The Dawn of the Crisis Generation

March 4th is over, but we’ve only just begun.

“Why the hell did you get on that highway?” asked the cops, our cell mates, our coworkers, our classmates. There are many responses that could be given that have been outlined by banners, occupation demands, student leaders, or budget statistics, but none of them really connect to why one would take over a highway. Obviously there are no libraries on a highway. The funding for schools isn’t going to be found on any one of those lanes of oncoming traffic. And, in fact, a lot of people who were arrested on the highway were not students or teachers. This is because the highway takeover is an action against a power structure that is much larger than this year’s budget crisis.

That morning we awakened to newspaper headlines stating the governor’s support for sanctioned student protests. We weren’t the least bit impressed by this patronizing rhetoric. Our motivations for walking up that on ramp to 880 were far deeper and broader than some piddly demand for a return of the same: An education system that has for a long time been the bedrock to our highly divided class system in the United States. The myth that change will come to this society by poor people reaching middle class status through the university makes no sense; a school degree does not impact the condition of the neighborhoods and families we come from. It should also now be clear to everyone that ritualized demonstrations that fail to break out of the normal functioning of society represent nothing more than the further consolidation of state power. What fails to concretely disrupt the system ultimately strengthens it. We know that if we “win” funding from Governor Schwarzenegger this is no victory, but a diversion of funds from one group of already-struggling people to pacify another, without changing shit. For example, plans are in the works that will take money from the health care of prisoners in order to fatten university administrators’ pockets. We refuse to accept a shallow bribe that places “our” interests in competition with the interests of our potential comrades.

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