That yearly debate insanity has started
That yearly election insanity, euphemistically called "the debate," has begun again. The carnage is set to begin at 6:30 tonight in Ellsworth Hall, and it will be continued Tuesday at 4:30 p.m. in the Forum Room of the Kansas Union and at 8 p.m. in McCollum Hall.
The last time I heard—and in an election campaign the situation could have changed while the type was being set—these debates were to include four five-minute speeches, four three-minute rebuttals, and questions from the audience.
THAT'S DANDY-ROO for candidates who are punching a time-clock. But the debates will sway no votes.
Why? (1) The audience won't come to learn anything. They're there to jump on the bandwagon and join the cheering squads. And there will be 30 DU and Beta flunkies present to lead the hisses for the villain and the huzzas for the hero. Afterwards, with any luck, everybody can jump into their favorite motorcade and go screaming down Jayhawk Boulevard. Democracy in action.
(2) If, perchance, someone did slip in the side door
to find out the candidates' positions on issues, he will be sadly disappointed and his apathy will be reinforced.
THE ISSUES ARE NOT at stake in such a debate. It becomes a question of which candidate is the neatest dresser, which remembers to wink at the girls in the front row, which wears the English Leather, and which can better wield a verbal stiletto, "Image" and "personality" are the key words. Glibness, polish and a rah-rah sense of humor are the desirable attributes.
I'm all for fun—and Lord knows this campus needs more humor—but let's keep the chucks for the rest of the campaign. The beer parties, the motorcades and the clandestine, smoke-filled rooms provide plenty of opportunities for political games.
Why make a mockery of debate, which—properly developed—could be one of the few public-interest-oriented campaign devices on campus?
If (as it seems) there must be debates, let them be less farcical. Let them be cross-examination debates, so each candidate can directly put the other on the spot concerning key issues and platform planks. Keep the cheering squads and hoopla to a minimum.
$AWS^{^{\star}}elections$
Student elections seem to be running rife (or spreading like a pox—whichever you prefer) this week. Not only are student body elections Wednesday and Thursday, but AWS Senate elections are Tuesday
Hopefully, the flashier of the two-student body elections—will not cause campus women to neglect the AWS elections. They are fully as important.
NEXT YEAR AWS will be embarking upon extensive constitutional and structural reform. The Senate members and officers elected Tuesday will direct the formation of that constitution and the aims of that structural reform.
Further, the regulations of the recent Rules Convention must be approved by the AWS Senate—the Senate elected this Tuesday.
It is especially important that all campus women those living in residence halls, sororities, scholarship halls, off-campus housing, and married women-vote carefully Tuesday.
—Jacke Thayer
university forum
UP claims student rights as issue
(Editor's Note: The following are excerpts from the University Party White Paper on Student Rights. University Party feels that student rights are the basic issue of the campaign, and the party wishes part of their White Paper published in their section of University Forum.)
The University Party fully recognizes that the realization of the hope, or proposal, discussed in this paper will require long and intense effort, tempered with patience and understanding.
Nonetheless, we are fully confident that a responsive program of student rights, ideals and duties will eventually be formulated upon this, or a highly similar, proposal.
WE ALSO realize that university administrators who privately wish for such meaningful changes as we propose often feel constrained—by unfortunate circumstance — to publicly remain unresponsive. We fully sympathize with those who are bound by such a problem.
However, the University Party feels that never before has the need for a clear statement of student rights been so vitally necessary; nor has the time been so ripe for action.
The spring of 1966 has breathed an exciting promise of change upon the campus of KU—a promise of greater respect, freedom, and strength among the members of our university community.
THE PROMISE—a truly new, sincere, meaningful one—
is made by the University Party; a genuine coalition of students from all campus areas, which seeks a renewal of effort to establish KU as a national leader in the recognition of students as free, mature individuals who yearn to be responsible for their own acts, and who seek the experience of full citizenship as the best education of all.
It is with the confidence that the entire student body seeks new freedoms and individual responsibilities—similar in nature and philosophy to those so courageously achieved by KU's women-that the University Party has embarked upon some new directions in representative student government.
Of major importance in this journey is the fourth plank of the 1966 University Party platform:
The goal of—and our profound hope for—this proposal is that each student be recognized by the university as a fully accredited and responsible member of the community in which he lives—assuming all the rights, duties and obligations that such citizenship requires.
(4) Total abolition of disciplinary actions by the university in all areas other than those directly related to academic matters.
CLEARLY, it is wrong to chain students to the turmoil of a specie of double standards. In a society where civil or criminal laws regulate particular transgressions, only those laws
and the courts provided for their enforcement should be charged with punishing the transgressor. Where social and moral matters are concerned (such as are not specifically dealt with by statute), responsibility for regulation of those matters should be left to the individual, his parents and his peers.
