<p>Salaries represent how much the economy values your labor and what you can produce with your skills. If we have to justify what we learn with it’s use in the greater economy, then you can just as easily attack all areas of learning besides the most lucrative ones. The economy values its writers less than its doctors or engineers, but it also values it’s scientists, mathematicians, and educators less. You are making an arbitrary decision when you decide to criticize English majors but not others.</p>
<p>Thankfully there has not been too much complaining in this thread about the occupation of Wheeler Hall. I agree there may have been more productive ways to protest, but they are protesting against the tuition increase on the behalf of everyone who goes to Berkeley. I’m pretty sure most of you have skipped class for less important reasons. For those people, it would be hypocritical to complain now.</p>
<ol>
<li>Even assuming Doug’s points about the opportunity costs of maintaining the English department, why is wealth maximization treated as an imperative? We are already far wealthier as a nation than practically any other at all points in history. If anything, it is time to focus more on culture, community, and the environment.</li>
</ol>
<p>(Furthermore, it is not even true to say that “hard sciences” people benefit the nation more than other “softer” majors (though even I have to admit to retaining some skepticism towards those like Ethnic Studies). The latter play a key role in manning the bureaucracy, legal / judicial apparatus, and cultural institutions that glue a country together. Their efforts are not as easily measurable, as those working for Google or Northrop-Grumman, but not less important for all that).</p>
<ol>
<li>Speaking of opportunity costs, why not cut the Econ department since economists (partially) got us into this mess in the first place? [PS. not serious].</li>
</ol>
<p>You guys have gone off topic from the original post.</p>
<p>Here’s my view of the situation: The UC regents approved collateral for a whole bunch of construction bonds BEFORE the fee increase. They knew they were going to increase it. They knew they were to do it way before the Regents ever met.</p>
<p>Additionally, last year the UC attained the status of financial emergency, giving all administrative power to Yudof. (that might be a little off because i’m quoting a friend, who’s quoting a professor, but in any case, Yudof can do whatever he wants). So, even IF the regents board voted no on the fee hike, he would have overrode them and passed the 32% fee hike anyways because they already promised the money for the construction bonds. That’s what you should be mad about.</p>
<p>It shows police officers beating students for not moving. The students NEVER provoked the officers in anyway, yet they kept beating them. People’s hands were broken. People were shot with rubber bullets. One student was hit across the head and the police officer laughed at him. This is how our school handles our students. Fire yourselves up. Stand up against these injustices that occur on your campus. Don’t sit by passively. This is not the time to stand idly by and give your two cents on how this is all stupid when your fellow peers are getting beaten for standing for what they believe in.</p>
<p>FIGHT. STAND UP FOR YOUR EDUCATION.</p>
<p>How?</p>
<p>Disrupt the school from now until the end of the semester in any way possible. Pull alarms. stand up and walk out in groups from classes. Do something.</p>
<p>Let’s take a time machine back to before crypto.</p>
<p>“Hey, let’s cut number theory from the math department because it’s useless. Even GH Hardy admits it”.</p>
<p>Boom. No RSA.</p>
<p>“Whereas science and engineering students are needed to innovate, social science and business majors are needed to set up the societal framework that supports such innovation.”</p>
<p>That is such an imprecise statement, and you know it. Technically, lawyers are needed to set it up too, since they have to push legal documents past the money-sapping precedents put down by other lawyers.</p>
<p>cavilier: Don’t think that anybody who doesn’t side with the current crop of protesters is either apathetic or lazy. There is something called inefficacy, such as your statement, “more productive ways to protest”. I should have the freedom to attend whichever class I want to.
And their issue may affect all of us, but their cause is mostly selfish. Fighting for your own group of people is not altruistic. Not that people shouldn’t be able to fight for their own rights, but they shouldn’t claim to be making the objectively righteous decision, which they pretty much are. (Education is a right/important/socially desirable). Especially when they turn coat later.</p>
<p>And see how the humanities majors responded to the idea of raising Engineering fees. More self-righteous justification.</p>
<p>First I should make it clear that I did not protest. Still, knowing all the little reasons people choose to cut class, I think it’s hypocritical when those same people make such a row over something like this when it’s done to make a statement. I’m not sure what you mean when you say that their cause is selfish or if you have any reasoning to go with that. In any case, I dislike the tuition increases, although right now I view it as a grim necessity, and so I support them protestors.</p>
<p>Pulling fire alarms for the purpose of disrupting class is probably the worst thing you could do. That’s just going to **** people off and turn them against you. And as long as they are against you, they might get confused and start thinking in favor of the chancellor.</p>
<p>Calasian: They believe in helping themselves. I believe in righteousness, at the cost of the self.
I do not view them as righteous, and I do not believe in what they believe.
