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Volume 38 Issue 2
September 19, 2000

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The Fading of the Student Protester

BY J.W. WATSON
MESA LEGEND
Submitted September 19, 2000

If the pendulum ever swings back to a more heightened sense of activism among college students, as MCC history instructor and Vietnam veteran Jesus Peralta suggests it eventually will, the student protesters of tomorrow will be chanting far less romantic and poetic cadences than "Hell No! We Won’t Go!" and "Make Love, Not War!"

Instead, what you may hear is, "We want our bilingual education!"

Intriguing — but not inspirational.

"The 1960s were just a very unique time. I think today’s students are a lot more self-centered than we were back then," said Peralta, awarded three Purple Hearts from two tours-of-duty in Vietnam.

"We are at peace, and the economy is really good. Students today have to be really passionate to become involved."

After his time in Vietnam, where he was wounded twice in ’66 and ’69, leaving him now with a total hip replacement, Peralta began protesting alongside the United Farm Workers of Monterey, Calif., who were fighting for better pay and working conditions initiated by Chicano civil rights leader Cesar Chavez.

Jim Allen/MESA LEGEND

Today, in his Chicano History class, Peralta said his students ask him why Chicanos are not as militant as they were in the ’60s.

"In return, I look at them and ask, ‘Why aren’t you more involved?’ When I became involved with the United Farm Workers, there was a sense of pride and passion in what we were doing. I think today there’s a sense of complacency among students.

"It’s not that there isn’t a cause — it’s that students don’t care enough to find it."

With voter turnout among 18- to 25-year-olds at an all-time low for the 1996 general election, fellow MCC instructor Allen Meyer, a political science adjunct faculty member, agrees that there are many issues which should concern students, but are falling by the wayside due to the boom of the U.S. economy and lack of a Vietnam or Cold War.

"What college students wanted in the ’60s is not what they want today. Making money is the priority today," said Meyer, who worked in the Office of Budget and Management in Washington, D.C., from 1968 to 1985.

"You have a situation in the ’90s where job opportunities are pretty good, and students are far more cynical about their role in politics to pay any attention to anything other than the economy."

Meyer added that issues such as tax cuts, and cutting public services and public funding are not ones that will generate "any real radicalism" among college students.

Peralta believes that issues such as religious freedom, immigration and maintaining bilingual education could be the next movement of student protesters.

"If you look at the history of this nation, there’s always been cycles," Peralta said.

"And, right now, we may very well be in that phase of consolidation and conservatism."

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