Student grants
Sir: Digby Jacks (Letters, March 31) demonstrates one reason why grown people don't take students seriously — or at least students' "spokesmen." Since you have written saying that they should not be taken seriously, he insists that you are taking them seriously because you have written about them. His is the juvenile assump tion that, if you are getting attention, then you are getting serious consideration for the noises you are making. Infants start doing this in their prams, and keep doing it until they reach maturity. I know a lot of students, and respect most of them for their hard work, integrity, and honest desire to discover what it's all about. I also observe the antics of their 'leaders,' most of whom merely ape the worst behaviour of the more sour and surly of their elders, without a grain of humour or of originality. This long-faced minority claims to speak for the majority — and the majority lets it, because the majority have better things to do with their time and talents than go through the protracted mummery of student unionism — especially since they know that the only ' action ' that can result has no force. The idea, for instance, of a students' strike is hilarious, but Digby Jacks and his fellows take themselves so seriously, and are so convinced that others take them seriously, that they can't see it. Not to worry: they will when they grow up.
William Barnes 39 Ardmore Road, Glasgow
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