-RJ Schinner
‘If you feel and know something is wrong, you need to speak up. You can’t just
be a bystander, or it will get worse. Not just for yourself, but for people in
the future.’
-student at Beacon High School, NYC
High school students across the country, from the South Bronx to Springfield,
Missouri to Berkeley are gearing up for walk-outs and protests on Nov. 2nd. It
stands out how these youth are taking this up with the spirit captured in the
above quote: that we cannot accept the future as it is shaping up under Bush.
From Under Surveillance to Out on the Streets: Dewitt Clinton High
Some are directly facing the latest police state measures on the road towards
fascism. Students at Dewitt Clinton High in the South Bronx are now forced
through metal detectors in the morning, locked inside an overcrowded school all
day (built for 2-3 thousand, now with a student body of 5,000), and instead of
having adequate teachers and books, getting harassed and sometimes attacked by
increasing numbers of police, inside and outside of school. As one student
remarked, ‘there’s more police than teachers,’ and (the police) ‘treat us like
animals.’ Rather than accept going to what looked more like a prison than a
school, 1,500 students walked out on Sept. 19th, took to the streets, and
marched on the school board, demanding an end to this repressive environment.
These are the youth who are treated like ‘criminals,’ who by and large are
offered no future but prison, the military, or hustling to survive, and they
are setting a powerful example of defiance and refusing to be treated this way.
There are some important lessons from this advanced experience. First, how this
walk-out started: while everyone at the school were outraged by the police
state conditions, most were hesitant to do anything about it. This all changed
when one student stood outside in protest one morning, and after a few hours,
as others got fed up of waiting in line to be searched and criminalized through
metal detectors, was joined by 1,500. As one student put it, ‘unless we who
have the guts and passion stand up, others won’t join up with us.’
Second, taking this action also showed these students the potential power they
have. These are youth who are constantly told they are worthless and discarded
by a rotten education system which holds out no future. But when these youth
stood up, this galvanized support from others and put a check on the
powers-that-be.
And third, taking part in this outpouring of resistance got these youth thirsty
for a deeper understanding of what are the problems and solutions to the
problems humanity faces, and how to continue the struggle. One student
described seeing people she thought were apathetic before digging into World
Can’t Wait fliers and copies of Revolution newspaper. These youth are not only
concerned about the repression they face at their school, but are making the
connections between this and the other outrages in society (like the mass
murder committed by the Bush regime in New Orleans), and gearing up for
walk-outs and protests on Nov. 2nd.
Spreading the Spirit
What’s going down at Dewitt is a particularly inspiring example, but there’s a
lot more shaking at high schools across the country. One student described the
scene at his school in a progressive middle class suburb of Chicago
when he was joined by World Can’t Wait student organizers after school:
‘As students poured out of the front door at
they were greeted by calls over a bull horn and a mass of flyers. In only a few
minutes the entire crowd had become polarized, most cheering on the WCW, a few
yelling at them. Friends took different sides of the debate; exposing the
underlying outrage and worry over this regime. Students poured over the
organizers; all wanting a flyer and to sign up. The one problem that we then
faced was the security at my school. They falsely stated that the public school
was private property and that they could not be there. Most of the crowd was
yelling for us to continue, and people continued to sign up and grab flyers.
Eventually we were forced by the security and police across the street, but
much of the crowd followed. Over the next half an hour or so we continued to
sign people up, talk to students, and get out the call. Often we would arrive
at a group of students only to find that others had beaten us there and had
already gotten around the call. Even with the setback of being kicked off the
school in only a few minutes, we received tons of support, got around hundreds
of copies of the call, received dozens of signatures, and made a lasting impact
on the student body.’
This infectious defiance is beginning to spread. One good example of breaking
through boundaries was when some students at Beacon High, a mostly white middle
class progressive school in NYC, held an impromptu march to nearby LaGuardia
High (a multi-national arts school) and MLK high (which has a mostly Black
student population and resembles a prison more than a school). The youth from
Beacon got out fliers to and made connections with others. This was a good
first step at breaking through these barriers, especially as at Beacon,
students are always told to avoid the ‘dangerous’ MLK students, but there’s lots
more work to done on this, and what better way to do it than building a youth
movement to drive out the Bush regime.
(As a side note here, I was talking with a friend recently, and it hit us that
there’s all these high schools across the country named after Martin Luther
King, Jr., and all of them are virtually all-Black and receive some of the
worst funding and resources for education. Here they are naming these schools
‘MLK’ in an attempt to show ‘how far we’ve come’ in breaking down segregation,
yet these same schools are the most stunning examples of segregation and the
continued oppression of Black people. People should check out Jonathon Kozol’s
new book, Shame of the Nation for a stunning look into just what terrible
condition public schools are in for the poor and oppressed nationalities.)
This example of spreading the movement from school to school is one dynamic we
need to get going even more. Beyond doing this directly, it’s been striking how
quickly word of mouth, fliers, stickers, and ‘Resist or Die’ T-shirts have
gotten the word around. We are now hearing about schools we have no direct
connection to beginning to organize walk-outs. And we are getting a steady
stream of emails from students in random cities and small towns across the country
that are organizing for Nov. 2nd.
