Behrend collegian. (Erie, Pa.) 1971-1988, March 29, 1979, Image 2

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    Page Twoi
1141114:;1
varying view points
EARTHLINGS
WAKE
By Nick Flagella
To my fellow earthlings I would
like to make a statement, WAKE
UP! I for one am tired of living
with the fear of total destruction
of this big, blue stone. But our
"advanced civilizations" con
tinually ignore the logic of our
( i.e. earthlings) situation. We are
all living on the same finite rock,
and the only way we can right the
many wrongs man has created
every major technological
advance in the last hundred years
has been an environmental
disaster) is to work together in a
way that we have never done
before.
But I am wandering from my
point. I wish to plant a seed into
whoever reads these words. It is
a seed of peace, peace born of
peace, not of war. War only
brings a victor and a loser and a
hate that lasts until it boils over,
and once again war steals that
spotlight.
In the article recently
published by THE COLLEGIAN
entitled "A Professional Soldier's
Viewpoint," I was surprised to
-find out that M. Sgt. King felt that
• a soldier could somehow also be a
Christian. This is as ridiculous as
believing a capitalistic society
could also be a Christian society.
What an outrage, what un
believable contradiction of
terms! Any true Christian would
never slander, hit, or kill another
human being. He would turn "the
other cheek." Like it or not, this
is the word of Christ. There are
many weekend Catholics and
Protestants in this world, but
very few total Christians. This is
because of the fact that the
people that label themselves as
Christians. If they were they
would cease these continuous
attempts to become more
materialistic, wealthy, and
powerful, which ultimately lead
to war.
This, war making, which is a
game between the wealthy
classes of the participating
societies, is a lie to the men and
women who fight, kill, and die in
it. Take our country's last two
world wars. They were both
fought under the shadow of lies.
Going into W.W. I, the U.S.,
Germany, Japan, England, and
France were all competing for
the world championship of in
dustrialism, a competition that
By Holly Mactaggant
- I listen to some sort of criticism
about this school every day, be it
fact or fiction. Why don't some of
these people who complain about
everything try running a few
things sometimes?
I'm afraid we would see the
crybabies running for immediate
cover. I could hear it now "I
didn't know that" would ring
resoundingly throughout the
continues today. They were
fighting for land and resources to
feed their respective industries.
So yipu say okay, so what?
Survival of the fittest and all that
crap. That great American
Teddy Roosevelt tried to justify
that competition when he said
that war against civilized
countries is wrong, but war
between a civilized nation and an
uncivilized nation (such as some
South American countries) is
okay. When you consider the
amount of resources in un
derdeveloped or "uncivilized"
countries, it is clear to even the
most loyal American why Teddy
would bother to make a distinc
tion between types of war. After
all, war is war. But where are
these lies I wrote of earlier?
To find them let's look in on a
typical brain washing session in
any of the basic training facilities
of our armed "Christian" forces.
As the scene opens we find Sgt.
X addressing a group of new
recruits who are preparing to go
to a small Southeast Asian nation
to fight for the preservation of
liberty, equality, freedom, and of
course peace. He tells the men
that it is up to them to spread the
American way into the Asian
way, that somehow they will be
defending American equality,
which has never existed anyway
( not in a class society, baby).
So these soldiers go off to war
fighting for freedom and
equality, and they really believe
this today. This is the greatest
tragedy of these lies, because the
men are not fighting for these
ideals, but to retain the world
championship of industrialism.
They are forced to fight for lies.
Who would fight for money,
power, and domination of ,an
economic neo-colonial system? I
should qualify that statement and
direct it to M. Sgt. King; what
"Christian" would fight for these
things? Zero! That's how many.
Some may think that I am a
"true Christian". But I am not,
nor will I ever be one. But at least
I will not lie about it. I believe in
peace, in coexistence. Some of
what Christians preach is the
same as what I believe, and if it
takes true Christianity or true
Hinduism or true anything to help
earthlings live together, I support
their efforts. Peace brings peace.
War brings war.
Opinion Voiced
entire school
If you have a -justified com
plaint, write it out! If you can't
write it, it can't be said; so
therefore don't say it please, at
least not to me. I'm sick of the
contempt in this school. The
school is wrong in some places.
Rules have to be changed, so
change them! Written com
plaints - are welcome. Get the
issues out in the open now!
Behrend Collegian
The Deferment
by Rick Allen,
6th term Nutrition
A number of articles in the
Collegian recently have argued
for or against reinstating the
draft to insure a competant and
representative armed force. The
issue is important enough to be
debated in the public forum as
well as in the minds of every
responsible citizen. I feel that one
important function and con
sequence of the draft has hitherto
remained unmentioned by either
side.
I am referring to a
phenomenon sometimes called
the "deferment effect." Defer
ments are granted for a variety
of reasons, such as the nature of a
person's profession, academic
pursuits, or perhaps position in
society. The effect is to
redistribute the pattern of
careers and professions in all
sectors of the economy, including
the non-military. This is essen
tially an indirect conrol over the
behavior of the vast majority of
people in our country, not just
those individuals in the Service.
This is done by assigning value,
ostensibly in the national in
terest, to certain professions or
academic pursuits in order to
encourage more people to enter
these areas, thereby encouraging
growth in these areas. For
example, in a purely hypothetical
case, suppose the army is looking
for advancement in the field of
chemical warfare and assigns
"determent status" to students
majoring in Checmical
Engineering in order to en
courage more students to enter
this field.
