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In this episode, we delve into the heart of campus activism sweeping across the United States, spotlighting the recent student protests in support of Gaza and calls to end violence. We connect with a faculty member from Yale to discuss the nuances of the current movement, and journey back to the spirited 1960s with a professor from Berkeley who once walked in similar protests. Join us as we explore how today’s demonstrations resonate with the past, uncovering the threads that link generations of students in their pursuit of justice and peace.
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Stephanie: Greetings, everybody, and welcome to another episode of Nonviolence Radio. I’m your host, Stephanie Van Hook. And my co-host and news anchor for the Nonviolence Report, Michael Nagler, will actually be one of my guests today. So, let me explain.
On this episode, we turn our attention to the student movements across the United States right now for justice in Palestine.
So our first conversation on the show today is with Professor Alex Gil. He’s from Yale University, and he is associated with the Faculty for Justice in Palestine, the Yale chapter. He talks to us about Occupy Yale, and some of the students’ demands, and generally gets an inside view of what’s taking place on the Yale campus as of this week.
So let’s jump in and hear from Professor Gil.
Alex: Hi. I’m Alex Gil. I am Senior Lecturer II and Associate research Faculty of Digital Humanities in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at Yale University. And I am a member of the Yale chapter of Faculty for Justice in Palestine.
Stephanie: Well, thanks so much for your time today. Obviously, these student protests in relation to the genocide taking place in Gaza, and the extreme violence in the West Bank, are on people’s hearts and minds, and, we’d just love to hear from you about what’s happening at Yale University.
Alex: Yeah. I have sad news to report, that they were arrested again. A second round of arrests happened this morning with, I understand, a different group of students because the ones who were arrested didn’t want to jeopardize further disciplinary action. So, I think a new batch of students, put themselves up for arrests. They’re very coordinated.
But let’s go back a little bit. So, the Yale students have been peacefully protesting for a couple weeks now. You saw the first direct action was an encampment in what we call Beinecke Plaza in front of the Beinecke – and that one was very peaceful. That one was broken by the first round of arrests.
I was there, along with many of my colleagues, providing support, observing. We’ve tried to, not to tell them what to do. We’re supporting them in their own decisions. And that was around the time when circulation of claims of them being violent started appearing in different media venues.
One of the videos that became really famous, of a student getting poked by a Palestinian flag. And right-wing media, of course, ran with that one. But it’s been debunked by now. I wasn’t there at that particular time that happened, but other colleagues were there, and we knew the story that was being told was not the case.
Everything we witnessed was students being very well-informed, very community oriented, caring for each other. They spent most of their time studying and painting, singing. It’s a model of a peace movement, right? That’s what we have witnessed consistently.
That didn’t stop with the first round of arrests. They came back this time. First, they were in different locations, a different point in the past week. And they set up a second encampment yesterday in what we call Cross Campus, which is in front of the Sterling Library – for those listeners familiar with the New Haven geography, or the Yale geography.
And again, same story. Students were incredibly peaceful, supportive of each other. And they were arrested again this morning. That’s the short version of this story. Our faculty group has been very supportive of them, trying to figure out ways we can help, and witness, and bear witness to their peace. No harassment worth talking about.
Michael: Alex, I wanted to just introduce myself a little bit. I was actually in the Free Speech Movement at Berkeley 60 years ago, if you can believe that. And I’m comparing and contrasting, and it’s very interesting. When we protested, also it was very large numbers. And the issue was not dissimilar. It was about racism in housing in Berkeley. And once again, there were these waves of protests which were stimulated by arrests and by dumb things that the administration did.
And in fact, we called them ‘atrocities’. And we look forward to the next atrocity. When our enthusiasm was lagging, we knew the university would do something outrageous and thousands more students would pile on. So, in that respect, I’m seeing a similarity. And I just want to get your comments on all this in a minute.
But in another respect, I’m seeing a dissimilarity – that our protest was not really well aimed. The opponent that we were really after was not the university or the administration of the university. But today, what I’m seeing – and you address this very well in your letter – is that the students are calling on universities to do something very concretely in their power to do, which is to just disinvest from those entities which would be supporting Israeli militarism.
So, it looks to me – and here’s where I want to get your comment, Alex. It looks to me like there’s been something of a growth of sophistication among the protesters in the intervening half century or more. Could I hear your thoughts on that?
Alex: Yes, I’d be happy to. So, of course, many other student movements have taken place in the intervening time between when you were protesting 60 years ago and today. So there’s always this – there’s this historical phenomenon where, I think – was it Rosa Parks who first noticed this? That movements learn from each other. Barring some real interruption in historical memory in a given society, through the destruction of archives or other phenomena, students learn from each other.
