CSUN Students Deserve Applause for Taking Up the Torch of Protest : Effort to oust a white instructor is misplaced, but youthful warriors are earning their leadership stripes through trial and error. No one should be alarmed or appalled.

On Feb. 21, 1965, when I was 11 years old, I stood huddled outside the Audubon Ballroom in New York City, waiting to gain entrance into what was to become Malcolm X’s last public speaking engagement. With the sound of screams and people pouring from the building, what was to be an inspirational experience for a young girl turned into a nightmare. I learned firsthand about violence, the uncertainty of life and shattered dreams.

I remembered that experience when thinking of recent events at Cal State Northridge, where minority students have made some San Fernando Valley residents nervous.

CSUN’s ethnic rumblings began last year when African American and Jewish students clashed over the presence of Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan on campus.

A few weeks ago, African American and Latino students demanded the dismissal of a newly hired white instructor because of the color of her skin and the fact that she was unable to speak to minority students in the language of the barrio or the ghetto.

Then a coalition of 200 faculty members and minority students marched to protest the reorganization of a $4.5-million program that provides grants and tutorial support to struggling students.

The effort to oust the white teacher was especially sharply criticized and provoked charges of reverse discrimination. And I must say I disagree with the students on this issue.

For some of us, however, the student unrest represents the actions of a new generation of minority students eager to carry the torch of human and civil rights. As with generations of student protesters before them, these youthful warriors will earn their leadership stripes through trial and error.

No one should be alarmed or appalled by what is happening at CSUN. We are a nation that has repeatedly witnessed student movements of all dimensions--from the practical to the engaging to the destructive to the totally outrageous. The fact that these students can protest in a way that encourages reciprocal respect from CSUN President Blenda J. Wilson is an indication that we are witnessing the maturing of tomorrow’s leaders, as opposed to the development of tomorrow’s fanatics.

I was personally and profoundly touched by student protest. In the early ‘70s, as a naive college freshman attending Holy Cross College in Worcester, Mass., I was schooled by upperclassmen who passed on the art of protest with the reverence of bards handing down a celebrated oral tradition.

At that time, student protest meant forcefully establishing your agenda, fighting for a voice in campus policies and defining “turf” in regard to other student groups. Has the definition really changed?

The Holy Cross upperclassmen, who once included the likes of Clarence Thomas, had a track record to prove their point. Prior to my arrival on campus, they had taken over a campus building in protest of the college’s investment ties to South Africa. While the investment question was never resolved, the students won the right to have a black-students-only residence floor, a special black admissions catalogue written and produced by black students, a greater voice in school policy-making and a close relationship with school administrators.

Unlike us, the CSUN students didn’t take over any buildings, destroy any property or make irresponsible statements to the media. Their protest dramatized their passion and sense of purpose--something we middle-aged specimens used to feel, before we embraced the status quo.

But we still have the emotional battle scars to remind CSUN protesters that true empowerment of youth and their ascension to leadership can come only from practice, learning one’s boundaries, engaging others in meaningful dialogue and being engaged.

The minority students at CSUN need to be applauded for their interest in wanting to pick up the torch some of us threw down when we graduated from college and got our first job offer. They need to be encouraged to play a significant role in the debate of issues that impact the lives of all students. We should applaud their ability to protest with clarity, humanity and intellectual rigor, especially when the issues they focus on will make America a more ethnically sensitive place for all of us.

But CSUN students--and all college students--must take the time to learn from the mistakes of those who have gone before them--those who confused honorable protest with advancing personal and self-serving agendas. They must be cognizant that discrimination against a white woman is as unacceptable as discrimination against an African American or a Latino.

History repeats itself, even when it comes to students’ flexing their intellectual and emotional muscles. As long as the CSUNs of this nation have administrators who will not be threatened by the same show of empowerment they themselves exercised in their youth, we should be able to pass the torch with a sense of peace and belief that our communities will survive a little radicalism now and then.