Image provided by: Clackamas Community College; Oregon City, OR
About The Clackamas print. (Oregon City, Oregon) 1989-2019 | View Entire Issue (April 21, 1993)
Wednesday. April 21, 1993 __________ _ OpiXliOll ___________ - TlfWlSkamas Print Pg. 7 The prince says 'success lay in the attitude' I would like to do two things: first tell the more than 2,000 readers that get vicarious thrills by reading my column thank you; and second, to tell you why I am so successful. The majority of my princely success lay in the attitude. A positive attitude is essential in developing an attack plan for excellence. That is no cassette program that told me this, that is traditional family wisdom handed to me from my mother, my grand mother, and so on. If you believe every gloom-and-doom headline you ever read, you’re going to live your life in constant fear and misery. You’d probably say “That’s bad for you! That’ll kill you if you eat that!” and so on. Life’s too short for that. What I say to all those head lines is “Get real!” Rather, the whole idea is to look at life like it is a recreational activity in which you do not get bored with, one giant weekend. If you’ve seen those G.I. Joe’s commercials, you know what I mean. I seize the weekend, like they do. A positive attitude is essen tial to proper character develo pment because if your attitude is negative, you have a tendency to bring down the attitudes of those around you. That is an observa tion I made from past experi ences. If you have a positive at titude, vice versa is the case. Those around you find you to be a more cordial person to be around. And you tend to have more energy, better social skills, and just sim ply be better all around. What a positive attitude will do to you can best be illustrated by World Wrestling Federation Champion Hulk Hogan. Now there’s a positive attitude at work. What has that guy done - he’s only won the championship five become the most popular athlete in all the WWF, been a positive role model to literally millions of children around the world, done the near impossible and a num- The World Beat by Eric St. Anthony’s times (a record in the WWF), appeared in two motion pictures, Letters to the Editor To The Editor: How serious does an abuse have to become before the pub lic will stand up and do some thing about it? Everyday, human beings in our nation’s nursing homes are being abused -- not by neglect or physical roughness but by unnecessary drugging. This drugging is condoned by many medical professionals and carried out by some well-mean ing, but ignorant nursing home personnel. Our senior citizens are not given a choice about taking these drugs. It is considered “necessary” treatment to keep them in the proper frame of mind and under control. By 1985,the NationalDis- ease and Therapeutic Index re ported that while adults 60 years and older made up only 11 per cent of thé population of the U.S., they used more than a third of all anti-psychotic drugs. These would be drugs like Hal- dol, Thorazine, and Prozac which are administered to create maximum behavioral disruption and make the pa tient less violent and destruc tive. A study of2,000 pharma cies done in 1986 showed that 60.5 percent of prescriptions for nursing home residents over 65 years of age were for major tranquilizersand 17.1 percent were for minor tranquilizers. A Harvard Medical School survey of 55 Boston-area rest homes published in the Janu ary 26,1989 issue of the “New England Journal of Medicine” reported that 55 percent of the 1,201 nursing home residents surveyed took at least one psy chiatric drug, with 39 percent being given anti-psychotic drugs. You can find that data in “Science News” of Febru ary 11, 1989. Psychiatric drugs are dan gerous, mind-altering drugs whose side effects include memory loss, hallucinations, extreme agitation and body tremors. The abuse of Amer ica’s elderly with potent mind altering, dangerous psychiat ric drugs is not occasional but continues to occur daily in nurs ing homes across the country. It is our society’s ignorance which will allow this abuse to continue until you and I are elderly and become the vic tims of our own lack of action. Information about the dan gerous effects of psychiatric drugs can be obtained from the Citizens’ Commission On Human Rights at 1-800-869- 2247. CCHR was formed in 1969 by the Church of Scien tology to investigate and ex pose psychiatric violations of human rights. An Open Letter to the CCC Community Political correctness or free speech? Are the two re ally in conflict? This subject should concern us especially because the college has al ways been a center of intellec tual freedom and a place to explore new ideas. The first amendment’s guarantee of free speech has only