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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Dec. 11, 1929)
4 THE BATTALION the lattalion Published every Wednesday night by the Students' Association of the Agricultural and Mechanical College of Texas. Subscription Price $1.75 per year. ALL ADS RUN UNTIL ORDERED OUT. Entered as second-class matter at the post office at Bryan, Texas, under the Act of Congress March 3rd., 1879. Member of National College Press Association All undergraduates in the College are eligible to try for a place on the Editorial Staff of this paper. Freshmen, Sophomores, and Juniors who are interested in journalism for its own sake, are urged to make themselves known to some member of the staff. EDITORIAL STAFF L. W. JOHNSTON Editor-in-Chief J. M. GARCIA Managing Editor S. C. GIESEY Associate Editor Y. B. GRIFFIS Associate Editor P. A. DRESSER Sports Editor C. WILLIAMS Associate Editor F. R. McKNIGHT Assistant Sports Editor R. L. HERBERT News Editor C. V. ELLIS . Associate News Editor W. G. CARNAHAN Assistant News Editor J. A. BARNES Assistant News Editor C. M. BLOCK Assistant News Editor M. H. HOLLOWAY Columnist S. A. ROELOFS Columnist BUSINESS STAFF LESTER HANKS Business Manager D. W. SHERRILL Assistant Business Manager J. A. REYNOLDS Circulation Manager THE STUDENT FORUM Editor’s note:—Due to an excitment created by an editorial published last week, an innumerable amount of contributions have been pouring to the editor’s desk. These have made it urgent the opening of this new column with the hope that it will not fade into obscurity when the storm has passed. Such contributions may or may not be signed; however the publishing of such will depend entirely upon their contents. An editorial appeared in last week’s Bat that was written, we hope, merely to arouse an answer. Here is an attempt. This editorial sets forth again the eternal weakling’s plea for subju gation of muscle to brains. To force the big man to kow-tow to the little man, to make physical supremacy a disgrace. Why? One has to be a little man to really understand. But let’s avoid personalities. The writer of last week’s editorial says that a college should instruct in order that progress should follow, mechanical progress, scientific prog ress and possibly, though not mentioned, ethical progress. If last week’s writer could see beyond his nose he would understand that athletics is merely a minor outgrowth of one of the greatest forces acting in America today. That is, Advertising. Football teams are touted, college spirit aroused, enthusiasm created in order to advertise what everyone believes is good for the general pub lic, namely: a college education. Now last week’s writer should have realized that a college, in its pres ent sense, is not an institution for hot housing genious. Today’s college disiminates knowledge to the many in order that general intelligence may be elevated, that the sons of the college graduates will be reared in the highest possible general standard of living. Clean sportsmanship, an appreciation of strenuous exercise, an the humanising effect of personal contact in some form of combat can be found today only in athletics. And there is also the probability that the athlete’s sons will have less tendency to idiocy than the so-called intellec tuals. If the writer of last week’s editorial is really the genious that he poses, then he is wasting his time dosing himself weekly with the diluted pap that is put on the counter for general consumption here at College. He could much better spend his time in a library, or in the laboratory of some large industrial organization; but then the requirements for entrance in such places is a little high compared to A. and M.’s. Having searched diligently for three years for an intellectual student on this campus, and now having found one, the present writer thinks that the athlete is the most valuable of the two. LOOKING INTO THE CRUCIBLE Everyone knows that the mass of people in the world, and in the Corps of Cadets, may be generally classified into twej groups—dreamers and Doers—and it is also common knowledge that the Dreamers rarely arrive at anything more tangible than the flimsy stuff that dreams are made of. Doers, on the other hand, often become substantial folk and really amount to something. Let us discuss Doers. Doers never become bored with life. They live and fight in its con tests and tournaments with monsters called Greed and Selfishness—all this for the glorification of the process, so that it may continue to provide more struggles for more Doers in the futui’e. A gallant lot, surely, but these men of action run a risk. A wise man once said (he was a dreamer) that men who fight with monsters should be very careful lest they thereby become monsters, and that men gazing into an abyss should know that the abyss is also gazing into them. Whether we be dreamers or realists, we can see that he was probably right, for it has long been the custom of mankind to fight fire with fire. Now we realists who are going blithely out to face whatever fate may put in our paths will undoubtedly be called upon to strive with many monsters and to look long into many abysses, and it were surely a bitter ject if we should become monsters in our turn, fair game for our children’s pity, greatly and piously hated by our fellows— From the weighty evils discussed above the dreamer has nothing to fear, because he is an idle, careless fellow at best, and much too lazy to fight with even the most insignificent realities, much less the monstrous ones, nor does he gaze over long into abysses. But the case of the realist is different, he is sometimes changed in the struggle, much in him is killed that he can ill afford to lose, until he becomes strange and evil in the sight of those around him—a monster. A poet has said this better than we may hope to have said it. Strange how these dreamers say things so well— “Good when the bugles are ranting It is to be iron and fire; Good to be oak in the foray, Ice to a guilty desire. But when the battle is over (Marvel and wonder the while) Give to a woman a woman’s Heart, and a child’s to a child.” FOR THOSE Come in early, so we can get them ready in plenty of time. i CHRISTMAS PRESENTS "XToxxx- ! And at one sitting you can solve all your Gift Problems. Aggiezland Studio JXTOUTiaC CD ZB?’ You Gan Get the Best Military Clothing Stationery Drawing Material and Toilet Articles at the jfioccfyange Ji> tare The Official Store of the College