The North Texas Daily (Denton, Tex.), Vol. 71, No. 34, Ed. 1 Wednesday, October 28, 1987 Page: 2 of 8
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The North 1 exas Daily
Commentary
Page 2
Wednesday, October 28, 1987
Editorials
Open your eyes folks:
breast cancer can kill
As unfortunate as it is, the recently diagnosed breast
cancer of first lady Nancy Reagan has prompted many
women to open their eyes and realize the dangers of
undetected breast cancer.
While many women around the world are well aware
of the dangers of breast cancer, why must it take this
kind of publicity to bring others’ attention to the second
leading cause of cancer deaths among women in the
United States?
Last week, the first lady was diagnosed as having
breast cancer. While the whole world was kept
informed, she had her left breast removed.
In the wake, hospitals and clinics around the United
States have received numerous calls from women
requesting breast X-rays and information regarding the
second leading cause of cancer deaths among women
in this country.
Breast cancer is very serious and deadly if not taken
care of. According to statistics compiled by the
American Cancer Society, an estimated 130,000 cases
of breast cancer are diagnosed each year. There is no
way to prevent the disease and no effective cure in
the later stages. But women have a better chance of
fighting the disease by detecting the cancer early,
removing all the cancerous cells before they have had
time to spread.
It seems reasonable to assume that at one time or
another the vast array of media campaigns have reached
just about everyone with information about breast
cancer. And like most human beings, women were
probably thinking it couldn't happen to them. Where
does this ignorance come from?
Well, breast cancer must be happening to somebody
or else there would not be an estimated 130,000 new
cases each year. Wouldn't it be better to have a
mammogram (breast X-ray) performed just to be sure?
The painless 20 minute test costs from $70 to $100,
and can detect lumps that are too small to feel during
self-examination. Annually, these tests save countless
numbers of women and their families a lot ot future
trauma and heartache.
Many people in the United Slates are known for
putting off until tomorrow what could be done today.
They have the mentality that it will happen to someone
else, not me. This attitude must be put to rest. Diseases
and conditions of all kinds end the lives of thousands
of people each day. Conditions like heart disease,
high blood pressure and breast cancer can be treated
successfully if detected early.
Ours is a materialistic society. So much emphasis
is placed on the type of car you own, the style of
clothes you wear and whether or not you have a
swimming pool in the back of the yard. It seems as
if no emphasis or importance is placed on health and
being physically fit. If the emphasis is there, it is not
taken seriously, at least not until it is too late.
Whoever decided to publicize Nancy Reagan’s
mastectomy did a wonderful thing for the women of
this country. Maybe now, after viewing her ordeal,
they have finally realized that breast cancer does not
discriminate against any certain type of woman. It
can and does strike all.
Girl's victory snaps
equal rights into sport
Equality has scored a victory. It may be a minor
victory, but it is a victory nonetheless. And when it
comes to the issue of equality between men and
women—or girls and boys—it is traditionally a hard
fought victory.
Kristen Snell, a 13-year-old girl who lives in Plano,
recently won the right to play football on her middle
school’s eighth-grade football squad.
Snell, who is now a seventh-grader at R.C. Carpenter
Middle School, was among the 46 players who
attended football practice last week, which makes her
the first girl in Plano history to play football on what
was previously on all-boy team.
Snell received the school board’s approval to play
football for the Carpenter Cowboys after attorneys
warned the board that Snell could successfully challenge
the board's initial decision, which was not to allow
Snell to play.
At the beginning of the 1987-88 school year, the
“self-proclaimed tomboy” approached Leroy Mont-
ogomery, the Cowboys’ head coach, and the middle
school’s principal about playing football for the all-male
team. Both the principal and Montgomery, as well
as Superintendent H. Wayne Hendrick, denied Snell’s
request to join the team.
Although high school girls are not allowed to
participate in contact sports, middle school girls were
previously given the right to play football on teams
that were formerly made up of all-male members by
an amendment to Texas’ Interscholastic League con-
stitution. Still, few girls have gone out for the sport.
And while the school board may have overturned
its original decision, it did not do so without mis-
givings.
“I think it was a mistake for her (Snell) to go out
for football because of the possibile injuries,” said
school board member Jack Buteyn, “but I thought
her attitude was positive and that’s why 1 voted in
favor of it. It’s her right to play based on the pre-
cedents ...”
The board’s approval may have enabled Snell to
be among the 46 players who attended football practice
last week, but the bureaucratic and time-consuming
maneuverings it took to get Snell on the field have
caused her to miss participating in most of the team’s
football games; there are only two games left in the
Cowboys’ season.