So, I think, by now students realize that if they figure out a target that is doable, they probably will have a larger impact than if they remain fuzzy wuzzy. That’s it. It’s interesting because I don’t think all student movements in the United States right now have the same level of precision.
I’m very proud of our students at Yale because they’re – even within divestment there are levels of fuzziness. For example, if you consider some student movements in other universities are asking for a blanket divestment from Israel, joining the BDS movement in general – or building on the BDS movement that has existed in our universities for several years now.
Our students are specifically asking for divesting from the weapons industry. Not necessarily investment in Israel in general. Avoiding the issue, for example, of investment in big technology like Amazon or Google – who sell, for example, facial recognition software to the Israeli government, right?
They’re avoiding those kind of gray areas that would be more difficult to divest from. They’re being very specific about weapons manufacturers. As I understand it. As I understand it. There might be contradictory evidence on the ground, obviously, because, movements sometimes don’t speak in one voice.
But not only are they asking for divestment from a very specific sector of industry, they are also asking the university to reinvest in New Haven, in the community. So, as many other university communities, the relationship between the town and the university can be fraught. That is the case historically, in New Haven, in its relationships to Yale.
I think one of the things that makes the student movement here beautiful is that they’re building coalition with other movements in the city, not necessarily associated with Yale. And specifically asking for the university to reinvest in the community instead of investing in weapons of war. This is very precise and also aligns with what the university has been saying they want to do, right?
So they’re doubling down on the university’s own claims that they want rapprochement with the city, with the town, right? That they want to go beyond the historical tensions between the two entities and do as much as they can to repair those relationships.
Stephanie: Michael brought up this letter, Yale’s Faculty for Justice in Palestine. Faculty for Justice in Palestine, FJP, is an international organization. And that’s how we became in touch with you. Why don’t you tell us about, president Salovey’s initial letter where you’re talking about these tensions between the New Haven community and Yale, and what were some of the problems that the faculty and students had noticed in that letter from the president that then, had you write this public statement as well?
Alex: So, the letter you’re referring to from our president cited the outside agitators. That might not be the exact language they use, but it’s this, very old trope of outside influences on student movements that are usually disruptive.
They’re always portrayed as – I’ve seen it in many other statements from other presidents in other universities this week, right? It’s this idea that the barbarians at the gate will turn, what is otherwise understood by the administration as a peaceful process, into a safety concern.
Now, of course, in the context of New Haven – actually, I would hazard to say that in most of the context, it’s not very far from racist tropes. In our case, it also was very disappointing because, this kind of statement doesn’t help with those of us trying to work with the community in New Haven. Trying to get ourselves involved in helping out with many issues in the town.
Because other community organizations in the town read this and they – yeah, of course, we are, you know, we are the danger. It’s also often used, and in this case, as an excuse, as a safety concern. But it’s not very convincing as an excuse.
First of all, the community organizations that the students did build coalitions with, the day after they got arrested when they were pushed outside of campus grounds, were as you can imagine, very peaceful. Social justice-oriented community organizations working on many issues, from immigration to labor issues. And some right now are involved in pro-Palestinian protests. They were also, just as the students, highly organized, and peaceful.
This is very disappointing to us. And I think it’s one of the motivators, for us to put out a statement. In our Faculty for Justice in Palestine chapter, we tend not to put out too many statements speaking in one voice. Organizing a common voice takes effort, labor, that we’ve been using to support our students. But that one, that statement we felt was necessary, and we came together and put some work into making – into saying something that we all agree.
Stephanie: Yeah. And it’s beautiful, too. The letter must have felt really good to the community and the students to have support from faculty members. I know that, Michael, in your experience in the Free Speech Movement, it was, you know, “No one over 30,” and you were at some odds with professors and other faculty members.
Michael: That “no one over 30” thing came in at the end. But what happened, after some five weeks of protests, there was a stalemate between the students on the one hand, and the administration armed with the local constabulary on the other hand. And so, the issue was really lobbed to the faculty. And at famous vote, the faculty voted in favor, basically, of the student protest, something like 824 to 200.
So, what I’m seeing now, Alex, again, in terms of growth, is that the faculty are on board first. They don’t have to be won over. Is that your perception also?
