Wednesday, May 15, 1996 - The Michigan Daily - 5
ex, violence and
kids
When I first heard the phrase "one person's
trash is another person's art," I probably contem-
plated raiding my garbage can and making a
mural. Most people would know the mural's
pieces came from a garbage can. But as long as
one person - even I alone - -- -
*lled it art, that's what it was.
In my opinion, trash was
trash, whether I called it trash
or not. But I learned over time
that people put a lot of weight
into phrases like this one.
When people needed a maxim.
to justify valuing something
cheap or protecting something
despicable, these magic words
always seemed to do the trick. TONY
So I wasn't surprised by GHECEA
*hat I heard last April during
"Debating Decency: A Panel Discussion on the
Communications Decency Act and the Regulation
of Speech Online." In particular, I wasn't amazed
by Robert Hamilton, a lawyer for CompuServe.
I wasn't amazed by Hamilton's position on
regulating the Internet: That because we can't all
agree on a definition of "obscene;' we can't con-
trol obscenity online. Because some people find
photos of swimsuit models obscene, attempts to
, gulate photos of sexual torture have to fail.
Nobody agrees on a standard," said Hamilton. No
one could agree on a law. And besides, some peo-
ple think photos of sexual torture are pretty neat.
As always, I wasn't amazed. I was annoyed.
lIf you like photos of bestiality, I have no right
to cover your eyes. But this panel was addressing
whether children should be able to access explicit
material. Said Hamilton, the law could do nothing
to keep kids away. Parents should protect their
children. Even if data providers had some way of
knowing a user was a child (Hamilton said they
*dn't), society couldn't expect them to limit
access to explicit material when society couldn't
even agree on what that material was.
Exasperated, I asked Hamilton a question:
"When you're driving, and it's getting dark, do
you keep from turning your headlights on until
everyone else has turned on theirs?"
His answer should have been that he turned his
lights on when he knew it was dark enough; funny
thing was, when he thought it was dark enough,
4 ost other people agreed. Instead he clarified his
ent: While almost everyone agrees on mate-
rial that children shouldn't see, the few who dis-
agree will always make rules impossible.
The panel discussion ended after that, so I did-
n't ask any more questions. But Hamilton had
taken a cop-out, and cop-outs - even those based
on maxims - always strike me as lame.
One person's trash is another person's art, and
when we're dealing with art, that's fine. But when
it comes to determining what children see, that
maxim doesn't apply. There is a body of violent
Cd sexually explicit material that almost every-
e - including Hamilton -agrees that children
shouldn't see. A small group of people who dis-
agrees has no business hindering the law.
It doesn't require banning pornography or cut-
ting off Internet access. But it does mean asking
programmers to shield children from explicit
material. The same technology that created the
Internet can make it safe for children.
People like Hamilton would burden parents
and hide behind witty maxims. We can excuse him
r that; after all, he represents CompuServe in
court. But those who write laws for this country
must think more deeply than people like
Hamilton. "One person's trash is another person's
art" won't cut it when it comes to kids..
- Tony Ghecea can be reached via e-
mail at adghecea@umich.edu.
NOTABLE QUOTABLE
"(We're acceptingproposals) involving new or existing com-
munity service learning programs that would either continue
or expand the University's involvement with the state."
- Provost .J Bernard Machen, regarding the $8 million gift to the Universityfrom the
state of Michigan
sOUND AND
Walking man
FURY
JIM LASSER
SHARP As TOAST
YOU 4AV(E THE Ri tMfr *o A SOcK DEALJ
ANV1IN6 'YOU -SAYOR D0 CAN SE tUSE 0DIN T74E BS .
YOU ALSO HAvE T-rHE we-,N41 YD SELL Tio1 toV/rR/-H7s
T'0 YOUR CASE,
Pr~OVL'ZTO 'O.
'U' not a drain on Ann
Arbor finances
To THE DAILY:
I have no quarrel with your con-
tention that the City of Ann Arbor
should consider a city income tax as it
looks at the long term fiscal outlook
for the community ("Dollars and
Sense", April 22). I would ask, how-
ever, that your editors reflect on one
of your prunary points in support of
your position, that the University of
Michigan is "an enormous fiscal drain
on Ann Arbor."
