On Sunday, the Georgetown Occupy contingent facilitated eight hours of workshops and teach-ins in Red Square, in direct response to a Wall Street Boot Camp training session that occurred on the same day. Georgetown students, faculty, and even alumni from the Chimes a capella group contributed to the vibrant discussions of the day.
Despite attendance of some faculty members, there was a noticeable absence of University administrators. Staff members from the Center for Multicultural Equity and Access and the Center for Social Justice passed the teach-in throughout the day, but never stayed or expressed support. The director of the LGBTQ center, Shiva Subbaraman, declined a verbal invitation to attend, stating that as an administrator she did not want to be involved in the politicized event. It appears that the voices of administrators indebted to a long history of campus activism have been co-opted into an attitude of institutional passivity, highlighting how the Georgetown environment marginalizes alternative, left-leaning voices.
The University has historically upheld this precedent through dismissing or actively suppressing student voices for a more just Georgetown. In 2005, the Georgetown Solidarity Committee’s Living Wage activists fought an uphill battle securing support from the CSJ. In 2006, hundreds of students from MEChA de Georgetown mobilized against an on-campus speech by George Simcox, founder of the Minutemen border patrol vigilante group. In response, Vice President Dan Porterfield erected a fence—a literal border—segregating students from the main event.
According to GU Occupy activist Rob Byrne (COL ’12), this has been a consistent pattern in the intervening years. “Whenever students organize around the systemic problems at Georgetown, the administration responds by only targeting them aesthetically through a labyrinth of University committees and working groups,” he said. “Other times, they simply wait for student activists to graduate, allowing the problem to go away.”
When we look at the whole picture, it is clear the Georgetown community is not living up to the promise of “pluralism in action.” The choices of Subbaraman and others not to attend the teach-in was likely not based on any animosity towards the Occupy movement or its goals, but it is endemic of a pattern within the University higher-ups. It may be easy for mainstream liberal voices to attain legitimacy and recognition from the University, but truly alternative groups are often dismissed. That is acceptable when the individuals involved are violent or hateful, but that is not the Occupy contingent. The rhetoric of Ann Coulter and George Simcox, both of whom were welcomed to campus, fits much better into these categories. Regardless of one’s attitudes toward the movement, anyone who went to the teach-in Sunday knows that GU Occupy’s opinions deserve legitimacy and consideration on our campus. It’s time that everyone—both the administration and student body—realize that as well.
