In response to an upcoming controversial bake sale on campus, a list of seven tentative demands by a coalition of UC Berkeley students of the campus administration were posted online — but leaders of that coalition said the demands are not finalized and their release was premature.
“The leaders of a developing multicultural coalition are not responsible for this (blog post’s) publication,” said Salih Muhammad and Reuben Canedo, members of the coalition’s logistics committee, in a statement. “The (post) reflects notes from a community meeting that we held on Friday, September 23, and all points on here will be critically discussed and developed as a communal body. The leaders of this coalition do not endorse the aforementioned statements… We look forward to better communication in our collective futures.”
The students met at Rochdale Village Apartments on Friday evening to discuss and respond to the Berkeley College Republicans’ “Increase Diversity Bake Sale,” which is intended to protest SB 185, an affirmative action-like bill currently awaiting signature from Gov. Jerry Brown. The pricing of the sale’s baked goods varies according to the consumer’s race and gender.
According to the blog post, the Friday meetingwas moved to the Multicultural Community Center in the Martin Luther King Jr. Student Union building on the UC Berkeley campus and grew to nearly 200 students “of underrepresented communities of color.”
“Support for affirmative action was overwhelming, and continuations committees were formed,” the blog post states.
The blog post lists the following as “Tentative Demands for the UC Berkeley Campus Administration” :
- “Concretize the vague language of the university’s “Principles of Community” so that it explicitly condemns racism, sexism, xenophobia, ableism, islamaphobia, anti-semitism, classism, sizeism, homophobia, hetreosexism, transphobia, and cissexism.”
- “Include the university’s (updated) “Principles of Community” on every course syllabus in the manner of our Statement of Academic Honesty. If the university is to concern itself with making students feel safe in the classroom, then we believe that students should feel that their instructors are committed to maintaining that safe space, not just hoping for it.”
- “Integrate the (updated) “Principles of Community” into the Student Code of Conduct, thus creating a system in which anti-community offenses are subject to disciplinary action.”
- “Restructure the American Cultures Requirement to be an Ethnic Studies/Gender Studies Requirement. The function of this requirement must be to prepare students to engage in respectful cross-cultural interaction outside of the classroom, rather than a vacuous exploration of texts. “
- “ Removal of the following clause from the description of the American Cultures curriculum guidelines,
“This is not an ethnic studies requirement, nor a Third World cultures requirement, nor an adjusted Western civilization requirement, nor a course on racism.”
If courses are going to claim to be teaching some aspect of “American Culture”, these subjects must addressed, especially the issue of racism.”
- “Cultural competence training for all UC Berkeley Students in the manner of the pre-freshman Alcohol EDU program. Training is to be co-facilitated by representatives from both the Office of Equity and Inclusion and the student body.”
- ”An end to UCPD intimidation and harassment of students.”
The coalition is coordinating a mass demonstration on Sproul Plaza at 11:30 a.m. on Tuesday — the same date as the bake sale.
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So along the lines of #1 by baring all forms of racism, sexism, xenophobia, ableism, islamaphobia, anti-semitism, classism, sizeism, homophobia, hetreosexism, transphobia, and cissexism, I would foresee great problems. By definition that would bar a great deal of groups on campus, no groups who has a basis of race could continue (ABA, Arab Student Union, APAC, CSA, ect…), nor sex (Berkeley Women in Business, Graduate Women of Engineering, and most sports team as they aren’t CoRec), along with a pletera of other student organizations that I don’t wish to list here (nor do I believe you wish to read such a list).
It’s important to step back and take some perspective. Yes we should not say or do things that will hurt others, but at the same time we should not take political correctness to the point that there is a campus policy requiring every group to meet diversity standards.
We are sensitive to this and other similar issues because of the actions of the past, but what’s important now is that we don’t repeat those mistakes, and instead focus on what they will be in the future.
