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[beet]

Friends,

I write you now from occupied space. At about 10p.m. last night, about 70 individuals took the space in the name of Take Back NYU!. Below is an explanation.

Love and rage,
beet



well, we finally did it.
 
 
ACTUALLY, THAT'S MINE.
or why we finally, really took back nyu.


WHAT’S MINE? THE UNIVERSITY, OF COURSE. IT’S YOURS, TOO!

A group of student-empowering, social-justice-minded rabblerousers have occupied the Marketplace at Kimmel and we refuse to move until our demands are met. All are encouraged to join us on the third floor and help us sustain this occupation until NYU complies with our demands. Our demands are as follows:

      -Full, annual disclosure of NYU’s operating budget and endowment.

      -The election of a student body whose purpose is the socially

      responsible investment of NYU’s funds and all of whom are full, voting members of the Board of Trustees. That this body investigate NYU’s investments in war and genocide profiteers, specifically the Israeli occupation of Gaza.

      -That tuition be stabilized; that no student pays more tuition than they did their first year. That the University meet 100% of students’ government-calculated financial need.

      -That all NYU employees, including graduate students, are granted union rights, and that work study employees are allowed collective bargaining rights.

      -That NYU provide humanitarian aid to Gaza, and that it offers scholarships for 13 Palestinian students annually.

      -That NYU grant public access to Bobst Library and that student groups get priority when reserving space in all NYU-owned or –leased buildings.

We apologize for inconveniencing the loyal lunchgoers of the Kimmel Marketplace, but we are not sorry for causing a disruption! Established channels have been insufficient to make our voices heard by the administration, and we have waited too long to be taken seriously. By disrupting the University’s functioning now, we are forcing the administration to deal with those people it depends upon the most—we, the students!

Our demands, though many and varied, are united by the desire to empower students to take part in the governance of their University.

By making public the endowment and budget, and establishing a student voice in the investment of funds and on the Board of Trustees, we are creating a means for active student participation in the administration of the University. By providing union rights for graduate students and collective bargaining rights for work study employees, we are guaranteeing that the students upon whom the University depends for labor are treated and compensated fairly.

By drastically reducing the amount that tuition can increase, we are forcing the University to reassess its spending and cut back appropriately (instead of making a low-income student take out more loans, perhaps the University can build one less abroad site). By forcing the University to meet 100% of students’ financial need, we are ensuring that students spend less time working multiple jobs to make ends meet and more time making the University a place where active minds flourish.

By demanding investigation into war and genocide profiteers, providing aid to Gaza, and offering scholarshipts to Palestinian students, we are demanding that the University heed our own voices immediately. Through these demands we are also stating our solidarity with the students who have occupied their universities in the United Kingdom and elsewhere demanding aid for war-torn Gaza.

By demanding students have priority in reserving space in NYU buildings, we are literally making space for ourselves in the University, and putting students above groups who rent out space in our buildings. By allowing the public access to Bobst Library and the wealth of knowledge it contains we are building a bridge between NYU and the community it so often displaces, while empowering students of all universities (as well as alums of our own) to take part in information that is too often consolidated in the Ivory Tower. 

We have waited too long for the University to respond of its own volition. We have let administrators push us around through endless red tape, through never-ending tuition hikes, through unfair labor practices, through secrecy and lies, through power being consolidated in a tiny group of (mostly) rich white dudes who know nothing about our lives as students. We wrote John Sexton a nice letter and struggled to contain our rage in Town Hall after Town Hall; we’ve agitated and tabled and built our coalition. Our demands serve and concern all students. We refuse to dignify the University’s lack of response with our own inaction.

So we take action! We’ve got food and sleeping bags and good friends and we are not going anywhere. Join us! This is a sleepover for student empowerment, a party for participation in the University, a disruption for democracy, an occupation for all!


Love and rage,

Take Back NYU!
www.takebacknyu.com

[throw_aways]

sweet!   

(i'd say more, but i'm in a mega hurry!)

[caren connecticut]

shit, if i paid that much cash for school i'd wanna know where all of it was going, too.

[redpatch]

200k? I support this. and i hate you all.

