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The NZUSA student delegation returned on Monday from 3 weeks in the Peoples Republic of China. Wellington members will be taking part in a discussion and question session in the Union Hall from 12 - 2.30 on Thursday August 2.
The Victoria University Students' Association will stay affiliated to the national association, NZUSA. A motion to withdraw the association from NZUSA was easily defeated at a Special General Meeting on Tuesday night.
Peter Winter who proposed the motion attacked NZUSA as a bureaucracy which had too many officers and spent too much money ($25,000 per annum) on wages and honoraria. He and the seconder of the motion John Allum said NZUSA did nothing to help students in their basic concerns.
A number of the elected and paid officers of NZUSA were present at the SGM and they pointed out exactly what work they had been doing. Education Research Officer Christine Scott pointed out that NZUSA's officials could only do what they were directed to do by the August and May Councils of the national association. Peter Wilson took up this point and emphasised that NZUSA policy was made by the constituent students' associations, not the officers.
Graeme Collins said the demand for withdrawal from NZUSA reflected a fair criticism of NZUSA, its officers and the local students' executives. He said there was a lack of knowledge about NZUSA's activities, but also a lack of interest on the part of students. However the onus was on NZUSA people to spread information about the association and exactly what it was doing; "But if I was to get up at every meeting and say what I did last week and what I'm doing now I'd feel a proper tit," he concluded.
Closing the debate Peter Winter said the discussion had done a lot of good in spreading information about NZUSA's work. However he was not satisfied by the replies to his criticisms. He said NZUSA officers should find out what it was like to be a student because they were out of touch with students and acting from a position of arrogance. However when the vote on the motion was finally taken few students present agreed with Winter's criticism and his motion was thrown out.
The SGM also decided to raise the Students' Association fee for
Carl Thayer, who is touring New Zealand at the invitation of the Auckland Indochina Day Committee and the Wellington Committee on Vietnam, has studied the Vietnamese situation for the last ten years. He has taught in Vietnam and visited the country as recently as last year. He is currently collating the results of his studies on the Provisional Revolutionary Government of South Vietnam for a doctoral dissertation at the Australian National University in Canberra. The excerpts printed below are from his address to the Auckland Indochina Day held at Auckland University on July 14.
Why no capital? Immediately that a ceasefire in Vietnam was to go into effect the PRG was to name its delegates to the four-party Joint Military Commission. They were to name the places where they were to be met by representatives of the United States, the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and the Saigon Administration to form this four party Joint Military Commission. And when they did so and flew their flag and named their places they got bombed by the Saigon Government. I think I have indicated also before, the dangers in a period of peace like the time immediately after the
I've got two theories as to where a capital will be declared, but it will be declared only when the outside countries of the world have recognised both the PRG and the Thieu government and do all they can, through this representation, through this recognition, to force the Saigon parties to continue to work together and not to give any kind of aid to encourage one or the other to upset the balance and the structure of peace that should be emerging in South Vietnam.
So recognition can play a positive part in putting pressure on both sides to get on with the business of solving the problem, which is to be left to them to work out. When that encouragement comes, when the two sides stop jockeying for position and finally reach an agreement as they're supposed to have done, then and only then, one of two areas are likely to be declared a capital of Vietnam. One, ironically enough, is that district capital where I taught, in Binh Long province. The other, I would suggest, would be in Quang Tri province, immediately south of the so-called demilitarised zone. I suggest this because intelligence reports from my own government that are in the New York Times say that SAM 2 missiles are appearing in great numbers in this area, that bulldozers and cement mixers have been busy preparing old American airstrips for use. Now the missiles, it should be pointed out, are defensive. The PRG does not have an airforce to my knowledge. I think that when the moment comes they will be able to stave off what is after all the world's third largest airforce, that of the Saigon administration.
Finally, American intelligence reports tell us that 10,000 Vietnamese who left South Vietnam during the conflict, who went to the Democratic Republic of South Vietnam and have received educational training in accountancy, business and all these facets that public servants need to know, have now returned to their own portion of the country to take up posts in the PRG. I think very shortly we will see a government declare the location of its own capital and will have fully staffed itself. The only stumbling block I can really see on the horizon is that the conflict and turmoil in Cambodia must first be ended, because that constitutes a very vital factor influencing all development, all trust, between the two parties in Vietnam.
I'm happy to see my own government finally standing up to the President after so many years, and asserting what they should have done a long time ago — the power of the purse — to have him call off the bombing in Cambodia. Perhaps it will hasten the end of the Lon Nol regime and with it a solution to the Cambodian problem, and then by reverse effect maybe we can have a solution to the problem in Vietnam itself. But until the Cambodian situation is solved I can see little hope for encouraging signs and mutual trust between the two parties in South Vietnam.
First, there are liberated areas of Vietnam which, except for the military occupation by American troops in '66, have remained liberated territories since Far East Economic Review has shown them. If you go back and look at General Giap's book, Dienhienphu, he produces a map of the military situation at the end of the battle of Dienbienphu, which shows the liberated territories of South Vietnam. These spots, these leopard spots that he's got on his map in
The second thing is that the result of the war has been to take Vietnam off the rolls as an undeveloped country in terms of statistics of being a rural country and has urbanised it fantastically by bombing the people into the cities, and I think these people constitute, if not a territorial base, then a popular base of support for the PRG. When these people are allowed to return to the free fire zones, which after all were their homes, then the enlargement of leopard spots of PRG controlled territory will increase.
I would not press for derecognition of the Thieu regime. I think that the countries that recognise it now should recognise the PRG and, using these contacts, pressurise both these people to agree to follow and implement strictly the terms of the Paris Agreements and get on with their business, but not interfere in any other way.
The Paris Peace Agreements call for non-interference, and they limit quite strictly the kind of aid that can be given. If the United States Government would stop its material aid to the Saigon government, if it would not help replace part for part each item on their military lists, the Thieu regime would in all probability collapse very, very quickly. The people would desert it. That's certainly true. Therefore, I would think that part of the way of applying pressure on the United States is to isolate its own position by recognising the PRG and showing the United States that the world, that the international system itself, can constitute a counter-balance.
A concert of nations in the international system recognising the PRG constitutes a setback for the United States in its plan to keep the Thieu regime as the only one that is observed in the world.
Cafmanz has existed under various names since the Woodbourne campaign of early 1971. Until now it has been an action-based organisation, and has staged major demonstrations at all three US military bases in NZ, one of which has now closed, and another of which has had its cloak of respectability removed. Obviously the campaign so far has been successful — all New Zealanders are now aware of the US military presence.
However, it has become apparent that CAFMANZ must seek broader support for its objectives. To gain the popular support which we feel will generate the powerful thrust necessary for a successful political movement, CAFMANZ intends to develop itself as an educational and lobbying organisation, while at the same time continuing its work on the action front.
The usual channels of lobbying politicians have already been followed to some extent, although we intend to pursue this further.
National speaking tours by Owen Wilkes and others have been proposed and persistent harrassment of the base at Harewood is continuing.
One of our first moves in the educational field will be the publication of a regular CAFMANZ journal, as yet un-named, which it is intended will publicise the results of our research into the continuing advance of foreign military and economic influence in New Zealand. The journal will print both solicited and unsolicited material of a high standard. To finance its publication we hope to attract a large number of subscribers. The cost of a ten-issue subscription will be $2. The journal will be printed and produced, will be of eight —12 pages and published on a regular monthly or bi-monthly basis. We ask you to enter your subscription now so that work on the first issue can begin.
The first issue will include an account of Owen Wilkes' very significant visit to Australia and his discussions with anti-imperialist organisations there. Donations to the CAFMANZ general fund are also desperately needed for printing, financing travel for speakers and as a long term proposition, to engage a full-time research officer. All donations will be acknowledged. Please send them to CAFMANZ General Fund, P.O. Box 2258, Christchurch.
The denial of (he existence of student suicides by Waikato University administrators is another example of how lightly these people deal with students' lives. In the Waikato Times(July 5) the Registrar said that to his knowledge and that of the Vice-Chancellor and university medical staff, there were no suicides at the university in Dominion (July 6) they admitted to one suicide. The Students' Association has confirmed that there were definitely two and claim there were possibly another six.
It appears that the administration does not know what is going on inside its own university. They have attempted to stop anyone else finding out and talking about it too. The day after Dr Fretz, a lecturer in History at Waikato, disclosed to the Students' Association the suspected suicide rate at Waikato University, he was summoned to a meeting with the Registrar and Vice-Chancellor and hauled over the coals for daring to tell the students that they were the most exploited he had met in eight years of university teaching and further, relating the information on suicides in this context. He has been asked to appear before the University Council to justify his statement to the students. Whatever happened to the freedom of speech that is meant to exist in the university?
Carl Gordon, President of the Students' Association and a co-opted member of the council has been denied access to university documents because he will not undertake to respect their confidentiality. He has been excluded from all confidential business of the Council. The students at Waikato have no access to information that is vital to their interests.
Students at Waikato University are victims of paternalistic and dictatorial Council and Professorial Board. Dr Fretz claimed the workload of Waikato students must be partly responsible for student suicides and alienation. A survey at Otago University in students.'(Waikato Times, July 5.)
The Waikato University Act states the contrary. The Act says it is the function of the Professorial Board to 'prescribe from time to time the content of any subject in any course, and the extent and nature of any practical work.' The final responsibility for the scope of the course and workloads therefore lies with the administration.
In a situation where the university authorities so obviously and cynically act against student interests, students must have access to all information. The only way for students to safeguard their interests is to have more than a token representation in the administration.
At Victoria University workloads are very high. What is the recorded suicide rate here? What has been the effect of heavy workloads? Some information gathered by the Welfare Service on the subject was given to the Professorial Board last month. But this is not enough. The University Administration has a duty to ensure that workload effect on student health is carefully and comprehensively studied and acted on. Any report dealing with this topic must be openly available, not just to the Administration. As an indicator of workload effect, the suicide rate amongst students at Victoria University is most relevant.
On Monday July 23 a notice went up on the notice board outside the Students' Association calling for applications for the editorships of Salient Cappicade and the Orientation Handbook. Also required are a Treasurer for the Publications Board and advertising managers for all VUWSA publications. At the moment it seems that the prospects of getting someone new in these positions is bleak. Its about time that some new blood applied for the editorships, especially that of Salient. If no one comes forward it seems that the jobs will remain in the hands of the present Salient clique (to use a YS cliche), and once again students will moan that they don't have a newspaper that reflects student opinion or allows all groups to adequately express their point of view.
If no one applies before August 27 then this will certainly be the case and students, who have complained about the content of this year's paper will have nobody but themselves to blame if they get the same type of material to read again next year.
All applications must be in writing and will close on Monday, August 27. They must give an outline of the applicants proposed course of study for
Applicants will be interviewed at a public meeting of the Publications Board, the Students' Association body which has control of all business concerning publications on Tuesday, August 28.
Anybody requiring information about any of the positions is invited to contact the Publications Officer, Peter Boshier, or the editors of Salient.
I was down in Addington last week to catch the trots but my money ran out and I had to fly back to Wellington on Tuesday. Arriving at the airport heartbroken, despondent and penniless I was contemplating running into the next Friendship that landed when who should I see but Peter Franks, co-editor of Salient just back from China. Got a lift back to town with his mates but they dropped me off at the Salient office which was a bit of a piss-off. Underneath the Mao poster at Peter's desk was a firmly ensconced Jonathan Hughes carrying out his nefarious activities as President of the Friends of Salient Association. Les Slater was sitting next to him at the typewriter banging at it in typical machine gun fashion. "No desk" says Pete, and moves to hang up his coat but there was no room left as Graeme Collins. Gordon Clifton and Les Aitkens had pinned their's there. "Oh well," said Pete "I expect it's still good to be back among friends." as he turned around in time to hear Neil Pearce mutter to David Tripe "How can I do good layout if the pricks didn't take any pictures." In the distance behind the dust cloud of Peter's departure sat Helen Pankhurst, Anthony Ward and Kathy Baxter sipping a cup of tea that Stephen Hall had just made.
Well Pete's sunburned feet weren't lasting loo well and he wandered down the hall a bit disillusioned. In the next room Claire Smith was typing the copy as Debbie Tail picked up the mistakes. Pete was just about to sit down and catch up on a bit of rest when Lloyd Weeber romped in singing some Louis Armstrong hit. Don Franks and Bruce Robinson who had been quietly discussing the fate of Keith Locke jumped at him weapons raised. Anyway their photographer guy called Grub came in and photographed the whole thing. I was just about to walk home when in came Peter's co-editor Roger Steele from the chiropidist and said "helio, get back to work you lazy bastards Stewart was in the darkroom developing the photos Cheryl Dimond took while she was in China and missed the whole thing, which didn't matter a helluva lot did it?
Last weeek an appeal was held on campus to raise funds for medical aid and reconstruction in Vietnam - Students responded munificently and overe $ 500 was raised. The struggle to rebuild a devostated country ontinues and more donations would be welcomed...
Most students will be aware of the 'male chauvinist pig competition' which was organised on campus as part of the Vietnam Medical Aid Appeal. The Young Socialists stands opposed to this competition, and believes it has a responsibility to explain why.
No doubt the organisers of this competition believed it was both a progressive and radical venture. In reality however, the manner in which the whole competition was conducted indicated an incredible lack of understanding of what the feminist movement is all about, and/ or a total failure to think through the real implications of this competition.
The competition was conducted in an entirely frivolous manner, with many people randomly nominating friends, political enemies, and in some cases even women! The atmosphere of hilarity which surrounded the voting table throughout the competition (and this came from those staffing the table, as well as from passerbys), gave the whole venture the overtones of a sick capping stunt.
