University of Virginia Library

Letters To The Editor

War Moratorium: Don't Involve University

For five years the politicians
have told us that victory in
Vietnam would only be a matter of
months. It is obvious to all but the
flag-wavers who would substitute a
gory victory for virtue that this is
not true. The U.S. is not in a
position to win. After all, the
French tried, and I mean really
tried, to conquer Vietnam. They
weren't holding back so Litton
Industries could make another
buck, or franc, but they still lost.

We are pouring lives down the
drain solely out of national pride.
No one pretends anymore that out
cause is freedom for the South
Vietnamese. Such authors as William
Corson and William J. Lederer
have exposed the brutal military
dictatorship that we uphold there,
and even YAF has not termed them
communists.

What prestige are we supposedly
maintaining by our presence there?
The only way to restore our
prestige as a freedom-loving people
(as opposed to nation) and gain
true pride in ourselves is to reject the
YAF—Kwapisz doctoring of my-country-(my-war)-right-or-wrong,

and to admit that we are and were
wrong and get out. I urge the
members of the academic community
to reject those who would
march all our young men off to
Vietnam to the tune of "Die Fahne
Hoch," and support the Vietnam
Moratorium.

Here is my reaction to the
campaign for cancellation of classes
on October 15, in observance of the
Vietnam Moratorium:

The University is an institution
of learning, properly dedicated to
the promotion of studying and
teaching. It should not be available
for use by anybody or by everybody
as an ideological base or a
political instrument. In so far as it
permits itself to be used for the
latter purposes, it forfeits its claim
to the service of serious scholars,
the tuition of serious students, and
the financial support of taxpayers.

We all have our causes. In
promoting them, we have an
obligation not to implicate our
University, lest we distort it and
ultimately destroy it as an educational
institution. Our troubled
society has many needs, not least
among them the preservation and
the improvement of centers of
learning and teaching. We might all
profit by pondering the wisdom of
the University of Michigan student
who was reported, in yesterday's
Washington Post, as having responded
to a fellow-student who
interrupted a class to speak in
support of a student strike by
saying, in effect, "Would you please
take your demonstration outside?
I'm in class."

To The Members of the Young
American For Freedom:

Your threat to seek a court
injunction against the University if
it closes for the Vietnam Moratorium
is quite a praiseworthy tactic as
compared to the liberation of
buildings or any other typical
student disruption. However, I find
your motives quite debase. Surely,
you freedom fighters are not in
support of the war, for if you were
I'm sure that you would be in
fatigues in Vietnam rather than
coats and ties in Charlottesville.
Rather your motives must be to
create a counter reacting to the
liberal-radical student headliners as
you were told to do at your
summer convention.

The trouble with characters like
you is that under the pretense of
defending freedom you take what
rights a democracy offers and twist
them around for your own selfish
purposes. True, no student should
be denied the right to go to classes,
but there are certain things which
are more important than our daily
routines. If you would look beyond
your own small circles you would
realize this.

I hope that if the administration
had any plans to take part in the
Moratorium that they won't be
intimidated by your antics, for it
would be a great loss to the
University not be "involved."

Bad Concert

I won't take up much space
complaining about Saturday night's
concert catastrophe — there are
probably enough letters doing that
anyway. What I would like to do is
offer a suggestion to whomever
plans these things.

What little there was of Saturday's
Sly concert was painfully
reminiscent of the problem of the
Temptations' show last year: the
band and drums came in great, but
no one could hear the words. I
myself moved from my chair on the
floor of University Hall (where I
couldn't hear the voices) to the first
gallery around the Hall (still no
words) and finally to the very top
of the Hall (and still nothing!). I
had to explain to my unbelieving
date that the first song was "Dance
to the Music!" And it was that way
for almost the full 40 minutes.

A performer has two responsibilities:
to play his music in his own
way, and to give a good concert.
While Sly certainly fulfilled the first
of these, why couldn't we have the
second also? I suggest that in future
concerts, the students who organize
the show should be stationed
around the Hall so that, if people
can't hear the words, they can go
back and report it to someone who
can let the engineers or the
performers know about it - rather
than have a repeat of last year,
when students had to shout out
that they couldn't hear the words,
at each break between songs.

Now really, that wouldn't be
hard to do, would it? Why not try
it then? At least it would be a small
step in improving a student's
chances of attending a good concert.

Big Brother

It was with some amusement
that I read Tom Gardner's article in
Wednesday's paper. If Mr. Gardner
has to go to such extreme lengths
to rationalize his dislike of the
current make-up of Student Council,
then there can be very little
wrong with it. May I suggest that
Mr. Gardner take a course in Logic,
for I find very little of it in his
article.

The main complaint of Mr.
Gardner's article is the idea that the
present Council is not strictly
apportioned along one-man, one-vote
lines. As usual with Radicals,
this is an over-simplification. A
glance at Article IV, Section 2,
Paragraph (b) of the Student
Council Constitution reveals that
the current make up of the Council
is as equitable as possible if all
Schools are to be represented. Here
is the problem about which Mr.
Gardner complains so loudly, but
where is the solution? There is none
offered. True, there is one hinted
at, but it is so ridiculous, I hesitate
to take it seriously, or even to
repeat it. Mr. Gardner hints at
disenfranchising some Schools,
specifically Graduate Business.

With the disenfranchisement of
some of the smaller schools, the
representatives of the College
would have almost total control
over suggested appointments to
Faculty committees, such as the
housing, calendar and Master Plan
committees. Are not the students
of the smaller schools interested in
these matters? The Master Plan calls
for a new Law and Graduate
Business complex. Should the students
of these schools not have a
say in these matters?

Mr. Gardner states, adherence to
the one-man one-vote principle,
under which all students should be
equal. Should the students of the
College be more equal? Perhaps Mr.
Gardner wants to be the most equal
of all. Move over George Orwell,
have you been topped.