The Brotherhood Award
(Editor's Note—The following is an editorial written by the late Ron Gallagher as a student at the University of Kansas. Gallagher was killed Saturday in Vietnam where he was working as a free-lance photographer.
Melvin Mencher, Kansas news advisor from 1958-62, wrote, "Five years ago this month, Ron wrote an editorial in the Kansan that expressed his view of journalism. The Daily Kansan had won a gold medal, first-place award from the National Conference of Christians and Jews for its stories and articles on discrimination in off campus housing. It was the first college newspaper to win this award. Ron wrote about the duties of a journalist. Perhaps it was this sense of obligation that made him go to Vietnam. He wrote the following editorial:)
The National Brotherhood Mass Media award for editorials the National Conference of Christians and Jews presented to the Kansan today is both recognition of the efforts of the Kansan staff and a tribute to the entire University.
THE KANSAN is a student newspaper. It is owned by the students of the University and could not long exist without their support. As a student owned paper the Kansan owes its existence to the University administration, as do all similarly constituted organizations.
Thus the award that the Kansan has won reflects credit not only on those who are and have been actively engaged in its operation but also upon the student owners and the administration which have allowed it to do its job.
It has not always been easy for either the administration or the students to support the Kansan. The Kansan has taken positions that have been opposed to both administration policy and the thinking of a majority of students. Some Kansan opinions have even brought criticism from outside the University.
YET, THE STUDENT OWNERS and the University responsible for the Kansan's existence have always allowed the Kansan the right to express these opinions.
There is no doubt that a free and independent student newspaper can exist only where there is a university administration and student body that is strong enough to guarantee its operation.
The history of the free press reveals that it has only been able to exist in an atmosphere where those with the power to control its existence have had the strength not to exert it.
There have been threats to the Kansan's continued operation as a completely free and independent newspaper. Some individuals, who contend that the Kansan is "irresponsible." have attempted to pressure those who can control the Kansan into using this control to effect certain changes. These individuals invariably refer to the Kansan as "irresponsible." Is it possible that what they are really trying to say is that they do not agree with the Kansan? It seems that one man's "irresponsibility" is another's Brotherhood award.
THOSE NEWSPAPERS that attempt to do their job in their communities know well the same pressures that the Kansan has experienced from time to time. There is always the subscriber who cancels his subscription in disagreement with the paper's policy or the advertiser who threatens to discontinue advertising. Yet these papers continue in the job that they think important without yielding to those who bring pressure. For yielding would end the paper's free and independent policy and make it a tool of those outside pressures.
The Kansan won this award, in competition with the best commercial newspapers in the country, for daring to discuss problems that many would rather have left unmentioned. Since the Kansan began commenting on discrimination at KU we have noted that conditions, which were at that time comparatively good, have become better until today KU students are more tolerant than ever before.
BUT THE DISCRIMINATION problem still exists at KU. It is a problem that has met its solution in only a few places. Thus discrimination shall continue to be a subject for Kansan editorial comment until that day when equality of the races will be a fact rather than an ideal.
The Kansan is proud of this Brotherhood award and it hopes that its student owners and the University administration share this pride. This accomplishment is proof of the merits of a truly free university.
The people say—
To the Editor:
As almost every statement made in the article "Cruel play opens" (UDK, March 13. 1967, p. 1) is wrong I only can come to the conclusion that the author, Ned Valentine, (1) has not the slightest knowledge of the subject he
is dealing with, (2) has not read the play on which he is writing;
"The Fersecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as Performed by the Inmates of the Asylum of Charenton Under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade" (short "Marat Sade") neither
LITTLE MAN ON CAMPUS
I SUSPECT THAT EVERY NOW AND THEN PROFESSOR ADAMS HITS ON A RATHER TOUCHY SUBJECT,"
"concerns the ghastly experience through which an assassin is put," nor "deals with a conflict between the Marquis de Sade and Jean-Paul Marat" (there is no "conflict" at all in the play, and it is part of the author's dramatic theory not to show any "conflict", but to present situations). Set in the bathouse of the Asylum of Charenten in 1808 the play shows the different aspects under which a revolution can be seen: While the Marquis de Sade (an individualist who does not see any sense in a revolution) and Jean-Paul Marat (a fanatic believer in revolution) are discussing this subject, the excess of the French Revolution is performed by the inmates.
The author, Peter Wiess, is not a German, but a Swedish playwright (he prefers to be called "European"): Born in Germany, he is living since 1939 in Stockholm and is a citizen of Sweden.*)
The English director Peter Brook (not Brooks) has not "developed" the "Theatre of Cruelty." his ideas are based on a concept expressed by the French playwright and producer Antonin Artaud in the essays of his book "The Theatre and Its Double" (1938).
Sincerely,
Horst Claus
Assistant Director
of the show
- The play also was written in 1622, not in 1964.
Daily Kansan
2
editorial page
Wednesday, March 15, 1967
"We've Shown That We're Willing To Go More Than Half Way”
UDK Movie Review: The Endless Summer
Surfing movie great documentary
Bruce Brown's "The Endless Summer" is such a movie. Its discussion of the fine sport of surfing becomes poetry as Brown's sensitive camera expeses the classic rhythms of man and board and wave.
By SCOTT NUNLEY
Every moviegoer has his favorite documentary, a film valued for itself and not merely for its factual content. In recent years a popular poll would certainly include the best of Disney's nature films, and such others as "Mondo Cane" and "To Die in Madrid."
THE RELATIONSHIPS between men and the various seas have fascinated poets of all ages and languages. Brown reveals a new and elegant but strangely intimate relationship not easily recognized in the jam of turned-on California surfers. "The real surfer." Brown says, "wants to be alone with the waves." His film follows two very ordinary and very devoted surfers around the world in search of this new partnership between man and the sea.
At its worst, however, "The Endless Summer" descends into the lecture hall or home-movie parlor. Brown must be credited with his film's failures as directly as he is with its successes. It is his casual, bantering narrative that provides the weakest sections, destroying with uninspired language what he had created with inspired cinematography.
Perhaps the film might have avoided the documentary format entirely. The animated maps, the jarring inserts of great surfers performing might have been easily replaced by a director of Brown's talent. The accompanying narration might have been allowed to emerge from the photography itself.
Brown's world of surfing bears little resemblance to "Gidget"s. He creates a documentary about beauty, courage, skill and laughter. Almost he creates an heroic stance for his board riders, almost a classic myth of man and sea.
KANSAN TELEPHONE NUMBERS
Newsroom—UN 4-3646 — Business Office—UN 4-3198
The Daily Kansan, student newspaper at The University of Kansas, is represented by National Advertising Service, 18 East 50 St. New York, N.Y. 10022. Students can apply for a position in the postage paid at Lawrence, Kan., every afternoon during the University year except Saturdays and Sundays. University holidays and examination periods. Accommodations, goods, services and employment advertised in the University Day Care Centers 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.
EXECUTIVE STAFF
EXECUTIVE STAFF
Managing Editor ... Joan McCaoe
Business Manager ... Tony Chop
Editorial Editors ... Dan Austin, Barb Phillips