This presents a college student
that has an interest in chemistry
t or even one who has no interest)
with a choice; major in Chemical
Engineering or take a chance on
being drafted. The possibility of
being drafted is a fairly strong
aversive stimulus, and many
people presented with this choice
will choose to major in Chemical
Engineering. This despite the
fact that their true interest may
lie in the area of biochemistry of
chemical entropy stystems, or
music, all of which could possibly
be beneficial to the nation.
The example is not specifically
important, what is important is
that the individual has had his
behavior modified by someone
else in a direct, planned, perhaps
subtle manner.
This is not a theory I have
made up, nor is it the neurotic
Summer Term
by Tom Miller
We are rapidly approaching
Summer Term of 1979. I am
assuming it will be as bad as the
past two summer terms. I have
been paying the same tuition in
the summer as I did during the
regular school year. Why?
We are certainly not afforded
the same use of school facilities.
The past two summer terms the
commuter cafeteria has been
closed, library hours were
shortened, and there is relatively
no selection of courses offerred.
Why?
We pay the exact same amount
for tuition. Another problem is
the late date at which the course
offerings are disclosed to the
students. As of this writing a
tentative course schedule is out;
- which only the faculty has copies
of. It seems rather strange that
they have copies seeing that it is
the students who will be at
tending the classes.
This article is written with the
hope that future prospective
summer term students will be
aware of the problems that they
will face.
Effect
ranting of a paranoid behaviorist.
Rather this is an admitted func
tion of the selective service
system.
An article entitled Channeling,
put out by the Selective Service in
1965, admits that this tool has
been used consciously in the past.
I quote from that article: "The
club of induction has been used to
drive out of areas considered to
be less important to the areas of
greater importance in which
deferments were given, the in
dividuals who did not or could not
participate in activities which
were considered essential to the
defense of the nation."
The article also mentions the
purpose of the deferment
process; "The psychology of
granting wide choice under
pressure to take action is the
American or indirect way of
achieving what is done be
direction in foreign countries
where choice is not permitted.
Here choice is limited buy not
denied ... "
Obviously the Selective Service
is openly acknowledging their
control, as is demonstrated by
the opening paragraph of their
article; "One of the major
products of the Selective Service
classification process is the
channeling of manpower into
many endeavors, occupations,
and activities that are in the
national interest . "
I leave the debate over who
should decide what is in the
national interest to others, as I do
the controversy over whether or
not the voluntary system is
adequate to insure protection to
the nation. Rather, I wish to
simply point out that there are
consequences of the draft which
are not always perceived, but
nevertheless are very real and
pervasive. All people should be
aware of these consequences in
order to make more enlightened
decisions regarding the
desirability of a return to the
draft and also because it is
precisely when we are unaware
of these effects that they are the
most insidious.
Sthrtab c]elltatau
Member of
llpslPress Ansariattpu
Laura Seman
Editor-in-Chief
Jody Kamens Tom Britten
Editorial Editor Entertainment Editor
Holly MacTaggart Laura Seman
News Editor Sports Editor
Photo Editor
Grant Edwards
Staff
Rick Allen
Barb Bogdan
Emily Lott
Joe Hohman
Mark Porterfield
•
Mike Callaghan
Polly Zadernak
Connie Pukanie
Mum Siegel
Mailing Address-Behrend College, Station Road, Erie, Pa. 16563
Office-Reed Union Building
Office Hours: 8:00 a.m. - 10:50 a.m., Mon. Wed. Fri.
Phone: 898-1511 Ext. 238
Opinions expressed by the editors and staff of the Behrend
Collegian ore not necessarily those of the University Ad
ministration, faculty, or the student body.
March 29, 1979
JRC Plans
24-Hour
Visitation
by Gary C. Hitechew
JRC President
As the end of spring term ap
proaches, I feel it is time to look
throughout the past school year
to see what we have ac
complished to make Behrend a
better place.
Although we have achieved
many minor goals, we have yet to
reach our major goal-24 hour
visitation. I use the term "we"
liberally, for I'm referring to all
dorm students.
As President off the JRC, it is
my responsibility to initiate
action on matters that concern
dorm students. Unfortunately,
due to a lack of enthusiasm and a
clause in our constitution which
states that we are not allowed to
work on changing visitation until
spring term, nothing at all has
been accomplished.
Preliminary plans are now
being made so they may be
submitted to the administration
before the end of the school year.
Even though we may not reach
our goal this year, it is im
perative we begin work on 24
hour visitation for those students
returning next year. JRC is not
pushing approval of 24 hour
visitation for the sake of wild
parties, orgies, and so on, but
rather for the sake of safety.
There are various methods which
can be employed in setting up a
plan, but the primary objective
will be to eliminate the problem
of people wandering aimlessly
around the floors (especially
girls) at various times.
People wanting to visit will be
required to leave some form of
identification and to be escorted
to the room they are visiting. We
ra,alize not everyone will be in
favor of 24 hour visitation, and
this will be included in our plan to
give those people an alternative.
For those who are interested
and concerned about 14 hour
visitation, you are welcome to
attend JRC's meeting on April 3
at 7:00 p.m. to discuss plans and
give suggestions. This is your
chance to get involved in
something that will directly
affect you—help it work!