eoitorio
Ticket heaven 's manna should fall on walk-ons
Being governor is a tough job. In addition to
preparing budgets , making speeches and working
from morning to night, he has to decide what to do
with the 14 free season tickets given him by the UNL
chancellor's office.
Whoever said all men are created equal forgot to
read the fine print in the Constitution. Somewhere in
there it apparently says that certain individuals, by
virtue of being in a position to help a university, have
an inherent right to free football tickets.
And so former governors, regents, former regents,
news executives and a host of government officials all,
receive this manna from heaven each fall. That free
tickets go to those most able to afford them says
something for the American system.
According to a Lincoln Journal article, the
chancellor's office gave away 3,119 complimentary
tickets last year at a cost of $5,374 to the taxpayers.
Had those tickets been sold to the public at regular
prices instead of to the chancellor's office at SI. 50
apiece, the athletic department would be about
$20,000 richer.
If it is any comfort, there are inequalities within
the inequality. Each of Nebraska's U.S. senators gets
two complimentary season tickets. The state's three
U.S. representatives have to fend for themselves.
Members of the NU Board of Regents get two
season press box tickets and 10 season stadium
tickets. If that doesn't motivate students to run for
ASUN presidentstudent regent this spring, nothing
will.
And right in at the trough with the rest of the hogs
are the newspaper -executives to whom a total of
1,428 individual game tickets were given last year.
There is nothing wrong with free passes for journalists
actually covering the games. But nonworking
journalists who take the cheap way in are reading
the
something into freedom of the press that
Founding Fathers didn t put there.
There is talk in the chancellor's office about
limiting the number of complimentary tickets-a
move worth commendation if it were being prompted
by something more than the tight financial situation.
While the university probably can't be expected to
entirely do away with complimentary tickets and
their intrinsic public relations value, it could make
the practice more palatable to those who still pay
their way into the games. Let's earmark the money
spent on complimentary tickets for use in athletic
scholarships, perhaps specifically for walk-ons who
come in time to play but too late for a scholarship.
This way the athletes would benefit, the university
would benefit, the officials would still get their free
tickets and the taxpayer's money, at least indirectly,
would do what it was intended to do-aid education.
Wes Albers
""Ike Umver&iy of Nebraska,
chancellor office districted
3119 complimentary Gxthu&er
fexstbatt tickets io dbvemmerit
officials and newsQxecotivs
in 74
TKe tickets, 4o& p the
Chancellor's office at a
reduced price ($l.so eacn),
cost $5,374 and were -p&id
Cbr oi of the university's
cg3ir&l expense fund-
LIKE
BUY TWO
.
G&r FOOTBALL
Kr" TICKETS, PLEASE
I fi. C-w. i
-fWFY'EE FOR MY BOV5- 1
WE HAD A MAP-D WINTER ON
THE. FARM TH5 YEAR AND I
PROMISED TUtm V-OUTWLU
TtCV&TS IF THEY WOWED
-t-- REAL HARD
THERE ARE NO MOKE
TICKETS AVAILABLE-
us:
s1
U
II
THEY'RE
REAL GOOD
SOY5" HERE'S
MY $14.59.
IT Tr
would be valued at almost $24 ooo.
a stadium e3t and $11 -fpr a
seat in the press Ipqy: "
1 The Lincoln
venirj5 Jsirvial
5 2-21-75-
-
t cm'T
Aff&RD A
5CALPER ' AND
I PROVED.
THE eoYS
sniffs
m YOLI HAVE TUfE
FREE 6EASOM PASSES
FOR MYSELF AND MY'
INFLUENTIAL RlfcNK f
i i i
n v
1 HERE TWw A-
Enlightenment dead; more introspection needed
, Toward the end of the 18th century, the most
revolutionary intellectual movement since
Christianity burst onto the European scene.
The Enlightenment began the dismantling of 1,600
years of Christian heritage and a Western tradition
stretching back through Plato and Moses.
Progress-that ineffable belief that the world is
getting better-became the idea that shaped the
intellectual climate of the Western world throughout
the 19th and into the 20th century.
