OPINION: Are we really protected? WEDNESDAY
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January 19, 2011 | Volume 206 | Number 82 | 40 cents | An independent student newspaper serving Iowa State since 1890. ™
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Allocation of funds to be voted on By Whitney.Sager iowastatedaily.com
Veronica Olson, senior in philosophy, plans on joining the marines after she graduates from Iowa State next winter. Photo: David Derong/Iowa State Daily
Feeling liberated Lesbian student comes out due to legislation repeal By John.Lonsdale iowastatedaily.com Veronica Olson is risking everything this morning. With the repeal of the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy Dec. 18, 2010, Olson, senior in philosophy, is finally able to come out as a lesbian without the fear of being refused entrance into the service after she graduates next semester — almost. Although the policy has passed legislation, there is still a chance it will be reinstated, which means all of Olson’s hard work in the Naval Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (NROTC), her childhood dreams of being in the military and her future career are over. Olson is petite and shy. She wears a deepgreen, button-down shirt, accenting the barelythere green tips in her hair; her smile and laugh break up her guarded front once she begins to speak about her life and her lackluster running time during her ROTC days. That is, until she starts to talk about DADT. “I’m scared a little bit,” Olson said. “There’s a chance the repeal will be taken back. That’s a concern with me talking and letting you use my name and picture. It’s a small chance, but the risk of losing the career I want because I speak out for something I’m passionate about ... if I got to become an officer, and I didn’t do this, I’d be more ashamed. I don’t want to be that kind of officer.” Olson aspires to become an officer in the Marines. When her elementary classmates wanted to be firemen and ballerinas, she wanted to be a U.S. Marine — a lifelong goal that controls every aspect of her life.
DADT was implemented when Olson was 4 years old. Her sexual orientation wasn’t something she thought about back then, but it was something that Olson said phased in around first or second grade and continued on through her high school years. When her sexuality started to develop, she knew that if she wanted to serve in the military she could not have romantic relationships. She has only dated one woman briefly last year, and DADT was a large reason for the split. “I didn’t want to date someone and try to have to hide it,” Olson said. “I couldn’t ask someone to be in the closet for me, especially if they were out in the first place.” Perhaps the biggest strain from DADT was while Olson was in ROTC. She constantly received friendly questions about dating and weekend plans, which would be covered up or avoided for protection. “Every week, every day, you have to try to avoid or decide between lying and not answering [the questions] or risk losing your career,” Olson said. Having to hide who you are is incredibly stressful and has a negative impact on the individuals who must do it even if it doesn’t have any impact on their peers, Olson said. Some who support DADT have been vocal about their concerns of not having “homo shoved in their faces,” Olson said. Coming out The end of 2010 was anything but ordinary for Olson. She officially came out to her parents and younger sister at a restaurant in mid-October. “I know that my family was accepting,” Olson said. “That’s who they are. I knew I was safe with them.” As soon as she told her parents, they went
back to asking her sister how her calculus class was going and left Olson with a racing heart, but all was well. In November, Olson came out to the most important person in her extended family — her grandmother. Olson’s eyes swelled with tears as she recalled the day she had to tell the woman she had always looked up to about the secret she had kept for so long. “I’m going to try not to cry ... she [her grandmother] just said, ‘I’ll love you no matter who you are. Love is love. I love you,’” Olson said. Olson didn’t come out to anyone else in her family because DADT was still in place at the time. The most important people in her life knew and she didn’t want her extended family, including a cousin in the military, to have to choose between reporting her to the military or keeping her secret. The reality of DADT All NATO members allow homosexuals to openly serve except for the United States and Turkey, according to the Christian Science Monitor. More than 13,000 American military men and women have been discharged since the 1994 policy implementation, not counting those who left on free will. The Williams Institute at UCLA School of Law reported that DADT has cost more than $1 billion. Research studies performed at the Palm Center at the University of California, Santa Barbara, found that “allowing homosexuals to serve contributes to improving the command climate in foreign militaries, decreasing harassment, retaining critical personnel and enhancing respect for privacy.” Brad Freihoefer, coordinator for Lesbian,
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Investigation
Attack victim shares account By Kaitlin.York iowastatedaily.com “Get the hell away, just run.” Those were the first thoughts that came to mind of a female ISU student who was attacked on Friday in Campustown. “I didn’t recognize them at all, but I definitely would if I saw them again,” said the student who wishes to remain anonymous due to fear or possible threats of being attacked again. Some images still remain a blur, but she said there were at least four men, dressed in black, that followed her into the apartment complex. “I didn’t think anything of it, I thought that they probably lived here too,” she said. With the start of the new semester, the student’s plan for the night was to go out on a Thursday night, have a couple drinks, have some fun, then go home and get a good night’s rest for class the following afternoon.
