Thursday, April 29, 1993
Change the image of women
the spelling
by Alicia Hartman
Co-ailior
We've all heard the facts about
sexual assault, dating and
domestic violence and child
sexual assault, all of which
place primary focus on female
victims.
Last I knew, there are also
males (mostly children) who are
sexually assaulted, but they are
often neglected.
We're all familiar with Take
Back the Night and the events
that occurred here on campus.
TBTN has sparked recent
interest in women's rights and
their status in society.
However, there are a few things
I just don't quite understand.
The word "woman" once
meant "the wife of man." Now
these radicals who insist on
spelling "woman/women"
WOMYN better settle down and
think for a minute. Changing
the spelling of "woman" is not
going to change the image of
women or what is being done to
them. Besides, changing the
spelling will only be effective
in print. When you say
"womyn", you still hear a
"man" or "men" on the end.
The rules of helicopter piloting
by Dave Barry
Syndicated Columnist
TODAY'S AVIATION
TOPIC IS: How to fly a
helicopter. Although flying a
helicopter may seem very
difficult, the truth is that if you
can drive a car, you can, with
just a few minutes of
instruction, take the controls of
one of these amazing machines.
Of course you would
immediately crash and die. This
is why you need to remember:
RULE ONE OF
HELICOPTER PILOTING:
Always have somebody sitting
right next to you who actually
knows how to fly the helicopter
and can snatch the controls away
from you.
Because the truth is that
helicopters are nothing at all like
cars. Cars work because of basic
scientific principles that
everybody understands, such as
internal combustion and parallel
parking. Whereas scientists still
have no idea what holds
helicopters up. "Whatever it is,
it could stop at any moment," is
their current feeling. This leads
.to:
RULE TWO OF
HELICOPTER PILOTING:
Maybe you should forget the
entire thing.
This was what I was thinking
on a recent Saturday morning as
not
"Womyn" is not in the
dictionary, (possible someday)
and the rest of the population is
going to continue to use
"woman" and "women."
What about these professions
that end in "-man" like mailman
and milkman? We just
substitute "-person" in place of
"-man." Mail person, milk
person. But this limits these
jobs to human beings. We
don't want to give favoritism to
Homo Sapiens. Maybe it
should be "mail carrier" and
"milk deliverer" so we treat each
and every life form fairly, from
the mice to the elephants.
There are those who also wish
to change "he/she" to "she/he."
What's the big deal? We used to
write "he" and "his" to represent
a man or a woman. Then it
became "he/she" and "his/her."
The problem is that "he/she"
and "his/her" are hard to read,
and the English language is
confusing enough as it is.
"He/she" is somewhat
difficult to understand, yet it is
politically correct. We'll keep
the male gender first because
"he" comes before "she" in the
dictionary. Although "her"
comes before "his", we'll keep it
I stood outside a small airport in
South Florida, where I was
about to take my first helicopter
lesson. This was not my idea.
This was the idea of Pam
Gallina-Raissiguier, a pilot who
flies radio reporters over Miami
during rush hour so they can
alert drivers to traffic problems
("Bob, we have a three-mile
backup on the interstate due to
an international cocaine truck").
Pam is active in an
international organization of
women helicopters pilots called--
Gloria Steinem, avert your eyes
-the "Whirly Girls." She
thought it would be a great idea
for me to take a helicopter
lesson.
I began having severe doubts
when I saw Pam's helicopter.
This was a small helicopter. It
looked like it should have a little
slot where you insert quarters to
make it go up and down. I knew
that if we got airborne in a
helicopter this size in South
Florida, some of our larger
tropical flying insects could very
well attempt to mate with us.
Also, this helicopter had no
doors. As a Frequent Flyer, I
know for a fact that all your
leading U.S. airlines, despite
being bankrupt, maintain a strict
safety policy of having doors on
their aircraft.
"Don't we need a larger
helicopter?" I asked Pam.
Opinion
"his/her" because we use
"he/she" more often. Is anyone
else out there as thoroughly
confused as I? See the
horrendousness this causes?
Heck, since we're rewriting
the dictionary, we may as well '
rewrite history too. Some
Biblical historians believe that
woman was created from the rib
of man. Well, there are some
women who claim that woman
was on earth first and man came
from woMAN. See the
connection?
I have a friend (Debbie) who
attends University Park and she
participated in Take Back the
Night. Debbie sent me
information about the TBTN
activities at U.P., and along
with it was a flyer. It reads:
Women Unite!
Take back the night
March 31, 1993
Rally & March
7 p.m. Old Main
While everyone is
invited to the rally,
the march is for
WOMYN only
Now what's wrong with this
sign? We have "women" at the
top and "womyn" at the bottom.
