Students and politics
Sir: Mr Paul Barry's criticisms (December 8) of the article by Dr Rhodes Boyson appear to resolve themselves into pedantic disputation about the meaning of the phrase 'political activity.' By implicity comparing the sort of 'activity' indulged in by potential Tory Prime Ministers with that of International Marxists, it is surely Mr. Barry who is "talking utter rubbish." Those in Oxford who witnessed the occupation of the Examination Schools, the repulse of the university proctors' attempts to enter the building, the chaotic results of it all upon academic organisation have no doubts about the peculiar nature of this sort of 'activity.' If Dr Boyson is at all to be criticised it is on the score of gracing such behaviour with the epithet 'political' at all. Thuggery is something very like thuggery whether the participants are well-educated or not. I will not point out that there are just a few important characteristics which differentiate all this from the 'activity' of the youthful William Grenville, Lord Liverpool, Sir Robert Peel and Mr Gladstone. The mind boggles at the comparison. And perhaps there is another difference too. In their day the university authorities knew how to deal with those who defied the proctors.
Robin Harris Chairman, Oxford University, Conservative Trident Group, Exeter College, Oxford.
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