As it happens our interests are shaped by our heritage, whether it’s a celebration of Jewish Seder, the Indian celebration of Holi, or the West African Homowo Festival – events which are inherently racist (or in the case of the Seder, Semitic) what’s important today is to not give one group an advantage over the other, but to try to help other’s understand a foreign culture.
Unforgivably these calls do quite the opposite, ”creating a system in which anti-community offenses are subject to disciplinary action” does the same thing Jim Crow laws did 70 years ago (and in perspective remember that Jim Crow laws were widely considered political correct at the time – but I will admit this to be an extreme example), we should instead be working on removing race and nationality from our considerations as should any true Melting Pot, and instead work to help the disadvantaged (be they black, white, yelow, brown) to overcome adversity - and by doing so I guarantee you will see that racial disparity start to disappear.
They should have their demonstration outside the Free Speech Movement Cafe, just for the sake of irony.
Have the students ever heard of a piece of paper called the Constitution? They might want to take a look at it sometimes and see if anything addresses political speech.
Sure sounds like some of them have heard about the Communist Manifesto…
I could make my own demands of this “coalition” but it would be more along the lines of telling them go take their faux outrage and firmly plant it in their dark, smelly, backside cavity.
I never took Alcohol EDU, and I would sure as hell find a way to BS my way through this bureaucratic “cultural competence training,” let alone take the damn thing.
To the authors of this list: take a step back and think for a second. By framing the cultures you want to promote in terms of a competency test you are eroding the beauty of those cultures. People can’t learn to appreciate others through a seminar.
Also: The UCPD, many of whom are former Cal students themselves, are some of the most respectful individuals on campus, regardless of uniform. The students who have been beaten and “harassed” by the officers usually behave in such a manner than the police don’t have a choice.
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A list of demands? That’s what an eight year old does when he is upset. An adult asks for things, listens, and negotiates.
True, but what makes you think we are dealing with mature adults here?
Everyone: Here’s how we can support the side of right and put a finger
in the face of the control freaks in ASUCk. The BCR need to put up an
E-bay or Paypal site on-line and sell virtual diversity cupcakes. I
don’t care if it’s just a freaking picture of a cupcake, I will gladly
sign up for 10 of them and forward $20 for them to set up a legal
defense fund to fight this bovine scat. Not that I’m a Republican or
even agree with half of what the GOP stands for, but they are in the
right on this one and don’t need to be singled out for persecution by a
bunch of junior NSDAP wannabes…
See, those against the BCR won’t even get the NSDAP reference because:
1. They are the least educated on campus (they got into Cal how?)
2. They are too busy whining about a bake sale which THEY COULD HAVE COMPLETELY IGNORED.
One other point: where do Salih Muhammad, Reuben Canedo, or any of these other megalomaniac Rochdale ass-clowns think they have a right to DEMAND ANYTHING?
These junior totalitarian wanna-bes have obviously spent more time sniffing their own underwear than washing it, given they seem to think their own fecal matter doesn’t stink…
[“Integrate the (updated) “Principles of Community” into the Student Code
of Conduct, thus creating a system in which anti-community offenses are
subject to disciplinary action.”]
Sounds more like something we would expect from the Universidad de la Habana or Pyongyang U. than something that should be accepted on an American college campus. Nice of them to jettison free speech for others when it doesn’t suit their own agenda…
“Sizeism?”! “Cissexism” You know what “ism” I’d like to see ousted from this “educational” institution of ours. NARCISSISM. Let’s get rid of that instead of demanding that the university require students to enroll in classes with an obviously political rather than instructive agenda. You people are completely insane and will spin ANYTHING into an excuse to spread hysterical far left propaganda. Wow.
Its no longer about Left or Right with these idiots, its about conformity and re-education.
To the list authors: go read some Solzhenitsyn or Orwell and let me know if you still think what you’re doing is admirable.
What does UCPD have to do with the bake sale? Don’t use this incredibly distasteful event as yet another attempt to avoid taking responsibility for, you know, occupying buildings…