Silly me, it must be that only
"With doors?"
"Get in," said Pam.
You don't defy a direct order
form a Whiny Girl.
Now we're in the helicopter,
and Pam is explaining the
controls to me over the headset,
but there's static and the engine
is making a lot of noise
your throttle
(something)," she is saying.
"This is your cyclic and
(something) your collective."
"(Something) give you the
controls when we reach 500
feet," Pam says.
"What?" I say.
But Pam is not listening. She
is moving a control thing and
WHOAAA we are off the
ground, hovering, and now
WHOOOAAAAAAA we are
shooting up in the air, and there
are still no doors on this
particular helicopter.
Now Pam is giving me the
main control thing.
RULE THREE OF
HELICOPTER PILOTING: If
anybody tries to give you the
main control thing, refuse to
take it.
Pam says: "You don't need
hardly any pressure t 0..."
AIEEEEEEEEEEE
"That was too much
pressure," Pam says.
Now I am flying the
helicopter. I AM FLYING THE
HELICOPTER. I am flying it
the feminist and liberal
"womyn" of the '9os can
participate in the march, and the
barefoot, pregnant and in the
kitchen "women" have to stay
home.
Here's something else that
kills me. These women are
fighting for equal rights, yet
they don't want men marching
with them. Is there a
contradiction here or is it just
me? And how can you prevent
males from participating in a
march if it is a public event?
Believe it or not, there are
some males out there who want
to help women, and they are
being, yes, DISCRIMINATED
against. Nothing like setting a
double standard.
Is this movement's purpose to
improve women's place in
society or just to promote male
bashing? Although there are
men out there who cannot
control their behavior, that
doesn't mean the entire male
population should be labeled
"evil."
I have never been raped or
assaulted, but just because one,
or even several men hurt a
woman, that does not give her
the right to hate the entire male
by not moving a single body
part, for fear of jiggling the
control thing. I look like the
Lincoln Memorial statue of
Abraham Lincoln, only more
rigid.
"Make a right turn," Pam is
saying.
I gingerly move the control
thing one zillionth of an inch to
the right and the helicopter
LEANS OVER TOWARD MY
SIDE AND THERE IS STILL
NO DOOR HERE. I instantly
move the thing one zillionth of
an inch back.
"I'm not turning right," I
inform Pam.
"What?" she says.
"Only left turns," I tell her.
When you've been flying
helicopters as long as I have,
you know your limits.
After a while it becomes clear
to Pam that if she continues to
allow the Lincoln statue to pilot
the helicopter, we are going to
wind up flying in a straight line
until we run out of fuel,
possibly over Antarctica, so she
takes the control thing back.
That is the good news. The bad
news is, she's now saying
something about demonstrating
an "emergency procedure."
"It's for when your engine
dies," Pam says. "It's called
`auto-rotation.' Do you like
amusement park rides?"
I say: No, I D 0000000.."
species
This parallels the hatred some
blacks have for whites. I am
white and I feel terrible for how
my ancestors treated blacks
generations ago, but I was not
alive at that time and I cannot
change the past. We must
move forward and continue to
improve relations between
blacks and whites.
Women do not have it as
rough as they think considering
the progress they've made since
the Women's Suffrage
Movement of the mid 1800 s,
and the fight for the ERA in the
19605. Since time began with
Adam and Eve (or is it Eve and
Adam?), and even during the
prehistoric period, woman has
been subservient to man, and
women haven't spoken out until
19th century.
The points is, change doesn't
happen overnight, and yes, the
process does take a long time.
Women should focus their
energy toward advancing their
status in society, instead of
attempting to alter the English
language.
Remember, it's not the
spelling of women or the order
of third persons that need
changed. What needs changed is
the image of women.
RULE FOUR OF
HELICOPTER PILOTING:
"Auto-rotation" means
"coming down out of the sky at
about the same speed and
aerodynamic stability as that of a
forklift dropped from a bomber."
Now we're close to the ground
( although my stomach is still at
500 feet), and Pam is
completing my training by
having me hover the helicopter.
RULE FIVE OF
HELICOPTER PILOTING: You
can't hover the helicopter. The
idea is to hang over one spot on
the ground. I am hovering over
an area approximately the size of
Australia. I am swooping
around sideways and backwards
like a crazed bumblebee. If I
were trying to rescue a person
from the roof of a 100-story
burning building, the person
would realize that it would be
safer to simply jump. At times I
think I am hovering upside
down. Even Pam looks nervous.
So I am very happy when we
finally get back on the ground.
Pam tells me I did great, and
she'd be glad to take me up
again. I tell her that sounds like
a fun idea.
RULE SIX OF
HELICOPTER PILOTING:
Sometimes you have to lie.
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