Day of Action/Reaction: Resistance to Convey a Point

Many people have been greatly affected by the budget cuts and the cuts to the athletic department at UC Berkeley. Students, faculty and other participants hoped to portray a strong message through the October 7th walkout, but unfortunately, the demonstration proved to be disorganized and confusing. Although I personally did not participate in the events of the strike, I heard that it was not nearly as effective as the March 4th protest earlier this year. On October 7th, I had a class in Wheeler Auditorium at 11am and a large group of students that was normally not in the class sat down. They all walked out of the auditorium at 11:30am to show their support for the protest, which, although it made a point, many of them were not clear about the issues that they were protesting. Although the idea of resistance was a prominent way to convey the anger and frustration of the budget cuts, the message would have been expressed in a much stronger manner if the strike had been better organized.

I feel that the outcome of this walkout parallels the occurrence in Like a Hurricane that was planned by Adam Nordwall and Richard Oakes. In Like a Hurricane, the issues that they wanted to address and draw attention to were solid but the planning was not. The actual event consisted of a series of spontaneous actions rather than being conducted in an organized manner.

If the walkout had been more organized and planned in a more effective manner, it probably would have proven to be more successful.

~A.B.