To any feminist, or any man who fully supports the feminist movement, male chauvinism is not something to joke about; and any venture which tends to treat sexism in such a manner deserves to be vigorously condemned. Of course it is no longer acceptable to joke and laugh about racism; but it appears that some people are still so politically backward as to joke about sexism.
The Young Socialists does not condemn such competitions in principle. A competition aimed at male chauvinism, and organised by women in the feminist movement, could be a valid method of explaining the ideas of the movement and raising people's consciousness as to how disgusting sexism really is. The competition in question, however, did very little in this direction. In fact, from our observations the majority of the organisers and participants in this competition were men, a point which compels us to indicate how farcical it would be for white people to claim (and in a joking manner at that) that they could legitimately select the 'racist pig of the year'.
There are even indications that some people are so unscrupulous as to use this competition as a means of furthering their factional ends. Some rabid 'Trot'-baiters, for example, appear to have been having a field day nominating leaders of the Young Socialists and Socialist Action League- a fact which is really a condemnation of their own infantile politics, and their ignorance in relation to the feminist movement, rather than the 'exposure' of any outstanding male chauvinists among the leaderships of these two socialist organisations. Nevertheless, the use of this competition by some people as a means of furthering their factional interests, should be roundly condemned by all supporters of the feminist movement. Those who try to use this competition as a vehicle for their petty factionalism have nothing in common with the aims and purposes of the feminist movement.
The 'justification' for this competition was that it helped raise money for the Medical Aid Appeal. But this is a pretty flimsy 'rationalisation'. To raise money for the Appeal by means which make a joke out of sexism, and therefore indirectly ridicule the whole feminist movement, is hardly a very enlightened way to go about things. The Appeal is supposed to raise money by appealing to peoples humanitarian instincts, and, according to the organisers, help the process of raising people's consciousness about the war in Indochina and the plight of the Indochinese peoples. But what 'justification' can be found for a competition which, while raising money, ridicules one of the movements which is fighting for social change. There is nothing 'progressive in a competition which appeals to people's most backward prejudices by making a joke out of male chauvinism.
The "Male Chauvinist Pig Competition" recently held to raise money for the Vietnam Medical Aid Appeal was warmly welcomed and supported by the VUW Rationalist Society. It is our unshakeable conviction that any cause which has as its aim the relief of those suffering from the atrocities of imperialist war is worthy of support by all humanitarian minded people.
The horrors of war — death in all its forms, starvation, infanticide and disease are little known to us in peaceful New Zealand. And the Vietnam War has become "old news" to many people, a boring topic of discussion and a much misunderstood sequence of human events. It is with great enthusiasm therefore, that we greet such efforts as the "Male Chauvinist Pig Competition"; a reminder to us all that the struggle in Indochina is still to be resolved and a material expression of solidarity with our South East Asian brothers and sisters.
But the "Male Chauvinist Pig Competition" has managed to kill (or at least, severely maim) two birds with one stone. It has provided a voice on this university campus for a little recognised group to air their views on a question of great importance to all students. An opportunity for the undoubtedly exploited women of this campus to expose the more chauvinistic among their oppressors. By means of the competition rules (i.e. 5c secret ballot votes) even the most timid of women (and those men among us with a conscience) were able to register their complete abhorence and rejection of male chauvinism..
The VUW Rationalist Society was gratified to see that none of its members were present in the black "finalists" list of men contemptuous of the opposite sex. The Society accepts this verdict of fellow students with some pride, but without any degree of complacency. We will continue to fight, as we have fought in the past against the odious manifestations of sexism in this society. In pursuing this rational course we take the opportunity to point out the fact that those who have polled high in the competition would do well to enter into serious self-criticism of their chauvinistic behaviour. The Rationalist Society takes note of the fact that a prominent member of the Young Socialist's club appears to have excelled himself in the field of male chauvinism. It has long been our view that the Young Socialists, (campus front for the Socialist Action League) is a thoroughly male dominated body as is its parent organisation. Female Young Socialist members appear to have no say in the decision making process of the Young Socialist club. The policies of the Young Socialists mirror exactly the policies of the Socialist Action League, which is itself a small Trotskyist Party where women are prominent only in the field of feminism. At meetings about other important issues such as antiwar and antiapartheid it is invariably the men who speak. The official organ of the SAL ("Socialist Action") is almost entirely written by men. Such women who do contribute to this journal seem to be limited almost solely to the subjects of abortion and feminism. The Rationalist Society has as one of its main aims the continuation of friendly relations with all student clubs. We offer the Young Socialists friendly criticism rather than hostility. However we stress that male chauvinism must be combatted where ever it appears, and that the rights of all women should be upheld. It is for this reason that we support such activities as "Male Chauvinist Pig Competition" to be playing a progressive and farsighted role.
Last Wednesday saw the lunch time crowd in the Union Hall asked for 30c as they entered. Their "What for?" was answered by mas ter of ceremonies Peter Botchup. VUWSA's Publication Officer proclaiming "Now for your pleasure and the Vietnam Aid Appeal coffers we present the first ever 'Executive Revue'."
Obviously with such an appalling choice of cast not much could be hoped for. The first number saw Don Franks (Salient s philosopher minstrel) push Peter Wilson's withered voice through some Joe Hill numbers and an ambitious Joan Baez piece which convinced the audience that if the revolution was no more than song and dance it would be won tomorrow.
Back came Peter Brochure, more 'Sinclair' than sincere, with a succession of skits — How to handle a demonstrator', a pantomime 'Cederella and the Fairy-Chan mother' and the 'Trot of the Week Competition' (modelled on 'Opportunity knocks'). A final rousing chorus led by Peter Wilson (he does look suspiciously like Rotherham) of 'Dead Trot in the Middle of the Road' finished it off.
The strictly amateur production featured various executive members plus Lindsey Rae, Gyles Beckford, Colin he slier and Don Franks adapting old lines in light of local conditions proving along the way that you can still get away with a simple gag and a nod and a wink.
About $60 was raised for the Medical Aid Appeal as a result of the preformance. And of course Peter Bothersome and the young Emotionalists sang 'A song for the Revolution' — ying tong ying tong tiddly i fo, ying tong ying tong tiddly i fo.....as Kurt Vonnegut would have it — "And so it goes."
Gay Pride Week was held in New Zealand during the week June 24-30. It is in part a commemoration of the Stonewall riots on
New Zealand has gay liberation movements in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch most of which were founded in
Gay Pride Week in Wellington began on the Tuesday when a table was set up in the foyer of the Student Union Building offering both free pamphlets and other moderately priced literature. A background board displayed articles, pamphlets etc about homsexuality.
Reactions to both the table and the board were very interesting and probably showed attitudes towards homosexuality. Most students passing by gave a sidelong glance to? see what it was all about, blushed, then hurried past. Some bolder individuals clutched tightly to a friend of the opposite sex — almost to the point of crushing him or her — then very bravely strolled up to have a closer look. The majority of those who felt free to look and perhaps purchase, were persons prepared to be blatant about their own homosexuality or a few rare liberated heterosexuals. Despite the trepidation with which the majority of students obviously regarded the table, a small profit was made on sales.
To members of the recently inaugurated Gay Liberation (VUW), the differing response to the board once the table and those manning it were removed, was indeed significant. Our "splurge" remained right through Tuesday and Wednesday. Without the presence of any people presumed gay because they were sitting behind "that table", others felt free to have a browse. One of our number who passed several times on Wednesday observed something like a dozen people grouped round it each time.
The next event was on the Wednesday, when the Psychology Society devoted their lunchtime forum to the topic of homosexuality. Here the response was overwhelming, the smoking room being overcrowded to the extent that even floor space ran out. The speakers included Professor Taylor; Chris Parkin; the President of the Wellington Gay Liberation Front; Paul Kells and Mr S.W. Ransom.
Professor Taylor, having been requested to centre his address around the "causes" of homosexuality, expressed a reluctance to do so. To look at the "causes" of homosexuality he pointed out, carries with it the implication that homosexuality is an illness, a "condition" which can be "cured". His belief along with many others currently involved in research, is that it is neither necessary nor desirable to attempt a "cure".
Meanwhile the question of social justice continues to be ignored. Gay people are still treated unjustly — socially, legally, even psychologically. The Wolfenden Report published in Britain in
Professor Taylor mentioned some psychological factors which have been advanced to 'explain' the homosexual condition, concluding that these were largely irrelevant — the homosexual should no longer be deprived of social and legal justice.
Bodies still crammed tightly together, Mr Ransom — representing the NZ Homosexual Law Reform Society — took the floor. His talk centred around the attempts to introduce law reform in New Zealand which organizations, churches etc support; results of a NZ survey published in the Sunday News; law reform overseas; and the changing attitudes within schools at a senior level and the police force both of whom request speakers from the NZHLRS.
Support it appears is quite considerable. Presbyterian and Methodist churches, Society of Friends, Associated Churches of Christ, some Anglican diosceses are all favourable. As far as the secular scene is concerned further support comes from the Jaycees, National Council of Women, the Howard League for Penal Reform, NZUSA, and the Council for Civil Liberties.
Other sources of support: magazines such as Thursday and the NZ Women's Weekly are sympathetic; the Auckland press and local papers are helping us come out of hiding and the national conferences of both the Labour and National parties voted in favour of this long overdue reform. We are slow in joining the trend. In recent years 26 countries and eight states of the USA have amended their laws to allow homosexual acts between consenting adults.
There is hope! A bill is being drafted, submissions prepared, with the probability of it being a Private Member's bill with a free vote.
The air was growing yet thinner. Paul Kells of the NZUSA rose to speak on the topics of oppression and discrimination. Both go further than the legal aspect: we gays are subject to police harrassment, discrimination from employers, landlords, medical and religious sources, assault even blackmail. For this there is no logical
Here the president of the Wellington Gay Liberation Front spoke briefly on the functions of this organisation. The Wellington Gay Liberation Front, founded last year, has three basic areas of activity: functions, such as dances, parties very informal; Sunday afternoon discussion; wine and cheese evenings which are held to provide a meeting ground for homsexuals and often the invitation is extended to others as well; the welfare cell is responsible for the Gay Aid telephone service which has been extensively used since its inauguration; finally there is a publicity/education cell working to keep Gay Lib members informed as to what is happening within the movement and along with the university movement seeking to "infiltrate society".
Finally, just before the lack of oxygen became critical, Mr C.J.F. Parkm, another representative of the NZHLRS, spoke on the religious origins of the prejudice we gays must endure. The Judaeo—Christian religions have been strong in influencing this prejudice and hostility in Western societies. The high level of hostility can be explained by four factors:
Mr Parkin concluded by pointing out that churches and churchmen have more recently been leaders in seeking amelioration of the homosexual dilemma. For example in NZ the
On Thursday from 12.30—1.30 the same venue was used for the inaugural meeting of Gay Liberation (VUW). A president, secretary, and treasurer were elected, and the group settled down to decide its main objectives. More details of this later — however those present decided that Gay Lib (VUW) should be politically orientated — a movement which will move out and educate the public thereby hopefully initiating a change in social attitudes. One observation — surely there are more than one or two female homosexuals (or lesbians) on campus? Is this university movement to be very male dominated? It is great that several feminists have decided to join us in our cause but support from more lesbians would also be welcome.
The concluding event of Gay Pride Week was a wine and cheese evening held in our now well-established den — the smoking room. It was once again a "squash-in", which made it all the more enjoyable for our mixed population of heterosexuals and homosexuals.
So that was Gay Pride Week in Wellington. A little too introverted and directed too much at a university population perhaps. Hopefully next year some of you will assist in reaching out to the public, letting them know homosexuals do exist and can no longer tolerate being ignored, oppressed and discriminated against.
As for this year some interesting observation have been made. Only if people were not in danger of being labelled "queer" were they prepared to participate. Hence the acceleration of pedestrian traffic through the foyer during the time the table was manned. The Psychology Society lunchtime forums being an established 'happening", people felt free to attend without being labelled one of us. Perhaps it is a mere myth that university students are radical, tolerant, engineers of social change. Or more probably, even students do not feel free to assist in fighting for an end to homosexual oppression lest they themselves be put in that dreadful category. Gay Liberation (VUW) is not intended to be exclusively for gays. We need all the support which you are prepared to give us.
Our objectives are these: a) To campaign for a new social environment where homosexuals have an equal status with heterosexuals as guaranteed in the United Nations Charter. b) To campaign to end all discrimination in law and in society against homosexuals, c) To continually press for reform of legislation to achieve the above objects.
Regular lunchtime meetings are intended. Already we have pooled resources with the Wellington Gay Liberation Front's Publicity and Education Cell. Fortnightly meetings are held at which a previously assigned subject is discussed. One individual volunteers to prepare a paper which serves as a basis for discussion, all members are requested tor read about the topic.
The purpose of this is simple we are concerned to educate ourselves so that we may in turn educate society. Gay people are tired of the myths and ignorance surrounding homosexuality. Above all Gay Lib wishes to present a responsible and informed image to those whom it goes out to meet — not simply a "this has happened to me or my friends" story. Objectivity is important.
Incidentally it may be of interest to note that according to Kinsey's figures, of all the males enrolled at Victoria; 160 will be exclusive homosexuals for their entire life; 320 will be exclusive for at least three years between 16—55 years; 400 will be predominately homo sexual for at least three years between 16—55 years of age, 520 will have more homosexual than heterosexual behaviour for at least three years between 16—55 years of age; 720 will have an equal proportion of homosexual and heterosexual behaviour for three years between 16-55 years; 1000 will have more than incidental homosexual experience or reaction over a similar three year period; 1200 will have incidental homosexual experience or reaction over a similar three year period; 2000 (i.e. only 50%) will never experience emotional or physical homosexual behaviour.
