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Thursday, July 13, 1978
University Daily Kansan
UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Comment
Unused editorials represent the opinion of the Kansan editorial staff. Signed columns represent the views of only the writers.
Senate asserts power
Because of decisive action by the Student Senate in April, the Kansas University Athletic Corporation has now backed down from its plans to alter student seating at football games.
The possibility of a change in the number of seats available to students at football games are April 18, when Doug Messer, assistant men's athletic director, made a recommendation that the Senate Athletic Seating Board consider giving up portions of student seating to increase the revenue from games.
Messer explained that KUAC needed the added money because of a KUAC deficit of more than $100,000. He said there were two ways to alleviate the deficit.
"We can make some seating adjustments or win a ball of a lot of games," Messer said.
The loss of revenue would mean the difference between a good athletic program and a bad one, he said.
The seating board and the Senate Sports Committee responded immediately by passing a resolution that no seating changes be made.
ON MAY 3 the full Senate passed the Sports Committee's resolution unanimously. On May 9 the Seating Committee discussed the Senate's resolution with Messer and told him the Senate would not condone any change in student seating. A compromise was reached in which it was tentatively decided that the only change would be to move the band to a higher section.
Ron Allen, chairperson of the seating board, said the move would make the band better heard by the crowd.
There will be the exact same number of
student seats and of band seats." Allen said.
"We just decided that moving the band up would be better for both students and band members."
The decision was made after an alternative suggestion to move the band to the "horsehose" section of the field was strongly opposed by band members.
strongly opposed by banks
The final approval was delayed until fall,
when members of the press could be present
during voting.
"We didn't want anyone to think that we were making decisions behind their backs by waiting until the Kansan stopped printing." Allen said.
MESSER, NOW acting men's athletic director, said that although final approval had not been given for the plan, tickets for the new seats would be printed this summer so that the athletic department could meet its printing schedule.
"We had to print tickets in June or July," Messer said. "I don't care whether the band moves or not. I have no preferences whatsoever. However, if someone wants to reverse the decision, we'll be happy to change the tickets. We'll just reshuffle them in the fall."
Messer said he did not know whether the move would generate any additional revenue.
"It such a negligible move that it's hard to say," he said.
KUAC may still lose its revenue. However, what is more important is that the Senate was able to influence the actions of KUAC to the benefit of the students.
The Senate has properly executed its power to act in the students' interest.
Give ERA new life, fair shake
By KERRY BARSOTTI
Once again the future of the Equal Rights Amendment looks bleak. This time the proposed law faces extinction altogether.
Guest Writer
Lacking ratification in just three states, the amendment, which would guarantee equal rights without regard to sex, has a deadline for passage in March. Even proponents of ERA, who ordinarily seize any new bill, have said that they are without hope that the amendment will be ratified before the deadline. '
Legislators are proposing that the deadline be extended for four to seven years to give those states that haven't ratified the amendment a chance to reconsider.
Opponents of ERA are screaming foul play.
"THAT WOULD be like telling the Royals they have another chance to play for the pennant after they've already won a title, a member of Kansas City-based STER Aba, said.
They argue that to grant an extension of the deadline for passage would be changing the rules in the middle of the game.
Perhaps Congress is changing the rules, but an extension of the original constitution as within the jurisdiction of Congress.
An imposed time limit for proposed amendments is not mandated by the Constitution and, therefore, is not binding. Other constitutional amendments had deadlines for passage. Some amendments lingered for decades awaiting ratification. The Supreme Court decided during the 1928th that if enough interest in the amendment was found it would of no consequence.
be reintroduced, as it has been in every Congress since 1923. To begin the process of passing both houses of Congress and over all op-era would be costly and time-consuming.
If the extension is denied, the amendment would undoubtedly
THAT THERE is support of ERA is without question. Most Americans favor the amendment and its passage, according to a recent opposition forces have been successful in promoting their doomaday theories about its implications.
imminent destruction of families, they say.
