In my nearly four years at Marquette, I cannot recall a student organization displaying such a flagrant disregard for the deeply-held beliefs of others than the College Republicans demonstrated in their "Adopt a Sniper" program early last week.

Regardless of personal convictions about the justification or necessity of the war, all of us — Republicans and Democrats, Christians and non-Christians, Americans and members of other nations — must be able to agree that the loss of life, including widespread civilian casualties, is nothing short of tragic.

A program that paints the protection of trained snipers as a charity cause is a stinging affront to all who have tirelessly worked for peace, non-violence, and alternative solutions to war.

While it is certainly unacceptable that our troops are not adequately protected, this is a matter for the U.S. military to address and is indicative of insufficient planning on the part of its leaders.

Such band-aid treatment as the Adopt a Sniper program not only perpetuates the problem but also diverts charitable donations that could otherwise be used in the tsunami relief effort or as aid for families of genocide victims in Sudan.

The fact that the Adopt a Sniper program was deliberately launched during Mission Week makes it particularly spurious; any fundraiser that distributes paraphernalia with the inscribed logo "1 Shot, 1 Kill, No Remorse, I Decide" is necessarily incongruous with the "direct way to construct peace" that the chairman of College Republicans claimed the fundraiser to be in Thursday's article.

Furthermore, the negative attention generated for Marquette University, including a Reuters article appearing in such sources as CNN.com and the Seattle Post-Intelligence, affects all members of the Marquette community in an unnecessary and disturbing way.

In order to respect the beliefs of others, uphold the ideal of peace, and promote a positive reputation for Marquette, College Republicans must rethink their approach to "constructing peace."

Karen Rupprecht is a senior in the College of Arts & Sciences.

This article appeared in The Marquette Tribune on Feb. 10 2005.