Victorious Students Unleashed (VSU) rally - Next Stop: May Day rally contingent! : Melbourne Indymedia

http://sydney.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=54808&group=webcast

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http://www.theage.com.au/news/National/Students-on-the-streets/2005/04/28/1114635689914.html?oneclick=true

10,000 join rallies over uni fee ban

By David Rood, Higher education reporter - April 29, 2005

[ PHOTO: "(Ending compulsory fees) is about the gutting of student life on campus." REBECCA BARRIGOS, union official ]

More than 10,000 students rallied around the nation yesterday as part of a campaign opposing the Federal Government's controversial move to scrap compulsory student union fees.

In Melbourne, a crowd of up to 5000 university students stretched over three city blocks as they snaked their way from the State Library down Swanston Street and around to the Treasury Gardens.

The Federal Government introduced a bill last month to abolish mandatory fees from next year. Compulsory fees, which cost up to $500 a year at Victorian universities, are used for student services, including sporting facilities, welfare and child care.

Under the changes, universities face multimillion-dollar fines if they impose compulsory union fees.

National Union of Students education officer Rebecca Barrigos said the large protest showed that students were clearly opposed to voluntary fees. She said voluntary unionism would devastate students' ability to organise and defend their interests.

"(It) is about the gutting of student life on campus," Ms Barrigos said. "It's about removing all the student culture and community that makes university a good place for students . . . and also all the support services and welfare services that make for students (being) able to receive a quality education."

Federal Opposition education spokeswoman Jenny Macklin told the Sydney rally that Labor would oppose the bill in Parliament and on campuses.

"Students could simply not afford to pay for services such as child care, health care, food, entertainment, sporting clubs, accommodation advice and counselling, which were subsidised from union fees," she said. "Let's face it, how many people would voluntarily pay their taxes if they didn't have to?"

Education Minister Brendan Nelson has argued that students can continue to pay for services if they wish to but the choice should be theirs. The bill is expected to be passed after the Government assumes control of the Senate on July 1.

A fiery verbal exchange broke out between the protesters and a dozen Liberal students who gatecrashed the rally outside the Victorian Parliament yesterday.

Addressing the largest student rally of recent years, National Tertiary Education Union general secretary Grahame McCulloch, said student organisation was a fundamental part of university life.

Union fees made a contribution in cultural, sporting and social spheres as well as providing a comprehensive range of services, he said.

"No universities worth the name can exist without that."

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http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117,15118660-421,00.html

Students march to defend unions

By Brendan O'Keefe and Louise Perry - April 29, 2005

THOUSANDS of university students downed books yesterday to join protests against voluntary student unionism legislation, which they say will kill campus life.

About 5000 students from Sydney's five universities and Wollongong University gathered at the University of Sydney, where they heard Deputy Opposition Leader Jenny Macklin call on government ministers to pay retrospectively for services they had used when they were students.
About 5000 marched in Melbourne, 1200 rallied in Brisbane and hundreds turned out in other capitals.

Ms Macklin said if the Howard Government's voluntary student unions system applied when Treasurer Peter Costello was at Monash University in the late 1970s, he would owe $4933.33 for his involvement in the university's AFL club.

"It's time that Peter Costello coughed up," she said.

Health Minister Tony Abbott would owe Sydney University $5376 and Workplace Relations Minister Kevin Andrews owed Melbourne University $5054.55, Ms Macklin said.

Sydney University academic board chairman John Carter told students they had the institution's support.

"The university is behind you on this one; from the senate down, the academic board and the vast majority of my colleagues," he said.

"I haven't seen so many people on the front lawn since the Vietnam days and it says a great deal when there's so many of you here protesting in favour of a tax."

Sydney's Students Representative Council president Rose Jackson called on the Government to allow a national student vote on VSU.

"If the Government is serious about student choice, it will give us an on-campus referendum," Ms Jackson said.

Ms Macklin said Labor would support the students all the way.

"The Howard Government wants to get rid of you, but keep strong, we'll be there with you in order to beat this legislation," she said.

