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Monday, March 25, 1974
University Daily Kansan
KANSAN comme
Editorials, columns and letters published on this page reflect only the opinions of the writers.
Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzz . . .
I don't consider myself more stupid than an average person, but Ralph Nader, the government and Detroit have made me feel like an idiot. And from what I hear and about the situation it's going to get worse.
I drive only during vacations, when some generous family member lends me his car. The damned thing beeps and buzzes at me until I take the keys out or fasten the seat belt. Nine times out of 10 I don't mind the noise because the seat belt should be fastened.
But oh, that 10th time! When I leave the car to open the garage door and then drive into the garage, that know-it-all creature of Detroit irritates me to no end. I see no reason to fasten the seat belt for a trip of 30 feet into the air why should I? Restoring the car wastes fuel and the only possible thief in sight is 1. But the unconscious car knows better.
When my borrowed car is a 1974 model, my problems will increase. The stupid thing won't start unless I do everything it tells me to do.
My calamity is more tolerable, however, when I think of the poor soul who must listen to this racket and know that it in an automatic car wash.
This lament brings up the question of the justification for regulations of this kind. The
validity of legislation about buzkers to make drivers remember to remove keys from the ignition is understandable. Forgetting the keys encourage theft and is likely to cause the potential theft as well as to the driver.
However, why should the government dictate that drivers wear seat belts? The government has no right to badger drivers into wearing them by requiring buzers in cars, and it has no right to pass laws that make it a crime to drive with a seat belt. It doesn't not yet gained enough support for passage, but support has been growing.
Under American philosophical tradition stemming from John Locke, the function of government is to protect society at large, mediate disputes and balance conflicting rights of citizens. On that basis the government has no right to demand that I wear a seat belt. Failure to wear one hurts no one except myself. The right to drive without belts conflicts with no one else's rights. Society is no better off whether I wear a seat belt or not.
Regardless of the benefits to be gained from seat belt regulation, government intervention in this case may insecure an on-person rights.
—Elaine Zimmerman
Muffled War of Words A Tragedy of Detente
(Kirill Chenkin was a journalist in the Soviet Union until he emigrated to Israel
By KIRILL CHENKIN
Special to the Los Angeles Times
The Voice of America is be heard loud and clear in Russia, but that is bad news. A not-so-bad shift has taken place in the once-crucial war of words over the airwaves; the United States has made the programming on the VAO's Russian broadcasts much more mellow in exchange for a halt in jammers during through because they no longer say anything of value—nothing that might be considered hostile to the Communist cause. It is another price that America pays for rapprochement.
I know. I was there. I lived in Moscow for many years and I, along with many others, depended heavily on these stations for information about contemporary affairs.
THE AMERICAN PEOPLE may not think that this mellowing is terribly important—they may even think it worthwhile, as a way of protecting President Nixon's precious "detente." But to the thinking people of Russia—and not to those whom the media likes to call "dissident," they have been emanating from the transmitters of Voice of America, the BBC and Radio Liberty have long been a major part of their daily lives.
The change in policy has never been expressed—but it has been documented. A computer study released by the VOA, for instance, has shown that the programs have increased by 45 percent according to the study, VAO's coverage of Soviet affairs has been decreased by 67 per cent, while music was increased by 18 per cent, American science programs by 41 per cent and sports by 96 per cent. At the end of the decade, foreign affairs has been eliminated.
Soviet propagandists have long asserted
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that the purpose of these foreign broadcasts
is to incite anti-Soviet feelings in
lattermen.
BUT I BEG to differ. I know the motivation of the Soviet listener. It is not anti-Soviet, but rather critical and rational. It is motivated by a personal assessment of Soviet reality and doesn't have to be provoked or stimulated in any way.
The Soviet listener is eager to gain information. After more than 50 years of constant brain-conditioning, he is still aware that he is a human being with the capacity to make skills for others otherwise unavailable, and is eager for an opportunity to judge for himself.
Of course, his main concern is news about the Soviet Union—news about those aspects of Soviet foreign policy that the Russian government doesn't discuss openly at home. In short, the listener wants what he cannot hear; the listener wants what he wants a look at the other side of the coin.
ANYONE LING IN Russia is forced to exist in a world of abstractions, where facts and events are arbitrarily suppressed and history is rewritten daily. Foreign news is broadcast therefore, the only contact with the outside world is through foreign broadcasts.