ERA would bring about homosexual marriage, community bathrooms and the
Legislators also have interpreted the amendment as a vote for or against women's liberation rather than a vote against discrimination and in favor of equal rights.
With an amendment as simply as almost, almost arguably, is the most suitable that misunderstanding is likely to occur. But to misconstruce the wording entirely, as the opponents have, is clearly an error.
Some feminists would argue that ERA is so vague that it isn't even clear that equal rights are guaranteed. How can
such an amendment imply that homosexual marriages and community bathrooms would be sanctioned?
AS WITH any measure that threatens tradition, ERA has been misinterpreted and rejected without the consideration that it, and the millions of women it would affect, deserves. It is the nature of democracy to ensure that each legislative proposal be fully considered before it is killed.
ERA is, of course, a symbolic gesture—its effect would be gradual. But it is a necessary gesture.
Passage of the amendment, regardless of the time and effort it may take, would illustrate America's commitment to opportunity and treatment for both men and women.
An extension of the deadline would allow the necessary time for legislators to understand the legislation, including in a logical, educated fashion.
even it the amendment failed after careful consideration, we would know that it had been given a fair chance.
Kerry Barsotti is a Leawood junior majoring in journalism.
Despite tortures, Ph.D. is worth it
N. V. Times Features
By STEPHEN S. PEARCE
STAMFORD, Conn. — Crowded into an office, five members of my doctoral committee questioned me for two hours in a highly formalized procedure, reminiscent of a secret rite, about my "masterpiece”一"The Effect of Group Counseling on Levels of Depression Among Retired Women." My greatest fear was that a professor's sudden inspiration to make the study more "meaningful" might sentence me to another year of relentless research.
Then a motion for me to step outside, 10 minutes of deliberation and finally: "Congratulations, Dr. Pearce."
Joy, ecstasy, tears, a peak experience? No, merely numbness and relief. I tell myself, "Look, there is a sun out there, a patient wife to love, friends who have given up calling to be rediscovered, six years of books and movies to catch up on, boxes of unread magazines, a new tennis racket, a diet—projects planned but never begun. Rip up that resignation from the human race—at last!"
Last year I watched a high school graduate do cartwheels upon receiving his degree. I could understand his exultation, but frankly I am much too tired for now—after six years of work, $15,000 and 45 hours of work in the classroom. I photocopied articles, counseling texts, administrative directives, university gobbledygook, course outlines and notes. Why have I saved this mountain? Perhaps I squirreled everything away while subconsciously viewing a scenario in which the degree would never be lost. I will take it home. Haul, dump the fire load on the university lawn and set it on fire.
That was not necessary, but I am still tempted to purge myself, a rite of purification to mark "The End." At the least, there is the nagging temptation to stack everything away where it can never be found. That is how far I'd like to be from the clutter in my home and
Six years of drinking and working and sleeping my thesis could well have engendered yet another study: "The Effect of Dissertations on Graduate Students' Levels of Depression"—a thesis within a thesis. How would I have scored on the Self-Rating Depression Scale? I have crying spells; I have trouble sleeping; I am more irritable than usual; I feel that others would be better if I were
I now understand why many doctoral students settle for the A.B.D. (all但不-dissertation) degree. A thesis is omnious; the need to create the perfect study overwhelms. Unwilling to settle for imperfection, many settle for nothing; for them, there is neither structure nor schedule nor pressure to finish. But for me there was one motivating thought: If dissertations were not difficult, universities would grant Ph.D.s to everyone and the entire world would have an obstacle to obtain a学位. In other words, the absence of tolerance for this subterfuge is subverted and intelligence made a stepchild to a coveted goal. What is it that separates the Ph.D.s from the A.B.D.*? Endurance.
Depression results from spending so many years preparing a thesis and recognizing its long-term insignificance. One sympathetic faculty member confided that students had neither the time nor the energy to get up early and go out for a walk, of here, and when you're finished, you can do something worthwhile.
