Newspapers / The Brunswick Beacon (Shallotte, … / Dec. 27, 1990, edition 1 / Page 4
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Opinion Page THE BRUNSWICK j^BEACON Edward M. Sweatt and Carulyn H. Sweatt Publishers Edward M. Sweatt Ekiitor Snsan Usher Neivs Editor Doug Kntter and Terry Pope Staff Writers Johnny Craig Sports Ekiltor Peggy Eanvood Office Manager Carolyn H. Swcatt Advertising Director Timberley Adams (Sc Cecelia Core Advertising Repn'sentaint's Tammte Galloway & Dorothy Brrnnan Tijpesetters William Manning Pressman Brcnda Cleinmons Photo Technician Lonnle Sprinkle Assistant Prvssntan Phoebe Clemnions and Franccs Sweatt Circulation PAGE 4 A THURSDAV DECEMBER 27, 1990 There Are Ways To Make Our Roads A Lot Safer Along w ith the growth and prosperity comes tragedy. Before the Christmas holiday period. Brunswick County had already surpas>ed it^ 19X9 total in highway deaths for the year. Fifteen people have died as a result of traffic accidents on the county's highways this year while 14 were killed last year. There is more had news. During the holiday season, the number of accidents usually increases as a result of heavier traffic. Families travel to be together or folks are out driving while on vacation. Some plan to spend time at our beautiful beaches but never make it. Unfortunately, there may be more deaths before the calender year ends. There is something we can do to help make our highways safer that isn't being done. As the number of Brunswick County residents continues to grow, from 35.000 in 1980 to an estimated 55,000 in 1W0. the number of highway deaths will also increase. As more cars travel the roads, more accidents will occur. The revelation in Brunswick County District Court recent ly that a man could be stopped 16 times for driving without a license and still be free to roam the county's highways was shocking. He was given a three-year active prison term by Judge William C. Gore Jr. for driving without a license and for speeding 74 mph in a 55 mph zone. The courts need to follow that example and work harder to clear our highways of irresponsible drivers who increase the dancer for others. Stiffer penalties need to be imposed so those whose driving privileges are taken away because of driving while impaired convictions and other abuses of the N.C. Department of Motor Vehicle's regulations will think twice before getting behind the wheel of a car. Some traffic cases make a mockery out of the judicial system. Tougher fines and jail terms may be the only deterrent to keep such criminals out of the driver's seat, to keep them from killing innocent drivers or themselves. How many months of a three-year prison term is someone likely to serve when our prisons and jails are already overflowing with criminals? This holiday season. 15 people will not be sharing time with their families because they had the misfortune of meeting their death in traffic accidents in Bninswick County. Accidents will continue to happen and the death rate is likely to rise as does the county's population. But knowing that the courts are treating the criminals like criminals will ease a lot of minds. Get-Tough Stand On Green Boxes Overdue Brunswick County Commissioners' gel-tough stand on trash disposal sites comes none too soon. In fact, it's overdue. At their Dec. 17 meeting commissioners gave the landfill department 30 days to clean up its public trash disposal sites. That includes green box sites and the county's three conve nience stations. Commissioners and Interim County Manager David Clegg are going to inspect the sites in one month's time. No one said last Monday what would happen if the sites don't pass muster. It's true, as the county landfill director pointed out. that the public doesn't do its part Dumpers use green boxes to dispose of items, such as furniture, appliances, land-clearing and con struction debris, that should go only to the landfill. And van dals do cause a lot of wear and tear, setting fire to boxes, tear ing down signs and the like. But if the sites were better maintained in the first place, chances are the public would take better care of them as well. At most sites it would help if the boxes were emptied more frequently or if more boxes were available. By Monday morn ing most boxes are overflowing, sometimes surrounded by as much debris on the ground as is inside the boxes. Only a cursory inspection is necessary at most sites to de termine that past "clean up" efforts have been mainly just to ken gestures, picking up the most obvious loose debris and leaving the rest to decay?or rust. Check out dumpster sites in surrounding counties?or even as far away as Watauga County?and the view overall is much better. Some of the larger convenience stations have paved access areas or are surrounded with solid, painted fences to keep loose trash from blowing away. Most are tidy, even at the end of a weekend. There's no reason Brunswick County can't do as well. To do any less is to say that Brunswick County people just don't care?that our property owners are trashier than those in other places, that our county employees are lazier or less capa ble those in other places, that our landfill department isn't ade quately equipped, staff or funded. People tend to live up to others' expectations of them, '["hat goes for county employees and the public at large. The higher the county's standards of performance and ex pectations, the more likely we are to have