one restric tion: “clear and present dan ger.” That is, when the utter ance could cause danger to the public. I respect and encourage the diversity of viewpoints on this campus because open sharing encourages all people to examine their own beliefs. So I favor completely uncen sored speech. However, 1992’s election and a graffiti experiment on a campus bulletin board have presented new, difficult prob lems. During Fall Term, T- shirts were worn, and signs carried that used inflamma tory language (f— the OCA, kill all the faggots) that shocked with their anger and poor logic. Name calling filled the air and much of the language was pow ered with hate. Should we prohibit hate-driven, violent language? How would that kind of language affect us should we be in an attacked group? Then, on a bulletin board, I put a small card that said “a woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle.” I thought it might grow some graffiti, and it did. Later, a small note tacked right below said something like “a bitch without a man is like a dying person without life support” A pretty crude response, but I figured we had to start some where, so I responded “fine for dogs, but what about women?” Later, it was all gone. Since it was unapproved in the first place, I wasn’t sur- prised. I was sur prised to hear it had been taken down because of the hateful sentiment it expressed. Cer tainly, it was an ugly, hateful response, but I didn’t fully understand the situation until I learned that the person who took it down had been a vic tim of hate mail — on this campus. Hate mail doesn’t seem like the same kind of free speech we usually talk about. Do we have a right to attack someone with words? I would like to see a graf fiti wall on this campus. Far more than just the run-of-the- mill obscenities and phone numbers, graffiti is a rich source of anonymous art -- drawings, poems and dialogues about important issues. A place to speak freely in ink. But what about all the anger out there? What about all those personal attacks on individu als in writing? What about slander? What about free speech? Jan Roose Sincerely, Jane M. Williams Concerned Oregonian ber of other things, all of which could only be made possible by a positive attitude. One of the things the Hulkster has done was come up with the “Four Demandments of Hulka- mania:” saying your prayers, eating your vitaihins, training hard and believing in yourself. It is the fourth demandment that is inte gral. The belief in yourself can parlay itself into the other three, to say nothing of what else it can do. So to Hulk Hogan, I give the Handsome Prince’s Award for The Most Positive Attitude I Have Ever Knowh. And to the 2,000 readers that get vicarious thrills by reading my column, I give tw.o things: the Handsome Prince’s Award for Best Fan Club; and my most sincere and royal gratitude. In other words, thank you ... from the Handsome Prince. Earth Day events you may get involved in by Michelle Myers Earth Day in the Portland area has become busier with each passing year as more ecologi- cally-conscience people are doing their part for Mother Earth. Here are some Earth Day events from the Portland area and around the state where you may get involved. Plant a tree and don ’ t forget to re cycle! Oregon State University is participating in Earth Week ’93 through April 24. Events in clude handing out condoms to combat global population in creases, a day of mourning for the damage already done to the planet and on Friday and a Music for the Earth Festival where six different bands can be heard. Oregon Fish and Wildlife and Friends and Neighbors of Sauvie Island will do an island clean up from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Satur day. Just meet at Sauvie Island School off Reeder Rd. and Charlton Rd. at 8:45 a.m. For more information call 621-3587. A forum on problems of global overpopulation will be held at Pioneer Courthouse Square on Saturday from 10 a.m. to-4 p.m. Call 591-0832 for more informa tion. Plant a tree for Mother Earth by heading down to Fort Stevens State Park where they have com bined efforts with the Oregon Department of Forestry to give away Douglas Fir and pine seed lings. They will be given away Saturday from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.at the Historic Area Museum Build ing and 2 to 4 p.m. at the Camp ground Information Booth. For more information call Oregon Parks and Recreation at 378-6378. Celebrate Earth Day with a walk in the forest at Tryon Creek State Park, 11321 S.W. Terwil liger Blvd, on Sunday. Visit educational stations along the trail and learn things such as animal tracks, rolling a log and the life cycle and Indian uses of a cedar tree. Also, plant a tree! Earth Share SM
