Tuesday, April 25, 2006
Hey, put out your pants
The GA-MOU proponents have an editorial. It's full of mostly lies. I should mention that Jay Stagi, who was at the hearing, found it absolutely impossible to fathom why a graduate student would be interested in the failure of the GA-MOU referendum. Apparently, the idea that a graduate student would not be a whore, and would rather have some sense of justice and fairness that he would seek to advance, even if there was some minor cost to himself, is beyond him.
The assembly is currently afforded second-class rights as a student government, with ASUC being the fiscal parent and having the right to speak for all students on the campus. ASUC currently has oversight on assembly expenditures and can veto decisions made by the assembly on issues concerning graduate students.
The assembly is not a person. It doesn't have the right to have equal status. Graduate students must have equal rights, but they do, at least as far as the ASUC is concerned. They can vote, they can run for office, and they can beg for money just like undergraduates can. Of course the ASUC has oversight over the assembly, because graduate students vote for the ASUC, and it represents all students. The fact that graduate students also get a bonus government in the GA, and don't have to pay anything to the Senate, makes the argument that it is actually undergraduates who are second-class members of the ASUC. This referendum seeks to make this even worse.
Secondly, the memorandum clarifies the structure of elections costs. This has always been controversial, as there is no formal structure in place and graduate students felt doubly taxed because they support another student government in the assembly.
This is a blatant lie. There is no controversy. There is formal structure. The existing MOU holds the GA responsible for a share of election costs equal to the proportion of graduate students on campus. Check it out for yourself. Graduate students are not doubly taxed. We pay the same amount as undergraduates, it just happens that our money goes to the GA. We can't bitch about supporting the ASUC, because we are part of the ASUC and have voting power in it. Of course we have to support it. It's our government.
Opponents of the memorandum assert that graduate students will not be paying their fair share in ASUC general elections. This is certainly not the case. The ASUC executive office, senate, and members of the Graduate Assembly have all agreed on the fairness of having the assembly pay an amount equivalent to the fraction of the graduate students that voted, or 12 percent, whichever is higher. It creates incentives participation by graduate students and is not a fixed amount.
Incentives? The incentive is that if more graduate students vote, the GA gets less money. How is that an incentive? That's an incentive to not vote. There's nothing fair about rewarding the apathy of graduate students with a discount.
This also creates a structure that spells out the exact amount owed by the assembly to ASUC. It is a compromise that provides guaranteed income for ASUC, while not depleting the funds of the assembly.
Such a structure was already in place. The fact that the GA refused to follow it doesn't mean that it wasn't in place.
The other argument against the referendum is that graduate students are simply not looking to participate in student government. This cannot be further from the truth.
Instead of seeking absolute autonomy, we are trying to encourage participation in ASUC by creating a collaborative relationship through increased graduate student participation in the Elections and Judicial councils.
If some graduate students are too lazy to get off their ass and vote, that's their problem. It's not a justification to fuck up the balance of power and give the GA special benefits.
And to think I went through the effort of making an honest op-ed. What was I thinking? I should've claimed that passage would require all undergraduate students to cut off their left hand and donate it to the GA.
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