Eighty-two years of editorial freedom Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan Judge Green by 'students per ormance' 420 Maynard St., Ann Arbor, Mich. News Phone: 764-0552 Editorials printed in The Michigan Doily express the individual opinions of staff writers or the editors. This must be noted in all reprints. FRIDAY, OCTOBER 20, 1972 Bannig thenomreturns THE HUMAN RIGHTS Party members of City Council are introducing pro- posed ordinances which would ban non- returnable containers and bottles from the city. The ordinance to ban the non-return- able bottle scourge is one of four con- sumer protection ordinances which HRP has proposed. The other proposed ordi- nances would add regulations to the sale of meats and other foodstuffs within the city and require the labelling of the nu- tritional content of all foodstuffs where the consumer can clearly see it. The attempt to ban non-returnable bottles, however, is the most dramatic of the four proposals. The import of the ordinance hits squarely at the consump- tion habits of not only the city as a whole but students in particular. THE BAN would effect products of whicih students are primary con- sumers. It would alter the way every- thing from coke to beer to fruit punch is sold and it would mean that an awful lot of students who drink an awful lot of beer, wine, pop and fruit juice will end up spending more time than they do now returning their returnable bottles. There will undoubtedly be a great hue and cry from some businessmen who wish to continue offering their customers,, many of whom are willing students, the convenience and indeed the irresponsi- bility of purchasing non-returnable beverage containers. The ordinance would undoubtedly cause some disruption as retail outlets throughout the city alter the way they sell nearly all beverages. A further bur- den would be placed on those the ordi- nances defines as dealers, those who would sell the returnable bottled bever- ages. They would have to provide a stand where the bottles could be return- ed by the customers and where the cus- tomers would claim their deposit. THE RECEPTION which this proposal receives 'will truly test the ecological sentiment in the community - and the great many people who say that they're for cleaning up the Great Lakes will be somewhat taken aback by the sacrifices which the ordinance to regulate non- returnable bottles would call upon them to make. That is precisely why the ordinance as well as the other HRP consumer protec- tion proposals should be put into effect by City Council. THE LONGER such moves are delayed, even if simply on the local level, the harder it will be to ever bring them into effect. As more people become more accustomed to tossing beverage contain- ers away to be piled in junk yards or dumped in the oceans the harder it will be for them to change those conditioned habits. The longer non-returnable bot- tles flourish the greater the number of children who will become used to planned wastefulness, dooming the next genera- tion to the, same self-defeating lifestyle. It is a much wiser and moreover an easier thing to make the change now, even if just for the city of Ann Arbor, than to wait until we are all living in that oft predicted garbage pile of af- fluence. --FRED SHELL By RICHARD SROGES ALTHOUGH PAYING taxes is my only connection with the University of Mich- igan, I would like to comment on the suspension of Prof. Mark Green. However, because of their nature, I think I should first outline some possible sources of bias in my viewpoint. I taught for six years at another univer- sity. Earlier, I spent two years doing re- search directed toward the development of chemical weapons - although I am an experimental psychologist, not a chemist. While I taught, I tried scrupulously to avoid injecting my ethical, moral, and poli- tical views into my teaching. I consider myself a libertarianuradicaltpacifist; my political activities outside the classroom led to dismissal from my teaching post, and I have been unemployed for the last fifteen months. PROF. GREEN was suspended for pre- senting an anti-war slide show to an or- ganic chemistry class; his department chair- man contends that the slides were irrele- vant to the subject matter of the class. Prof. Green "is reported to have said that he wanted his students to know that the material taught, in part, is atsed by . . . corporations to produce the weapons shown on the slides." The issue is whether information, or per- haps propaganda, regarding ures of science is relevant to the teaching of science. Pre- sumably, both Prof. .Green and his chair- man are competent scientists; both a r e also experienced teachers. Yet they dis- agree. How is the issue to be resolved? I suggest that since Prof. Green teaches organic chemistry, th most "relevant" ques- tion about his teaching performance is, "Do his students learn as wuch organic chemistry from him as they would from another instructor?" That they also learn something else is both inevitable and no concern of the University's. If Prof. Green's teaching performance is to be reviewed, it should be reviewed by comparing the terminal performance' of Prof. Green's students with that of stu- dents taught by other instructors. If the performance of Prof. Green's students is significantly inferior to that of otherstu- dents, he should be dismissed; if not, he should be retained. Incidentally, should it happen that the performance of his students is markedly superior to that of other students, he should be promoted. If valid data on the relative terminal performance of his