1971_05 The Daily Collegian May 1971

              THE DAILY COLLEGIAN   'Thuraday, May 10, 1971
Non-involvement  —  a
policy of self destruction
By Martyn Green
"/ do my thing, and you d
These words by Frederick S.
Perls seem an admirable philosophy - it first sight But If
we consider them a moment we
realize that tbey are espousing
nothing less than a policy of non-
Involveroent. "You do your thing
and I'U do mine," appears to be
an excellent Idea, for It allows
us the freedom to be ourselves -
or so It seems. But suppose we
see somebody ailing themselves
slowly on drugs - are we supposed to turn our heads away
and not care - because he ls
doing his thing? «Or worse still
- if we see a man viciously
beating his child, are we to turn
a deaf ear to Its screams — because he should be allowed to'do
his thing?" Should we permit a
man to drive recklessly down the
freeway, doing his "thing* Uke
mad, thereby causing a wreck that
doesn't harm HIM ln the sUghtest
- but kills three other people?
Granting him total freedom to do
his thing then, would eventually
deny others the right to do theirs.
SHORTSIGHTED
I therefore suggest that this
Ideal Is a shortsighted one - a
great theory but a poor practice.
We cannot so rashly deny our
concern for  others. We cannot
say we don't want to get Involved
- we ARE Involved. If nothing
else, we are Involved.with others
Ity. This we cannot deny. We cannot forsake our commitment to
others without forsaking Ufe itself. With Ufe comes the concomittant of care, concern, empathy and Identification with others. We can't NOT be Involved-
we ARE.
And yet In America and other
western  societies we are wlt-
nlal of that which we are. "If you
are ln a big city," advises Marshall McCluhan, "and you are attacked, don't shout 'Help!' -that
requires too much commitment.
Shout 'Fire!'. People can handle
something Uke that without getting Involved."
Fear of getting Involved Is not
new. Can one ever forget the Infamy of the triple stabbing of
Catherine Genovese In New York
one night In 1963? No less than
thirty-eight people heard her
screams — but none went to help
or even called the police. Their
excuse? "We didn't want to get
Involved,' they bleated pathetically.
TKRRIHLK BTKN_
This sickness Is not only confined to our society. A couple of
years ago, a party of British
university students were driving
their Jeep up a mountainous road
ln northern Norway, on their way
to do some research In Lapland.
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no one attempted to come down
, and assist In helping the survivors. So, alone, the students picked
their way down among the rocks
to attend to the Injured with what
medical supplies they bad available.
Hard to believe? perhaps. But
I know the facts are true. My
slater was one of the students.
IIOl-SENDOl'S SCREAM
Then In Australia a Uttle while
ago a man attempted to attack
a young woman one evening, after
stalking her as she walked to her
home In a quiet Sydney suburb.
When she let out a horrendous
scream he fled, flinging her to
the ground. Yet no one came out
of their houses to see what was
wrong. Next day, when the woman outside whose house the girl
had been attacked saw her, she
confessed that she and her husband had heard the scream the
night before. Apparently her husband realized It was "a genuine
scream of terror" because It was
•the most blood-curdling thing*
he had ever heard. Then why
didn't be come to help her?
•Well,' she said, shuffUng her
feet, ^he doesn't like to get In-
An unlikely story? Not at all.
The young lady concerned, a
former girlfriend of mine, told
lt to me herself.
NOTHING NEW
Turning to politics briefly, It
ls obvious that a politics of non-
lnvolvement Is nothing new. It
might even be suggested that
ONE of the reasons for the protests against the Vietnam war
might be this same, growing,
fear of Involvement. (Although,
admittedly, the question ls not
Just as simple as that.)
Fear of Involvement is not only
i of physical danger,
MOTTO OF OUR AGE
Those six words, "I don't want
to get Involved" could weU be- '
come the motto of our age. Even
ln   Interpersonal    relationships
deplorably often. One reason *
could   be   that   the  person le 8
afraid of getting hurt  - emo- I
ttonally if not physically. And ln |
thts society which has so much
more than a Ukely possibility.
What, one may ask, Is the basis
for trust ln any society? It ts not
an easy question to answer. It
may take a long time before one
comes to realize that trust ls
based on reliability through consistency. Consistency can only
come from one thing - nonesty.
