HIGHACRES COLLEGIAN, NOVEMBER 15, 1971 -- PAGE TWO
Editorial comments
So you think it's an easy thing to write a newspaper
editorial? Try it sometime. Lide right now, with a deadline
looming on the horizon. If you won't take my word for it, ask
Me. or Rich. They go thru the same problems.
There are a number of things to take into consideration. For
instance, subject, relevance to current campus atmosphere, style,
length, etc. But for now, let's just worry about a subject.
We could write about apathy. It seems that apathy, or some
reasonable facsimile, has returned to Highacres for this term. It is
hampering the efficiency and endeavors of several campus groups,
most notably, the staff of the New Horizons Literary Magazine.
As it stands now, the entire staff of the publication could be
counted on one paw of a three-toed sloth.
If you happen to be interested in helping with the literary
magazine, and we hope you are, see Tom Winters or Rich R
ocknian, co-editors.
Another thing we could write about is the upcomeing
Student Government election. Would pinochle or ping-pong or
something. Ten or twenty paces from the ballot box and not so
much as a second thought about voting.
How many of you know that Highacres is now a member of
the National Student Lobby. SGA President Paul Yanoshik
pushed for it and SGA finally voted in favor of our joining. His is
certainly a worthwhile project. For more information ad
Yanoshik's open letter in an adjoining column on this page. Or
better yet, talk to Paul yourself.
One thing that bugs me, too, is the outright disconcern by a
few students when it comes to keeping our campus clean....
everyday one sees empty soda cups, vapkins, papers, and various
and sundry other litter scattered about the place. There are
plenty of trash cans and receptacles located at strategic points of
traffic. Use them. There are many more points that could and
should be brought up here and now. But late hours hinder the
mind, as do many other things. Understand?
~~~.
=SIM
'Relax...if there's life on Earth we'd
have known about it long ago !'
lifr• Eigigtarti Tollrgian
The Collegian office is located in the Memorial Building
Office hours are Monday thru Friday, 1-4 p.m.
John Roslevich, Jr
E. J. Pietroski
T. W. Heppe
Richard Campbell
STA F
NEWS: Arnim. Cumsky, Cindy Lonoconus, Margaret
Grega, Anne Mckinstry, John Mertz.
ENTERTAINMENT: Jean Yese!ski, Leßoy of
Warrington. SPORTS: Craig knouse. editor; Jack
McCulcheon. ADVERTISING: Bob Allison, manager;
Gloria .11aksima/•. COMPOSITION: Lorraine Drake„Anita
Thomas, I)eb Soroka, Thomas Heppe, JoAnn Depretis.
PIIO7'OGR A PII Y: Charlie Fox, Gary Welsh, Paul
Pianovich. EDITORIAL WRITERS: Mel Mundic, Richard
Rock man.
Letter Policy
Opinions expressed in The HIGHACRES COLLEGIAN are
those of Individual contributors and do not necessarily reflect the
official views of The COLLEGIAN.
Unsigned editorials represent the official opinions of The
COLLEGIAN.
Responsible comment to material published in The
COLLEGIAN is invited. All letters must be type-written and signed.
Faculty members are students are invited to submit articles to
be published in a special section of The COLLEGIAN entitled
'lmpact.' Articles and other material (poems included) should be no
longer than 400 words and must be typed. •
Target
BOARD OF DIP ECTORS
Location . . . between longitudes 178 degrees 37 minutes E
~..,,,..
. 4,,,
c. . 1 5......... a 2 n t d 179 t dees frieesd2s9lmdinutes
egrees 3 E 9 and . betwe es enlatitudes 51 degrees
romarii Description ... an island, forty-two miles long, that varies
from two to four miles in width.
Habitation . . . only two land dwelling mammals, rats and
Editor-in-chief
Business Manager
Production Manager
Faculty Advisor
"For this food, we thank Thee, Lord. Amen."
"Amen," Mr. 452's family replied in unison to emphasize the
sentiment.
The 21st Century family was seated around a large dinner
table in their sub-basement. On the table was a delicious looking
Thanksgiving dinner. There were dishes of corn, tomatoes, and
cranberry sauce adorning the traditional Thanksgiving bird.
Mr. 452 and his wife began to eat. Their young son and
daughter joined in with an exuberance they could not hide after
their parents had begun eating. They had been anticipating the
joys of Thanksgiving for months.