students can- not be obtained, he should be rtained be- cause there is no case against him. MANY PEOPLE hold that decisions. about the uses of science are non-scientific, that scientists have no special competence in ideological and political matters, and that these matters are therefore irrelevant to the teaching of science. But, even if such, limits to the competence of scientists are acknowledged, it is not certain that class- room discussion of these matters is neces- sarily detrimental to the teaching of sci- ence. We have no adequate theory of in- struction; we cannot specify many of the variables in such a theory with any de- gree of certainty. However, it is at least possible that ideology, political beliefs, and the uses to which science may be put are relevant to the motivation of some individuals to learn science. It is also possible that discussing such matters tends to make better citizens and better people, if not better scientists. It is even possible that discussing these mat- ters in as many classroom contexts as pos- sible would help to depoliticize universities. While scientists may have no special com- petence in such matters, they also have no special incompetence, and there is no good reason for them to promote such special incompetence in their students. Any teach- er should be free to discuss or not to dis- cuss any subject, both in his classroom and outside of it, as long as he also does an adequate job of teaching his putative sub- ject matter. Universities are not intended to be models of totalitarianism - even in small ways. It may be objected that I am defending Prof. Green only because his views on war and weapons are similar to mine. In fact, I don't know his views, and I consider them irrelevant to the issue. If he were an ardent militarist who had used a slide show to pro- mote military uses of chemistry, my argu- ment would still hold - and I hope I would have suficient integrity to present it. ON A PERSONAL level, however, I must say that of all that I regret having done, what I regret most deeply is having spent two years doing chemical warfare re- search. Had I encountered an instructor like Prof. Green when I took organic chemistry, I might not have that regret - even though I encountered passionately militaristic instructors in 'other courses. Jacques Barzun once wrote that "it is a proud thing to say 'I taught him'-and a wise one not to specify what." He was right. Richard Sroges is an experimental psy- chologist who calls himself a libertarian radical pacifist. M Anti-trust and I.B.M. AFTER THREE-and-a-half years of in- action, the justice department an- nounced its goals this week for the pend- ing government lawsuit against Interna- tional Business Machines Corp. (IBM). If the government wins this anti-trust suit, the entire IBM Corporation will be divided into several independent, com- petitive companies, each with equal ac- cess to the domestic and -international computer markets. As it stands now, the computer market is practically stifled under the influence of IBM, the world's largest manufac- turers of computers. From this vantage point, IBM does not hesitate to flex its muscles. A justice department investigation (which began in 1965) revealed that the corporation has taken drastic measures to discourage competition. It has severely cut profit margins and has often preferred to take a loss in order to monopolize the com- puter market. As the country's fifth largest corpora- tion, IBM has dominated the computer sales to schools and universities. Thus, even the educational system is prey to this computerized giant. GOVERNMENT INTERVENTION is long past due, but the, justice department can hardly be commended for its speed and efficiency. What progress has been made since the initiation of the suit? If it takes three-and-a-half years to an- nounce the goals, how long will it take for the court to hand down a decision? The government is obviously dragging its feet, but for what rational reason? The department apparently does not realize the urgency of the situation. While it is conducting the investigations, IBM is getting bigger, and the "little man" is subtly being pushed out of the market. Who will salvage these bankrupt companies if and when the IBM monop- oly is broken? IT IS HOPED that the IBM case will set a precedent for all other "influential" U. S. corporations. Perhaps the anti- trust law will finally be enforced, and IBM will no longer be the foremost, and virtually sole, name in computers. This, however, is doubtful considering the gov- ernment's typical disinterest. Let's keep our fingers crossed. Maybe AT&T will be next. -DENISE GRAY Le tter To The Daily: I'M DISAPPOINTED and angry that The Daily has apparently end- ed its long-standing opposition to victimless crime legislation. I hope that after the excitement of the scoop has died away you'll all spent some time rethinking the implications of the role you took in this whole affair (Daily stories on massage parlor arrests, Oct. 18). Victimless crime laws are b a d enough. I don't like knowing that it's against thelaw for me to smoke dope, that it's against the law for me to fornicate, that it's against the law for me to commit sodomy, that it's against the law for me to pay someone to have sex with me. Any one of these acts may be wrong for me, any one of them may harm me physically or psycholo- gically. But none of these acts harm anyone but me and other people who engage in them. It's one thing to force someone to smoke dope at gunpoint, or to pressure women into becoming prostitutes against their wills - but The Daily didn't even imnly that any of these women or men were working at the massage par- lors against theirtwills. As far as I can tell from the skimpy stories The Daily ran, the women w r e willing employes who had been told fairly clearly what their jobs would entail before they were hired. Ms. Fitzgerald, for examnie, found out very quickly what was in- volved in the business and refused to accept the job. Who was harm- ed? Is the implication that t h e mere thought of sexual relations for money is so repulsive that we should all jump up and throw the perpetrators in jail? Who was being exploited in this situation? Was it Ms. Fitzgerald? Was it the women who worked there? If it was, why didn't The Daily talk to them about t, m- stead of the police? Or is it that they aren't capable of judging for themselves what's exploiting them and what's not? Are you sending these women to jail for their own good? I certainly hope not. SCOOPS ARE all around v o i, people. How many Daily s t a f f members break the marijuana laws every week? How does The Daily justify sitting on news like that if it feels an obligation to expose "panderers" and "prostitutes?" Why not go out after the "dope pushers" and "drug fiends?" Or is The Daily now deciding for us all which victimless crimes are OK and which are evil and exploi- tative. I sincerely hope that there's more to all this than some kind of moralistic crusade or journal- istic hotdogging. Maybe there's some truth to The Daily's (or the police's) unsubstantiated innuen- does about "organized crime" and "blackmail." But if there is, why the hell isn't The Daily out getting those stories instead of sitting back on this one? One last question, which might be the most important one of ail: When did The Daily start manag- ing its news coverage to fit the schedules of the police? If the"o's one thing I've always been proud of about my former association with The Daily as an editor, it's been that The Daily never tail- ored its coverage to suit anybody's needs - or at least, we never did it on purpose. I'm deeply disappointed t h a t The Daily has broken itself off from that long tradition. -John Gray Literary Editor, 1969-70 Oct. 19 To The Dailv: R 0 o 1 z t 1 s 1 i t l 9 t _' 4 i 1 i c the letters contained the most ir- responsible and insidious encour- agement to what was assumed to be my fervor against the mixing of race and social class in t h e schools. Most of the moderating language of Griffin's public p r o- nouncements was missing in these ingroup letters. Perhaps the crowning blow was that he used my tax money to send me this political material. The letters were sent with the con- gressional franking privilege. -Walt Scheider Oct. 6 Thanks, Dick To The Daily: THE FOLLOWING is a letter I felt needed writing: Dear Mr. Nixon: Thank you so much for prolong- ing the Viet Nam war so that once again your Air Force jets can fly the "missing man" formation above our football stadium. Last Saturday was very impressive with 103,000 people standing and sing- ing "The Star Spangled Banner" while the flag was unfurling in the wind and the symbolic jet forma- tion was passing overhead as a tribute to those fallen in the war. How many more people did it commemorate this year than last, Mr. Nixon? -K. M. Iven Oct. 15 Edgar Awards To The Daily: WHEN THE DAILY presents its annual Edgar Awards in a few months, I hope you establish a new category. It will be known as the George Meany Presidential Neu- trality Award and it will be pre- sented to the Human Rights Par- ty for its distinguished non-support of George McGovern. Through this action, HRP h.as de- monstrated that its commitment to ending the war, elimination of rac- ism, and making major changes in America's economic system is secondary to its commitment to ideological purity. HRP offers no candidate of i t s own on its Michigan state-wide ticket, rather it devotes energies to sniping at McGovern. HRP knows that a candidate on its ticket probably couldn't get enough votes for HRP to remain on the ballot, yet its members slander McGov- ern for not being as radical ash they are. I don't much care about HRP's self-imposed rule against backing candidates of other parties. To take no. stand in 1972 is to ab- dicate all political responsibility. -Carolyn Epstein Oct. 17 Elden's house To The Daily: ONE MAY certainly think what one wishes about Judge S. J. El- .den's court decisions. Those whose'. image of Judge Elden's house is formed only by a reading of The Daily, have, however, the right to know that it, "today" notwith- standing, is nothing approximat- ing a "mansion". Rather it is a modest but attractive ranch lo- cated in a nicely integrated neigh- borhood. -William Zimmerman Director, Center for Russian and East Euro- pean Studies Oct. s The Editorial Page of The Michigan Daily is open to any- one who w i s h e s to submit articles. Generally speaking, all articles should be less than 1,000 words. 4 _4 4 Daily's role i*n#v bust cr tici~zed "Is Paris burning?""No, just the French mission in Hanoi!" 