Unfortunately a similar estimate has not been prepared for women students.
Don't hide away if you are gay. Don't ignore our oppression if you are straight. For any person interested in learning more about Gay Liberation (VUW) telephone any one of the following persons: Rae: 555-292 p.m. onwards. Keep trying or leave a contact number. Robert: 40—475. Michael: 49—468. Now you are aware to some extent of what Gay Pride Week and Gay Liberation are about, please join us if you feel able!
The essential role of the Marae in the preservation and propogation of things Maori has never been appreciated by Pake- has either at national or local level. Consequently the provision of Maraes in urban areas has been much neglected. In an effort to bring this situation to students notice Te Reo Maori Society is pressing hard for a Marae on campus and a field headquarters at Tikitiki East Coast. The following information on these developments is taken from a proposal currently being circulated by the Society and Koro Dewes, Senior Lecturer in Maori at VUW.
A Marae on this campus is proposed for educational, social and research purposes, and to reciprocate visits made by staff and students on Maori marae. An old house could be used in the initial stages: handy enough for lectures, seminars, demonstrations and practice of protocol, Te Reo Maori and Manaaki meetings; a large kitchen—dining room, a hall, toilet facilities, and an outdoor area with some privacy; eating and sleeping gear.
Marae-cum-field stations in selected regional Maori areas should also be anticipated. Kaiwaka Marae, 100 miles north of Gisbourne, has been offered by a Ngati Porou group to VUW and other educational institutions. Kaiwaka which could be independent of other Maraes, and so continual visits would not be a burden on the local people's hospitality and custom. Its amenities need upgrading and gear is needed.
Money is urgently needed, as are ideas for amenities and donations of gear.
In terms of here-and now and long term planning, a campus Marae is seen as being as necessary to the Maori courses, education and cultural activites generally, in the same way as the VUW Memorial Theatre services Drama Studies, commercial dramatic works, films, lectures and other sectors of the university and the community; this theatre is one of the best equipped and serviced in NZ.
A campus Marae on a practical plane should provide opportunities for students and staff to practise, study and observe Marae protocol, the arts of the orator and story-teller. That is the aims of oral proficiency and oral performance can be fulfilled far more adequately than at present. The University would be in a position to minimise embarrassment of staff and students who have been extended hospitality by Maori Marae in their field excursions. I have heard the cry of exploitation from some Maori leaders because of the lack of feed-back that is of benefit to them and of the lack of reciprocal visits especially, which have a high cultural value.
Establishing reciprocal relationships with Maori groups is a matter of urgency in researching and recording oral literature and oral history, and also for extending the experiences of staff and students.
For years certain of our exams in orals, oratory and protocol have been conducted in groups among students and and anywhere that is convenient such as the back of the Philosophy Dept or its seminar room and kitchen, or because of wet weather in
We recommend that campus Marae facilities be provided immediately to cater for and fulfil the aims of Maori Language and Literature; to cater for Te Reo Maori, Manaaki and other VUW societies; to facilitate and maintain good relationships between Maori groups and VUW research teams.
Proposed costs are $5000 (a guesstimate) for a prefab building or conversion of an old building with amenities.
The offer of Kaiwaka still stands from the Kaiwaka kinsfolk of Pine Taiapa, from me and Rev. Api Mahuika of Massey University. I am the intermedian of the local people. Conditions of use have yet to be fully discussed, but the title to the land should remain Maori and some Ringatu rules should be maintained, e.g. no smoking and shoes in the meeting house.
Kaiwaka Marae is a Ringatu Church Marae which is in the heart of the Ngati Porou territory, an area rich in things Maori. After 10 generations of use the Marae is very rarely used now, and its people in the district are very few in number. The Marae is two miles from Tikitiki township, which is 100 miles north of Gisborne, about eight to 10 hours motoring from Wellington.
The effective ground area is about one acre, and according to Ringatu custom is fenced into three areas namely, the burial ground and sacred storehouse in one corner, the meeting house with its open ground, the dining hall and kitchen with ample lawn space. Both the meeting house and dining room which were renovated by Pine Taiapa within the last five years are reticulated with electricity. The dining room should seat about 60 to 100 people on trestled tables, and the kitchen has ample cupboard space, a sink bench and a large, open fireplace.
Work on improving facilities has started and a works programme and costing is required now but while money is urgently needed from any source, I am convinced that much of the gear can be donated.
Proposed costs for Kaiwaka Marae are as follows:
Painting of dining room and meeting house to be completed (est.) $600. Transporting of three stoves to Tikitiki (est.) $15. Water supply for kitchen and ablution block; ablution block of brick blocks, 10 handbasins and 10 toilets; 400 gallon galvanised water tank; — total cost estimated (considerably less if labour is free) $6000. Overall cost — $6615.
Also needed are gifts or donations of the following: knives, forks, spoons — 100 unbreakable mugs, plates, desert plates - 100 serving dishes. Some pots and pans, serving dishes, small bowls. Washing machine and refrigerator. Sixty mattresses (preferably double) and pillows, runner carpets, vacuum cleaner.
I quote from Pine Taiapa's letter to the Vice Chancellor, Dr Taylor.... 'I gladly offer it (Kaiwaka) to you and the University in spite of its many inconveniences for people using it for a week or two weeks, and I am confident that the students will respond to take pride in having a Marae they can call their own while they are pursuing their studies. We will have teething obstacles, we will relish and overcome them, for we will be the first in the field of pooling our knowhow, to make our country a happy
Heroin addiction, according to the Nixon administration, has begun to recede. Can it be that the government is really winning its war against what President Nixon called "public enemy number one?"
In the most limited sense, the answer seems to be yes. There are only three ways that the great unknown army of addicts can be counted: when they get arrested, die or surrender themselves for rehabilitation. The statistical count for addicts in the first two categories is shrinking.
But while the number of heroin addicts is said to be decreasing, the number of people addicted to other drugs is increasing. Like quicksilver, the problems caused by heroin are simply being scattered to reappear in other forms.
Drug addiction is not new in the U.S. Morphine was so widely used during the Civil War that drug addiction was called "the soldiers' disease." It is estimated that there were more narcotics addicts in the U.S. before World War 1 than there are today.
Morphine and heroin were made illegal without prescription in
The leading cause of death among black adolescents in the last decade was due to drug addiction. Heroin has literally decimated many urban black communities.
There are very good reasons to believe that if heroin addiction really is decreasing it has little to do with the efforts of federal, state or local officials. Attempts to keep heroin out of the U.S. and to remove drug pushers from circulation, are failures even by the government's own standards.
The amount of heroin seized by police last year—about 860 pounds—was only a small percentage of the 12,000 to 24,000 pounds believed to have entered the U.S. Much of the seized heroin ends up in the pockets of policemen who have made the resale of confiscated heroin a profitable business.
The real role of the police seems to have been to protect drug traffickers. Detroit policemen recently shot and killed Mark Bethune, a young black man reportedly involved in efforts to fight distribution in the black community. Jimmy Hardy, organizer of a black community group in Cincinnati, was framed on a burglary charge after he released a list of city officials, businessmen and policemen he said took part in local narcotics traffic. Los Tres del Barrio, three young Chicanos from Los Angeles, are a similar case. The most famous of these cases is that of H. Rap Brown and three other men jailed for allegedly holding up a New York City bar which is a reputed focal point for the Harlem narcotics trade.
On a smaller scale, dozens of efforts to remove drugs from black and Latin communities or to truly rehabilitate addicts, has met with police repression. In many areas, rehabilitation programs were set up only after fierce community struggle, such as the Lincoln Hospital detoxification program in New York City, which was the result of a sit-in at the hospital.
What, then, is responsible for the recent optimistic figures on declining heroin addiction?
Part of the answer, of course, is simple electoral maneuvering. Last March, Nixon announced that "this administration has declared all-out global war on the drug menace." Since the President's own advisors had been saying for some time that heroin addiction was no longer on the rise, it was certainly to Nixon's advantage to declare a war he could win for once.
Another part of the answer is that the official statistics are an attempt to define the problem out of existence. If heroin and only heroin is considered, then the problem seems to be coming under control. But the illegal consumption of barbiturates, cocaine and the latest "hip" drug—methaqualone— are at a record high. All of these are as destructive as heroin and barbiturates are considerably more addictive. Barbiturate deaths are soaring. Exact national statistics have not yet appeared but there are, at least, two local surveys.
A survey of 6000 junior high and high school students in Kansas City, Mo., reported that 13 percent of the students used barbiturates. The New York Post, questioning city public school drug counselors, found that barbiturates are fast replacing heroin.
Most of these drugs are produced legally in the U.S. although their sales are illegal. Their use, on one hand, should be compared to the more than 80 million people in the U.S. who drink liquor regularly or the estimated 5 to 10 percent of the adult population who are considered alcoholics.
But there is another kind of legal addiction that many experts consider even more insidious—methadone. Methadone addiction is the fastest-growing of all in the U.S. When taken in a clinic, however, methadone is considered drug therapy rather than drug abuse.
At the beginning of this year there were almost 100,000 legal methadone addicts. This means more than one out of six heroin addicts had "switched" to methadone in giving up the heroin habit. The real effect of methadone programs, however, is only beginning to be seen.
Federal narcotics control funds, which jumped from $28 million in
Why is methadone so popular among law enforcement officials? First, it's the cheapest method of "treatment" practiced in the U.S. Treatment in a theraputic community, such as Synanon, costs about $8000 yearly per addict. Jail costs about the same. An addict on methadone, however, consumes only $2000 worth of the drug annually and with a little prodding, can hold down a job to support that habit.
Earlier in this century, heroin was first introduced into the U.S. as a cure for morphine addiction. It was not until a decade later that the cure was recognized as worse than the disease. The same pattern may yet be repeated with methadone.
Methadone was discovered in Germany
Taken in doses of 80 to 160 milligrams daily, methadone eliminates the addict's physical craving for heroin. If the addict does take heroin, the methadone will completely block its "high" effect.
In other words, the only reason an addict would voluntarily take methadone is to avoid the extremely painful process of heroin withdrawal. But there is a catch to it: methadone is ten times as addictive as heroin. Many authorities believe that methadone patients can never stop taking the drug Dr. Vincent Dole, an originator of methadone therapy and its chief defender, explains:
"It does not strike me as relevant whether these patients ever get off methadone. Some may want to and that's fine but what's relevant is that a treatment can be developed so that an addict can become a socially useful citizen."
A methadone addict, however, explains it in a different light. "Your memory is reduced to a childlike state; waking up in the middle of the night you can't feel your heartbeat, panic, think, worry paranoia; but all the time knowing that with sunrise you'll have to get some more poison. The maddening cycle never ends "
The methadone "cure" is simply repeating the pattern of heroin before it. No one knows why some people take narcotics and others, in the same situation, do not, nor is it well understood why drug addiction seems to run in cycles.
But the heroin plague hurts the oppressed nationalities and working class the most, while the bourgeoisie—and especially the state—have been strengthened by it. It is clear whom addiction serves.
As one particularly bitter addict explained his methadone experience, "See, they do care whether you stay on or stay off They don't want you to get off."
Printed by Wanganui Newspapers Ltd. P.O. Box 433, Wanganui, and published by the Victoria University of Wellington Students Association (Inc.) P.O. Box 196 Wellington N.Z.
Numerous displays around Wellington will be one of the features of Conservation Week. The Historic Places Trust will be mounting one in the foyer of the Railway Station, on the area around Chew House over the past 100 years. There will be other displays on native bush at the Willis Street Branch of the Wellington Savings Branch, on recycling waste at the "Loaves and Fishes", on fishes and birds of estuaries at the Lambton Quay Branch of the Bank of New' South Wales, on a bush walk and proposed aquatic reserve in the Eastern Bays at the National Bank in Featherston Street. Finally the Zoology and Botany Departments of VUW will have a display on native plant regeneration, paua fishing by conservation methods and sewage disposal in Wellington.
Both Shell Oil and BP will be giving free shows of conservation films all the week in their theatrettes, the Wellington Botanical Society will be giving a slide-show on native plants at the Public Library Lecture Hall on Tuesday July 31 and Friday August 3 from 12.30 to 1.45 while the organisation to preserve Heaphy will present colour slides and a display on Thursday August 2 at the same time and place.
There will be a forum on the Beech Forest issue at lunch-time on Wednesday August 1. A tree-plant will take place at Bowen Hospital on July 28 starting at 9am, and the Botanical Society will organise outings for small groups on August 4 starting at Muritai Park and going to Butterfly Creek, commencing 10am.
In initiating nation wide pickets for this coming Friday, June 27, the National Mobilisation Committee for Out of Southeast Asia Now has issued a call to all antiwar bodies throughout NZ for united action on that day. A press release issued recently by the NMC read in part:
"The National Mobilisation Committee...is calling on all antiwar groups to participate in these pickets, under whatever demands they see fit....At this crucial time tor the Indochinese people, it is more important than ever that all individuals and groups in the antiwar movement can come together in united action against the war."
This release was issued following a meeting of representatives from the Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch Mobilisation Committees in Auckland on July 15, and has been mailed to many antiwar groups throughout the country.
