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6 -- PORT PERRY STAR -- Tuesday, September 15, 1987 One Woman's View by Chris Carlisle Girls who want to play hockey on the boys' teams must be masochists. What ever happened to safely playing with dolls? The Ontario Human Rights Commission has been conducting an investigation into a 14 year old's complaint of sexual discrimination because she isn't allowed to play in the boys' league. Better she's sexually discriminated against than having her childbearing abilities destroyed by an extremely over-zealous but accidental wayward slashing hocking stick in the gut. Never mind the dangers. Boys are subjected to skate blades and flying pucks too. It's just that girls run the danger of losing visibili- ty and skating into danger when their lipstick and mascara get smeared all over their plexiglass face visors ---- okay, okay, only kidding! As I said, never mind the dangers. The point is, if the boys want to get together for a friendly, or violent, game of hockey, why should they have to let a girl play? Likewise, when the girls get together for a friendly or violent game, must they allow boys? We all like our little cliques and groups of like-minded. Groups where we all have something in common. What's wrong when the common element is the players' sex? When the "girls" get together for drinks, conversation or house building, quite often it's for that gender element alone. It's because we're female. If some guy shows up, the whole tone of the get-together changes. And while it may not be bad, it's just nice sometimes to spend time exclusively with those with whom one feels a natural bond. Back back to hockey. Contrary to the fact that boys and girls are equal, their bodies are not. Men are as a rule, bigger and stronger. Someone somewhere once said there's a difference between the way a man and woman's elbow bends that makes it easier to men to swing a bat and for women to hold babies. While examining arms to test this theory, one thing becomes apparent. The average male's arm is bigger, stronger and more muscular than the average female's. Line up a row of adolescent boys. Mix them up. Throw in a girl and put paper bags over their heads. Now try and find the girl. I'll bet that in the average group, you can spot the girl by her slighter build. Okay, lots of women will argue that point. Lots of girls are big- ger than some boys. But in general the male animal is bigger and stronger than the female. Wasn't he designed to be the hunter? Despite women's lib, I'd guess boys are still more aggressive physically than girls. So throw a girl on the team and what happens? Either the boys are going to be hung up and go out of their way to skate around her and be gentle, throwing their entire concentration and game off or they're going to be overly aggressive and go out of their way to get her out of the game fast. The poor kid is going to get hurt. Some of Ontario's best female hockey players have testified at the hearing and they say girls can compete on a skills level but not in speed and strength. So there you have it. Girls could just possibly be a handicap to the team. And if this discrimination issue is settled (Turn to page 8) Seventeen-year old Rob Jamieson admits he was apprehensive about taking his first ever job away from home this summer. But any doubts he may have had disappeared quickly after a few days working as a Junior Ranger at the Restoule Provincial Park and Campground near North Bay. In fact, the grade 12 student at Port Perry High School liked the work so much, he badly wants to sign on again next summer for a bet- ter paying foreman"s job. Rob had nothing but praise for the Junior Ranger summer program with the provincial Ministry of Natural Resources, even if the pay was only $15 per day (plus room and board) for a six day work week. He would recommend it as a sum- mer job to any 17 year old high school student in the province. Rob feels that a lot of teens his age may not know about the Junior Ranger program because it doesn't seem to get much publicity. He heard about the opportunity last fall and he ap- Viewpoint by John B. McClelland (From page 5) Hamre both would have made fine MPP's. They are classy in- dividuals. And Sam Cureatz made no bones about the fact his victory was largely due to the fact that he has spent the last ten years tending to the "nuts and bolts' issues in the riding. Sam pops everywhere for just about every darn function you can think of, big and small. He says he'll continue to be a *"'con- stituency man." I don't doubt that he will, but as just one of the Tory MPPs in the House at Queens Park, he is obviously going to have to play a major role for the PC's at the policy level. And the Party is going to have to find a new leader. One issue that I heard mentioned several times during the campaign in Durham East was the role Gary Herrema played in Diane Hamre's Liberal campaign. Gary is the chairman of the Region of Durham and I heard more than one Durham East voter grumble that the chairman of the Region should not get so actively involved in a provincial election campaign. Well, Regional council was recessed for the summer dur- ing the campaign. There's nothing that says a mayor, councillor, regional chairman or school board trustee cannot campaign for whoever they please, quietly or very, actively. But appearances are so critical in any election campaign. I also heard some griping about the fact