Woody Cavenaugh

The event was sponsored by the College Republicans and headed up by their president Melissa Westmoreland. I love naming names. That way if you google yourself and I've spoken about you, you won't be able to say I was talking behind your back anymore.

First off I want to congratulate them for a very successful Moral's week. As best as I can tell no one died, and no one got arrested, not even the socialist. But I can't in good conciousness say something nice about a repugnican without slapping them soundly across the head and neck with the other shoe. I can't let something like the other shoe just drop. But, to be fair to myself and the campus republicans, my beef isn't with them. I've got bigger fish to fry.

Moral Values. This term has been used for everything. Just this morning on NPR a listener said that the reason there were poor people was a lack of moral values. Moral Values means exactly nothing. The term now means less than the term food and air.

So a dance major, a Hari Krishna, myself, and a nutritionist walk into a grocery store and we are asked by a reporter to define "Food". Each of us is going to be absolutely certain that the other is completely out of their minds. Or at the very least very misguided, because each of us defined what "Food" meant to us. However we wouldn't walk away thinking less of one another. Though all of us were correct on what "food" was to us, one of the opinions was more based on a universal fact than the others.

A biologist, a chemist, and a priest walk into a bar. Ouch. So they all need glasses, now ask them what the definition of "Air" is. Better yet, do this here in Greensboro, in Mexico City, in Nepal, in Toyko, and in Borris, Co. Carlow. You will get not only different definitions but even different by city. The chemist could run test in each of those cities and each give you different answers, and all would be correct.

Now take John Rouse (of UNCG's College Republicans), myself, a Rabi, and a Hindi priest and ask us what Moral Values is. Just like above you would get very different answers. For instance, the Carolinian this week quotes John Rouse as saying about the 10 Commandments display in the EUC. "We are one country, one people, one set of beliefs" and another out of context sound bite. "We're not forcing a religion. You can't have safety without people having common creeds and beliefs." He says "One Country, one people, one set of beliefs", I say bologna.

This "One Country, one people one set of beliefs" doesn't exist. There have been attempts to create this, the most successful attempts of which are called North Korea, Cuba, and until recently Iraq.

Food and Air are tangable things that have concrete meaning, and those meanings change from person to person, place to place, culture to culture. "Moral Values" is intangable, it lacks definition, for this reason it is a perfect warcry for politics, but not for real life.

Sure you can try to throw religion at this argument, but religion splintered into a thousand thousand righteous things on legs a long time ago over this nebulous term "Moral Values". Why else would there be so many different religions and flavors of religions. Don't quote the bible at me until you tell me which version you are quoting from (There are seven popular ones and countless less popular versions). I want to know first if your edition of the bible supported women, or supported divorce. It is because no two people share or could possibly share the exact same moral values. Anyone who tells you different is lying to themselves.

Anyone who tries to force their moral values on you are taking away your rights and should be stopped. How you stop them depends on how you personally define Moral Values.