At the Melbourne rally, Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union Victorian secretary Martin Kingham pledged the Victorian union movement's support for the students.

"This Federal Government is hellbent on destroying any form of collective community power," he told the protesters.

Mr Nelson introduced the VSU bill last month.

Students say the legislation, which is sure to be enacted after the Coalition gains control of the Senate on July 1, would strip $161 million from campus organisations, which provide subsidised services such as childcare, food and sports facilities.

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http://www.abc.net.au/news/items/200504/1355984.htm?midnorthcoast

Students rally against end to compulsory union fees

Friday, 29 April 2005

Hundreds of students from Southern Cross University (SCU) staged protests yesterday against the Federal Government's plans to end compulsory student union fees.

Students from Lismore, Coffs Harbour and Tweed Heads' campuses were involved in the protests, which they claim will slash university services and jobs.

SCU Lismore union organiser Steven Senise has called on the Federal Member for Page, Ian Causley, to support their calls to stop the voluntary student unionism (VSU) legislation.

"We want Ian Causley to stick by his constituents and say that this Bill is bad for Lismore," he said.

"That this bill will rip $2.5 million out of the Lismore economy, that it will destroy 150 jobs in Lismore."

Mr Causley says he cannot stop Government plans to end compulsory student union fees.

He says he supports the Bill but believes special financial arrangements should be made for regional universities.

"Well two things I suppose, firstly I'd be asking for the fact that the legislation allows the university to charge fees to people who may not join the union but may want to use some of the services, that would be one position," he said.

"If, in fact, there was proven to be a shortfall which made it difficult for regional universities then I would argue that we need to have a close look at supporting some of those areas.

"The area that we can debate and I can represent them is in the area where this Bill... doesn't allow the university to charge fees.

"I think that can be debated and maybe able to be amended, and the area where maybe the Government needs to have a closer look at regional universities as to some financial support for them because they have a lower number of students attending those universities."

Mr Senise says Mr Causley should be fighting to save jobs and services.

"We want Ian Causley to stand by his constituents and the institutions of Lismore and this region and do the right thing by this region and do what he's supposed to be doing which is representing Lismore and the electorate of Page rather than coming to Page and representing the agenda of Canberra," he said.

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http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=49304

Students reject union changes

AAP

Up to 300 people have marched through Perth streets, protesting against federal plans to axe compulsory student unionism at universities.

National Union of Students WA branch president Susie Byers said the federal government needed to take notice of students who rallied around the nation on Thursday in opposition to a plan she said could spell the end for cheap campus services such as childcare and health care.

"Students will walk out of classes and hit the streets and defend our student organisations," Ms Byers said.

"Students believe that the services that they are provided, like childcare and independent representation, are essential and it is fair that everybody who benefits from these services should contribute a small amount to them.

"We are trying to tell the federal government that the impacts of this legislation are going to be so huge that they should really just leave student organisations alone."

WA Education and Training Minister Ljiljanna Ravlich said she too opposed the federal government's planned changes.

"Within a university environment there are a range of services that need to be offered. I would hate to see those services not being offered," she said.

"I don't think it is in students' interests to not have a range of services that support their educational outcomes."

Ms Byers said WA had previous experience with a form of voluntary student unionism and it resulted in 75 job losses and cuts to services, including the closure of a sexual assault referral service.

"I think they think students are on their side on this issue and we are here today to tell them we are not," she said.

Ms Byers said this was the beginning of the student campaign against the proposed end to compulsory unionism, with a community education campaign next on the agenda.

The protesters rallied in Solidarity Park, opposite WA parliament, before walking through city streets to the state headquarters of the Liberal Party.

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http://www.theadvertiser.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,15120703%255E911,00.html

Politics claim as students march to save unions
By Political Reporter BRONWYN HURRELL in Canberra
29apr05
SOUTH Australian university students yesterday defended funding anti-Coalition election material as a "survival strategy", as students around the country protested against federal legislation to ban compulsory student union fees.

The Government argues compulsory student unionism forces students to pay for services they do not need â?? including anti-Coalition election campaigns.

