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Reliqion still the opiate of the masses
Religions suppress personal
individuals the opportunity
to think for themselves
r | ''he first time I saw the Hale
JL. 101, heading north to my
parents’ California home. As my
best friend, who was driving, com
plained about being only half a
mile from our exit, 1 looked out my
window and saw what looked like
an erased star. I wasn’t quite sure
what it was at first.
“Hey, isn’t that the comet?” I
said. My friend glanced up and
started laughing at the circum
stance of the sighting.
Soon, we passed a five-car acci
dent. A woman was being pushed
into an ambulance on a stretcher.
Two children were sitting in the
back seat of a car as a policeman
kneeled near the open passenger’s
door, scribbling in a notebook.
Amidst all of the flashing red and
blue lights, the last thing on our
minds was the irrelevant white
smudge in the sky.
Over the next few days, that
white smudge would become quite
relevant to the family members of
39 dead cult members. The mass
suicide by the Heaven’s Gate cult
on March 26 was performed in or
der to reach a supposed UFO that
was trailing behind the comet —
the irrelevant white smudge in the
sky.
Suddenly, Lt. Uhura’s brother is
dead. She appears on CNN’s “Larry
King Live” and all the callers are
asking about is how she couldn’t
see it coming because of her affilia
tion with the Psychic Friends Net
work.
Suddenly, a man with wide
open blue eyes and white hair is
entreating from the cover of
Newsweek: “Follow me.”
freedoms and deny
Bopp comet I was stuck in
a traffic jam on Highway
OPINION
By Nicole Bristol
Apparently, this scary man, Mar
shall Applewhite, the cult’s
founder, was the son of a Presbyter
ian minister. In the 1970s, Apple
white checked himself into a psy
chiatric hospital to be “cured” of
his homosexual desires.
I believe his insecurity about his
sexuality led to the cult’s main phi
losophy: The human body contains
an asexual soul that can only find
salvation in outer space. Apple
white’s followers renounced their
sexuality as well. If he hadn’t been
taught that his natural sexual de
sires were wrong, possibly none of
this would have happened.
The entire situation of cults in
general is depressing and absurd. I
don’t think there is a cause that’s
worth surrendering your right to
think for yourself, speak to your
families and engage in sexual activ
ity. The Heaven’s Gate situation
could have evolved because Apple
white was in denial of his homo
sexuality. Thus, he founded a new
religion in order to provide a means
to ignore his sexuality completely.
Unfortunately, the spirituality he
added to this denial resulted in the
deaths of 38 other people
However, what we can learn
from this event is that after people
sacrifice their right to think for
themselves, tragedies often occur.
The magnitude of the tragedy de
pends on which religion or belief
system is involved.
Karl Marx once said that religion
was the opiate of the masses. And
for masses of Americans, religion is
their drug of choice. Christianity is
one of the largest cults of them all,
sedating people with the Bible.
Why think for yourself if you can
lazily pick up a black book that will
tell you how to lead your life?
A black book that will teach you
how to deprive yourself of
natural sexual desires and
to dwell in unnecessary
shame and guilt. Chris
tianity justifies irrespon
sibility, creating a situa
tion in which a person can
wrong another person and
turn to a god (one that has
“punished” millions of oth
er people) to effortlessly
gain immediate forgiveness.
The Catholic cult encour
ages people not to use birth
control. Failure to use birth
control can lead to the
spread of AIDS, STDs and
the overpopulation prob
lem.
The Bible tells you to do
unto others as you would
have them do unto you.
Marshall Applewhite def
initely followed the Gold
en Rule — providing 38
people with a deadly
mixture of barbitu
rates and vodka that
he himself ingested.
One of the viola
tions of the Heav
en’s Gate code was
“trusting my own
judgment or using my own
mind. ” The reason cults and reli
gion exist is because people are
afraid to use their own minds to
create their belief systems; thus,
they follow other people’s ideolo
gies and get into trouble.
You were born with the right and
responsibility to think for yourself.
You only have a limited amount of
time on this planet. Don’t waste
your time here by surrendering this
right by allowing another institu
tion or person to think for you.
Nicole Kristal is a columnist for the
Emerald. She can be e-mailed at
nkristal@gladstone.uoregon.edu.
Her views do not necessarily reflect
those of the newspaper or the
Emerald’s editorial board.