Alex: Not only the Faculty for Justice in Palestine chapter, but also many other faculty, who don’t necessarily align with our views, have joined us on the ground. There was a Faculty Senate meeting. Many showed up, have joined. There’s a letter being circulated, not that has been signed already, but last time I checked – it was like 3 or 4 days ago, had 200 plus signatures – might probably have, like, 300 by now, or more, I don’t know – have joined us in condemning the arrests and in supporting our students.
I’m relatively new at Yale University. I was at Columbia University for ten years, and apparently I got out right on time. And let me tell you, I am so proud of my colleagues here, and I’m so happy to be here right now. Because all I’ve seen, whether it’s FJP or otherwise, all I’ve seen is an incredible concern, and support for our students, and disappointment in the administration’s handling of this.
Many of us also feel that we’re at an inflection point in the United States relationship to higher ed with pressures that feel at least unique to our moment, even if they’re not 100% new in history. Bearing down on academic freedom of speech, bearing down on the meaning of the university. Who speaks for the university. Who is represented by the university. And even what are we supposed to do at a university, right? Are we here to research, to teach, to build community? These are questions that are being asked.
And particularly, with the level of intensity right now, let’s just say that. And so, faculty also not necessarily aligning with a defense of the Palestinian people, trying to stop the war, feel that too. It’s not only that they care about the students deeply. They do, because I’ve seen it. I’ve witnessed it. It’s also that they care about the future of the university.
Stephanie: Are there any risks for the professors to show their support of this divestment campaign and the Occupy Yale?
Alex: I imagine so, but we’re, you know, we’re relatively smart folks. We’re also organized. So, we manage risk, and we make sure that the most vulnerable members of our group, of our chapter, are protected. We keep them in the green, as we say.
There’s always risk involved in any of these situations. And of course, we’ve seen faculty, trying to remind police officers that they’re professors in the middle of an arrest on the news or on social media. So, no matter how safe you think you are, there’s always risk. There’s always risk. All you can do is manage the risk carefully, thoughtfully.
Stephanie: I just want to explore that risk space for a second, because it seems that, therefore, as faculty, you might have a little bit more safety than students right now because first of all, there’s this kind of cycle of activism, right? Where it’s hard to keep things going at college campuses because the students that are involved eventually graduate and move away.
And so, in a way, it has to be carried on by faculty in some way to continue the thread. But the students, as we know, are also at risk of – at least I know at Columbia’s campus, you can tell us about Yale, but for participating they can be, banned from campus, from continuing the school year, from taking their finals, to being expelled.
And at the same time, then you have, like, the university presidents and administration who are at risk from this kind of political system that’s trying to get them out of their jobs, you know, because of their support for this situation. So, it seems like everybody needs to work together, but everyone’s handling different kinds of risks. Like sometimes they’re pitting you against the administration in a way that, there’s also risks that they’re holding that they also need to address that pit them against you all, you know?
Alex: Yeah, no, that’s very well said. That’s very well said. I’m not going to weep too much for the risk that the executive suite is taking, especially at a private university like Yale, because of the way that the governance structure is set up. And because of the way that this is being handled, where decisions about arrests are like hot air floating towards the top. As time passes by, they float more and more towards the top.
I would say that of all parties, they’re probably a lower risk of anything really catastrophic happening to them, right? It’s interesting with the faculty and the students. It depends. For the most part, students are taking the biggest risk here. At the same time, it’s important to point out, for example, I’ve had a couple of my students that I know are risking deportation if they get arrested, right?
It was funny because it was one of the scenes, one of them was sitting at the edge of the encampment and I had to go and tell them, “Listen, right now, I need you to stand over there in case anything happens. And also, please wear a mask. I don’t want to see a picture of you in any of these things.” This kind of thing, right? So, we have different levels of risk within the students, right? The students are also very savvy. None of them are taking uninformed decisions about their risk that they’re taking.
The vast majority of them understand what the possible consequences of any action are. Whether they’re going to sit in the encampment or not, etc.
With faculty, interestingly enough, we also have faculty who are under risk of deportation, right? So in that sense, they share a higher risk, maybe, than the students even getting arrested.
So, important to consider these kinds of complexities as they play out, right? Also, a faculty who is the sole provider for two kids, and doesn’t have a tenured job is also taking a large risk, right?
So, risk is played out usually at the personal decision level, hopefully. And I’ve seen it that actually, for the most part, it has been that way. After a good understanding, a solid understanding of what those risks. Nobody is pressured to take this or that risk, right? Of whatever peer pressure there is going on, it’s at a very, very, you know, subtle level of psychological level, whatever those pressures are remain fuzzy.
