Antiwar movement gets boost from stupid university administrators
On September 29, the Holyoke (MA) Community College administration gave a gift to the antiwar movement. On that day, students protesting National Guard recruitment were attacked by campus police egged on by the Campus Republicans. The students posed an extreme threat by offering flowers to the recruiters. The police could not tolerate such rebellious behavior and attacked the demonstrators, including macing one of the students.
As reported on the Campus Antiwar Network web site:
Both of the students who were battered by campus police are upstanding members of the HCC community. One is a tutor in the CAPS Center. The other received the David James Taylor Excellence in Philosophy Award, is Vice President for Academic Affairs on the Student Senate, is a member of the College’s Learning Communities Committee, and is a frequent contributor to the student newspaper. Several of the activists involved observed that the student who was maced had consistently played a moderating role in the protest.
As the assault was taking place, approximately a dozen College Republicans were moving forward, pumping their fists in the air, shouting and encouraging the Officers on. Throughout the morning, the campus police force ignored the activities of the College Republicans and were only deployed against the protesters.
One of the protesting students was then banned from campus.
Those of us old enough to remember the 1960’s movements remember well that the greatest boosts for the movement often came from the overreaction of campus police and university administrations. Nothing radicalizes and mobilizes students like seeing their peers manhandled and abused by arrogant authorities. Likely, this is what’s happening here. The UMass-Amherst Anti-War coalition has called a protest this Thursday (October 6). Thanks to the geniuses in the Holyoke Community College administration, antiwar students around the Northeast will now have a mobilizing focus. See the letters of support they have already received from around the world, including from Cindy Sheehan.
With the Iraq war reaching new levels of unpopularity, perhaps this will be the beginning of a new student movement against the war. And the lack of such a mass movement on campuses has been a serious impediment to the development of mass resistance to the war. After all, students, when motivated and mobilized, have an intensity and focus that many of us older folks have long ago lost. Stay tuned.
Add comment October 4th, 2005