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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 21, 1970)
Opinion The fact is, it is the young who have in their own amateurish, even grotesque way, gotten dissent off the adult drawing board. They have torn it out of the books and journals an older generation of radi cals authored, and they have fashioned it into a style of life. They have turned the hypotheses of disgruntled elders into ex periments, though often without the will ingness to admit that one may have to concede failure at the end of any true experiment. When all is said and done, however, one cannot help being ambivalent toward this compensatory dynantism of the young. For it is, at last, symptomatic of a thor oughly diseased state of affairs. It is not ideal, it is probably not even good that the young should bear so great a respon sibility for inventing or initiating for their society as a whole. It is too big a job for them to do successfully. It is indeed tragic that in a crisis that demands the tact and wisdom of maturity, everything that looks most hopeful in our culture should be building from scratch—-as must be the case when the builders are absolute be ginners. —Theodore Roszak. The Making of a Counter Culture, Reflections on the technocratic society and its youthful opposition m DEMAND! *END ROl \2-m ... temmNfr h-£SMUSH DM-\ 1 cm center 14-fi/OMQRB 1 tfuffputau Letters Emphatic disassociation The Arab Student Association held an unscheduled meeting Thursday, Jan. 13, in connection with implicating its name in the Emerald, on the previous day with the proposed “People’s Trial,” organized by the Jan. 14 Coalition. The organization adopt ed a resolution to this effect: The Arab Student Association wishes to emphatically disassoci ate itself from all activities or ganized and conducted by the Jan. 14 Coalition. The Association calls upon the Emerald to print a correction con cerning linking the organization’s name with the Jan. 14 Coalition in Monday’s paper. We understand and wish it known that the Em erald’s reporting staff made a mis take in including the association’s name among the groups support ing and organizing the Jan. 14 Coalition. The Arab Student As sociation had no intention of lending such support. Any parti cipation by Arab Students in the trial was on an individual basis and should be so regarded. Abdel Halim President ROTC confronted The other day, out of mere curiosity, 1 decided to attend an ROTC class. I’d refuse to be a part of any force like our Army but I wanted to know what kind of education these possible offi cers receive. I was politely received in James McDanial's class on Jan. 15, though I was told that next time I was to have permission prior to attending the class. The lecture of the day con - cerned military courtesies such as the use of sir in addressing a senior officer, the use of the sa lute and some supposedly logi cal explanation for a junior offi cer opening and closing doors for his senior! The logic being that the senior has more work to do, so he must get to his job faster through doors opened by his ju nior. I asked a few questions con cerning the psychological conse quences of siring and the salute but McDanials seemed to deny that there could be any detrimen tal effects upon soldiers. I could have argued every mil itarily sided point McDanials made, however, when the group of anti ROTC people approached the buildings, he dismissed the class as he said he would, earlier. The majority of those in the class left, looking like fourth graders, pleased to get out of class due to a lire drill. While the marchers shouted out side locked classroom doors, 1 attempted to argue my anti - war stance with those remaining, in eluding McDanials. Although I got the same old arguments and falsehoods about the war in Viet nam, a couple of boys I talked to seemed concerned and somewhat frightened that their justifications for enrolling didn’t stand upon sound foundations. People, my point is that we can confront these enrollees on a one to one basis in class, raising questions as to the validity and morality of their acceptance of indoctrination. If these boys are confronted by a large group of people in their small classrooms, certainly they will get paranoid and start to reason in military lines. If we could turn on a few at a time to the possible conse quences of their future actions perhaps they will not enroll in ROTC, therefore ROTC will cease to exist. I think it is worth a try. David Parker Junior, Liberal Arts Established channels A group of students with no dis cernable program of interest to the bulk of the members of the University community has just forced the adjournment of the monthly meeting of the general faculty (Jan. 14). I suppose they felt it worth while to demonstrate that a small group can disrupt the orderly pro cedure of a large unarmed assem bly. Was there any question in their minds about that before? The cost to the general Univer sity community was delay in dis cussing and possibly passing leg islation to reduce the nine-hour English Composition requirement to six hours and possibly asking the President to establish a com mittee to review the contracts under which ROTC courses are presently taught here, among oth er things. None of the items on the agen da for the general faculty meet ing was particularly earth-shak ing, but with regard to those two at least I should have thought ra tional students would have re garded them as somewhat more urgent than the fun and games that took their place. Does anybody seriously imagine that in a ‘politicized” and "po larized" atmosphere the left wing and poor people will find their lot improved? Why should ra tional people prefer irresponsible hysteria to mere smugness. See ing in our University there are channels for achieving changes in course content, administrative structure below the State Board level and, 1 think (but would be happy to know facts to the con trary if 1 am uninformed) any other aspects of the organization and operation of the University, it is difficult to understand why any proposal that can stand pub lie scrutiny is not presented through established channels. Is it thought that the Univer sity community, the legislature of Oregon or the public-at-large will be more kindly disposed to de mands presented to the accom paniment of riot? Or that changes can be wrought by riot that the University community, the legis lature of Oregon or the public at-large do not want? Or is it pre tended that merely