[pandaxcore]

i hope ya'll have plans for when cops try to raid

[Seta]

oh, so when dozens of UK unis occupy, you don't care, but the second an AMERICAN uni goes under you're all excited. hypocrites

[noah balloon]

this might sound bad but i didn't even realize you were occupying your university until you went on facebook and said "the occupation's going well!" which coincidentally was right after i thought to myself, "where the hell has sami been?"

[pandaxcore]

yea dude, i had no clue

[Anna Karina]

this might sound bad but i didn't even realize you were occupying your university until you went on facebook and said "the occupation's going well!" which coincidentally was right after i thought to myself, "where the hell has sami been?"

To be fair, nobody cares about the UK regardless of what they do.

[Seta]

for all those interested:

our group blog: http://warwicksolidaritysitin.wordpress.com
a good Facebook group for the UK (and wider) occupations: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=45406209703

[themcf]

This is NYU you are talking about they won't do shit for you. If you did actually want any progress you would not make such a huge list of demands where it is easier to write them all off becuase it is an overwhelming list of some unreasonable (and of course some VERY reasonable like the tuition not going up on you) demands.

Didn't this happen up the street at New School a few months ago? Anything come from that?

[redpatch]

new school succeeded

[Salvmasterg]

new school succeeded

you can read about their victory here: http://www.newschoolinexile.com/archive.htm

I just got back from NYU.  I left before it was over but it seems like it didn't end nearly as well as the New School.  There were some real impressive moments however.  At around 11:30 there were maybe 200 of us barricaded on the side-walk and we picked up the barricades and took over the street, which the protesters still occupied when I left around 1:30.   An hour or so later we had swelled to at least a thousand people.  There was also I sizable counter-protest throughout. Around 1:00 some black bloc people provoked the cops, which lead to a major overreaction on the part of the cops who proceeded to use billy clubs and pepper spray to beat the shit out of the front line of the protesters.  A slight street battle ensued with the crowd surging back and forth, but eventually taking the street back from the cops, I don't believe there were any arrests during this.  After it happened though we started losing people, and the reactionaries on the sidewalk got more confident, with chants such as "fuck you", and "arrest them."  My understanding is that after this the administrators offered to let people leave the occupation without punishment, they refused to call it amnesty, but I understand that it was essentially the same.   I believe there were around 20 students occupying at this point and many of them had left the occupation by 1:30 when I left.  There were a handful of students remaining but things didn't look good.  The protest was dwindling back down to 150 or so, we were probably outnumbered by cops towards the end.  Hopefully the remaining people will make it out okay.

Also did you all hear about the (victorious) occupation at U of Rochester for divestment from Israel a week or two ago?

But now I need to get some sleep.  Oh by the way, it's been a while pix board. you cats been
O-R-G-A-N-I-Z-I-N-G?  (and the only acceptable reply here is an enthusiastic "hell yeahz")

[Anna Karina]

I haven't clicked on any links or read anything aside from that paragraph, but it sounds like non-violent protesting all around so I'll definitely back that up.

One of the main mistakes a lot of these things tend to have is when a non-violent protest starts and cops start being violent, the crowd responds with violence (which I understand is obviously somewhat of a human condition but in the same sense it nullifies the non-violent protest completely).

I'll have to read up on things tomorrow and see what happened/is happening.

[pandaxcore]

hm, an attempt to strengthen the inner barricades should have been the main focus initially.

was this a militant occupation or more of college kids hanging out in sleeping bags?

id say next time get ahold of some bolts and impact guns and erect some withstanding barricades.


good effort though

[Salvmasterg]

The administration tricked the remaining occupiers into leaving by offering to negotiate and then detaining them.  They then suspended the student's.  Here's the blurb, including people you can call and email to help.  A loud and angry defense campaign is going to be the best thing to ensure that these students go unpunished.

Today New York University has shown its true face more than ever. Claiming to be a "private university in the public service," it is clearly not even in the service of those students whose tuitions allow it to exist.

Earlier today, NYU cut power to all outlets in the occupied space and turned off the wireless internet.  Obviously this was an attempt to silence and intimidate the occupiers who have broad-based support.

Then, NYU said it would negotiate and instead detained and suspended the student negotiators when they showed up.  Security has now broken through the barricade and people are being detained and suspended.

Instead of dialog and negotiation, the NYU administration has shown they prefer the authoritarian, dissent-quashing, dictator route. It is a true reflection of how they run their university. Nothing but thugs with suits on, interested in getting rich under the guise of "education."

