Seventy-Sixth Year
EDITED AND MANAGED BY STUDENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
UNDER AUTHORITY OF BOARD IN CONTROL OF STUDENT PUBLICATIONS
Where Opinions Are Free. 420 MAYNARD ST., ANN ARBOR, MICH.
Truth Will Prevail
NEWS PHONE: 764-0552
Editorials printed in The Michigan Daily express the individual opinions of staff writers
or the editors. This must be noted in all reprints.
SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 5, 1965 NIGHT EDITOR: ROBERT MOORE
U.S. Goals, Outlook Cause
Today's Student Alienation
A GROWING SENSE of alienation from
current American social values on the
part of a large number of intelligent
young men and women has been increas-
ingly evident in recent months. The im-
plications of this disaffection, which is
definitely not limited to a small "beat-
nik" fringe, may well have serious conse-
quences for the nation's future.
The signs of this quiet rebellion have
been manifold and, at times, tinged with
violence. Beginning with the lengthy
demonstrations at the Berkeley campus
of the sprawling, over-mechanized Uni-
versity of California, continuing with
the series of "teach-in" and protest meet-
ings over American foreign policy last
spring and during the summer, and ac-
companied by the drastic increase in poli-
tical and social activism on campuses
throughout the nation, the suggestions
of discontent are too loud, too widespread
to dismiss or ignore.
The protests against our Viet Nam
policy and the demonstrations against
segregation and discrimination are not
solely political movements. Supporting
the general awakening of college-age
youth and their increased concern with
important issues outside their often nar-
rowly constricted campus preoccupations,
has been a growing sense of disgust and
abhorrence of the basic values upon
which the highly touted "American way
of life" is founded.
IT IS NOT the admirable aspects of the
collective American soul which are the
'U' Shows Concern
For Students
AT THE HEIGHT of the current con-
troversy over the University's inade-
quate off-campus housing policies, criti-
cizers have failed to notice one important
point: the University is finally beginnng
to concern itself with the economic prob-
lems of its students.
When the University is able to ques-
tion the effectiveness of its position on
involvement in public economic affairs
affecting its students, an important step
has been taken. Not only was a report
submitted to Student Government Coun-
cil stating that policies protecting the
standards of off-campus housing are in-
adequate, but Council has recommended
that a 1929 Regents bylaw forbidding the
University to compete with private busi-
ness be repealed, so that a University-
sponsored bookstore can be established.
These two moves could lead to Univer-
sity low-cost housing and a considerable
savings in the cost of textbooks and sup-
plies.
All of this is well and good, but the
question still remains whether even the
University always reflects student inter-
est adequately. One might well argue that
students do not want to be treated ac-
cording to paternalistic policies, yet just
this week a new, paternalistic policy was
handed down concerning open-opens in
the residence halls.
THE IMPORTANT POINT is that stu-
S dents should be the judges of how
their problems are to be handled-and in
most cases they are the best judges. It
therefore becomes important that stu-
dents have an effective voice in whatever
University involvement in student af-
fairs is established.
This view has already been expressed
by Vice-President for Student Affairs
Richard L. Cutler. At the United States
Student Press Association, he indicated
that students should help to decide issues
such as course content and tenure, and
that they must also have the power to
veto and make their decisions stick.
Cutler's call at a recent SGC meeting
for student support of the bookstore, and
his defense of responsible student activ-
ism clearly shows that the University has
finally become aware of the value of stu-
dent opinion in helping to combat student
problems.
ALL THIS is not to say that the Univer-
sity has by any means solved the prob-
lem of high rents and book prices in Ann
cause of the festering sore of dissatisfac-
tion-rather, the more visible, often more
prevalent signs of crass materialism,
corruption, "affluence" amid yawning
chasms of poverty, and mass-media pre-
occupation with trivia which are con-
tributing to the demoralization of many
American youth.
The obvious imperfect nature of high-
er education, which we need not dwell
upon in detail here, is also a strong fac-
tor leading to disillusionment and aim-
lessness. College life is not a rose gar-
den, as 90 per cent of high school seniors
believe when they graduate. Neither is
life, for that matter; but the peculiarly
American characteristic of encouraging
impossibly romantic, even idealistic day-
dreams is responsible in large part for the
resulting alienation and rootlessness
which seems to be spreading through our
large universities.
