Letters

To the Editors,

Since their seems to be some controversy about calling police “Pigs,” I would like to say that when you call any group any one name, that you are generalizing.

Whether you call a policeman a pig, a long haired freak a hippy, or a black man a nigger it’s all the same.

Believe it or not police are people and by classing them together as one name, you are guilty of exactly what their doing. Not to say that the majority of police aren’t sadists, I’m sure they are, but you have to realize that police work naturally caters to sadists.

You at the Estate continually talk of revolution. I would like to refer your readers to an article in the November 22 L.A. Free Press entitled “Is Love Dead?” This cat makes sense. If you haven’t got that issue, let me quote, “When you pick up a gun and learn to kill, the part of you that loved flowers & simple things will die.”

Maybe you people don’t realize that revolution means killing. Is that really what you think is best?

Jeffrey H. Ward

Jackson

Editors’ Note: Why don’t you re-read our answer to the letter in the last issue that first brought up the “pig” affair for an answer to your first two paragraphs.

Cops are humans—very interesting. So was Hitler and Stalin and Eichmann and Ky and Johnson. So what? Do you think these monsters could have been won over by sweet words? Try it on the next pig you see at a demonstration when he’s about to split your skull.

I think the quote you gave is bullshit. If you aren’t ready to defend your revolution with any means necessary you can expect to be crunched. The people in power don’t play and if you want change you better not either. Would you have been against the American Revolution?

Dear People,

I’ve had a lot of time to do some deep thinking and reflecting on man, eternity, the world’s present social conditions, and the Beatles. It’s the latter that I’ve found most confusing. Maybe it’s because they’re people.

That they’re victims of human nature would probably be the most encompassing answer; yet I consider myself human, thus part of a coalition with nature, and I can’t rationalize their attitudes of hypocrisy into every day life.

But of course “nothing is real.” At least for the Beatles it isn’t. And maybe that’s part of the answer.

“All you need is love” they sung while wading knee deep in money and the most expensive recording equipment. The sounds they produce (not always the lyrics, though) are beautiful, like only the Beatles can afford to make.

The music does hit the right nerve endings though; and it pleases.

It’s the lives and attitudes that encompass their productions that have all but obliterated any taste sensation I ever had for those productions.

How can they sing one way and live another? Maybe they’re one of the modern miracles of marketing.

They preach love to make money. They won’t give “money for minds that hate,” yet look around and you’ll find that one of the laws of existence is that the greatest love is the greatest producer of hate.

They’re not even interested in giving money for minds that love. When Lennon was questioned about the poor and hungry around him during a tour of India he said he couldn’t do anything about them.

The Beatles’ only interest is the Beatles and I’m not sure if that’s human nature or not.

All I do in here is read and write. If you can use the preceding you’re welcome to it. It seems to be impossible for me to get your newspaper. I missed the last 3 issues. I could dig reading them if you could get them here.

Insanely,

David Valler

Wayne County Jail

Detroit 48226

Dear Editors,

I’ve read so many uncomplimentary articles about the Grande Ballroom that I just had to write in and tell you what a wonderful time I had Sunday, Dec. 1^st. Uncle Russ had the Grateful Dead in to do their thing along with the Popcorn Blizzard. The Hog Farm was also on hand to supervise a group therapy thing.

There was something for everyone and it was so beautiful I couldn’t believe it. A group of Rocks let me play jump-rope with them. I sat on the floor next to a guy who was diligently coloring and started coloring with him. He was kind, and we joked about his work of art. The kids around us were tapping a balloon back and forth, the object...simply keeping it off the floor and I loved it. A jester gave me a lollipop and I thanked him. I played ball with a kid whose name I didn’t even know and when that lost its appeal, I took up tinker toys.

The Dead played for 2 hours straight through the candle burning, right through the paper plate tossing and they were still going when I left.

I never had so much good clean uninhibited fun in my life. I thank you, Grande Ballroom, I thank you Uncle Russ.

Peace,

Marlene Bordin

Dear Editor:

May one of the “pushing fifty” get a word in?

Yours is the most interesting generation to come along since the ‘thirties. We too, because of the depression, took a look at the establishment and puked. Many of us turned to Communism as an antidote to the sights around us.

Now Communism, in theory, is a beautiful thing, but in reality, like Christianity, it has never been practiced.

Some of my generation, perhaps most, have fallen in with the rest—if you can’t beat them, join them. So we made our peace with the status quo and survived. But some of us still remember. We remember.

I hope to live long enough to see how your generation changes the world. In other words, what will the world be like when you become the establishment? If you are successful, it will be good. If not, you can join us liberals.

Yes, the liberals you hate so much. Only because we are so much like you. After all, who are you going to hate—Nixon? He’s on another planet.

Voltaire says through the characters in Candide: “Can human nature change? Can a leopard change his spots?” If you kids can succeed in changing human nature, you will have done what no one has been able to do in all of history. I hope you make it.

Your paper is great. Herewith three dollars for a subscription—or is the rate six dollars for dirty liberals?

Name withheld on request

To the Editors:

In relation to your article entitled “White Panther Statement” [FE #66, November 14–27, 1968]; I approve of most “obscenities” as a form of expression, but I really cannot see any righteous need in the statement that we should “Fuck God in the ass,” that could not be expressed in some way other than using the name of Hope in such a manner.

Other than that one minute complaint, I think the Fifth Estate is deserving of a monument in its efforts of telling it like it really is.

Me

Editors’ Note: We also pondered Brother Sinclair’s statement and really cannot figure the deep Zenta meaning behind it, but have faith in the mastery of Zenta and the White Panther Party. All truths will be revealed through these twin paths.