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National Geographic : 1966 May
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I talked one day with another senior, 21 year-old JoAnne Schwartz, who came to Cali fornia from New Jersey. JoAnne went through two major crises that have recently shaken Berkeley-the so-called Free Speech Move ment and the furor over United States policy in Viet Nam. I asked how it was that the scholarly world of Berkeley could erupt so suddenly into chaos. Her answer shed light not merely on Berkeley but on much of Cali fornia as well. "The Viet Nam demonstration is a poor ex ample," she began, "because it wasn't really Berkeley. Only a few hundred students were involved out of thousands-most of the dem onstrators didn't even come from here. "But the Free Speech Movement is some thing else; in the end, nearly all of us got in 666 volved. I won't argue the pros and cons of it, because that's been done to death. But you asked me how it could happen." She paused. "I guess I would answer: 'Because it's Cali fornia-and California hasn't settled down yet.' In a way, I hope it never will, because I suspect it would lose something vital. "People are new and rootless here," she said. "California attracts that kind because, in a sense, it's still a frontier. Not in the old way, of course, but in other respects: in the experimental architecture, for example, or in new sports and fashions-even in those way out religions Los Angeles is so fond of. "But you see, that's part of the way Cali fornians are: Always trying for something different, always in search of the new-and not always thinking whether it's good or bad.
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