In Wellington, where the antiwar movement is more clearly divided than anywhere else in the country (between the Wellington Mobilisation Committee which is demanding US and NZ Out of Southeast Asia Now' and the Wellington Committee on Vietnam which is working around 'Strict Implementation of the Peace Agreement' and Medical Aid), the Wellington Mobilisation Committee made a formal approach to the Wellington Committee on Vietnam in a letter dated July 11. In line with the policy outlined in the NMC press release, this letter requested that the Wellington Committee on Vietnam participate in building the pickets, under its own demands if necessary, as a means of gaining united action in Wellington on July 27. Briefly this letter stated:
"....while openly recognising that there is no basis in Wellington at this stage for agreement on central demands for the antiwar movement, there is nevertheless a basis lor the COV and the WMC expressing some form of unity in action. That is, both organisations can publicise the picket under their own demands, produce their own placards for the action, and so on."
With or without a formal written reply from the Wellington Committee on Vietnam (and to date, July 19, the Wellington Mobilisation Committee has not received one), it is still hoped that all the diverse forces in the Wellington antiwar movement will help to build the July 27 picket, and participate actively in it. If this can be achieved in Wellington (where the picket will take place outside the Saigon embassy), then there is every reason to hope that united action can also take place in all the other main centres of New Zealand.
The short history of the educational development conference is revealing of certain differences between the National and the Labour Parties. Differences in style and public relations persuasion, if not of educational ideology or social intent.
The National Party undoubtedly conceived the Conference as a hasty election ploy, setting up a marvellous, high-spirited, incredibly ill-organised nosh-up for various party faithful and educationally significant academics around the country. Preparation was limited, and delegates came to the conference unprepared for serious discussion. Its product, beyond hangovers, was the creation of a number of working parties which were to grind off into the sunset, masticating submissions and papers, eventually to produce a digest of the people's wishes.
Labour has a different view of the involvement of the electorate in the affairs which most effect them. They prefer to go closer to the people, to demonstrably prove their desire to consult with the electorate, to consider its views and to use them in its decisions.
Thus, on taking office, the Minister announced a new structure Cor the Conference, which settled uncomfortably on the old. Suddenly the value of submissions and papers was usurped by open discussion in a series of provinical conferences.
Throughout the entire affair the people of this country have been mollified with the suggestion that "things are happening ", that in fact they might for once be instrumental in effecting the direction of one of our major institutions. Many have been prepared to hold off in their complaints and desire for change in the belief that their time will come.
That all this is patently false should be obvious. The Minister of Education has a low, low priority in the Cabinet — he is the 13th in the order of seniority, and is not a decisive man. He is known as a ditherer, and to have a "cluttered mind". Any who have listened to his speeches on television and radio or read his press releases cannot help but be impressed by his air of uninformed enthusiasm. Issues follow hot on the heels of each other - none is ever taken up in depth, most are never heard of again. An instance of this is the question of the school leaving age, or innovations in technical education, or of the review of tertiary institutions. I suspect that Amos is a genuinely concerned educationalist — but the qualities that endear him to Kirk are not those which make him a good Minister.
Furthermore the Government — National or Labour — has never intimated that they will pay the slightest attention to what the people write or say. In fact, the image one has is exactly the opposite — they will listen, then do what they want anyway. (Or in this case, what Kirk wants Amos to do.) A clue to governmental thinking on the issue is given in a letter to the National Secretary of NZEI from the Minister of Education.
"I believe," he wrote, "that it is important for New Zealanders as a whole to feel that they have some say, albeit small, in the formulation of future policy. In general people tend to accept and cooperate with new ventures if they feel that they have been consulted in a democratic way."
The important omission here is the belief that the people have anything to add to policy formulations. The most obvious intent is to dupe them into thinking that they can. It is human engineering at its worst.
It might occur to the naive that it is bad politics to make a show of consulting the people, arousing their hopes in order to dash them harder on the rocks of autocratic reality, or to pretend that the people ever had anything to offer in the first place.
In fact the whole consultation/submission/deputation roundabout serves a powerful political purpose; in creating a form of democratic process it enhances the chance of failure, increasing the probability of resignation, acquiescence, and apathy. Because it appears objective and valid it prevents despair, unrest and disruption.
Training for political impotence, of which the Educational Development Conference is an important lesson, begins in the schools. The school council is the cornerstone of this ritual. Letters to MPs, petitions, carefully composed submissions to Commissions of Enquiry, well rehearsed deputations to Ministers, are the continuing story. Occasional grand conferences are the highlights. Through all these efforts we are cajoled into thinking that we in fact are really 'doing something' when we prepare and present a petition. The point is that we know before hand that nothing will change. Just as the school council is encouraged to suggest new ways of improving the school with the foreknowledge that most will be refused, so we are encouraged to participate in Conferences. One marvels at our capacity to deceive ourselves into thinking that we are 'doing something' if we are not really doing anything at all except to carry out a ritual of effort and denial: "With earnestness we will petition if with compassion you will promise to refuse." (Jonothan Kozol)
In fact such capacity is not unusual, but is the result of ten or twelve years of instruction in political indifference. We have been denied for years the right to participate, we have become afraid of participation. Our experience in the schools is one of oppression, of subjection to the authority of others. Little wonder that most of us feel inadequate; intimidated by authority figures we come eventually to believe in our own inferiority. Convinced of our incapacity to lead. And for those few among us who dare to question, who recognise their oppression and wish it otherwise? We research, we petition, we visit Ministers. And are perhaps relieved when our petitions fail, or are secretly satisfied when the Minister assures us that "his department is investigating", or that "a position paper is being prepared", or that "he will most certainly look into the matter". The Minister is playing the game as our teachers taught us. Now we can enjoy the catharsis of having 'acted', which is not action but a pale imitation. To have succeeded would have meant responsibility for the future was ours, would have granted us authority and power. To most of us this is an alien condition, for which we are hardly prepared.
In school teachers stress the virtues of social order. They emphasise that there are no serious contradictions in this dominion and that there is little need for conflict or rage. A great deal of impotence depends upon this pretence. To keep us from reflecting too long on our social conditions, or examining the nature of our impotence, we are encouraged to new enthusiasms, new projects. Who can doubt this in light of Labour's enthusiastic defence of the environment or its championing of the Pacific people against French testing.
To the same ends, those of us who are burdened by our impotence are encouraged to join the play of government. We are invited onto working parties, coopted into advisory bodies and invited to conferences.
Is it possible, given the nature of our so small democratic process for the people to call Amos' bluff? Sadly, one must say no. For the government is subject to pressure from a wide variety of groups, not least of which is the business community. Even if government were to entertain the ideal of participatory democracy, it would be dissuaded by capital pressures; if given full control of their communities, the people might rule in their own interests rather than in the interests of profit. Were those of us who envisages better way of learning allowed control, we would undoubtedly increase the numbers of radical youth, and thus the pressure for socialist change.
Before we achieve our aims for progressive education, it will be necessary to create the pre-conditions of reform — radically altered economic and political control. It is impossible to achieve educational change without at the same time removing power from the hands of the capitalist ruling class.
Perhaps what we can do is to arouse the awareness among others of the relationship between our educational experience, and the capitalist nature of our society, of the economic reasons why many must fail in order to sustain the privileges of the few. Why large proportions of our fellows are ruthlessly persuaded of their stupidity in order that the factory floor is full. And why our political education is negative, denying, and emasculating.
With the latest Education Gazette we received a pamphlet on the Educational Development Conference. I notice that the new symbol adopted for the Conferece with appropriate modification, looks surprisingly reminiscent of a snail.
In the past we have accused the Education Department of being impervious to change. A bureaucratic monolith stuck motionless in a prehistoric bog.
We have held great hopes for the Department under the new Labour Government. Unfortunately, change seems to be coming exceedingly slowly. We firmly hope that the snail does not represent, the speed at which Labour Party Education policy will be implemented.
Talien July 13, 1973
The industrial development in Liaoning province is in fact one of socialist China's most remarkable achievements. For years the area was occupied by foreign invaders, mainly the Japanese. Shenyang, the capital of the province, was the scene of the
The tremendous industrial development of Liaoning province since the area was liberated in
In Anshan, which is known locally as the Iron and Steel City', we saw large-scale heavy industrial development for the first time. We visited a small part of the massive Anshan Iron and Steel Complex, and saw huge ingots of iron being made into steel. The shed where we saw this being done was about half-a-mile long, and we watched a swirling river of red-hot metal being rolled and forged into sheets of steel. One heavy rolling mill produced 3,500 tons of railway line every day.
Watching this process in operation was an exhilarating experience. Less impressive was the atmosphere outside. The thick black smoke billowing from the chimneys, the heavy smog and the strong smell of sulphur was an unpleasant reminder that heavy industry produces heavy pollution.
The Vice-Chairman of Anshan Iron and Steel Complex's Revolutionary Committee gave us an outline of how the Revolutionary Committee was tackling the pollution problem. The principle that was used, he said, was multipurpose utilisation, or reutilisation of waste.
Before the Cultural Revolution the slag left over from the iron and steel processes was dumped and apparently looked like a "huge mountain". Now it is used for making bricks for building houses.
Polluted water is utilised by drawing off the chemicals — over 14 chemical elements can be taken from this water — and using high temperature water to heat Anshan's housing area. Ashan's weather is very cold in winter, and the use of waste water for heating saves coal and reduces manpower.
The liberation of the Northeast area from the Kuomintang reactionaries and the Japanese imperialists did not mean that all political problems were solved, and that the local people could build China's heavy industrial base unimpeded.
In
The period of the Cultural Revolution provided another test of the creativity and ingenuity of the workers of Anshan where the national conflict between the revolutionary line of Chairman Mao and the capitalist road of Liu Shao—Chi became a question of basically whether the Iron and Steel Complex could develop further or not.
The Vice-Chairman of the complex's Revolutionary Committee explained the difference between the "two lines" (i.e further socialist development or the restoration of capitalist development) at the complex. The capitalist roaders in the complex management believed that the complex was big enough and thought that output could not be increased. They considered that because the complex was already very advanced industrially there was no need to develop new techniques. Finally these people considered that the problem of utilising wastes could not be solved because the complex was so big.
In short one line at the Anshan Complex was complacent and defeatist: the complex didn't need further expansion or development and couldn't handle the problems that such development would create.
Opponents of this attitude in Ashnan followed Mao Tsetung's advice of relying on the masses to overcome problems, and they put forward the principles of the Anshan Constitution of
In brief this programme called tor the expansion of the Iron and Steel Complex, utilisation of all potentialities at the complex, and the development of technical innovations to increase production.
The examples of reutilisation of wastes which have already been mentioned illustrate how the management and workers are trying to utilise all the complex's potentialities. A huge blast furnace which produced 3000 tons of pig iron a day illustrated how the complex was being expanded. This furnace which had a capacity of 2025 cubic metres, was built last year in only 10 months through the hard work and ingenuity of the workers who designed the furnace.
Before visiting the complex we saw a remarkable demonstration of the development of technical innovations to assist production when we visited a power substation near Anshan and saw workers carrying out free live line operations. A free live line operation means doing maintenance work on high voltage lines without turning off the current and thus disrupting production by causing power cuts in factories. This innovation was a practical example of serving the people, and had been developed by a careful combination of theory and practice. The workers we talked to at the substation emphasised that the innovation of the free live line operation in Anshan was a case of applying Mao's philosophical works. It was not surprising to find that the "Four essays of Philosophy" were constantly studied by these workers.
Impressive as the industrial processes we have seen in operation have been politics are still in command, rather than industrial development for the sake of it. At the Anshan Iron and Steel Complex it became clear that without the creativity of the rank and file workers in applying Marxist theory in their work the mistaken ideas of the capitalist roaders in the complex's management would have become the reality. For New Zealanders who are used to politics being divorced from the lives and work of the ordinary people it is difficult to understand that the development of heavy industry in China is primarily a political question, and only secondarily a question of economic and technical expertise.
It is very easy to adopt a cynical attitude to the Chinese view that economic and social progress depends on the creativity of the ordinary people in applying Marxist politics. But the transformation of a backward area, exploited by foreign invaders and their local stooges, into an advanced industrial area which is the industrial base of socialist China in the space of 20 years is an achievement which is a kick in the guts for cynics and western economic experts who sneer at socialism.
On the docks of the port of Talien we saw some of the products of the Liaoning province's iron and steel industry; crates of material which were about to be shipped to Africa to help build the Tanzam railway in Tanzania and Zambia. This reminded us that China's industrial development is not only for socialist construction at home, but also to help the development of the Third World and the struggle against imperialism and racism in Southern Africa.
The industrial progress in
Today the factory's 11,000 workers produce three main categories of machinery: forging mache is, rolling machines of different kinds
In
A good
While the main emphasis at the Shenyang Heavy Machinery Building Factory was on production of machinery, the factory was an outstanding example of the operation of the principle of self-reliance.
The plant had its own power system which produced gas and electricity, and its own transportation system which included 13 kilometres of rail track. 40 railway carriages and two locomotives. It had a farm which had 100 acres in rice for training cadres in productive labour.
The welfare services were extremely impressive. In the last two years 176,000 square metres of housing development has been built for workers' homes. There is a hospital which provides free medical treatment for workers and has 270 beds, and 300 beds for babies in nursaries and 350 beds for children in kindergartens. The trade union at the factory runs a Cultural Palace which can hold 1,700 people, and organises cultural activities for workers. The factory has even built a special bus for transporting pregnant women workers.
The difference between this factory, and industrial enterprises in the People's Republic in general, and big factories in capitalist countries is not so much in the welfare facilities provided or even in the self sufficiency of the Shenyang Heavy Machinery Building Factory compared to similar enterprises in the capitalist world.