'I 1' Today's staff: News: Debbie Allen, Pat Bauer, Benedetti, Bob Burakoff, Dave henn, Meryl Gordon Editorial Page: Fred.Shell Arts Page: Richard Glatzer Photo technician: Karen Kasmauski Jan Bur- then it should apply equally to oth- er repressive laws, including laws forbidding prostitution. Although it may offend The Daily's middle- class double standard of morality, if a woman chooses freely to be- come a prostitute, then no one, in- cluding The Daily, has the right to prevent her from doing so. --Mary Williams Wendy Willence Oct. 18 Relevancy To The Daily: MUCH TO MY surprise I find the question of "relevancy" in the classroom, to be a hot issue. Isn't it the duty and, indeed, the obli- gation of every teacher to bring into the classroom the relevancy of the material he teaches? This should be especially so in the sci- ences (biology, chemistry, and phy- sics) since it is by virtue of our own technology that we are screw- ed-up. By understanding how our tech- nology has been misused we can help prevent future blunders. In- deed, the same technology that messed us up can be used to help rectify the problems. Therefore, a discussion of these problems in our classrooms seems to me to be an essential feature of the educa- tional process. For the three years that I have been teaching at the University, I have assumed that part of my "charge" as an educator was to teach students the essential facts and concepts of developmental biol- ogy, as well as the "relevancy" of the subject matter to the "real world." Indeed, such topics as fertility control, environmental pol- lutants as teratogens, drugs and the placental barrier, and anomal- ies of sexual differentiation are all topics with particular socio-biologi- cal significance. I would hope and urge that other professors at this university bring appropriate relevant material into their classrooms. Indeed, there is no scientific discipline in w h i c h clear and unmistakably relevant material can not be taught effec- tively. -Michael Berns Asst. prof of Zoology Oct. 19 Court packing To The Deily: SGC's CREDENTIALS & R u l e s Court is sunnosed to be a "judi- cal reliability. "Traditionally," said SGC Administrative Vice President Curt Steinhauer on Oct. 15, "SGC has always staffed C&R with mem- bers' political cronies." In this case, C&R is packed with GROUP/'"Integrity" depend- ents. Incredibly, SGC appointed Dave Schaper to C&R. This is the same gentleman who conducted the most incompetent election in SGC history last winter, if in fact he was not personally responsible for rigging it. As Steinhauer s a i d , Schaper "knows a lot about elec- tions." Indeed, he may be the only one who knows who really won the last one. , SGC also appointed Lee G i 11, founder of the "Integrity" party which he has since provided as GROUP's latest alias. The third ap- pointee, Bridgette Kehoe, is co- ordinating vice president of SGC and, like the others, has no judi- cial experience. All three "judges" are paid political appointees of SGC (Schaper is treasurer, G ill and Kehoe are vice presidents) who serve at the pleasure of the presi- dent, Bill Jacobs of GROUP. -Sandy Green Thom Gillis Bob Black Community Coalition candidates for SGC Oct. 17 Griffin mail To The Daily: YOUR BOX on the editorial page, titled "Get involved - write your reps!" with the addresses of sena- tors and representatives, has pro- vided me with an experience which has been educational, even though not exactly in the way it was intended. Some time ago I wrote a letter to Sen. Robert Griffin expressing dismay at the rather cynical way in which he has made school bus- ing a national political issue, en- couraging those who were using the issue to inflame racial feeling, and making the efforts of those who want to deal with the issue on its merits and somewhat rationally, really quite impossible. What I fully expected in response was the usual sort of thank you-I- read-your-messages-I-appreciate- your-comment kind of letter which is standard. Instead, I had the good fortune -- or the misfortune =- to have had my letter put in the wrong pile by4 the secretary who sorts these out- I faculty comment I Welfare and spacecraft: U.S.cn afford both By JAMES LOUDON DAVID FRADIN'S otherwise excellent article on the value of the U.S. space program (Daily, Oct. 17) was marred by his perpetua- tion of the "either-or" mythology which sees space expenditures as somehow in competition with welfare. The fact is that we can easily afford both. Our GNP is over a trillion dollars a year (a stack of a trillion dollar bills would reach halfway to the Moon!) ; we spend huge amounts for luxuries with no feeling of pain '(twice as much, per year, for cosmetics alone as for the entire NASA budget)3; and our population is large enough that we could double NASA's funding, if we felt it desir- able,,'by taxing each U.S. citizen less than the price of a pack of cigar- ettes per week. THIS NOTION (that we we can afford space or social programs but not both) has already done irretrievable damage to our space program when used the other way-against NASA by its opponents- and I'm distressed to see someone in favor of the program employing it. For example, this decade contains an opportunity for a Grand Tour, in which a single spacecraft could fly past all five of the unexplored and extremely important outer planets (Jupiter to Pluto) plus many of their moons. Such a chance occurs only once in 175 years. This year we threw it away rather than increase NASA's budget)my a mere 10 per cent - the amount we spend on chewing gum in a single year. Fradin men- tioned the cancellation of Apollos 18, 19, and 20, forced by similar budget cts several years ago. Since each Apollo flight has returned about as much information as all its predecessors put together, this amounts to slashing the total Apollo data return to one eighth of what it could have been - to save five per cent of the amount already spent, an amount smaller than any football season's gate receipts. E WE SPEND one percent of the federal budget on space and 52 th -m.nt e_ se_ _ncheinggu in a n tha dye ar raina te- IN I _# 1I Sf u I {5r k