that municipal politi- cians (like Mrs. Hamre) don't have to resign their local seats to seek provincial or federal election. One local man told me that municipal politicians should at very least take an unpaid leave of absence during the campaign if they are seeking higher office. As for Gary Herrema's highly visible role in Diane Hamre's campaign, I heard it mentioned often enough to conclude that it may have been a minor (very minor) factor in the minds of some voters. Junior Ranger program is okay with teenager plied in November and was ac- cepted in April of this year. The program included his train transportation to and from North Bay. Most of the time Rob and the other crew members were working in the Restoule Park, taking care of maintenance, clean-up, cutting wood, clearing rocks from the beach. But there were plenty of organized side trips as well, in- cluding one to the huge underground NORAD base in North Bay. The Junior Ranger workers stayed in bunk-houses about a mile from the campground and Rob said the meals were excellent. Besides giving him eight weeks of healthy out-doors work and some money in the bank when it was over, the Junior Ranger program is a good way to meet other people his age. Next summer, he'd like to go back to Restoule as a sub foreman, but he'd be glad to accept a job at any provincial park in Ontario. And the experience he had this summer was so positive, he's think- ing seriously of pursuing a career with the Ministry of Natural Resources. Rob was one of nearly 45,000 young Ontario high schoo) students employed in the Junior Ranger pro- gram this summer. To qualify, a student must be 17 (but not 18 as of August 31). To find out more about this sum- mer employment opportunity, students should write to the Ministry of Natural Resources, Whitney Block, Queens Park, Toronto. M7A 1W3. Looking for A Place to Advertise Your Business? LOOK HERE! Where consumers in need shop for the professionals in business! Call: 985-7383 for more information. Random Jottings by J. Peter Hvidsten HIDE AND SEEK I imagine anyone who has young children, at one time or another when they are being little demons, have either said out loud or to themselves, "get lost you little brat." \ Now I know that one should not think like that, but there are times when Kids can get on your nerves, and sometimes you say things that you really do not mean literally. But can you imagine what someone would do if they had told their child "get lost" and they did just that. Well, Nancy and I had the fright of our life last weekend, when our 2'u year old Matthew disap- peared for about 15 minutes. Nancy had decided to go to the store for some milk, and a paper on Sunday morning, and the little guy didn't want to go, so I said I'd keep an eye on him while she was gone. Well, she hadn't been gone more than two minutes, and he disappeared. Matt was playing with some toys in the base- ment, while I was working just around the corner from him. I saw he was quite content, so | began to hammer a couple of nails, and that's when it happened. : In the time that it takes to hammer two 3 inch nails into a piece of wood, he vanished from the rec room, and for that matter the whole house (or as it seemed). I checked every room in the basement, went to the main floor, searching through the rooms calling him and finally ran upstairs looking in the bedrooms, closets, bathrooms, and anywhere I thought he might hide. By this time I began to think that Matt had gone upstairs before Nancy had left and she had taken him with her, so I Tan outside to see if I could see them on the street. But there was nothing! Sure that he was still in the house, I ran back in- side and searched the three floors again. By this time, I was positive he must have gone with Nancy, so I hopped into the van and drove downtown and caught her as she:was coming out of the store, but there was no little boy tagging along behind her. A bit of panic was beginning to creep in now, and I raced back to the house to begin another search Starting in the basement, I searched every nook and cranny I could find, and then proceeded to do the same on the two main floors. By now Nancy had returned and she also got into the search. We called for him to come out, offered him bribes, but there was not a sound or an answer and it was very apparent, by the look on Nancy's face, that she was deeply worried. We decided to have one more good look before reporting to the Police, go we searched the backyard and the neighbours yi Convinced he wasn't out- side, I ran back into the house and Nancy got onto her bicycle to search around the block. Then as I began to run back to the basement, I noticed a move- ment in a storage room at the bottom of the steps, and I knew he was safe. I called Nancy back and the two of us walked down the steps to the basement and stared at a slight movement in the old baby carriage. Reaching over, I picked up a thin foam mattress and there he was, laying on his back in the carriage staring up at us with a large grin on his fac .. You can't imagine the relief we felt knowing he was safe, but at the same time we were ready to tan- his-hide, for the prank he had jst pulled. So after a few hugs and kisses, we proceeded to tell him he had been a bad boy hiding on us and we didn't/want him to do that again, etc. etc. etc. Soon all was forgotten, and life got back to nor- mal. But you can bet we'll both be a little niore (Turn to page 8) vipa ig