Henry Steele Commager succinctly
pointed out in a recent Saturday Review
article that American life, including the
conduct of its foreign policy, is based on
strongly idealistic notions of equality,
brotherhood and "the pursuit of hap-
piness," all of which leads to a self-
righteously moralistic tone in much of
our behavior and national policies. Yet,
the truth is, as Prof. Commager points
out, that we, as a nation, are no better
than most others; as a people, we have
our strong and weak points, like most
others; as individuals, we possess all the
human frailties common to all mankind.
There is no bitterness or disillusion-
ment in these conclusions; Commager is
merely "telling it the way it is." Bob
Dylan, Norman Mailer, and James Bald-
win, among many others, also tell it the
way it is, which is why they have obtain-
ed the increasing respect and admiration
of surprisingly large segments of Ameri-
can college students.
yET, IS IT ENOUGH to attribute unrest
among students to false dreams, goals
and hopes? Or has there been a definite
change in our goals and outlook as a
nation?
The heady wines of idealism and hope
surrounding the youthful administration
of President Kennedy have undeniably
given way to the more conventional,
down-to-earth, uninspired leadership of
the LBJ era. The nation has adopted a
more militaristic pose in international af-
fairs while increasing the strength of
its armed forces.
The civil rights revolution, having
achieved its initial goals, is now pressing
for an end to de facto discrimination
among many former sympathizers. The
long years of frustration suffered by the
Negro in ghettoes across the nation have
given way to explosions of well-justified
rage, anger and hate (in the process, sur-
prising many obtuse citizens who can't
seem to discover even a single reason for
the violence).
The economic boom has continued un-
abated for at least two-thirds of the na-
tion's people, but along with it has come
the dawning realization to many that
wealth and comfort are not enough to
justify life, that the nation is spiritual-
ly empty, without any long-term purpose
aside from the extension of economic
prosperity to all its citizens, without any
tangible goals except to "roll back the
Communist menace."
Likewise, many individuals find them-
selves without personal goals, caught up
in the ultimately fruitless search for hap-
piness through wealth, or power, or a
vague concept known as "self-fulfill-
ment."
THESE ARE SOME of the reasons why a
significant minority of college youth
is in revolt against the established values
of our society. Undoubtedly, there are
other reasons which may take precedence
over these for some individuals; granted,
some of the unrest is the product of in-
dividual neurosis or "maladjustment."
Yet, collective frustration and unhappi-
ness seem to be growing by leaps and
bounds, aiming toward an unknown peak
of mass discontent.
Is there a solution to this massive
problem? Can society offer any solace to
its affluent yet unhappy younger citi-
zens? Some writers claim that only in-
AT
EDITOR'S NOTE: The author
received high honors in the
English Honors Program at the
University and was, for the past
two years, editor of Generation
Magazine. His column, a com-
mentary on books, the arts,
things political and religious,
will appear each Sunday.
FIFTEEN YEARS AGO, Francis
Otto Matthiessen, world-famed
Harvard man-of-letters, leaped
from the 12th floor of the Boston
hotel Manger. The man who had
written hundreds of articles and
reviews; who had edited or
authored 14 books in his 48 years
of life; who had defended the
Harvard tutorial system and
Harry Bridges; who created the
masterpiece of American criticism
-The American Renaissance-
wrote in a final note: "How much
the state of the world has to do
with my state of mind I do not
know. But as a Christian and a
socialist believing in international
peace, I find myself terribly op-
pressed by the present tensions."
His death (which was reported
in two columns in The New York
Times) was not a rallying point
in the moral chaos in which
America wallowed in those days
after the fall of Europe, at the
beginning of the McCarthy era,
before Korea. His willful death
was far subtler in effect - it
damned the society that had so
Will 1
By NEIL SHISTER
and ROBERT KLIVANS
AN ENGLISH biologist, address-
ing the rather prestigious
sounding British Association for
the Advancement of Science, has
come up with some disconcerting
conclusions about the behavior of
both monkeys and men in relation
to their living quarters.
Dr. W. M. S. Russell has de-
cided that deviant behavior, re-
flected by a rising crime rate, is
directly attributable to conges-
tion.