I find it difficult to believe that an
employer who provides over 22,000
jobs to Ann Arbor residents and over
10% of the total work-force of the
entire county could be considered a
"drain" on the community. The annual
payroll to taxpaying area residents
exceeds $900 million which then mul-
tiplies throughout the community,
supporting the retail and service sec-
tors of the economy. The University
purchased over $85 million worth of
goods from tax-paying Washtenaw
County vendors last fiscal year alone.
The Daily editorial contends that
the Universt is "a major drain on the
city finances' because it owns "40%
of the taxable land in the city." Please
review your map. The City of Ann
Arbor comprises about 2 8 square
miles. The 2,872 acres the University
owns in Ann Arbor is about 4.5 square
miles or only 16% of the city total.
It is true that the presence of the
University brings with it some unique
costs that the community bears. I sim-
ply suggest that arguments for or
against a city income tax should not
be made from a faulty assumption
that the University is not contributing
its "fair share" to Ann Arbor.
JIM KOSTEVA
DIRECTOR OF COMMUNITY RELATIONS
Art Garfunkel is probably walking some-
where right now. I can see his puffy Afro-esque
hair bobbing slowly down some lonesome
avenue. I see his lanky anns swinging back and
forth at his sides. He is whistling something.
Probably something he didn't write. Art
Garfunkel. When's the last
time you thought about Art
Garfunkel'? I mean, really
thought hard about Art
Garfunkel?
When Art Garfunkel
parted ways with the mythi-
cal King of Lyrics Paul.
Simon, the future didn't
look so bright. Harmony
vocalists are a dime a
dozen. Big hair and suede DEAN
vests were going out of BAKOPOULOS
style. Now, years later,
things still don't look so bright for Art Garfunkel.
I read in the New York Times last month that,
while Paul Simon continued a legendary career, Art
Garfunkel went for a walk. Apparently, he enjoyed
himself, because he walks an awful lot lately.
Garfunkel leaves his New York home and walks.
Then he is shuttled back to his apartment for a
week. After a week off, he flies back to where he
left off and starts walking again. Then back to New
York. Then back to hoofing it again. It's an ongoing
cycle for him. He is walking across the country.
My friend says she envisions poor Art walking all
alone, singing harmony to nobody. He's talking to
lampposts: "Hello lamppost, wacha' knowin'?" And
he's still looking forrEmily, wherever he may find her.
My friend says it's heartbreaking to think of
the poor walking soul. I tend to agree.
I've been worrying about Art Garfunkel for quite
some time now. I wonder how he makes enough
money to eat. (A grant from the National Endowment
for the Arts, perhaps?) I wonder if sometimes in the
stillness of the night, the strolling, sapient Art ever
gets lonely. If he might ever need a bridge over trou-
bled water? Most of all, I wonder why Art is walking.
I started to think about Art this summer,
because it seems everywhere I go these days peo-
ple are heading somewhere. Going somewhere,
towards this vague hazy goal. Why this need to
travel when summer strikes? Why are we constant-
ly drawn away from where we are? Why does Art
Garfunkel's aimless walk seem touchingly human?
When I think of good old Art out there wan-
dering the nation's landscape, I think of him as a
representative of all the restless dreams in this
country. Art Garfunkel knows the reasons we
young Americans love the idea of journeys, of
road trips. We think somewhere, somehow, around
the next corner we are going to find something -
something we just can't explain until we have it.
Basically, I think it's the great American idea
of hope. We always hope for something more,
something better, and so we go off looking for it.
F. Scott Fitzgerald, the desperately hopeful
novelist, in his desperately hopeful American
novel, "The Great Gatsby," seems to know the
cause of the great American restlessness. I think
his final passage in that novel is one of the finest
passages in all of literature, and I also think it
sums up the spirit of the American need to wan-
der: "It eluded us then, but that's no matter -
tomorrow we will run faster, stretch our arms
farther... And one fine morning.."
Like Jay Gatsby or Art Garfunkel, we keep
striving for what's around that next corner, and
when summer comes we hop in our cars or put on
our walking shoes and set off after "it."
We'll never find "it," though. "It"'s not out
there. But don't tell Art Garfunkel; just buy him a
cup ofjoe if you see him, and let him keep on hop-
ing and wandering for the rest of us.
- Dean Bakopoulos can be reached via e-
mail at deanc?aumichedu.
140W t f1 k
YOUR WRITING
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