s4e Sirrian Daitj Seventy-eight years of editorial freedom Edited ,and managed by students of the University of Michigan under authority of Board in Control of Student Publications Suzy Homemaker, (also in black) $19.95 420 Maynard St., Ann Arbor, MMich. News Phone: 764-0552 Editorials printed in The Michigan Doily exp ress the individual opinions of staff writers or: the editors. This must be noted in all reprints. SUNDAY, JANUARY 19, 1969 NIGHT EDITOR: LESLIE WAYNE Sunday morning By BILL LAVELY VE KNOWN for some time now that the world is changing quickly, but it took a visit to a toy store to make me realize just how much has happened in the ten years since I was a child. More impressive than the changes, however, was the degree to which prevailing social winds and conflicts are reflected, in the toys that children play with. Little girls, I discovered, are still playing with dolls. But to go with the dolls are a display of ap- pliances that would warm the heart of a General Electric execu- tive. A child now can play house with suburban conveniences that re- flect the space age technology of her mother's suburban kitchen, such as, the "easy wash dish- washer," featuring "new jet ac- tion." MODERN TECHNOLOGY has really revolutionized childrens' toys. When I was a kid, anything that ran on a battery was pretty neat. Now you can get a "Jack and Jill TV/radio set," or perhaps a "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs telephone" complete with to the voices of each dwarf. talk. Furthermore, they even have boy dolls with a realistic anatomy. The toy companies have certainly kept pace with technology, and at long last are even willing to recognize the existence of the human body. But in social consciousness, they still lag behind. In response to the pot scene among the micro-bopper set, there has been no miniature hookah or roach clip accessory to the Earbie collection. But the psychedelic world has had a definite influence on the toy scene as evidenced by a series of toys which may fairly be called "light show sets." But the most attractive toys, to my mind, in the toy stores today are the gigantic stuffed animals. WHEN I WAS A little boy, I had a teddy bear which I called brown bear. (Because was brown.) Today, under the influence of psychedelic fantasy, the toy stores would present me with "chartreuse bear" or "magenta bear." And more exotic creatures-jungle and circus ani- mals and even mythological creatures, multi-colored' dragons-are coming to predominate over the tame domestic stuffed pet we played with. To keep up with evolving social advances, many toy stores have tried to integrate their doll collections. Unfortunately, these dolls will never be more than token, as the manufacturers, understandably ham- peted by the stereotyped images which they themselves helped to perpetuate for so long, have succeeded in making a black dell that has straight hair. But .the proof of social awareness among the toymakers is the alienation doll. The most compelling of these is called "little miss no-name." She is dressed in ragged burlap, and has large, sorrowful eyes from which a permanent plastic tear will forever drip. The loneliness and genuine feeling of alienation that is expressed in this doll, as well as the sensitivity of its makers, who this time have really managed to psych out the buying public, is expressed well by the little verse on its package: "I need someone to love me I want to learn to play please take me home with you and brush my tear away."-Hasbrq, $7.98. 1 : seven recorded disks for listening And for the child with an intellectual bent, there is the "talking learning machine" which features 432 different sound tracks in Eng- lish, Spanish and French. REMEMBER BARBIE? She was the first doll to be well stacked. Barbie is still around with all her accessories, and now she can even . 104 Ar mageddon scheduled for noon, ju By JIM HECK WE CALLED HER crazy when we were alone. In Swanson's garage or Ted's basement. We delighted in saying the word and extracted a certain malicious joy from it. Rick would mock her crippled walk and with a frightened chiseled smile de- fend himself, "Everyone knows she's crazy." She was crazy because she said the world would end on July 5. Was she sure? "Yes. The world will end at noon, July 5, C.S.T." She would gather us kids around and tell us how it' would all end, how the mountains would crumble like the giant cliffs of a melting glacier, how the earth would rumble like the cars in a bumpy train, how finally we would be all cold and silent. And her eyes, the staccato gestures of her hands, were all too convincing. But when we asked how she knew all this, her blue eyes watered and she turned away. She just knew, she would say. "WE WILL BE able," she spoke softly, ",to shoot our fireworks on July 4 and pretend they are volcanoes, We will snap our firecrackers like the thunder that will' rock us to destruction." She was crazy. Everybody knew she was crazy. But in public, around adults, we were forbidden to tise the word. It was not a nice word. But they believed it. In their own circles, in the bridge club cliques and sewing circles, they must have used the word.r As summer came and Mrs. Pitcher's family refused to put her away, people's nerves became rattled. Especially the' adults. 'ly 5, C.S.T. kid from his place of seclusion and ad- monish him first never to say "crazy," second to run when Mrs. Pitcher came down the street, and third to get the hell up to his room for being such a brat. I was beginning to write crazy on any scrap of paper I could find, and hoarding the collection inside' a bureau drawer. I would write the word, print the word, write it backwards, frontwards, mirrored. Rick even wrote the word four times in a short paragraph we were asked to write gbout elephants. Elephants, Rick said, were crazier than birds which were really crazy. But dogs and cats are probably the most crazy. Elephantsrare crazy because they have trunks. SEVERAL WEEKS before July 5 the adults formed a community action group to send Mrs. Pitcher away. But the plan- ning ended in fighting. Besides, having her put away would not delay July 5, as Ted's mother so aptly pointed out. On the way to school we spent most of our time deciding who else besides Mrs. Pitcher was crazy, just so we could use the word. By the end of Jne there were many people who we could call crazy. Our par- ents were crazy. The organization was crazy." The whole world 'was crazy, and we were probably crazy. When the day arrived, we huddled in our dens, while husbands sat in front of television sets, as if they could accept the end of the world as long as they were in front of the TV. NOON CAME and the precious moments afterwards. I suppose I would be dishonest not to'admit we kids were somewhat dis- appointed when nothing happened. After all it would have been very exciting. Rick was mad and shot off a firecracker. The Game By HOWARD KOHN POKER GAMES in the Quad were for Saturday nights. We would sit in the lounge, cokes laced with rum to keep our spirits high through the night. We could forget the week's routine and-the drudgery of preparing for a time when we might finally do what we wanted. t Poker games in the Quad were also for hustlers. We had just started to deal the cards when a clear-eyed high school dropout, smiling like an open textbook, walked in and asked about the stakes. "Quarter ante. Dime raises." WE WERE NOT ,without our suspicions. But we couldn't resist the challenge, may- be just out of a defiant need to prove that 13 years of homework was worth more than the paper it had been written on. "Buy your chips and sit down." This was his profession. He spoke as if the gospel had inspired him, explaining that he'd just learned how to play poker and hoped we wouldn't mind if he overbid the value of his cards. I remember hearing the same thing from a teacher once who said he was new to the game and hoped we wouldn't mind if he overestimated the value of knowing Latin names for flowers. But having been suckered once I was all the more ready to be suckered again. Our hustler bluffers recklessly, raising us when he held only a pair of deuces or a missing straight. And we took his money, at first. WE SHOULD have known better. You can walk through the botanical gardens and appreciate the delicate patterns of 4utercups on the-artificial ponds but you had better know the genus and species for next week's test. Once we started the poker game we couldn't stop, simply because the massage of liquor and the carrot flavor of in- frequent winnings lured us into believing we could eventually come out ahead. The high school dropout took us for some $150, patiently cashing in his chips for quarters and dimes, winning more and cashing in more, My teacher I guess is still doing the same thing somewhere. 4!