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THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Wednesday, October 16, 1968
Voice secrecy
The height of inconsistency was reached by Voice Monday night.
The group, which was advocating that the University Senate have open meetings, voted to draw the veils of secrecy around its own gathering. A University Daily Kansan reporter was asked to leave and did. Another Kansan reporter was barred entrance into the meeting. A third reporter later got into the meeting by not identifying himself.
Voice, which sets itself up as spokesman for the student body when it demands 50 per cent student representation in the University among other things, has slapped the students in the face. Now, Voice, composed of less than 150 students, not only proposes to tell the Administration what the other some 16,000 students should want, but also wants to do this without allowing the press to report Voice actions to the students.
The Kansan supports in principle many of the beliefs of Voice, including increased student participation in University government and increased University concern for off-campus society.
But the Kansan also believes in the right of the public to know of actions that may affect it. And the public has the right to learn of these actions in the discussion stages, not to be told of the decisions after they have been reached.
The reason advanced by Voice spokesmen for barring newsmen access was that the Kansan has "distorted" its views and actions in the past.
Perhaps the real reason is that Voice, like many other news sources, doesn't like any publicity unless it is solely favorable. It is interesting to note that Students for a Democratic Society and Voice have agreed to publish their own newspaper, which is likely to be noticeably lacking in impartiality.
The Kansan is not devoid of errors. The reporters who work for the paper are human. With
this attitude in mind, we try to give all viewpoints equal time.
When Voice has felt that its actions were misinterpreted or inaccurately reported in the Kansan, we have printed letters from members to that effect. In one issue, the whole editorial page was turned over to a question and answer interview with two Voice members who served on the student faculty committee.
Voice will hurt itself by this unsavory move toward secrecy.More significantly, it is likely to jeopardize passage of the proposed Senate Code which would implement greater student participation in the school's government. Many wrongly associate the revolutionary Senate proposals with Voice, and some faculty members feel they are being forced into adopting the code and now are having second thoughts.
It's a disappointing development. Voice supposedly embodied the ideals of participatory government in which the masses have a larger voice.
There is much hope for the group with so many ideals and fervor for righting the wrongs of the world. We still believe many of the Voice members are some of the most intelligent and concerned persons on the Hill.
But they have stooped to tactics used by demagogues and extremists-threat of force through a sit-in, unsupported charges such as branding the faculty fascist, and now meetings closed to the press.
Voice, after all, seems not to be so different from those they so violently condemn. Hopefully this will be proved wrong.
Monte Mace Managing Editor
Letter to the Editor
To the Editor:
Against reactionaries
In keeping with your subjective, anti-intellectual tradition you have again elected to "pitch" toward the reactionaries. This may be evidenced by Mr. Alison Steimel's editorial "Can wrong be right?" and Mr. Mike Shearer's lead story regarding the LHS board meeting.
To keep the record straight, I am the individual who made the statement that I do not consider myself to be guilty of the sins of my forefathers. If you find personal or social guilt in the slavery which existed a hundred years ago, that's your bag. But, it occurs to me that if one follows that line of reactionary thinking he must condemn the recently born German child for the Nazi horror camps of World War II. Man, in my view this thinking is not only reactionary but smells of the Dark Ages!
At any rate, the remark was made as I attempted to ask the first of two questions at the LHS board meeting. First, who is going to pay for "special attention" afforded Negro students? An angry reactionary, complete with the beard and beads of a monkish martyr, sitting in the front row of the auditorium shouted something to the effect that, "Former slave owners ought to pay for special attention." I replied, "Why? I am not guilty of the sins of my great-great-great grandfather so let the former slave sue him." At this junature, there was considerable booing and I truly expected the reactionaries to demand that I be struck by lighting.
The second question I attempted to ask was: Why the great concern if fifty students desire to withdraw from the public school system? I continue to ask this question. Is it because there is a general feeling that if the blacks are retained in public
51. 8.6
Edward J. Paris Oakland, California graduate student
Come now, reactionaries, if you are really so frightened don't continue in your attempt to pass yourself off as altruistic humanitarians. Admit that you are frightened of the possibility that the Negro might not accept your concept of Utopia but, in your self-satisfying fear and guilt, don't attempt to saddle me with your "cross".
school they will be indoctrinated with the idea that Utopia is an amalgamated, ant hill society? I mean, we don't object to private religious or military schools so why should there be objection to black schools? Apparently, if one can believe Rick Atkinson who states that, "if the board, administration and teachers do not act now they will be like Nero fiddling while Rome burned," the reactionaries are fearful of a black community. Of what are they afraid? That the blacks will race across the land like the Vandals who sacked Rome? Is it a fear that the Negro will consume the ant hill?
