Dare to be Great... and risk your shirt By PAUL RUSKIN THREE HUNDRED screaming maniacs jumping up and down on their chairs, wildly clap- ping their hands, singing songs at the top of their lungs. Three solid hours of unabated bedlam. What makes these people yell so frantically? Ironically enough, half of them don't even know. They've been told only one word: money-lots of maney, "enough to make you filthy, stinking, rich for the rest of your life." recruits an unsuspecting vic- tim, known as a "guest" in DTBG jargon, and eventually, through an invidious. process, convinces the guest that he too wants to become an agent. To become an agent, a guest must pay $1,000, ostensibly for a "motivation course" w h i c h will teach him how to become successful. The original agent gets $400 of the $1,000 and DTBG gets the rest. The guest must also bring in two more guests, whisked away, along with about 90 other agents and guests, to Weber's restaurant. Here they enjoy a breakfast of bacon and eggs, as well as an hour and a half introduction to the orienta- tion program. The breakfast is the f i r s t segment in a five hour prepara- ory designed to put people in the proper frame of mind for a subsequent three hour lecture program, where the guests fin- ally learn the specific details of DTBG. THE ORIENTATION starts in- nocently enough with everyone, guest and agent, introducing himself and stating what his pre- sent job is or, if he is an agent, what his job was before he join- ed the business. "My name is Dave Gay. Used to be a body man - mostly on cars but a little on the s i d e there - huh, huh huh." Agents warn the newcomers to "keep an open mind, take in everything that's said. What's about to happen to you here to- day will change your life." After the introductions, com- pany officials begin to soften you up for the kill, "Everyone has the potential to be great. However, they've been conditioned since birth to think they are useless. Factories buy your body from the neck down for $3.50 an hour and they dn t let you use the part from the neck up at all." "WE AT DTBG think that everyone has a right to be rich sod we teach people how ,o do it.' During the speeches, people like "Smilie" William, come tp and relate prsonal andcdotes. Smilie says he has made $'i,000 They've been told only one word: money-lots 6f money, "enough to make you filthy stinking rich for the rest of your life . . . We at DTBC think that everyone has a right to be rich and 1ve teach people how to do it." in the 1 weeks since he joined the company. After breakfast, everyone piles back into the buses and drives off to the-Ramada Inn, the other stop on our trip. During the bus ride, agents teach a variety of songs and chants, which are later put to good use at Ramada Inn. HERE'S A sample: "Awwwwwwwwwwwwwwww MONEY da da da, da da da, da da da, Ann Arbor's number one. (Re- peat three times) da da da, da da;- da da da, da da; da da da, da, da, RICH (Repeat twice) - FILTHY STINKIN RICH." At Ramada Inn, our group is herded into a large meeting room along with about 200 other persons from the East and West Detroit factions of DTBG. Now the fun begins. Agents led us in the cheers and chants which we learned on the bus. At first many of the guests, who wear red name tags to distinguish them from the agents, who have green tags, are slightly hesitant about sing- ing and shouting. However, the spirit is catchy. Before long everyone, guest and agent alike, is standing on his chair, stomp- ing his feet, clapping his hands, and singing as loud as he can. TO STIMULATE even more enthusiasm, an agent casually takes a couple of hundred dol- lar bills out of hid' pocket and organizes a competition between the Ann Arbor and Detroit groups. Whichever group shouts the loudest will split the money. After a considerable amound of chanting, and fake arguments, the competition is declared a tie and neither side gets any money. Although the pep rally contin- ses for a tiring three hours, no one is allowed to sit down to take a rest. Agents walk through the crowd and encourage, phjsi- cally if necessary, all sitters to stand up. Lack of enthusiasm is See DARE, Page 9 They haven't the slightest idea hose they are going to go about becoming rich, but after an hour of yelling, all rational considera- tions seem to have disappeared. The people now see only one color - green they have only one desire - wealth; they know only one word - money. THE EASE with which 3 0 0 seemingly rational, mainly low- er middle class Americans could be turned into a mob of mind- less fanatics is frightening to watch. In this case, the object of their frenzy was the relative- ly harmless subject of money. The method, however, remains the same whether it concerns money, George Wallace warning against busing, or Adolf Hitler raving about the "Aryan race." The 300 fanatics just described were participants in an "orient- ation" session held by an illegal con outfit known as Dare To Be Great (DTBGo, a subsidiary of Turner Enterprises. DTBG has one goal, making money, and to do so they have developed an elaborate scheme for stealing from innocent