Henderson (on his while charger) Returns

Before I say anything at all let me stress the fad that I am not a gambling man. Even when the odds are overwhelmingly my favour. It is because of this, and-o-other reason, that when I heard the news of the death of the beloved and deified Mao Tse-tung my comment to my flatmate, to the effect of 'Salient will have a front page on this', was not converted into a financial transaction last Monday when the inevitable appeared. While this front page does not upset me, being after all a marginally good photo of a marginally great man (although not up to the standard of the 1975 Lenin), it is a sad reflection upon the most undesirable feature of this, ostensibly 'student' newspaper the meaninglessness of most of the content to the life of the average student, who works in the library, smokes dope socially and drinks beer alcoholically.

If you are going to toe the correct leftwing line (and I fear that this is inescapable) will you please stop being Boring about it???

Your newspaper is depressing. Tedious. Repetitive. It is also dead.

Wake your ideas up and bring back the comix, smear attacks on the executive (who now, more than ever, deserve them) and the silly letters. A few more rock reviews would help.

Then you might start getting your readership back. Because whether you like it or not [unclear: younreadership] is Gone.

I spent two years working on Salient, and, god only help me, the only entire issue I ever read was a 1972 back copy.

I no longer care about this newspaper but I think there are still some people who do. Stop Ignoring them.

Yours from the depths of liberalism,

Salient and Mao Tse-Tung

The cover of the last issue of Salient was certainty impressive, and a good deal more artistic than usual. After beginning with such a tribute, if that is what is was, to Mao, why then did you feel the need to excuse yourself to your readers for printing it? If you, and your stuff are concerned that Salient is in fact "a magazine dominated by the left and not concerned with students" then it is up to you to make it more relevant. If however you consider that the death of such a great justified our paying a tribute to him, then it should not be necessary for your to apologise to the readers.

Indeed the editorial did merely "pay lip service" to Mao, when the cover of the paper suggested to me that there would be a feature article inside, telling the more apathetic and less well informed majority (myself included) some fact, not propaganda, about what Chines owes to Mao and what we owe him respect for achieving.

In such an article as the editorial the tribute which was begun lost any impact, even [unclear: sincererity], by your not expressing your respect of him without the preceding apology for your belief.

Alleged to Have Syphilis

It seems I have to protect my head again, this time from someone called James Robb. The nuclear issue, particularly the Truxtun's visit, is very controversial and has divided the country into sides'. Since I don't subscribe to the prevalent view that union members are all of one type of mentality, I was rather skeptical when union spokesmen tried to convince the public that their members were unified in their stand.

James Robb's attempt at lifting me from my ignorance confirms that they weren't. Rather like saying that the National Government has the full support of all New Zealanders, isn't it. That is why I made the comment to which James Robb took such predictable offence.

As for the statement about Black Power defence fund, I was a bit dismayed at the time that such a potentially controversial motion was passed with so little discussion. I deliberately used emotive words in an attempt to evoke some sort of reaction from the notoriously silent majority. If anything is misleading it is James Robb's version of what I was implying.

It's all rather pointless though since the people you really want to get through to only read Harold Hedd and the Letters anyway.

A Lone Protester

As an apathetic pro-semite, middle-of-the-road heterosexual I have been under considerable pressure in maintaining my intellectual freedom at this university over the last 3 years.

Aware of my obvious impotence as a one man pressure group I have let the tides of liberalism and communism rush back and forth about me. With the patience of Job have I watched the SRC travel in ever decreasing circles.

But this time they have gone too far.

I hereby give Public Notice of my intent to smoke cigars and/or cigarettes in the "public parts" of the Union Building, and my further intent to maime, injure or handicap any smug jumped up little bastard who attempts (physically) to ban, hinder or curtail this most cherished of my social activities.

Race Relations Act Remembered

I am horrified that the Editor of Salient has permitted last week's letter against Malaysian students to appear in his newspaper under the guise of "democratic thought". Letters such as these only intend and serve to provoke ill feeling among students.

Though it could be argued that bringing these feelings into the open is preferable to letting them fester unheard, section 25 of the Race Relations Act 1971 sees inciting racial disharmony as an offence.

Under section 25 subsection I an action could lie against Jordan K. Mangrove-Muncher and the Editor of Salient for publishing threatening, insulting or abusive material with the intent to excite hostility or ill will against or bring into contempt Malaysian students on the grounds of race or national origins.

MSA Annual Report

What a badminton report the WMSA (65/76) presented in their Annual Report!

'Sad to say Wellington had to field the same team that won the competition last year being unable to inject new blood.'

What a down- to - earth sarcastic piece of garbage. We hope that people would not be misled by that rotten report. Anyway, we have good reasons to believe that it would be a much better report if it goes like this;

'Sad to say Wellington had to field the same team that won the competition last year as the selector could not afford to leave his friends out of the team by taking in new blood'.

Doesn't this sound better? Perhaps our former progressive WMSA president (Mr A.L. Leo) would like to arrange a match between us and the team that won the recent NZMSA Games. We would be looking forward to meeting the. Please, Mr Leo, do not disappoint us.

Another Silly Letter

I resent all insinuations that I am a raving homosexual and a perverter of little boys -I am not camp. I catagorically deny any implications to that end! I am not. Definitely not......well, a bit.

