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Commentary Oregon Daily Emerald Monday, January 3, 2005 NEWS STAFF (541)346-5511 JEN SUDICK EDITOR IN CHIEF STEVEN R NEUMAN MANAGING EDITOR IARED PABEN AYISHA YAHYA NEWS EDITORS MEGHANN CUNIFF PARKER HOWEU. SENIOR NEWS REPORTERS MORIAH RALINCrr AMANDA BOLSINCER ADAM CHERRY KARA HANSEN ANTHONY LUCERO NEWS REPORTERS CLAYTON (ONES SPORTS EDITOR ION ROETMAN SENIOR SPORTS REPORTER STEPHEN MILLER BRIAN SMITH SPORTS REPORTERS RYAN NYBURG PULSE EDITOR NATASHA CHIUNGER1AN SENIOR PULSE REPORTER AMY LICHTY RYAN MURPHY PULSE REPORTERS CAT BALDWIN PULSE CARTOONIST DAVID JAGERNAUTH EDITORIAL EDITOR JENNIFER MCBRIDE AILEE SLATER TRAVIS W1LLSE COLUMNISTS ASHLEY GRIFFIN SUPPLEMENT FREELANCE EDITOR GABE BRADLEY NEWS FREELANCE EDITOR/ DIRECTOR OF RECRUITMENT DANIELLE HICKEY PHOTO EDITOR LAUREN WIMER SENIOR PHOTOGRAPHER TIM BOBOSKY PHOTOGRAPHER NICOLE BARKER ERIK BISHOFF PART-TIME PHOTOGRAPHER BRET FURTWANGLER GRAPHIC ARTIST KIRA PARK DESIGN EDITOR WENDY K1EFFER AMANDA LEE DUSTIN REESE BRIANNE SHOIJAN DESIGNERS SHADRA BEESLEY IEANNIE EVERS COPY CHIEFS KIMBERLY BLACKFIELD PAUL THOMPSON SPORTS COPY EDITORS AMANDA EVRARD AMBER LINDROS NEWS COPY EDITORS UNDSAY BURT PULSE COPY EDITOR ADRIENNE NELSON ONLINE EDITOR SLADE LEESON WEBMASTER BUSINESS (541)346-5511 lum KltUL GENERAL MANAGER KATHY CARBONE BUSINESS MANAGER REBECCA CRITCHETT RECEPTIONIST NATHAN FOSTER AIBING GUO ANDREW LEAHY JOHN LONG MALIvORY MAHONEY HOLLY MISTELL DISTRIBUTION ADVERTISING (541)346-3712 MELISSA GUST ADVERTISING DIRECTOR TYLER MACK SALES MANAGER MATT BETZ HERON CALISCH-DOLEN MEGAN HAMLIN KATE HIRONAKA MAEGAN KASER-LEE MIA LEIDELMEYER EMILY PHILBIN SHANNON ROGERS SALES REPRESENTATIVES KELLEE KAUFTHEIL AD ASSISTANT CLASSIFIED (541)3464343 TRINA SHANAMAN CLASSIFIED MANAGER KAIY GAGNON SABRINA GOWETTE LESLIE STRAIGHT KERI SPANGLER KATIE STRINGER CLASSIFIED ADVERTISING ASSOCIATES PRODUCTION (541)3464381 MICHELE ROSS PRODUCTION MANAGER TARA SLOAN PRODUCTION COORDINATOR |EN CRAM LET KRISTEN DICHARRY CAMERON GAUT ANDY HOLLAND DESIGNERS The Oregon Daily Emerald Is pub lished daily Monday through Fri day during the school year by the Oregon Dally Emerald Publishing Co. Inc., at the University of Ore gon. Eugene, Ore. The Emerald operates independently of the University with offices in Suite 300 of the Erb Memorial Union. The Emerald is pnvate property. Unlawful removal or use of papers is prosecutable by law r Bret Furtwangler | Graphic artist ■ In my opinion Law of the covenant Louisiana, Arkansas and Arizona have introduced laws that could pre vent divorce if it is not filed for one of three reasons, and Kansas is looking toward a similar bill. So-called “covenant marriage” is a legal option that couples can choose by signing an affidavit swearing they will stay mar ried for the rest of their lives except in the case of infidelity, child or spousal abuse, or abandonment. These mar riages must usually undergo a separa tion period of about two years before a divorce can become legal. The cou ple must also undergo marriage coun seling prior to the wedding, as well as before divorce. Along with more well-known is sues such as gay marriage and abor tion, this tidbit of recent history illus trates our country’s sharp move toward conservatism in societal deal ings with relationships, sexuality and the family. In the case of adultery, abuse or abandonment, a couple in a covenant marriage must still under go up to two years of additional marriage and counseling. In any of these cases, but especially in those of abuse, it seems pointless, and possibly dangerous, to continue the marriage. Undergoing two years of close contact with an abuser would surely be traumatizing in and of it self, but for a legal document to en courage this contact, and to encour age the idea of marriage over an actual person’s happiness or safety, seems flawed. Even though covenant marriage is still a choice, it seems likely that partners could easily egg unsure spouses into such an arrangement, and marriages could end up at an even worse place. Abused or AILEE SLATER FURTHER FROM PERFECTION abandoned spouses would be forced to interact with an assailant because of legal terms they never wanted to buy into in the first place. According to an Arkansas county newspaper, covenant marriage pro vides an opportunity for individual couples to combat divorce in a state with one of our nation’s highest di vorce rates. Marriage may be a sacred institution, but simply making this in stitution harder to escape is not con serving anything except for outdated values of what a healthy relationship between two adults should be. Maybe marriage just isn’t it. Although conservatives hail mar riage as key to keeping families safe, perhaps these politicians should use their energy — now concentrated on promoting covenant marriages — to dealing with real problems, such as the fact that 34 percent of murdered women are murdered by their intimate partners, according to the National Women Abuse Prevention Project. Peggy Vaughan, author of “The Monogamy Myth”, estimates that ap proximately 80 percent of marriages experience at least one case of infideli ty. Conservatism is hardly worthwhile if what we are conserving seems to be so imperfect in the first place. In our society today, there looks to be a cultural understanding that tradi tional marriage makes less and less sense. For better or for worse, tech nology has offered devices through which we can engage in relatively safe sex without being in a relation ship, and U.S. citizens