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Columbus
Dispatch...
Oval
becomes forum for students’
gripes
Protesters join ‘occupy’ movement
October 26, 2011
Droves
of Ohio State University
students braved cloudy skies yesterday to vent their frustrations and
spread
the message of the Occupy Wall Street movement.
The
crowd, gathered at OSU’s Oval,
numbered more than 100 throughout the day, chanting and holding signs
with
myriad grievances — from student loans to environmental concerns to
proposed
privatization of university parking. More than 630 people said on
Facebook that
they would attend the event.
“We
mostly want to get students
aware,” said Chelsea Pflum, an OSU senior studying philosophy and
international
studies. “I hope (students) learn more, especially about the
privatization of
parking lots because that’s not something that’s well-known.”
Throughout
the afternoon, participants
listened to music, shared stories and hoisted signs before marching to
the
Statehouse, where protesters affiliated with Occupy Columbus continued
their
vigil. The group sent representatives to the Columbus City Council
meeting last
night, while another affiliated group drafted a letter to university
President
E. Gordon Gee.
Literature
disparaged “corporate
greed” and unequal distribution of wealth, highlighting the 98 OSU
employees
who made more than $300,000 in 2009 as compared to one making that
amount in
2000. Gee made $802,126 in 2009 while the highest paid employee in 2000
was
Fred Sanfilippo, dean of the College of Medicine and Public Health
Administration,
who made $450,000.
A
letter on display named more than 60
university professors who supported the movement, and several
professors spoke
during periodic teach-ins. Pranav Jani, an associate professor of
English,
highlighted the similarities and connections between the Occupy Wall
Street
movement and the Arab Spring uprisings in the Middle East, while Gene
Holland,
an arts and humanities professor, disparaged capitalism.
“Capitalism
can only sustain itself
with war, which is unacceptable,” he said. “It’s not that capitalism is
in
crisis. Capitalism is the crisis.”
Thousands
of other students passed
through the area on the way to and from classes. A group opposed to the
rally
gathered nearby and debated with Occupy the Oval supporters throughout
the day.
Police reported no incidents or arrests associated with the gathering.
“It’s
all about socialism. That’s the
true nature of the movement,” said Zena Aziz, an OSU student studying
French
and political science and a member of the Laissez-Faire Syndicate, a
pro-capitalist group.
Daniella
Augenstein, founder of the
Laissez-Faire Syndicate and an OSU student, said she opposed the Occupy
the
Oval group’s opposition to privatization of higher education, saying
she
thought a deregulated economy would be more effective.
“Privatization
has become something of
a dirty word,” Augenstein said. “With public education, to be effective
and
innovative, it needs to be deregulated and privatized.”
Mike
Pataky, of the conservative group
CampusReform.org, said he did not think the wealthy were responsible
for social
and economic conditions, and banks should not be punished for them. He
said
individuals should be responsible for their own wealth.
“(The
Occupy movement’s) whole idea is
this socialistic kind of taking from others to provide for themselves,”
Pataky
said.
Still,
Occupy the Oval demonstrators
said the rally was a success, and more gatherings are planned.
“I
bet we could agree on a lot of
things if we sat down and talked about them,” Pflum said of the
dissenting
viewpoints, “I don’t think you can say we’re all necessarily socialist.”
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