Our Fight is Marching on!

[Sung to the tune of Glory Glory Hallelujah]

Harvard's Dining Halls are empty
For its workers are on strike
They are marching for fair wages
And against the healthcare hike
and for regular employment
They have now begun to fight
The Union's marching on!

[Refrain]
Harvard's wages are outrageous
Loss of benefits contagious
But we will remain courageous
Our fight is marching on!

Wealth and poverty are side by side
but our com-mun-ity is tight
Students, workers, and professors are now taking up the fight
other places pay much lower
but it doesn't make it right.
Give in our to our demands!

[Refrain]
Harvard's wages are outrageous
Loss of benefits contagious
But we will remain courageous
Our fight is marching on!

While negotiations stall
The endowment's climbing higher
They don't have to pay no taxes
'cause they're smart as Donald Trump
but they know the world is watching
As they hoard up all their cash
and let the workers starve.

[Refrain]
Harvard's wages are outrageous
Loss of benefits contagious
But we will remain courageous
Our fight is marching on!

Written for my union brothers and sisters who are striking for sustainable wages and benefits.

We Are All Harvard University Dining Services Workers

When the HUDS workers announced a strike to fight for sustainable wages and healthcare I felt a surge of renewed energy. Why? I’m not a dining services worker. I have worked for 22 years in the library system as part of HUCTW (Harvard Union of Clerical and Technical Workers), which recently accepted a concessionary contract with 25% increase to our healthcare co-pays. HUCTW did successfully bargain against even worse proposed health care increases that were forced upon Harvard’s professional non- unionized staff: http://openharv.freeforums.net/. Though I have no children, and a higher salary than the average dining services worker, I have to budget very carefully to make ends meet, factoring in the high cost of living in the Boston area, and a hefty student loan debt from my undergraduate and two Master’s degrees. I also have crohn’s disease, a chronic illness, which I have managed successfully, thanks to my health benefits. I am a little apprehensive about the coming healthcare increases in January. I can’t imagine what an enormous burden these cuts to healthcare would be to a dining hall worker who makes less money than I do, and perhaps has a family, a chronic illness, or student loan debt, because…surprise! …they too have aspirations for themselves and their families.

Reading the press releases and the spin put on salary negotiations by the university has been rather disappointing. Saying the burden of the increasing cost of healthcare should be “shared” between the employees and their powerful, wealthy employer implies there is an equal partnership. Taking on the increased cost of healthcare would not really be a financial burden to Harvard, but it would be a severe financial burden to the relatively poorly compensated dining hall workers. Comparing Harvard’s salaries to employers in the private sector who pay even less is a reversal in the image Harvard generally maintains. As a university its peers are other Ivy Leagues, but as an employer it is proud to be better than the lowest paying employers? Harvard’s non-profit tax status should more than make up for the increased cost of healthcare for employees. According to a 2014 article in NY Magazine, if you took away Harvard’s tax exempt status, it would owe the state of Massachusetts 80 million a year. (http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2014/09/take-away- harvards-nonprofit- status.html).

We are all workers performing different essential functions as part of the Harvard ecosystem. No one at Harvard is more important than anyone else. Some of us have more power or opportunities for reasons having more to do with privilege than hard work, merit or intelligence. Some people cook and put food on the table for a living. All of us need food on the table to sustain our lives. We are all students. Some of us are now, have been, or will be in the future. We learn just as much from being part of a community as we do from attending a university. Right now the Harvard dining hall workers are giving us a lesson in standing up for one’s beliefs, and speaking truth to power. There is a great deal at stake for them, and coordinating a strike to fight for better wages and benefits takes great courage. They are standing up for themselves with a powerful and unanimous spirit.

Clerical workers, professors, and even most professional administrative staff have more in common with the dining hall workers than they do with the handful of administrators who make the financial decisions about salaries and wages. Many of the professional staff publically objected to the increased financial strain the cuts to health benefits would impose on them and their families. Without a union they have sustained even worse cuts to their health benefits, which is minimally offset by their salaries, and the prestige of their positions. We all get sick, we all have families to support, and lives to sustain, that is what motivates us to work hard, and aspire to better things.

When I was an undergraduate at Cornell, President Frank T. Rhodes often spoke about “nurturing” the students. “Nurturing” is an appropriate word to describe the role dining hall workers have played in our community. They provide food, and they are a caring presence to the students and the staff. At the rally Wednesday evening one student described how dining hall workers made sure she got her food when her leg was in a cast, and I heard countless similar stories. Now they are giving us an important life lesson. Sustainable wages and good health care are worth fighting for, and they are leading the charge.

Where is the Love?

Recently I have felt overwhelmed by the violent events in the media, though I know that as an individual there is very little I can do about it. I've often avoided re-posting stories that have violent content or graphic pictures, constructing a narrative of my own life, more than my opinions on events beyond my control. That changed this week when I saw the viral story of the murder of Philando Castile, a hard working man in a loving relationship going about his evening errands with his girlfriend and her child.

Though I am bi-racial with a black father and a white mother, and am in a relationship with a white man, when I saw this woman, Lavish Reynolds calmy live streaming the horrific murder by police officer of her partner, I thought of myself and the bonds that connect us to one another. I did not see just another unarmed black man being shot dead by a police officer, I saw a woman losing the man she most loved and treasured in her life. There are so many obstacles and challenges to finding healthy loving relationships. I thought about how the bonds of trust and love we forge as individuals can be shattered and torn apart in an instant by an encounter with empowered fear and hate. I could not stop thinking about Philando Castile. He was not criminal with a record, and even if he was, he did not deserve to be executed at a random traffic stop. He had a good job, was well respected, and abided by the second amendment, the right to bear arms with a permit. He was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, driving while black.

At times like these I really feel helpless to do anything to change society, except to do my part, love my neighbor, my friends, my family, and speak out when I see injustice. Today my boyfriend and I took a walk in the woods in Concord, near Henry David Thoreau's cabin in the woods, and I mused to him that I would just like to remove my mind from the chaos and focus on beauty and nature instead. I understand why some people want to live "off the grid." Would it serve society better if we could each go off into our own little cabins in the woods and pray for humanity, living lives of prayer, sustainable gardening, and quiet contemplation? Unfortunately, or fortunately, the stages of life, infirmity, and old age do not make living in isolation feasible. We need each other's care, attention, and love.

So, while there are no simple answers, the most powerful thing we can do is make a choice within ourselves not to be an agent of evil and hate. Racism is a societal construct, but it has a very real and pernicious power to destroy society. When faced with a choice, look within, and always choose love, even if it is not easiest choice.