Students for freedom
I found this picture care of facebook. It shows a recent student protest (19th of March) in favour of retaining freedom of association and in favour of repudiating compulsory collectivism. Well done to all those involved in this event defending voluntary student unionism (VSU).
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Shame on the guy with the third (green) pen. The picture would otherwise have shown remarkable decentralised coordination.
Where were these guys when I was at uni! Nice work.
I guess they’re the liberal students. The ALSF was always big on VSU – we ran lots of campaigns on it, back in the day. Thought it was all over – guess not. Always thought VSU was the best thing the Howard government did – not that there was a long list to pick from….
Personally I think Abbott & Costello were beyond the pale in wasting the H of R’s time to pass this silly piece of legislation just to score a point left over from their university days. Of course universities should be able to charge compulsory student activity fees. Every other university on the planet does it; even the University of Chicago!
They should charge about $750 per student per annum, but make it able to be added onto HECS debts. Our campuses already suffer far too much from Canberra’s micro management.
is this Tim Andrews, Terje?
Pommy – he should be in amoungst it there somewhere. You will recall he visited our APEC rally.
John there’s quite clearly a difference between university operational fees and a student union.
My experience of the union at my uni was as follows:
When I was at uni I was forced to monetarily support a whole lot of leftist political crap such as banning Nestle products (believe it or not), campaigning against VSU, racist/sexist equal opportunity campaigns, paying for student union election propaganda and other nonsense.
The union staff were corrupt and used to favour clubs which they were associated with so they could buy more beer for themselves.
I strongly opposed their political opinions and actions but had no choice but to cough up my union fee or else I would be automatically un-enrolled from uni and therefore fail my classes.
Why should I pay for some social club full of losers to buy beer? What’s this got to do with operating a uni?
Apparently the union was subsidising the cost of food on campus. (something I also didn’t want). However it was still cheaper for me to drive down to the shopping mall and buy my lunch there. Most of the businesses that did try to set up at the uni (encouraged by subsidies) went bankrupt. It was quite sad to watch. Some survived such as 7/11 type stores and I’m sure they are still there without the union’s dirty money and doing very well.
The union were not only useless, they were harmful to the majority of students. The things I did use such as the employment advice service, (which also turned out to be useless) I would have happily paid for as opposed to the hundreds of dollars a semester that I was forced to give to hyperactive left wing morons with no friends wearing stupid political propaganda T-shirts that I was forced to pay for ie: the student union staff.
I agree about pre VSU. At ANU, the Darts Club was a rort by John XXIII College, and fellow Johns boys and myself considered a “Margaret Thatcher Appreciation Club” – one poster of Maggie, nothing else about her and $1000 per year funding for kegs.
What TimR said…
I detested the student’s union in my uni days – it was an absolute waste of money. They subsidised student supplies shop/kiosk – but it was still more expensive than just getting your stuff from k-mart.
Drinks were cheaper at the uni bar, but that’s about it.
Next you’ll be asking for students to pay their own way!
Thankfully, the fascist Tibetans have revealed their true colours, and the People’s Chinese Republic is steadfastly refusing to give in! Come on, Students, rally around the red flag! We need the NSU so we can support Communism everywhere!!!
At least these days you’re not supporting ’causes’.
Yeah and if you got a picture of the anti VSU crowd it would be about 50 times larger than that.
I remember walking through campus watching a guy with a microphone shouting that the government was taking away the freedom of association.
Yeah, but that because socialists seem more inclined to be activists. Taking away freedom of association?… Scary when people think in slogans without thinking things through.
The student money in my uni (UWA) sent our guild fees to the PLO and Hamas.