Still, Snell, who said she hopes to play either running
back or defensive end, will be eligible to try out for
the school’s eighth-grade football team next year.
“It’s been a challenge just to play the last game
this year,” she said. “I will definitely come out
for football next year. I think girls should do whatever
they want, and I am.”
The fact that the school board allowed Snell to
compete for a slot on the formerly all-male team is
admirable, yet it should not have taken the school
board so long to approve Snell’s participation on the
team, especially since the state's Interscholastic League
has an amendment that approves play for middle school
girls.
Nonetheless, Snell’s perseverance and determination
have helped—if only on a small scale—pave the way
of equality among the sexes.
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Pari-mutuel odds against the poor
By Jim Fredricks
Guest Columnist
Texans will have an opportunity
Tuesday to make a decision on allow-
ing pari-mutuel betting in the state.
But that’s not all we will decide. The
decision on whether or not to take
advantage of the state’s poor while
at the same time supporting a dying
industry will also be made.
To many, the issue seems to be
one of prudishness as opposed to
practicality. The strongest and most
vocal opposition seems to have come
from Southern Baptists, whom many
see as being merely concerned with
ruining other people’s fun. As for the
pragmatists, they say the economic
benefits that will pile up as a result
of allowing pari-mutuel betting will
go far in helping Texas out of the
economic slump it’s been exper-
iencing.
The pari-mutuel question, however,
encompasses much more than mere
prudishness and pragmatism. Those
who oppose pari-mutuel betting are
fighting in part to prevent the install-
ment of a system that will most cer-
tainly abuse the poor of Texas.
THE ECONOMIC TERM used to
describe such an effect is regressive
taxation. In short, most forms of
gambling, pari-mutuel betting in-
cluded, act as a regressive, instead
of progressive, form of taxation.
Some of the evidence in support
of this argument comes from
“Gambling in America,” the final
report of a three-year study by the
Commission on the Review of the
National Policy tov.ard Gambling.
Pari-mutuel betting is regressive
taxation because the poor end up
spending a higher percentage of their
income on it than do those people of
modest or affluent means. The impli-
cations are obvious: Do we want to
encourage an industry that will take
advantage of the poor—those who
don’t have the money to gamble away
to begin with?
This also raises the question of the
propriety of a state profiting from its
citizens' losses. Is it really proper for
a state to make money off of a
person’s misfortune?
Aside from the question of its effect
on the poor, we must ask whether
we want to support a dying industry.
Why bring back an industry in the
hopes of raising some revenue when
in all likelihood it will become a drain
on the state?
IN STATES SUCH as Illinois and
Massachusetts lobbyists are pleading
those states’ legislatures to lower
gambling taxes because the tracks in
those states are failing.
According to information produced
by Texans Who Care, a lobby against
horseracing, the racetrack industry is
already in decline:
“The average daily attendance at
racetracks is declining. Fifty percent
of horse breeders lose money; 90
percent of horse owners lose money.
Last year, the newly-built Canterbury'
Downs in Minnesota projected by the
horse racing industry in 1985 to earn
$10 million for the state - lost $7.9
million”
According to figures produced and
compiled by Comptroller Bob Bullock
in conjuction with the Legislative
Budget Board, the projected income
for Texas from pari-mutuel wagering
on dog and horse racing would be
about $22 million for 1988, rising to
about $110 million by 1991. This
works out to less than 1 percent of
the state’s budget per year. And this
is a money-making proposition?
IF GAMBLING WERE already
a pervasive practice in Texas, then it
might make a little bit of sense to
regulate it and attempt to produce
some revenue from it. Gambling is
not an ever-present reality in Texas,
though, so why create and encourage
a practice that won’t be of much
benefit anyway? What it really
amounts to is a spineless attempt by
state legislators to help solve the state’s
budget problems. If we need more
revenues, let’s find another way.
Texas does not need pari-mutuel
betting. What we do need are better
ideas and more creative solutions from
our legislators, and a no vote on the
referendum will make this clear to
them.
Death of a family member spurs insights for an ultimate arrangement
Many people don't want to think about it, much
less plan for it.
But if you think about it, then it makes sense
to plan for it.
Death.
When you’re young, it seems time is on your
side and death is something far away in the
future—no need to worry about it.
A couple of weeks ago my grandmother died
in Commerce. Last week a foreign student died
in Denton. Every day people die all over the world.
I hadn’t considered my death until my grand-
mother died.
Fortunately, she had jotted down her burial
wishes and left them in her Bible. Otherwise, no
one would have known exactly what she wanted.