For the most part, everybody is explicitly being given space, whether it’s faculty or students, to make decisions, weighing their own understanding of the situation and their own understanding of their life situation. My understanding is that at other universities where I have many friends all over the higher ed sector in the United States, I’m hearing similar reports.
Michael: Alex, I’m so glad to hear what you just said, because, again, in the Free Speech Movement, you know, the bad old days, there was none of that toleration for individual variation in opinion.
It was very polarized. And you either were with us or against us. And I’m still smarting to this day from insults hurled at me by former friends, because I saw a little bit of a nuance, in some issue or another, which they didn’t see. So, again, that is sounding like a long-term arc of growth in sophistication, which can only be to the good.
Alex: I think so. I have a lot of hope for peaceful movements in – at least in the United States, if this is the arc that we are in, hopefully it continues to be this way. Hopefully, this one succeeds at least in achieving some of the goals. I mean, needless to say, I am so proud of the students.
I’m so proud of their commitment to justice. And I do hope that this university stops investing in weapons of war and reinvests into the community here. The community here needs it.
Stephanie: Hey, everybody. You’re at Nonviolence Radio. We were just speaking with Professor Alex Gil. He’s from Yale University about Occupy Yale and the student movement taking place around the country, particularly around the support for students from an organization called Faculty for Justice in Palestine.
And we want to remind you that community radio plays a very important role in getting up to date information to you about movements around the world. So, do support your local radio station. And in this case is KWMR with a donation to support this show. They’re in their fund drive right now. You can make a donation at KWMR.org.
In this next part of our show, we’re going to turn to Michael Nagler. Michael is with the Metta Center for nonviolence. But before he was your Metta Center friend and your co-host of Nonviolence Radio, news anchor, he was a student at UC Berkeley and a member of the student body during the Free Speech Movement. And these student movements around the country right now are speaking to the past, to those who came before, in the Free Speech Movement and the Civil Rights Movement, in the movement for ending apartheid in South Africa, and so forth.
So, we wanted to talk to Michael about some of his experiences, what he learned, and maybe what he’d like to say to students today. And I’m joined on this interview by our reporter at large, who is visiting our office today, Amery Kessler. So you’ll hear from Amery as well in the discussion with Michael.
So, today, Michael, instead of doing the nonviolence report and being one of the hosts with me, we’re actually going to turn to you for some insights about your experience. So, you were actively involved in this Free Speech Movement at UC Berkeley in 1964. And with the students at Sproul Plaza right now, they are drawing from these legacies of Free Speech Movement, the Anti-Apartheid Movement.
So, you know what it’s like to be a student. You know what it’s like to be a faculty at Berkeley. And you know what it’s like to be a part of a student movement. So, what was it like to be in the Free Speech Movement?
Michael: It was so exciting. It’d be hard to convey that. And I mean not exciting in the frantic sense, but in the very deep sense. We actually thought that that was the revolution. That we were going to change everything. There was no precedent for this, you know, in America, in our generation.
The turnout was, 20,000 students on Sproul Plaza, up on the balconies of the building across the plaza. There was a little bit of loss of focus, shall we say, because people got very excited when they realized that they were being interviewed in the newspaper, and they were in the newspaper.
Stephanie: The media was actually, in a way, like a provocateur in the movement, to get people to go off of the focus of the topic. What was the goal of the Free Speech Movement?
Michael: That is the real question, Stephanie. The original goal was not – what’s the Aristotelian term for this? The spark plug was a measure was going to be passed, Proposition 13, never forget that, which would, ostensibly, be a Democratic thing, which would enable landlords to refuse rentals to anyone they wanted to, would not rent to non-white people, in some cases. Though in Berkeley, a large percentage of the population is Asian. And don’t forget the Civil Rights Movement was going on as we speak. So, we in many cases, felt guilty and frustrated about not being down in Mississippi.
And here was a chance for us to be part of that. And also, be against a real injustice. Now, the problem was that that went out of focus because the issue that provoked it – this is why it’s called the Free Speech Movement and not the anti-racism movement. The university didn’t want us using the plaza for giving speeches over the P.A. because it would disrupt classes. So, it’s very similar to the issue at Columbia and every other campus today.
So, we ended up being angry, or some of us did. And this bothered me very much. We ended up being angry at the administration of the university. And then it spilled over into anger at the faculty, and what you actually had going on was a psychological thing against authority figures.
You have to remember; the world was a dreadful place in the 1950s. It was boring and violent. There was no possibility of fulfillment in a world like that for many people. So, a huge amount of bottled-up frustration and anger was coming out. That energized the movement, but it also put it a little bit out of focus.