Be prepared to defend any individual or group that is targeted academically or legally for their role in the occupation. Widespread support for the occupation and its demands will not be extinguished by NYU's hypocritical, tyrannical behavior.

Come out to 60 Washington Square South if you can.

Email NYU Administrators. Demand amnesty and no suspensions:

NYU President John Sexton: john.sexton@nyu.edu

John Beckman, NYU Spokesperson: jhb5@nyu.edu

Office of the Provost: provost@nyu.edu

Office of the Vice President: evp@nyu.edu

hm, an attempt to strengthen the inner barricades should have been the main focus initially.

I believe it was, one of the first things the student's did was make giant pile of furniture to barricade the door.  You can learn more about what happened than my paragraph at http://takebacknyu.com/. 

was this a militant occupation or more of college kids hanging out in sleeping bags?

Of course, I don't think you can really have an occupation that isn't militant.

id say next time get ahold of some bolts and impact guns and erect some withstanding barricades.

I think the strength of the barricades was less important than the correlation of forces between the administration/cops and the occupiers/protesters.

[pandaxcore]

yea i definitely understand, i think maybe the students should r e occupy with more forces, more militancy and have the administators meet in their space on their terms

[Seta]

The administration tricked the remaining occupiers into leaving by offering to negotiate and then detaining them.  They then suspended the student's.  Here's the blurb, including people you can call and email to help.  A loud and angry defense campaign is going to be the best thing to ensure that these students go unpunished.

Today New York University has shown its true face more than ever. Claiming to be a "private university in the public service," it is clearly not even in the service of those students whose tuitions allow it to exist.

Earlier today, NYU cut power to all outlets in the occupied space and turned off the wireless internet.  Obviously this was an attempt to silence and intimidate the occupiers who have broad-based support.

Then, NYU said it would negotiate and instead detained and suspended the student negotiators when they showed up.  Security has now broken through the barricade and people are being detained and suspended.

Instead of dialog and negotiation, the NYU administration has shown they prefer the authoritarian, dissent-quashing, dictator route. It is a true reflection of how they run their university. Nothing but thugs with suits on, interested in getting rich under the guise of "education."

Be prepared to defend any individual or group that is targeted academically or legally for their role in the occupation. Widespread support for the occupation and its demands will not be extinguished by NYU's hypocritical, tyrannical behavior.

Come out to 60 Washington Square South if you can.

Email NYU Administrators. Demand amnesty and no suspensions:

NYU President John Sexton: john.sexton@nyu.edu

John Beckman, NYU Spokesperson: jhb5@nyu.edu

Office of the Provost: provost@nyu.edu

Office of the Vice President: evp@nyu.edu

they did that over here too for Sheffield Hallam.

was this a militant occupation or more of college kids hanging out in sleeping bags?

Of course, I don't think you can really have an occupation that isn't militant.

we sure as hell tried!

[Salvmasterg]

Hey everyone, so as part of the defense campaign if activists on this board could convince groups that they work with to put out statements of solidarity it would be most excellent, some international solidarity (Sami  ) would be kickass as well.  Here's a statement that NYCLAW put out:

New York City Labor Against the War denounces the NYU administration's attack on student protesters of Take Back NYU.

The students demand that the university serve its student body through financial transparency and accountability.

They demand that the administration recognize the Graduate Student Organizing Committee/UAW Local 2110, and agree to fair labor contracts for all university employees.

They are particularly courageous in calling on NYU to support the people of Gaza and end University complicity with the Israeli apartheid regime -- demands that parallel recent student protests at the University of Rochester, Hampshire College, and two dozen universities through the UK.

When the administration arrogantly ignored these concerns, protesters nonviolently occupied their student center, a direct action in the tradition of the civil rights, Vietnam antiwar and anti-apartheid movements.

The administration's response has been typically deceitful and vindictive.

It called in the NYPD to attack protest rallies outside the building. It falsely agreed to negotiate, only to detain the students' representatives. It forcibly removed other protesters -- some of whom were assaulted by NYU security, and at least one of whom was arrested. It suspended eighteen protesters and evicted them from university residences.

