. Don't go up to people and ask, "Do you like my humor col- umn?" They may answer, "It's a humor column?" 01 :7 . : Daily needs to Article 67 E-mail hackers In yet another case of e-mail piracy, a Uni versity of Texas password was 'cracked' over the weekend. The hacker subsequently used the account to distribute a KKK-like, white supremacist propaganda message. This message was received by thousands of Univer- sity of Michigan Engineering students, all listed on the CAEN user file, which is open to the public through the Internet. Unfortunately, the same open nature of the Internet that makes it such a popular and widely used tool, also allows for files like this to be viewed by hackers. Originally, the Unix/IFS system, under which CAEN and ITD operate, was intended to be a file sharing arrangement for small organizations. However, as it was adapted for use by larger institutions, the openness of the system became a problem, as security mea- sures based on the smaller entities became vulnerable to expanded use. As it grows and ages, it is being used more often in illegal ways, such as the attempts to break into e-mail accounts. More safeguards need to be imple- mented to avoid a repeat of the Texas fiasco, and a similar incident that occurred through a cracked University account last April. The lTD system, through which the racist message was sent out from the University last year, has since changed its password requirements, de- manding a mixture of capital and lower-case letters. Currently, while the CAEN user file en- codes passwords, the ITD version - also open more vulnerable to cracker programs. These programs help decipher passwords, but suc- ceed when a specific sequence is guessed at. The ITD system, in which the 'x' can stand for anything, gives no clues as to password length or letter and number breakdown. Although CAEN has taken the initiative in asking stu- dents to create complex passwords to foil crackers, the coded passwords remain avail- able to hackers. As of now, CAEN and ITD operate wholly separately. These two major University groups need to work together to shut down unauthorized accesses. The burden must also be shared with the students of the University. They must choose passwords carefully, avoiding derivatives of their own names or words found in the dictio- nary. These types of passwords are most eas- ily deciphered. Furthermore, students must be careful in accessing their accounts. Many accounts are broken into by amateur hackers glancing at hands typing in passwords. Espe- cially around final exams, with computer use and stress levels high, people need to exercise caution while logging on to an e-mail system. Ironically the University of Texas - the source of the racist message --recently used a password 'cracker' on its own e-mail lists to find passwords vulnerable to such programs. Upon finding those passwords, U-T suspended the accounts, advising the users to change their passwords. A similar program has been used before by the University for similar purposes. The University needs to keep check- ina naciiuordc in rdr, to nrotect -oudents substantiate figures To the Daily: According to the send mail header information that came with the racist e-mail that was sent out on Sunday night, ex- actly 500 engineering students were targeted by the mail. Even considering that the mail made its way into mailing lists whereby the e-mail propagated out to more students, I don't see where the "10,000 engineering students" figure comes from. Can you substantiate this please? Calvin Chu Engineering sophomore LSA vs. Engineering round IV To the Daily: Once again, Mr. Erik Berg has taken his pen into his hands in an effort to belittle LSA courses. "... if all classes were evaluated, and then reassigned credits based on the amount and difficulty of work per- formed, the vast majority of LSA classes would be worth zero credits ("LSA students don't deserve any credit" 12/ 5)." As finals approach and term papers are rearing their dead- lines, I am forced to wonder when Mr. Berg has the oppor- tunity to write such witty and intelligent editorials. Dawn Verbrigghe LSA sophomore defames character of CRISP employees To the Daily: I am writing to you regard- ing the article in the weekend section of your paper on De- cember 1, 1994. Was this article supposed to be some sort of joke and if so, I don't think it was a bit funny. It is nothing more than slander and defamation of character. You could very well wind up with a law suit. Is it the intent of The Michi- gan Daily to humiliate senior citizens who are honestly try- ing to do a good job of helping students enroll? Does the Daily endorse this type of harmful insults from an apparent sick lustful mind? If this is what your subscribers desire, we are in deep trouble and headed for the wrath of God to fall upon the offenders. The least the Daily can do is to print an apology to the CRISP Dept. for this type of behavior by your Art EditorM.Bernardo. She should cleanse her mind. She deserves to be fired. Reuben 0. Peterson The elderly gent at the door (of CRISP) Racist e-mail from Buckley To the Daily: Readers who enjoyed the racist e-mail message which appeared recently on the front page of the Daily should read the Michigan Review on a regular basis. The "Serpent's Tooth" column which appears in each issue is a thrilling 11. If you put a history textbook under your pillow before you go to sleep, it's just as good as actually reading the book, and a lot more relaxing. 12. Don't call professors "dude." 14. Don't be superstitious. 15. When one of your best friends touches your food, throw it out; it may have diseases. However, when employees at Subway whom you have never met before make your sandwich with their bare hands, it's OK to eat it. 16. If you're bored at 4 a.m., knock on University President James Duderstadt's door and ask him to "explain the code." He likes that. 17. When your professor says "Hi," don't say, "Yes, I am." 18. All men may be pigs, but not all pigs are men. 19. When picking a major, re-1 search all the possibilities, weigh the pros and cons, decide what you are interested in, figure out where you will learn the most and then pick the easiest. 20. Don't eat soup with a fork unless you have a lot of time. 21. Not everyone stops at red lights, so you don't have to either. 22. Women do not appreciate you walking into their restroom. 23. Don't study at the UGLi. With all the talking that goes on there, it's very difficult to fallasleep. 24. Don't study atthe Grad. With all the studying that goes on there, you feel very guilty talking. 25. Batman is big, fast and smart, but he doesn't respond to fan mail. 26. Wear pants. 27. Just because aplace is named "The Fishbowl" doesn't mean you 01 01 pi 01 I ;II II