And then we got angry at the police for policing the place. We got angry at the sheriff, and the governor. We got angry at the authorities at Santa Rita prison. But on the whole, it was a very, lively and upbeat thing.
Stephanie: I imagine a lot of creativity was part of that movement. Talk about some of the creativity that you saw as part of this?
Michael: You know, in the movement itself, as it was going on on campus, there wasn’t a whole lot of creativity. What you’re seeing is the aftereffects.
Stephanie: I see.
Michael: Which were many and very strong. And so, it really was changing history. And then, of course, we had a map. This is kind of creative. We had a big map of the United States, and it consisted of three lobes. One was Harvard, one was Wisconsin, and one was Berkeley. Those were the three places where it was happening.
And, you know, I can remember some students being alarmed because they were on television and their parents would see them back in New England. We were vilified, viciously. The claim of outside agitators, of course, again, was put up by the university in order to reassure parents that the campus environment was one of hospitality and so on.
And I think we ultimately learned a lot. You see, as the way that University of California governance is structured, an unusually large amount of it does reside in the faculty. And so that comes down to the Academic Senate. And all of this built up to an Academic Senate meeting. And after that, a very large gathering up in the Hearst – in Greek Theatre up on the hill.
Okay. So, we’re at the Academic Senate meeting. I was a part of an organization called the Graduate Student Assembly, GSA. And we had a meeting the day before the Academic Senate meeting was to take place. And people started to plan to boycott the meeting, disrupt the meeting. And we could have done it. We could have kept the faculty out of that building. There would be no meeting.
But, you know, I was kind of a voice of moderation in many ways, throughout the whole thing really. And I got up there and said, “You know, we don’t know what the faculty is going to vote yet, so why protest them before they vote?” which would only make things worse. “But let’s let them know that we are there.”
So, the faculty walked into Wheeler Hall between rows of masked students. And I think we had signs up, but I don’t think we were – we were certainly not jeering them. We were not disrespectful. And we waited outside. And when it came to, the critical vote, should they support the students or not? The vote was in our favor. The numbers were something like 829 to 200, something like that. So, it was a smashing success.
And then that really led to a lot of opening up on the part of the whole university structure. Because part of the problem was, how confining and uncreative and stultifying the degree process, what we called the machine, had become. We felt like you were dropped into a hopper and ground out.
So, this led to the famous speech by Mario Savio where he said, “Sometimes you just have to throw yourself down on the wheels of the machine.” And I would say that the Free Speech Movement was a cultural watershed, and it did lead to some results – not nearly what we had all hoped. We really felt like we should take back the university from the governor and the state. And with the faculty being in some kind of awkward and intermediate place.
But there were some reforms, like the fact that I was able to start the Peace and Conflict Studies program some years later. You couldn’t have dreamed of such a thing before the Free Speech Movement. And of course, Ethnic Studies were a little bit different, but it followed the same pattern. Protest followed by innovation.
Stephanie: It seems like your experience in the Free Speech Movement was emotional for you, and life changing. You talk about how it affected the way that you worked within the university, creating a program later in your career. And knowing you, I know that there are some nonviolent principles that are in what you’ve already spoken about. About your willingness to hear what the faculty had to say.
So, talk about why is this emotional for you. And what have you learned, about nonviolence.
Michael: I really don’t quite totally know why it was so emotional for me. It always has been, incidentally, back then and now. I think because of the incredible hope. You know, sometimes when I listen to, if you’ll pardon the expression, the Jewish national anthem, the Israeli national anthem is called Hatikvah, which means the hope. I get choked up just about that idea.
That, where there is a hope that we could break out of all of this. At the time, of course, that was mainly political. Really, things were very bad. They were as bad as they are now in terms of international politics.
But unfortunately, when you don’t go into something in a mature, considered way, you end up squabbling with the people who are nearest at hand rather than the people who are really causing the injustice.
And I’m happy to say that I think today’s students are much more sophisticated that way. And we were just angry at the administration for not letting us use the plaza to give speeches at.
So, I was shocked – shocked by some of the students who expressed vulgarity toward – remember, I’m about to become a faculty member. I’m the only person that was both a graduate student and a professor in the Free Speech Movement. While it was still going on.
So, that’s my big claim in history. And so, I was shocked by the vulgarity that was expressed towards the faculty and the administration. Because I had no problem with the university. Though it was a bureaucracy, and we were all very – we felt stifled somewhat, by the bureaucracy.