After prolonged experimenta-
tion, Russell reported that "mon-
keys, even when they have plenty
of food, become aggressive in
crowded conditions. Monkey so-
cieties are found to be brutal
dictatorships with constant out-
breaks of violence."
The eminent biologist added
that "crowded monkeys, musk-
rats, meadow mice and wild rats
attack and even kill their young."
frustrated a man, that he felt his
only means of meaningful protest
was to destroy the only thing it
valued-his mind.
AS A STUDENT and a human
being I have come to F. O. Mat-
thiessen late. Two years ago I
first heard his name, mentioned
in connection with an American
literature course. Matthiessen's
piece on a work was recommended
to me as "honest and definitive."
A year ago, I heard a moving
sermon preached in which Mat-
thiessen and three others who
had died in April-Dietrich Bon-
hoeffer, Teilhard de Chardin,
Bruce Klunder-were eulogized as
"April's Fools"; men who had re-
sponded to life's call beyond the
norms of reason and prudence,
men who had given themselves to
life.
I have spent much of the past
six months reading of and think-
ing of, F. 0. Matthiessen. His life
and death have been both stimulus
and subject. Much of the time
was spent in attempting to probe
the meaning of his death and the
reasons for the pure act, his clear
self-destruction (as precise as any
sentence he ever wrote). What I
have come to, at least at present,
is inversion: the meaning of his
death is the meaning of his life.
He contained, as does our coun-
try, vast contradictions. A bril-
liant scholar, he was an energetic
In Parenthesis
By GEORGE ABBOTT WHITE
teacher, who asked penetrating
questions and challenged his stu-
dents to trenscend themselves to
new excellences. A man of thought,,
of intricate analysis, he was en-
gaged in the dirt and sweat, of
the politics of the Depression, the
Spanish Civil War, the war
against fascism, the war against
McCarthy and McCarthyism.
He fought for what he believed
through the Harvard Teacher's
Union, the Massachussets Civil
Liberties Union, the Progressive
Party, and a host of other organ-
izations which were labeled "sub-
versive." A homosexual, he was a
man of the greatest love and de-
votion to his work, his students,
his friends. A man who was
thought an island was in fact, a
part of the maine-although he
was an intellectual, a Harvard in-
tellectual, a radical intellectual,
he . suffered and died, for the
whole.
MATTHIESSEN in short, laid
himself open by his very act of
opening himself to the world-he
gave his life for life. His life and
death are brutal reminders of the
ribute
to
F.
O. Matthiessen
enormous difficulties of integrity,
of living a life of wholeness. The
contradictions that harnessed,
made for creative tension, were
dissociated by a frightened and
accusing society. To be scholar
and teacher, thinker, and actor;
to be a radical intellectual-be-
came more and more difficult and
dangerous.
For if anything,, Matthiessen
was radical.
Orthodox analyses of the Ameri-
can dilemma-the chasm between
democratic ideals and capitalistic
practice-and their accompanying
"solutions" (the difficulty lies
elsewhere, not in the system),
were to him, inadequate and in-
tolerable.
He affirmed his faith in demo-
cratic socialism again and again
and was told as many times by
friends and colleagues to stay out
of politics, to stop spending so
much time with students-to
write and criticize. Yet his unity
of vision would allow him nothing
but unity of action. He held the
contradictions by faith and will
and made no such expunctions. As
he wrote in 1947 after returning
to America from Czechoslovakia:
If you believe in a democratic
socialism, you must act accord-
ingly, and work for it. Many of
the positions you take will be
the same as those taken by
Communists, and you will of
coursebe vilified for that. But
however bad the odds, the final
stakes are international cooper-
ation or a war that will, at the
very least, complete the de-
struction of Europe: the heart
of our civilization.
Contradictions evident to others
were evident to Matthiessen, but
he lived in spite of them. There
the tragedy and there, the glory.
ONE DOES NOT have to create
a cult to appreciate Matthies-
sen's credo that "the searching
mind be balanced by the feeling
heart." Nor similarly, deny reality
for his attempt to 'see the obj ect
as it really is, clearly, but in all
its complexity, with all its am-
biguities." Criticism for Matthies-
sen was not a surrogate for re-
ligionornfor "creativity,"-but
nothing less, as he said here at
The University of Michigan in a
Hopwood Lecture in 1949, than a
social duty. Teaching was not a
facet of his work, but an integral
part of his very existence.