Student unions say essential services such as on-campus child care and employment services, as well as thousands of jobs, will be lost under voluntary student unionism (VSU).

Students took their protest to the steps of Parliament yesterday.

"VSU will turn universities into little more than harsh, unsupportive degree factories, where all you do is get a piece of paper," University of Adelaide students association president David Pearson said.

Flinders University students association general secretary Jacqui Forte said students had to "fight for the survival" of services.

National Union of Students state president Finn McCarthy-Adams said the services provided by student organisations were an integral part of the university community. "University is a life experience, not just getting a degree,' he said.

Federal Liberal MP Andrew Southcott brandished documents yesterday showing Flinders University's student union funded anti-Coalition campaigns during the last election.

Union board minutes from June last year showed a resolution to use projects funds to contribute $8000 to a cross-campus campaign urging students to preference the Coalition last. The document urged this "to secure the future of student organisations".

Dr Southcott said political mail-outs should "hardly (be) their core business". "They're saying it's all about sport and clubs but, as we know, a lot of money is going on activities like this (anti-Coalition campaign)," he said.

Dr Southcott admitted he was "pretty involved in running campaigns for the union board" as an Adelaide University undergraduate himself.

But he said the composition of the student body had "changed dramatically" and many part-time, external and mature-aged students had no need for some union services.

"Normally, students protest against paying fees, today they're protesting for the right to be forced to pay fees," he said.

Flinders University students association president Aaron Jackson defended the funding, saying the money went "not (to) a political campaign as such".

"The money didn't go to any particular party," he said.

"I'd see it as more of a survival strategy â?? an awareness campaign based around our own survival."

In Adelaide, the national day of action focused on highlighting university culture with a concert and other social activities.

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http://bathurst.yourguide.com.au/detail.asp?class=news&subclass=local&category=general%20news&story_id=389690&y=2005&m=4

Federal government

By Peter Veness - Thursday, 28 April 2005

BATHURST jobs will be lost if the Federal Government succeeds in pushing through voluntary student unionism.

This frank message came from Charles Sturt University Student Association Bathurst general manager Shane Manners yesterday.

"We anticipate we will get some small amount of money from voluntary contributions (but) we have to plan for the worst and hope for the best," Mr Manners said.

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http://www.abc.net.au/news/items/200504/1355646.htm?tasmania

Vice Chancellor speaks out in support of student unions

Thursday, 28 April 2005

The Vice Chancellor of the University of Tasmania, Daryl Le Grew, says the Federal Government's plans to make student unionism voluntary are a waste of time.

Professor Le Grew says the lack of federal funding for universities should be a higher priority.

The Vice Chancellor this afternoon addressed an anti-VSU rally at the university's Hobart campus.

He says the Government does not understand the way student unions operate.

"The assumption that student associations are politically active every day of the week is just nonsense.

"I mean, we have tremendous relationships here with the student associations, they advocate for students, of course they do, why shouldn't they? It's part of being in a community."

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http://news.google.com.au/news?hl=en&ned=au&q=voluntary+student+unionism

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http://sydney.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=54808&group=webcast

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What the hell do the red fascists have to do with student unions? It is a real shame that the bastards have, once again, attached themselves to a cause that they will most likely use to further their own intrests rather than actually, you know, work for the greater good and the prevention of VSU being enacted. Pah!

now, what evidence justifies your insults? which fascists are you talking about? the biggest radical newspaper out there, giving their photos for indymedia? oh, how terrible ... why don't you just get an education about fascism, activism, marxism, and also: get a life!

Green Left Weakly mostly uninvolved in anti VSU activism, mostly building for the Cuba Venuzuala meeting in complete competition with stopping VSU activity. Which sect worst hough was Socialist Alternative.

Green Left Weakly mostly uninvolved in anti VSU activism, mostly building for the Cuba Venuzuala meeting in complete competition with stopping VSU activity. worst sect was Socialist Alternative of course!.