“One of the men followed me into the elevator,” she said, “and that’s when he grabbed my head and slammed it into the wall of the elevator.” Fear and panic ran through her mind while she kicked and scratched. The elevator doors opened as they reached her destination at the third level. After kicking and clawing at the attacker’s face, she was able to crawl out of the elevator and run away from him. “I still am wondering why this happened to me. I don’t get why someone would do that,” the student said. “I banged on everyone’s door in the hallway when finally the girls next door to me answered.” Her neighbors wiped the blood flowing down her face and called for an ambulance. A note was left for her roommate explaining there had been an incident and she was being taken to Mary Greeley Medical Center.
The hardest part for her is dealing with the “why’s” and “what if’s” of the situation. “The scariest part is I wasn’t even outside walking home at the time, I was in my complex,” she said. “What if I had just been going down to get the mail?” She wasn’t walking across Ames nor did she have to cross a main road. With less than a block to walk from Paddy’s, 124 Welch Ave., to her residence at Welch Crown Center, 217 Welch Ave., being attacked was the least of her worries. “It happened so fast. It was one second I was in my complex and the next I was on the floor bleeding,” she said. She recalls blacking out momentarily. “Everyone you see you’re not going to look at them and think, ‘Are you going to hit me?’” she said. “It’s one of those things where I can’t help but think, ‘What if I wasn’t walking home by myself?’” Her friends continue to sympa-
thize and apologize for not walking home with her, but being assaulted wasn’t anyone’s expectation that night. “It was completely unexpected and you don’t ever think that it will happen to you,” she said. It remains unknown as to whether the attacker wanted to rape her, take her purse or just hurt her. These questions may never be answered. “If he was any bigger than what he was, I may not have been able to fight against him,” she said. “I’m lucky he was small enough for me to get away.” Walking away from this incident leaves the student with wounds on her head and a new can of Mace Pepper Spray. “I just want people to know that this kind of stuff does happen. It’s scary. People think because we’re in a small town that it won’t happen to them,” she said. “None of my girl friends walk home alone anymore; we’ve realized that it’s too risky.”
The Government of the Student Body will vote on allocating funds to several organizations and host guest speaker President Gregory Geoffroy at its meeting Wednesday. At its meeting last week, GSB members asked questions of intent regarding the requests for funding. Halley Stille, speaker of the senate and senior in French, said this discussion was the first of a two-part process GSB Geoffroy follows for allocating funds. “We ask questions about bills one week, then discuss and vote the next,” Stille said. Organizations that have requested GSB funding include: • “Conference Funding for MBLGTACC” — $5,000 to attend the 2011 Midwest Bisexual Lesbian Gay Transgender Ally College Conference • “Safety Equipment for the Horseman’s
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Faculty
Senate elects president Tuesday By Jacob.Stewart iowastatedaily.com The ISU faculty senate elected a new president, Ann Marie Vanderzanden, Tuesday night. She was elected after the first vote ended in a tie between Robert Wallace, associate professor of ecology, evolution and organismal biology, and Vanderzanden, associate director for the department of horticulture. Vanderzanden recently completed her second term on the senate and as the council chairwoman for the department of horticulture. She was excited to work with the senate and is confident in her ability to be president. She also plans to address faculty morale concerns. The most heated issue of the night was the ratification of the unacceptable performance of duties policy. The policy, which has been undergoing revision and review for the past four months, was brought before the senate for a vote, but several faculty members had prob-
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Taxpayers First Act
University to lose in budget cuts By Paige.Godden iowastatedaily.com The Iowa House held an open forum Tuesday night in order to address HD45, the Taxpayers First Act, which has a list of several budget cuts, including a $3.7 million reduction for Iowa State for fiscal year 2011. “Most of the time political leaders don’t leave anything in place long enough to see if it works ... [we] worked tirelessly to develop a curriculum core ... after having spent millions in research and development you want to throw the baby out of the bathwater,” said a third-grade teacher from Western Hills Elementary School in West Des Moines. A representative from the Coalition for a Better Iowa said he is representing a broad range of people concerned about the future of the state. Gerald McEntee, president of the American Federation of State, County and Municiapl Employees, said if the state cuts appropriations it doesn’t mean the state will see a reduction in the needs of Iowans.
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