European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - January 13, 1989, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Page 10 the stars and stripes Friday january 13,1989 George will Mississippi burning recoils terrifying tone of Era a Black Man who was Young in 1964 emerged blinking from the bludgeoning administered by Mississippi burning and wondered aloud is this movie necessary an interesting word  it is optional but Good to touch the sore of that summer when the three civil rights workers were Mur dered. But it was not necessary to touch the truth the Way this movie docs. The movie is winning awards and throwing off Sparks that Are kindling controversies. The most emotional criticism is unjust but there is rough Justice in that criticism. The movie plays fast and Loose with facts for the Frank political purpose of evoking visceral responses. Angry critics say that Blacks Are reduced to the role of Mere victims appearing on screen Only As sufferers a background chorus to a melodrama of White Fri agents battling White conspirators. Such critics Are complaining because the movie s makers did not choose to make a fundamentally different movie. The movie does not set out to Tell the rounded Story of Freedom summer in Mississippi. The movie s subject is the cracking of one conspiracy. In that episode Blacks were largely bystanders. But Midway through Mississippi burning the movie becomes a 1960s clean up this town Western with a dash of familiar male bonding and a Large Dol lop of dirty Harry intruding in the dust. The movie was made by people Many of them liberals who be Lieve that conservatism is boffo at the Box office. Liberalism at least As defined by conservatism is systematic impotence Well meaning wooly headed Ness that tries to overwhelm problems by piling on re sources and makes matters worse. Fri agent Ward is liberalism incarnate. He sends armies of Blue suited agents wading into swamps. By trying to interrogate a Black Man in Public at a segregated lunch counter. Ward gets the Man beaten. Ward s buddy after some turbulent bonding is agent Anderson an Oliver North with a Middle aged Nian s mileage registered on his face. Anderson is a get it done no nonsense about due process please sort of fellow who operates beyond the Warren court s wild est nightmares. He gets Ward to acquiesce in the use of violence coercion kidnapping Semi seduction entrap ment and a few Nicks with a razor to crack the Case. It is a sign of the times that a movie made for the pro claimed purpose of raising society s consciousness panders to conservative appetites the satisfaction of which is considered commercially necessary. The director. Alan Parker says i m trying to reach an entire generation who knows nothing of that historical event to cause them to react to it viscerally Carl Rowan English Only emotionally because of the racism that s around them now. And that s enough of a reason a justification for the  All drama is in a sense manipulative. But there Are respectful and disrespectful ways of approaching an audience and a historical record. When the subject is real people and events and nothing As Distant As Richard Iii it is neither necessary nor acceptable to tamper so much with the truth. The three deaths moved history. The six week Hunt for the bodies became the hinge on which the nation s political will turned toward Strong Federal action. It is a Story so dramatic that no embellishment should be thought necessary. Charles Dickens was a journalistic  he wanted to inform As Well As entertain to improve the world while by depicting it. He exaggerated and caricatured to provoke reforming impulses. But movie journalism derived from real recent events owes the re Cord More respect than Mississippi burning shows. Movies almost never miss an Opportunity for missing an Opportunity for Fidelity and subtlety. How Ever Hollywood history can whet appetites for the real thing and the real Story of the 1964 murders is told in Seth Cagin and Philip Dray s Book we Are not  Reading it is a harrowing experience several Black corpses were found in Mississippi by authorities searching for Goodman Schwerner and Chan by. One of the Saddest discoveries of the season was the body of a never identified boy about 14, wearing a Core Congress of racial Equality  that victim would have been about 40 today. His parents Are probably living and remembering and won Dering. There Are so Many such silent aches beneath the nation s scar tissue that it is respectful and kind to say we remember the Way it was. Mississippi Burn ing is broadly truthful about the terrifying tone of that time and place. Remembrance of that is necessary. C Washington Post writers group american dream fading for new generation Boca Raton fun. I just want our kids to be better off than we  that expression of Hope has been uttered by italians first sighting the statue of Liberty Blacks emerging from a sharecropping role and the other last vestiges of slav Ery by almost penniless political refugees from Vietnam. Hungary Cuba. Thankfully in vast millions of cases this special american dream has come True. My father now 93. Never earned As much As $600 in a single year of his life but his children have done better. My father in Law never owned More than one sunday go to meeting suit at one time in his Lite. But he saw four children graduate from College and medical and other graduate schools. Vietnamese and koreans who run liquor stores and mom and pop grocer outlets arc watching their kids graduate at the top of their High school and College classes. But dont let that tool you into be Lieving that the old american system of one generation faring better than the last one is still in Force. Many Young people who Are starting families looking for jobs trying to buy Homes arc coming upon lean years that Drift into leaner years. Two recent reports indicate that Mil Lions of Young people Are starting out far behind the generation that came before them and finding that their chances of closing the Gap Are not Good. The old better off than we were dream is fading. One of the reports prepared by the Chil Dren s defense fund and northeastern University s Center for labor Market studies warns that americans under the age of 30 Are suffering a frightening Cycle of plummeting earnings declining marriage rates. Increasing numbers of sin Gle Parent families and skyrocketing poverty  this generation could be the first to end up worse off than their parents says cd president Marian Wright  the other study from the William t. Grant foundation s commission on work family and citizenship is called the forgotten  the title refers to 20 million americans aged 16 to 24 who will never go to College. These Young peo ple it says Start their adult lives in the economic limbo of unemployment pan time jobs and poverty wages that threat ens both their future and that of the nation. Many of them never break  a few figures from the reports Illus trate the plight of Young people and fam Ilies Between 1973 and 1986, the real median income of families headed by a 20-to-24-year-old fell 27 percent. Income for All families dropped by about 1 per cent in the same period. While most Young families had less income in 1986 than in 1973, minority and single Parent families under 25 suffered the most. Given current trends Young men and women can expect to earn an aver age of 25 percent less throughout their lifetimes than the generation 10 years earlier. Not every Young family has lost ground. Those headed by people with College educations have made consider Able gains since 1973. But those headed by High school graduates a group that used to get off to a pretty Good Start were much More Likely to be poor in 1986 than in 1973. To help Young americans both studies Call for building on current programs that have proved effective such As head Stan chapter i of the elementary and secon Dary school act the Job corps and the Job training partnership act. The groups urge that private and non profit sectors of the Community work with families and All Levels of government to Salvage this vital segment of our population. The children s defense fund gives highest priority to increasing the red eral minimum wage and passing the act for better child care services which would get Uncle Sam involved in ensuring that children from working families get Quality affordable accessible child care. The Grant foundation s commission proposes a fair Chance youth opportunities demonstration act to stimulate the development of an integrated approach to the education training and service needs of All youth. We must never let the dream of owning a Home vanish. Besides new programs we must have new attitudes. The forgotten half cannot be viewed As failures simply because they Don t attend College. As the commission reminds us these Are the Young people who build our Homes drive our buses re pair our automobiles fix our televisions maintain and serve our offices schools and hospitals and keep the production lines of our Mills and factories  the Challenge says the report is see ing them in a new Light one that recognizes their strengths respects their diver sity and challenges their  without this support and encouragement it warns America runs the risk of becoming a divided nation with the educated and prosperous on one Side the less educated and struggling on the other. Young people and Young families Are this country s future. We cannot afford to neglect even the least of them for their Sake and America s. C Norin Anrica Syndicate. Inc