He’s in the soup! 💕

Original thread:

https://mobile.twitter.com/DianaMiller5/status/1522278413096132609?cxt=HHwWgoC53deJnKAqAAAA

Note, I am finding these threads on the twitter feeds of ICU nurses who are now dreading the horrors that Roe falling will bring to their hospitals. This, on top of the horrors that they’ve seen and continue to see because of the pandemic. They were already exhausted and hanging by a thread.

What’s with the hate, that’s why I’m here 😭

DONT SEND THEM HERE

Cold Places in the Portuguese Central Region

Photography By Henri Prestes

This is an old post I had when I graduated from UMass Lowell. I was annoyed about the commencement speakers and how universities/university politics are in general, and I just felt like I had to write something up. I posted it on medium originally but am moving it here just to keep it on record. It’s a little preachy and I don’t expect anybody to read it, but it helped me vent at the time.

UML Commencement Blog

May 20, 2018

Dispatch from UMass Lowell’s 2018 Commencement

AKA “UML Should Properly Pay its Faculty and Tell Raytheon to Go Screw”

Had I known in advance the amoral principles that would be celebrated or what an undeservedly self-congratulatory enterprise it would be, I would have skipped the UMass Lowell Commencement out of principle. Granted, I should’ve known the whole show would be outrageously smug, this being the common characteristic of literally every university commencement in human history. But, on the promise of sharing a memorable moment with friends, I let go of my cynicism going into the Tsongas Arena only for it to return very quickly just a few minutes in.

The first thing that irked me (well, the first thing besides the Sheriff of Middlesex County ominously beginning the ceremony by creating a war-drum like beat which I thought was going to kick off the start of a ritual sacrifice) was the university administration’s officials heaping praise upon themselves. They cited UML’s growth, and its growing recognition in a lot of different academic fields. They (rightly) stated that a large portion of this growing success lies with the university’s faculty. They called the professors world-renowned and praised the way they build relationships with students and aid them in personal growth and professional development. This praise for faculty members from administrators rang hollow on my ears, however, seeing as how the university has failed to properly compensate their “world-renowned” staff.

The university is currently in intense negotiations with various sections of its teaching staff. But where the most tension lies is with the adjunct faculty of UMass Lowell, who make up a significant number of the professors on campus and teach a majority of freshman and sophomore courses. The university currently pays them absolute garbage, and significantly less than how much adjunct faculty, performing the exact same job, are paid at other schools within the UMass system. The adjunct faculty’s union has been attempting to negotiate a fair contract for three years but has been getting jerked around by the university the entire time. All the while, the people within the administration (who contribute nothing of value at the school) have been spending hundreds of millions of dollars on sparkly new buildings and paying themselves undeservedly comfortable salaries. You would think that a school administration that’s willing to heap praise on its professors and use them as applause lines would also pay them properly and treat them fairly, but you would be wrong.

When administration officials mentioned the partnership between Raytheon and UML, they said the two sides worked with each other, “To (their) mutual benefit.” In other words, UMass Lowell gets some of that sweet, sweet blood money in exchange for Raytheon getting special privileges from the school’s respected engineering and research programs. This includes office spaces on campus used for both research and recruitment, their almost guaranteed presence at every career and job event at the university, and of course celebratory recognition at events such as this commencement. The fact that UMass Lowell is in a very close partnership with such an immoral company should be a fact that brings shame and disgust upon everyone involved. And, if the university were being run by people of conscience, which it evidently isn’t, this partnership would end immediately.

This ultimately brings us to the commencement address itself, by a presidential historian whose name I’ve already forgotten. In between sharing quips exchanged when he met the Bush family, the historian condemned viewing politics as an existential struggle between opposing interests and encouraged Americans to come together, end the “divisiveness” of modern politics and attempt to hear from opposing viewpoints. I’m sure this point of view is popular amongst the political elite in this country, such as the Bush family — a family responsible for, among other things, the creation of a mass surveillance program of people all over the world and every American citizen, the illegal torture of thousands of people across the world and the murder of a million Iraqis. “Americans should stop being so divisive and critical, and just unite behind their war criminal leaders!” Not every viewpoint is worth listening to. I don’t want to hear what the Bush family has to say about anything, the only exception being to maybe try and get an understanding as to how these sociopaths sleep at night.

But more problematic with the historian’s claim that politics isn’t an existential battle is that it’s completely ahistorical. Political struggle has always been a conflict between different interests — opposing sides — vying for power and resources. You can see that even just within UMass Lowell. You either support the UML adjunct faculty in their struggle to get fair compensation or side with the administration against them; you either support the university in its cozying up to war profiteers or you’re against it. As a great man and far more memorable historian once said, you can’t be neutral on a moving train. You must pick a side in the moral causes of our time. So, Mr. Commencement Speaker, you can take your kumbaya respectability politics and shove them up your ass.

And, on that positive note, happy graduation everybody!