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Yahoo!Ignoring the restrictions imposed by the mere geometry of UCSB’s curbs and sidewalks, students marching today in protest of the University of California’s involvement with military efforts stepped across the newly installed roundabout at the campus’s east entrance and walked down Highway 217 toward a cluster of California Highway Patrol vehicles. The crowd—nearly one thousand, according to event planners, though more conservative estimates place the number closer to 500—had convened initially in Isla Vista at Pardall Road, in front of a tunnel underpass through which many UCSB students ride their bikes to get to class. Part of the protest included a strike that discouraged students from attending class in symbolism of a decisive break from “business as usual.” Thus, the spot was integral for the protestors to hail passers-by to drop their daily activities in favor of joining the rally. However, the class walkout—which some students disobeyed, even if they purported to support the protest—paled in comparison to the literal walk down the principal highway leading into campus, which stopped traffic.
As UC Police Department officers redirected cars trying to exit campus, the mob of protestors stood before the CHP, who told students not to step past their line of cars. The presence of the officers prevented the protest from reaching the 101, which some in the crowd alleged was their plan, but the barricade also resulted in an hour-long confrontation between the two entities. Despite the size of the student protest group and the riot gear CHP officers sported, the worst of the interaction was limited to two arrests. Former UCSB student Jesse Carrieri was taken into custody for disobeying a peace officer, as was a women’s studies department professor, Mireille Miller-Young.
Protestors sat on the pavement of Highway 217 and listened to
speakers address the group with words of encouragement, news of
other opportunities for political activism and the like. “I wasn’t
planning on coming today. I was on the bus,” said Dos Pueblos High
School student Adam Rothman, referencing a public transit vehicle
trying 
that had been completely stopped from
circling the roundabout when the march halted it. The crowd met
this identification with cheers. Other speakers spoke about the
protest being sadly uncharacteristic of the crop of young adults.
“Our generation is the one that will be remembered for iPods and
ignorance,” said a speaker. “We’re the generation that is willing
to get arrested for public intoxication on the weekend on [Del
Playa Drive] and not in a protest for civil disobedience.” Jeronimo
Saldana, a member of UCSB’s Associated Students Legislative Council
who took part in the protest, praised the crowd for coming as far
as they had. “We shut down the university as of now. We’re showing
our solidarity,” he said. “This is beautiful. Let’s keep this going
on.”
Walking Before Running and Gathering Before Marching
Indeed, the spirit of the afternoon carried on for hours, especially for the handful of organizers that arrived at the initial Pardall Road location at 7 a.m. Organizers described the event as one that continually grew in energy and number as the day wore on. “It’s amazing to be here and look at all the people who showed up,” said Andrew Culp, a research and advocacy associate at the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation. “And it’s had this ripple effect,” he said, noting that UCSB’s protest seems to have inspired similar ones at 27 other universities throughout the nation, including Columbia, UCLA, UC Davis and Berkeley. “The fact that this all happened so organically speaks to how powerful this is,” said junior film studies and global studies major Ellen McClure of the way UCSB’s recognition of the worldwide February 15, 2003 protests—in which an estimated six to ten million people protested the United States’ planned invasion of Iraq—had apparently given rise to additional activism beyond Santa Barbara.
One of the speakers at the Pardall Road stage of the protest
identified himself as “Yousef B.” and explained that college
students had a responsibility to protest the injustices suffered
overseas 
because people in Iraq were not all that
different from Americans. “If you’ve never seen an Iraqi, then
right here—I am a person from Iraq and I look like you,” he said
after addressing the crowd with the traditional Muslim greeting of
peace. The speaker continued to say that unlike American students,
however, those studying at colleges in Iraq spend an approximate
amount of time working for their degrees but “have no hope,” as the
future of their country is so uncertain.
Darwin BondGraham, a second year sociology grad student at UCSB, said the protest was important because, in his opinion, many students need an extra nudge to become agents of political change. “A lot of students are democrats in the way Dianne Feinstein is a democrat and [voted for the war] or Hillary Clinton is and served on the board of directors for Walmart… We’re trying to get people radicalized.” BondGraham, who appeared to be a de facto leader for the organizers, who consciously rejected electing any sort of formal boss, said he would like today’s protest to be a first step in changing UCSB’s overall political climate into one of activity instead of apathy.
Questioning Authority
Indeed, 
little apathy was present among the
protestors for the duration of today’s events. Even though the
crowd eventually relented and marched back onto campus, it then
focused its energies on Cheadle Hall, which houses many of the
university’s administrative officials. Protestors demanded to speak
with Chancellor Henry Yang and have him answer their charges that
the UC system is furthering war efforts, for example, by pushing
its engineering researchers to work on weapons.