Stephanie: We have our reporter at large here with us. He is still at large, but at the Metta office. Amery, you were just at UC Berkeley yesterday trying to talk with the people in the movement, observing, playing a very important role of providing observation and witness. So, what did you see and let’s bring that into the conversation.
Amery: Yes. I’d love to share. I was happy, or, grateful to go down there and see for myself because I was confused by the messages in different media. What the scene was there at the encampment.
And I had some preconceptions of what to expect. I expected police presence, so I kind of prepared for that, knowing my rights. And reminding myself of best actions or behaviors. I expected a little bit of, say, loud action or maybe even chaos, where I’d be needing to pull people aside in order to hear them, that kind of thing.
And when I arrived, I saw, a lot of what seemed like a typical college campus. No police presence. And then soon at Sproul Hall, I noticed an organized encampment, with a very clearly marked information table. Some signage about the grad student’s message, their list of demands. There were four points.
Another thing I expected to see, or expected to do, was talk with several students. And get different perspectives, different points of view. And I ended up talking with one student that explained very clearly, and this speaks to what you were talking about, Michael, centering the cause. And where was the attention going?
One of the first things that I learned was the efforts the students were making to unify their message and keep the cause centered, not to focus on the students. So that’s how that discussion went. Or I learned from that student their list of demands and their urgency or their prioritization of centering the cause on the people of Palestine.
Stephanie: So Amery was at the UC Berkeley campus. Let’s hear about what those four demands were from one of the media representatives for the movement over at the UC Berkeley campus.
In this clip you’ll also hear a bit of buzzing noise in the background. Now, I think it’s important for you to hear that noise because what it’s representing are drones. It’s the drone noise, it’s representing that drones are constantly flying overhead in Gaza. And this is the noise that they’re hearing every day. They’re blaring that noise over the speakers at UC Berkeley in Sproul Plaza right now to bring that point home.
Student: We have four main demands. The first one is, end the silence. End the silence, as the university has yet to acknowledge that genocide is occurring actively. And it took until just recently for them to even mutter the word ‘Palestinian’ and to acknowledge the number of Palestinian lives that have been lost.
The second is financial divestment. Financial divestment from, we’re looking at, specifically the arms manufacturers. It’s complicated as we’re like a public university, but we are able to track the money and see that the university is investing $2 billion in BlackRock. Which is an investment company that holds ties to things like General Electric, things like Lockheed Martin, things like Boeing. And so that’s one of our demands.
The third is academic boycott. Boycotting Israeli institutions, and their academic ties to Berkeley.
And then the fourth is, stop the repression. Stop the repression of Palestinian student voices, Arab student voices, students who have been speaking out, and have been unable to have their voices heard.
Amery: In asking about the demands, the student that I spoke with listed the demands, and I asked what the reception was from the university. And they were clear, and it was evident, that the university was, in a sense, ignoring them, and that there wasn’t this kind of dramatic conflict happening, at the moment, anyhow.
And they were also told that they didn’t understand what divestment was, divestment from supporting, financially or otherwise, the violence. And from what I could tell, they certainly did understand what divestment meant. And I’d be curious about how – we could all stay curious or just find out for ourselves or have that discussion, do we understand this or not?
There was a relative calm. With keeping the cause centered, and the demands centered, and without there being violent kind of reaction, or action and reaction between the universities and the students, I hope that we end up hearing more and more about what the students’ concerns are and can decide for ourselves.
Stephanie: So how does that land with you, Michael? As a veteran of the Free Speech Movement at UC Berkeley and somebody who cares very deeply about the students at Berkeley. All students, but I mean, these are –
Michael: Yeah –
Stephanie: These are your students, too.
Michael: Yeah, still. Yeah. I am very pleased to hear many of the aspects of what’s going on now. The seriousness about the issue, the lack of, I’m going to use a strong-ish word here, clowning around and clamoring for personal attention and egos – egos showing up.
But I did have an awfully interesting observation while you were speaking, Amery. And that is that I think in the intervening half a century plus, I think the students have learned, and the administration has not. When we were, you know, our movements sagged many times. I mean, it went on for weeks, you know. And we would get sick and tired.
Thanksgiving happened, people went back home, you know, things subsided. And just as they were about to disappear, the administration would make a huge mistake. We called them ‘atrocities’. You know, like they arrested somebody or they, you know, I can’t quite remember what all those things were. They were probably pretty small, but they managed to infuriate us. And guess what? The next morning, there’d be 20,000 of us again out on Sproul Plaza.
So, you know, those were some of the great hopes, and the progress and the disappointments.
