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 University of Pittsburgh Enters 3rd Week |
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By Jack Nichols
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania—Running on pure resolve, 18 young protesters on a hunger
strike at the University of Pittsburgh have entered the third week of their fast. According
to local reports, they are more unified and effective than any demonstrators seen
at the university in memory. The strikers vowed to continue, despite fatigue, headaches, irritability and one hospitalization.
According to the latest reports, those fasting, though weary, are still attending classes. One student, who had fasted for 16 days, undertook a final exam in her self-defense class. Another, however, fainted Friday and was hospitalized. Participants are both gays and heterosexuals, students and employees united on a matter of principle. Prior to the protest, most of these youthful activists were hardly familiar with each other. Their unyielding commitment to principle has solidly united them, however, in a manner that has publicly pained those university officials refusing to meet with them. The protesters' purpose is to effect such a meeting in order to turn around anti-gay discrimination practiced by the school. Major media companies, including London's BBC, have covered the protest.
The Board is essentially self-selecting and its members are not publicly responsible, nor are they involved in the day to day activities of the University. Their decisions, however, affect the whole of the university's community. A handful of Board members are responsible, say protesters, for the school's discriminatory stance and their evident bias has flared in the wake of their having launched a legal attack on Pittsburgh's gay-friendly civil rights ordinance. "Their action," say the protesters, " flies in the face of the founding principle of this nation: democratic accountability. While the Equal Rights Alliance understands and appreciates the Trustees' public service, the concept of accountability is a way to help them make better decisions." A formal plea to the Board was issued by the hunger strikers: "We encourage Chancellor Nordenberg and the members of the Board of Trustees use their power to call an emergency meeting of the Board to create the forum where students, faculty, staff, media, and community members can voice their concerns about domestic partner benefits and the impact of the University's policy. "This is an emergency. The actions of a few members of the Board ignore the health of hunger strikers, show contempt for the entire university community, and threaten decades of civil rights progress. Chairman Connolly described the hunger strike as "an extortion tactic." Ironically, such extortion, say the protesters, is precisely "the tactic that the handful of Board members have used. Presumably by threatening to pull their contributions if Pitt extends medical benefits (as has happened when limited same-sex benefits were granted), they have pushed the university into the position of threatening to eliminate statewide civil rights protections unless Deborah Henson, who was denied health benefits for her lesbian partner, sacrifices her own." By using the unquestioned authority of his office to promote his own political views, Chairman Connolly's actions are "at best an abuse of power and at worse they resemble tyranny," say the strikers. Members of the Equal Rights Alliance, who have not, reportedly, received direct support from the university's gay and lesbian organizations, decided to act on an issue which does not directly benefit them. The hunger strikers are standing up for the civil rights not only of campus employees, they say, "but also the citizens of Pittsburgh." In so doing, they are pushing, they say, "to create a community of tolerance for the entire city." The student activists, angry and disappointed over the school's inaction say they are willing to initiate a full-scale act of civil disobedience if the university's Board persists in its promotion of prejudice. Shandra Williams, a secretary in the provost's office and the only non-student faster said: "We will not go away… If we do not get an immediate cooperative response, we will initiate a full-scale action of civil disobedience." |