After much ruckus, Vice Chancellor Michael Young emerged and explained that although Chancellor Yang was not in the office, he would relay the message. Young said that he endorsed any citizen’s right to protest. “All people should have the right to speak and do so with dignity and respect,” he said. Shouts from the crowd demanded for administration to respond to other concerns, as well—among them, “What about nuclear weapons?”, “Yang has a cell phone!” and “What about our brothers in jail?” Responding to the last of these, Young responded that he’d heard that the two arrested protestors had been released. And with assurances from Young that the university would work with students to help understand each other’s goals, the crowd dispersed.
“The more attention they can get, the better,” said UCSB student Peter Borris, who watched the protest at Cheadle Hall. “I was just in the army and the can call me back anytime, so I’m all for [the protest]. Amberjae Freeman, a global studies graduate student, said she was pleased to see such a large group protesting—particularly one that included some of her students—though she said she was somewhat troubled by the relatively fewer number of minority students involved, especially given the number of student organizations that traditionally support liberal causes. “The absence of black and Latino [protestors] is noticeable to me in particular,” she said.
One for the Team
Sergeant Dave 
Robertson, acting as a spokesperson for
the CHP, said after the protest that the retreat from Highway 217
happened as a result of an agreement between police and the
marchers. “We can’t allow them to block access to campus, and the
leaders of the group agreed,” he said. Robertson, who admitted that
he had been at UCSB when student protests burned down Isla Vista’s
Bank of America building, also said he felt the decision to march
down the highway was poorly planned and could have easily resulted
in a less peaceful resolution than the one that occurred. “Their
idea is good, but their method is bad,” he said.
Robertson also said that he understood that the student arrested, Jesse Carrieri, had been taken into custody for having brandished a starter pistol. Later investigation, however, revealed that the weapon in question had actually been a black water gun and that Carrieri’s arrest happened as a result of his refusal to obey a police officer’s orders to step away from the CHP’s makeshift barricade.
Carrieri, however, said he was not informed of his reason for arrest until well after he had been taken into police custody. Furthermore, he said the arrest stemmed from an officer’s misunderstanding his curiosity into the protest’s legal standing. “I went to an officer behind the barricade to ask a question, and he tells me ‘Get back.’ I was trying to discern what law we were breaking by being there—what we would be arrested for,” Carrieri said. “It seemed totally ludicrous and pointless… I was questioning authority, but literally, not rhetorically,” he said. “I was being polite, but the second I crossed the line, so to speak, I become a number to them. What was I in violation of? Questioning authority.”
Released about five hours after his arrest—and hours after Young announced to the crowd that both arrested individuals had been let go—Carrieri said he was surprised to see Chancellor Yang, who offered to drive him from Santa Barbara County Jail back to Isla Vista. For that unexpected presence, Carrieri said he was thankful. “His being there helped expedite our release. They were saying I might be in your cell over night,” he said.
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Discussion Guidelines
The energy and the goal of stopping the war in Iraq is terrific.
The tie-in to UCSB is inaccurate. The so-called support of defense by UCSB is the other way around, really... a mechanism to exploit military bucks to do basic research.
All the attacks on UCSB in the late 1960's accomplished one thing... the screwing of UCSB. Meanwhile the true perpetrators and profiteers off the Vietnam War... the General Dynamics, Dow Chemicals, FMACs, etc... got off scot free and greatly enriched. The same thing is going on now.
Rightwing supporters of the war love to see leftwing demonstrators attack UCSB, because that accomplishes the goals of the right. Rule number one of all nasty politics is to incite disagreements among your enemies. Conservatives from Andy Caldwell to Karl Rove (who knows damn well that the employer where employees contribute the largest $ sum to Kerry was the University of California) will cackle with glee when demonstrators at UCSB pummel the UCSB administration and professors.
A much better target would be the remnants of the war industry on Hollister Avenue... Raytheon etc.
agate
February 16, 2007 at 6:45 a.m.
agate-
Sorry to break your idyllic conception of UCSB but they have taken over $300 million for the DOD in the last 10 years. That doesn't even include military contractor money from the likes of Lockheed, Raytheon and Toyon.
Much of the research is not basic - they are designing tank armor, UAVs, and a lot of other research with specific applications.
For example, the UC gets over 2.8 billion dollars from the DOE to make nukes for the nations two nuclear design labs. Every nuke has been designed by a UC employee. The UC gets slightly over 2.7 from the state of CA to oversee education. 2.7, 2.8 - see the difference?
Yes, Raytheon sucks and they should be shut down. But is the UCSB just a misunderstood cog in the machine? No. You can borrow my copy of "The Cold War and American Science: The Military-Industrial-Academic Complex at MIT and Stanford" and it will all start to make sense, m'kay?
ac
Andrew
February 16, 2007 at 8:01 a.m.
