emerald
Vol. 82, No. 152
Eugene, Oregon 97403
Tuesday, May 12, 1981
Photo by Erich Boekelheide
A piece for peace
Lane County Commissioner Jerry Rust and friends enjoy an
apple pie presented to them Monday by the Citizens for Lasting
Security and Citizens for Safe Energy. The groups presented
pies to local notables as an alternative celebration of Mothers'
Day and protest against the nuclear arms race.
f
Activist urges no aid
for South Africans
By MIKE RUST
Ol the Emerald
If the United States and other Western coun
tries were to adopt a "moral" attitude toward
South Africa, the racist Nationalist regime would
collapse, says Fred Dube of the African National
Congress.
"We don’t believe they would last a year. A
year is probably too long," says Dube.
The deputy United Nations representative of
the South African organization said in an inter
view Monday that Western economic investment
and clandestine arms shipments prop up that
country’s white minority government both mater
ially and psychologically.
"What’s sustaining them now is that they
think surely that if things come to a push, that if
the ANC in particular is going to be in power, then
the United States, Britain and France would come
to our help.
“So that psychologically it makes them re
sistant to any form of change.
"That’s number one. Number two is that if
they were to pull out their economic investments
in South Africa, South Africa would collapse."
ANC, founded in 1912, is the oldest black
liberation organization in South Africa and has
observer status at the United Nations. At first
nonviolent, the ANC has advocated armed resis
tance since 1961, Dube says.
Dube, 51, has been involved in the conflict in
South Africa for 26 years, four of which were
spent in prison. Five months of his 1963-68 prison
stay were passed in “90-day detention" where the
monotony of solitary confinement was interrupted
only by police beatings Dube has lived abroad
since 1968.
However, he fully expects to return to South
Africa.
“The morale of the people and the support of
the people for the African National Congress has
grown to a point where even newspapers who
Photo by Erich Boekelheide
Fred Dube
support the government now have been able to
come out with things that three years ago would
have been considered sacreligious — asking the
government, and telling the government that they
cannot afford not to talk to the African National
Congress."
ANC has organized an underground
movement within the country that has carried out
many acts of sabotage, Dube says.
Support for the ANC is widespread among
both black African countries and "non-aligned’’
countries, Dube says.
ANC hopes to establish a "new society,"
Dube says, adding that rejection of capitalism
does not necessarily mean embracing commun
ism. The situation and conditions in South Africa
make a racial war inevitable, but the result will be
a country where blacks and whites can live
together, he says. ANC action is directed "against
policies,” rather than race, Dube adds.
Transcendental tree talk?
Humankind should communicate with trees, speaker advises
By CAROLINE PETRICH
Ol the Emerald
Dorothy Maclean talks to trees.
And they talk back
But the trees don't communicate in English or with
a wave of their branches. Maclean says she commun
icates through mental attunement or meditation.
And she doesn’t converse with the actual tree, but
with an angel — or as she prefers to call it, a "deva,'' the
Sanskrit word for angel.
Maclean says the world may suffer dire
consequences if too many trees are stripped from the
land.
"The trees are the skin of the earth. If the skin is
destroyed, the planet perishes."
Maclean is one of the co-founders of the Findhorn
Garden, a successful commune in northern Scotland
She spoke to a Eugene audience last week about her
experiences.
Maclean and several friends began the garden in
1962 after being fired from their jobs at a nearby resort.
They moved to a trailer park, Findhorn, and continued
their old habit of meditation. Through meditation, each
would become “attuned” to the inner self, thereby
becoming unified with the exterior world
Maclean held her first conversation with the deva of
the garden pea, the "landscape angel." The deva
greeted Maclean and asked what had taken human
beings so long to talk to plants.
Maclean's roommate wanted to grow a garden but
wasn't sure of gardening's dos and don’ts. So she gave
Maclean a list of 15 questions to ask the landscape
deva. Following the deva's tips, they planted the garden
in dry, sandy soil.
The phenomenal garden in the sand attracted
many visitors who wanted to discover Findhorn’s
secret.
"We didn’t dare say we were talking to angels,"
Maclean says, “so we said we had a good compost."
Maclean then began to communicate with the
Monterey Cypress.
"The tree said, 'Trees are not so much doers but
be-ers. Man can only dream of spaces we can be,' ”
Maclean says.
Where do men and women fit into this cosmic
pattern?
"We are the consciousness of the planet," Ma
clean says.
And what makes us different from animals and
plants is our creativity, which Maclean considers a
"gift.”
"We are angels Our destiny is to be conscious
angels.”
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Emerald photo
What do trees have to say? Plenty, says Dorthy Maclean.