We knew she wanted to be buried next to my
grandfather. That was about it.
She left a poem to be read and the titles of a
couple of hymns to be sung.
Fifteen miles north of Greenville, near Com-
merce, she and my grandfather raised three children
and lots of cotton on several acres of blackland
in South Sulphur. She sewed for a clothing manu-
facturing company to add money to the household
budget.
SHE SEWED THE clothes for her family out
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Wilbanks
of flour sacks during the depression and most of
the years that followed ’til the children married
and moved away.
Last year her children gave her the money to
get a store-bought dress she saw in a window.
“How pretty it was,” she said. The dress cost
$100 more than she would ever pay to purchase
“just a dress."
The dress was lavender, her favorite color, and
had applique flowers on it. She held fast to the
notion of not spending that much money on a
dress because extravagance was something she
seldom saw.
“Scott’s above, I don't see how anyone could
spend that much for clothes. Why I could buy
enough material to make 10 dresses for that,"
she would say. Don’t ask what "Scott’s above"
refers to. I never knew; she always said it.
She finally gave in and bought the dress. She
wore it to church and on other special occasions.
When she had it on, she was like a child after
Christmas showing her most prized "toy” to
her friends.
That’s the dress she said she wanted to be buried
in. Her accessories were to be the diamond car-
screws, which were a Christmas gift.
Those things were easy to arrange.
I’ve never priced caskets or other burial arrange-
ments. It was definitely an eye-opener when 1
found out how much these cost and how much
was involved.
We chose a pale mauve casket with a band of
lavender and pink flowers around it. It was a
moderately priced piece of artwork at about $2,600.
THEN WE BOUGHT the cement block which
goes over it to protect the remains and keep the
casket in place. There is the cost of the chapel
service, spray of flowers for the casket, embalming
services, hairdresser and cosmetologist, restroom
facitilities (yes, if you wanted the opportunity to
use the restroom during the services, the cost in
this case was $150) and limousine service.
Someone has to dig the hole too. That was
about $100.
Planning a funeral isn’t something the average
person docs every day (except funeral directors.
but that’s their business).
We didn’t have to purchase a plot or tombstone.
That had already been taken care of 10 years ago
when my grandfather died.
As the funeral director asked the questions about
which of this and that we wanted, every "yes"
was answered with the chime of his calculator.
The total came to $5,200.
I don’t mean to sound disrespectful, nor morbid
about these matters, but at some point in life most
of us have to face these decisions.
Amid the grief and mourning, a family can incur
a hefty expense.
A simple or moderate burial can run into the
thousands. There are restrictions on burying
someone. In many counties you can’t legally just
bury a loved-one under the oak tree in the back-
yard.
My grandmother set aside a few certificates of
deposit to pay for the funeral the way she wanted
it.
Other than the expenses, I noticed that many
of her friends stopped by to pay their respects.
Most were about the same age as she.
I WAS AMAZED at the social grace of those
who were her age.
1 expected everyone to be gloomy and make
me dread being around However, that wasn't the
case. Many of them actually made me feel better.
One man who had grown up with my grand-
mother said, “Lola Belle was a wonderful woman
In fact, I had been sweet on her in school, but
after she met your grandfather, 1 didn’t have a
chance."
Another woman said: “1 remember when she
and I sneaked off and went to a dance. If our
parents had ever found out, we would probably
still be locked in our rooms.”
Dancing was strictly forbidden in that era of
our Southern Baptist family. 1 was the first gen-
eration allowed to go to high school dances.
Through all of this I learned how real my
grandmother was. In her youth, she was probably
very much like me . . . maybe not, but at least I
caught those remarks which made me aware of
how alive she was and how she had worked to
make life for me a lot easier.
After the ordeal I began to wonder how prepared
I was for my parents’ deaths, my husband's and
my own.
Later, I discussed funeral arrangments with them
1 want to be cremated.
It’s simple, no one has to worry about what I
will wear, and it costs about $900. A simple little
service at my home might be nice.
The North Texas Daily
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Comments
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stories or features should be directed to the editor at 565-2353
71st Year
North Texas State University Denton. Texas
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Southwestern Journalism Congress
LAURA DOWLEAHN, editor
RICHARD AIKEN, advertising manager
Letters should be mailed to Box 5278, NT Station, Denton, Texas 76203,
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Dowlearn, Laura. The North Texas Daily (Denton, Tex.), Vol. 71, No. 34, Ed. 1 Wednesday, October 28, 1987, newspaper, October 28, 1987; Denton, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth561394/m1/2/: accessed July 17, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting UNT Libraries Special Collections.