What really distinguishes this factory in Shenyang from a factory in the USA or the Soviet Union for example, is that here a factory is run by the workers in the interests of the workers.
Before outlining examples of how the workers at this factory control its operations it is important to emphasise that in China the working class, allied with the peasants, is the ruling class. The Cultural Revolution, as a struggle that was won by the masses and the revolutionary line of Chairman Mao. showed just how weak the bureaucrats and experts were when confronted by the masses.
This point is important in understanding the differences between trade unions in China and trade unions in New Zealand. In China the trade unions do not confront a hostile class which owns the means of production. It is still vital to organise workers into unions, but the functions of the unions are to organise political study, technical study and the socialist emulation campaign, a campaign designed to boost production by publicising the achievements of advanced workers and production teams in the workshops.
While the administration of the Shenyang Heavy Machinery Building Factory is carried out by a relatively small group of administrators under the guidance of the Revolutionary Committee, the rank and file workers have a number of controls over the bureaucrats.
Administrative workers are appointed by the Revolutionary Committee after consultation with the rank and file workers, who have direct representation on the Revolutionary Committee. These administrators spend one day a week working on the factory floor, to remind them whose interests they are serving. Leading members of workshops spend three days a week on the factory floor.
While technical staff draw up blueprints for the design of new products, these blue prints have to be submitted to and discussed by the rank and file workers before they an developed into actual plans for production. This concept of letting workers on the factory floor participate in designing new products is essential because the workers themselves, along with the technicians, have to solve problems of production on the job.
In the area of solving problems one can begin to see the connections between the workers' political study and their role as the leading force in the factory. One of the advanced workers at Shenyang Heavy Machines Building Factory described how workers tackled problems by applying the principles of Marxism—Leninism—Mao Tsetung thought.
He pointed out that in their work the workers often encountered different kinds of contradictions. "It would be stupid," he said, "to try and solve all the contradictions at once, so we follow Chairman Mao s teaching and always look for the major contradiction and solve that first."
This worker gave one specific example of how he and his comrades had solved a problem by applying Mao's teaching. Previously the workers had used an ordinary vertical hammer to crush iron ingots. But this machine was not effective enough, and it was suggested that the workers should make a bowl vertical hammer to do the job. Few workers knew what a bowl vertical hammer looked like, and after many experiements and relating theory and practice the workers made a bowl vertical hammer. This improvement increased efficiency four times.
Before we left the Shenyang Heavy Machinery Building Factory it was stressed to us that the factory had a number of problems to overcome. Greater mechanisation and better co-ordination of different processes are needed to reduce labour-intensity. This was a reminder that Chinese industry is still in the developing stages and had not reached the level of advanced industrial countries.
As an outstanding example of the principle of self-reliance operating in practice the Shenyang Heavy Machinery Building Factory was a sharp reminder of the puny nature of New Zealand industry and the danger of relying on foreign capital and agricultural exports.
This is the full text of a lecture delivered at this University last week by Dr Rangi Walker, Senior Lecturer at the Centre for Continuing Education, University of Auckland. He argues that the official policy of racial integration is merely a rationale for the assimilation of the Maori into Pakeha society. The Maori people have been defined as a 'problem' which can be 'solved' by what amounts to the elimination of their culture. Dr Walker insists that a separate Maori identity must be retained, and that this is possible in a genuinely egalitarian society. However, there may have to be some modification of 'democracy' as it exists in New Zealand today......
The question of authority and the individual from a Maori point of view has to be considered within the context of the total social field. Maoris are born into a world which has a social structure determined by historic antecedents. Briefly, the crucial historic determinants were those of a viable culture overlaid by an era of colonial exploitation and outright subjugation by superior fire power. The Maori accommodated to Pakeha dominance following the crushing of the prophetic movements of Te Ua, Te Kooti and Te Whiti in the
The Maori withdrew to his tribal hinterland, there to "whakatipu tangata" to plant and rear men. It was during this period of withdrawal that the Maori renewed his strength and regenerated his culture. The great leaders of the day. Buck, Ngata and Pomare worked on a wide front of improving standards of hygiene, housing, education and farming practices. Their success was measured by the rapid population recovery of the Maori from 40,000 at the turn of the century to over 275,000 today. They also revised Maori arts and crafts and an interest in Maori songs and poetry. The Maori culture groups that today sing traditional waiata as well as modern action songs are the living embodiment of the vision of these men to maintain the cultural continuity of the Maori. At the heart of Ngata's programme was the renovation and building of maraes, the focal point of Maori community life. Up until the urban migration of the postwar years the majority of the Maoris were born into rural Maori communities within a tribal context.
In such communities there was a well defined social structure and hierarchy of authority. At the elementary level was the whaanau or extended family unit headed by the father. After him, rank was determined by order of birth, the mataamua or first born having seniority over his teina or junior siblings. The spokesman of the extended family on the forum of the marae was the most senior member present, namely the patriarch. In his absence the first born male had the right to speak. At the community level the larger unit of the hapu or sub-tribe recognised certain kaumaatua or elders as leaders by virtue of seniority of descent on a genealogical basis. Despite this hierarchy of elders, patriarchs and senior males, their power was not authoritarian. Apart from some tribes such as the Arawa who did not permit their women to speak on the marae, the marae for those who had rights or tuurangawaewae in was an entirely democratic institution.
Since the members of a sub-tribe were all related there was no such thing as a two party system or adherence to a convention such as majority rule. Because the hapu was a primary group that rested in the ideology of the unity of the kinship group, it could maintain itself only on the basis of consensual decision making.
The marae as an institution was ideally suited to authority based on the consensual decision of the community. The community would meet by day on the marae to consider a take or problem. The aphorisms of the Maori stressed that the democratic process would not be served unless matters were discussed openly on the marae, 'Kia whitingia e te ra, kia puhipuhia e te hau', (That they might be exposed to the bright sunlight and blown about by the wind). This is in contrast to the Pakeha method of sitting in committee behind closed doors.
An important element in arriving at consensual decisions was the absence of a time dimension. If a conclusion could not be arrived at on the marae, then the discussion would continue in the meeting house at night. The physical arrangements in the meeting house of bedding on the floor were well suited to the prolonged discussions necessary for consensual decisions. Those that became hors de combat would fall asleep in their recumbent positions to rejoin the fray at any time in the middle of the night that they felt inclined. Often, it was here that a final decision was made, and in this respect the meeting house complemented the marae. According to the aphorism "Nga korero i kore i oti i runga i te marae me whakatutuki ki roto i te whare." (The discussions that were not completed on the marae should he brought to a conclusion in the house.)
The authority system I have described belongs to the sub-culture of the Maori, a structure that I have designated elsewhere as the minor system of Maori social organisation. Beyond this is the world of the Pakeha. Maoris born into the minor system and socialised in its ways, soon became aware of Pakeha influence from outside their community. The Pakeha being an outsider to the Maori community may even have been used as a bogey-man by parents. This image of the Pakeha as something to be held in awe is soon reinforced by other contacts. Gradually the Maori child perceives that the Pakeha represents power beyond and above the authority of his community. He is the dairy inspector who can condemn the family milking shed for not being up to standard. He is the teacher who can mete out punishment at school for misdemeanours or slackness in work. He is the shopkeeper who can advance or withdraw credit, he is the postmaster who doles out family benefit, the boss who can give his father the sack, or the policeman who puts bad people in gaol. In this way, the Maori child learns the difference between Maori and Pakeha, between minority and majority group status. He also perceives that in material matters Pakehas are more affluent than Maoris.
By comparison with the Pakeha. being a Maori despite all its positive aspects, may end up as a negative quantity. Research by Vaughan1 has shown that up to the age of seven and eight Maori children may suffer from an identity conflict. They think that they look like Pakehas because they have acquired a sufficient knowledge relating to the culture of the out group to want to belong to it. Besides, the Pakeha authorities tend to define Maoris in a negative way. Since the time of Sir George Grey for instance, the Maori has been defined as a "problem", for which the solution was assimilation. In recent years much time and thought has been given to the "problem of Maori education". Last week a headline in an Auckland newspaper following the release of the Social Welfare Department's report stated that "Maoris top juvenile crime list."2 These negative definitions of the Maori serve to deepen the identity conflicts of Maori children. Together with the disadvantages in minority group status they lead to loss of pride and low self esteem expressed in being whakaitia (shy ).
The poor self-image is probably the greatest disadvantage that the Maori child suffers in competition with the Pakeha. He would like to dissociate himself from being a Maori, from minority group status and become successful like the Pakeha; but it is impossible for him to do so. He cannot escape categorisation on the basis of his physical features. Gradually he gets his identity right and he rebels against Pakeha authority that shackles him with minority group status and its attendant disadvantages. Maori children are cooperative and conforming in the infant school. It is in the middle standards about the age of seven and eight when they have worked out their identity and its full implications that they become anti-social and disruptive in school.
School and Pakeha authority worsens the situation for the child by its failure to put a positive valuation on Maori identity. The teachers in the main are monocultural and don't even take the trouble to pronounce Maori names correctly. It is no wonder that school for Maori children becomes a place of failure, a place to leave as soon as one turns fifteen.
Maori children give up the struggle against the constricting effect of the Pakeha-defined mythology that Maoris are "fat, lazy, cunning, promiscuous, happy-go-lucky, lacking in ambition, apathetic, shiftless, improvident, unreliable"3 or on the positive side that they're musical, good at rugby and good with their hands, especially at carpentry or track-driving. In the end, only those Maoris who were prepared to conceal their Maoriness or who are endowed with unusual drive could participate in the Pakeha game of social mobility according to Pakeha defined rules.
The Pakeha world is redeemed from condemnation for its institutionalised racism by the presence of token Maoris. They give a shaky foundation to our loudly proclaimed reputation for racial harmony and equality.
But things are changing. With the urban migration in the post-war years the policy of accommodation to Pakeha dominance by withdrawal came to an end. By forsaking his ancestral lands for the towns and cities the Maori signified his desire to share in the cultural goals of the urban industrial system. Metge4 found that the majority of her informants migrated to the city for the big three factors of work, money and pleasure.
In the city the Maori has been exposed for perhaps the first time to the possibility of being assimilated by the dominant Pakeha. The Pakeha, who controls the decision making processes that affect the Maori suffers from what I call ghetto-paranoia. It is a state of mind that is peculiar to the majority group and stems from fear, suspicion, ignorance and intolerance about the Maori minority. Ghetto paranoia has its charter in the "We are one people" ideology enunciated by Governor Hobson at the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi. From this famous utterance Sir George Grey derived his assimilationist policy as the solution to the "Maori problem".
Through the education system the concept was translated into action by the exclusion of the Maori language. The effectiveness of this policy of cultural genocide is reflected in the retreat of the Maori language. In
Since the hura kohatu, the unveiling of a memorial headstone has replaced the hahunga or exhumation of ancestral bones. The urban marae has been updated to comply with the building and health regulations of the Pakeha. Despite these adjustments the Maori is still subject to intensive assimilation pressures from the Pakeha. The Department of Maori Affairs for instance practices a policy of pepper-potting Maori houses in Pakeha neighbourhoods. Behind this policy is the naive assumption that Maoris will become brown Pakehas by blending in with the people of the neighbourhood. Integration, meaning assimilation, becomes complete when Maoris manifest bourgeois behaviour by trimming their hedges and mowing their lawns. The pepper-potting policy is an example of ghetto-paranoia par excellence on the part of Pakeha authorities.
Fortunately, the policy has failed because it is not observed by the State Advances Corporation. Because Maoris are suspicious of the Department of Maori Affairs and also because the majority of them are in the lower income bracket, they go to the State Advances Corporation for their housing requirements. The Corporation stuffs them willy-nilly into places like Te Atatu, Mangere, Otara and Porirua. It is suburbs like these that are erroneously depicted in the media as ghettos. This of course is a misuse of the term because there are no constraints, other than financial ones, as to where anyone black or white wishes to settle in New Zealand. By the same sort of reasoning one might well argue that an "executive subdivision" or a housing estate called "White Acres" in an Auckland suburb are ghettoes.
Contrary to the expectations of ghetto paranoia, suburbs where there is a high density of Maoris have developed in the direction of greater understanding and harmony rather than increased tension. This is because where there is a sufficient density of Maoris they can to some extent overcome problems of social disorganisation resulting from the loss of their kin group by forming voluntary associations. Maori Welfare Committees. Maori Women's Welfare Leagues, Maori Culture Clubs, Maori wardens, Maori benevolent societies. Maori credit unions, Maori churches. Maori sports clubs all operate as integrative mechanisms within the total framework of society. They stress Maori identity, adherence to social norms and the continuity of Maori values. Without these voluntary associations, Maoris would lose their sense of identity and self-determination.
It is clear that the social planners should plan for a high density of Maoris, perhaps up to 50% in new housing estates. The argument for a planned density of Maoris against the official policy of spreading them thinly on the ground can be tested by identifying the places where Maori-Pakeha gang fights have occurred. They have occurred at Papatoetoe not Otara, Palmerston North not Porirua and at Christchurch and Invercargill where Maoris are thought to be as rare as the white heron.
Despite the Maori desire to maintain social harmony in his own way, he is continuously being assailed by ghetto-paranoia. We are all too familiar with the cry of some people to abolish Maori rugby teams as being separatist or even Maori representation in Parliament. In
The decision was a Pakeha one, arbitarily arrived at by Pakeha authorities without consulting the Maori people. This is one problem with ghetto paranoia, it can be rationalised on the basis of the ideal of social equality, of equality of opportunity. Yet we all know that there is nothing more inequal than making unequals equal. If any gains are to be made in Maori education then Pakeha authorities are going to have to learn to share their power with Maoris.
