Orman Daily
EMERALD
The Oregon Daily Eme*ald published Monday throug^Fnday during
■except Oct. 30; Dec. 5 through Jan. 3, Mar 6 through 38^ m y ’Students of the University
.-rate*: $5 per school year; $2 per term.
rates: per * * -r~ -- ^
^Opinions expressed on ihe ASUO^r^/thf^U^rsity. 'initialededitoriafs are written by
byW editor. -
’Anita Holmes, Editor
Don Thompson, Business Manager
Lorna Larson, Managing Editor_'
Shiri-EY Hillard, Barbara Williams, Assts. to Business Manager
yjev/s Editor: Norman Anderson
Sports Editor: John Barton
Asst. News Editors: Marjory Bush, Bill Frye,
Gretchen Grondahl. , „ . , „
Asst. Managing Editors: Bob Funk. Gretchen
Grondahl, Fred Vosper.
Night Editor: Sarah Turnbull.
Circulation Manager: Jean Lovell.
Advertising Manager: Virginia k-e'logg
Don Miller. Val Schultz, Harriet Vahey.
Who Leads the Way to Salem?
Oregon’s own congress convenes this morning at Salem.
Legislators, their families, and lobbyists from all parts of the
state have dug into the capital city in preparation for a lengthy
and heated session.
Here in Eugene—72 miles south of Salem—we students study
government from textbooks while they enact it on the floor
of the statehouse.
Why don’t we drop the books for a Tuesday or Thursday
afternoon and sit in on Oregon’s 46th biennial legislative as
sembly? A crowded calendar day in the legislature and a light
day on the campus could be chosen.
Such a pilgrimage to Salem must be initiated and organized
by the students. No administrative member of the University
is allowed within shouting distance of a senator or represen
tative while the session is underway.
But we surely must have a political science club or even the
international relations organization—one of which could
mastermind the trip. Details such as date, transportation, and
arrangements with officials in Salem would have to be worked
out.
The Emerald would gladly give all possible assistance, and
the Executive Council should be of some help.
If we University of Oregon students aren t the moles peo
ple say we are—we’ll go to Salem this winter. But we’re not
suggesting the trip for what people say—there must be many
more students who, like us, would like to learn government
from the gallery as well as from the book.
Better Understanding-World Law School
The student newspaper of Harvard Law School heartily
approves of the projected world law school, which has long
been needed to provide a broader approach to world legal
problems.”
Such a school, according to the Harvard paper, “would at
tack international legal problems from a world viewpoint.
“Lawyers in the international field are beset with a host of
special difficulties not encountered by national lawyers. There
is no single legal international framework.
“Lawyers must come to understand the basic concepts and
■ways of thought of those trained in alien systems of law. Spe
cial training and skills are required. Present law schools do
not do an adequate enough job.”
It is curious that such a school was not heretofore estab
lished. Such a step many decades ago might well have kept
the world from the course it steers today.
When the legal minds of the world fail to understand the
basic concepts and ways of thought of each other, global un
derstanding on many other levels is impossible.
And this lack of basic understanding seems to lie beneath
most of today’s troubles. Without a question, the great gap
of understanding between the Far East and the West set off
the first sparks when the foreigner moved into China, Japan,
and Korea.
If every major nation of the world established a law school
emphasizing the international . . . but today that is an if of
immense proportions.____
I
V
i
THE DAILY ^
to the University business office for moving the deadline
of dormitory board and room payments to the tenth of
each month. University paychecks are issued the tenth,
and it bad been a long standing complaint that dorm bills
were due the fifth.
THE OREGON LEMON ...
to Executive Council members and Howard Lemons, as
sistant to President Newburn, for not catching the legal
quirk in the proposed new student body cards until Sun
day afternoon before the pictures were to be taken. The
legal technicality has temporarily squashed the cards.
Morals in Colleges: a Series
Campus Dating and
Courtship—No. 3
This is the third of a series
of articles on the college stu
dents of 1950—their outlook
on life, their moral codes and
behavior, their changing
standards. The series origi
nally ran in the New York
Post.
By Max Lerner
The bright college years are
the time for courtship, and the
campus-is as good a place for it
as any. The late teens are the
years of sexual and emotional as
well as mental growing up. These
are the impressionable years,
when body, looks, brain, wit, ath
letic prowess, grace, skill, per
sonality and achievement all
leave a deep imprint.
But with many—let us not mis
take it— there is already evident
a depth and seriousness of court
ship that shows they are on the
threshold of becoming mature
persons. They are thinking in col
lege not only about a career but
about marriage. They are look
ing about not only for a job but
for a mate.
There has been a tendency re
cently for the anthropologists
who study American civilization
to have some fun with these
youngsters and their courtship
habits. I mean, of Course, not a
rowdy and ribald fun but a sol
emn, intellectual kind of fun.