And  to  maintain one's honesty,
As they rounded a corner they
came upon a terrible scene — a
bus   full  of people had spun off
down the steep slope and was
lying on Its side amongst the
rocks a hundred feet below. It
must have happened only minutes
before as some of the less Injured passengers were then trying to clamber out, covered In
blood. Along the edge of the road
a small crowd of Norwegians
were gathering to view the
wrecked bus. Yet not one of their
number made a move to go down
and help their comrades. It was
up to the shocked and disgusted
university students to take the
initiative. Even after they had
I with the onlookers
however. It e
pleasure pursuits. 'Playboy'mag-
azlne. for Instance, represents
perhaps the ultimate ln non-
Involved sex. The monthly fol_-
out Playmate Is Just an Image
on a page. Although they claim
they "personalize" her with background details, she ls really
nothing^more than a Technl-
coloured Image of an abstract
body — however beautiful that
may be. No mind, no heart — and
! no feelings. Hence, no Involve-
Even In the area of reality sex
Is non-lnvolvlng. One male European student once observed
about American girls,'Over here
you don't have to say you love
them." it might be suggested then
that for some people at least,
sex ls not so much making love
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unreliability. Completing the circle then, unreliability muat, t,uite
patently,  be the bane ol trust.
one must have a sense of honour.
Wtth UtUe true honour there
can be no real honesty. Lack of
honesty breeds Inconsistency -
and Inconsistency gives rise to
unreliability. Completing the circle then, unreliability must, quite
patently, be the bane of trust.
EVIDENCED EVERYWHERE
That there ts so little trust ln
this society Is evidenced everywhere — one has only to look
around to see lt. It Is even admitted In the papers. Last year,
for Instance, a newspaper carried the following report: ". . .
Self doubt now runs so deeply
Into all levels of U.S. society that
even spectacular evidence of the
continuing U.S. achievement
tends to be ignored or heavily
discounted. ... A recent report
dug up a most disconcerting fact:
a year after the landing on the
moon a substantial number of
Americans did not believe that lt
had happened. In a Washington,
D.C., ghetto half of those interviewed expressed doubt that man
had reached the moon. Many of
the skeptics had seen"Nell Armstrong's moonwalk on television:
they thought lt had been faked.*
Contrast this with the experience of an F.S.C. student who
visited England last year. He was
sitting once ln a London railway
station ln the early hours of the
morning, waiting for his train.
A British "Bobby* (policeman),
perhaps checking tor vagrants
perhaps for some other reason,
tapped him on the shoulder and
said, 'Excuse me sir X are you
traveling?"
•Yes," the sleepy young man
assured him.
•Righto sir," said the Bobby.
•Thank you very much." And wtth
that he walked away without another word. How many American
poUcemen would do that? I would
suggest that their first n .,
would most likely have b
•Let's see your ticket, buddy.*
MODULAR RELATIONSHIPS
Why then ls America becoming"
so sick, so alienated, squntrust-
lng - and so unlnvolved? Is tt
necessarily a Concomittant of a
progressive society ln this modern age of high speed living, with
Its built-in obsolesence and modular relationships of replaceable
parts? Do we have to go the way
we are going? Do we have to disavow our humanity by expressing,
overtly or covertly, that we just
don't want to get Involved? I think
not. Involved ls more than Just
a word. It ls an ideal. But even
within the word Itself there ls
more than at first meets the
eye. For instance, one discovers
that there ls both "love" and
•life* In 'Involvement." (LOVE
ln InvOLVE and LIVE ln In-
VoLvEd). Tbe symbolism doesn't
stop there, however. If one takes
the time to examine further . . .
The point, nevertheless, ls that
we are Involved WITH Ufe and
we are involved BY love. Life
ls the most precious thing we
have; love the most rewarding
thing we know. Mankind ls Indeed our brother, and yes, we
ARE our brothers' keepers. So
then, to Frederick Perls "Bill
of Rights" I would reply by quoting John Donne's "United Nations Charter":
>f thy tricnda or ol
•; anyman'a death
a / am In-
I in mankind; and th
I maintain then, that we ARE
Involved with manldng by virtue
of our common humanity. Todeny
this fact denies ourselves - our
hearts, our minds — and our
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THE DAILY COLLEGIAN
Our assumptions - and intercultural dating
One thing that all cultures pro-
vlce-a cultural universal In other words-is a set of basic asr
suptlons about life, Its meaning
and the way It should be conducted. The process of socialization
ls the process wheTebjr-these assumptions are made to seem obvious. Once acquired It Is very
hard Indeed to look outside one
self a
d pre-
celve that any other contradictory assumption Is right or bas
any truth ln lt. Thus, wen «o-
claUzed, one wants to do what
one has to do-and one knows
why. Our assuptlons explain lt.
Without them we would be constantly having to make horren-
questlon such things as whether
we should (O first through a door,
or should tb* young lady beside
us?   Luckily, these minor prob
lems are taken care of for us by
our assumptions about reality.
Thus we don't have to think. And,
as a philosopher once observed,
•There ls nothing a man won't do
to avoid thinking.*
Nevertheless assumptions do
have value in slropUfying our
lives and reducing the Inconsequential choices to automatic decisions (although perhaps we go
too far, and, as the philosopher
suggests, avoid awareness of
what we ara doing entirely).
