(Toronto – MockeryNewsNetwork) York University student activist Brian Xavier Fordham-Gilles surveyed the crowd gathered in Vari Hall and shared a smug look with his girlfriend Daphodyl. “I really think that this will get our message heard” he told me, “There’s nothing more evil in this world than Bush and his racist, pro-globalization junta!”. Pausing to take a sip of his Starbucks Venti Soy Chai Latte, and adjust his self-conciously hip Buddy Holly glasses, he continues “I can’t stomach this University’s support for the racist, corporatist regimes in Canada and the US! I mean, this school actually teaches MBA courses! Here, this pamphlet I had printed on Organic hemp paper explains our position.” He digs in the pocket of his Molson sweatshirt briefly and hands me the tract in question.
As Fordman-Gilles moves off to demand that the cooler of Coca-Cola be placed closer to the speaker’s podium, I begin reading his Manifesto:
“As students and members of the York community we aim to demonstrate our
opposition to the Bush Agenda and the US Empire in solidarity with people
around the world fighting for justice and dignity on this day, and also
highlight local institutional complicity in global oppression and war.
The empire is not just bombs and check-points, it is also tied to the
day-to-day exploitation and oppression of women, Indigenous people, people
of colour, workers, and the earth. Whenever we speak out against
oppression, we are silenced with disciplinary action and smear campaigns.
We therefore condemn York University for its continued attacks on dissent
and free speech on campus, and for its ties to war, occupation and
oppression around the world.”
I ponder this while watching a young man in a Bananna Republic sweater attempt to fasten a Workers World Party sign to the wall with a Black & Decker staple gun. Could York really be the bastion of corpratist oppression? Could one of Canada’s largest Universities be a hotbed of sexism and rigid gender roles? I decided to I needed to talk to more students to find out.
Arturo Velasques – “Gitmo” to his friends, due to his Cuban heritage – wears his identity proudly on his sleve. “I’m very proud of my Hispanic, African-American and Cree heritage.” he says, continuing, “What right does a Board of Governors made up of fat, White autocrats have to dictate the curriculum of the Ethnic Studies department? Obviously these White men are going to try to indoctrinate us with their Euro-Centric view of race and history, and I’m against racism in all it’s forms!”
“Yeah!” chimes in Melody Princeton, stamping her Doctor Martin’s workboot, the act making the chain running from her nosering to her ear shake. “How can a bunch of men tell the Womens Studies department what to do! They can’t know the pain of living in a Male-Dominated oligarchy like Canada!” I joke that I haven’t noticed a lot of Male-Dominated oligarchy in Toronto lately. “Then you’re blind!“, she explodes “Even here at what’s suposed to be a place of academic freedom where we’re all free to explore worldviews not inimical to our own I’m required to take Buissness 101 to graduate! I mean, the professor is a man! And the boys in the class laughed at me when I tried to explain how the Laffler curve obviously represents a breast and is a sign of the oppression and objectification of Womyn in our society!” She breathes heavily as she tries to disentangle her green and pink hair from one of her eyebrow piercings. “It’s like rape!” she exclaims as she strides off to harrangue the whey-faced lad in Vietnam-era fatigues who has started selling SmartDogs from Vari Hall’s snackbar.
As I move past the table where the Reactionary Canadian Workers People’s Revolutionary Party is selling copies of their book “Canadian Gulag: How Non-Collectivist Economic Policies Enslave The Canadian Worker” (Random House, 2000. $19.95 US, $34.70CDN) and Das Kapital, I spy Wallace Endicott III, Dean of the Aborigional Studies Department.
“Call me Laughing Wolf.” He says, tossing a stray lock of his long, blonde hair from his face, “I haven’t gone by Endicott since I rejoined my Tribe.”
A tall, fair-skinned man with an easy-going manner, he laughs engagingly as he tightens his arm around his companion, 19 year old Brittney White, a chiropodist’s daughter from St. Johns and a major in Interperative dance Studies here at York. Laughing Wolf fixes me with his intense blue eyes as he says “I’m just trying to educate the masses about the plight of my people and the Oppressive Government System that employs me twenty hours a week.” Laughing Wolf is a very intense person, you can hear the capital letters in every declamitory sentence. He tightens his grip on Ms. White still further, his long fingered hand idly playing with the breast of her macrame halter. “When the White Devil came to this continent my People were living a simple, contented life. I think we, as Human Beings, need to go back to that. I realized this long ago, after I was fired from my middle management position at the CBC, we need to take back the Bounty Of Gaia for our own and live in harmony with Brother Raven and Brother Coyote.”
He pauses momentarily to address Ms. White, “Toots, go get me a couple of those SmartDogs and a Coke, wouldja? It looks like the Anarchist Workers Colectivist Party is trying to shut Jerry down again”. As Ms. White turns to go he delivers a resounding smack on her pert dancer’s butt. “Man!, I basically agree with the AWCP, but it gets annoying when they shut Jerry down every time, makes it hard to get a hot dog. Where was I? Oh, yes. I think we as a species need to go back to a simpler time of having the squaws gather acorns and grow corn while we braves hunt Brother Buffalo. After all, you can’t very well be racist when you might even have to depend on a white guy to bring down dinner!”
The Hall is starting to fill up with more people and a miasma of anger, patchoulli, and halitosis. Through the front windows I can see the gathering stormtroopers of the Fascist university regime. I wander slowly through the throng, lost in thought. How can a University Board made up of Rich White Males “educate” an Afro-Cuban-Indian anti-racialist, or understand a radical Feminist working to rid society of sexism, aggressive male streotypes and rigid gender roles? How can they comprehend the simple nobility of a First Nation Brave like Laughing Wolf? As I walk past a Gay Studies activist holding a “No Straights!” sign from the Alternate Gender Tolerance Campaign it hits me. I, too am tired of having the terms of my life dictated by McDonalds. I, too, am tired of being oppressed for my estimated one-sixtyfourth Cherrokee blood.
I, too, have found my Tribe.
As the first clouds of the Man’s tear gas hit the front of the crowd and the Pigs are bombarded with small rocks and empty coke bottles, I join my people.
David Epstein is a former MNN intern currently majoring in Doctrinaire Communism with minors in Political Science and International Studies. He plans to run for Parliment.