If Maoris want separate provision in education, the right to develop a parallel system where they think that their children can get a better deal than is provided at present in our State schools, then perhaps they deserve it as a minority right.
At another level it is disturbing to learn that even the Protestant churches suffer from ghetto paranoia. The hierarchy of the Anglican, Methodist and Presbyterian churches view Maori Missions as separatist and wish to abolish them in the interest of an abstract ideal called equality. Equality according to ghetto paranoic thinking means the abolition of Maori identity and inclusion with the Pakeha on Pakeha terms. If this is what the Protestant churches want then I would venture to predict a drop in their membership. It is no accident that the Roman Catholic Church had the highest growth rate of 12% last year. Not only does the Catholic Church grant Maoris inclusion on their terms but it also makes extensive concessions to biculturalism. It even goes so far as to help the people establish Maori community centres. Equality should not be equated with uniformity. It should also mean the right to be different. God preserve us from developing a homogenous uniform and conforming society. To quote a proverb from the third world, "All the gardens of the world are different, it is only the deserts that are the same."
My final point about authority from the Maori point of view is the Pakeha's commitment to the tyranny of the majority under the guise of democratic rule. Democratic societies of West-European origin accept the principles of majority rule as a functional convention by which social life is ordered to achieve the greatest good for the greatest number. While the convention of majority rule may have been valid in racially homogenous societies such as Victorian England it is questionable in modern racially heterogenous societies. Since most societies of the world, because of the effects of colonialism or migration are heterogeneous, the effect of majority rule in the overall political structure is to create outvoted minorities. Minority rights have no safeguard in democracies and depend entirely on the whim or altruism of the majority. Because of the modern conditions of plural societies what is needed is a United Nations convention on the rights of minorities.
Maoris in New Zealand constitute an outvoted minority who for a hundred years since the civil disturbances created by Te Kooti have waited on the altruism of the Pakeha majority. When they suffered from a sense of grievance, Maoris in accordance with due process have gone with petitions to Parliament. When they failed to gain redress there, they took their petitions to the Queen of England and more recently in
In
In
Another of the recommendations contained in the Maori Council's submission was one to the effect that at least one of the eight District officers in the Department of Maori Affairs should be a Maori. One would have thought that Maoris by virtue of their knowledge of Maori language, and of marae etiquette would have some advantage overa Pakeha in a post that purports to deal with Maori Affairs.
The matter came to a head in Auckland this year when a new Pakeha District Officer was appointed to the Department. It was disturbing to learn that there were no Maori criteria in the State Services Commission's term of reference for a job in the Maori Affairs. Worse still, it was brought to light that the Wanganui Office of the Department had a higher grading than the Auckland Office because the former had more land to deal with while the latter dealt only with people. The imagination is stupefied that an office of a Maori Welfare Department located in the largest Polynesian city in the world has a lower grading than the one in Wanganui because it only deals with people. What a misplaced sense of values!
How can the situation be remedied? A tentative answer is to adapt the democratic system of majoritarian rule to the needs of a bicultural and plural society. We need to create a pluralistic democracy by making provision for minority views in the decision-making processes of the country. In short, the Pakeha will have to learn to share his power with the Maori, especially in those areas where decisions affect the Maori. For the sake of our children, the future well being of our society may well depend on the greater democratisation of authority.
Vaughan, G. The Development of Ethnic Awareness in Maori and Pakeha School Chilren 1964, p. 48.
Below are manifestos for the three contested positions. All other positions have been filled unopposed.
I am the present Sports Officer, an executive member of the Wellington Committee on Vietnam, chairman of the Student Anti-Imperialist Front, and a student representative on the Joint Committee Council.
My reason for first standing for Sports Officer was to provide student voters with the opportunity to elect a politically unified executive. Previous execs, hamstrung by conservative elements had become isolated from student opinion, such as in the case of PBEC. I took my election as a mandate to further the actions of groups who oppose such things as the Vietnam war and South African sporting contacts. This was not to mean that my intention was to ignore the sports aspect of my portfolio, I believe that I have fulfilled my obligations in this regard as Sports Officer and on Sports Committee. Non students are paying more in sports clubs, there is now a pool table in the former Hart room. I would continue such a sports policy.
Most students do not vote; I do not represent them or their interests. Such students are representative of an ignorance and selfishness that imagines that their total apathy has no connection with the plight of their fellow man suffering under colonialism and imperialism throughout the world. To them especially, such concepts are mere word playing.
Should I be re-elected I will regard it as a mandate from concerned students to strive for increased social change both within the university and in its external relations.
In the university the main problem is assessment. In-term assessment, regarded as the panacea for all ills has become the all year round rack. No progress can be made until all assessment techniques employed are scrapped. Students are in a powerless position, incapable of controlling the university in which their destinies and those of society are decided. The university car park in Waiteata Road is an example of almost feudal privilege enjoyed by the administration who never use their parks.
In external relations developments must be carefully fostered. Rama's tenant's furniture in the Union was symbolic of a new student era of forming working relationships with radical groups and organisations beyond the university.
Many students are no doubt wondering why I am running for both Man Vice President and Sport's Officer. It is not because my political ambitions have gone to my head. I am concerned to see a situation develop that has resulted in an almost non-election this year. In my memory, since I first enrolled at this university in
I am running for more than one position on the executive because I want to see at least something in the lines of an election.
The current student executive and the editors of Salient bear a large part of the responsibility for the development of this stifling atmosphere where there is no room for the existence of dissenting views. And Don Carson, who I understand is running for sports officer for the third time, as a member of the current executive shares in the responsibility for the creation of the witch hunt atmosphere at Victoria.
I claim no sports administrative experience. Nor do I intend to outbid Don in the provision of billiards room, etc. However, I do have confidence in my ability to learn the job and pledge to represent student sporting interests to the best of my ability. And in my role on the student executive, if elected, I pledge to campaign for support for the points in the Young Socialist election manifesto, and to fight for a situation where there is room for all points of view to be freely expressed without any big sticks being held over the dissenters' heads.
I see the role of Man Vice President not as a specialist position such as publications, but as a position to 1) Lighten the workload of the President and 2) To put a special emphasis on issues or activities that need attention.
While I fully support the SRC as the best way to set policy for the Students' Association I see several factors which stop it from being more efficient. The lack of interest of students in the democratic running of the Students' Association (like these elections) is comparable to the lack of interest students have in controlling their own courses. I support groups that have recently sprung up like the English students asking for more student control, and see the questions of internal assessment, student representation, what is an education, and student control as the most relevant issues to students. This notwithstanding, I see the relevance of furthering Students' Association support for organisations and individuals that are working for change in the wider society.
Communication between the Executive and other students and between students themselves is a continuing problem. I support other ways of communicating than SRC, ways where students can discuss ideas and their points of view. For instance, the introduction of groups for first year students to get to know one another and discuss ideas as at Canterbury University I see as a priority.
My previous experience in Students' Association affairs is as follows:
A charge that is often thrown at socialist candidates by their opponents in student elections is that by running on a broad political platform we are not relating to student interests. Where do we stand on increased university workloads, on cramped library conditions, on student housing, on the quality and cost of cafeteria food, etc, etc? Of course the Young Socialist candidates (who are, after all, students ourselves) are concerned about these questions and if elected to office would devote a good deal of our energies to furthering the immediate interests of the student body. After all, that is one of the principal reasons why a student association and a student executive exist.
But students as a whole today are interested in more than their own piece of bread and butter. They have again and again shown their concern over broad political questions such as Vietnam, apartheid and women's rights, and candidates have a duty to state where they stand on such issues. In addition to mobilising students in defence of their immediate interests, the Young Socialist candidates including myself as Man Vice President, if elected, will campaign for support for the following points:
—For a continuing campaign for the complete and unconditional US and NZ withdrawal from Southeast Asia. Stop the bombing of Cambodia. Break all NZ ties with the Saigon dictatorship. Support the July 27 antiwar picket of the Saigon embassy.
—For a women's rights university. For a free 24-hour government-financed university creche. For a women's studies course incorporated into the university curricula. Full support for the women's rights parade on Suffrage Day, September 19, demanding that abortion be a women's right to choose.
—For homosexual rights. End all discrimination against gays.
—For a university open to all. Cost of living bursaries to all students. End UE admission requirements (which, for example, prevent Maoris, Polynesian and overseas students who are not fluent in English from entering university).
Members of the Young Socialists are continually being asked by students: "Why are the Young Socialists hated so much by the other student leaders?" Apart from Out political differences with these other "radicals", the answer is simply that the Young Socialists are the only organised force on campus which has been prepared to consistently stand up to the in group which currently dominates the students' association.
This point is highlighted by the fact that the Young Socialist candidates are the only candidates which are standing up against this in-group control in the current elections. Where the Young Socialists aren't running for a position, people have been elected unopposed.
This cannot simply be explained away as "student apathy". This state of affairs is, in our opinion, a direct reflection of the disgusting atmosphere which has been generated on campus this year — where virtually anyone who openly opposes the current administration runs the risk of being abused, slandered, and "trot- baited". The
A central obligation of the student president and of the student executive will be to strongly condemn this state of affairs, and campaign for a free and democratic atmosphere on campus. This does not mean that the Young Socialist candidates have no firm ideas on all the major social and political questions of today. A glance through our programme clearly indicates where we stand on a number of important issues. It does mean, however, that we will actively support the right of all students (including those we disagree with) to freely express their opinions and organise around whatever issues they choose. This stands in sharp contrast to Peter Wilson's record.
A vote for the Young Socialist candidates is a vote against the stifling atmosphere on campus and a vote for respect for the viewpoints of all students.
In my last Election Manifesto I made the following statement, "The past year has shown that the Students' Association cannot afford equivocating leadership. Nor on the other hand can we afford dictatorial officers. My position at all times and on all issues will be clear, but decisions on all matters of policy will be referred to SRC's and SGM's. All such policy will be upheld and enacted promptly." In fulfilling my duties as President for
During this year the Association provided the first concrete support to student parents in the form of extra creche facilities in the Union Building. It has supported calls for the development of studies in Maori language, the environment and greater student say in the selection of law faculty staff. It has strengthened and enlarged its prerogatives in the field of the actual intellectual work students perform. The development of student groups which are considering questions such as assessment, the establishment of the "learning exchange" - this is the type of activity which shall continue to have my wholehearted support.
Similarly, student dissatisfaction with aspects of the Welfare Services in the university can only be relieved by increasing the degree of student involvement in decisions in this field. Concrete moves in this direction have already been taken. At the same time the Association and I in my capacity as President, have provided strong support for organisations such as Nga Tamatoa, the Tenants' Protection Association and the Wellington Committee on Vietnam. Because the character of the university is tightly linked to the character of the society of which it is a part, it follows that uniting the elements which are working for change in both is the only way of ultimately achieving a real transformation in either. The lack of continuity in Students' Association personnel is undoubtedly a major problem in advancing a practical strategy of this kind.
I have also chosen to stand again because the role of the universities is obviously undergoing reappraisal and change. A major educational development conference is planned for next year. It is vital that students be represented by people who can uphold their interests against the liberal-conservative consensus which, in practice, always works to the detriment of those interests in the course of making education a tougher means of enforcing the social authority of the status quo.
Finally, the unsatisfactory situation in the area of cafeteria facilities is something for which I must accept my share of responsibility. The problem has still to be effectively tackled, though the reconsideration of the catering contract which is now due, must result in improved facilities if the problem is not to be handed down from one year to the next. If I am re-elected President for
A few weeks ago an Indian Chief, speaking at a public ceremony welcoming Queen Elizabeth to Canada, pleaded that the broken treaties be honoured. A mounted policeman said when the Chief's microphone was disconnected "Well, that was a stroke of genius". Such has been the contempt of Europeans for the Indian's attempts to inform us of their plights. "Touch the Earth" is a record of such unheard pleas, and of the anger, anguish and dismay of a people vanquished with genocidal fervour.
In "When the last Red man shall have perished, and the memory of my tribe shall have become a myth among the white man, these shores will swarm with the invisible dead of my tribe, and when your childrens' children think themselves alone in the field, the store, the shop, or in the silence of the pathless woods, they will not be alone... At night when the streets of your cities and villages are silent and you think them deserted, they will throng with the returning hosts that once filled them and still love this beautiful land. The White Man will never be alone."
While "Touch the Earth" does not claim to be a scholarly book, there are eleven pages of bibliography and notes. The 185 pages (including 54 of photographs taken in the early
"Touch the Earth" portrays forced confrontation with the invading European technology upon an oral-tradition, non literate but nevertheless highly intelligent culture with concepts of ethics and social responsibility in advance of those which Europeans so often imagined they possessed.
The Indian reverence for ecological conservation is evident throughout this book. They saw and were appalled at the destruction of the buffalo, bear, deer, the forests and the prairies and the streams. Tatanka Yotanka, or Sitting Bull, the famed Sioux warrior had this to say:
"I wish all to know that I do not propose to sell any part of my country, nor will I have the whites cutting our timber along the rivers, more especially the oak. I am particularly fond of the little groves of oak trees. I love to look at them, because they endure the wintry storm and the summer's heat, and — not unlike ourselves — seem to flourish by them."
