PUBLISHED: 10-27-08

Letter to the Editor

Don’t be a change zombie

Change is coming. The change we need is on its way in this “historic” election. But what change?

Will income inequality, segregated public schools, “pay-or-die” health care, fossil-fueled climate change, corporate personhood, the debt-based money system, the military-industrial complex, rampant commercialism, the “war on terror,” government spying or widespread electoral fraud be properly addressed?

Change and hope has become a metronome, which keeps us under auto-hypnosis.

It’s turned us into obedient dead souls unwilling to challenge the system.

We who must be brave, ethical students-attending a college that Jonathan Kozol says “represents the cutting edge of moral decency”-cannot become rigid, impersonal, uncreative and destructively authoritarian cogs for a machine. We must maintain the crucial ability to interrogate reality, ask questions and be the change we
want to see.

We must stand up against injustices-for example, when a teacher’s academic freedom is under attack or when students’ rights are being infringed upon. We must not lower our expectations for leaders or the future.

Sure, change zombies aren’t as scary as values vampires who appear on the other side of the aisle, but when’s the last time you attended a sociopolitical college event or student organization meeting?

This Halloween you may realize you’ve been wearing a costume and have already frightened many. Ask yourself if you’re part of election night of the living dead.

Kevin Gosztola

Junior

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