Moving forward, looking back

As we celebrate the Campus Y´s 150-year history this weekend, I feel immense pride in the catalyzing role it has played in student ideas and action throughout UNC’s history.

For me, the true weight of the Campus Y’s contribution only becomes clear through the oral histories of its leaders, such as Jim Medford. Their stories give life to its instrumental role in the struggle for desegregation, the fight against the Speaker Ban, and the opposition to the Vietnam War at UNC.

Such accounts provide insight into the defining characteristic of the Campus Y: an unwavering commitment to act out against injustice, regardless of the scale or power of the opposition. Such a commitment forms the essence of the organization and breeds the infectious spirit that has continually attracted some of the university’s best minds.

Fulfilling this creed, however, no longer drives collective mobilization of all members of the Campus Y but has been ceded largely to individual committees. In seeking to fulfill its goal of promoting social justice through pluralism, the Campus Y consistently brands itself as an organization that welcomes all ideas.

Although such commitment upholds the Campus Y’s ideal that all viewpoints should have our ears, it must be coupled with the duty to critically evaluate these ideas and, when necessary, strongly denounce those that contribute to oppression.

During my three years of involvement — one as a committee co-chair — the Campus Y as a whole has failed to substantively act on any issue with a political bent.

With as salient an issue as health care dominating the national political scene last year, the Campus Y should have acted as the organizing force on campus to ensure an effective policy to provide universal access to this human right.

Similarly, the Campus Y should have been the first organization on campus to support our housekeepers in the face of demeaning treatment permitted by University policy. But in both cases, student mobilization primarily coalesced outside its doors.

This aversion to the supposedly “political” must end: Maintaining an apolitical stance and promoting social justice are inherently paradoxical.

In order to remain relevant, the Campus Y must regain its stature as a collective of student activists which provides a leading moral voice in our community to supplement the already high-impact work of its committees.

Throughout its history, the Campus Y has embraced controversy and opposition, not for the sake of it, but as expected outcomes of progressive ideals and action. In committing itself in the fight for justice and challenging the status quo, the Campus Y will inevitably anger some but will also provide needed leadership in bringing together the diverse yet dedicated advocates for social change in our university.

To move forward, the Campus Y must enhance communication between its base and leadership, create effective exchanges with more community partners, and draw from ideas and strategies developed outside its current constituency.

However, this reform must begin with basic restructuring. The Cabinet, comprised of the Executive Board and committee co-chairs, should function as a space for identifying pertinent issues and crafting an informed Campus Y-wide response.

The Executive Committee should then lead the implementation of these plans with education and mobilization of the larger community as a central goal to achieve success.

Using the minds and passion of student leaders that have shaped such innovative organizations as HOPE, Nourish International, and Carolina Microfinance Initiative, the Campus Y could mobilize the UNC community around issues which not only impact us as members of individual committees, but as members of a larger social justice community.

Collective action will breed collective identity, returning what has become only a building hosting a cohort of strong organizations to its historical manifestation — an enduring example of the power of a cohesive community of students to be a force for change in our society.

Jonathan Tarleton is a Senior Latin American studies major, he is a guest columnist for The Daily Tarheel.