Page Two

SCARLET AND BLACK

 

ScarletL and Black

GRINNELL COLLEGE

Grinnell

A wot-luv newspaper published each Friday ot the
college year by the Grinch Commuter on Student Pub.

ircotions. Represented for national advertising it
tional Advertising Servi

NI-

lnc., College Pub lshels

vA Representative, is Ens: soni'su-cct, New York, 22, N.Y.
«Second class postage pitid at Grinnell. Iowa, Subscrtpllon
rate 35,00 per school year. idoo paid subscrlptions,

News non-on .

rumor: znrron
cont EDITOR , .
neuron EDITORS

CHIEF rrromona
moi-commute
Burr

narold Fuson

Susan will

Martini Berkevy

Net] Fischer

Susnn Gelber

, Itnn Kinchnor

. . . .liin Stu-rul-

_ Alnn Bernhardt, Susan 1mm

. rout Nncbmln, cn-rlcs Smlth, Kryl Nenmlnn,

nl'c lint Srhneimv, Kntlly siren, .lnn i-i-lu, Jlne rot-inn
Paul Jones, Ann Klrscluier, Bruce nip-tram,
Richard Kuhn, Andy luau, Theren Johnston

8&3 Editorial Staff Appointed

Six ii A 1! staff members
have been appointed to editor-
ial positions in the past week.
They are Martha Berkey, News
Editor; Suzanne Geiber, Copy
Editor; Neil Fischer, Feature
Editor; Ann Kirschner and
Alan Axeirod, Senior Editors;
and Jim Slurgis, Chief Photo-
grapher.

Miss Berkey is a sophomore
and former Copy Editor. Miss
Gelber, a junior, was previous-
ly a staff member of the Sim
and has worked for The Mon
tins Ferry Times Leader, Mor-
tins Ferry, Ohio. She was also
on the staff of two Shell Oil

publications, Mr. Fischer is I
sophomore transfer student
from Tulane University, in
New Orleans, where he was a
columnist for the Tulane Hul-
laballoo.

Miss Kirschner, a sopho«
more, was an sails reporter last
year. Mr. Axelrod is a junior
and a farmer Associate Editor.
Mr. scurgis has done extensive
work for the StitB as well as
for the Cyclone. He is a sopho-
more,

The new appointees will join
Anne Farrer, Assistant to the
Editor, and Steve Casey, Sports
Editor.

 

letters . . .

Questions Editorial

To The Editor:

1 was much struck by the edi»
torlal in the last issue, in which
is repeated several times the
notion that rules should rellect
reality.

The notion strikes me as both
dangerous and fallacious. It
human conduct were simply
and merely natural, like natural
laws, then rules, i.e.. scientiﬁc
laws, would be no more than re-
flections of reality, But if hu-
man conduct is a matter of
choice, of free will, then your
editorial’s thesis will be that
laws ought to correspond to
whatever human beings choose
to do. If the majority should
choose to be cruel, intolerant,
vicious, then the laws should,
by reflecting these, sanction
ouch attitudes and their conse-
quent acts.

Man’s nature is, it seems to
me, unlike nature’s nature; and
no man’s rules precede the re~
silty of his conduct. Otherwise
there would be no use in having
rules and laws.

John Crosset,
Department of
Classical Language

Blind Commitment?
To The Editor:

The Des Moines Project
raises larger, m are urgent
questions — probing questions
about ourselves and our roles
as college students and mem-
bers of society. The questions
which we raised last week
should have, we think, been
asked and answered before
Grinnell College students be«
came involved with the sock»

economic problems of Des

Moines,

Few advocate poverty. In
this country, it is simply un-
American and anti-Great Soc-
iety to brandish pro - poverty
sentiments; more importantly,
though, we recognize that the
poverty of a few is the poverty
of all. Yet each of us must
ultimately discover and define
our motives: are we joining
blindly because involvement
and commitment are now so-
cially acceptable and the 'in'
thing? Or do we commit our-
selves oiit of basically humani-
tarian and egalitarian motives?
How do we commit ourselves.

Whether to is better to be
blindly committed or uncom-
mitted is a moot question; the
issue we face is how can we
pragmaticaliy involve our-
selves in social action without
being duped and mislead? The
desire of Grinnell College stu-
dents to become involved in
social reform is not an issue.
Nor is the issue the existence
of need in this area; both are
real and do exist. Perhaps the
participants would object to
our terminology of ‘blind com-
mitment. yet, each one of us
is blindly committed to some
aspect of life without really
knowing why ~— nor do most of
us take the time to discover
why because youthful enthusi-
asm will suffice. Before we
commit ourselves, whether to
civtl relorm or to graduate
school, wouldn’t the possibili-
ties of failure be somewhat re-
duced if we assembled as much
concrete. speciiic, factual
information as possible before
embarking upon any worth
while project? The Des Moines
Project, for example, perhaps
would still exist if judicious-

PH]

Friday. September 23. I966

Invalid Generalizations

As a young fish 1 used to wonder what going
to a liberal arts school would be like, so i decided

to go to Grinnell College.

I adjusted my scales, swam into the opaque
bowl where the school was located, and was sur-
prised tb see all of the students attached to the
sides of the bowl by tape over their fins. As soon
as I was discovered, I, too, was taped down. It
was really terrible, because I couldn’t see out
and whenever I looked in, all I saw were stnlg<
gling fish and changeless patterns of activity in

the center of the bowl.

Looking a little closer, even though I was
bound by the tape. I saw several older fish talking
heatedly about something I couldn’t understand.
They never quit talking, and oddly enough, never
moved, never changed their position, and, as far
as I could tell, had probably always been that
way. As long as I was there, I never did know
who they were, or what they were doing.