Transformed from "Mr." to "Dr.". I realized that nothing had really changed, which made my energy-drained brain all the more numb. I had been admitted into "The Club," but no secret knowledge was imparted, except the faculty's ominous words: "Don't worry, depression develops in about six weeks as you wonder what to do with yourself."
The true maturity of the Ph.D. is the realization that one should never undertake a similar project. For some, the liberty of free time is abrogated, because academia forces production of papers, books and articles. In this atmosphere, academic freedom becomes a prison. Others, who seem driven by an inner force, will just never learn. After all, what am I doing here at this typewriter?
Waisted that all left behind with the thesis? Will I be overwhelmed by loss and a new void that cannot be filled with paper? I had never imagined that depression would arise from an inability to deal with freedom.
Depression?
Stephen S. Pearce, rabbi of Temple Simai, Stamford, Conn., was awarded his doctorate June 4 from St. John's University in Jamaica, N.Y.
By JAMES CALLAGHAN
Europe, U.S. build common goals
In all our enterprises Europe and America must work together. Our partnership is now one of the permanent factors in our interlocked economically, through our armed forces, in our cultures. Changes in America are soon reproduced in Europe in the United States into America. We are wedded to democratic values and we have joint responsibility to uphold them. So Europe and America should work together.
We shall have the chance to do so next month when the leaders of seven powerful industrial democracies, six from Europe and North America, together with Japan, will meet to seek international program of concerted action to overcome our shared problems.
We are now seeing the early beginnings of a new process of consultations between heads of state and government in many countries, has been ad hoc. Every meeting has seen a useful exchange of ideas. Every meeting has added more formality and by the small number of participants. This has added greatly to the value of the discussions. We have utilized these made speeches at each other.
The time has come when the valuable meetings should cease to be ad hoc and should be held regularly. All of us should know that by any country could be disastrous for the rest. So we are "condemned to cooperate" and there is a need for us to think out the structure and the nature of that cooperation—what we hope to accute to the common good.
ark of selfish self-interest, I doubt whether it would protect us from the flood.
Hubert Humphrey said once that we should “internationallyize our concepts.” He added, “that statement to what I perceive to be three critical areas in our international relations—the Third World, the Soviet Union and Africa?” Humphrey added, “Seek for others the same goals we seek for ourselves.”
We frequently say that the current decade has witnessed the emergence of a number of countries with an influence even on the most powerful industrialized countries. But we have yet to come to terms with their needs, and we know the real needs of their people.
We must offer a better hope to the people of the developing world than the prospect of the large industrialized countries' preparing to batten down the storm and hoping to ride out the storm relative security. Even if we were able to construct such an
Help for the developing countries is not only a moral imperative but, like the Marshall Plan, an act of statesmanship and enlightened self-interest. The tragedy is that the current world economy is under pressure for many years, is inhibiting our response to the developing countries.
The Western world is preoccupied with its own problems: how to mitigate the effects of inflation, slow growth in unemployed men, women and young people. That is
show charity when you are down and out but woe beidle any of you who look like succeeding."
On the other hand, the developing countries need to recognize that the West also has genuine problems of unemployment, especially when industrial competition from the newer developing countries.
But one thing we can each do without waiting. England shares the common commitment to seek to convert past loans to convert current grants. I hope we shall be able to announce a decision within a few weeks. In America there is a bill before Congress that still bears the name of Hubert Humphrey and that calls similar conversions from past loans into grants for the best developed countries.
There is a need for increased capital flows to those countries.
In England we have a job of political education to do if we are to convince our people of the enlightened self-interest of such a politician whose chronic poverty and malnutrition are in themselves one of the main sources of instability in the Third World and that they will lead to increasing political adventurists will dabble and seek to gain advantage.
The multilateral trade negotiations also should aim to meet the special requirements of the developing countries by giving greater access to food and water in distrustual countries need time to adjust to rapidly changing patterns of trade, the best way to do this is through selective arrangement of export markets. If it does the wholesome invocation of global protectionism.
