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Endorsement taints organization

By Daily Bruin Staff

May 1, 1996 9:00 p.m.

Wednesday, May 1, 1996

By Romben Aquino

A time-honored UCLA tradition became the site of a cheap
politically-motivated gimmick. After watching this year’s Spring
Sing, it is no longer a secret which slate the Student Alumni
Association is endorsing. In a skit between acts, Todd Sargent, a
member of the Student Alumni Association (SAA) board of directors,
and a continual critic of the Students First! slate, sang "United
Students, we will take our campus back."

"Take our campus back" from what? I’m sure most of the
non-undergraduate audience members thought that he was referring to
a campus run amuck by squirrels (since that’s what the rest of the
company was talking about). I, however, think Sargent used the line
as a not-so-veiled attack on a student government which consists of
mostly students of color and advocates for the needs of those who
have traditionally been kept out of the power structure. (When any
government pays attention to the needs of those who have been
previously ignored, it advances the interests of all its
citizens.)

Not only that, Sargent got free advertising for the United
Students slate too!

SAA’s constitution prohibits such endorsements. In Article VIII,
it says: "No person may use the SAA name or any SAA program to
endorse a student government position." As vice president of public
relations, he should know the bylaws of the organization’s
constitution. Even if SAA had not intended it, the action of one of
its "leaders" at one of its events taints the rest of the
organization.

Furthermore, sentiments that proclaim the campus as "ours" sound
familiar to the anti-immigrant hysteria that is currently sweeping
the nation. Since ethnic minorities aren’t welcome in "our"
country; we have recently witnessed the use of force against two
Mexican nationals in Riverside, the brutal murder of Thien Minh Ly
in Tustin, and the questionable shooting of Hong Il Kim in Orange
County. I am not calling Sargent a racist, as I’m sure he hadn’t
intended any racial overtones by his endorsement of United
Students, but I’m sure words can be better chosen next time (if
there is a next time).

Did the entire Spring Sing audience really deserve to hear
Sargent’s political views? Perhaps someone is still a little bitter
for having lost to the Students First! slate a year ago? Does the
thought of a few, dedicated, "uppity" minorities running student
government scare him that much? Okay, Sargent, let’s take "our"
campus back … to the 1950s … we’ll shut out all those
minorities who don’t belong here at UCLA (because the ones that did
get in probably got in through affirmative action anyway), and then
the only "diversity" that will exist on this campus will be whether
students are Alpha Betas or Kappa Epsilon Gammas.

For a society that prides itself on the ideals of equality,
doesn’t it seem odd that some people get scared when others strive
to makea those ideals a reality? We all move forward when members
of its lowest echelons feel that they are part of the process.

Aquino is a fourth-year political science student.

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