Another name change
"I am the lowest thing on earth," said Don Jenkins in the Kansas Union Friday. Then he and the rest of his new but old group proceeded to prove their point in front of the numerous passers-by in the Union.
"You gotta sing loud if you wanna end war and stuff," Arlo Guthrie has said. And Bill Berkowitz did his part, calling everyone from Dean Balfour to anybody with a T-neck a communist. "Join the Marines," Berkowitz shouted to the masses while he handed out leaflets stolen from the Marine recruiters on the other side of the room.
The seriousness of the situation seemed lost in the mirth of Mr. Berkowitz's shouts. His comrades laughed well. They even joined in occasionally. Rick Atkinson, his wife and others seemed only to be trying to outdo each other in yelling the most humorous line.
The arguments were the same as they have been intermittently since radical students abandoned the civil rights fight for
the then new Vietnam war. Only the names have changed. The new student left organization is called F.A.R.T.s (there now it's in print and you can change it to something someone would say in public).
Evidently the new argument revolves around the new organization, which the Rev. Tom Rehorn, in a lucid moment, chose to ban from the Wesley Foundation. Reports from different members of the organization indicate the problem emanates from the office of Dean of Students William Balfour.
Some say he okayed the organization. Others say he gave his approval if the name is changed-not an unfair request by any means.
At any rate the organization is not as yet an organization recognized by the administration. It's hard to say it matters much. The name will soon go the way of SDS, Student Voice and People's Voice. A noise by any other name is still a noise. And that seems to be all that comes from the KU militants of the new left. (ATJ)
A product of system
Student militants are the most direct products of the system toward which their militancy is directed.
Our society asks for non-violence, and very haughtily the student militant replies, "I disapprove of what you do, so I will not do as you say." He then acts violently to oppose society.
What he does, unknowingly, is to emulate the society which he opposes. He chooses to do as our society does: solve, or rather make a stupid attempt at solving problems with force and aggression, rather than with peace and reason.
Since early childhood, in school, in church and even in the cub scouts. Americans are taught patriotism, or a soapy allegiance which has for some time passed as patriotism. We are simply taught that the United States is good.
What then, that government which we have been taught is good acts with jets, bombs and troops first and negotiations second, is it little wonder that children will grow up to use force and aggression as a first course?
The irony of the actions of campus militants is that they think they are opposing a corruption by ignoring unpracticed ideals.
We all remember, for example, President John Kennedy's dramatic showdown in the Atlantic Ocean when Nikita Khrushchev was forced to return to the Soviet Union missiles intended for Cuba bases, which is where Soviet missiles belong—if missiles belong anywhere. While Americans applauded Kennedy's actions, few reflected on the fact that the United States has both the Soviet Union and China virtually surrounded with very similar weapons.
That was an example of the United States saying one thing (that no nation has the right to surround another nation with missiles) while doing another (surrounding other nations with missiles).
A legitimate reaction to the hypocrisies of America would be to weigh carefully the recommendations of an often mistaken government and the older generation it represents. A poor reaction is to act violently in the face of a violent
government's recommendation that youth act non-violently.
"To think is easy. To act is difficult. To act according to what one thinks is the most difficult of all," wrote Goethe.
Both the United States, which usually goes to the United Nations after it is securely involved in a military dispute, and militant students, who often storm administration centers before negotiating with administrators, have trouble correlating their thoughts and actions. Either could be a teacher for the other.(MS)
Gun study needed
"Shall we 'get behind' the new president, men?"
By RICHARD LOUV
In a decision that was made too quickly, with too little supporting evidence, the All Student Council (ASC) last Tuesday gave its endorsement to the use of firearms by campus police.
In making this decision the ASC essentially forgot to consider carefully the changing nature of this campus. Regardless of the moral or practical pros and cons, what really needs to be discussed is the very real social role that guns will play on this campus in the future.
There are far more black students at KU, and a rising political temperature has, in the last two years, moved KU out of the fifties. Joe College is dead, or dying.
Ten years from now, or perhaps two, what will the presence of firearms do to the general mood of the campus; will it create a mood conducive to Columbia-type violence . . . or not?
Early this year two armed policemen stood at the back of the room during the first SDS meeting, a peaceful meeting. Will the presence of guns be conducive to that peace in the future?
Neither Joe Goering, who made the proposal, nor Chief Moomau know all there is to know about both sides of the question. There are eminent psychologists and sociologists on this campus that could do a much better job of investigation.
Most people have never thought about this issue before, probably because they have been conditioned to an attitude that violence can be prevented only by counter-violence. But no one can forget the Chicago police, who came prepared for something to happen.
Bill Hansen, Shawnee Mission graduate student, told of seeing a student at Berkeley shot down by a policeman for calling him a "pig." The Boy Scout motto "Be Prepared" takes on a less idealistic meaning in the context of this situation in which a policeman came prepared, prepared for violence, assuming violence would occur. This is an adolescent society, one that assumes war will come, and prepares for it, that assumes race riots will occur and spends its money on preparation for those riots instead of preventing them.
A different kind of preparation is needed. A preparation based on more expert opinion and more supporting evidence than even the word of a respected student body vice-president, or a respected police chief. The issue should not die; it should be referred to experts. Perhaps in this way there could be more than lip-service given to Robert Kennedy's ideal, "to tame the savageness of man and make gentle the life of the world."
Letters to the editor A rather drab group
To the Editor:
After talking at some length with Rick Atkinson, Donald Jenkins and Bill Berkowitz (whom I take to be the self-appointed leaders of campus radicalism), I am led to believe that the following is characteristic of their views.
They do not believe that their own views about educational theory, student power, international and domestic human relations are "tight" in any ultimate sense, presumably because there is no "rightness" upon which one can structure his own views. They promote their views for two primary reasons: A. To realize what they take to be their own self-interest; B. Because their views are assumed to reflect the genuine interests of people whom they champion.
Disgustingly, the majority of the students responsible to KU radicalism are espoused KU radicals who don't seriously question the specific goals or tactics of their self appointed leaders. For example, Mr. Jenkins espouses the view (being an admitted irrationalist) that conventional scholarly research isn't just incomplete, it's absurd. There is nothing quite as incongruous as watching a "radical" graduate student applaud a forceful personality whose interests are antithetical to his own. As another example, Mr. Berkowitz himself admits that his brand of tactics probably retends growth, and consequently the power, of student radicalism. So, what is serving Mr. Berkowitz' self interest, c.f. perhaps Freud for possible explanation, is destructive at times to the self interest of a general radicalism.
It seems that the rational presentation of issues in behalf of a general KU radicalism is clearly lacking in this leadership. What passes for radicalism seems to be nothing more than inflammatory rhetoric, personal effrontery and intimidation. Perhaps because the rest of us interested in change at KU are too lazy to act, we may have little progress; but at a minimum we ought not ignorantly confuse our interests with those of Don, Rick Atkinson and Bill. Red paint doth not disguise a DRAB, narrow elitism.
David Baird Philosophy Graduate Student
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