The Cornell Daily Sun (https://cornellsun.com/author/nickwilson/)
Instead of reviewing other areas of its supposedly-meager spending budget, Cornell has decided to find out how well the University functions without the people who take out the trash, mow the grass and cook the food on our campus.
“Yet there is no avoiding time, the sea of time, the sea of memory and forgetfulness, the years of promise, gone and unrecoverable, of the land almost allowed to claim its better destiny, only to have the claim jumped by evildoers known all too well, and taken instead and held hostage to the future we must live in now forever. May we trust that this blessed ship is bound for some better shore, some undrowned Lemuria, risen and redeemed, where the American fate, mercifully, failed to transpire.” — Thomas Pynchon ’59
When Cornell’s encampment is uprooted tonight, green and yellow patches of deadened grass will remain on the Arts Quad for some time — subtle discoloration indicating that at some point, something was here. After a few weeks at most, the grass will be mowed and grown anew, removing this temporary imprint. In three years, virtually all of the undergraduates who experienced life within our Liberated Zone will have graduated. Soon enough, our story will be reduced to the same vague murmurs of disquiet that eventually subsume all student protest movements.
Do not look away from Gaza, and let your shock at such images drive you to action — not despair. Direct action against our University’s material support for the Israeli occupation is a moral necessity given the gravity of what we are up against.
As of today, we have been withdrawn from all of our current courses, for which we may not receive credit, and we are not permitted to be on our campus (pending an unspecified grace period). As a resident of Mennen Hall, I have also been evicted from my home on campus.