Green Left Weakly mostly uninvolved in anti VSU activism, mostly building for the Cuba Venuzuala meeting in complete competition with anti VSU activity. worst sect was Socialist Alternative of course!.

This attempt to mix socialists with fascists is very annoying and very dangerous.

It is an insult to anarchists, socialists, communists and all our struggles, and it can make people think fascists are to be treated just like other political groups.

Fascists are war criminals and racist murderers.

No space to fascists.
No free speech to racists.
United front against nazis, fascists and racists everywhere.

Please, children. Be quiet or I will send you to your rooms.

I suggest a secret ballot amongst all Australian university students to gauge the level of support for or opposition to the Government's policy on compulsory union fees.

No doubt student union officials would endorse such a proposal.

Not.

From the current Green Left Weekly that supported the students as actively as you can as a newspaper:

No VSU! Students won't be silenced

by Zoe Kenny

This year the federal government is moving ahead with its anti-student union legislation, euphemistically referred to as “voluntary student unionism”. VSU is designed to eliminate the funding base for university student unions, as well as getting rid of “universal student unionism” — which will drastically reduce membership of student unions. This is a blatant attempt to destroy the organisations that students have and to weaken students' ability to defend their rights as students.

This is not the first time that an attempt has been made to introduce VSU. Ever since left-wing university students began to lead the campaign against Australian involvement in the Vietnam War and in the process won more leading positions in student unions, there have been numerous attempts by the Liberals to destroy student unions.

In the mid 1990s, Coalition state governments in Victoria and Western Australia introduced VSU legislation, albeit in different forms, with the WA version being much more destructive. The Howard Coalition government is attempting to push through a version of VSU which is based on the WA version. This only allows universities to collect fees for academic purposes, bans compulsory fees for student associations and allows the government to charge universities huge fines if they don't follow the new regulations.

It's clear that the federal government has decided that the Victorian version of VSU — which allowed student unions to provide services, but tried to prevent them from running political campaigns — did not go far enough and have gone for the WA “scorched earth” version.

The introduction of the WA model of VSU into federal parliament has given the more conservative sections of the leadership of the anti-VSU campaign — headed by Labor Party students — the fuel they need to avoid a political campaign — they are mainly focusing on the provision of campus services as being the key thing at stake.

While it's true that this model is going to have a detrimental effect on student services, and this is going to make life even harder for disadvantaged students, we should make sure that the campaign against VSU does not simply become one to save student services and not deal with the issue of the right to run political campaigns.

One of the dangers of this line of argument is that if the VSU legislation is watered down, which happened before in Victoria, and universities are still allowed to levy a fee for services, then the anti-VSU campaign could be demobilised, with its “protect services” wing claiming the campaign has “won” — even though elected student representatives will have lost control over the fees charged to students. Such a scenario is looking more likely.

John Mullarvey, the chief executive of the Australian Council of Vice-Chancellors, told the April 21 Australian that the board believes the way forward is to lobby the government to allow universities to have a “compulsory services and amenities fee”. The suggested compulsory service fee would cover sports clubs, international student services, and child care, dental, welfare, computer, and photocopy facilities.

The government's attack on student's rights cannot be separated from its broader attack on higher education. VSU is a key part of federal education minister Brendan Nelson's higher education “reform” package — a series of measures that constitute a massive attack on publicly funded university education.

Ultimately these changes are aimed at creating a fully privatised higher education system. University education, which should be a fundamental right for all people, will once again become the exclusive privilege of the wealthy.

The government knows it will be easier to implement its privatisation plans if student opposition can be demobilised. VSU is aimed at weakening the ability of students to wage campaigns against the Nelson “reforms”.

VSU is also a part of a broader attack on the rights of working people in general. At the same time that students' rights are being attacked, the Howard government is also attacking the rights of Iraqi people who are suffering under a brutal US-led occupation which Australian troops are backing. The government is attacking the rights of asylum seekers. It is preparing to attack workers' rights to organise and defend themselves against employers.

VSU is also about weakening students' ability to conduct campaigns in solidarity with other sections of the population who are resisting the Howard government's agenda.