people. HERE'S HOW the system works: A Dare To Be Great agent NIGHT EDI'Ot: ASSISTANT NIGHT DIT( EDITORIAL PAGE EDITC PHOTO TECHNICIA summ, CAROL WIECK ..... . BOB ANDREWS .. ROBERT BARKIN .. JAN 'BENEDETTI . . . ..... ROSE SUE BERSTEIN DANIEL BOR Us.... ROBERT CONROW LINDA DREEBEN DENNY GAINER .... ANDY GOLDING . . MERYL GORDON SHERRY KASTLE KAREN LAAKKO .... ELLIOT LEGOW ARTHUR LERNER ... DIANE LEVICK . DAVID MARGOLICK . JIM O'BRIEN CHRIS PARKS. .. NANCY ROSENBAUM PAUL RUSKIN ... ROLFE TESSEM . . .. PAUL TRAVIS .. . . GARY VILLANI.. ..... JIM WALLACE'.... DEBORAH WHITIN who then belong to the original agent, before he himself can be- come an agent. Thus, the orig- inal agent now has two more guests, each of whom will pay" $1,000 and will bring in two ore guests apiece for our oi"oinal agent. THE' PROCESS keeps mui- plying and theoretically, it' o'i- ginal agent will very giticly have hundreds of gusts, each of whom are worth $400 to him. The whole process sounds e - tremely easy - and workable - when it is first described. The only hard part is convincing peo- ple to pay their :1,000. ( The DTBG motto is "git the check;)' To convince people to pay the money, DTBG has devised an in- tensive orientation program. EARLY SUND)AY morning an agent comes to the guest's door to pick him up for the day's activity. Guest and agent walk out to the street and enter a 1572 Cad- illac. The agent claims to own the car, but it is actually a company owned car which agents use to impress their guests. Within no time at all the tw 'o alive at a waiting bus and are JAN BENEDtTTI R: NANCY ROSENBAUM R: ROSE SUE BERSTEIN N: DENNY GAINER r Staff General Business Assistant ....... Associate Sports Editor ...... Night Editor Night Editor ... ,....Co-Editor Sports Night Editor Books Editor Night Editor Photography Editor Business Manager Assistant Night Editor Circulation Manager Classified Manager Sports Editor Co-Editor Assistant Night Editor Photographer Science Editor .... Night Editor Assistant Night Editor Assistant Night Editor ... Photographer Night Editor .....Photographer Photographer Circulation Assistant -Daily--Denny Gainer Letters to The Daily .O 'O ef To The Daily: IT WAS recently announced that the salary of my successor as Women's Representative has been cut by $3,500, one month after she was hired. The reasons for this cut have never been clearly stated, and there are many indications that this is a further attempt at the harass- ment and intimidation by the University administration of wo- men who request salaries appro- priate to the responsibility of their jobs. The University purports to set salaries according to the level of responsibility required in any given position. Yet, the Office of Academic Affairs admits that it has yet to look at the rating given to the job in question by its own Professional / Admin- istrative study (presently being conducted by Robert Hayes & Associates). On what basis, then, did the Administration decide to cut her salary? The question is still an open one, presumably to be resolved via the grievance procedure. HOWEVER, there are two in- teresting coincidences worth mentioning. The Women's Re- presentative works as a team with a Representative of the Personnel Department. This' wo- man has recently filed a com- plaint asking that her salary be raised to the level of the Wo- men's Representative, in order to more accurately reflect t h e aditional level of responsibility given to her in conducting t he File Review. This leads me to conclude that by cutting the sal- ary of the Women's Representa- tive, the University is attempt- ing to downgrade the actual re- sponsibility required of the wo- men in these jobs. The University administration is also harassing the Chairwo- man of the Commission for Wo. men. The University claims to have established a "new policy" which at present only applies to the Chairwoman of the Commis- sion for Women: that administra- tive personnel holding joint ap- pointments will no longer have a single salary rate, but separate rates set for each appointment. However, I have two questions about this "new policy": why is the rate for the Chairwoman set lower than the other half of her appointment; and why has this policy begun with the Chair- woman of the Women's Commis- sion? THE COINCIDENCE of these events and the premature term- ination of the File Review seoem to suggest that there is a con- certed effort abroad to crooh movement toward salary equity and intimidate all those who have been involved in it. Al- though it is difficult for vo- men in "showcase" positions to fight for their own rights as well as those of other women, I hope they will fight these ac- tions. Successful intimidation of these women will be a serious setback of the rights of all wo- men employes on campus. -Zena Zumeta (former Women's Repre- sentative) June 26 Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan Editorials printed in The Michigan Daily express the individual opinions of the author. This must be noted in all reprint's. WEDNESDAY, JUNE 28, 1972 News Phone: 764-0552 II) 1 s i 1 lt I _ The Victor in Vietnam