Hardly had they begun eating when, suddenly and
unexpectedly, the underground dining room became stifling hot.
The lead-lined wall which fortified the hidden door began to glow
crimson.
"What is it? " cried Mrs. 452.
If Mr. 452 suspected, he said nothing.
All at once the door melted away and two uniformed,
helmeted men armed with laser weapons rushed in.
"The...the Brain Police!" Mr. 452 shouted in disbelief.
Mrs. 452 screamed with tears running down her cheeks, her
face turning pale in the iridescent light. The children sat at their
seats and watched in amazement.
"Don't move! This is a raid! Line up against that far wall,
All "Don't move! This is a raid! Line up against that far wall,
all of you! " ordered the senior officer.
"What do you mean by this outrage? ! " Mr. 452 exclaimed.
"We were doing nothing but celebrating..."
"I'll say you were celebrating!" replied the senior officer.
"You're all under arrest. The charge is overeating. You have the
right to remain silent. Anything you say may be used against you.
You have the right to have a lawyer. If you can't afford one the
court will appoint one for you."
"Officer!" Mr. 452 resounded, "We...we were merely
EATING!"
"Oh, come now," the policeman snickered. "Don't make me
laugh by pretending you don't know the law. Every child in
school knows that the eating, buying, selling, and possessing of
food has been illegal for decades. Ever since the world's
population became so large that every available acre of land had
to be used for housing, farming has been outlawed and
"food-subs" in pill form have taken the place of natural food.
"And besides that, the Chief Surgeon has determined that
eating food is hazardous to your health. You watch the news,
mister. You must be aware that our doctors and scientists have
reason to believe that over-indulgence in food may cause brain
damage!"
"But, it hasn't been proven," retorted the anguished father.
"People have been eating for thousands of years and it has never
affected their brains!"
"Really? " replied the police officer. "Don't you think
SOMETHING must have been wrong with their brains all those
years to get us into so many messes? !"
"He...he's got a point, Father," his small son meekly
ventured.
"Quiet, boy! Whose side are you On, anyway? !"
"Not only that," the armed law-enforcer added, "but there is
reason to believe that eating may become addicting. In fact,
preliminary investigations show that the soft stuff you have on
I hate to say, I told you so, but...
How do you like it so far? Pretty dull stuff, eh? Megaton
Cannikin. Gotcha! All oHow do you like it so far? Pretty dull
stuff, eh? Then let me add the magic words. Amchitka. Nuclear. Fellow Students: Joining
5-Megaton. Cannikin. Gotcha! All of which means we can get on the National Student Lobby on
with this editorial. Oct. 29, we as a Campus began
Question . . . Could the Supreme Court,- the Senate, the- our representation to the
demonstrations or the petitions, letters and telegrams, of legislative body of the United
concerned American and World citizens have stopped the nuclear States. Our vies and the views
test? The answer, of course, has already been given. They could ,of other concerned students
not. Even a ten-time multiplication of their efforts would not 'will be represented by the
have changed the decision. No way. It was never in doubt. Never. lobby organized for students.
I have always believed that expert opinion is just that .. . The procedure for acquiring
expert. After all, this is the technology that conquered polio; the student views used by the NSL
technology that created the transistor; the technology that put is done in a most democratic
man on the moon. manner. A referendum is sent
Why then, such dedicated opposition? Didn't the experts out to all member Campuses
assure us that everything was cool? Did someone know something with a list of the most crucial
the experts didn't know? issues of our time. These issues
If the world was to come to an end at 5 p.m. E.S.T. are to be merited as to
Saturday, why study for Monday's Anthropology exam? opinions and priority. It is
I looked for reassurance, and found it in a 41-page report necessary that each and
issued in May by the Atomic Energy Commission, I grabbed my
trusty dictionary (rule one in digesting any government report)
and began to read.
I found that Project Cannikin was the result of four full years
of intensive study. The study was made by scientists and
technicians in the fields of oceanography, biology and ecology,
geophysics and geology and hydrology and seismography.
After two years of research, their preliminary evaluations
were tested by a 1-megaton blast on Amchitka on October 2,
1969. The Milrow test verified the advance evaluations and
predictions.
Everything boiled down to one brief statement. The'
5-megaton nuclear explosion would have "no significant import
on man, animal life or the environment."
The experts said that everything would be cool. Everything
was cool.
With my faith in expert opinion re-inforced, I should be
happy. I am not.