Here then is the challenge for the international com-
Marshall Arisman
inevitable because our societies cannot live permanently with those flaws in their economies. But we must pay equal attention to the adverse consequence on the poorer countries, whose populations increase transactions of resources due to the effect of our recession on their poverty. The industrialized democracies must avoid an attitude that says, "We will
countries. Japan recently has decided to double her official development assistance in three years, instead of four to five years; that is a welcome move in the right direction. Even so, Japan's need to run mass pension surpluses. Through the World Bank or in other ways it should be possible for those countries who are running big surprises to do more to help.
munity for the rest of this century—to reorder priorities so that every member of the family of man can be liberated from human oppression and to afford the hardship that is the permanent lot of millions of the world's citizens. Offer a hungry peasant the bread or democracy for his starving brother and he will choose bread.
If our democratic values are
to triumph, we must embark upon a program of partnership and sharing unmatched in history.
As we are ready to match like with like in the military field, so we are eager to match like with like in disarmament. We want very much to beat like with like in disarmament, we will strive very hard for safe and balanced disarmment. We recognize the position of the Soviet Union as a military superpower of equal strength to the United States, it plays a predominant role in the NATO alliance. But we do not accept that NATO and the Warsaw Pact should be condemned to the current situation or even worse, condemned to never-ending increase in the costs of weapons as new and more expensive technology replaces the old. We also do not want to compromise those who seem ready to retreat into a new cold war.
Such a relapse would certainly make Europe no safer. But equally certainly it would put an end to the possibility of making any significant advances in the disarmament negotiation agenda and would ultimately involve the Soviet Union in a dialogue at all levels, on all issues and at all times. Sometimes there will seem to be little or no progress, as in the matter of human rights just now. Sometimes in the East-West disagreement in the East-West dialogue resulting from actions in a particular continent or area, as we see in parts of Africa. We should resist the natural impulse that would automatically establish linkage between areas of the theoretical and practical ager for progress and other areas in which their actions are unacceptable.
For example, the case for entering into a further SALT agreement stands by itself. It is in all our interests, but this is not a progress towards it should not be deflected by other disputes.
there will be actions that may call for such a linkage to the other countries, should be examined rationally and on its own merits and should not be part of a spasm to some particular Soviet act.
We cannot escape involvement in the struggle to stiggle. Africa has shown that she welcomes that involvement when it contributes to redressing the evils of poverty and underdevelopment. But there is a big gap between
involvement and intervention.
No country has the right to intervene for its own ends in the affairs of another.
It is America and Britain who are making the greatest effort to find a just and peaceful solution for the future of Rhodesia. Equally, we two, along with France, Germany and Canada, form the Alliance, building the maximum effort to find peaceful solutions in Namibia.
I know that Americans sometimes look across the Atlantic and wonder how this new composite member of the Western family is going to do better. The Market enters a prickly adolescence, some Americans wish that we would grow up quickly into a fully fledged United States of Europe; others want Europe may grow too fast and use its giant industrial strength in ways harmful to America. Its character will be modified when the Common Market is enlarged from nine countries through the addition of Greece, Portugal and Spain.
healthy working relationship between the democracies of Western Europe and America is pivotal to the success of a whole range of international issues. The Common Market would be stiltified if it ever tried to undress Americanism. Fortunately, I can see absolutely no desire on anyone's part to follow such a disastrous course.
The Common Market will not develop into a tidy federal entity during the lifetime of the stubborn sovereignty of the nation-state will continue to be a fact.
The European community has come to stay; however, it may evolve and be changed. The United States is not in a crisis to be grateful that its existence has ensured that two of its largest members, France and Germany, historic allies, remain in their three bitter wars in less than a century, now work closely and intimately together bringing stability and hope for the future of Western Europe.
The preceeding were excerpts from a speech given by the British prime minister, James Callaghan, after receiving the first Hubert Humphrey International Award from the National Committee for American Foreign Policy.