The socialist youth organisation Resistance advocates that the anti-VSU campaign highlights this through its demands and slogans — for example, by calling for “Money for education, not war!”.

The anti-VSU campaign also needs to link up with the National Tertiary Education Union, which is fighting its own battle against the government's attacks on higher education.

[Zoe Kenny is the national coordinator of Resistance.]

From Green Left Weekly, April 27, 2005.
Visit the Green Left Weekly home page @ http://www.GreenLeft.org.au/

Send a letter to the editor: GLW@greenleft.org.au
Join the Green Left discussion list @ http://groups.yahoo.com/group/GreenLeft_discussion/

Australia needs real democracy. Including a media landscape that deserves that name, not this incredible duopoly that is the basis for the oligarchic First-Past-the-Post joke they call democratic voting system ...

The socialist youth organisation Resistance advocates that the anti-VSU campaign highlights this through its demands and slogans — for example, by calling for “Money for education, not war!”.

Should read "undemocratic bastardistation of socialism into something hitleresque" rather than "socialist," also that resistance has nothing to do with most of the slogans used, also that this entire article is full of other errors of a similar kind. Remember comrades: Resistance is Futile!

who is this embarrassing sophie? get an education, yeah right. you must be a black fascist, eh? (fascist obviously meaning nothing at all.) "resistance is futile" eh? pull your head out of your arse, sophascist ...

What a smorgasboard of samples for the avid collector such as I!

A veritable 'who's who' of imbecilia, the poorer only for the absence of pr. Oh if only pr were within this thread - a full set would have been lovely!

In some of the biggest university student demonstrations seen during the last decade, thousands of students downed pens and poured into the streets on April 28 to protest the federal government’s attacks on student unions. Called by the National Union of Students (NUS), rallies were held across the country to opposed Coalition plans to introduce so-called voluntary student unionism (VSU).

Aimed at silencing some of the most vocal critics of the Coalition government, the proposed VSU bill will weaken student unions ability to defend students’ rights; and to provide the many services they currently do, such as childcare and subsidised accommodation. When the VSU legislation was introduced into parliament on March 16, it was met with demonstrations of hundreds across the country.

Jenna McConnochie, an organiser of the April 27 Wollongong protest, told GLW that “in a social and political climate of selfish individualism and greed, the government wants to smash the experience of collectivism, of community, of having a strong collective voice. They want to nip in the bud the experience, ideology and training ground for unionism and activism that student associations provide.

“The loss of student unions is just one more attack on higher education, with the overall aim of dehumanising, privatising and deregulating universities. Removing student associations, the primary vocal opponents to these attacks, paves the way for the unchallenged and systematic McDonaldisation of universities.”

The April 28 protests signalled a step forward in the campaign. An estimated 13,000 students mobilised across the country. University of Technology, Sydney Student Representative Council president Michelle Sparks told Green Left Weekly: “[This fight] is not just about sausage rolls and sports, it’s about the democratic rights of students to collectively organise against government policy.”

She added, “The rally marks a really positive start to the campaign in which we will defeat VSU.”

McConnochie agreed: “The change in campus life in just the last two weeks, from apathy to action, gives me hope that students are prepared to fight this legislation and that we can and will win.”

Zoe Kenny reports that around 3000 students gathered at Sydney University on the day, the biggest single-campus mobilisation in the country. SRC president Rose Jackson pointed out that: “if the government was serious about choice, it will give us an on-campus referendum.”

The protesters marched into the city offices of the Department of Education, Science and Training, where they met up with another 1500 students from the four other Sydney campuses, and Wollongong university. Outside DEST, Lee Rhiannon from the Greens spoke about how the VSU legislation was part of a broader attack on unions by the Coalition government.

Speaking at the festival at the end of the day, deputy Labor leader Jenny Macklin argued that the Coalition members who are pushing for VSU and a user-pays university system, and who received a free education should pay back what they owe for their degrees.

In Melbourne, Edward Ashcroft reports that 5000 students converged in the city, including 250 students who traveled by bus in from each of Latrobe University and Monash University.