We are proud of these students' protest and refusal to be silenced. NYU administration must immediately:

1. Rescind suspensions, dorm evictions and all other disciplinary action.

2. Drop all criminal charges.

3. Meet the students' demands.

Also if people haven't emailed the administration yet, they should really do it.  The more pressure the administration feels the more likely they are to mess up, so we should keep it as hot as we can.  Here's a good example of an email that someone in the bay area sent out:

From:
Date: February 20, 2009 1:40:02 PM PST
To: john.sexton@nyu.edu, jhb5@nyu.edu, provost@nyu.edu, evp@nyu.edu

Subject: shame on you

Dear President Sexton and NYU Administrators,
   I have just received news that you are suspending students who took part in a peaceful sit-in.  Don't we have due process in the United States?  You are acting as the police, prosecution, judge and jury.  I encourage you to immediately change course.  At a minimum, the students should be re-instated, moved back into their dorms and given their rights to due process through the appropriate university disciplinary hearings.  Otherwise, your administration will lose all credibility, you will become the laughing stock of the academic world, and the students will win their rights anyway after a long struggle that brings shame and disrepute to your leadership.

Sincerely,

Additionally, if you or anyone you know is an NYU alum be sure to (have them) mention that you (they) won't be giving NYU any money in your (their) private philanthropy and estate.  Not that people will anyway, but it's just one more thing to make them feel some pressure.

This is NYU you are talking about they won't do shit for you. If you did actually want any progress you would not make such a huge list of demands where it is easier to write them all off becuase it is an overwhelming list of some unreasonable (and of course some VERY reasonable like the tuition not going up on you) demands.

I'm curious which demands you feel are unreasonable and why.

yea i definitely understand, i think maybe the students should r e occupy with more forces, more militancy and have the administators meet in their space on their terms

Yeah, I obviously agree with with your inclination to reoccupy, but I feel like saying that the reason the occupation failed because it wasn't militant enough, and because they didn't try to force the administrators to meet on their terms pretty much ignores the on the ground realities of the occupation.  On the question of militancy, the occupation of a building is in itself a militant act, not to mention the occupation of the street by a, at it's height, very rowdy and confrontational protest.  So I don't quite get why you feel like it wasn't militant enough, was there anything specifically that makes you think that?  As for getting the administration to meet on their terms, the administration was refusing to negotiate at all for the majority of the occupation, and when it finally did negotiate refused to even call their offer of amnesty what it was.  Of course this isn't to say that I'm not in favor of forcing administrators to meet on the occupying students' terms, the validity of this tactic could be seen clearly in the beads of sweat running down the Dean of the Univeristy of Rochester's neck as he was forced to negotiate in front of 70 student occupiers.  Rather, I would argue that assigning abstract prescriptions without looking at the balance of forces on the ground is idealism of the first degree, I also believe that this is the trap that the student's who remained inside the occupation fell into.  In tandem with the consensus organizing model inside the occupation, a minority blocked what should have been a democratic decision for the occupiers to cut their loses and leave as a unified group, rather than forcing a defense campaign.

I haven't clicked on any links or read anything aside from that paragraph, but it sounds like non-violent protesting all around so I'll definitely back that up.

One of the main mistakes a lot of these things tend to have is when a non-violent protest starts and cops start being violent, the crowd responds with violence (which I understand is obviously somewhat of a human condition but in the same sense it nullifies the non-violent protest completely).

I'll have to read up on things tomorrow and see what happened/is happening.

Awesome, glad to have your support. I really encourage you (and everyone else) show that support by shooting the administrators a quick email as it really will make a difference in the lives of students standing up non-violently and non-destructively against oppressive and genocidal structures.

[pandaxcore]

yea consensus is problematic and should be used when advantageous, not in occupations that can easily have you injured.


i think that they SHOULD have had the administrators meet int THEIR space, and to maintain a serious face for the occupation.

this will show seriousness rather than what many will receive as privileged college kids whining.

i do not see this as being the case, but i do think this can be a general feeling when seen by the public.

also a back up plan to reinforce your position to defend against the cops, and if the cops are mounting for attack, to take the offensive.

when the mounting attack is building up, use that time to be able to hold the area.

i think occupations CAN be non militant.

the evergreen occupation was fucking hilarious at best.


an organized front to show the seriousness of the issue and a total disregard for terms set by administrators until they are ready to play by your rules, is mandatory.

i love people broke locks to address the crowd and what not, i applaud that for sure.

but i feel if militancy wasn't lacking they would still have the building.