The student voice of Midwestern State University
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With a 4-1 win over Northeastern State, MSU clinches LSC title.
WEDNESDAY, November 4, 2009
Car accident clarifies MSU police jurisdiction Chris Collins Managing Editor
The MSU police are taking over the world! Not really. But they do have jurisdiction over the entire Wichita County. Bet you didn’t know that. Chet Patterson, a 31-yearold nursing major, was made acutely aware of that fact Thursday night. MSU police ticketed Patterson after he was rammed from behind by another car at a red light. The other driver, sophomore education major Amy Steere,
admitted blame for the accident and agreed to pay for the damage. She was also ticketed by MSU police. Strangely enough, the incident was not on campus. In fact, it was about a mile away on the corner of Southwest Parkway and Taft. “I think it’s bogus,” Steere said. “I shouldn’t have been ticketed at all.” Steere said she knew MSU police had jurisdiction around the campus area, but didn’t think they operated countywide. She said she had never heard of someone receiving a ticket
Photo by Julia Raymond Students could see the light bar on MSU police vehicles like this one flashing behind their cars even off campus. Campus cops have jurisdiction all over Wichita county.
from a campus cop outside of MSU. Both Patterson and Steere received two tickets for the accident: one for running a red light and another for not updating
their addresses on their licenses. They both said they were amazed that they were ticketed for getting in an accident, and were even more amazed that one of the tickets was for running a
red light. “I thought I would get a ticket for riding too close to Chet or something, but not for the light,” Steere said. Patterson argued that if he had run the red light he wouldn’t have gotten rear-ended, and if Steele had she couldn’t have run into him. He said that was the main reason he was mystified about the whole situation. “That’s bullshit,” Patterson said. He said he talked to the WF police, Vice President of University Advancement and Student Affairs Dr. Howard Farrell,
Police Chief Michael Hagy and even a lawyer to get the issue cleared up. He said so far he hasn’t found a way around paying a tickets he said he didn’t deserve to get. In all, the two tickets totaled over $300. “I want some action and resolution,” Patterson said. “I know there are problems with the police and people that want to complain about them.” He said he thinks there should be a system in place where students can critique the service given to them by MSU police. See POLICE page 5
Club offers fellowship for Pagans on campus Abbie Scott Hunt For the Wichitan
Susie Hassan went skydiving to celebrate turning 21. (Photo courtesy)
Susie Hassan bypasses a pub crawl for a parachute to celebrate her twenty-first birthday Susie Hassan For the Wichitan
“No! You can die!” It was mother speaking right after I told her what I wanted for my 21st birthday. She wasn’t happy. Neither was I. “Well, it’s my body so I’m going skydiving,” I responded hotly. Unlike mom, dad didn’t freak out. “It will be a good
learning experience,” he said calmly. It was more than that. Since I was 16 I’d wanted to skydive. I always figured that jumping out of a plane would be the perfect way to celebrate my formal entry into adulthood. Hey, it beat having a beer. So, my parents forked over the $295 for me to take the plunge, which included a mid-air video and still photographs. I
decided to go during the summer, because February – my birthday month – would be too cold and windy. I asked my good friend, Amy Kimble, if she would like to tag along, but she decided to jump as well. Now, that’s a friend. June 28 finally came. Until then, I’d pushed thoughts of dying to the back of my mind. Now, they were beginning to See SKYDIVING page 5
The sun sets over the lake. Ribbons of pink and purple clouds unfurl across the sky. In the distance, coyotes bark and play. It’s Samhain, the moon is full, and the Pagan Student Union has gathered together for their holiday celebration. But what, exactly, is a pagan? Adam Henson, sophomore English major and president of the P.S.U. has been a practicing pagan for more than two years. Henson said, “I would say a textbook definition is ‘any nonJudeo, Christian, or Muslim religion—more than that…first of all, you’ve gotta be sure not to step on anybody’s toes when you do define it…a religion with earth-centered, nature-based worship that is not mainstream. Spiritual people can find whatever personal meaning they are seeking through paganism.” Henson started the P.S.U. this fall. He was inspired to do so when he discovered a pagan organization at a university he considered attending before deciding on M.S.U. Henson said he wanted to find a group to participate in and figured others might be interested, too. “Being in the part of the country that we are, it’s not as easy to follow that path, so I figured there were probably other people like me, and sure enough there were. I feel we deserve our own venue as well,” Henson said. “I’m primarily looking to establish a fairly constant group for fellowship, because that is something difficult to find in this area for any pagan or nonChristian person around here… to provide a support system for people who might not otherwise have one…and there are a few people who have expressed appreciation already for it, because there is nothing else like it around.” The P.S.U. became an official organization in late October when the paperwork was finally approved but has been meeting once a week since the beginning of the semester. They have already held circles for the harvest festival of Mabon and the new year Sam-
P.S.U. Logo
hain celebration, which are Celtic (or Druidic) holidays that date back thousands of years before Christianity. In ancient Ireland, Scotland, and parts of England, the Druids were the priests and priestesses of the Celtic community. They spent several years in school learning prayer and ritual in order to become priests and priestesses. The Druids understood the intrinsic connection between man and nature and saw that mankind was really only a part of a much larger pattern. They kept time by a lunar cycle that determines the dates of the Celtic holidays to be celebrated today. Henson said that a major factor in his creation of the P.S.U. was his desire to have fellowship with a community of likeminded people with whom he could celebrate holidays. “There’s an emphasis on, as far as worshipping together goes, holidays as another main focus of the group. To be able to celebrate the holidays where otherwise we wouldn’t be able to,” said Henson. Some of what he would like to accomplish with the P.S.U., Henson said, is to clarify for people in the community exactly what pagans are, and what they are not. “People can be as involved as they want in it, researching See PAGAN page 5