Students from a wide range of organisations including art, music and theatre clubs participated, highlighting the effect the legislation would have on campus life.

Jon Piccini reports that 1500 angry students marched through the streets of Brisbane. Speakers ranged from the president of International Students Association to a speaker from the University of Queensland Lego Club — targeted by education minister Brendan Nelson in parliament. The message was a united acknowledgment that VSU threatens all clubs, university life and campus culture.

At an open speakout outside the offices of Liberal senators, Stella Riethmuller from the socialist youth organisation Resistance and an activist on Queensland College of Arts, called for students “to join May Day to show solidarity with unions under attack from the Coalition government’s industrial relations reform plan”.

At a speakout earlier that day on University of Queensland, Jonathan Hames, the Queensland president of the National Union of Students argued “VSU is nothing but revenge on student organisations for our opposition to the Howard government’s policies regarding increasing university fees”.

A large crowd of University of Western Australia students gathered to hear representatives from clubs on campus such as Resistance, Queer Collective, UWA Labour and UWA Greens before joining the main rally in Perth, reports Thad Bochat.

UWA Vice-Chancellor Alan Robson stressed that despite other differences, it was important for students and the administration to unite against this regressive legislation. UWA students joined others in the city, with 200 students marching to the doors of Liberal Party headquarters at Menzies House, chanting “come out, come out, tell us what you’re about”.

In Adelaide, Sam King reported that more than 250 students marched from the University of Adelaide to Parliament House. The march — called only a few days before it took place — heard from Senator Natasha Stott-Despoja, and ALP parliamentarian Kate Ellis.

President of the Students Association of the University of Adelaide (SAUA) Dave Pearson questioned the federal government’s right to abolish compulsory student unionism when it was wasting its own compulsory tax revenues to wage war in Iraq.

The march and rally was organised as one component of a day-long “Make Some Noise” event designed to demonstrate popular support for universal student unionism. “Make Some Noise” involved speakers, bands, comedians, campus clubs and circulation of pro-student unionism materials.

Chanting “hell no, we won’t go, hell yes, democracy’s best”, 250 Southern Cross University students, staff and supporters marched through Lismore, reports Nick Fredman. Speakers included representative from the SCU Student Representative Council, University Union and Law Society, and the unions on campus who pointing out that more than 150 local jobs were at stake.

Afterwards, participants rallied at federal National Party MP Ian Causley’s office, where Causley told the crowd that he would “take your concerns to Canberra” and that “maybe the legislation can be tinkered with around the edges”.

In Canberra, Amy McDonell reported that more than 200 students from the Australian National University took part in National Day of Action. Students wearing black armbands to mark the death of student services under VSU gathered around a makeshift cemetery to hear speakers at an on-campus rally before marching into the city.

More than 300 students chanted “VSU is not a choice, give students back their voice” when they joined the rally and march at Wollongong University the day before the national protests, reports Grant Coleman. In the lead-up the protest the Education Action Collective had distributed 100 “Stop VSU” t-shirts (in only one hour), covered the campus in posters and stickers and had spoken to students about VSU at most lectures that week.

Rallies were held in other cities with 350 protesting in Armidale, 300 in Gippsland, and 150 in Wodonga.

The increased attendance by trade unionists (in comparison to previous rallies), combined with plans by many student groups to participate in May Day protests, indicated that there have been steps forward in building a united front against PM John Howard’s attacks on everybody’s right to organise.

This was highlighted by the Victorian secretary for the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union, Martin Kingham, at the rally in Melbourne. Emphasising the need for students and workers to “fight around a common cause”, Kingham added: “This federal Government is hell-bent on destroying any form of collective community power.”

Across the country contingents from the NTEU, the Community and Public Sector Union, and the Liquor, Hospitality and Miscellaneous Workers Union, the three main unions that cover staff on campus, joined the rallies. In Melbourne the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union, the CFMEU and the Rail, Tram and Bus Drivers Union attended, whilst the CFMEU had a contingent in Sydney.

