First, a mini-rant. Medical student Brian Levine sat on the GAC and helped design the company union proposal which he, Rodney Washington, and John Beckman are currently touting ad nauseam. Today, the WSN reports that Levine has been awarded a $50,000 fellowship from the University's new Catherine B. Reynolds program (named after the controversal philanthropofinancier who is NYU's newest trustee.) Does this strike anyone else as problematic?
Now on to the real post. Today marks the end of the sixth month of the strike. It's been a difficult, crazy year, occasionally amazing, occasionally ludicrous, like yesterday when none other than Geraldo Rivera walked by us while we were leafletting in midtown, refused a leaflet, and was too busy and/or famous to deign to talk to a bunch of lowly strikers. Dude, even Alec Baldwin at least had some quips for us. Look, Geraldo. We're news. We're newsworthy. Al Capone's secret vault? Not so much. Next time you see folks wearing picket signs, maybe you should talk to them. You might learn something.
Speaking of newsworthy, yesterday was the screening of Steve Fletcher's film I'm on strike because..., which is a 20-minute long documentary about the press strategy of the strike and well worth seeing both for the insights Susan, Mike P, and Steve provide, the interview with some of the nerds which explores an apparent rift between the 113 University Place orthodoxy and the subterranean branding campaign launched by incognito rogue sociologists, and all of the actual strike footage, of picket lines and rallies and storming the library and the 4.27 convention and civil disobedience, a powerful reminder of how long and hard this struggle has been and how hard we have fought and how much harder we will continue to fight as we move forward into the summer and beyond.
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