Take, for example, two recent
books by the British anthropolo
gist Geoffrey Gorer (“The Ameri
can People”) and the American
anthropologist Margaret Mead
(“Male and Female”). Both
books include a long discussion
of the pattern of “dating” by
American boys and girls.
Gorer especially has a hilarious
time with American “dating,” as
if he were describing the highly
patterned and ritualized behav
ior of a primitive group. He links
it not with love for some one in
the other sex, but with esteem
for oneself. He regards it not as
part of courtship, but as a kind of
game from which every element
of genuine emotion has been
squeezed out.
In fact, he says it is “compar
able to such a competitive game
Re: Hash
Psychology-Humbug!
Columnist Lampoons It
-^ By Bob Funk ——
We are led to believe by the
vernacular press that anybody
can be a psychologist these days.
Instead of spending the evening
with television (as people liv
ing in places other than Oregon
and the Lake Tchad region are
wont to do) you can delve into
dianetics. Popular parlor games
are fast channeling into the
“Name My Complex’’ category ,
and if Mr. Lamb were still alive
he would probably be writing a
child’s version of Mr. Freud as he
did of Mr. Shakespeare.
We are not at all sure about
psychology. W’e don’t care for it.
(Psychologist’s note: those who
do not like psychology are un
doubtedly psychotics who fear
the science because it may reveal
facets Of their personalities which
they are afraid to face). It seems
to us that psychology is the sci
ence which has enabled the un
happy to see how miserable they
really are. “How am I unhappy
—let me count the ways . . .”
might be an author’s preface to
many psychology books.
Determined not to be held back
by our own rather medieval views
on the subject, we have made our
debut into the field of popular
psychoanalyzntion for everyone,
and have found it easier than
thinking. To be a good psycholo
gist, we discover, one needs only
an appercipient mind, and a mo
tivating interest (plus intelli
gence, years of experience, and
two or three college degrees).
Our first Project in Psychology
(we may record other’s later, or
hold them all to be published in a
large book called Contradictions)
was in the field of mental images.
Everybody who keeps up with
these things knows that our
minds are rich in imagery, which
helps us to think. For instance,
if someone were to yell the word
“dog” quite suddenly, an image
of a dog might leap into our con
sciousness. Or we might see a set
of teeth (fear motive) or a litter
of pups (probably Oedipus com
plex) or a section of fur (mater
ialistic motive).
Now to get back to imagery.
We interviewed several persons
to sec just what kind of imagery
their minds dealt with.
The first person interviewed
saw the image of a bathtub when
we yelled “bathtub” quite sud
denly. We labeled this person
Predictable Mentality. The sec
ond interviewee saw a large
snake w’hen we said “reptile” and
said they felt shivery all over.
We labeled this person an Emo
tional Type Mentality.
The third person saw nothing
at all when we yelled a word, so
we called him Non-Mental, or
Blank Type. The fourth person re
fused to co-operate, so we label
ed him an Evasive, or Hidden
Psychotic Type.
Having completed our Mental
Imagery Survey, we are now
working on a General Compila
tion and Evaluation, with Foot
notes.
as chess, in which the rules are
known to, and observed by, both
parties, but in which each move
is a response to the previous
iuov'e *of the other player.”
He calls an invitation to a date
“a pleasant and mutually profit
able evening to enhance each
other’s self-esteem and demon
strate one’s skill in the game.
He cites the case of a “typical
Midwestern college fraternity,”
in which “ the senior members
insisted that the juniors have at
least three dates a week; and
further that these dates should be
with girls who did honor to the
fraternity, and, barring betroth
al, should not be too frequently
with the same girl.”
Margaret Mead is a good deal
more subtle than Gorer, and the
last part of her book, “Male and
Female,” is a richly woven tapes
try of American sexual attitudes.
Yet she too falls into the over
simplification of Gorer about our
institution of “dating.” -«
She says that the boy takes
out the girl “as he takes out his
new car, but more impersonally,
because the car is his for good,
but the girl is his only for the ev
ening.” She defines a successful
date as one “on which there is no
petting at all, but merely a bat
tle of wits, of verbal parrying,
while the boy convinces the girl
that he is so pbpular that he has
the courage to ask for anything,
and the girl convinces the boy
that she is so popular that she
has to give nothing.”
I don’t know which of the two
over-simplifications about young
Americans trouble me more—the
one spread by the sensationalists
who say that the campuses are
dens of iniquity filled with teen
age Casanovas and Lilliths in
dulging in wild orgies and prac
ticing the most monstrous ob
scenities, or the one which is be
ing spread by the intellectuals
who tell us that our young camp
us boys and girls are only cold
and calculating strategists.
If 1 speak strbngly about two
social scientists whose work as a
whole I value, it is because I have
in mind the actual boys and girls
whom I have known on many
campuses, and because it is dan
gerous to let a very attractive
anthropological theory distort
the real human beings that every
practicing teacher knows.
(Please turn to page three)
Kampus Karacters
Another term is underway, and once again the academic prof and the
activity-ite take a long, despairing look at one another.