Worse Than You Think

Nguyen Tuong Van, an Australian drug dealer, is going to be hanged by the Singapore government for smuggling 396 grams (14 ounces) of pure heroin into the city in 2002. The sentence caused an uproar in Australia, where consumers, politicians and newspaper editorials criticized Singapore for being authoritarian and called for boycotts of companies including Singapore Telecommunications Ltd.'s Optus unit and Singapore Airlines Ltd. Appranently, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong doesn't give a shit. Lee even had the guts to tell off the German chancellor today at a news conference.

"The government has decided that the law has to take its course, and the law will take its course. We take a very serious view of drug trafficking; the penalty is death. In this case, it was an enormous amount of drugs.''

Nguyen didn't deny anything, but said that the drugs were not for sale in Singapore. He said he was carrying them to Australia for a Sydney syndicate to help his brother Khoa, a former heroin addict, pay A$30,000 (US$22,062) in debts.

Okay. There are the facts. Now the real question is how we can just allow this to happen. The death penalty for drug trafficking? Does drug trafficking really deserve death? Even when the drugs aren't even going to be dealt within Singapore? And remember that this isn't just death. This man is going to be hanged-- one of the more barbaric and painful forms of death. Depending on the method of course, when a person is hanged, the neck is broken and they are choked to death. It is considered to be very painful and death usually isn't instantaneous.

Isn't Singapore afraid of their status as a somewhat civilized society? I realize that many other places still use hanging as an execution method, including our very own Washington and New Hampshire, but in the cases of those two states, hanging is only used if the person being executed wishes to be hanged. Other countries also have this policy, but once again, it is rarely if ever used.

And perhaps only in the Middle East and Africa is the death penalty used for a matter as relatively petty as this. Sure, drug trafficking is a major offense, and shouldn't be tolerated, but killing the person is not the answer. And it is very possible that the man being killed is a drug user himself, and in the case of many drugs, the user becomes physically and psychologically dependent. If this is the case, it isn't possible for the drug user to quit himself. Instead of killing the man, they should confisticate the drugs and send him to Australia. Then Australia can put him in jail or therapy or whatever else they think is necessary for the man.

Of course, the sad thing is that nothing can be done about this at this point. Singapore is going to kill him tomorrow, even after requests from Australia and numerous organizations to do otherwise.

I suppose there is one thing we all can learn from this: If you're a drug trafficker, add Singapore of your list of countries not to go to.

This last Sunday, I was reading the comics page as I usually do. Several years ago, I started having the Sunday paper delivered to me. And with the Sunday paper, along with all of the ads, came the comics. And it became almost a tradition to read the comics every Sunday. Now I get the paper everyday, but I don't care much for the black-and-white ones that come every day. No, the color makes all the difference. Anyways, I was going down the page until I hit Ziggy, which hasn't ever been funny. It's one of those cartoons that makes you wonder why the hell they still have it in the comics page. It's always incredibly stupid, and it usually talks about something really unfunny regarding aliens in a spaceship. Well anyways, I didn't care much for it, and whenever I run into it, I always just dismiss it as just one of those unfunny comics intended to be cute for little kids. Well this Sunday, the topic was very uncute. When I read it, literally, the first thing that came to mind was whoaa.... and then holy shit...

so now our kids are supposed to learn about how "WE NEED TO GET RID OF THE GAYS!"?

I realize I stated the topic quite bluntly, but it deserves no less.

Are all of the stereotypes true? Is Kansas seriously a state full of hicks?







Being a resident of Kansas City, I've always marveled over how many Americans seriously think that Kansas is just a big field full of hickish farms. Sadly enough, it might be true. If you didn't know already, the debate over evolution and creationism is only getting worse. Six of the 10 board members have previously endorsed the theory of intelligent design, which says that the universe is so complex it must have been created by a higher force. Advocates of the theory say intelligent design gives students a more balanced view of evolution. President Bush has even weighed in on the issue, and rather unsuprisingly, he thinks that schools should present both concepts when teaching about the origins of life.

However, the fact is that this so-called "intelligent design" is often really just creationism -- a literal reading of the Bible's story of creation -- camouflaged in scientific language. Now its not like I don't believe in God or that I think the Bible is full of shit. I don't believe that AT ALL.

Although the state's new academic standards won't dictate what classroom teachers actually teach (that will be left to the local school boards), many educators worry that the state standards will encourage creationism advocates to pressure their local boards.

"At some point, teachers in some districts are going to say it's not worth the hassle," said Ken Bingman, who teaches biology at Blue Valley West High School in the Kansas City area.

Now just the prospect of the state board of education dictating what we should believe is horrendous (even if the dictatorship is indirect). I mean, wasn't the seperation of church and state the basis of our government? Are we just going to forget all of our morals and do what the ultra-conservative Republicans think we should do? I think not.

If religion is going to be taught anywhere, it should be taught at home or at places of worship. If a Catholic school teaches creationism, there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. Parents are sending their children to school with the knowledge that the teachings of Catholism will be taught to their children. When parents send their kids to a PUBLIC school, they ARE NOT expecting their children to be taught creationism, or for that matter, any religious beliefs. Now when I say that, I'm not talking about petty matters like the portion of the Pledge of Alleigance that says "under God." If it offends you that much to say God, just skip over the part. But actually teaching kids what the Bible says camoflauged in science shouldn't be allowed. It is up to the student, not the school, to decide what he or she believes.