Another day another college is engulfed in idiocy. I have a theory that some demands are included not for the content or an attempt to solve a problem but for an entirely different reason. The rhetoric sings! The phrase is meaningless in itself but it sounds so damn good that it takes on a life of it’s own. Here’s some oldies but goodies:
“Ho! Ho! Ho! chi minh” a well known phrase from the sixties antiwar demonstrations, that’s it, no other context. At least a similar rendition was a summation or refrain that didn’t stand alone. Who can forget, “Ho, Ho, Ho, Green Giant?”
Then there was the crowd favorite, “Hey! Hey! LBJ!” was then sometimes followed by “How many kids did you kill today?” Unfortunately the attention span of the crowd rarely allowed a complete thought.
At my old Alma Mater Southwest Texas State University (SWTSU) now referred to as Texas State University a group referred to as The San Marcos Ten decided to hold an anti war demonstration in 1969. They were all promptly thrown out of school. Controversy and protests continued and were to culminate with a call to action and civil disobedience. (I got this from one of the participants years later). The rally took place in City Park.
The protesters had a stage and a PA system. The speakers, my informant included, were ready and raring to go to decry the war mongering, baby killing administration of LBJ. Did I mention that LBJ was SWTSU’s most distinguished graduate? They were just waiting for the band to finish.
There were three features of an antiwar demonstrations of the time, not generally reported by the press (1) Rock and Roll free concerts, (2) Dope and (3) Easy Pussy. Rumors abounded that if you couldn’t get laid at an antiwar rally, then it just was never going to happen.
At any rate according to my informant a Texas Department of Public Safety Narcotics Investigator showed up at the rally. He had access to the ring leaders and speakers. The informant swears that while the band was playing the narc was handing out Quaaludes like they were M&M’s. Being the dedicated revolutionaries that they were, everybody gobbled down as many as they could get their hands on.
Quaaludes were marketed as a muscle relaxer. They are now banned worldwide as having absolutely no medical value but a high potential for abuse. The outward effect of quaalude ingestion presents as if somebody was highly intoxicated on alcohol.The band stopped playing, the big moment arrived. None of the speakers could string two coherent words together, as speaker after speaker wobbled, lurched and struggled to make their way to the mike, others fell off the stage. The message was lost, the budding revolutionaries slipped off into obscurity and my informant mourned what might have been. He “coulda been a contenda” the next Abbie Hoffman but for Rorer 714.
Events at Occidental College have the same comic potential, not during the rally but in the aftermath. One of their demands is that the campus police be required to turn in their ballistic vests. Since ballistic vests are not required kit for babysitters, I don’t have the energy to argue with them.
A second and related demand is exclusion of military and external police rhetoric from all documents and daily discourse.
Let’s try this one on for size, A student, located at the corner of LBJ and Sessions Drive calls the University Police to report the theft of their bicycle. The Dispatcher contacts the officer, Unit 719, 10-17 (meet the complainant) at Sessions and LBJ for a stolen property report.
Now under the new regime Unit (jargon) 719 (jargon) Hey can somebody, 10-17 (militaristic and police jargon) go to Sessions and LBJ (old white guy probably would have owned slaves if he could have) at the north edge of campus by the barricade of the only one way street to meet the complainant, victim, reporting person,(police rhetoric) guy (assumes gender) for a stolen bicycle (this may be a justified expropriation) report (jargon).
Dispatch, on second thought never mind it just isn’t worth the effort.