Exit the King

SOME PEOPLE came in today to ask for help in bailing King Collins out of jail. They explained about bondsmen, about bail, about money you lose, and money you get back. We asked why they thought anybody wanted King Collins out of jail.

Mr. Collins accuses us, among other things, of not engaging in meaningful dialogue at this University, of being sexually, repressed, and of not being "involved." He has demonstrated his own masculinity by taking off his pants, his own involvement by bringing a Soc Rel class to a halt, and his own dialogue by shouting down Professor Inkeles.

There is no denying that there is "dialogue" all over Cambridge. But there is little talk of freedom or liberation. There is gut anger. Is the anger because we are threatened? Yes. Have they made us feel trapped? Yes.

It is not our masculinity or femininity, however, that is endangered. We are not suddenly aware of the prison of this University. What is endangered is the trust and openness of this place, such as it is; we are trapped by a wall of blindness that wants to "involve" us, to make us blind and brutal too. It may have succeeded.

WHAT FRIGHTENS us about King Collins and his gang are not their ideas--which are interesting to a point but hardly new. We fear him personally because of his irrationality, and his careless imposition. He has easily demonstrated the immediacy of his disruptive exploitive tactics. We feel trapped because the only ways to deal with him are ways we despise--police, arrests, anger, hate.

Instead of waking us to new thought and new freedom, they have made us, even those of us most enthusiastic at the outset, reflect on the kinds of thoughts that really do threaten us, things we abhor considering. Thoughts of preserving the system--where classes and dormitory rooms are open to anyone--instead of changing it. Mr. Collins's gang says if kids don't want them in class to "get involved" and "make" them leave. But we don't like to be forced into police committees. We catch our talk of "outsiders" and "disruption" and it reminds us of all the things we have fought against.

The smarter ones of us have listened to you briefly and walked away, Mr. Collins. Your laughable epiphanies of nudity, your pathetic revelations of freedom are cant. We know we are alive and don't need to discuss it. Your need is your own. But others of us have tried to argue methods, and existences, somehow too naive to believe that you won't listen and understand. It is our way, to talk things out and to believe that others would do the same if they would only understand.

The two people who took King Collins's dialogue seriously were Professor Inkeles and a student named John Henry, who invited Collins to Eliot House last weekend. Both finally called the police to get rid of them. King Collins and his gang have brought out in us the vigilant spirit--with all its anger and fear. I know they have freed nobody. I hope they haven't imprisoned us either.