Editor in chief: Laura Cadiz
Editorial Editors: Bret Jacobson, Laura Lucas
Newsroom: (541)346-5511
Room 300, Erb Memorial Union
P.O. Box 3159, Eugene, OR 97403
B-mail: ode@oregon.uoregon.edu
Tuesday
January 11,2000
Volume 101, Issue 73
Emerald
MODEM BEASTS
of the great outdoors
T|he moose, weary from its
journey, lazes in a grove of
aspen trees, eating the few
winter shoots it sees. Its calf,
just weaned onto real moose food,
nudges close to its mother in the
dry December cold of the Wasatch
mountains.
Mother moose stiffens sudden
ly. What did she hear? A coyote? A
hunter? She relaxes, it’s only a fam
ily of deer. The night’s snow cov
ers some
tracks and
scat, but it’s
clear from
the ground
that wood
land crea
tures fre
quent this
spot, a few
yards from a
large, open
snowfield.
V a a a a -
ROOM! My
Jonathan
Gruber
brother,
Todd, and I tear onto the field on
snowmobiles. Vroom! He aims for
every snowbank at top speed. I am
content to follow far behind, so
that I’ll be able to brake just quickly
enough to avoid running over his
mangled body when he wipes out
at 40 or 50 mph. Nonetheless, my
trip is far from serene: Every rev of
the engine causes the machine to
spit out copious quantities of blue
smoke.
Well, it turned out that no one
died. Todd will live to deflower the
virgin wilderness again next year,
and the woodland creatures took
off for the safety of denser flora, al
though the baby moose was
knocked senseless from acciden
tally running into a tree.
I still don’t like snowmobiling
the Utah mountains too much, but
I do it anyway, to be social. But as
guilty as I feel about burning fossil
fuels inefficiently simply so that
we can feel the serenity of the
wilderness at 40 mph, it’s not near
ly as maddening as driving around
Salt Lake City from the lowly
depths of an actual car.
I specify “actual car,” not in ref
erence to the snowmobiles, but
rather in reference to the gigantic
sport utility vehicles that every
person and most household pets
use to drive themselves around the
gigantic traffic jam that is sunny
Salt Lake City. While SUVs may
not be the biggest problem for our
environment, reducing the spread
of these monsters presents a prime
opportunity for normal people to
do their part in preventing pollu
tion.
Yes, we’re spoiled in Eugene as
so many people ride the bus and bi
cycle for their major forms of trans
portation. But even here, an occa
sional smoggy haze can be seen.
How can we prevent Salt Lake
City’s fate from becoming our
own? It’s not like the SUV bug has
n’t come to Oregon, or has spared
anywhere else in the country, for
that matter. And things hardly ap
pear to be getting better. NBC news
reported last week that 73 percent
of current SUV owners intend to
buy another as their next vehicle.
As an anti-SUV Web site
(http://poseur.4x4.org) points out,
the problem is not people who ac
tually use their SUVs for going off
road. It’s the “lemmings” who use
their trendy SUVs just like every
normal car they’ve ever owned: to
get from point A to point B.
People do need to get between
points. And, they can maybe use
the massive cargo hold and quasi
off-road capabilities of an SUV a
couple times a month. The prob
lem is, most people only want to
have one vehicle (per person,
maybe) to finance and insure. So
when they could just as soon be
driving a little car, they’re stopping
at the grocery store in a gas-guz
zling, visibility-restricting, pollu
tant-emitting SUV.
To a young person like myself,
one who drives only because of the
generosity of my family, several
idealistic solutions come to mind.
Because so few of us in the student
community have the opportunity
to drive SUVs anyway, they can
wait.
If I were writing for all of you
when we’re out in the real world,
and we were actually faced with
the choice of buying SUVs versus
something else, convincing you to
choose a car (with frequent use of a
bike and bus) would be a lot more
difficult.
I know that lobbying Pani, my
stepmother (a University alumna
and genuine former hippie), not to
purchase the family’s second (!)
SUV was an exercise in futility.
OK, so she drives around in the
mountains a lot. What happened to
the loving-of-the-Earth mentality?
Are we doomed to enter suburbia
behind the wheels of SUVs so large
they have to be registered in all sur
rounding states and span their own
time zones? Nothing personal
against Pani, whom I love dearly,
but what is it about the real world
that makes people think that they
are somehow owed the lifestyle
they choose, regardless of its im
pact on other people and future
generations?
She laughs at my quasi-idealism,
pointing out how many nice things
I have that are either bad for the en
vironment or otherwise a result of
the capitalist crusades of her gen
eration. I don’t have a good re
sponse to that... presumably, she
must know something I don’t.
Perhaps all we can do now is re
member, when
we are older,
||j;
to considef the young idealists
who we are now. I have the feeling
that selfish middle age, synthe
sized with our current feelings,
could be really great. Unfortunate
ly, the older we get, the lower we
regard our former opinions. Life
will indeed be different for us
when we are older, but I am going
to try to listen to my youthful con
science. And I promise to snowmo
bile just once a year.
Jonathan Gruber isa columnist for the
Oregon Daily Emerald. His views do not
necessarily represent those of the Emer
ald. He can be reached via e-mail jgru
ber@gladstone.uoregon edu.
Bryan Dixon Emerald
World Wide What
Should financial aid be suspended for a student's drug conviction?
.0. a
1 ii e_w &
www.dailyemerald^com
44 Suspend
ing financial
aid would be
a good idea/'
Justin Hyland
freshman
44 It depends
on what drug
they’re getting
busted for. ”
DanMa
senior, fine and
applied arts
44 First offences
should require a
probationary pe^
riod, but for
more serious of
fences financial
aid should be re
voked.”
Sherrie
Brunell-Neuleib
graduate, psychology
Because ed
ucation is most
important you'd
think it should
be [revoked for]
a probationary
period
Chris Buckley
sophomore, french