The intensity of the jamming has always been a signal to listeners that a given broadcast is, in some fashion, worthwhile. Having been a steady listener to foreign broadcasts in the Soviet Union, I know this from experience. I also know the frustration of trying to access my radio over my radio. It is an almost physical assault—an insult to human dignity.
To get a feel for the new Voice of America, imagine what the reaction would be if Radio Moscow beamed programs to Americans in order to American foreign policy. If Radio Moscow promoted the Nixon administration, an American listener (who is almost nonexistent, anyway) would consider listening to a game daffy and would turn off his radio.
BUT FOR MANY Russians, the Voice of America is no joke, and the change in policy on the part of both governments—the United States' softening of the VOA and the Russians' halt of the jamming—has one end that leads inevitably to a drastic drop in the audience for VOA. Something that's inoffensive to the government isn't likely to be worth tuning in.
The VOA's loss of a strong voice has left the Soviet listener without food for thought and will continue to be outside—as well as inside—the well-guarded boundaries of the Soviet Union.
This is detente?
Rights of Mental Patients Defended
This is the first of a two-part discussion of alleged abuse and humiliation of Kansas mental hospital patients and violations of their constitutional rights.
By JEROME LLOYD Kansan Staff Reporter
In 1971, a woman punished her 19-year-old daughter by committing to her the Owatotami State Mental Hospital. At issue: The girl was dating a black man. Although she was declared by a probate court to be in need of "help," the hospital refused her treatment and released her. Shortly thereafter, the outraged mother hurled the girl's birth certificate in her face and told her she was no longer a member of the family.
The young woman's case inspired the founding of the Mental Patients Support Committee, whose main goal is to counter what it contends are scandalous violations of the constitutional rights of mental patients.
The committee, which is based in Lawrence, includes psychologists, social workers, expatants, students of medicine and psychology, and his country enjoys a reputation for progressiveness that is
In Kansas, all that is required to initiate a commitment proceeding is the notarized signature of a "reputable" citizen. Afterwards, an order of protective custody, under which a person is compelled to remain in a state hospital for observation, will often be issued without his being informed of his rights to a hearing or even of the allegations against him. In this immediate future—at times, his fate—will be decided by a state hospital staff, which typically includes unmuskled or beginning psychiatrists.
Louis Frydman, associate professor of social welfare at the University of Kansas, struggled for the girl's release in 1971 and has since been an active committee member. According to Frydman, equal opportunities are necessary freedom from cruel and unusual punishment are now denied mental patients in the state of Kansas.
It is the committee's contention that the humiliation, the frequently hazardous drugs and the occasional electroshock treatment that Kansas mental patients receive at the
hands of state hospital psychiatrists,
constitute cruel and unusual punishment.
It believes that in Kansas, as elsewhere,
mental patients are punished, not only by
the law but by psychiatry, because of an
ingrained myth of their dangerousness to
society and because their views threaten
established norms.
ill-deserved, such a group is indeed welcome.
The committee declares that any citizen has the right to believe what he wishes, so as not to be influenced by others. And it holds that mental patients must cease to be the only minority group in America still legally deprived of the basic rights like liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Since 1971, as a result of the committee's pressure, two measures, have been introduced in the Kansas Senate on the issue of whether senators should measure the measures was Senate Bill 230, which would have abolished involuntary commitment altogether, except in cases in which it could actually be proved that the person was a felon. The senate passed its last fall. Senate Bill 230 was killed last fall.
not to be subjected to electroshock therapy, experimental medication, psychosurgery (which, according to the committee has been revived in other parts of the country and other hazardous treatment methods without the patient's written consent; the right to conjugal visits; the right to unrestricted communication with others; the right to wear a mask; the right to wear his own clothes; and the right to freedom from self-incrimination. At present, these rights are frequently denied mental patients in Kansas.
Griff and the Unicorn
Since the scrapping of the bill last fall, the Special Committee on Health has drafted Senate Bill 765. This bill stipulates that, in cases of involuntary commitment, all allegiance to the patient must be informed of his right to hearings. And the patient must not be brought to court under the influence of mind-altering drugs. Under the new bill, a victim may be deemed by psychiatrists, instead of on the basis of proofs brought forward in court; and most of the rights enumerated in Senate Bill 239 could be denied by psychiatrists for good cause." But, as Frydman puts it, "the law becomes law, at least it is a foot in the door."
