KANSAN Comment
Dove Day: October 15
Imagine a cast of thousands, pitted against a gang of ruthless killers. Staged on a set costing millions to design and build, the action includes speeches, poetry, workshops, folk-singing, a silent vigil and flics—all the contemporary mind-grabbers.
The screenplay looks good, and chances are the action will follow the script.
It appears as if the Oct. 15 Moratorium will be well-supported. Last week, the name of the University of Kansas was listed with 49 other schools in a New York Times advertisement for the Moratorium.
That's the screenplay for Oct. 15, as described by the KU Student Mobilization Committee to end the war in Vietnam. The group would like all of KU's student and faculty community to avoid classes in a day-long Moratorium on "business as usual." The national Vietnam Moratorium Committee hopes that sufficient national student support for the anti-war protest will induce Nixon to provide "a firm public commitment to get troops out now, a commitment to a total withdrawal in a short period of time.
This anti-war protest, rooted in the New Left, Establishment Left, and liberal elements at KU, is also growing into the middle-class moderate factions.
At KU, the class boycott and corresponding activities have drawn support from members of the Student Senate, including President Dave Awbrey. Other supporters including certain SDS members; the local young socialist clan, a cadre of professors, and the College Young Republicans.
I'm going to okay the committee's efforts and absent myself from classes Oct. 15. I support what seem to be the two basic premises: America should
Take a trip, Gen. Hershey
Photo by Halina Pawl
withdraw its forces from Vietnam, and a united student protest might influence Nixon to effect such a change.
But I'd also like to offer certain reservations.
First of all, I believe at least a thousand students will skip classes. But don't they do that every day? Perhaps not in such great numbers—but ask any professor, skipping classes is a popular sport. So we are lying to ourselves if we say that because 1,000 students boycott classes, ipso facto, 1,000 students support the Moratorium's goals.
A big chunk of those students will only be playing "dove for a day."
I also wonder why we have decided to suspend our academic activities, instead of extracurricular activities. Academia has been used during this past decade as a great limestone wall against which we bounce our various rubber balls. The reasons are
varied: the idea of temporary suspension of classes is only too popular among undergraduates for one.
"But the Moratorium will be an educational activity!" I can hear the cries already. Well, that's the way the screenplay is written. Speeches, workshops, discussion, letter-writing, soul-searching
But I know my fellow students—and myself—better than that. Many of us will choose to sit at home, visit the local taverns, sit under trees, or go to the flies
We won't really be suspending our "business as usual." As a matter of fact, business will probably be better than ever on Oct. 15.
On that day, American college students will self-righteously absent themselves from classes.
And in taverns and department and clothing stores across America, the straights, rights, lefts and moderates will pump another few million dollars into the swelling American economy, doing their little bit to provide funds for the war they claim to abhor.
Wherein lies my final reservation about the Moratorium. Why don't students attempt to wield the real kind of power—economic power?
Bureaucrat of the breakfast table
WASHINGTON, D.C.-Henry Kissinger, chief White House adviser on national security affairs, recently told reporter Gerald Astor: "I can understand the anguish of the younger generation. They lack models, they have no heroes, they see no great purpose in the world. But conscientious objection is destructive of a society. The imperatives of the individual are always in conflict with the organization of society. Conscientious objection must be reserved for only the greatest moral issues, and Vietnam is not of this magnitude."
Refuse to pay taxes, don't install a telephone, boycott beer, quit smoking. Don't buy new clothes, move into a less expensive apartment. Walk, don't use your car. Cut expenditures to the bone. A couple of thousand students on a poverty strike could seriously dent the Lawrence economy. Garner enough student support across the country, and the nation will notice a disturbing downward trend in expenditures for consumer goods.
Money talks, and men like President Nixon spend a lot of time listening to it.
And a moratorium on student spending, no matter how limited, would also be a more honest tactic than a widespread class boycott.
But I enjoy spending money. I can't live without my stereo, my car, an occasional movie, and all the appurtenances of American mddle class life.
So I'll protest the war in an infinitely more comfortable way: I'll skip classes.
These are some of the reasons why I'm uneasy about offering my unequivocal support to the Oct. 15 Moratorium.
I sincerely hope my doubts will be proven unfounded.
Joanna K. Wiebe
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