A Frightening Future
‘Bush isn’t only waging an illegitimate war, but is UNRAVELING THE SOCIAL
CONDITIONS that we won through protest in the 60s and 70s) This country is
being led by a few thousand Christian Fascists, and if we do not begin to
oppose them RIGHT NOW, then they can be sure that whoever comes after Bush will
be worst.’
-student at New Trier High in a Chicago
suburb
‘Global warming is not something you can easily reverse and undo.’
As the above comments from high school students suggest, many are confronting
the realities around them and not wanting to live in a world like this. These
youth were outraged to see people left to die in New
Orleans, and the callous and criminal neglect on the
part of the Bush regime. They watch as Iraqis are murdered, and threats are
made to invade more countries, and their generation is expected to carry out
these atrocities. They are lied to and fooled by military recruiters who now
attempt to lure them in with video games (if the blatant lies don’t work), and
those who aren’t fooled fear a draft. Young women see the right to choose in
the crosshairs, and don’t want a fate of forced motherhood. This generation
takes a look outside and sees the vast and widening disparity between those
people at the top of the food chain and those cast off as worthless, who
receive no access to resources, education, healthcare, or jobs. And the
implications of this deadly path for the future are horrific.
To anyone who cares about the planet and its people, all this is unacceptable.
And for these youth, who are looking at all this with fresh eyes, and have not
yet completed the conditioning process for acceptance and aquiecence, the only
thing that makes sense is to resist all this. This stand outs in contrast to
the many rationalizations out there ( ‘now that he got elected, we just have to
deal with it’ or ‘it’s not really that bad’ or ‘this is just the way the world
is’ ( rationalizations that only serve to accept this nightmare.
The ‘Resist or Die’ slogan has resonated with this generation, because this is
the reality they are confronting.
Getting Ready for Nov. 2nd
While there is a lot of enthusiasm for Nov. 2nd, it is also the case that
student walk-outs won’t happen without a lot of struggle. Youth who are
organizing in the high schools describe how there is a constant battle against
not just apathy but getting youth to take a risk and be part of the resistance.
Youth have been bombarded with a constant message that they are worthless,
don’t know enough to have an opinion, and can’t effect anything. It’s striking
how the very education system, and overall political structures in society
actually reinforce this- from the schools that, despite many teacher’s best
efforts, don’t teach much, and are now having fundamentalist Christianity
shoved into the discourse, to the political processes that keeps people on the
sidelines as bystanders. In contrast to this, when youth take it upon
themselves to learn the truth about the world and step out of the ‘political
process’ and act with defiance and determination, this has a big effect on the
rest of society.
The high school students who are stepping forward in the movement to drive out
the Bush regime not only have a developing understanding of what are the
problems humanity faces and how to solve them, but are hungry to understand
this more fully. These youth are not settling for facile answers or just raw
anger at how the world is, but are finding the ways to articulate their righteous
anger and win over more.
One thing everyone I interviewed loved about this movement is that it invites
their active and thoughtful participation, and that the leaders and organizers
foster this dynamic. This is not a movement of spectators or cheerleaders, but
one that depends on and is built by those who step forward to take
responsibility for the future, and there is no age requirement.
Building a movement like this is part of rising to the challenges before us.
There is already beginning to be debate in the high schools about whether or
not to walk-out on Nov. 2nd, what the ramifications will be, and whether it is
worth it. Those who are stepping forward first have a big responsibility to
engage this debate and win over the millions who can make history. Through our
actions and our words, we need to be setting a standard to follow and
continually challenging those who are still on the fence. And there must be a
huge buzz about Nov. 2nd and big momentum building up to the day that is the
beginning of the end of the Bush regime. And while the youth are stepping to
the forefront of this movement, their parents, teachers, and others need to
step forward in support and as part of this movement, not allowing the most
defiant to be isolated and crushed by intimidation, police batons, or
punishment.
All the risks youth are taking to drive out this regime are well worth it, and
stand out in sharp contrast to the ethos promoted in this society: to concern
yourself solely with your own future (in some ‘me-first’ and careerist way).
These youth are developing a whole new model for how to live your life, and
this is something everyone, including all those who are jaded or cynical about
the prospects for resistance, should take inspiration from.
Finally, on thing that struck me in interviewing youth for this article is that
when I asked ‘what kind of world do you want to live?’, this was the first time
they had ever been asked this. So it took a second to put their thoughts
together, but when they did, they had quite a clear view of many of the heavy
burdens on people that could be easily solved in a different society. And while
it’s clear that growing up in this society has put blinders on people’s ability
to envision a better future, being part of this resistance and beginning to ask
these questions is enabling these youth to dream about how the world should be,
and what it will take to get there.
A shout-out to everyone who I interviewed for this article, and to all the
youth who ‘can’t just be a bystander.’ If you’re organizing a walk-out at your
school Nov. 2nd, or are trying to figure out how to, email
youth_students@worldcantwait.org