tidy dump sites. It's about time someone put their foot down. It's up to the county commissioners now to see that their mandate is carried out, one way or another. What To Do When You Need Another Word The things a journalist will do. Like make up new words or hang on to ones he or she should dump in the garbage for good. "The reporter ncccssanly writes under pressure and hits not long to search for the right word. In the heat of the moment, he is as likely as not to strike off a new expression or wrench the language to fit his idea." So says a textbook used in a "History of the English Language" class 1 took this semester at UNC W'ilmington. In us discussion of the influence of journalism on the Fnglish language in the 19th and 20th centuries, it crvdits news re porters for being sleazy and mali cious abusers of the language. I took issue with the writers Albert Baugh and Thomas Cable, professors at the universities of Pennsylvania and Texas, respective ly, for blaming it on the press. They also seem to forget that not all re porters arc male. But 1 had to back down from my defensive posture re cently when I was caught abusing our language. Please don't tell any one. "In his effort to be interesting and racy he adopts an informal and col loquial style, and many of the collo quialisms currcnt in popular speech find their way into writing first in Terry Pope (T.^ i the magazine anil the newspaper.** Journalists have created the fol lowing terms that, the professors claim, arc abuses of our English language: to "hack" a team; to "h?x)st" our community; to "comb" the wixxfs for a criminal; to "hop" the Atlantic, to "oust" a politician; to "spike" a rumor; to "probe" into a department; to act as a "go-be tween"; a political "slate;" and to head the "cleanup" effort. My reading of this chapter last week almost coincided with a mini lecture I got from our news editor about the crime reports 1 write each week for the paper. Looking through the shcrilf's department's reports each week, there are always some breaking and entcrings and larcenies and it seemed okay to use the phrase, thieves "hit" someone's house while they were away. Trying to pass that one through was like trying to block one of Michael Jordan's shots. No way. The radar honed in on the "hit" part and I nx)k some ribbing about the need to select a better word. After all. docs a burglar actually hit the house, with his fists, a tire iron, a baseball bat? Okay, so I used "thieves hit," a lazy choice of words, I admit it. When you really stop to think about it. the reader deserves a better de scription. Okay, so I used "thieves hit" once in a story. "Three times," she replied. I'd been had. Caught red-handed. Pleaded no contest. I really was sur prised that in the usual rush to meet a deadline 1 wasn't even aware of that kind of usage. Abuser of the Knglish language, 30 days proba tion. Baugh and Cable continue their word game by picking on sports writers who are "often hard pressed to avoid monotony in his description of similar contests day after day, and in his desire to he picturesque he sel dom feels any scruple about intro ducing the latest slang in his particu lar held of interest." Some examples they feel should Ik avoided: "neck and neck" and "out of the running", as in horscrac ing; "caught napping" and "off base" as in baseball; "sidestep," "down and out" and "straight from the shoulder" as in boxing. There are some that they don't list that drive me crazy, such as "linkstcrs" for golfers, 1 think; "gridiron" for football field; "pigskin" for a foot ball; "spikcrs" for volleyball players and so on. If the professors could have stopped there, too, 1 think their point would have been well made. But they continued. Did you know that "one of our popular news weeklies makes the use of verbal novelties a feature of its style, rou tinely identifying people through capitalized epithets. Such as: Swedish Film Maker so and so; Candy Tycoon so and so; Pundit so and so. They also criticize the media's way of stringing togeth er hyphenated words as dcscrip tives, such as "show-biz-struck." But everybody knows that those popular news weeklies arc garbage, not journalism. I'd like to spike the rumor once and for all to help boost our image here at the show-biz-struck Bruns wick Beacon, wc shoot straight from the shoulder in our news re porting. Nobody's going to catch us napping or abusing the language around here. ">V\R?6<JR o >M<?o cZARot//VA S LETTER TO THE EDITOR Bridge And Sidewalk Are Needed At Sunset Beach To the editor: But I feel it is about lime other I wrote a letter to the North people who live right here by the Carolina Department of Transporta- bridge be heard. We all could not tion in March of 1990 giving my make their meetings to be heard and views of the bridge replacement, if they would all just write in letting Since that time members of the their feelings be known, we just Sunset Beach Taxpayers Associa- might get a new bridge. tion have been riding around with They want to save that bridge, bumper stickers on their cars to Well, do it, but open it on the side, save their bridge. Then they can come look at it. Most of these people do not even 1 live across the street from the live near this bridge; how can they Intracoastal Waterway a mile down have so much to say in this matter? the road from the bridge. The bridge People who live near this bridge or opens on the hour (during the sea on Sunset Beach