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Student protests, 1972-1973

1972-01-30 New York Times Magazine Article: ""Metamorphosis Of A Campus Radical"" Page 10

N.Y Times Magazine
Jan 30, 1972
10 (of 12)

"Metamorphosis of a Campus Radical"

practical now," he explains. "They recognize that change can only be accomplished from a financial power base. So we're getting out of the clouds of social change and onto the ground of it. Change depends on money and trust, and people trust you if you have it and manage it responsibly."
Politis's administration had taken Sutton's corporate Iowa Student Agencies and built it into a bustling enterprise which had already taken in and paid out twice as much money as previous administrations. In addition to The Hulk, it has started a co-op bookstore, maintains legal services for draft counseling and advice to tenants, and funds such social services as the Crisis Center. 
Last spring, Politis was prepared for a bust which would equal the previous year's. He deputized a troop of monitors and, as it turned out, they were needed for May Day ushered in a fortnight of peace rallies and skirmishes with the police. It was the final phase of the revolutionary cycle, a time of parade, of a challenging of motives and of squabbling over them. 
On Wednesday, May 5, a large crowd was drawn to the Pentacrest by the rumor that, in emulation of Indochina war tactics, a dog was to be burned on the Old Capitol steps. When it was learned that no consenting animal could be found, the crowd moved off. The demonstrators were in an exuberant mood as they trooped the business district in a show of righteous force, but here they were menaced and scattered

 students and  police. It took place on the bluff overlooking the Iowa River site of the men's dormitories. There were some injuries among the police and widespread destruction. University authorities, many of whom had sympathized with student indignation, were now alarmed. President Boyd noted that everything admirable had gone out of the demonstrations, that they were no longer even political. The mass of students had stood by, conditioned to the trasher's self casting in the hero's role, and to permissiveness toward it. Not that a few broken windows are important to a university, but the state of mind which produced them could almost as easily, get to the heart of the place. 
The majority of radicals were equally displeased, admitting it had been an ugly night, one in which even old comrades had lost their humanness. They view it now as the end of a revolutionary cycle and the beginning of the disillusion which prevails today. 
Reasons for that disillusionment are real. Despite radical skepticism , the war was wound down and the changing economy has altered most of the issues. Refusal to work for the makers of napalm would be a rather empty gesture in today's job market. 
Indeed the whole, sharp, black and white picture of four years ago has gone blurred and gray. Students no longer see the possibility of participating in and effecting political change. The villains are harder to spot and the heroes are dead or dying 

concerned with subsisting, or else they've destroyed themselves with dope."
If the active revolution is over, the theoretical one is surely not. History professors notice that their brightest students are Marxist and that their teaching assistants make up reading lists heavy with Fannon, Cleaver and Debray. 
Student president Politis is pressed to keep his volatile constituency in hand. The constituents, in turn, regularly remind him of the night when his monitors turned against their to pro 

We have to live our politics now, like the Women's Center and day care."
Sexism is the central issue today, and work at the Women's Center is wholly concerned with it. Women there describe their work as a process in which they can clarify their interests, establish their goals and help one another assume responsibility for achieving them. 
Women are objects in American society, they explain, and they are prevented from fulfillment in all sorts of ways. Society tells a wom

second, they are concerned with self-sufficiency, that is teaching each other such practical skills as fixing faucets and budgeting, as well as the group projects of abortion counseling, the clinic and day care. 
Day care is thoroughly Women's Lib, a service to free the university women from the yoke of children. There are five day care centers serving students and faculty mothers at present, and while their function is that of all day kindergarten, their principles are those of the 

THE HULK - Stan Lee's comic book character on the wall provides both the name for this Iowa campus hangout and a symbol for the latent power of the university's 20,000 students. The Hulk when around

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N.Y Times Magazine Jan 30, 1972 10 (of 12) "Metamorphosis of a Campus Radical" practical now," he explains. "They recognize that change can only be accomplished from a financial power base. So we're getting out of the clouds of social change and onto the ground of it. Change depends on money and trust, and people trust you if you have it and manage it responsibly." Politis's administration had taken Sutton's corporate Iowa Student Agencies and built it into a bustling enterprise which had already taken in and paid out twice as much money as previous administrations. In addition to The Hulk, it has started a co-op bookstore, maintains legal services for draft counseling and advice to tenants, and funds such social services as the Crisis Center. Last spring, Politis was prepared for a bust which would equal the previous year's. He deputized a troop of monitors and, as it turned out, they were needed for May Day ushered in a fortnight of peace rallies and skirmishes with the police. It was the final phase of the revolutionary cycle, a time of parade, of a challenging of motives and of squabbling over them. On Wednesday, May 5, a large crowd was drawn to the Pentacrest by the rumor that, in emulation of Indochina war tactics, a dog was to be burned on the Old Capitol steps. When it was learned that no consenting animal could be found, the crowd moved off. The demonstrators were in an exuberant mood as they trooped the business district in a show of righteous force, but here they were menaced and scattered students and police. It took place on the bluff overlooking the Iowa River site of the men's dormitories. There were some injuries among the police and widespread destruction. University authorities, many of whom had sympathized with student indignation, were now alarmed. President Boyd noted that everything admirable had gone out of the demonstrations, that they were no longer even political. The mass of students had stood by, conditioned to the trasher's self casting in the hero's role, and to permissiveness toward it. Not that a few broken windows are important to a university, but the state of mind which produced them could almost as easily, get to the heart of the place. The majority of radicals were equally displeased, admitting it had been an ugly night, one in which even old comrades had lost their humanness. They view it now as the end of a revolutionary cycle and the beginning of the disillusion which prevails today. Reasons for that disillusionment are real. Despite radical skepticism , the war was wound down and the changing economy has altered most of the issues. Refusal to work for the makers of napalm would be a rather empty gesture in today's job market. Indeed the whole, sharp, black and white picture of four years ago has gone blurred and gray. Students no longer see the possibility of participating in and effecting political change. The villains are harder to spot and the heroes are dead or dying concerned with subsisting, or else they've destroyed themselves with dope." If the active revolution is over, the theoretical one is surely not. History professors notice that their brightest students are Marxist and that their teaching assistants make up reading lists heavy with Fannon, Cleaver and Debray. Student president Politis is pressed to keep his volatile constituency in hand. The constituents, in turn, regularly remind him of the night when his monitors turned against their to pro We have to live our politics now, like the Women's Center and day care." Sexism is the central issue today, and work at the Women's Center is wholly concerned with it. Women there describe their work as a process in which they can clarify their interests, establish their goals and help one another assume responsibility for achieving them. Women are objects in American society, they explain, and they are prevented from fulfillment in all sorts of ways. Society tells a wom second, they are concerned with self-sufficiency, that is teaching each other such practical skills as fixing faucets and budgeting, as well as the group projects of abortion counseling, the clinic and day care. Day care is thoroughly Women's Lib, a service to free the university women from the yoke of children. There are five day care centers serving students and faculty mothers at present, and while their function is that of all day kindergarten, their principles are those of the THE HULK - Stan Lee's comic book character on the wall provides both the name for this Iowa campus hangout and a symbol for the latent power of the university's 20,000 students. The Hulk when around