I stayed at Grinnell for my whole college
career, and teamed two things:
freedom can never be used in an unqualified
sense, and an institution is by nature an unchang-
lng thing. The only thing that l was allowed to
learn for myself was that fishbowls are unchang<

ing,

isolation is one of those
mixed blessings that was be-
stowed on this college by a
handful of visionary Congrega-
tional ministers and that minor
robber baron, J. B. Grinnell.

The lowa frontier may have
been exerting in the midrlssﬂ's:
but a century later, Grinnell

seems distant from the events.

and experiences which deeply
involve other youths of our so-
ciety. Geography may thus be
a factor limiting the involve-
ment of Grinnell students in the
civil rights demonstrations in
the South, the poverty pro—
grams of Appalachia, and the
Viet Nam policy organizations
centered in universities east of
the Mississippi and west of the
Rockies.

But geography is too simple
an explanation for the distance
between Grinnell students and
the activities of their content»
poraries, One senses that the
real cause of the non . involve-
ment of the average Grinnel-
lian in the rebellion against the
American Establishment is his
failure, on the intellectual lev-
21, to develop a critical attitude
toward the society that pro-
duced and conditioned him.

When I finally was untaped and awarded the
piece of tape for my Valiant career and per-

severance, I was given a chance to talk to a stu<

dent who didn’t stay at Grinnell but worked
loose from his tape and was washed out of the
bowl because at that. He had a few things to say
about the time he spent there.

He said that he, too, had high hopes when he
went, but that he. like all the others, was imme«
diately lettered by a tape which he called con-
vention, unimaginativeness, and unwillingness to
change. I didn’t. really understand him since I

had never been taught the value of metaphor.

the concept or

glasses.

Dan Bucks

Rumblings

A goal of the liberal educa<
tion, to paraphrase at least one
prolessor, is to develop indi ‘-
duals who understand them-
selves and their world and,
most importantly, who compre-
hend the changes that both the
individual and society are un-
dergoing. By this criterion of
critical awareness, most Grin<
nell students flunk the test of
a liberally educated person.

It Grinneilians understood
themselves and their world,
would they be so lax at relat-
ing their accumulated knowl<
edge to values and purposes?
It this campus were populated
with students who were acquir<
ing a liberal education, would
there be such a failure by
Grinnellians to immerse them
selves in the affairs at our
time?

Poverty in Grinnell, Des
Moines, and the Tama reserva-
tion does not activate this cam<
pus. De facto segregation in
Iowa is not even recognized.
Study groups on the Viet Nam
war, a war that is fast ap-
proaching Korean levels and
that could escalate into a ma-
jor catastrophe - are crushed
under the combined weight of
apathy and humanities papers.

Even problems that are more

He went on to say that he had been close enough
to hear the old fish in the middle talking, and
that the only topic of concern was how to build
the perlect pedestal on which to sit, He said that:
the most common topic of humor was the idea of
experimentation and responsibility for chances
taken if anything were changed. 1 chuckled, since
I knew the joke already.

He went on, and I‘ve g0! to admit that he was
a good speaker, even though he was a sophist.
After a while, I tired of listening to him and de-
cided to go home, sit down and have a good
yawn. The only thing that i wonder is if those
old fish can still see through their rosecoiored

immediate, that are located on
campus, do not inspire the stu<
dents in action. Organizations
are choked by the combined in.
fluences of bureaucracy, petty
personal concerns, and student
indifference A social structure
that restricts students from
forming their own personal
moral values does not raise
cries of objection. The call tor
students to help in welding this
college into an inspired com-
munity goes unhecded.

If Grinnell studens do not:
really understand the present
nature of themselves and their
world, how can they begin to
comprehend how the forces of
today will shape the future?

Perhaps these rumblings will
fall on deaf ears, and students
will continue to enter, in me
chanical manner, the class-
rooms and laboratories. But
hopefully, a few will begin to
understand that the times are
changing, and that indifference
to these changes results in
ignorance and confusion. if a
few understand, this campus
need not accept that world as
it is, but can begin to en-
vision the world as it ought
to be. With an awakened con-
sciousness, the students can
end their worship of fake gods.

 

ness of reason had prevailed
and fundamental questions
been asked and answered.

The Des Moines Project was
an experience which should
serve as a model in defining
motive a n d commitment.
Surely knowledge and under-
standing of a problem is pre-
requiSite to solution. Now, case
in point, did Billy King really
possess the ability to communi-
cate this knowledge to a pre-
dominantly midtlie class group
of college students? Why was-
not a more detailed, in , depth,
study made before the initial
relatively large - scale plunge
taken?

Enthusiasm, commitment. by

all means! But uninformed
involvement when informed in-
voiyement was both possible and
desirable?
Suzie Hughes
Jamie Baker

D.M. Project Evaluated

To the Edltor:

A final evaluation of the Des
Moines project would be valu-
able both for interested students
and those who might consider a
comparable project in tlie fu-
titre.

i think that most people are
aware of the achievements of
the Des Moines Project. It:
started three block groups, co-

operated with three rent strikes.
and distributed information on
welfare, the poverty program,
city government, etc. through-
out the community in which it
operated. To the Grinnell stu-
dent who has had no experience
with community organizing. I
can suppose that the achieve.
merits seem minimal. But com-
munity organizers only intend
to build the groundwork for
change in a slum. Their work
involves undramatic, person-to-
person encounters; improved
education or better housing con-
ditions don’t come for years.

.M. LETTER—
(Continucd on Page 7)

 

