The Garbage Disposal Unit
31st January 2011, 20:05
The Canadian Federation of Students' annual day of walking in circles holding signs and listening to speeches is the day after tomorrow - unfortunately, outside of Quebec there's not much of a recent history of students doing anything interesting in this country . . . but, given the exciting example of the UK and Italy, and of young people more generally in a tonne of other places, I'm hopeful something could, y'know, happen.
Anyway, here's the text of a leaflet that was distributed around DAL in Halifax:
DAYS OF ACTION
LIVES OF BOREDOM
Another year, another national "Day of Action" called by the Canadian Federation Students.
Another year, another repetition of demands that the government address growing student debt, rising tuition fees, underfunding of education, etc.
If previous years are any indication - and these things tend to be nothing if not predictable - most students won't give a fuck. Does it mystify anyone (other than the CFS bureaucrats) that the promise of walking down Spring Garden Road (lead, flanked, followed by cops) chanting "1-2-3-4!", and carrying prefabricated placards fails to arouse the passions of our generation?
Further, even if these means could possibly be effective, the ends strike us as equally uninspiring.
"A mechanically produced specialist is now the goal of the "educational system." A modern economic system demands mass production of students who are not educated and have been rendered incapable of thinking." - On The Poverty Of Student Life
The problem is not that universities are underfunded. A look at DAL President Tom Traves's salary - in excess of $220,000 - should say enough. The problem is not that we are chained to student debt. Tuition fees are no more of an indignity than paying for food or shelter. This society makes simply being alive a matter of paying. The problem is that student life is part-and-parcel of this society more generally.
Every complaint we could make as students, followed through to its obvious conclusion, is a complaint with the operation of the whole social machine. Of course the answers offered by the CFS strike us as inadequate, if the real questions are never posed we're doomed to make the same choice as our parents:
"Young people everywhere have been allowed to choose
between love and a garbage disposal unit.
Everywhere they have chosen the garbage disposal unit.
It is perhaps ironic that where the university, and social norms generally, have been most challenged by students, tuition fees are the lowest. In 2005, Quebec students responded to cuts to bursaries with a wave of strikes and occupations that shook not just the schools, but the province.
In occupied colleges students experimented in autogestion (roughly self-organization), feeding themselves, teaching themselves, and learning to relate in new ways. They also experimented in self-defense, driving off cops, building barricades, and in some cases maintaining the occupations for months.
On the streets, demonstrators began to talk - not just about bursaries - but about abolishing tuition altogether. From there, it became possible to talk about abolishing capitalism without sounding like a hopeless romantic (hope ran high).
Of course, under these circumstances, the government became eager to negotiate and found eager partners in the FEUQ and CFS bureaucrats who saw the situation exploding out of their control. The government offered concessions, the students were told to go back to class by "their" leaders, and the experiments ended. Not a happy ending by any means, but the lessons should be clear.
So, what about February 2nd?
February 2nd might be a depressing corpse-walk, but it also might be an opportunity to find one another. In England and Italy, recent student demonstrations have exploded into confrontations; by actually fighting for themselves, students have learned lessons that can't be taught in a classroom. February 2nd might be the first day of a learning experience that could open doors not to better careers, but to better worlds. If we can meet each other in the streets, out of the student ghetto, we can initiate projects that transcend the limits of student politics.
We'll be there, looking for accomplices. Will you be with us?
Anyway, here's the text of a leaflet that was distributed around DAL in Halifax:
DAYS OF ACTION
LIVES OF BOREDOM
Another year, another national "Day of Action" called by the Canadian Federation Students.
Another year, another repetition of demands that the government address growing student debt, rising tuition fees, underfunding of education, etc.
If previous years are any indication - and these things tend to be nothing if not predictable - most students won't give a fuck. Does it mystify anyone (other than the CFS bureaucrats) that the promise of walking down Spring Garden Road (lead, flanked, followed by cops) chanting "1-2-3-4!", and carrying prefabricated placards fails to arouse the passions of our generation?
Further, even if these means could possibly be effective, the ends strike us as equally uninspiring.
"A mechanically produced specialist is now the goal of the "educational system." A modern economic system demands mass production of students who are not educated and have been rendered incapable of thinking." - On The Poverty Of Student Life
The problem is not that universities are underfunded. A look at DAL President Tom Traves's salary - in excess of $220,000 - should say enough. The problem is not that we are chained to student debt. Tuition fees are no more of an indignity than paying for food or shelter. This society makes simply being alive a matter of paying. The problem is that student life is part-and-parcel of this society more generally.
Every complaint we could make as students, followed through to its obvious conclusion, is a complaint with the operation of the whole social machine. Of course the answers offered by the CFS strike us as inadequate, if the real questions are never posed we're doomed to make the same choice as our parents:
"Young people everywhere have been allowed to choose
between love and a garbage disposal unit.
Everywhere they have chosen the garbage disposal unit.
It is perhaps ironic that where the university, and social norms generally, have been most challenged by students, tuition fees are the lowest. In 2005, Quebec students responded to cuts to bursaries with a wave of strikes and occupations that shook not just the schools, but the province.
In occupied colleges students experimented in autogestion (roughly self-organization), feeding themselves, teaching themselves, and learning to relate in new ways. They also experimented in self-defense, driving off cops, building barricades, and in some cases maintaining the occupations for months.
On the streets, demonstrators began to talk - not just about bursaries - but about abolishing tuition altogether. From there, it became possible to talk about abolishing capitalism without sounding like a hopeless romantic (hope ran high).
Of course, under these circumstances, the government became eager to negotiate and found eager partners in the FEUQ and CFS bureaucrats who saw the situation exploding out of their control. The government offered concessions, the students were told to go back to class by "their" leaders, and the experiments ended. Not a happy ending by any means, but the lessons should be clear.
So, what about February 2nd?
February 2nd might be a depressing corpse-walk, but it also might be an opportunity to find one another. In England and Italy, recent student demonstrations have exploded into confrontations; by actually fighting for themselves, students have learned lessons that can't be taught in a classroom. February 2nd might be the first day of a learning experience that could open doors not to better careers, but to better worlds. If we can meet each other in the streets, out of the student ghetto, we can initiate projects that transcend the limits of student politics.
We'll be there, looking for accomplices. Will you be with us?