Andrew, I have no idyllic view, but recall every bit of research conducted at UCSB is non-classified. A very tiny fraction of that $300 million has specific applications, and what does is in the open literature.
There is no institutional pressure to do defense research at UCSB, and in fact, the overwhelming majority of professors, researchers, and administrators choose not to do defense research.
Why color the entire institution with the actions of a tiny minority?
As for the UC System itself, particularly LLNL and Los Alamos, that is a different matter. I suggest you go to LLNL and Los Alamos and protest there... protesting at UCSB is senseless.
UC doesn't make any nukes, but it does design them all.
UCSB is not a cog in any machine. It is a pretty good place to discuss all of this, and shutting it down is just nuts. Why not protest at General Dynamics, Halliburton, etc? Why not at Vandenberg? Protesting at UCSB does the work of the conservatives, who would love to shut down UCSB.
And what about all the consumption by the military of modern research into multiculturism, in order to control the modern military, where people of color are absolutely crucial to the war machine? Why focus only on engineering and science? The military exploits research from many, many different sectors of UCSB, not just the hard sciences.
agate
February 16, 2007 at 9:31 a.m.
Agate-
To start things off, you sound like a hard science prof who is on the defense. I agree with you, military research is not good, it's not a problem with the sciences as a whole. A panel of scientists (like the NSF) should decide what gets funded, not a panel of generals (like DARPA). Additionally, it's not just a sciences problem, I _whole heartedly agree with you_ and if you want to point out to me specific research going on in other departments, I will gladly include it in my criticism of UCSB.
Next, you're also right that UCSB is a great institution that only gets about 15% of its federal dollars from military research - which would mean it would have no problem getting rid of that slice, no? Please don't mischaracterize me or the protest, the messaging was "UCSB is better than this, there's no reason military research should be going on here."
I encourage _you_ to organize protests against Halliburton, Raytheon, etc etc. The reason that students were so excited yesterday is because they took control of their institution's levers of power. Students are in a unique place to affect their own school not huge trans-national corporations.
As for making nukes - you're wrong again. LANL is the only lab that produces plutonium pits since Rocky Flats shut down in 1989. The National Nuclear Security Administration has admitted that this critical component, the primary ("trigger"), can only be produced at LANL and without it, there can be no new nukes. Given the NNSA's wont to switch to Complex 2030 and the RRW paradigm, this is a watershed moment.
I agree that we should be protesting LLNL and LANL, but those labs are way off in the of nowhere for a reason - thousands of people won't fly out to New Mexico just to go to a protest.
You keep on repeating that protest is what conservatives would love, but you're missing the point 1) if research can't be held accountable by the lefties in power, i find nothing wrong with the right being used as a wedge to wake people up. the two-party politics of the US is so corroded, it requires boomeranging and playing 'sides' against each other 2) your demonizing polemics would give carte blanche approval to _any_ research as long as it not 'in the majority'.
I appreciate your input, but the entrenched position you're arguing from is unnecessarily criticizing good, productive action.
-ac
Andrew
February 16, 2007 at 10:13 a.m.
>Why color the entire institution with the actions of > a tiny minority?
With all due respect to agate, you make some excellent arguments, but this is not one of them. The purpose of the strike was to protest an unjust war and specifically to target the local involvement in the production of the means to wage that war. As members of the UCSB community (students, staff, and professors) we have no interest in condemning the "entire institution." It is exactly because of our support for institutions of higher education that we would care to bring attention to programs within it whose aims are ethically suspect.
Your comment about racial minorities is well taken. Not enough people understand how the rhetoric of racial equality is co-opted by the state to make use of the labor and service of minorities. The source of the social ill that we are unanimously against is militarism which we should resist in all its forms. So that will be taken on in different forms and arenas:
Racial studies scholars need to speak out against war and militarism (and many do) to make explicit that their efforts for social justice are not converted into "equal access" to the military war machine;
members of corporate institutions like the UC (and other military contractors like the ones agate mentions) need to speak and act out against elements within our communities that are furthering militarism such as military funding for weapons development and the development of "benign" technology that has potential military applications.
At least what public rallies like this can accomplish is the much needed media attention and give a public presence to dissent. The issues of institutional reform of a state university should be open to public debate and participating in rallies is one way to bring your voice to that debate.
Resist militarism.
Wage peace with every layer of your being.
Think critically about the justifications provided by the apparatus of state power.
Develop your own analysis of public/political issues.
Take responsibility for your own education!
clearwater
February 16, 2007 at 10:40 a.m.
If and when people get tired of waiting for justice from the formal grievance procedures of the University, the electoral system, their jobs, the courts, or their landlords they are faced with the choice of whether or not to act outside that formal grievance procedure. That is a subjective decision with heavy costs for those who no longer feel that they can afford to wait.