Using their logic: The cops have not harmed me. Those who pulled fire alarms did. I chose not to go to their protest, yet they did not respect my decision. Nor was it the act of isolated people. It was organized and they wanted to force us to help them.</p>
<p>Is your issue with the police, with the regents, or the state government? You seem to be too blinded by anger to differentiate them, yet they are separate entities, with different goals.</p>
<p>I might be biased. The last youtube video I heard people yelling “shame on you” to cops was when some protesters against the marine corps decided to attack a completely non-violent conservative counter-protest, and some of their members were arrested for assault.</p>
<p>False alarms are extremely endangering for those in the building. You would go far in a terrorist organization, for sure.</p>
<p>This is the age-old questions for revolutionaries. Bolsheviks or Mensheviks?</p>
<p>At the end of the day, it was the Bolsheviks who brought the turkey home. As such, regrettable though they are, pulling fire alarms, pressuring non-participants, and occupying buildings are proper means, and the road we should be going along.</p>
<p>Yeah, you said you disliked the approach by protesters.</p>
<p>By selfish, I mean they have something to gain by protesting, and that it is the driving factor. Listen to their rhetoric:
“Education is a right, not a privilege”. That wasn’t written in some Book of Life, and it’s not in the UN declaration either, if you care about that.
Only UC students protest. Obviously it’s not a good enough cause that outsiders are helping them. They expect taxpayers to pay for their education, because they “deserve” it. Basically, “give me something for free, because …”
Whatever they use to fill the second half is irrelevant. The [low] quality of the justification does not make it not selfish.</p>
<p>@ak-That’s probably the wrong analogy to be making. The Bolsheviks were spectacularly out of touch with economic reality, and we all know how their story ultimately ends.</p>
<p>@math-The protest chant is pretty smug and simple-minded, but it’s still a better chant than something like “Increasing the cost of public education harms meritocracy in California and serves to worsen our state’s economic future in the long-run.” </p>
<p>If you don’t have a dog in their fight, then I can see how it would be annoying. I don’t like their methods of protest, but I can tolerate it because I agree with their cause. But if they just start randomly pulling fire alarms…</p>
<p>The protesters think they “deserve” it because for the last 50 years the state of California has had a compact with the people that a low cost, actually free(no tuition), would be provided to all eligible students. Californian families who paid fairly high tax rates and put up with high housing prices for the last 20 (or 50 years, if you want to go way back) years made the decision to do so with that promise of a low cost or free public education in mind.</p>
<p><em>stands on pedestal in revolutionary melodramatic pose</em> @cavilier,
That’s looking too far ahead. In the short run, the Bolsheviks did ouster a corrupt and discredited political system, unlike those too limp-wristed to do anything but talk. We must bear in mind that sometimes, when a political system becomes too disconnected from the people, the people must change the language in which it talks to the elites to one the elites can understand.</p>
<p>If you want a low cost education, go to community college.</p>
<p>Yeah. The Bolsheviks replaced one corrupt system with another. Can’t you at least pretend that you have a good idea?</p>
<p>Also, I’d like to see all these over-privileged (yet completely ungrateful) 20-something college children try to revolt. What, are you going to use your knowledge of Poli. Sci. to overthrow the government?</p>
<p>You’re putting all these grand words in, but all I hear is “we are too stupid to argue for our own indefensible position, so you guys should stop thinking and just listen to us”.</p>
<p>I’m sure some protesters are simply protesting to satisfy their need to rebel, but it’s definitely unfair to characterize all the protesters as over-privileged and ungrateful. The way you mock their goals is also rather unfair. There is a lot of resentment toward the government for their short-sighted cuts to education, but the protests are mainly against the tuition increases. They aren’t protesting for some conceited high-brow ideal, but for their sake of continuing their education here at Berkeley.</p>
<p>Really…“only 34% of English majors get employed”…and 10% go on to graduate school. Are you saying that 56% never get employed? So there are 56% of the English majors just sitting home unemployed? This is a ridiculous statement. And no, I’m not an English major – just don’t like to see absurd statistics that mean nothing. Its tough for the hard science majors to get jobs too. A friend told me about an opening for a low entry level lab technician at a little lab and they were flooded with over a 100 applications --many from bio tech majors from Berkeley. California colleges are cranking out too many bio science majors, pre-med, etc. There won’t be jobs for all of them. At least English majors can take their writing and analytical skills and apply them to myriad jobs and careers.</p>
<p>The harsher rhetoric was aimed at ak-dogg’s thing about Bolsheviks.</p>
<p>The fee increase is basically a non-issue for $20,000 income families ($70000 income for that matter), considering financial aid.
I fall into that category…</p>
<p>(However, stating such is a pathos argument, and somewhat deceptive, since my family is middle-class).</p>
<p>…but I’m not really grateful to taxpayers or “society” for my financial aid. How did education make me a better member of society then?</p>
<p>Besides, this comes down to the whole socialist vs minarchist debate. There’s this notion that there should be equality, or at least minimal stuff for everyone. There’s also this notion that people should be able to keep their own property. Seeing as how the redistribution process is corrupt and inefficient, it seems like we should lean to the latter.</p>
<p>In short, crappy things happen, but how does that translate to unfair? Any investment by the state is already generous, not something deserved.</p>
<p>Speaking of the term investment, people complain about having to take student loans. Don’t student loans exemplify the idea of investing in students? They get the education, then pay back their investment!</p>
<p>As for the middle class getting shafted, maybe they should live more frugally. They might enjoy it, and take away a new lesson in spending money. Yeah, that’s presumptive for me to say, but so is demanding a bigger slice from taxpayers.</p>