Od/Ed
There’s nothing funny about anarchy, civilian deaths and domestic terrorism
By AJ Piwarun
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In a February 11th Op/Ed, JJ Burseth gave his opinion of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee student government, the Student Association, by renaming it the “Student Aristocracy”. In an Op/Ed published the next week, he compared the Student Association to Nazis. While Mr. Burseth can resort to name calling and personal attacks all he wants (it’s a free country), he is naïve to think students and faculty alike will conform to his definition of a “leader”.
Mr. Burseth is president of the Students for a Democratic Society at UWM. It’s the college branch of the Weathermen Underground, founded by Mark Rudd, mastermind of the violent uprising at Columbia University in 1969, and heralded by William Ayers, who bombed the U.S. Capital building in Washington, D.C. So I would like to ask Mr. Burseth and members of SDS what’s so funny about anarchy, civilian deaths and domestic terrorism?
The editorial in question, “What’s so funny about peace, love and underfunding?” addressed the recent cut in funding to the Women’s Resource Center, the LGBT Center, and LINKS. In case the rest of the UWM student body is as ignorant to their tuition statement as Mr. Burseth is, tuition is at its highest point in UWM history.
So how does the UWM “Student Aristocracy” defend such claims of draconian cuts and insensitivity to diversity? Well, to be quite honest, we’ll just use a little something called common sense.
The LINKS center was found ineligible for student tuition money because it’s a duplicate service. LINKS is an offshoot of both the First Year Center and all 4 of the multicultural resource centers located in Bolton Hall. Why should students cough up their hard earned money to support a duplicate service?
The LGBT Center was cut because they were going to hire an assistant director with student money. The cut in funding went from $2.80 per student to $2.55 per student. In reality, that will NOT make or break the center. They should use the Center for Volunteerism and Student Leadership model and employ more students if they need help.
The Women’s Resource Center, taking in an astounding $4.60 per student last year, was decreased to $3.00 per student. In the opinion of the Student Association, every UWM student should NOT be forced to pay for assistant directors.
The University Administration has what’s called a private “101” account that it uses to pay other directors. By cutting the assistant director of the WRC, the Student Association put the ball in the court of Chancellor Santiago. If the position is needed, like the center claims, then the University will use its private account to pay for it. This position can easily be filled by adding more student workers - something that we would consider vital to an organization’s infrastructure.
The ideology of the current student government, SUFC, is relatively simple. We believe students should not be taxed out of higher education. We implemented our plan to ensure students should not be unfairly taxed under the auspices of segregated fees, which is the UW System’s socialized institute of tuition taxes.
We held true to our belief that our student government should be limited in size. We reduced the size of our own government by freezing the line item budgets of executive branch staff that were deemed unproductive. Finally, we held to our promise of getting back parking appeals, to fight the anti-student Residential Preferred Parking legislation.
With all the facts presented, Mr. Burseth, I would like to ask you to define leadership. Do you define it as the founder of a domestic terrorist organization, or the elected students that accomplished something this year that student governments have failed to do in the past: save students money?
> Comments
RS on Mar 03, 2008 at 05:58 AM:
A.J. is right. Between Bolton Hall and the Union there is a combination of eight resource centers that are paid for by students in some way shape or form. Many of the services offered by the WRC are also available at the Norris Health Center. If not there, perhaps one could visit a site off campus. It would not be the end of the world!!
It is not the responsibility of students to pay for duplicate services or multiple resource centers. I am not saying that diversity centers (such as the LBGT Center, WRC, or CVSL) should not exist; I just think one or two would be fine. Go to Bolton, the Union and then go though the campus and start counting. When do students get a break??? How many resource centers do we really need??? WRC, CVSL, LINKS LBGT, TARK, the Multicultural Student Lounge, the First Year Center, The Peer Mentoring center, the African American student center, the Renaldo Hernandez student center. And UWM does not value diversity?????? Give me a break!
I know that the current leadership in SA does value diversity. They also value not taxing those most unable to pay out of school. They have made difficult decisions. They are not nazis. A.J., you and your cohorts have done a fine job. The decisions you have made clearly reflect the views of the silent and reasonable MAJORTY of students who elected you, NOT THOSE of the very loud MINORITY who want to toss money at multiple resource centers many of which do the same thing, up until the point that there is no money left to spend, all in the name of diversity. When you ask them how much is enough? The answer is “there will never be enough.” Perhaps the motto of these left wing extremists should be "no dollar left behind."
Leave the students to focus on the most important part of their university experience: ACIDEMICS! Most students just want to make it through school without huge amounts of debt. THANKS FOR A JOB WELL DONE SA!!
AJ Piwarun is a blatant liar. on Mar 03, 2008 at 08:41 AM:
A.J. -
Jay is not the "President" of SDS. SDS is non-hierarchical and democratic; there are no bosses or presidents. I know that that must be hard for you to comprehend.
