Second Year student at CCNY, a Black Woman Majoring in Medical Sciences:
“This is the time of our lives we’re supposed to be exposed to this. But it’s clear from what happened that some ideas are not deemed acceptable.”
May 21, 2016 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us
Revolution/revcom: What’s your reaction to the arrest of the Revolution Club members who were getting out the message “Time To Get Organized for an ACTUAL Revolution: Message from the Central Committee of the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA” at City College?
A: I had never heard of someone being arrested on campus—I figured it had to be something really, really bad. And then what I found out what it was, I thought it was really ridiculous, to arrest people for hanging posters. Being a student at the school, I know people hang up posters all the time, for anything, all the time. When my club has events, we hang posters without permission. But what they did to them was unconstitutional, and I’m not OK with that.
I also don’t like our college president. I don’t like the way we’re treated. Nobody does. It even comes down in ways like we had no toilet paper on campus!
Revolution/revcom: That’s degrading! But going back to what you said, that you figured this had to have been something really bad for them to have been arrested—what do you think about what happened now that you know what the real story is?
A: It definitely had something to do with the message. They just wanted to get rid of this and they thought the only way they can do it. And from what I heard, the administration wants to stop them from doing this, and make them rethink their choices, and what they stand for, and break them. And that is not OK!
Revolution/revcom: How does that make you feel?
A: It’s upsetting. This is a college. We’re told to think critically and question. To think about the way the world is and how we can change it. This is the time of our lives we’re supposed to be exposed to this. But it’s clear from what happened that some ideas are not deemed acceptable. But then what’s the point of a university, if you’re not going to be exposed to everything.
So then you have this club that comes around and they tell you here’s the problem, and here’s the solution. But because that’s against what the university stands for, what the university president stands for, what the police stand for, that’s going to be shut down.
Revolution/revcom: You read the message that’s at the heart of all this, right? What do you think about it?
A: Yes. I had also read the first point in the Six Resolutions of the Central Committee of the Revolution Communist Party, USA [available here at revcom.us]—it makes a lot of sense. I feel in our college environment, most students would be for this. People really want positive change—a lot of students around me want to make positive change. I think they’re suppressing something because a lot of students would be for this.
I’ve read the message. It’s where the future should be going. If we don’t go in that direction, what the revolution is calling for, the machine is gonna keep pushing forward, exploiting people and the environment to the point of no return. So the fact that the administration prefers to stay in that system, and keep students from knowing the reality of the situation, and the answers—that’s disgusting. That’s inhumane!
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