We applaud the birth of Lies magazine and hope the publication will fill a needed niche of edgy, stimulating media at Brandeis. However, we must note that the Lies editors tainted their debut by including an article titled "The Lies Guide to Banging Sorority Girls." Assuming more discretion in the future, we are glad the Union senate did not follow through with their threat to de-charter the magazine, and we look forward to seeing what Lies can produce.

There is a dearth of general interest magazines on this campus, and those that do exist publish too erratically. In their opening note, the Lies editors pledged to provide a "music based forum on cultural critique," a broad territory that includes comments on college life in general. This is what people want to read.

Still, we must not ignore the contentious sorority article, which pushed the limits just a bit too far. There is a delicate line between writing that is clever or thought-provoking and writing that is downright offensive. This article described various ways that college boys could get sorority girls in bed. Admittedly, the piece was meant in jest, but the attempt at satire failed. Too few people found the article funny.

Despite this article's nature, we are relieved that the senate ultimately decided not to de-charter the magazine. This would have been rash and unconstructive. A new organization is bound to make mistakes as it gets off the ground.

Last year at Harvard, two students battled for months to launch a magazine called H Bomb that would contain nude photography. They eventually succeeded, and the magazine is a tasteful collection of portraits and ruminations on sex, drugs, the body, and life. Though Brandeis approval for nudity might be a long shot, we do need something in this vein on campus.

Lies currently stands alone as the only incisive, witty publication on campus. We hope it fine-tunes the art of satire before trying this genre again. Otherwise, we are eager to read future issues, and hope they will inspire existing publications to shape up or even perhaps lead new publications to be developed.