Dr. Walter Menninger, clinical director at Topeka State Hospital, said last fall that those who were concerned for the well-being of the involuntarily committed patient must be that professional help would usually be needed if the patient were to be cared for at all.
Rep. Richard C. Loux, D-Wichita, last month demanded sharply: "Can we let a patient refuse treatment and prescribe treatment for himself?"
A crucial question arises at this juncture: Is the treatment offered by state hospitals in Kansas beneficial for the mental patient? Frydman's opinion is that, since treatment is self-directed conceived along humanitarian theory, actually injurious to his mental health.
"in somewhat less than half the cases," Frydman says, "the patient is detained against his will. And if a voluntary patient tries to leave the hospital, he may be forced to undergo surgery or forced to take drugs that are of questionable medical value. His dignity frequently suffers in psychotherapy; if he hopes to get out of the hospital, he will usually have to tell his therapist how much he has gained during his stay—which, for him, will probably be a humiliating lie. And the patient is usually forced to perform lowly tasks."
Ethics Entangle Capital Reporters
Frydman sums up the committee's evaluation of treatment in Kansas state hospitals.
Patrick J. Slyan of the Hearst
Napkiss former member of the
Hearst Company
Since the agency's news staff cannot participate in partisan news interpretation, a moderator is hired for $7 each to moderate a program. Strout received $240 in 1973. The standing committee ruled that appearances on the Voice of America constitute "government journalism."
By MARY RUSSELL The Washington Post
WASHINGTON—The era of Watergate has produced a super-sensitivity about ethical questions for those in business, government and the press. Most sensitive of all, perceptions of the press which, in casting Watergate as Watergate, it has a special duty to be without sin.
He was denied his gallery card after he refused to answer "Yes" to a question on a membership form that asks, "Do you agree not to accept payment for publicity, advertising, or promotion work for any individual, corporation, or organization while a member of the press galleries, including payment for appearances on radio or television programs sponsored by any organization," or "the government?" Of about 1,200 gallery members, only four refused to answer "Yes" to the question.
by Sokoloff
But a recent decision by the standing committee of correspondents of the Senate and House press galleries offers a good example of what might be called pharaismian splitering over rules that impose injuries rather than to the purity it aims for.
After 50 years of covering everything from Teapot Dome to Watergate, Christian Science Monitor Washington correspondent Richard L. Strout, who also writes the book *New Republic*, finds himself without access to the Capitol Hill press galleries.
Strout, for many years, has appeared on a Voice of America program called "Issues in the News," weekly program in which two reporters take onosing sides of an issue.
"decided it was time to act to avoid the appearance—if not the reality—a if conflict by saying a reporter should not accept news from the government he is assured to cover."
Stront said of the decision, "It's worse than nonsense. It's an infringement on the rights of journalists. The program merely gives the flavor, temper, mood of the country ——we're respectful to the country and so forth, but we say what's in our hearts."
The standing committee of correspondents administers House and Senate daily press facilities under authority delegated to it by Congress. Since 1877, it has decided who may be accredited to the galleries and other press facilities, including space at press tables in hearing rooms and work space in the galleries.
Since Struit's exorcism, more than 30 reporters from such papers as the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the Los Angeles Times, Copley News Service and the Wall Street Journal, have written to the standing committee, protesting the ruling.
In a letter to the committee, 17 members of the Wall Street Journal questioned whether the standing committee can set journalistic ethics outside of its
congressional jurisdiction—namely, the rest of the federal government. The writers did agree that it was wise to bar paid appearances by members of the press galleries on radio-television programs sponsored by members of Congress.
But without getting into First Amendment rights or who has the right to set ethical standards for journalists, the committee decides what information is vulnerable to the grounds of consistency.
For instance, many reporters participate in paid broadcasts of interviews with leaders of the AFL-CIO or the head of the Chamber of Commerce, for which they're about $0.5 if a reporter should not accept payment directly from the government, how about accepting it from lobbying groups that are constantly at work on the pulit?
William J. Eaton of the Chicago Daily News, who was chairman of the standing committee of correspondents, belongs to the newspaper. On Monday he month to write an opinion column in the union newspaper, the Guild Reporter. Or what about appearances on the Public Broadcasting Corporation, which receives from congressional appropriations?
Or what about the galleries themselves?