Commitment to his beliefs and
a willingness to defend them, to
face, in the open, any challenge no
matter what the cost, was not a
foolish idealism-but perhaps the
very same heroic engagement
radical intellectuals in our own
era feel conscience-bound, life-
bound, to do.
4
-4
7-,
Drive Quaddies to Infanticide?
IN CONNECTION with the Uni-
versity's unrelenting objectivity
and honesty in critically examin-
ing itself and its problems, it
might be advantageous to extend
the erudite Dr. Russell an invi-
tation to Ann Arbor.
Here he could try on human be-
ings the conditions under which
he tortured and tormented his
mindless monkeys and helpless
field mice. For at the University
Dr. Russell would find an exten-
sive laboratory beyond his fond-
est hopes, or even his wildest
dreams.
With scientific plan and pur-
pose, the University has created,
Dr. Russell's nightmare in fright-
ening reality, freshmen substitut-
ing for primates, quads for cages
and IQC for dictatorial govern-
ment.
Imagine, if you will, the doc-
tor's first day on campus, leis-
urely strolling through the Diag
dodging left and right to outma-
neuver stampeding students or
spending a relaxed evening in the
UGLI amidst the husped air of
sobriety, frantically searching for
a seat. But the congested class-
rooms, the overflowing fishbowl,
and the perpetual waiting are sec-
ondary to this scientist's purpose.
It is in the Quads, those in-
nocuous havens of University
housing, that Russell's subjects are
stored-much like sardines in the
A&P.
RUSSELL FOUND that over-
crowding is sufficient to stimulate
.aggression even when food is pres-
ent. The brilliant planners and
psychologists of the administra-
tion have increased the harrow-
ing experience of the quaddies by.,
substituting potatoes for protein
and pond-water for soup.
While some may find this menu
a bit distasteful, it must be rec-
ognized that the individual must
sacrifice luxury for the advance-
ment of science.
The living quarters themselves
are most in line with Dr. Rus-
sell's overcrowding thesis. Univer-
sity planners, consistently able to
get the maximum numbers in the
minimum space, have blazed the
trail for future experimenters by
crossing the sub-human thresh-
old of endurance. Systematically
increasing the capacity of the
dorms while maintaining the same
physical plant, the University has
set up optimal conditions, to carry
out Dr. Russell's experiment. Al-
though the freshman enrollment
has increased approximately 400
per year over the past several
years, not a single new dormitory
room has been built in the same
period.
Oh, the delight in Dr. Rus-
sell's eyes as he witnesses four
quaddies, living in an old broom
closet, becoming perturbed, agi-
tated and ultimately killing their
young.
Have the patterns of behavior
at the University verified Russell's
experimental thesis? One merely
has to consider those hot, humid
nights of September when, froth-
ing at the mouth and seething
within, congested, quaddies pour
forth from the crowded dorms,
rage across the once-fertile plains
'of the diag, and direct their
catharsis of destruction against
the nylon undergarmepts of the
hill.
In a , final act of disgust they
hurl themselves to the pavement
of State Street, defying traffic to
destroy them.
THE UNIVERSITY'S invitation
to Dr. Russell would necessarily
be a great contribution to scien-
tific progress %nd might eventual-
ly represent the bulwark for future
research in this area. As Russell
himself might say, in that most
uncommonly English manner,
"Never have so many done so
much so long for so little so un-
bearably.
4
A
Advice, Men--How To Wheel and Deal in the UGLI
By JOYCE WINSLOW
MEN, JUST AS there is a rou-
tine procedure for registering
for classes, so there is a routine
method for picking up girls at the
UGLI. It's easy to be successful.
All that is required is a mastery
of fundamental procedure and 20
cents.
To begin with, pick a table in
the back of either the basement
or first floor on a rainy weekday
evening. If it's raining nature will
be on your side, because she'll be
trapped inside with you.
Have at least three books be-
sides the one you are reading on
the table in front of you to give
the appearance that you really
came to study. This will intrigue
her as nothing is more fascinat-
ing to a woman than a man who
ignores her. Be sure that the book
you are reading has a one-word
title printed in bold capital let-
ters all across the book, such as
PSYCHOLOGY. This will give her
an opening to ask something
about you, such as, "Oh, are you
studying psychology?" What you
reply is entirely up to you. But
that comes later. Right now just
wait.