"On "We know that you highly esteem the kind of learning taught in these Colleges, and that the Maintenance of our young Men, while with you, would be very expensive to you. We are convinced, that you mean to do us Good by your Proposal; and we thank you heartily. But you, who are wise must know that different Nations have different Conceptions of things and you will therefore not take it amiss, if our Ideals of this kind of Education happen not to be the same as yours. We have had some Experience of it. Several of our young People were formerly brought up at the Colleges of the Northern Provinces: they were instructed in all your Sciences, but, when they came back to us, they were bad Runners, ignorant of every means of living in the woods. . . neither fit for Hunter, Warrior, nor Counsellors, they were totally good for nothing.We are, however, not the less oblig'd by your kind Offer, tho' we decline accepting it; and, to show our grateful sense of it, if the Gentlemen of Virginia will send us a Dozen of their Sons, we will take Care of their Education, instruct them in all we know, and make Men of them.
It is perhaps stating the obvious but it is far from difficult to find parallels between the Indian experience of Europeans, and that of the Maori.
This review of an intensely moving chronicle of North American Indians and their writing was not induced by a free copy sent for the purpose of cheap publicity. After having bought and read it, I was compelled to accord it the attention it deserves. It is available from Printed Matter Books, Plimmer Steps. Wellington.
Inside the Concert Chamber there's a sparring match with rigged rules between the Watersiders and the FOL in the centre of the audience, competing with a schmaltsy singer in one corner. In another, what appears to be a mechanical soldier stiffly salutes, and salutes, and. . . until suddenly all the performers vanish; the 'real' performance gets underway with the appearance of Edward Gibbon Wakefield riding on the back of one of his working-class immigrants. The first half moves brilliantly through what could be described — lamely — as a potted portrait of settlers, politicos and others till we reach the coronation of King Dick (alias Seddon), and the advent of prosperity along with a name for progress, i.e. an identity as both a nation and people. Theatre Action perform imaginatively and economically, drawing a character in a deft movement. But it's not really an attempt to produce well- rounded characters or a fixed story line; it's more a mosaic of images moving very fast, with no time for the audience to fix onto a particular one, or to abstract themselves from the action.
Problems arise after the interval. The audience has typed the production: fast satire with an element of mysticism and an underlying pessimism. So they're not prepared for the extreme realism, the plodding pace when the troupe shows us life here and now in 'The Best of All Possible Worlds', alias NZ, alias 'mashed potato feel'. We tend to define good theatre by its attack, and very often equate a sharp, incisive performance with swiftness. Thus the slowness challenged a fairly basic conception, and to a certain extent alienated the audience. It took me a good ten minutes to adjust to the changed pace, and perhaps also the dreariness, before I felt at ease again — only to be disrupted by the appearance of some unimaginative, dull stereotypes. Most of which I have seen before offered as objects of ridicule, and which serve only to make me angry at the creator's sterility and arrogance. Theatre Action redeemed themselves by mixing in familiar with unfamiliar themes and caricatures and, in general, presenting them in tones rather than blatant black and white. Certainly the second half lays itself open for criticism on several planes, but I think only that which regrets the occasional loss of imagination and what could be called a sense of dignity is valid. The audience is left to reconcile myths with reality. With action going on all around the audience, people had frequently to make a choice between one event and another. The audience here is a far more active concept than the easier 'picture frame' presentation, wherein each individual sees the same things.
'The Best of All Possible Worlds' is not only enjoyable, but also challenges certain basic categorisations, the least of which is concerned with theatre.
The Drama Society's third offering for this term will be James Saunders' 'Next Time I'll Sing To You'. Accused in the past by "Salient" and others of producing fatuous plays, this production is a significant contribution to a subject which has puzzled man for thousands of years: "What is life?" "What is the purpose of existence?"
Although nominally an investigation of the life of a hermit who divorced himself from society for forty years, 'Next Time I'll Sing To You" in fact attempts to answer this age-old question. It uses techniques bordering on absurd theatre — highly amusing while always remaining thought provoking — dare it be said intellectually stimulating. It stands more as an excerpt from a piece of continuous action without beginning or end rather than the 'well made play' beloved of commercial and amateur theatre alike.
'Next Time I'll Sing To You" nearly reached production last year when it was to be directed by the visiting lecturer in drama, Richard Rothrock, but arrangements fell through; it is now being directed by Alastair MacFarlane.
This play should offer an amusing and stimulating evening's entertainment. It will be performed in the Memorial Theatre in the final week of term, from July 31 to August 4. Bookings may be made at the Students' Association Office.
"Shoot Out at the Fantasy Factory" is a good album: well-conceived, well-played, even excellent in parts, but it never really breaks free of the stricture of Stevie Winwood's careful production and soars. The promise intimated by the title and the cover, a three dimensional mock-up of suits drifting aimlessly through space, is not really borne out by the music.
The title cut and album opener is a medium paced rocker, anchored by Reebop's shifting conga rhythm, which sounds as if it's a section from a longer song arbitrarily sliced at both ends. Winwood's production has smoothed every thing out and his vocal has been buried in the final mix. There are no crests or troughs — the sound is too uniform, too unruffled.
"Roll Right Stones", the long track that rounds out the remainder of the side represents about the same waste of vinyl as "Do What you like" on the Blind Faith album. Winwood's voice is slightly more to the fore but imparts a lyric that is so obscure as to be well nigh unintelligible. The verses are linked by an interwoven piano-sax-organ break which threatens to inject some life into the proceedings momentarily but lack of differentiation between the lead and rhythm section kills it dead. The themes are there, but the variation necessary to carry such a lengthy track is sadly lacking.
Over to side two and "Evening Blue", a ballad in the same vein as "No face, no name, no number" from the first album or the title cut from "John Barleycorn". Building slowly over an acoustic guitar introduction Winwood's vocal is fine, if a trifle inhibited and affected and Chris Wood takes a well-phrased solo against a swirling organ backdrop.
The instrumental, "Tragic Magic", drags but "Sometimes I feel so uninspired", a full-frontal approach to the mythical deficiency, closes the album on a high note. The lyrics are sung depressingly at first as they twist sharply from despair to paranoia into a guitar solo that recalls to mind some of the best of Clapton's work. There's life here, the instrumentation is crisp and well-defined, leaving you with the impression that they' are professionals, completely in control, who know exactly what they want and the best way of going about it. Although Traffic may be an acquired taste, once the listener has granted them their stylistic predilections, at their best, as on this track, they're irresistable.
When you first hear Stealers Wheel from England, you're gonna jump up and down and raise merry hell. If you reckon you ever heard a "derivative band", forget it 'cos Wheel cop them all.
They do the Beatles so well you'd be excused for thinking they'd reformed — and after you've heard the album they'll be the crassest musical plagiarists you know.
Happily they're such a bloody delightful band, you'll forgive them for being so outrageously the stealers they are, fall in love with the music and take it all as Stealers Wheel, period.
What that all means is that Wheel aren't original and they're not brilliant. They're unashamedly stolen left, right and centre and come up with a gloriously zippy album that's better than the Raspberries and quite simply one of the best A-grade Pop records I've heard in a long time.
Leiber and Stoller, one-time producers of the Coasters and Presley, have so Americanised Stealers Wheel they sound as United Stated as Gene Pitney and Lassie, without the gloss and plus a dash of British cuteness.
They've also given you a stingy 28 minutes record time but don't complain. Stealers Wheel are very, very good.
Late Again is the most instantly likeable track with JJ Cale stoned lethargy, some amazingly wooden organ and charming falsetto tail-offs from vocalist Gerry Rafferty.
On Johnny's Song they sound so laid-back, it's almost ridiculous — like maybe they were drunk or tired when recording time came round.
I Get By and Jose are slow rockers. Bread- like in construction and if that puts you off, the guitar on I Get By has been pushed so far forward it's shattering.
And then there's Stuck in the Middle With You, the hit song in America. Short, tense and bittersweet: I don't know why I came here tonight/ I got the feeling that something ain't right/ I'm so scared in case I fall off my chair/And I'm wondering how I'll get down the stairs/ Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right/Here I am, stuck in the middle with you/And I'm wondering what I should do.
Buy this album if only for Late Again and Stuck in the Middle: a lot to pay for six minutes and none of your friends will take you to tea for it. If you want half an hour of Good Clean Stuff, it's better than anything you've bought this year and you'll like it. Promise.
Bowie has grown up, unbeknown to us all, and the LP that clinches it is this, his latest masterpiece.
The lyrics are hard to understand, the rruisic even harder, but you still love him for it: after all he invited us all to fall in love with him on Hunky Dory and The Man Who Sold the World, but it failed so he seduced us with Ziggy Stardust and we all fell for it. Sucked in.
He's brilliant cos he works on the mind, not the body.
From Drive-In-Saturday to Time, Aladdin Sane is futuristic, delving into the unknown, showing us what's in store, all completely unrealistic, yet credible.
For Bowie, the album is unusually heavy. Listen to the phasing on Panic in Detroit for example. He's changed all right, no mistaking that. He's into something new cos he's got us twisted round his little finger and he knows we'll respond and how . . .
He's given us everything we asked for after Ziggy and more. We're still getting the hard, driving sound of Trevor Bolder's bass and Mick Ronson's lead. These guys, of course, are the - 'Spiders' who won the hearts with Bowie on Ziggy.
He hasn't failed on this album, in fact he's given us more than expected, and how it is revered, it's almost sacreligious.
If you like Bowie, you'd have bought him by now so what else is there to say?
'I'd like to think that Bob Dylan's performances on this album are yet another elaborate joke; another mask, (like that Rolling Stone, interview) behind which a duty is performed while giving the least possible clue to where he is really at. But over the last few years he's been working so hard at hiding his artistry that the suspicion is growing that the pretence has become a reality, the cupboard is bare, and in a very depressing sense he's invisible now with no secrets to conceal. Certainly he has never sung worse, played worse or written more wretched material than what appears here. It seems that while he's outgrown the homespun homilies of "Skyline" and "Self Portrait" no new direction has yet formed. Mr Dylan, meet Mr Lennon and welcome to the void.
Doug Sahm himself is a variation on the same theme. Since
In fact, all the energy and creativity here went into the drawing on the cover. But why does everyone on the cover look so happy? Why those shit-eating grins? Considering the quality of the music its enough to make you very paranoid.
This is quite bad.
Can are a five-piece German group, hailed in Britain as the spearhead of the Germanic progressive rock explosion.
Actually, they're pretty boring. As in Dik Mik and Hawkwind, and five arty-farty heads too full of Stockhausen and a "concord of sweet sounds".
Vitamin C has something about "your nose is bloody silly". Yeah, bloody silly. Pinch is a nine minute foray into engineer's tricks and grubby stops-and-starts: "freak-outs" were the words Japanese vocalist, Damo Suzuki, muttered flippantly in an interview.
For those among you dulled by Pink Floyd's excursion into soul music, for those seeking the only genuine electronic extension of Hawkwind, for the heavy-headed among us . . . you might like Can.
Thirty-eight minutes playing time. Go to it.
This is a very special recording indeed. It is one of the few recordings available today of a virtuoso who died at the age of 33 in
A real treat, not only for opera fans but especially for lovers of fine sinking. The quality and range of Renata Tebaldi's magnificent voice has rarely thrilled me as much as in these operatic arias. And as a partner, the Academia Orchestra could very well be the perfect model of how an accompanying orchestra should sound and react: it is there all the time, tactful and never intruding on the star's performance, a fact which unfortunately is not always observed by many ensembles of this kind. The programme is mainly Italian — Mascagni, Catalani, Rossini. . . and Mozart's "Marriage of Figaro", with a couple of arias not often heard or known. As opera goes, they are highly sentimental (sentimentalised?) themes of unrequited love, embittered passion, amorous intrigues and melodramatic situations.
It has been said that the music of Edgar Varese has the beauty and precision of an intricate machine which creates its emotion objectively and not as a subjective projection of the composer's feelings. As one of the outstanding experimentalists of his day, Varese has always been primarily concerned with the organisation of sound, a concept which he traces back to his great love for science and mathematics and favoured as an engineering student. His approach to music is therefore of an abstract and complex nature and he tends to think in blocks of sound that generate their own polyphony or chordal harmony, independently. In spite of this freedom from conformity, most of Varese's works are highly organised, although not really programmed, and possess form and structure. His dissonant world often rejects standard instrumental procedures and combinations, such as the large string section which nevertheless happens to be used in "Arcana", but it is neatly counterbalanced by 39 percussion instruments and an augmented wind section. His obsession with percussion as a means of colour has lead him, as in the case of "Integrales", to increase the percussion elements in the orchestra by changing rhythms and obtaining new "voices" (the lion-roar or string drum) in order to convey the full impact of dramatic overtones. This direction is carried a step further in "Ionisation", one of Varese's most radical works and in which percussive sounds are manipulated for 100% effect. The performance of all three compositions by the LA Philharmonic Orchestra is skillfully handled by this competent ensemble.
Letters to the Editor should be given to one of the editors, left in the box outside the office or posted to Box 1347. If possible, they should be typed or printed legibly, double spaced on one side of the paper only.
We try to impose a limit of 300 words per letter — if you can't cnofine yourself please come and see us about the possibility of putting it in the form of an article.
At the beginning of this year (if you can remember) the Registrar insisted that departments must inform their students of how they were going to be assessed, and that departments stick to their assessment policies, no matter what. All very nice... Now the Registry is insisting that several departments, with nearly two-thirds of the academic year gone, should change their policies. The Information Science Department, which has no finals paper (total internal assessment) for several of its honours courses and has stuck to this policy all year, has just been told to change its policy. The Registrar has come across an outdated, forgotten regulation which insists on a finals paper for honours courses. They can't amend it until next year, they say.
