Posts tagged politics

By, Dan Kalnas

     During the 2009-2010 school enrollment year I often stayed up late talking cynically about college with my good friend, Troy. We discussed the irrationality of spending enough money to possibly cripple ourselves in debt for the foreseeable future for high school cafeteria quality food and what amounted to a comparatively comfortable prison cell, while attending classes and studying subjects that could and were, being done online for leisure.

     At the time I was studying philosophy and art history and planned to pursue a PhD in one or both subjects. I was hungry to learn, but had to continually switch in and out of private-learning mode and that of conventional class. One was exciting and free while the other was regimented, costly and dull. One night my frustration reached a crescendo as I ranted about the need for radical change: free or affordable education for all or possibly even a total re-structuring of the “education industrial complex”. My friends agreed but were skeptical. I left early that night and brooded in the dorm.

     The next year I transferred to the University of Pittsburgh, closer to home and with better credentials for my subjects of choice, but this did nothing to satisfy my desire for honest education as I quickly realized that Pitt was also just a college. With no answers to sensible questions, I got frustrated.

     In Germany and presumably other European countries, a whole year of university adds up tothe equivalent of 2-4 paychecks from a full time, minimum wage job in America. Imaginepaying $500 per year for college, books included. A proposal like this, however, is likely to lead to accusations of socialist sympathies and Tea Party attacks and denouncements, while with democratic lip service of “support”. In short, our political system as it stands right now, will likely not respond to the legitimate demands of students, especially as the high paying jobs we were promised  are crushed by recession.

     In my time off from school, so far, I have watched revolutionary movements taking hold around the world: in Egypt and the greater Middle East, in Greece, Spain, Portugal and elsewhere. The most visceral to me, however, are those in the United Kingdom and Chile, where students are revolting, in one case again stausterity measures to bring their functional and sane system closer to what we Americans deal with, and one in the opposite direction, demanding free or affordable, as well as effective, education. As I watch these protests play out I can only imagine a solidarity movement taking hold in the US, demanding those same rights. 

     Footnote: I believe education must be seen as a human right if we are to convince ourselves that we support human progress.

     OccupyWallStreet is a perfect opportunity to voice these concerns if they are also your own. Remember,those who chair the universities make exorbitant salaries and could be counted, if not necessarily statistically, as members of the 1% who wield enormous power over our lives. If you are an indebted college student, or even if your family can pay for you, join the call to resist this injustice of knowledge for debt. Join your peers across the Atlantic and way down south, to demand reform and a life free from continuous indentured service to money lenders. Go to Occupytogether.org and find an occupation near you among more than 1,300 cities, and let your voice be heard.