Amery: It stood out to me, or I noticed when you spoke of noticing – or at the beginning of this Free Speech Movement, I heard you say, “We thought that was the revolution.”
Michael: Yep.
Amery: So, was that the revolution? Was it the beginning of the revolution? What is there to that?
Michael: Wow. That is really a very, very good question. I would have to say that it, you know, it certainly was not the complete revolution that we’d naively hoped for.
We were going to sweep evil off the map. There was going to be no more racism. None of the three evils wouldn’t happen, you know, that Martin Luther King had articulated in New York. I would say that a certain degree of authoritarianism became unpopular. Because in the end, after the big meeting up at, the Greek Theatre, the students really were vindicated. And the forces of repression that were trying to hold them down looked as bad as they really were.
So, there was an aspect of reinforcing human dignity and creativity and individuality against authoritarianism and rule and regulation living. Which, you know, hasn’t been complete by any means.
Stephanie: And was free speech protected on campuses at that time? Or did the Free Speech Movement play a role in speech being protected on campuses?
Michael: It played a big role. The arrangements were made, not unlike what happened at Columbia, maybe not too – not as far-reaching, where the administration was forced to make concessions. So now, if you go on the Berkeley campus, I was going to ask you if you saw this, Amery, if you walked a little further north from Sproul Plaza, there’s a big area. And in my day, there would be like, oh, maybe 20 tables and people would be tabling and arguing and disseminating information. That wasn’t happening?
Amery: I didn’t see it. Maybe I just did get that far.
Michael: It could also be the wrong time of year for some of that. But I would say that led to a higher level of sophistication among the students. A lot more. And liberalization did happen to some degree. I mean, as I say, I couldn’t have taught Peace and Conflict Studies without the Free Speech Movement having happened.
In fact, that was kind of – it was institutionalized. They started something called the Board of Educational Development, which allowed a faculty member to teach a course on any subject. And then after that course, if it succeeded, in other words, got a lot of students, then you had to go to the Academic Senate and officially the Course – the all powerful Course Committee, on which I even served one time after that, to decide whether it could be regularized and put in a department. Departments had to accept it.
Stephanie: Well, it’s certainly in the popular imagination around the 60s and the movement in the 60s, the Berkeley campus, the Berkeley students. And I think it still appeals to some rebellious academics who want to do their learning at a place where there was that kind of spirit, I think. And so, it is interesting that that spirit continues.
And it also continues to be ignored, or they don’t they don’t show that in the pictures of the 60s. You know, they show this they show the revolutionary spirit, but not what they were up against either.
Michael: Don’t forget that the beatniks and San Francisco was also part of that, opening up, you know, and at a certain point, it loses discrimination. And then there’s going to be kickback from that and repression.
Amery: A couple of things coming to mind, I’d like to ask you about, Michael. And they resonated with a lot that we learn about at Metta Center, in discussions of nonviolence. Media coverage. As I was there at the information table, I noticed a couple of other people with larger cameras and recorders And I overheard one say to the other, “Yeah, I was here last week, and nobody was covering this.” Or they didn’t see anyone covering it. “So, I’m back with a camera and a list of questions”. We talk about how important or strategic it can be to not only have the action, but also have –
Michael: Yeah. This is some – that’s a really good point. This is something that the movement speaking very generally has learned.
I remember arguing years ago with my friends when we were starting things that became nonviolent intervention, you know, nonviolent peace work, that if we have six people on a team, there has to be one person who is the media voice, the coordinator. And I argued for, you know, that person and an intermediate level of writers and then people who are actually in the media. So that you could feed them prepackaged information, it would save them a lot of trouble and get our message out uncorrupted.
I can remember one episode where I was filmed on campus. This is not in Sproul Plaza. On the lawn in front of the library. And someone said, “We want an interview about this.” In fact, I don’t remember what ‘this’ is because it kept on rolling. And I said, “You know, I’m reluctant to be interviewed because I’m afraid that you’ll take one little piece of what I said out of context, and you’ll make me look foolish.”
They said, “No, no, no, we would never do that.” So, I gave him like 20 minutes of, if I may say so, pretty, an insightful interview about, you know, what the issue was. And guess what? They took like 45 seconds, which was enough to make me look like a real fool, and that was broadcast nationally.
Amery: I have to say, Michael, your vision meets my experience decades later. I was there, and that’s what I was saying about. I went to the information tent.
Once they realized I was with the press, or here was Nonviolence Radio, they said, “Let us get you in touch with our media press person.” And that’s where I was waiting, kind of over seeing some of their activity and such.