have snapped up this offer. Likewise, with gender roles rapidly losing their holding pow er, men and women no longer need each other in the housewife versus breadwinner way that they used to. Technology has even given single par ents the ability to reproduce their own genetic offspring. These facts are scary to many, and for good reason. It is more than nerve-racking to see a system of sta bility, one that has been relied on for thousands of years, dissipating be fore our eyes. However, instead of fighting so relentlessly for the sacra ment of the traditional, perhaps it would be easier, and eventually bet ter for everyone involved, if our so ciety instead accepted the sexual and familial movement of the future and figured out how to solve issues such as keeping children safe or pre venting sexually transmitted dis eases through a mechanism other than cementing unhappy marriages with legal documents. It is important to remember that couples do not divorce because it is easy; they divorce because they no longer wish to be married. False ly constructed ideas of stability, built around one man and one woman and one perfectly manicured subur ban life, will only make the impend ing crash of the past and the future of relationships that much harder to reconcile. Conservatism is only as good as that which is being conserved. aileeslater@dailyemerald.com OREGON DAILY EMERALD LETTERS POLICY Letters to the editor and guest commentaries are encouraged, and should be sent to teters@dai1yemerald.com or submitted at the Oregon Daily Emerald office, EMU Suite 300 Electronic submissions are preferred. Letters are limited to 250 words, and guest commentaries to 550 words. Authors are limited to one submission per calendar month. Submissions should include phone number and address for verification. The Emerald reserves the right to edit tor space, grammar and style Guest submissions are published at the discretion of the Emerald ■ Editorial Adios, Barry; Hello winter Illegitimate divorce A Spokane County judge ruled this past week that a pregnant woman could not get a divorce from her husband, who was jailed two years ago for beating her. After she’s had the baby, she can divorce, said Judge Paul Bastine, who has pitted the rights of the unborn child against the woman’s right to a divorce. Bastine told The Spokesman-Review that he is concerned the child, who does not belong to the abusive hus band, would be made illegitimate. This ruling, and concerns of illegitimacy, come against the pleadings of a woman who says the marriage is preventing her from marrying the child’s bio logical father. The woman’s attorney, Terri Sloy er, wraps up the point succinctly: “We don’t live in 15th-century England. ... This is a very dangerous precedent to set — particularly in this case, with a woman who is a victim of do mestic violence.” Bye, bye, Barry Newspapers across the country just won’t be as funny now that syndicated humor columnist Dave Barry has taken an indefinite leave of ab sence. In his farewell column, which ran Sun day, Barry said he will decide sometime this year whether he will ever resume writing his weekly column. He also said he wants to focus on other projects. So while Barry’s humor will probably remain a part of the American con sciousness, many newspapers will be sorely lacking for a lighter side. In a world filled with murder, mayhem and more natural disasters than you can shake a stick at, newspapers are increasingly becoming bearers of bad tidings. And as much as Dilbert and Classic Peanuts help add a lighter side to newspapers, Barry’s work was something special. With no obvious successor to Barry’s column, many newspapers may give up on humor altogether. Sad day. Market sees cup half full Despite a tsunami that unleashed incompre hensible devastation, a continually deteriorating situation in Iraq, historic federal deficits and a re port of a possible heart attack risk from popular pain relief drugs such as Vioxx, the stock market finished the holiday season significantly up and left investors optimistic about the new year. Dur ing November and December, the Dow rose 8 percent and the NASDAQ rose 10 percent. It just goes to show that one person’s impending Apoc alypse is another person’s treasure. To torture or not to torture The Justice Department quietly posted a new, broader official definition of torture on the department’s Web site Thursday. The action is a substantial departure from an earlier policy that was supervised and coordinated in part by White House counsel Alberto R. Gonzales in August 2002. That earlier memo narrowly de fined torture and authorized President Bush, in the name of national security, to potentially ig nore national and international regulations. The change, made late in the evening and without public announcement, dismissed the 2002 definition, including the portions as serting that mistreatment could be deemed as torture only when it produced severe pain equivalent to that associated with organ fail ure or death. While it is admirable that the Bush Adminis tration has done the right thing and acknowl edged that torture is an abhorrent practice, it is disturbing that such a move coincidentally came less than a week before the Senate Judi ciary Committee is set to question Gonzales, a nominee for attorney general. Sadly, what should have been a compassionate and hu mane action has been reduced to base politics — a poor attempt to deflect criticism that Gon zales’ influence led in part to prisoner abuses in Iraq and at Guantanamo Bay.
