[858] in Discussion of MIT-community interests
boycott dining
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (alien)
Wed Oct 3 18:47:11 2001
Message-ID: <200110032123.RAA21924@department-of-alchemy.mit.edu>
Date: Wed, 3 Oct 2001 17:23:12 -0400
Reply-To: "Documentation at http://web.mit.edu/beland/talk/talk.html"
<MIT-Talk@MIT.EDU>, alien <alien@MIT.EDU>
From: alien <alien@MIT.EDU>
To: MIT-Talk@MIT.EDU
In-Reply-To: Your message of "Wed, 03 Oct 2001 17:11:01 EDT."
<Pine.LNX.4.21.0110031623310.19520-100000@sub-zero.mit.edu>
With the dot prostest there was something physical, concrete to
stop. It's somewhat harder to stop a campus-wide program, such as the
changes in the freshman housing system, or the dining plan. However, I
think with the dining plan we have a leg up, since at the moment it is
our money that supports it*. Therefore, one form of protest that we
can consider is a boycott.
If the administrators make it clear that they are not willing to
reconsider their posistion on the mandatory dining plan, then I say we
should have a vehement boycott Aramark campaign. It wouldn't be
terribly hard since their food sucks anyway! If it does come to this,
we would need to do it before the implementation of the program, since
after it's implemented they'll already have our money and if we don't
eat the food, it won't matter.
I agree entirely with niko. If we don't do something drastic, they
will ignore our "whining" and make decisions for us.
alien
*or, prevents it from running /too/ much into debt.
niko wrote:
>I apologize for sending such a short, flippant e-mail. Let me provide
>a few more details about what I mean.
>
>I was part of the relatively short-lived MIT Choice effort. Besides
>being about a year or two too late (I don't even remember when we were
>doing this anymore), MIT Choice had a few other fundamental flaws that
>I didn't realize until now. What makes me sad is that I see those
>same flaws coming up again and again in attempts by students to block
>the administration.
>
>In a word, we believed too much in the good faith of the administration.
>We let them run us in circles. The administration is good at waiting; it
>knows that the students at mit have a lot on their minds. They know
>that we've got tests and problem sets, and that every minute they spend
>talking to us and debating with us is one less minute we have to work on
>that; they know that that fact brings us one minute closer to the breaking
>point.
>
>The problem with MIT protest is that it's always civilized; it's always
>reasonable; it always ends on time. People always go home and finish up
>their work and view the protest is closed. It can't be that way.
>
>We may be able to win a fight about the dot*, and we will almost certainly
>win concessions on this issue, just as we won a few concessions on the housing
>issue. If MIT students want the administration to get the idea that they
>are not to be ignored in the future, they have to demonstrate that they
>are not ignoreable! Ultimately, the administration knows that when all is
>said and done, we will make noise and then stop. We need to NOT stop; we need
>to make them rue the day they crossed such clever, vindictive individuals.
>
>God could I go on about this, and other speculation on the fate of
>student protest at mit. Suffice to say that I think simply being
>reasonable is not enough. I also think that MIT Administrators are very
>smart and dedicated people. I think they, like us, are working for a better
>MIT: I just think that their vision of what a better MIT is differs
>drastically from ours, and that this schism will always frustrate understanding
>between the two groups.
>
>niko
>* - note: the fight on the dot was the one fight at MIT that I have seen
>the students simply rise up and get in the way. People went there, and
>they didn't leave. And the administration essentially caved.
