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monday, january 24, 1972
lincolh, nebraska vol. 95, no. 56
Groups
debate
'Justice in
America7
A meeting scheduled for late Monday
afternoon will begin the final round of
discussion to determine whether the 1972
World in Revolution Conference will take
place.
Kerry Winterer, Union Board President
said Interim Arbitration Board members
will meet in closed session initially to
clarify for themselves their role according
to a , recently approved plan. The plan,
which created the board, was
implemented after the January Board of
Regents meeting.
The approved committee report gives
the board members-ASUN President
Steve Fowler, Union Board President
Winterer, Faculty Senate President James
Lake and Interim Executive Dean of
Student Affairs Ely Myerson -final
authority concerning ASUN and Student
Union Operations on the Lincoln
Campuses. . .
The report provides for possible tie to
be broken by Interim Chancellor C. Peter
Magrath.
A closed meeting of the Union
Program Council (UPC) last Tuesday
night led to an open meeting of the same
board the following night.
In the Wednesday meeting Nebraska
Union Director Al Bennett said a
mid-December directive from Magrath
not to sign contracts for proposed World
in Revolution Conference speakers was
still in effect. In fact, he said, he'd been
reminded of it after the Board of Regents
thawed the freeze on all other student
fees in January.
Bennett also said lobbyists from the
State Legislature told him they believed
continuation of the conference, as it is,
would result in repercussions from the
University, specifically passage of State
Sen. Gerald Stromer's LB 1271, probably
in an amended form.
Stromer's bill would disallow receipt of
any state monies by any Nebraska
colleges that collect mandatory student
fees.
The UPC members passed unanimously
a resolution by Tom Lesoing that read, in
part:
"Whereas the continued . academic
growth of any institution of higher
learning such as the University of
Nebraska is dependent upon that
institution existing as a forum for debate
over controversial issues and new ideas;
and...
"Whereas this year's World in
Revolution Conference, entitled "Justice
in America" has planned a mixed
program that deals with many facets of
justice in this country; and ...
"Whereas the Justice in America
Conference planning has followed correct
procedures according to the Nebraska
Union Board of University of Nebraska
policies...
"We, the Nebraska Union Program
Council. ..will work... to guarantee the
continuation of the World in Revolution
Conference."
The resolution also called for the
Union Board to "immediately contact
Magrath or the Arbitration Board to
secure the funds to continue planning and
to implement the program."
A statement issued by the UNL
Afro-American Collegiate Society said it
believes the administration is afraid to
allow, specifically, Black Panter Bobby
Seale and lawyer William Kunstler to
speak.
The AACS said if those speakers are to
be censored because of their political
opinions, they demand that Gov. J. James
Exon, NU President , D. B. Varner,
Senators Carl Curtis and Roman Hruska,
and others also be removed from the
program since they are "obnoxious to us
as Black people."
The
invisible
alcoholic
by H. J. Cummins
A 30-year-old diabetic, missing a large
part of his stomach and all of his spleen,
left to join in a drinking spree to the
Orange Bowl, protesting to a Lincoln
alcohol counselor that he is only a "social
drinker."
' Another Lincoln man is in and out of
trouble with the law for "alcohol-related
offenses," but he laughes at suggestions
from professional counselors that alcohol
is, at the least, a problem in his life.
And only after withdrawal pains
"nothing could stop" and an attempted
suicide, did an 18-year-old Lincoln
woman admit that three years of heavy
drinking and four to six amphetamines a
day qualified her as a "chemically
dependent person."
These are three of an estimated 9,000
alcoholics in Lincoln 97 per cent of
whom are, so to speak, "alcoholics with a
home" according to professional alcohol
counselors.
All can afford to pay for a place to live
and their alcohol; many take tranquilizers
as well as drink-often at a doctor's
advice. But none can reconcile the picture
of the alcoholic street corner bum with
their own drinking habit.
This means almost all alcoholics who
receive treatment are coerced into it.
Spouses threaten divorce, children
threaten to leave home, or employers
confront the alcoholic and tell him to seek
help.
Ray Condreay, a Lincoln Action Program '
(LAP) counselor in alcohol rehabilitation,
said he's had neighbors of alcoholics call
him, and ask him to offer help to
someone.
A local welfare worker said most of
the "voluntary" commitments he handles
are really people that a judge or mental
health board has advised to seek help in a
treatment center or face fines and
possible imprisonment for their alcohol
offenses.
The director of a Chemical
Dependency Unit (CDU) at Lincoln
General Hospital, Marty Heist, said he
believes the increasing pressure put on
alcoholics by those around them is due to
the broadening recognition of alcoholism
for what it really is "a primary disease
that is both chronic and progressive."
The former shame many middle-to
upper-class people experienced in
admitting to an alcohol problem in their
family is being erased as the alarmingly
high alcoholic rates in those social strata
are being revealed, Heist said.
And the notion that an alcoholic can
stop drinking whenever he or she wants
to is being discredited, he said, adding
that it is now believed to be "physically
impossible for them to withdraw" in the
last stage of alcoholism.
He diagramed the stages this way: 1)
an individual realizes alcohol can change
his or her mood; 2) an individual seeks
the mood swing; 3) the harmful
dependency reached (by only 10 per cent
of the people) when a person finds any
excuse to drink and rationalizes
increasing discomforts with any excuse
left; 4) the "impaired judgement" stage
when the alcoholic drinks only to stay
normal no more "highs" and uses
defense mechanisms to deny reality, and
shelters the belief he is really all right.
This is the stage for "blackouts," when
an alcoholic functions normally, but from
time to time nothing is recorded in his
memory, he said.
Heist said one woman married a
stranger and moved to a new town during
a blackout only to come to three months
later. She had to wait until her daughter
got home from school to find out what
happened.
And a federal judge went to Rome and
back under the same conditions. He
would never have known had he not
found a plane ticket stub in his pocket
with his name on it.
National statistics show alcoholism hits
both sexes equally. But Hank Fleming, an
Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) member
and future employe of the Lincoln
Council on Alcoholism, said his
experience has indicated that many men
shelter their wives, so many women are
advanced alcoholics before their husbands
allow them to get help.
Heist said he believes many housewives
shelter themselves. They can stay at home
while drunk (in fact, if they make a habit
of it, they don't have to worry about
what they do during a blackout, unlike
most business men, and conveniently hide
all bottles from their family for a long
time.
Walt Giles, Coordinator of the
Municipal Court Alcohol Programs said
men cleverly hid their drinking habits,
too. A reformed alcoholic himself related
one of his favorites.
"When I'd wake up with an awful
hangover I knew a few stiff belts would
settle my stomach," he said. "But I also
knew that's what alcoholics do, so I never
would."
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