SOON WILL come the trip, trip,
scuffle, scuffle of worn-down Wee-
juns. A girl-yes, wow-carrying
three books will pull out a chair
directly across from you, deposit
her books on the table, sit down
and start to study - all without
the slightest glance in your direc-
tion. She knows you are there.
She knows because she had to
weave around tables and forge
through smoke to get to you.
The keyword now is "noncha-
lance." Try not to look at her. If
you do, she will think you are
trying to pick her up. She doesn't
want to get picked up in the
library, but she certainly wouldn't
mind MEETING a nice boy. O.K.
Onward.
Soon, she gets the feeling that if
she doesn't look at .you she will
just die, so she pretends to be
looking for a dear friend. She may
even mumble something like
"Where is that Sandy?" and in
seeking Sandy she will look you
right in the face about 10 or 12
times. Well, if she can look at you,
you can look back at her, right?
Right. But maintain your cool.
Go back to studying.
In a little while you'll discreetly
notice that her face is tilted to-
ward yours in an expression of
intense concentration. She is
pondering what she has just read
and is looking right through you
right? Wrong. She, is thinking, "I
wonder how high a heel I can
wear with him."
NOW, AND only now can you
grace her with your very small,
non-commital superman smile.
This starts things happening,
baby. She will suddenly remember
that she has to get a book on an-
other floor. You can tell this be-
cause she will whisper to herself,
"Oh, I have to get a book on an-
other floor." She will leave. When
she is out of sight, casually swing
over to her side of the table and
open the cover of the top book in
the pile. On the inside cover will
be written her name; address,
phone number and class schedule.
Convenienlt, eh? Of course, She
planned it that way.
When you finish copying down
this information, place her book
in an obviously different position
than the one she left it in. That
way, she knows that you know.
In about six minutes she will
return with some furshlugginer
book she swiped off the book cart
near the ladles room. Immediate-
ly she will notice that her top
book has been moved.
Of course. You planned it that
way, and she will smile to herself
kind of an ohboyohboyohboy
smile.
After an average of 10 more
minutes of study your eyes just
might happen to meet hers and
the two of you might Just happen
to smile at each other.
THIS IS where your 20 cents
comes in.
"I'm tired of studying," you
might say to her. "Would you like
to take a break and have coffee
with me downstairs?"
This will appeal to her because
there are enough people down-'
stairs to make it safe and you
seem like a nice guy.
If everything goes well in the
coffee shop, you will take her out
Saturday night. You may, have a
great time and go out again. You
may have a miserable time and
part company. But don't sweat it.
You can always pick up some
other girl in the UGLI.
I4
4
a- ...
' y far, _
...,
~r
a -t4
'U' Policies Unfair
To Heterosexuals
A
To the Editor:
AMERICAN morality demands,
sexual privacy and condemns
homosexuality. So how come, un-
der University rules, quaddies can
have intercourse with their room-
mates in private but can have
intercourse with their girls only
with the door open?
-Robert Farrell, Grad
-Edward Herstein, '66Ed
-Kenneth Winter, '66
Exalted?
To the Editor:
YOU ARE certainly the captain
of an exalted crew! Self-
styled "sophisticate" Jeff Good-
man, honed on Herbert Aptheker,
mimicking Mario Savio, slavish
disciple 'ofthe Berkeley line. Dull,
didactic Charlotte Wolter. Child-
ish, primitive Lynn A. Metzger ...
all on one witless page.
These self-appointed spokes-
men for the students are talking
board-and a damn dull noise it
is giving off.
Spare us these wheezy jere-
miads. Stop trying to whip up a
revolution without a cause.
If life here is so intolerable
then leave the structured world of
the campus, be as laissez faire as
you please, and we'll just have to
manage to blunder along in our
stinking, stygian academic dark-
ness without your stinging gadfly
goads.
In -the name of suffering stu-
dent humanity I ask that you
print this as a public service.
--E. J. Smith Jr, '67
EDITOR'S NOTE: "Editorials
printed in The Daily express the
individual opinions of staff writers
or the editors." The Daily doesn't
speak FOR students, it speaks AS
students.
Unstable?
I
A
J