And then that message was ‘the message’ and the only message, the list of demands, and some of the content. Streamlined. And I said I wonder what other universities, I’m near the Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio. I know we’ve got Sophia at Columbia University, and I asked if there was coordination with other universities or what I might hear if I asked them similar questions. They confidently said, “You’ll hear the same thing.”
Michael: Yeah. Don’t forget, you guys have cell phones and tents, and we had neither of those. I can remember very strongly, Christmas break, going back to New York, and trying to check with what had happened. You know, because then all my friends would come back to the city from their different colleges, and we would check in.
And Berkeley was strongly in the lead at that point. There was a lot of creative expression. In the forms of, print and radio media. And I think we all felt good about that element of it also.
Stephanie: To wrap up, Michael, I think you want to talk directly to the students now and people on campuses now – students, faculty, whoever. Based on your experience at the universities, working with students, being a part of the Free Speech Movement, and working so long with nonviolence, and doing your best to practice it and test it out in your life, give us some tips and tools. What needs to be in place? What could give people hope? Inspire us with some nonviolence.
Michael: I understand that you people, God bless you, are being well organized. Many of the things I’ve heard say to me that you are more mature and sophisticated than we were. So, it is same energy, better aimed, and that is super important.
I would say. Don’t let yourself be pulled off base by ill will, by hatred. Don’t ever express, or if you could possibly prevent it, even feel ill will towards persons. We are against injustice, and we have a powerful justice and a powerful truth on our side.
Secondly, we’ve learned so much since the Free Speech Movement about what nonviolence actually is.
I mean, if I may say so, here we are at the Metta Center with, you know, reams of resources that you can use. And I think you don’t, by in large, neglect the important dimension of learning and understanding and articulating. So that is a great step forward. And I would encourage you in that.
And I just want to wish you every success. Remember, you’re not in this for yourself personally, but for a very great cause. Don’t be afraid to suffer for that cause. And if you do have to suffer suspension, mishandling by the police, whatever, above all, don’t be bitter. This is part of how it works. And we know that now. Everything that we suffer will lead to successful change, as long as we don’t let it, injure ourselves morally, and make us bitter against persons.
Amery: I saw an example of what you were speaking. Not to be distracted or angered by – I don’t know how you said it, adversaries or –
Michael: Opponents.
Amery: Opponents. I saw exactly that. At the information tent, there was some heckling and just awful things being said. In a calm manner, but oddly enough, and with violence. So, from far away it seemed like a fine interaction, but the content was awful. And it was insult to injury. There were students there being of service, standing up for what they believed in, and they did exactly that.
This person eventually left. They recentered with each other, welcomed me and others into the encampment and into the conversation. And I took note of that and had a lot of gratitude for that. Because they passed on that, you know, kind of bait for a violent response or interaction. And it seemed that not only were they clear about not needing to have their personal egos seen, but not having their own personal anger, be a distraction from their service to the cause.
Michael: Things are moving forward in a very good direction. And there have been some disruptions and acts of vandalism. It doesn’t take much of that to spoil the movement. So, I hope that that stops. And I’m very glad that, as far as I know, none of that has happened at Berkeley.
Stephanie: It also makes me think when you’re discussing ill will that there’s this, wonderful statement from Martin Luther King Jr who said when, you know, that he was to blame, the movement was to blame for anger in people.
And he said, what we did, we didn’t lead to outbursts of anger. We expressed anger under discipline for maximum effect. I think every time we say that we always halt when we talk, we harness. We expressed anger under discipline for maximum effect, to really let it sink in. Do you have anything you want to say about that?
Michael: I think that is such a critical lesson. Students often feel helpless and disempowered, and if they could only realize that their very anger was their strength, if they express it in constructive channels.
Stephanie: Hey, everybody. You’ve been here at Nonviolence Radio. We were just talking with Michael Nagler, who’s usually my co-host and news anchor, but today we were interviewing him about his background in the student movement of the Free Speech Movement in the 1960s in Berkeley, and what he has to say to students today.
So a big shout-out and thank you to our mother station KWMR for making this show possible, to Matt Watrous, Robin Watrous, Sophia Pechaty, Annie Hewitt, Amery Kessler, to Professor Alex Gil, to the student movements, to all those working for justice and those who are going to in the future, to all the places that syndicate the show and including our friends over at Waging Nonviolence, thank you very much – to the Pacifica Network and to you, all of our listeners.
Until the next time, please take care of one another. If you want to learn more about nonviolence, go to MettaCenter.org, and we will see you in a couple of weeks.