Features, Page 4
Cambodian Student Association performs in TSU Since 1960 Volume 86, Issue 43
Daily Titan
Tuesday April 22, 2008
The Student Voice of California State University, Fullerton
DTSHORTHAND Mock gunman event this Friday Cal State Fullerton University Police, along with the CSUF administration, is preparing to conduct their first Active Shooter and Shelter in Place test drills this Friday. University Police will use Connect-ed, a mass communication tool to inform students and faculty of the test drill that will include a mock police response to a mock gunman on campus situation. A full preview of the drills will run on Thursday’s issue of the Daily Titan.
“Phonathon and Faxathon” event
On Monday, April 28 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. an event will be held in the Central Quad called a “Phonathon and Faxathon.” The Alliance for the CSU will be holding the event in order to send messages to Governor Schwarzenegger and the legislators in protest of the proposed budget cuts. Similar events will be taking place over the campus during the following few weeks, on all 23 CSU campuses. There will be phone scripts, cell phones and fax templates available at tables during the event. The goal is to get hundreds of students, faculty and staff to send the message to the government that the CSU is the solution to the state’s economic crisis. According to a press release, the goal of the Alliance for the CSU is to fight these cuts through campaigns. For more information visit www.allianceforthecsu.org.
Man stuck in elevator for 41 hours, recorded NEW YORK (AP) - A timelapse video of a man trapped in an elevator for 41 hours has become something of an Internet sensation when surveillance camera footage emerged after nearly a decade. "After a certain period of time I knew that I was in pretty big trouble because it was the weekend," Nicholas White said. Video of his Oct. 15, 1999, ordeal in an elevator in New York's McGraw-Hill building was posted online to accompany an article in the April 21 edition of The New Yorker. It can be seen on the magazine's Web site. It had been viewed more than 280,000 times on YouTube by Monday morning. White said he understood why the video has captured people's attention: So many have wondered what they would do if it happened to them. Edited to classical piano music, the video shows him pacing, trying to climb the walls, lying down, curled up in a fetal position, prying apart the doors. (He said he relieved himself down the shaft when the doors were open.) White sued the managers of the midtown skycraper and the elevator maintenance company and won an undisclosed settlement.
WEATHER tuesday Mostly Sunny/ High: 69, Low: 52
wednesday Partly Cloudy / High: 68, Low: 52
thursday Sunny/ High: 74, Low: 54
friday Sunny / High: 82, Low: 57
saturday Partly Cloudy/ High: 85, Low: 58
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Taking their causes to another level Activists talked about a myriad of topics at the Social Justice Summit By ERIC BARTOLOME
Daily Titan Staff Writer news@dailytitan.com
Two poetry artists and political activists addressed over 500 students at the Social Justice Summit at Cal State Fullerton. Keynote speakers Suheir Hammad and Staceyann Chin, who have both appeared in the HBO TV series “Def Poetry Jam,” performed spoken-word poetry for a crowd of college students, high school students, family and community members. Hammad and Chin were chosen to inspire the audience to take action against social injustice. One day removed from a New Orleans visit, Hammad, a Palestinian-American poet, spoke to the audience of inquisitive citizens and aspiring activists. As she spoke, Hammad brandished yellow-painted fingernails, which she said she wore to remind herself of the Louisiana struggle. She called out to different people in the crowd, asking them to define the term “Social Justice.” She then gave a spoken word poem, telling of her recent experience in New Orleans. “I brought with me an innocence I didn’t even know I possessed,” Hammad said. “Until I left it in the toxic streets in New Orleans.” Students Advocating Civic Transformation (ACT) sponsored the fourth annual Social Justice Summit, which took place in the Pavilions and multipurpose rooms in the Titan Student Union. Saturday’s Summit offered attendees the opportunity to sit in on three of 24 workshops. The workshops were led by refugees, teachers, students and other leading activists, who spoke on a broad range of topics, ranging from “Hunger and Poverty and the American Promise: Waging a War to Live” to “Animal Rights and Vegetarianism.” The day began at 9 a.m. with the showing of a YouTube video called “Miniature Earth.” The video showed various statistics, indicating what the world would be like if it was scaled down to 100 people. According to the video, if the world was scaled down to 100 people, 43 people would be living without basic sanitation and six people would hold 59 percent of the community’s wealth. The video also gave a sta-
Second keynote speaker Staceyann Chin tells her story in front of an audience at Cal State Fullerton during Saturday’s Social Justice Summit.