shutting down the orderly operation of the Uni versity will somehow benefit some body? Suppose a real issue should arise and a demonstration might be felt to be helpful; would to day’s activities increase its chan ces of being noticed sympathetic ally? In short, I am not only confus ed about the motives of today’s demonstrators, but am also sus picious that some may have lost contact with reality. Alfred Rubin Associate Professor of Law Abdicating reason I have noticed in the aftermath of last Wednesday's kangaroo court that no one has got the essential point about that “trial” or about the radicals’ “demands” on this or any other occasion. President Clark declined to play along with the radicals, be yond the point of pretending with them that they actually had something to say, on nothing but the contention that the trial ver dict was predetermined and hence, “art" rather than dialog, or whatever the jargon calls it these days. That he in particular failed to make the one right reply to the contemptible arrogance of these hoodlums—namely, that the ad ministrative policies and educa tional program of the University are not subject to their whims or anybody else’s in the student body—reflects on his value to the people of Oregon as an administra tor of their university. The University is public prop erty, which means that it is own ed by and operated for the ben efit of the people of Oregon — who pay the bills. The Univer sity's administration is employed by the people of the state to en sure efficient operation of the fa cility, for the purposes intended by the people of the state. The faculty are employees of the University and the students are customers of the services pro vided by the University. There is nothing sacred or mystical about either role: no spe cial rights or privileges accrue to students and faculty of a school qua students and faculty. In their respective roles as cus tomers and employees, students and faculty have no more right to determine administrative policies than post office patrons and pos tal clerks have to determine the price of postage stamps or the subject matter of commemora tive stamps. The University is not a political agent: it is an educational service supported by taxpayers. The Uni versity is not a social action cen ter: there are large numbers of us who do not care about the per sonal problems of people we do not know, and regard any de mands to the controversy as un warranted interference. That stu dents and faculty should run the University to suit their own pur poses, which will change moment to moment according to whether left wing or right wing or mod erate thugs seize control of the machinery of command, is an ar bitrary and contemptible abroga tion of the property rights of the people who own the University— Oregon taxpayers. For President Clark or any body else to reject the demands of the Jan. 14 Coalition or any other pressure group of whatever po litical stripe, on any grounds whatever, except that it is none of their damn business, is to abdi cate reason and justice, not to mention relevance. For an admin istrator in President Clark’s po sition it is worse—it is disloyalty to his employers and ought to be treated as such. John Keim Sophomore, Slav. Lang. Intellectual suicide? The SDS says “the University is an integral part of the military industrial - educational complex," noting that it benefits from fed eral grants, maintains financial relationships with huge corpora tions, and has board members in volved in big business. Granted. Is the University there by guilty of perpetuating the war and our other assorted afflictions? I find this hard to buy. Nor am I clear about their remedies other than blood and confusion. Federal money supports facul ty research, graduate training, and the library. Should we decline such support and commit intel lectual suicide? State Board members are in volved in big business. So are most successful Oregonians. Gov ernors appoint such people to state boards. The University does deal with big corporations. They sell us things we need: cars, typewrit ers. computers, paper towels. ... It could liquidate its corporate in vestments, but what would it then invest in? Government bonds? Mom-and-Pop grocery stores? Why snub marketable as sets that yield a favorable re turn? The Marxist tenets cf the SDS are simply wrong. On bal ance, “big business” and “high finance” have lost, not gained, from war. Nor are they propo nents of racism, pollution, or slums. Space forbids elaboration, but on the war-profiteering charge let me quote from a recent New Republic (Dec. 20, p. 15): “Although America’s munition makers are thought to be reap ing a financial bonanza from the Vietnam war, the facts indicate otherwise. In 1965 the top five defense contractors were Gener al Dynamics, Lockheed, General Electric and United Aircraft. By the beginning of 1969, one of the big five, Douglas has been squeez ed out of existence; a second one, Lockheed, was in trouble. Of the three remaining, two were under severe financial pressure. For many war contractors, Viet nam has been a headache; for others it has been disaster.” Henry Goldstein Assoc. Prof, of Economics Disheartening task The University community might like to share an example of frustration and resultant humor that occurred in my Anthropol ogy 101 class on Thursday, Jan uary 15, 1970. When I arrived at 10:30, a student whose pic ture appeared on the front page of the Emerald, Friday, January 16 (bottom picture, fourth per son from the left) asked to speak for a few minutes. I complied. After discussing the Moratori um, the Vietnam War, and other matters for three or four min utes, he asked for questions. A student asked him if he would please leave since he was pay ing money to attend scheduled classes and hear scheduled lec turers, not political lectures. If he wanted to listen to a political lecture he could go to one of the rallies. The lecturing student replied (undoubtedly without thinking) that that was the problem: when they held rallies no one went to them. At this point the stu dents in the audience (perhaps two-thirds to three-fourths of normal attendance) began to laugh and heckle the student so that he was forced to leave the hall. I could not help but reflect on the poor fellow’s plight: when you cannot even succeed in radi calizing the students, how can you expect to succeed with the general populace? It certainly is a disheartening and frustrating task being a student revolution ary. Philip Grant Asst. Prof., Anthro.