I wholeheartedly support the students at UCSB and all the other schools who withdrew their consent and obedience yesterday because we as a society have exhausted the formal grievance procedures that we are presented with for ending and preventing future slaughter of Iraqis, Afghanis, Iranians, and Palestinians and the destruction of habeas corpus and our hard won civil liberties by the Patriot Act. Petitions, writing letters to the editor, lobbying the UC regents, voting, and non-obstructive vigils and marches are the forms of communication with the state and its owners that we have been engaging in for the last 6 years.
In spite of this, the continuing trajectory of our society towards agressive militarism and domestic authoritarianism requires that we escalate our forms of communication to increasingly direct action to prevent the institutions that carry out the war and the destruction of lives domestically through exploitation and criminalization from functioning.
The means and ends will need to be decided and carried out by people who are fallible and human. Your community will need your critical thought and active participation since the outcome of the conflict between the state and the movements for justice will directly affect you.
Brian
February 16, 2007 at 11:12 a.m.
These bright people were beating on cars that tried to get through. At what point does damaging other peoples property justify a protest.
College students don't live in reality and that reality is reenforced by the liberal UCSB facult.
future of america
February 16, 2007 at 11:57 a.m.
No property was damaged that I am aware of; the vast majority of motorists showed support for us.
In response to the article, I would just like to point out that it is entirely untrue that UCSB is an "apathetic" campus. Before coming here I had no idea that it was so active because no one gives us credit for it, but I would argue that we are one of the most politically active UCs, if not the most (UCSC provides some good competition there). Berkeley's days of passionate activism have come and gone, and UCSB is an incredible bastion of activism these days. For the past several years we have registered the most new voters (almost 10,000 in 2006) and just look at all of the amazing students who continue to help the evicted tenants of Cedarwood in IV to this day.
I could go on and on, but please...don't call UCSB apathetic!!
sb student
February 16, 2007 at 1:23 p.m.
"future of america":
The reality is that we're at war and lives are being cut short. The college students who protested realize that reality, unlike many of their fellow students.
I don't believe anyone's personal property was damaged.
Zack
February 16, 2007 at 1:28 p.m.
Just a point I thought was funny: Some motorists were clearly supporting the protestors. Some, however, were just honking to try to get their car down the road. The protesting students responded to all honking cars with cheers. This amused me.
Mr.Peabody
February 16, 2007 at 2:04 p.m.
I was proud to be a UCSB student on Feb. 15th!!!
I think it's an outrage for anyone to criticize this antiwar protest despite the overwhelming evidence of inconsistencies, corruption, and negligence. For anyone who thinks that the simple objective of this war was to "liberate" Iraq from (admittedly oppressive dictator) Saddam, perhaps you should evaluate the historical trend of U.S. foreign policy from Hawaii, Philippines, Nicaragua, Haiti, Cuba, Grenada, Panama, Chile, Columbia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Iran (circa 1950), etc etc etc. We’ve toppled governments, even facilitated coup d’état. It’s important to question the motives of these operations and to use this historical knowledge to help form a coherent understanding of current affairs. The U.S. is a great country, one with tremendous potential for the common good. Unfortunately, recent history of the past few decades have been tainted with a ritual of American exceptionalism and one may bare the argument that the U.S. has rarely invested mass resources (comparable to that which is used to mobilize for war) for the benefit and prosperity of other nations if it is not in our explicit or implicit national interest. The Iraq war is an unjust war, and Afghanistan was a sideshow. What have we accomplished? I read somewhere that our current military [industrial complex] expenditures was being funded by future taxes. For us students, that’s us, and don’t quote me on this because my recollection of the specifics is a bit hazy, but I believe it was around $28,000 per person. Not to mention tuition increase. This war is local! For those who criticize the methods used to voice citizen opinion and concern over global affairs, I can see where your argument may lead. However, if you question the purpose or efficiency of Feb. 15th, 2007, the validity of your argument may seem feeble when posed with a simple question: what are YOU personally doing to voice your opinion on global affairs? These people who participated on Feb. 15th took civic responsibility into their own hands and physically mobilized. They resorted to vehicles of social change in the form of a protest when other conventional means have failed. I am personally appreciative for their leadership this past Thursday. What did this mobilization gain? A collective voice. Media coverage of UCSB dissent has also helped elicit an inspirational call for solidarity and discussions across the nation as other campuses have answered the call. It has announced the awakening of a conscious UCSB/I.V. collective. This is a stepping stone, and a large one. “...historical intervention is experienced as entailing some degree of self-sacrifice and risk.” War is barbaric and the majority of U.S. CONSTITUENTS have expressed this past election that we want representatives to embody and project our values and desires, as they should in democratic societies. It is time to “democratize history making itself.” If not today, when? The world can’t wait!
Quotations reference Richard Flacks’ Making History
Martin
February 17, 2007 at 3:34 a.m.
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