tistic showing that those who have food, clothes, a bed and a home are richer than 75 percent of the world’s population. Volunteer and Service Program Coordinator Amy Mattern opened the event, saying that the attendees of the Social Justice Summit would “learn about social injustices” and would also find an outlet to affect change. Freshman art major Rhoda Jien sat in on the workshop titled “Real World Solutions to End ModernDay Slavery and Human Trafficking.” In the workshop she was surprised to hear the story of a slave who was discovered in Irvine. The child had been illegally trafficked into the U.S. and was working as a slave for a family. “It was very eye-opening because I didn’t know that there was slavery in the U.S.,” Jien said. The workshops continued until 2:45 p.m. It was interrupted for a short time, as participants took a
break for a resource fair and a vegan lunch. Sophomore business major Roshan Patel attended a workshop on education reform. Patel felt empowered to take action after being confronted with statistics on the high number of high school dropouts. “It made me sad that our students aren’t being prepared for the challenges that they’re going to face in their future,” Patel said. Chin, a Jamaican national and lesbian activist, closed the day reading memoirs and performing haiku and poems. Speaking without a microphone, Chin lifted her voice to fill the auditorium. She flailed her arms as she ran and leaped through the crowd. Her poetry expressed personal stories like her first menstrual period, her love for jazz music and her sexual experiences. She spoke candidly on topics such as vaginas, artificial inseminaSee SOCIAL JUSTICE, Page 3
By ANDREW LIU/For the Daily Titan
Scrutinizing the issues An understanding of the conflicts in the world may lead to solutions By Juliette funes
Daily Titan Staff Writer news@dailytitan.com
During the Social Justice Summit on Saturday, several workshops were held to discuss the important social issues that are happening worldwide, including genocide, the Iraq War and gay issues. The topics addressed issues people should know about and the event is meant to prompt others to ask why certain conditions exist in the world, said Amy Mattern, the program coordinator for the Volunteer and Service Center.
In a workshop called “Genocide and Sudan,” John Gak, a Sudanese refugee, told his story of being a “lost boy.” Gak was one of 27,000 orphaned and displaced young men, also known as “lost boys,” who traveled from Sudan to Ethiopia to Kenya by foot to escape the genocide Sudan was undergoing. Facing disease and starvation, they ate mud and drank urine. Still, only 12,000 were able to survive the five-year exodus. “I fled for my life. I had no idea where I was going. I didn’t want to die around my parents,” Gak said. With the Sudanese people still in hardship, Gak asked, “Why are we still fighting while people are still enjoying their lives?”
See CONCERNS, Page 3
Students make a ‘shock and awe’ statement A CSUF student activist group falls to the ground as a symbolic gesture By Paul Aranda Jr.
Daily Titan Staff Writer news@dailytitan.com
Students activists gave an unexpected lesson in U.S. foreign policy to students, making their way to and from classes in the Humanities Building on Monday afternoon. At 12:45 p.m. approximately 15 members of Students for Peace and Social Justice gathered in front of the building and suddenly collapsed to the ground as two other members began to urge confused students to get involved in efforts to end the war in Iraq. The motionless students on the ground represented both U.S soldiers and Iraqi civilians killed during the five-year-long conflict. Adriana Cortes, a 19-year-old Cal State University Fullerton political science major, said the demonstration was meant to place a spotlight on an issue the group feels has been placed on the back burner. “We not only want to bring awareness to the war in Iraq, we want to call students into action,” Cortes said. The group members used their brief 10 minutes of attention to voice their opinions on the benefi-
By Nicole Padilla/For the Daily Titan Representing those who have been killed in the Iraq War, the Students for Peace and Social Justice fall to the ground in front of the Humanities Building.
ciaries and victims of the war. The members pressed students to take action in order to stop what they called an unjust and illegal war. One of the members who spoke during the demonstration was Carlos Amador, a 23-year-old CSUF
human services major. The war is unjust not only because it causes innocent people to lose their lives, but also because the soldiers who are sent to war are not provided the proper support they need once they come home, Amador said.
Students exiting and entering the building had looks of confusion over why students were laying motionless on the ground. The only resemblance of interaction between the group and students came at the the end of the demonstration as members gathered in a
circle and chanted “No more war.” A male student shouted back, “More war,” drawing several laughs from onlooking students. The noontime demonstration ended soon after and the courtyard quickly returned to its normal scene See DEMONSTRATION, Page 2