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LETTERS
Vote Miner/Unger
The election is far from a joke
and deserves the respect of all
the candidates and the entire
voting student body. Sarcastic,
casual voter’s guide statements
denigrate the serious responsi
bilities of the ASUO office, and
single platform campaigns will
not cut it.
I am voting for a team that is
serious about action, that has
real experience in student gov
ernment and that is making real
campaign promises. I urge the
students of this University not to
fall for hopes or sound bites, but
to empower concrete action and
specific quantifiable goals.
Bill Miner and Ben Unger are
pledging solid goals with the
means to accomplish them. How
will Miner and Unger encourage
awareness and tolerance on
campus? By creating a fund to
bring in guest educational
speakers. How are Miner and
Unger going to promote program
growth? They will limit the
ASUO budget.
How will Miner and Unger
promote life on campus? They
will bring the concerts here and
not let them defer to the Hult
Center where students pay
more. They will bring back the
beer gardens that once thrived in
the EMU.
I urge you to consider your
vote as a message. We demand
to be represented strongly by a
team that has answers. Vote
Miner/Unger.
Emily Robertson
Political Science
All about inaction
You may have noticed Bill
Miner and Ben Unger are run
ning for ASUO Executive. They
have bright yellow posters
everywhere boldly proclaiming
this fact. In fact, they got so
overzealous with the postering
and they so desperately want to
get their name out there, they
think nothing of violating elec
tion rules.
Before everyone got back from
spring break, the Miner/Ugner
campaign put up posters in
every place conceivable on cam
pus and they continue to poster
on a regular basis. Yet, they did
n’t stop there. They postered up
and down the streets surround
ing campus, on telephone poles
and on the back of street signs.
Postering in Eugene is illegal
and putting posters on the back
of stop signs should seem like an
obvious no-no.
These posters have been up
for almost two weeks now. True,
some of them have been re
moved, but many still remain.
For two weeks the Miner/Unger
campaign has unfairly been get
ting some valuable exposure in
many high traffic areas that oth
er ASUO candidates have not
been getting because they know
that is it is against local laws to
poster in these areas and that
this is a clear violation of elec
tions rules.
Bill Miner and Ben Unger
have known about their wrong
doing since last week. On Mon
day, the ASUO Election Board
told them they had 24 hours to
remove the illegal posters. Forty
eight hours later on Wednesday,
they were still to be found on
every telephone pole on Hilyard
and Patterson, so I filed a formal
complaint with the board. Bill
Miner himself told me that the
posters would be removed.
The next morning, walking to
school, I spotted Miner/Unger
posters on a telephone pole at
15th and Hilyard and on the back
of a street sign on Kincaid across
from the library. I did not go out
of my way to find these posters.
Four days after they were told
to rectify the situation, Miner
and Unger have yet to solve the
problem. But what do they care
about it at this point? The elec
tion cycle is almost over and
even if they take the posters
down now they will still have il
legally obtained more exposure
than the other candidates.
Their names should be taken
off the ballot since they are un
able to comply with the rules. At
the very least I would hope that
no one would vote for them. If
Bill Miner and Ben Unger are
unable to deep track of a few
hundred posters, how can we
trust them with 6 million dollars
of student money?
Mark Hemingway
Journalism
SIGMA PHI
EPSILON
Making their fra
ternity house ac- !
cessible for dis
abled brother
Jess Markt may
seem like com
mon sense, but
the actions of
these Greeks are |
still commend
able.
ATHLETIC
DEPARTMENT
Believe it or not, H
we stand by the
decision to hire
Ernie Kent as the
new men’s bas- |
ketbail coach.
This leaves assis- j
tant MarkTur
geoninalurch,
but new blood for
a program the
University hopes
to rebuild can
only help things.
I
FOOTNOTES
SITUATION
The battle contin- i
ues. The EMU
Board voted again j
on Wednesday to |
keep the group on
campus, but
things are far
from over. Exactly I
where Footnotes j
will be is still up in [
the air, and an up
coming ballot
measure is still
under debate.
Just end it!
TACO BELL
Taco connois
seurs should be
the first to know
that the once
cheap fast food
has gotten more
expensive lately.
While the stated
reason for the
price increase is
the raise of the
minimum wage,
other fast food
restaurants like j
Burger King have j
kept prices low. 1
So, enough ex
cuses, bring back
the 59 cent taco.