But all that is irrelevant, so to come to my point (no crudeness implied), the general masturbation over the Truxtun affair led me to thinking. Anyone who claims you have to be straight to think is nothing but a butch little liar. Anyway I suggest the students' Union should invest in a nuclear powered cafe. This would most certainly improve the service and the fallout (if any) could only improve the taste of those infamous pies.

If you don't like my suggestion you can go and stick it up your....nostril. Yours in Woolworths pantyhose and Evening gown, Col. Terrence A. Wanker (retired).

ps NH Toad is nothing if not a sociological reactionary! So there!

Critique of Feminism ill-reasoned

A few words of comment on Lindy and Leonie's astoundingly ill-reasoned article "A Critique of Feminism". And presumptuous! So they have the answers about what "really concerns the so-called 'average' woman". How dare they presume to speak on her behalf! What basis has their claim to be more in touch with working-class women?

It is no mere coincidence that the people with the power in this society are men. ("The enemy is obviously not men, but society") Many feminists this concomitance as a reason for an exclusively feminist (i.e. rather than a feminist socialist) stance. (Not to be confused with an independent women's movement working towards a socialist revolution, L & L!).

This power dynamic is, historically, related to the relegation of women to an inferior position by virtue of their anatomy. Of course capitalism and sexism are inevitably connected. No feminist would suggest that her goals could be achieved under a system which is based on inequality.

But after acknowledging that (while hinting that all the other middle-class feminists — sorry. I forgot for a moment that they're not — have missed that major theoretical point) Lindy and Leonie go on to assert that we should build up the family "so that it safeguards the rights of women and children"!! (This sounds suspiciously like the sexist mythology we're trying to escape.)

Capitalism maintains the ideology of the family to support us vital economic function: that of providing the unpaid labour of housewives so that their mates can go out and work, thus getting the labour of two human beings for the wage (and that only a fraction of its real value) of one. It disgusts me to hear anyone supporting one of the most basic units of oppression of the capitalist system. There is no "protection" for women in the family. God knows it's making enough of us crazy.

Lindy and Leonie seem to deny that the oppression of women cuts across class divisions. ("The Women's movement must be led by working class women"). Women will organise around issues that affect them as a sex. We may find (not coincidentally) that they are struggling towards the broader goals of socialism, but they will be struggling basically as women for their demands.

The most absurd claim in this article is that "abortion on demand does not have much support among working-class women because it does not attack the real problems they face"! Are you people Men that you don't see that most women are faced at least once in their lives with the Very Real Problem of an unwanted pregnancy?!

Surely no issue unites women more - and the consequences of all women having full control over their reproductive lives would seem to me to be profoundly revolutionary.

And frankly, the suggestion that "there is a refusal to unite the abortion struggle with the movement for day care" is utter nonsense. I challenge Lindy and Leonie's credentials as having "experienced many different types of feminists organisations".

The whole article smacks of a rather sophisticated form of the old divide and conquer ploy. More analysis of experience, less woolly rhetoric, please.

Morris and Cassidy on Feminism

Lynne McGimpsey, in last week's Salient, claims that if women were political enough to recognise their main enemy as their boss they would support abortion on demand. This is nonsense as the main concern of working women would surely change from week to week depending on their changing personal situation. The only time working women are concerned with abortion is when they need an abortion, whereas the problems they are faced with everyday is buying the groceries and paying the bills. One woman we know has-to keep herself, her husband and 2 pre-school children on an income of $80 a week. Recently, after paying all their basic costs for a week they were left with $4 to cover extra expenses e.g. dentists, doctor, new clothes etc.

Frankly it is very difficult to understand Lynne's logic. When she says that if working class women were political enough to recognise their boss as their main enemy "then surely working women would be the first to fight for their right to plan their pregnancies, pregnancy being the main argument the 'bosses' use in restricting women from advancement in employment".

Lynne is working within the framework of the bosses and thus adopting their viewpoint that the basic contradiction faring women within capitalist society is biological rather than that based on class. Women should not be fighting against the excuse which bosses give for throwing them out of the work force - pregnancy (an aspect of the biological contradiction). This is not why they are removed from the work force; it is because the economy can no longer absorb them (the class contradiction). Recently it has not been the risk of pregnancy that has been the excuse given for squeezing married women out of their jobs but rather an ideology' which says women should stay at home and look after their children. Surely it would be better to centre the primary attack on the unjust exclusion of married and single women when the economy decides it no longer needs them?

By placing the abortion campaign in a primary rather than a supportive role Lynne is essentially saying that the biological contradiction takes ascendency over the class contradiction.

We agree wholeheartedly with Lynne that working women suffer most from the present abortion laws. This is very true; working people suffer from all repressive legislation to a greater extent than people with money. Lynne says "a distinction mast be made between a movement comprising mainly middle-class women and one which propagates middle-class demands". That was the whole point of our article! Where we disagree is that abortion should not be raised as the primary demand in isolation from the main demand of working-class women i.e. better working conditions and higher pay.

It is debateable that the campaign for safe legal abortions "has involved women throughout the whole community" when the "unite" Against The Gill Bill" meeting in the Town Mall was mainly composed of middle-class women and men.

We're not disputing that abortion is an important issue and that any encroachment on our rights should be strongly fought against. Rather we think abortion should be seen within the total context of the fight for a decent standard of living, day-care, and a woman's right to work.