Sham Righteousness

The following, written by Mark C.Frazier and James W. Muller, represents the opinion of a minority of The Crimson staff.

LIKE AN OLD Time magazine, the recently exhumed grad student union only stirs up those who delight in the state and the tedious.

The Union's clamour is no more than a sham exercise in righteouseness. Tiny numbers of graduate students, less than a tenth of those at Harvard, voted to march out on strike if and when they can persuade another tenth to do likewise. Their exhortations attack a litany of alleged abuses--determination of spouse and parental income in judging scholarship need, preservation of awards based on merit, and refusal to recognize the Union as sole agent for grad students. Such complaints amount to no more, it appears, than a continuation of the great "Gimme" game of the sixties, in which the media championed demands of almost any group that considered itself aggrieved.

It would be hasty to dismiss concerns of graduate students as wholly puff and air. But what comes from the grad student union is a sense of deja vu: the remnants of Time's Now Generation still seem to be wanting instant everything.