KU's whole football image and progress are far too meaningful locally and nationally to permit a handful of KU "yell" leaders to damage them. This damage is happening now because of a few insipid stadium "yells."
To the Editor:
I agree entirely with Indiana resident Jack R. Wentworth, whose Oct. 8 UDK letter deplored the "yell" that exhorted KU players to "Go Get Gonzo!" in the Indiana game.
May I add another "yell" that reeks with immaturity spilling from "yell" leaders' mouths: "Give 'em hell, Big Blue! Give
'em hell!'"
We arrived on the Hill scene in fall of 1967 and writhed during the first football Saturday afternoon upon hearing "cheers" from the student section: "Kill, Vernon, kill!"
This was a cheer? It's sickness and moral decay. Thinking students know it was a verbal return to ignorant days when Christians were led to the lions in the Roman coliseum. That the majority of the fans don't want such action "inspired" by "yell" leaders was evidenced after the unfortunate KU-Indiana play wherein Don Autry's leg was broken. Fans gave him a standing ovation for minutes while he was carried from the field.
The English language contains more than 600,000 words. Let our KU "yell" leaders be relevant and urge proper cheer words hereafter, or it's time for new, creative, cheerful cheer-leaders. Anybody can be a "yell" leader... witness the yelling in the streets these days.
THE UNIVERSITY DAYA
KANSAN
Dan McCarthy
Assistant Instructor of Journalism
Kansan Telephone Numbers
Newroom—UN 4-3648
Burkshire Office, UN 4-3658
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Kansan Record Review
Alive tomorrow
By Scott Nunley
"The Great Society" (like its political namesake) no longer exists, but it is as alive as tomorrow.
Born and buried in San Francisco, this 1965 rock quintet has been resurrected in 1968 on two fantastically talented albums: "Consoicuous Only in its Absence" and "How It Was."
Possibly the finest single cut is the "Society"s mellow arrangement of "Sally Go Round the Roses," with Grace Slick's voice nicely balanced and controlled.
Here, of course, was where Grace Slick ("The Jefferson Airplane") budded and bloomed. And if you think her full flowering on the "Airplane" 's new "Crown of Creation" is superb, look back three years and amaze yourself at the power of her early wailing: Buffy St. Marie and beyond.
It's easy enough to understand why "The Great Society" never hit the big markets—with Darby and Jerry Slick, Grace created a jazz-oriented sound heavily based on the raga, the Eastern riffo guitar-sounding guitar and eerie recorder styling, years ahead of its acceptance.
The beat is almost always secondary in these cuts overwhelmed by the soaring solo performances of Grace's haunting voice and Darby's heavy guitar.
But equally balancing the instrumentation the album's lyrics hit solidly with each line. Nothing is fluffed in for show, no "june-spoon" nonsense to pad out a monotonous drum bummer. "The Great Society" had words to say that are still with the best being recorded.
"Crowds are cheering, there's so much laughter: I feel so high I think I'll not come down for ever after!"
This soaring, the high ectasy of the happy life, preoccupied "The Great Society." Laughing with her audience at the Matrix on the Bay, Grace could declare that—
Their friends and heroes, the people they sing to, are Free people, having learned the secrets of willfull happiness:
"Things that he chooses to put in his mind, seem to have placed his sadness behind him," ("Don't Think So")
And of course the drug scene echoes about the interior of their work, whether covertly in instrumentation ("Father") that imitates the breathless chemical trip or overdry ("Often as I May") in thinly disguised lyrics:
"I love him as often as I may; and I will give him, before he goes away, the grass and wine born love that makes him laugh and gentle . . . the eyes so black and wide and acid clear!"
When the censors and narks were busy chasing comedian Lenny Bruce, "The Great Society" was celebrating his tragic career:
"Use a short word for 'loving' and Dad you up doing time . . . Oh Lenny we're so glad you're getting well!" ("Father Bruce")
Of course, "The Jefferson Airplane" has adapted much of "The Great Society"'s style into its own. The earlier group's original arrangements of "White Rabbit" and "Somebody to Love" became "Airplane" hits with stepped up tempo but few essential alterations—Grace learned a bit more confidence perhaps between performances.
At the end of the first resurrected album, Grace's hopeful promise "Thank you, we'll be back later" proved to be true. The chances are slim, however, for a third revival. This is likely to be it for a progressive group that is still not dated—we'd best treasure what we have.
But stringing out with the original is always one of the most satisfying ways to travel.
"The Great Society" is free now, it exists in non-time and in all spaces. Buy their precious albums and check in Grace Slick (#73) on your 1969 Playboy Jazz and Pop Poll.
'You take care of the Reds and yellows abroad and I'll take care of the Reds and blacks at home!