In many places further actions are already planned or underway. In Brisbane, students voted to rally again on May 19, to continue momentum to stop the VSU legislation. The day coincides with a rally already called by the Sydney University Education Action Group and endorsed by the NSW branch of NUS. Melbourne students are planning to protest again on May 11, whilst at UWA a shutdown of student services is being organised by the Student Guild to dramatise what it will mean for students to lose their guild.

From Green Left Weekly, May 4, 2005 @ http://www.GreenLeft.org.au/back/2005/625/

Send a letter to the editor : GLW@greenleft.org.au
Join the Green Left discussion list @ http://groups.yahoo.com/group/GreenLeft_discussion/

"Send a letter to the editor : GLW@greenleft.org.au
Join the Green Left discussion list @ http://groups.yahoo.com/group/GreenLeft_discussion"

Not that anyone who makes any decisions reads this crap.

Played the role of off campus sect. on campus once per week selling Green Loofa exhorting their Venuzuala meeting in contradiction to anti VSU stall metres away. The interaction with activist was nil, sect posters predominant without mention of the student issue.

Worse of course was the Socialist Alternative sect wih their Marxoid meeting topics blared full volume across the passing student body - still no mention of VSU of course - sect heirarchy announcing and manipulating the robo membership.

The role of the Socialist Alternative, when not ranting with foamed mouths, is to recruit the petty bourgois youths. they are petty bourgouis youth sect under full complete control of the leadership cliques. the leadership never changes, while the robo youths undergo the steady churn.

in this insance we see a pamphlet, intended to jusify meeting of the strategy as outlined by the leadership to the student multitudes. only problem was that no ones turned up except a few of the drug addled. at least they ry to live like it was the 1960's with their elitist black skivvy wearing gangs.

"only problem was that no ones turned up except a few of the drug addled"

Got it in one. The attempts by GLW/SA/Generichitleryouththings to hijack this event is something that deserves further scrutiny. It almost makes one despair! The point of the anti-VSU rallies and such is to stop VSU, and has nothing, nothing at all, to do with any other political group or movement. You can stand up on your precious little soapbox and claim that socialists or whatever support the rallies, but that does not mean all do, and of course does not mean that students at said rallies want anything to do with whatever political group is yelling at people through microphones. It is sickening, the things "socialists" have done to the so-called "left."

Wonderful. Thank you all!

HANDS OFF OUR UNIONS

> It is sickening, the things "socialists" have done to the so-called "left."

so phie, where do YOU stand then? "sickening" to be part of somehting you can only write/speak out in "" ???

and something for SW: watch sectist, the small student activist block obviously felt quite comfortable to walk in front of the big SA contingent. now, don't be stupid and sya, that SA had nothing better to do in this may day rally than running of those few students ...

and again to problem-sophID: of course, all this has NOTHING to do with this horrible p-word (for imbeciles: i'm talking about POLITICS). nothing what - so - ever !!!

Evident to all and sundry is sect hijacking of the protest agenda. megaphones to the ready, a shrill creshando assails the eardrum. The reason? the young petty bourgois, sexually frusrated and full of the leadership slogan waiting to unleash

Me, I like a shrill creshando but what's a petty bourgois when it's at home? They are apparently drug addled, they wear black scivvies and possess megaphones. Maybe the bastards can spell petit bourgeois as well - how dare they!
Apparently they are sexually frustrated. Does "Sect Watcher" watch through their bedroom windows? Maybe that's what makes him/her froth at the mouth in this disconcerting malopropistic manner.

The thing which worries me about "sect watcher" is that I had previously thought that J. Edgar Hoover was dead. Yet the watcher's telegraphic style as well as his fusing of sexual voyeurism with anti-communist phobia is so close to J. Edgar Hoover that its disconcerting.

As for Sophie, I suspect she's just a right-winger trying the old COINTELPRO trick of trying to spread sectarianism and distrust amongst the left. Regular readers will notice that she copies insults from the other anti-socialist sectarianss who use/abuse this site, but doesn't seem to get the phraseology quite right. More thorough research needed, Officer!