On Protest, Activism, and Affecting Social Change, Part 1

I'm currently reading The Strawberry Statement, by James Simon Kunen, about the protests at Columbia University in 1968, and I thought it would provide a good opportunity to write a bit about social activism. The spring semester of 2011 was a volatile time at Dickinson College (now my alma mater). The previous fall had already seen tensions rising, with a panel discussion created to help encourage constructive dialogue about the role of Greek life (I wrote about that here) in that the hopes that such an event might ease some of the tension. But this past Spring, things boiled over.

The first in a series of increasingly politicized events was the invitation to Bill Ayers to speak at the Public Affairs Symposium (PAS), of which I was a committee a member, and whose theme was "Social Activism in an Individualistic Society." Some students, upset by Ayers's past, decided to protest his presence by handing out fliers accusing him of being a terrorist and excerpting his quotes out of context to make it appear that he advocates violent protests. Whether Ayers ever believed in violence against people as a form of protest, we may never know, but now he is certainly not an advocate of such a perspective.

The group of students protesting his presence was quite small, however, and the more vociferous objection to his presence came from recent alumni, many of whom vowed to cease contributing to the school should his invitation not be rescinded. The school stood by the decision to invite Ayers, if not without a little jab at the naivete of the organizing committee, and the event went off mostly without a hitch.

As part of the same PAS, the following day was the first ever Day of Action at Dickinson. PAS gave substantial funds to a number of students groups to allow them all to hold demonstrations on the same day. The event took over the student union building and the main plaza, and was followed that evening by a soapbox that allowed for speakers to express a great diversity of perspectives.

Around the same time as these two events, two other activists spoke on campus. Jaclyn Friedman, a feminist writer, and Komozi Woodard, a former student activist in his undergraduate years at Dickinson and now a professor of African-American history at Sarah Lawrence College. The atmosphere at Dickinson was becoming increasingly intense with such positive reinforcement of the wonders of activist behavior.

Out of this cauldron of activist sentiment emerged the largest protest at Dickinson since 1970, when students marched to the U.S. Army War College to protest American involvement in Vietnam. The cause this time, however, was much closer to home: a sexual assault climate that is dangerous and oppressive, as is true at almost every other college in the country, inadequately addressed by administrations.

A group of over 270 students occupied the administrative building, Old West, for three full days. By the third night, the administration and the student protesters had managed to reach an agreement on how to proceed, and the protest was ended. Although I would not attempt to speak for the administration, I believe that both sides found the outcome acceptable. Regardless, there will be an improved policy in place come the fall of 2011, as well as new educational programs for incoming students.

I had the privilege of participating in this protest, and in the next post I will talk about the experience of being in a protest, and some of the things that distinguished this experience for me.