A Tactic Outlives Its Time

The kids on the phone were sincere. They are set to stage a hunger strike next month on Olvera Street as part of a worldwide action to oppose Proposition 187 and other anti-immigrant measures.

College students also will fast in San Diego, Chicago, Mexico City and London, beginning on Feb. 16.

“We want to focus attention against Proposition 187,” explained Angel Cervantes, who is pursuing a master’s in history at Claremont Graduate School. “We feel there are a lot of (immigrants) who are scared, who don’t get proper information. They don’t know what’s the truth, who to trust. We want to help them.”

I felt good as the students talked about their protest because it was an outgrowth of Latino opposition to Proposition 187. I agree with those who say the measure, although approved by the voters, is bad public policy that must be defeated in the courts.

But there was also something unsettling. It kept bothering me until I figured out what it was.

It’s the unwise idea of yet another hunger strike.

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For many years, the hunger strike has been a powerful tool for Latinos in the struggle for social and political justice. Cesar Chavez staged several of them to further the cause of farm workers.

In one such action in 1968, Chavez refused to end it despite the pleas of close associates. Eventually, the late Robert F. Kennedy talked him into eating again with this: “We need you to lead the struggle. If you die, you can’t.”

The UFW as a result gained public support, more members, and better pay and working conditions for workers.

That led to the wide use of hunger strikes. In 1993, Chicano students at UCLA fasted for 14 days to push for the creation of a Chicano studies department. They didn’t get that, but the administration’s agreement to strengthen the existing Chicano studies program and name it after Chavez was hailed as a victory by the students.

So, it wasn’t a surprise that the students on the telephone wanted to use a hunger strike, a largely symbolic gesture since it will last only three days, to oppose Proposition 187. They also want, among other things, to persuade the United Nations to recognize human rights violations against immigrants in this country and set education as a national priority.

I felt uneasy as I listened because I think the time for hunger strikes has passed.

This is a new day and, unfortunately, the general public isn’t in a mood to be moved by anyone fasting. The 59% vote in favor of Proposition 187 indicates that. The drive to do away with affirmative action in California is further evidence.

Frankly, my cynical side thinks the public won’t shed too many tears if someone does die. It might spark a protest or a short-term solution, but I suspect the public isn’t in the mood to care. It wants a streamlined government with less “privileges” for the poor and minorities. It doesn’t care about fasting people who seek justice.

Some have similar misgivings, but they aren’t ready to turn away from hunger strikes.

Rodolfo Acuna, a Chicano Studies professor at Cal State Northridge, thinks hunger strikes are an effective political tool but admits that there are risks.

“(The students) should have a hunger strike as long as the intent is not to go more than three days,” he explained. “At age 62, isn’t it my failure and my generation’s that they must have a hunger strike? I’m still trying to build some kind of alternative, but it’s a very thin line. I think about those thin lines. . . . There’s going to be a Rush Limbaugh type running an institution who will say, ‘If they want to starve themselves to death, let them.’ ”

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I guess I’ve lost my zeal for hunger strikes because they can’t sustain long-term attention to problems. The students at UCLA are still squabbling with campus administrators over the pace of change in Chicano studies there. And the UFW gains fought for under Chavez in the 1960s and ‘70s are largely gone.

There’s also the personal toll of such actions. Chavez’s parents lived well into their 90s, but his health was affected by his continual fasts. When he died in 1993, he was only 66.

Chavez would have been a powerful voice against Proposition 187. He would have kept up the fight after its passage in the courts and in voter registration drives. Also, he probably would have fasted.

He was the greatest hero Latinos have had in this century, an enduring symbol of the continuing struggle we must wage in this country. I also think he died too soon, a victim of his own tactics.