The intellectual foundation of Western thnnoht
traditionally was based in a conception of man as
"creature, and not creator." Man was seen as a finite
being with limited capabilities.
Thus, prior to the F.nglihtenment, humans lived in
the world passively, believing that the essence of
reality was beyond this world and therefore could not
be affected by man in his finite and limited
capabilities.
During the Enlightenment the belief in a finite
man d'ed under the same blow that killed the infinite
Cod. For Voltaire, Condorcet and the other
philosophers, God, if he had ever existed, no longer
played an active role in human affairs.
Since a transcendent God had been denied, the
rational life became the measure of human existence.
Through the application of reason, man was to have
the capacity for improving the human condition. No
longer was man passively at the mercy of his
environment. He now knew that he could actively
work for a better world.
Beginning with the Enlightenment, man was seen
for the first tijne solely as a child of his environment.
Environmental factors such as the Church,
governmental institutions ani other social conditions
came to be viewed as th rrc.-jor influences on human
behavior. Depraved hu. ian behavior was no longer
blamed on a depraved soul, but on depraved
institutions. If such corrupt institutions could be
reformed or destroyed, then man could be made
page 4
better-man was seen as a reflection of his
environment.
These basic assumptions of the Enlightenment led
to a belief that reality could be molded to the infinite
will of man. Man could be made something other
than he was through his own efforts. Instead of being
limited, man was proclaimed to be limitless. Given
the application of sufficient intelligence, social
conditions could be changed to such an extent that
man could ultimately be perfected.
Man is pcrfectable-the world is et!ir."
better-what an incredible legacy of optimism the
Enlightenment brought to Western thought.
Beginning with the Enlightenment a strong
progressive current developed in the Western view of
rick johnson
fhymes ond reasons
the world. Man can control the reality that alfects
him and thus create himself anew, which ultimately
leads to a qualitatively superior existence.
Superior? Perhaps not, because such an intellectual
framework is a short step from the horrors of modern
totalitarianism.
If, as the philosophers, Robespierre, and Marx (all
of whom arc men of the Enlightenment) would have
us believe, reality is nothing but material forces to be
exploited and manipulated by man, then there would
seem to be nothing wrong in any notion designed to
exploit these forces with maximum efficiency If
bringing heaven to earth is the goal; if man's
perfectabihty is limitless; is there any limit 0 wfiat
can be done to attain this goal?
While 'most Americans continue to believe that
progress in human affairs is being madc-that the
Enlightenment ideals are still valid, I believe that such
notions are bankrupt, given the experience of the
daily nebraskan
20th century.
We have examined the development of
Enlightenment ideas and have ended with
totalitarianism.
It seems impossible to believe that progress is
being made in human affairs when we discover that a
humanity, which entered the modern 'age with such
optimism and an unprecedented outburst of activity,
is committing suicide.
The horror of modern war leaves little doubt that
ij cupaun. ij DdiudJiiy aim Siituitict on tin svfl
grander scale than his forebearers dreamed possible.
The ever-present threat of nuclear holocaust,
impending mass starvation, the death of the cities,
racism and increasing environmental strangulation are
evidence that the world is not getting better through
our efforts.
It seems that for every advance made by man in
the 20lh century, there his been a corresponding
degeneration.
If the Western experience has proved anything, it
is that political and social order is a reflection of the
order within man himself. Systems have tried to
impose order and perfectabihty from outside and
have failed.
The Enlightenment is dead, or dying. To continue
to believe in limitless human moral and social
progress sec rns to speak of a pride tha? borders on
foolishness.
If Western civilization, and America in particular,
is to come io grips with its problems and survive, each
individual must look within for the principles on
which that survival must be based.
A society is no better than the individuals that
make it up. No amount of social control or
reorganization of institutions will bring about justice
or an abundant and significant experience for all. Nor
will legislation make moral men. Principles of justice
and moral judgment must be individually recognized
and believed before they will govern action.
Wednesday, february 2G, 1975