This means that the students affected, who have been working extra hard during the year because of the requirements of having no finals paper, will now have to also go thru that mind-dulling, mental breaking process of sitting a finals paper. It also means that the staff of the department who have been busy all year keeping us busy, will now have to go thru that mind-dulling, heart-breaking process of writing the finals paper and marking the scripts. The Information Science Department is not the only department affected either.
This is obviously unfair. Students affected by this change in policy should join together and make a formal complaint to the Registrar — if they have any time to do so. Any such fellow student can contact me.
After the constant procession of "Salient is shit" etc letters in your correspondence columns I was interested to read Thorold Mays' "Salient: Light Entertainment?" contribution. This sort of criticism is the kind of material that might have improved the paper earlier if the hate mail writers had chosen to actually think about what they did or didn't want. Me? I'd be interested to sec a bit more creative writing, perhaps a bit of left wing verse.
Why don't I write the copy then? I can hear Roger Steele screaming in my ear. Have patience comrades. This epistle is my first faltering footstep.
Perhaps the most typifying feature of Victoria is the impersonal nature of the various departments. One of the Very few exceptions is the German Dept where there is a real feeling of conviviality among students and staff, which is centred around the house the department occupies (28 Kelburn Parade).
This surely is a situation which should be encouraged, But what is about to happen will have the opposite effect. The house is to be demolished to make way for the new ten storey Languages and Literature Faculty building (Von Zedlitz Building), where there will be little, if any, consideration for a students' room. There is a chance we may be allowed to move into a house in Fairlie Terrace, but nothing is definite. If this plan falls through, we are destined to life in a prefab, where space is so restricted that absolutely no provision can be made for student facilities. To have the department move into a prefab would not only help to destroy this almost unique atmosphere in the German Dept, but would contribute to the growing feeling in the university that the place is only a machine in which to programme people into a state where they can never acieve personal identity. Who wants this to happen?? We don't:
From students of the German Department and others. Kathleen Culliford, Glenda Howell, Rosalind Salas, Detlev Vosgerau, Chris Kelly, J. Nelson, Stefanie Oram, Elsie Bradley, Eric Schusser, Cecily Adams, Lisalotta Napp, Andrew Hibbard, John Zohrab, Jo Mitchell, Dillwyn Hiddlestone, Giilian Adsett, Harold Merriman, J. Harker, Mary Hunter, Peter Baumann, George Hendry, M. B. Johnson, Rand Baxter, Pat Scriven, Murray Needham and many more who can't fit on the page!!
Observation one: You Marxists maintain that the working classes are "exploited" by the capitalist for profit. In a Communist society, people have no individual worth or value apart from their value as a productive unit for the state; they are given education and health care to make and maintain more and more efficient and capable units of production, not for the purpose of the full development of the individual as a person. They exist for nothing but the use and glorification of the state. In other words they are exploited for their labour by the state, the very practise for which you condemn capitalism, and urge the revolutionary fight for a Communist state.
Observation two: Peter Wilson said recently at a Forum he thought it just fine if capitalists were taken out and shot. Strange behaviour from one whose beliefs are supposed to stem from his concern for humanity, for the dignity of man, for the alleviation of oppression and injustice etc. etc. Has he not heard we don't even take a man's life for murder now, not even the life of mass murderers like Manson, yet for what he calls "exploitation" a man can be just taken out and shot? Shows how much he really cares about human respect and justice, when you take him from abstract masses of people to specific individuals. When you get down to specifics, the only individuals who have any worth are those whom it suits the Marxists to attribute value to, which means anyone who agrees with them or at least doesn't strongly disagree with their ideas.
I wish to register my protest at the insidious and subversive forces of evil that are taking over the world with the evident support of fellow-travellers such as yourselves. Your support has increased markedly both in volume and tone over the past few issues, under the flimsy pretext of some few students visiting China who get three and a half pages of propaganda in your last issue. Not content with this you publish a further three pages on Rhodesia from a self-admitted biased source. How about some pretence at fairness such as an article from Ian Smith? Returning to New Zealand, you seem to be doing your best to stir racial hatred into our present harmony with three pages mumbling about the "minority race" and the "power structure". The last true words I saw in Salient on this topic came from Bob Jones. No apology is sufficient to cover the blatant pushing of your point of view in the "Salient Notes" of the last issue — how about less emphasis on "revolutionary correctness" and more on campus which the average student is much more concerned with? Whatever happened to the page on sports? — a subject much more likely to provide wholesome relaxation and character building than the present mythological paeans on China.
It is about time that someone pointed out what a brilliant paper Salient is. Under the wise and benevolent leadership of yourself and Peter it has become the most widely read student newspaper in New Zealand. Up at Auckland University bundles of Craccum lie unread. What are the masses demanding? More copies of Salient.
I have it on good authority that Norm (Right Hon!) reads Salient in bed every Wednesday night.
What student newspaper is sent to Jack Marshall from irate" parents of university student? with demands that the old cold war warrior do something about the commie subversion in the universities? Salient! Yes, even that ridiculous anachronism of the cold war has been asked by his constituents to read Salient.
Salient has more subversive content per page than all the others put together. Keep it up chaps.
It is about time something was done about the cafeteria. Various student politicians have stated their wish to improve standards — yet nothing happens. Articles are run showing ITT's reactionary nature and its inefficiency — yet nothing happens. Letters appear in Salient protesting at the shit served up — yet nothing happens. One begins to suspect either a conspiracy or a rake—off. Any comments comrades?
What has happened to the ancient Salient of ere? Where is the traditional sex, violence and beer swilling? Why has criticism become more muted and less persecutionary? If there's not improvement pretty soon I'll have to go, with a heavy heart, back to the Sundays and Truth.
Copy Deadlines
Contributions should be typed or written legibly double-spaced on one side of the paper only, and should be in the hands of the Editors by Wednesday evening. Late contributions will also be considered.
Advertising
Our new advertising manager is Brian Hegarty, phone 70-319 (ext. 75 & 81) at Salient, or 87-530 (Upper Hutt) at home.
Salient Office
1st Floor, University Union Building,
Phone 70-319 (ext. 75 & 81)
P.O. Box 1347, Wellington, New Zealand
Happened to attend a tome what issueless debate today (about whether one should or shouldn't have confidence in the Government). Both sides seemed to miss the point. In their bumblings and counter-attacks they gave me serious misgivings as to whether one should have confidence in Government per se.
After all, government by definition is the rule — or mis-rule — of one group of individuals over another i.e. suppression of the populus.
This is not necessary. Let me postulate the concept of a nihilistic u'opia, where in men live in harmony; and coercion and restraint are nonexistent. This state of being is not only far more desirable than the rule of law, but is also feasibile in fact inevitable.
Counter arguments to this type of political philosophy would come under two headings. Both can be discounted, Firstly, that it is hope lessly idealistic. So was Karl Marx condemned. Secondly, that human nature being what it is, mankind will always need laws and policing. This is the kind of argument used by the Christians against Darwin, and is tangible bullshit. I put it to you that not only have our minds, our morals and our bodies evolved, but so has government. Compare, for instance 18th Century justice with todays. Some evolution, at least.
Government by becoming less arbitary, is evolving itself out of justice. I submit, therefore, that persons attempting to stem the tide of evolution are not only being futile and reactionary, but by putting their ideas into action are endangering the progress of humanity.
I further submit, that in time when progressive leadership is vital in the dismantling of what is fast becoming an anachronism, such conservative reactionaries — whether they be fascist, spartacist or Trot — who still believe in the efficiency of government should be sweetly and harmoniously liquidated.
I feel compelled to comment on Rob Campbell's and Graeme Clarke's apologism on China's nuclear tests in Salient July 5.
Many readers may doubt the sense of "US Imperialists wifi never blow up the world, which they have the capacity to do, as that would defeat the reason for their existence. They want world hegemony, along with the USSR, to ensure their profits. No world equals no profits." That peculiar statement overlooks the USA's 'better dead than red' suicidal and homicidal crusading zeal so globally evident in recent years.
There might be no obstacle to the 'militarisation' of nuclear devices that cannot be surmounted by the application of nuclear theory and extant data to research and development. Militarisation of nuclear devices requires that they be made practical ordnance produced in such quantities as to be of significance in war, and 'logistically viable' — optimum weight/destructive capacity, so that they may easily be delivered great distances and produce more blast and heat damage than any non-nuclear high explosive, in addition to lethal and disabling radiation.
Nuclear tests as a political demonstration let a country's enemies surmise that it has 'militarised' its nuclear devices, particularly when it can, as China has done, demonstrate a reliable and accurate long range delivery system. In
If matters of this sort are considered as facts by a nation's enemies then nuclear testing is more for politically demonstrating military capacity than for research and development of weapons. Current political and technical developments in Israel and India make it likely that those countries may gate-crash their way into the exclusive nuclear club with nuclear weapons research and development, and of course, political demonstrations of capability by testing. Is nuclear proliferation really likely to lessen the chances of a nuclear conflagration? It might be sensible to suppose that the opposite is more likely.
Could you please tell me who the President of the Students' Union is this year as his/her name slipped my mind in March and nothing has since happened to assist me in remembering.
Your 'People's Voice' critic Rob Campbell seems to have stirred up a little flutter in the darkening dovecot of the CPNZ. "Chicken Man and the Roosters" have replied to Campbell's criticism with yet another example of the blind lashout at any questioning of their weekly squark. Well, Mr Vic "Chicken Man" Wilcox, lets see what your wrote and what the facts actually are.
P. V. July 18, 1973 (above the list of donations.) In huge type — "The list below represents solid support for the working class press. The regular support from workers around the country proves that, despite what some opportunists may claim, there is widespread working class support for a Marxist Leninist newspaper."
Fact. The list below contains no more than four hundred names at the most. In my experience the bulk of the present readership comprises party and ex-party members, members of other small parties and factions, kind hearted students and drunks. In
P. V. July 18 1973. "The People's Voice is the only Marxist Leninist newspaper in New Zealand. For this reason it is the only paper which works in the long term interest of the working class. Others may sneer at the political line, and deny the ability of the working people to understand Marxist —Leninist politics — but by doing so they abdicate from providing the working class with politics which will build the forces needed to seize state power."
Fact. This outrageous mixture of self- praise and distortion has typified the writing of the "Voice" for years. On what grounds does it claim to be a Marxist Leninist paper? On the grounds that it says it is, that's all. Which is not good enough. Many well meaning people, party and non-party, have banged their heads against the concrete wall of Vic's chicken coop in a vain attempt to criticise the grass lack of Marxist analysis in the "Voice". All such criticism is dismissed as "sneering at the political line." So you have the wonderful choice of the P.V. — love it or leave it.
Fifty two years after its foundation the CPNZ has been reduced to a few old men selling a wretched newspaper and the occasional leaflet. Lenin said: "New Zealand is the paradise of Social Democracy," and this is still true. The conditions of our country are not those that produce a vigorous Marxist—Leninist party at the present stage of history'. It's understandable that Chicken Man should cling to his illusions, he has little else. But it would be unfortunate if progressive people were to betaken in by his buffoonery at this stage of the game. The working class and its allies are not an appropriate subject of ridicule.
So its another election. Can't you seeah at the politics is shit of course who wants to get involved? We've got our individual development and degrees and careers and degrees to get.
Isn't if everyone that moans and then does nothing. The elections or non-elections are just what you moaning, do-nothing students deserve. Just a small group of Commies is what you get. They may do something which most of you apathetic mass won't.
I do not think the writers of the Nelson Race Relations Action Committee have said anything constructive in the whole two-page article included in Salient of July 18.
Have they any record of what Maori justice was like in the age before settlers arrived? My guess is that it would have been more severe and more dictatorial than the present-day magistrates ruling. If, on the other hand, all members of the Justice Department, Police and other administrative authorities were now Maori, what would be the difference in todays world?
I happen to be a pakeha who adopted two Maori boys aged 7 and 8. Now at ages 17 and 18 the elder is in detention centre and the other tending to be closely following his brother's example. The 18-year-old became so engrossed in the pleasantries of the Wellington non-working society that he could not be coaxed by me or others to report as required by the Probation Service. Now I do think he had to be disciplined and this unfortunately meant a re-survey of the original offences which everyone would rather have put out-of mind. So he becomes another unit in your Maori Offenders statistics which you protest about. What other alternatives have you got?
Bad up-bringing in an unloving home may be your criticism — but I would call you hypocrites because we took them from a Children's home, sought all possible advice in their up-bringing whereas you no doubt would have left them alone. I also think of the number who could have possibly helped with advice or offers of practical assistance during my last four years of solo parenthood and maybe changed their lives.
Could it not be that you learned ones are the ones who show my youngsters that "life" is — guzzling alcohol., living loosely and trying to get away with what you can in this world. And of course it is so common to hear of someone's offspring getting into trouble that these things become laughable jokes.
But, if you feel you have better methods of correction and up-bringing, advice and constructive criticism could still be useful to me in training the I 7-year-old. However I alternatively suggest that your help is needed in your own neighbourhood to watch Maori children growing up and advise them when they are straying and doing wrong.
Last night on the TeeVee Sir Keith Holyoak assured us that we are living in a "socialist dictatorship" under the new Labour Government. Might I ask Don Franks, who apprarentlv knows all about these things if this is, in fact correct.
Last night (Monday, July 16, at 8.1 5pm) in the seond floor coffee lounge we saw one of the 'caf' minions pouring the remains of the milk from the adjoining restaurant into the large milk jugs, i.e. out of the little jugs into the big ones. I have some idea that it is illegal of present food, which has already been presented to the public, to the public again. Perhaps a representative of the caf would care to make some comment before the matter is referred to the Health Dept.