The real question was not the possible adverse effects on the
environment. The real question was the need for the test in the ,
first place. President Nixon supplied the answer. He defended his
decision to go ahead with the nuclear test when he termed it vital
to national security, saying, "Unless we have a program to defend
the United States, we won't have any environment to protect."
Amchitka is described in the AEC report as a barren island.
There are no trees except for a few stunted spruce trees which
were planted in World War 11. There are only two land-dwelling
mammals on the island, rats ... and man.
If you like to deal in the abstract, perhaps you can
understand that one can read more than facts into that report
Thanksgiving Dinner
by Richard,Rockman
your table right now may lead to even more addicting foods;
foods like..." he looked at the children and then cupped his hands
to his visor and whispered into the man's ear, "foods like...pizza!
"And, " he continued in his normal tone of voice, "we can't
have our labor force cut by people getting into the vile habit of
eating, now, can we? Why, our economy would be destroyed if
we allowed that to happen."
"But, these food-sub pills," Mr. 452 pleaded, "they make me
so tense...so nervous. And eating food is so relaxing...it makes me
feel good after a hard day at work. It makes me forget all my
worries.
"And, anyway, I'm sick of being told I can't use what nature
offers man from her earth if I want to. We're ALL sick of this
oppression!" he cried out, motioning to his family.
Mr. 452 looked through the visor of the senior officer's
helmet and saw that his pleas had been totally ineffective.
Desperately, Mr. 452 tried another tactic, though he knew he was
clutching at straws.
"Listen, officer...you know in your heart there's nothing
wrong with food. Here," he said, lifting a dish of potatoes and
gravy from the table, "try some yourself. It'll make you feel so
much better. You'll see!"
"Now you've done it!" said the officer sternly. "As if
possessing and eating food at all wasn't enough, and then passing
the stuff around this joint to each other! Now you're trying to
incapacitate, corrupt, and bribe a Brain Police officer."
He leaned over and looked into the offender's face, "The law
isn't going to go easy on you!"
"Officer," Mr. 452 said with tears welling in his eyes, "have
you no heart? Have you no soul? This is our first offence! Can't
you just..."
"We know your kind!" the uniformed man broke in. "We've
had you under surveillance for quite a while."
"But, how? " Mr. 452 cried in exasperation. "We watched
our thoughts so carefully! We never thought about food unless we
were in this specially constructed, electromagnetized, lead-lined
basement. It should have sheilded all our thoughts from the Brain
Police."
"You didn't count on our new surveillance methods," the
upholder of justice said with satisfaction. "Our new Vibra-sensors
are designed to cut through all types of artificial thought
interference."
"But, how did you know to survey our sector? "
"Ha! You can't escape the reach of the long arm of the law!
We got your name when we raided the headquarters of the Grocer
Underground last week! I see you're shocked! You didn't think
we knew about the Grocer Underground, did you?
Mr. 452 was speechless. A beaten man. The rest of his family
huddled together and wept softly.
The younger officer broke the silence
"We'd better cart these criminals off. I've just been contacted
by headquarters via my helmet's built-in communications system.
We're needed on another case. It seems our international infra-red
scanning device has detected a crop of corn growing illegally in
Turkey."
"Please!" Mr. 452 cried. "Don't mention turkey!"
"You go on ahead," the senior officei - said to his subordinate
who began leading the family out of the room. Staring at the
dinner table, he said, "I want to stay here awhile
and...uh...inspect the evidence."
An open letter
to all students
SUPPORT THE HARRIS PRYOR
BILL OF RIGHTS FOR
OCEAN MAMMALS
BATTERED
BABIES.
Miss Alice Herrington, Chairman
Committee Jo• Humane Legislation, Inc
11 West 60th Street
New York, N. Y. 10023
I want to help protect the animals. I enclose $
to CHI.). Please add my name to your mailing list, and send me
a mat of this 'advertisement so that I can place it in my local
newspaper.
STREET & NUMBER
by Mel Mundie
everyone of us at Highacres fill
out our opinions on this
referendum Tuesday, Nov. 23.
The democratic process, which
is still predominant in
American government,
functions efficiently only
under majority participation
by the public. To participate it
is necessary to have our views
taken into consideration for
legislation if not into
legislation. I urge all students
to opinionate the referendum
on Nov. 23.
Sincerely
Paul J. Yanoshik
President SGA
El=