Rider University - Shadow Yearbook (Lawrenceville, NJ)

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Be a Deferred Customer You Have A Friend At The Draft Counseling Center by Robert Fritz Draft Center Counselor We have organized and operated the Draft Coun- seling Center because we believe that, as draft-age men, each of us needs to know our rights and obliga- tions under the Selective Service System if we hope to have some control over our destinies. Many people have justly criticized the government for its failure to provide adequate information to draft regis- trants. lt should be possible to go to a draft board and get a pamphlet fully explaining the regulations on defer- ments for men, on conscientious objection, on student deferments or on physical standards, but no such publi- cations are provided by Selective Service. Therefore, if one wants to know his choices and rights, he must turn elsewhere. The Counseling Center at Rider is our con- tribution to that need. We, who staff and operate the Counseling Center have as our main function the job of properly inter- preting the Selective Service Act as it pertains to each registrant. Each man that comes to us has a specific problem or question relating to his draft status. We at- tempt to help him solve that problem or answer that question utilizing all necessary and pertinent information. As the draft is presently organized, many people have become critical of it. Thus a discussion of the draft of- ten becomes a controversial debate on questions of mil- itary and foreign policy, and ultimately ends up on the subject of what kind of society Americans want. Those who advocate positions on these subjects offer an im- portant social and political service. Many times we at the Center become engaged in discussions that are concerned with these issues. This is all well and good: there is a need for this type of discussion. However, this is not the major purpose of the Counseling Center. Our object is to explore the alternatives open to the men faced by decisions about the draft. We try to de- scribe the choices, whether popular or unpopular, which might interest more than a few people. We then relate the choices to the specific problem of the man. Although we at the Center have strong opinions, we try to keep them out of our counseling. All we advocate is that each man get the fullest possible information, consider his choices carefully in terms of his own val- ues, and make his own decisions. If he doesn't, his draft board will decide for him. We at the Center believe that each man should try to control his own life, not allow a government agency or any other body to control it for him. Each man must de- cide where he stands with regard to military service. De- cisions about the draft involve questions of education, career, health, marriage, of conscience and principle, of life and death. One must realize that the basic function 96 of the military is to wage war, not to build men. Its really quite a sad commentary on the wealthiest country in the world that many young men who want to better themselves feel forced to join an organization that de- stroys other young men who doubtless would also like to better themselves. Consequently, we believe each man to the fullest extent possible should make such basic decisions for himself. We, at the Center hold to our beliefs a statement by Joan Baez: Ultimately you can listen to only one thing, not your President, not your many misguided leaders, save a few, not the Communists or the Socialists or the Republicans or the Democrats, but you must lis- ten to your heart and do what it dictates. Because your heart is the only thing which can tell you what is right and what is wrong. An increasing number of young men are saying, War is not the way! by refusing to serve in the military. For the majority of these youth this refusal is only one small part of their saying YES to life, to the beauty of the uni- verse and the dignity of man-to the task of helping to build a more truly human future for all men. As informed citizens, everyone should know what legal alternatives to military service are offeredg yet few do know. Our purpose at the Draft Counseling Center is to offer people an awareness, if they desire it. si X N X lx-Xxx X 'ff -.-. an ,.-,, 41,14 I I H XXX I I 1 J fs, 'llll I .ff l SQL

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Political Science Focus by the Staff The political arena. That no man's land where only the strong survive. Some life for a political science stu- dent to look forward to. ' But political science extends much further than the campaign trail and Ftider's Political Science Department has shown where. For example, 'poli-sci' delves into the issues and at- tempts to awaken a political awareness among the stu- dent body of the institution. This can be seen in one of the series of lectures that was partly sponsored by the department. The Men Of Peace series centered around Erasmus, Gandhi and Dr. Martin Luther King. Each subject was presented by an eminent scholar in the field of human relations. On a more regular basis, the department in con- junction with the Political Science Society, sponsors a United Nations Month on campus and sponsors a Na- tional Model United Nations, usually held in the late fall. It also jointly advises the International Relations Club, which schedules weekly meetings on world problems and issues. While the department seeks to better the campus' awareness of political thought and ideas, it further spends much time developing these students who will be going out into the world with that kind of thinking- the political science major. We try to have an open-door policy for students who are apprehensive about their place in the political world, Dr. Kenneth Maxwell, chairman of the depart ment said. For this reason, they have developed some intern-type courses to give the student an idea while he is in school what he would like to pursue when he gets out. Our field training program attempts to place stu dents in local and state government in order to gain practical experience. Some of our students have even worked in Washington for senators and represent atives, Dr. Maxwell continued. On campus the department has done much to further the political education of its majors. The Situation Room, located on the third floor of the Fine Arts Build ing, is an innovation of Dr. Maxwell who has worked in such rooms in the United Nations and the State Depart ment. Classes in that room are conducted much the same way that international meetings are, with each stu College-One Man's Opinion by Dr. Study, work, get involved! Or get drowned in rock mu- sic or booze, blow your mind, take a trip, say to hell with the system! Or just let yourself be carried away in the swirl of numbing routine. Are these the only alterna- tives in college? lt is said that college is for learning. About a lot of things: fine arts, social sciences, exact sciences. In this realm, colleges could be said to be doing all right. But how about the other type of learning, not measurable by any test, or for that matter infrequently appreciated by prospective employers? That is learning to find oneself, to become what one is, to think for oneself. Books and teachers, classmates and the media, these are so many catalysts for this type of learning. But above all it requires a more and more undefinable pre- requisite-solitude. Not the solitude that spells isolation and insulation, but the constructive solitude that puts one back into perspective with oneself, with others, with nature. Untried and unappreciated by the activist few and the apathetic mass alike, could its absence be a contributing factor to today's rampant sense of ruth- lessness and crisis of identity among collegians? ' Civilization is pressing on us from all sides, pollut- ing not only our environment but our minds as well. Our technology has created marvels, but it also created problems greater than our -will andfor our ability to solve them. Has our thinking been too much directed toward taming nature and too little toward under- standing human nature? And understanding man starts with the understanding of oneself. It has also been said that man is a social animal, therefore solitude is sometimes considered as an ano- i maly. Many dread it because for them solitude spells lo- Phan Thien Chau Asst. Prof. of Political Science neliness. Yet loneliness is a condition of the mind, not of physical surroundings. The cure of loneliness, in col- leges and elsewhere, is not to be found in more socia- Iizing but rather in getting to know oneself by learning to be oneself. A few times during one's college years, one should try solitude. To be alone with oneself, fully awake yet not bored, fully self-conscious yet not morbid, doing nothing in particular yet not feeling restless and uncom- fortable. Walking the untracked snow or the sand of a deserted beach or in the woods, alone, attuned to the sounds of wind, waves, insects, or watching the sun ris- ing or setting from some secluded spot, one asks a few simple questions about one-self: being, living, relating, about purpose, values, meaning of who one is and what is one doing with one's life. The answers are not guar- anteed to flash by complete or to be wholly satisfactory. A few minutes a month, a few hours a year, gradually one should feel at ease with oneself, with life's per- spectives beginning to dawn in one's mind. Construc- tive solitude should be refreshing rather than oppres- sive. One should get away thoughtful but serene, at ease with oneself, attuned to others, and at one with the universe. The college years, generally coming be- tween adolescense and the routine years of making a living, afford the greatest opportunity for self-knowl- edge. For what is the use of all the stored intruction data if one fails to know oneself? After all, robots could ingest, arrange, update and spew out data much more efficiently than any college grad. But machines shall not make this a more livable world. Only thoughtful people have the best chance of making it so. QQ