sec what goes on son) to let boats pass. We have day in and day out. I think most of boats backed up past my house cir them are afraid to speak out; afraid cling, wasting all that gas until the just in case the bridge is replaced bridge opens for them to pass. with a high rise and it turns out bad. We had a big sailboat capsize they might hear, "1 told you. Now from doing this. That poor fellow's we have to live with it." boat had to slay on it's side until the lidc camc in the next morning to the baby bccausc the bridge was go bring it right side up again. We have ing to be stuck for two hours more had barges hit the bridge and put it while they repaired it. out of order for days. The residents Other times the tide was extra who live on the island all year long high and there was nothing to be had to be transported back and forth done until the tide went out so the by row boats, including the school bridge would meet for the cars to children. drive over it. Meantime cars are We had a man years ago die on backed up for miles with screaming the other side of the bridge bccausc babies that arc hungry but these cars it was stuck and they couldn't get to cannot turn around. The people in him. side arc frustrated, some trying to My daughter and son-in-law went get to a tee-off at the golf course, to the bcach while I baby sat. When others trying to get to work or home they were late coming home, 1 was from work. frantic thinking something hap- If those in favor of saving this pened to them, but finally got a call bridge would live here and see all from them. They were in bumper to this and think of others instead of bumper traffic stuck on the other themselves and that cute little side of the bridge and walked back bridge, we could get on with U) the pier to call us to say to feed (see BRIDGE, Following Page) Warning: Guns And Children Just Don't Mix Guns and kids don'i mix. That was the message that came through loud and clear in two type-written pages of information on gun safety that recently found their way onto my desk. The separate sheets of paper came compliments of two Bruns wick County residents and faithful Beacon readers?Shallotte Police Chief Rodney Gause and Holden Beach resident Crawford Hart. They've probably never met one another. But they share a genuine concern about gun safely and chil dren, and they thought I might be interested. The fact of the matter is, 1 wasn't really interested at first. 1 don't have any children, nor do I own any guns. But the more I read, the more in terested I bccame. I'd like to share some of the information with you, because I know some of you do have kids and guns. Maybe the words on this page will help some one. Maybe they will help save a child's life. First of all, the police statistics Doug '? H Rutter tell ihc story. Gunshot wounds to children under the age of 16 have increased by 3CK) percent in urban areas over the last four years. Certainly, Brunswick County is not an urban area. But I'd be willing to bet we've got just as many guns per household here as there arc in New York City or Chicago or Atlanta. If gunshot wounds don't worry you, how about deaths? Gun acci dents were the fifth-leading cause of accidental death in America two years ago. Do you think the number of accidental gun related deaths has gone down since I98X? I seriously doubt it. Chief Gause tells me an Am erican is accidentally killed with a gun every day. Hundreds more are wounded every year. It's clear that more children are handling, carry ing and shooting guns today than ever before. So what can be done about it? Certainly, you can't single-handedly change the world. But you can make a difference in your own home. And if you think about it, that's not a bad place to start. Gun safety is largely a matter of education, and children are never Uk) young to learn. Parents can pro mote gun safety just by selling a g(K?d example for their kids. If kids see their parents treating guns with care and rcspcct, they are likely to do the same thing. Children arc natural explorers. Like it or not, many kids will devel op a healthy curiosity about the use and operation of guns. As pari of gun safely education, parents should emphasize to their children that guns are not toys. But merely telling children that guns aren't toys isn't enough. Kids tend to have an unrealistic idea of what guns are all about. Their knowledge of guns is based on ex periences with toy guns or what they see in cartoons on television. In other words, they don't know what they're messing with. The quickest and surest way to show youngsters the power of firearms is to take them to a firing range. A child who hears the sound of a gun firing and witnesses what damage that gun can do will learn a lesson. It's a serious mistake to assume that keeping children in the dark will prevent accidents. Nothing could be further from the truth. Keeping youngsters in the dark only ensures that they will not under stand the potential danger of guns. And it increases the likelihood that they will satisfy their natural curios ity without proper supervision. If you own guns and have chil dren, take the time to teach your kids about safety. Instead of hiding guns from your kids, teach diem to respect the power of guns. You'll both be better off.
The Brunswick Beacon (Shallotte, N.C.)
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Dec. 27, 1990, edition 1
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