Also, the Weather Underground disbanded 30 years ago. SDS has nothing to do with the tactics of that organization, which did include the destruction of property.
Civilian deaths? What the hell are you talking about? SDS is opposed to the murder of civilians, which is why the group is against the current occupation of Iraq. If anyone views civilian deaths flippantly, that person is you.
The only violence in the Columbia strike was violence by police against students.
You are a hypocrite and a blatant liar.
Only weeks ago, you were crying foul about out of context information (threatening the newspaper with a lawsuit and endorsing the SA's clearly illegal Sedition Act). Now you are the one printing lies.
Also, your idea of "common sense" is going to cost you the next election. Surveys on campus in December showed that virtually all students knew about and were opposed to the resource center cuts being forced through by the SA.
Johanan Raatz on Mar 03, 2008 at 10:23 AM:
"Jay is not the "President" of SDS."
Oh really?
"Organization: Students for a Democratic Society
Classification: Social Action
Campus Mail: Union Box 232
Campus Office: Union 394 Contact: Jonathan Burseth, (262) 352-6944, jburseth@uwm.edu
E-Mail: jburseth@uwm.edu
Purpose: SDS is a national multi-issue organization based around opposing imperialism, racism, sexism, homophobia, and other injustices and oppressions within our society.
Activities: Our activities include hosting speakers, showing movies, and taking various actions." http://www.uwm.edu/UWM/Student/Org/list-classification.html#soc
I wonder what the SDS student org application papers said then.
"SDS is non-hierarchical and democratic;"
A pure democracy without overarching rules and therefore someone to execute them is a contradiction in terms. Democracy requires interaction between members, but that interaction needs something to mediate it which is inherently heirarchical in nature.
If you don't have a just mediating system that is not open to the democractic process the interactions between the people in the system are therefore undemocractic in nature because their are no rules to define what the majority can and can not do to the minority.
This by the way is why our country is a democratic republic and not a pure democracy. The former is superior to the latter because it has the structure required to prevent the pure form of democracy from collapsing from its own contradictory lack of structure.
Ed on Mar 03, 2008 at 10:53 AM:
Frankly hippies and fascists deserve each other.
Johanan Raatz on Mar 03, 2008 at 12:33 PM:
I just realized that I am a dip. The SDS application papers don't say anything about formal officers, such as President or Treasurer, other than what is required by Wisconsin State Law and SA policy.
Johanan (the real one) on Mar 03, 2008 at 04:40 PM:
"I just realized that I am a dip. The SDS application papers don't say anything about formal officers, such as President or Treasurer, other than what is required by Wisconsin State Law and SA policy."
Look what I am saying is that to fill paper work to start a student org you need to list at least 4 officers on the paper. If they are officers they are by definition leaders in the organization.
Now who are you? Why don't you post under your real name and instead of hiding you views and comments under others names.
Mr. Burseth himself on Mar 03, 2008 at 04:47 PM:
Mr. Piwarun,
two things:
1) I specifically asked that you not call me JJ.
2) I am not the president of SDS. there is no such thing.
AJ and JJ on Mar 03, 2008 at 08:59 PM:
JJ and AJ need to get over themselves because neither seems very special
"Survey Says" on Mar 05, 2008 at 10:50 AM:
"Surveys on campus in December showed that virtually all students knew about and were opposed to the resource center cuts being forced through by the SA."
that's the biggest lie I've ever seen. like, it's truly laughable... how many student voted in the election? Did you survey all of them? How much BS did you feel them to inflame the responses?
the extreme is not mainstream. get over it. your BS agenda and lying to students sure aren't going to get you elected. it's what keeps people like AJ and the rest of SUFC in office.
Let's play fast money. on Mar 05, 2008 at 01:08 PM:
"How much BS did you feel them..."
Great proof-reading job, Ray Combs.
And you're wrong. The survey happened, and the questions were not preceded by biased prompting. The fact that people don't vote does not mean that they do not know what is going on.
"BS agenda and lying to students sure aren't going to get you elected. it's what keeps people like AJ and the rest of SUFC in office."
EXACTLY. A BS agenda and lying to students are exactly what keeps AJ and the rest of SUFC in office.
SFBS? aka the UWM Post on Mar 07, 2008 at 09:01 AM:
"The fact that people don't vote does not mean that they do not know what is going on."
Ah yes, from our highly reliable news source, the UWM Post. We've seen how accurate they can be.
When you manufacture documents to make front page news stories just to smear someone's reputation that you don't like... how is that objective or truthful.
I guess you're right! The Post's BS Agenda and lyging to students ARE exactly what keep AJ & co. in office; the students are sick of seeing reputations of hardworking people mauled by organizations like the university press.