Universities are formed with one basic goal: to educate young men and women. But, to teach what? Certainly English and physics. But morals and manners? A horrifying indictment befalls the American parent, and our system of pre-college schools if the answer is "yes!"
IF STUDENTS are removed from the guidance of their parents, and the university chooses to regulate the daily lives of these students above and beyond academic matters, the university must assume parental authority; not merely "in place of the parent," but as the parent in fact.
An educational institution has a responsibility to protect itself to the extent of providing penalties for the impairment of its academic functions. With the single exception of its legitimate police power in traffic regulation, the police powers of the university must be defined in relation to that all-inclusive phrase, "impairment of academic functions."
WE NOW ARE asked to accept a kind of sliding definition. Depending upon the amount of publicity received concerning the activity in question, the type of "crime" (which may run from "ungentlemanly conduct" to murder), the relationship of the criminal to the Endowment Association, the number of students the activity has directly affected, and other factors—the definition of the university's "proper role" constantly changes.
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY kansan For 76 Years, KU's Official Student Newspaper
Our deans are asked to be university functionaries, guidance counselors, judges, juries, prosecutors, witnesses for the defense, public relations men, and sometimes (when they have a spare moment) educators, as well. Such multiplicity of duties cannot be carried to its successful fruition in disciplinary cases where the university acts as parent—i.e., benevolent understanding for the individual student. The "loving parent" knows his child as an administrator can never know his students. To ask him to judge by any standard other than expediency—tempered by leniency—is absurd.
WOE UNTO HIM with the university albatross strapped about his neck, for the ends of his punishment shall justify the means. When guiltless students (not to mention the obviously guilty party) become matters of public conversation, student blood is shed on the sacrificial altar so that the name of the institution is not sullied. The claim that the present system "protects the student by giving him the benefit of the doubt" is pure rubbish.
Maturity is the assumption of a full role in society. This assumption includes all proper rights, privileges, and responsibilities as defined by the properly constituted civil authorities and personal conscience. Efforts by university officials to protect students from these responsibilities are beyond the purview of their authority.
KANSAN TELEPHONE NUMBERS
Newsroom—UN 4-3646 — Business Office—UN 4-3198
The Daily Kansan, student newspaper at The University of Kansas, is representative of the National Advertising Service. 18 East St. 50 St. New York, N.Y. 10022. Mail survey questions to the Department of Public Affairs and second class postage paid at Lawrence, Kan., every afternoon during business except Saturdays and Sundays. University holidays and examination periods. Goods, services and employment advertised in the University Daily Kansan are offered to all students without regard to color, creed or national origin.
The opinions expressed in the editorial column are those of the students whose names are signed to them. Guest editorial views are not necessarily the editor's. Any opinions expressed in the Daily Kansan are not necessarily those of The University of Kansas Administration or the State Board of Regents.
"Bacchanalia!" comes the cry to a background chorus of "How Ya' Gonna Keep 'Em Down on the Farm After They've Seen KU?" The obvious assumption is that, freed of restrictions other than those of the law, the average student will become some kind of satyr.
Daily Kansan editorial page Monday, March 28, 1966
2
If society risks possible corruption by acknowledged criminals to protect individual freedoms, why then should a university—supposedly dedicated to the development of leaders of society and intellectual exploration—do less?
IN SHORT, it is our feeling that increased student rights would mean more individual freedom, and less "bacchanalia." If a fraternity or individual student chooses to keep alcoholic beverages in private living quarters, it is none of the university's business.
The university itself has been disturbingly inconsistent in executing its own regulations. Depending upon who the student may be, whether he has the gross misfortune to meet a UPI reporter on his way into the Dean's office, or whether he can tell a good sob story—the student may be tapped on the hand with a "no-no" for shoplifting from the bookstore, or he may be "with drawn for proper rehabilitative treatment."
get placed on social probation?
Can a coed stay out all night and not be caught? It becomes a game for the few who are immature, and a hypocritical entrapment for the mature.
PRE-TRIAL action by the university forces the institution to take a public position on the guilt or innocence of the accused party—whether this judgment is intentional or not. The university would assume some risk if suspension policies were abolished—but, more important, the rights of the individual would be protected.
WE CONTEND that the current authority of the university often defeats its own narrow purpose. Students are challenged to "try to beat big brother." Can a fraternity throw a liquor party and not
In summary, University Party feels current administration policies in the area of student rights and regulations are not relevant to the needs and best interests of a responsible student body. Therefore, we pledge ourselves to work for the abolition of these outdated policies, and we urge all concerned students to assist us in this effort by supporting us in the coming student body elections, Wednesday and Thursday.