The Daily Gamecock

Brooke McAbee

Criticizing government is not anti-American

By Brooke McAbee | April 4, 2011

Complaints lead to progress Americans have recently adopted a rigid, often unconscious concept of patriotism. To be a true American is to be a patriot. And to be a patriot is to be uncritical of American policies, democracy and capitalism. This strict patriotism takes an extreme stance on any criticism of fundamental American concepts or policies. To consider the weaknesses in democracy, to discuss the fundamental flaws of capitalism or acknowledge its how it can be abused, to identify American actions as negative or destructive in the affairs of other countries — all, in our current discourse, are construed as anti-American.

If you hit a car, please leave a note

By Brooke McAbee | March 30, 2011

Responsibility vital to society In the face of more daunting questions of morality, whether to leave a note when you hit someone else’s car in the parking lot may seem a negligible decision. But the avoidance of such a small responsibility has larger implications.

Social media give voices to oppressed

By Brooke McAbee | March 21, 2011

Facebook, Twitter fuel fire for war As the Internet grows exponentially in users and content, so grows the desire to pin it down to a purpose. Because of possible anonymity, the Internet gives voice to the otherwise-silent. The Internet is a gathering place of extreme inanity and surprising profundity, and to give it a single purpose or single explanation is nearly impossible. Nevertheless, recent speculations on the Internet have focused on its centrality to popular uprisings, first noticeably in Tunisia, then Egypt and now in Libya. Rebellions in the first two countries relied on social networking for the garnering of support and communications, and the Libyan rebels are quickly following suit. Such rebellions are pioneers, and signal a movement away from traditional methods and arenas of discourse.

Defense of Marriage Act has no legal basis

By Brooke McAbee | March 14, 2011

Restricted homosexual rights clearly government's discrimination Due to recent actions of the Obama administration and House Speaker Boehner, the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) has returned to the public consciousness. Although the law aspires to uphold the institution of marriage, it unconstitutionally upholds prejudices against homosexual relationships, which have no defensible legal basis.

Flag no longer represents South

By Brooke McAbee | Feb. 21, 2011

State symbol tainted over time, some Confederate ideals better left in past Over a week ago, The Daily Gamecock published a guest column defending the Confederate flag at the South Carolina statehouse building. This controversy has sparked a long-standing, contentious debate over the Confederate flag's status as a symbol of the South. The enduring status of the Confederate flag as a symbol of the South is not untenable. The political boundary of the Confederacy matches, in many regards, what many Americans would identify as the South, and, since its formation and demise, many Southerners have imbued the Confederate flag with the positive traits of the South. For them, the flag represents the South as a place of tradition and community. A place of proud, friendly people who honor history and each other while respecting independent initiative and achievement. The flag's lifetime of more than 150 years has only more deeply ingrained these associated meanings while the distance in time from the Confederacy likewise distances the flag's meaning from rebellion.

Definition of rape shouldn’t be up for debate

By Brooke McAbee | Feb. 6, 2011

Assigning degrees of significance to sexual crime insults victims In the course of the ongoing debate over the federal government's support of abortion, Congress has come to a generally acceptable compromise: only offering funding for abortions in cases of incest, rape and danger to the mother's health. This compromise recognizes that there are reasons for ending a pregnancy that have less to do with personal whim and that morally-debased methods of impregnation should not be prolonged through an involuntary pregnancy and parenthood. A new bill in Congress, however, would specify the definition of rape to exclude support for victims of rapes that are not "forcible," including statutory rape, rape in which the woman was drugged or given excessive amounts of alcohol, rape of women with limited mental capacity and many forms of date rape.

Education should take top priority in college

By Brooke McAbee | Jan. 18, 2011

There are many defenses for the importance of active engagement in the classroom as students. In Western culture, for instance, there is a noble idea that education not only expands an individual’s knowledge but also improves character. Many arguments connect a university education with these noble aspirations. This argument is not one of them.  

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