IT'S TOO bad that the Living Wage Report, which was released last week, didn't come with a copy of Henry David Thoreau's "Civil Disobedience." For those who aren't familiar with the living wage campaign, it's that sinister plot --perpetrated by communists and tree-embracing humanitarians -- to ensure that workersat the University can afford Bacchanalian indulgences like food and clothing. Or so the University administration might have you believe. In truth, the living wage campaign is the contemporary incarnation of something that every college confronts -- a movement for social justice that is undeniably just, but which few care enough to listen.
I won't bother regaling you with self-righteous bloviating about how right the living wage is and how wrong its opponents are (though it is and they are). The report speaks for itself -- the University has both the obligation and the means to provide a livable wage for its workers. Now, to the more pertinent question: What aspects of our University culture prevent the wage from being implemented?
Aside from the student organizations that heckle at pedestrians outside New Cabell Hall, the University is conspicuously devoid of any provocative protesting. A student could walk around Grounds for an entire day and never be bothered by anyone advocating change or decrying injustice. This ought to change.
College should be uncomfortable; it should perpetually challenge and offend. Yet I fear that students at the University are uniformly unchallenged and not nearly offended enough. The living wage campaign attempted to interrupt this lull by holding a rally last Tuesday in front of the Rotunda. It was an inspiring and valiant effort to challenge the immoral position of President John T. Casteen III, but realistically, the effects will be localized and inevitably short-lived. Unfortunately, this rally is but an aberration in an otherwise complacent and lazy student milieu.
Earlier this year, I wrote about a religious cult that picketed outside Minor Hall, screaming lurid and witty syllogisms like, "You're all going to Hell!" and "Repent now!" Indeed, while the Woronieckis were deranged, their foul message endured long after they packed up the van and pilgrimaged to the next bastion of infidels.
From this cult's brief presentation, one can easily observe the profound power of stirring up the status quo -- just for the sake of doing so. Of course the Woronieckis didn't convert anyone to their brand of Falwellian idiocy -- that isn't the point. Their visit prompted discussion on the virtues of free speech and the dangers of religious extremism -- certainly, conversations worth having.
Regardless of a group's perceived insanity, obscurity or cultural marginalization, students benefit from a relentless and unwavering agitation for their beliefs. An environment in which ideas are constantly assaulted strengthens defensible ideas and hopefully topples those that betray reason. former History Prof. Paul Gaston, during a speech delivered at Tuesday's rally, fittingly pointed out Mr. Jefferson's sentiment on Shay's Rebellion, quoting, "'A little rebellion, every now and then, is a good thing.'"
For this reason, the living wage campaign and University students benefit from an environment in which the problems of the working poor become the problems of wealthy students. Hence, Thoreau, Martin Luther King, Gandhi and others employed the tactic of civil disobedience -- to provide friction against the unthinking movement of a societal machine.
Think, for instance, if a wave of sit-ins at the Pav prevented students from swilling their third cappuccino of the day; the conversation du jour might shift from the Facebook to what motivates those inconsiderate protestors. If the dining halls suddenly shut down
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