-very culture has different as-
sumptlons-and this lt what can
lead to wars Not everyculture ls
entirely different however-tbere
are many commonly held values
(which are derived from our assumptions) within Western societies tor Instance. Again
though, bow these are defined may
vary from one culture to another.
"Freedom" ls not quite the same
thing to an American as lt ls to
an EngUshman-because their
experiences and their respective
i affection for hla wife
The   other side . . •
histories, are different. But
there ls enough similarity tor a
generally workable* agreement
when one culture deals with the
other. Yet some cultures seem
to have some values that are not
only different but almost the reverse of many Western countries.
Consider for Instance the situation ln India where boys hold
hands with boys and never ever
hold a gin's hand. The value
which defines and sanctions this
behaviour Is quite the opposite of
many Western countries-boy« or
There Is nothing Intrinsic to support tt. Holding hands with another male does not necessarily
•mean* nor make that person a
"queer*. But try telling that to
an "authoritarian" Westerner.
And then, holding one's girlfriend's or wife's hand ln public
does not make one a promiscuous,
proletarian boor. But one would
find lt hard to convince an Indian
villager of that. To him such
public display of affection Is disgusting and utterly taboo. Consequently It can be seen that our
values are often discrepant because our assumptions are dlf-
one ls normally called upon to
risk. Probably .more dangerous
than verbal Interaction (whichls,
at least, more expUclt, even if
based on different assumptions
often) Is the process of cue-giving and receiving between a couple sharing different cultures.
•Cueromunlcatlon* or'Klneeles*
relationship. In «two-culture dyad tt can be almost a foreign language. Why? Because
Uke everything else, communication of any sort ls predicated
It is the
know better than their children
what ls .good for tbe family (and
not necessarily good tor tbe
child). Moreover, love la not an
factorf^^^^^^
yoa don't know t
i grammar,
munlcatlon becomes Ineffective
or starts to break down, the relationship wiU not last long to
both will withdraw from some
thing that brings no rewards, or
worse, carries costs.
Yet while emphasizing our Ineffective communication ai the
deepest personal level, tt must
also be acknowledged that we aU
share ia common humanity, and
Nothing else ln one's culture
ls fraught with such emotional
danger though than the practices
of courtship. Here common assumptions are almost Imperative
because  lt ls a very intimate
tbe time so much Is left unsaid.
It ls certainly hard enough for
any male or female ln their owt
culture to really communicate—
because they don't share exactly
the same "personal" culture of
their own values, beliefs and assumptions.
cation ls possible. Were lt not
for this we would never approach
a "stranger", marriage would be
a universal sentenc ""    ~
-and  Interethnlc
Impossibility.
Certain assumptions  underlie
every aspect of behaviour. Wlth-
lt would Interfere with flUal piety.
Nowadays most Chinese girls
would not think to go out more
than once or twice with a boy un-
. less she thought seriously of him
as a potential spouse. 'Dating*
then- ln most of Asia, If lt occurs
at all, la considered a preUml-
nary to marriage. In America
though, dating ls casual. There
ls no commitment beyond the one
date. And the next date ls not
made at the end of the current
on (as generally happens ln En-
(Contlnued on Page 6, Col. 8)
however, the assumptions of one's partner are
probably more analyzed than ln
any other type of Interaction.
Thla ts because there Is so much
at stake-our time, our emotions
-and our delicate ego. We have
already seen that, to an Indian,
public display of affection is taboo. A boy may not kiss or even
hold the hand of his girlfriend ln
public (this Is assuming be even
has one, tor roost, though not all,
marriages tn India are arranged).
Moreover, a man may not dis-
Signs of
our times
THE ULTIMATE TRAGEDY of war is that the children suffer
most. But this lovable little spastic orphan found a friend among
Ban Me Thuof s, Special Services troops. Here she is being helped
from the 'train* they constructed, after a ride through the town
one Saturday morning.
Thought for
the day
than euphemism, you know."
—F5.C. Professor
CAMPUS MUSMTKMAl
Cameua ku.n_tioi-i ta • oi-aonthi. Graffiti   scrawled  on a field
publication o^FrtanoStrt^Coiiata'a latrine  in a base in a northern
r'a'JJpVa'mVnt to tha Dally CalUgUa. province of South Vietnam: "Join
Th. »ia*. .apraa.ed in thla m.c.- the  Marines  - and  Invade the
.ma u. "_"Mjrf«eai"W«^.»if country of your choice."
Or, If you think this Is sick -
how about the poster In a San
Francisco advertising agency's
office: "Join the Army and see
the world. Meet exciting, exotic
people and kill them."
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