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The Daily Tar Heel

University Day Protester Asks University Officials To Come to the Table

I would like to clear up a couple of misconceptions presented in The Daily Tar Heel editorial on Oct. 17 "Off on the Wrong Foot."

First of all, the "goal of any protester" is NOT "to garner as much publicity for their cause as possible - while swaying the audience to be sympathetic to their position" as stated in the piece. The purpose of a protest is to get what you want from the person who has the power to give it to you; in this case the demand was for the University to come to the table to talk to representatives from UE Local 150, and the person with the power is Chancellor Moeser.

Some have described the tactics as rude and alienating, but I think we did what needed to be done. If people in the audience were annoyed and uncomfortable: sorry. But sometimes people have to be uncomfortable for social change to happen.

If Chancellor James Moeser, President Molly Broad and Gov. Jim Hunt were maddened and embarrassed, good. They should be embarrassed by the low wages and bad conditions they ask their workers to endure.

As for the DTH's assertion that this protest was "bad strategy," I beg to differ; I think it was perfect strategy. The workers and students have little actual power in this University (and by power, I mean money.) One of the few forms of power we have is people power. We used this power very effectively by making the chancellor, and all others there, listen to our demands.

The only thing we wanted was for the University to come to the table.

And that is what we still want. So Chancellor Moeser, will you come to the table and talk to representatives of UE Local 150?

Heather Yandow

Senior

Mathematics

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