The equipment is paid for by Congress, as are the salaries of employees who run the gallery. What's happening in the floor, following what's happening on the floor.
or, finally, is money the only criterion of what constitutes a conflict of interest? While congressmen and senators no longer pay reporters to appear with them on radio stations, the public is still encouraged to continue to appear without pay, mainly because it gives them a chance to further their contacts with a source. But in an election year such as this, such programs could be more effective. The candidate re-elected simply by keeping his name and face before his constituents.
And it takes no Cassandra to predict that if the five members of the committee take further steps to set themselves up as arbiter's ethical standards for 1,200 members of the Washington press corps, the tempest over denying Dick Strout his gallery card is going to look like a raindrop by comparison.
The problem with the "simple rule" is that it's opened up the whole ethical can of worms which the committee must now take over and appearing merely capricious or vindictive.
Letter Floats 8,000 Miles
By JACK SMITH
By JACK SMITH The Los Angeles Times
It is surely a romantic impulse to send a meaningless message to someone we don't know at a place we can't imagine, to be delivered maybe never. But people still do it and maybe even do so on a beach and human contact is made across the seas and years.
One of the persistent fancies of romantic literature is that of the message placed in a bottle and tossed in the sea, to be washed up on the beach. It was a strange, a long time later and far away.
Such an adventure has just come to fruition for Robert and Pamela Rycroft, of Tujunga, Calif. It was in January two years ago, writes Mrs. Rycroft, that she and her husband dropped a note overboard in a champagne bottle long ago, by the rush standards of today, that we had completely forgotten its existence."
THEN, JUST A week or so, ago, an air mail special letter arrived. "Nothing, say Mrs. Ryroff, "not even two cruises to Hawaii, gave us quite the thrill that two thin sheets of blue paper and thin blue envelope did last week . . ."
mrs. kyrcraft sent me a copy of the letter, and its enclosures. This is what was written, in a careful hand, on the two blue sheets of paper:
Dapa, Surigao Del Norte Philippines Jan. 20, 1974
I
very truly yours,
ENCLOSSED IS THE letter found inside the bottle which you have thrown, and it was found in the Siargan Island, Place Besson, a fishing ground of Caridad, a hario of Pilar, Surigoal Dore Norte, Phil., which is near the Philippine Deep.
"I am going to introduce my name as Mardonio L. Espeso, a nephew of the founder. My uncle does not know any names espada. Espera me come to her requesting us to help him on how to do with the letter. So, I extended my whole heart cooperation to send back the letter to you with my own expense. If ever you response this billet address it to me as stated above of this letter or transportation is very hard and communication is very rare.
M. Mardonio L. Espaso
Enclosed were the shells.
Dropped and its envelope. Both were torn
Mr. Robert W. Rvcroft:
..ms was found last Dec. 27, 1973, at 7 o'clock a.m. while they were fishing on that day. My uncle was very happy thinking that I was going to use the letter your letter and the envelope was destroyed upon opening the bottle. Mailing was delayed due to some circumstances that our barrio was flooded and all our crops were destroyed and especially roads and bridges
"LASTLY EXTEND OUR warmest congratulations to all of you there and us."
and noled, but readable except for one word. The note was on the stationary of the TSS Fairnes. The date was written as 1-9-72, 12 noon. The message:
"Abroad TSS Faireau, 40 miles (60 KM), off San Boni . . . (here a hole obscured the name) . . . Island, 28 Deg. 37 min. N. Lat; 116 dec. 15 min. W. Long."
The Ryczyk had enclosed an envelope and asked the under to return the note with the envelope.
IN HER BRIEF note to me, Mrs. Ryccrot had been almost as taciturn as in the note dropped from the Fairsea. Where was San Boni (something) Island? I thought of telephoning Mr. Boni; she hadn't given the number, and the operator told me there was no such listing.
I don't know why it took me so long to realize that all I had to do was look up the longitude and latitude in my atlas and I could put my finger on the spot. Two minutes later I knew that when the bottle was dropped overboard, the Fairsea was off the coast of Baja California, not 200 miles southwest of my own little Baja house.
How capricious the sea, that it should have carried that champagne bottle 8,000 miles across the Pacific, instead of dropping it on a rocky beach. The little driftwood beach below our porch.
The arrival of the letter brought back
memory, a special memory to Mrs.
Ryagoshin, a nun of the Nuns.
n was such a lovely bottle of champagne."