Vowing to Press Their Demands for Affirmative Action Despite Arrests and Decision of One to Drop Out . . . : Strikers Endure

One learned English by reading MAD magazine and jokingly calls himself an academic “nerd.” Another points to the immense popularity of TV’s “Baywatch” as an appalling symptom of what he considers America’s barren moral and social values.

A third is from a small Central Valley town, the first in his family to attend a four-year university.

But now their bellies are empty and grumbling--like the hearts, they say, of some of their fellow Californians.

The Latino college students say the state in which they were born has turned on Mexico, the country of their parents’ birth, and in general on people of color. First, they say, came the passage of Proposition 187 and the Republican Party’s “contract with America.” Then the UC regents voted in July to abolish affirmative action programs.

As a result of the regents’ vote, the students, four from UC Irvine and one from Claremont Colleges, decided to take the extraordinary step of starving themselves--on one of the most politically apathetic campuses in the UC system, in one of the most politically conservative counties in the state.

“We are trying to raise the struggle to another level by appealing to people’s humanity,” said hunger striker Angel Cervantes, a graduate student in history at Claremont Colleges. “Of course, we worry, ‘What if people have no humanity?’ ”

But this week, the physical and emotional cost surfaced: One of the five, UCI student Manuel Galvan, dropped out Monday after fasting for two weeks, succumbing for “health and family” reasons, strikers said.

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Perhaps foreshadowing his withdrawal, the 21-year-old Galvan, a beneficiary of affirmative action, last week talked about his ambivalence toward the extreme act of civil disobedience.

“If the regents would overturn their decision because of our strike, then I would be willing to die,” said Galvan, a biology major with a 3.2 grade-point average.

In the next breath, however, exhibiting the entire group’s skittishness about a premature death, Galvan added: “We don’t know if the regents actually will reconsider their decision. So we will have to weigh our decision to continue as we move along. . . . We don’t want to die for nothing.”

Indeed, if the remaining four quit their liquids-only fast today, the 16th day, and the UC regents still refuse to blink, the strikers would still claim victory.

“People are talking about the issue of affirmative action because of the strike,” said Cervantes, still an avid reader of MAD, which he credits with perfecting his English while he was growing up in a predominantly Mexican American neighborhood in the San Fernando Valley. “I think we have won already.” Cervantes joined the hunger strike as a gesture of solidarity with the UCI students.

The idea of staging a hunger strike came from Cervantes and UCI student Cesar Cruz, who both fasted for three days in February to protest the passage of Proposition 187.

“This strike is a lot more intense,” said Cervantes. “Then, I knew I only had to go three days. With this one, you don’t know when it’s going to end.”

Proposition 187 alarmed the hunger strikers, who were angered over what they regarded as racist attacks on Latinos. The state ballot initiative, which is still tied up in courts, set into motion the student activist groups that eventually brought the hunger strike together. But it was not until an October meeting of a new UCI group called the United Front that the five students decided to stage a hunger strike, believing something dramatic and provocative was needed to spur interest in the issue.

Now, despite their inexperience (news conferences have been called and canceled without notice), the hunger strikers’ story has attracted major coverage from television, radio and newspapers. The strikers’ refusal to honor a deadline to abandon their tent encampment across from UCI’s administration building this weekend also drew hundreds of supporters from around the state.

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With throngs of cameras nearby, they were arrested Sunday in their wheelchairs and later released from jail. On Tuesday, they reaffirmed their demands for affirmative action on the steps of the state Capitol. And they are calling for a day of protest today on all UC campuses.

“I’m overwhelmed by the attention we are getting,” said Juan Cazarez, 21, a UCI student who, according to university officials monitoring the strikers’ condition, has entered the early stages of kidney deterioration because of the fast. “We never really thought it could happen. Now that it has, it’s like a dream.”

If their dream has a voice, it’s Cruz, the 21-year-old UCI student who spearheaded the drive for the hunger strike. Soft-spoken and polite in casual conversation, Cruz lights up in front of an audience, becoming animated in his zeal to erase sexism and racism.

While encamped at UCI, Cruz decried from his wheelchair everything from “the myths of reverse discrimination” to the evils of some TV shows, such as “Baywatch.”

That show “dehumanizes people, treating women like sex objects,” Cruz, who is majoring in women’s studies, Spanish and history, told supporters. “You see this everywhere, and it has to stop.”

Sometimes, Cruz becomes extremely animated.

“Remember 1992 on the streets of L.A.! Prepare yourself for war!” Cruz shouted at a UC Board of Regents meeting in September.

His fellow hunger strikers acknowledge that Cruz can get carried away occasionally but point out that it was Cruz who urged the group to pursue a nonviolent protest.

“He’s a great, fiery speaker,” said Cervantes. “We all admire his intensity and work.”

If Cruz is the group’s voice, Cervantes, at 23 the oldest hunger striker, is the brain. A student of American social movements since World War II, Cervantes tries to incorporate the tactics and strategies of the civil rights movement into the battle for a colorblind America.

But like the other hunger strikers, Cervantes will not condemn violent protest outright.

“We want people to respect the peacefulness of our strike,” he said. “But I was in support of the L.A. riots. That was a form of expression of the community.”

Compared to Cruz and Cervantes, Cazarez and Enrique Valencia are newcomers to protest movements. Their roles in the strike seem more to support than to lead.

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As such, both are regarded as indispensable to the effort, say the strikers. Cazarez, who has lost 25 pounds from his 350-pound frame during the fast, is noted for his silence and decisiveness.

“I can’t stand talking and talking and meetings and meetings,” said Cazarez, a graduate of Buena Park High School. “I just like action.”

Valencia, who is from a small town near Stockton, is the youngest of five children and the first in his family to attend a four-year university. The hunger strike means risking his schooling. Like the other hunger strikers, Valencia is not attending class during the fast.

But Valencia says that friends are helping him keep up with his studies.

“I had to be part of this,” he said. “I feel like it is the gratitude I can show our ancestors, who struggled so much.”

Unlike Cruz and Cazarez, whose mothers are with the strikers, Valencia said that his mother in Mexico still does not know about the fast. She is old, he said, and the news might upset her fragile health.

“You know how mothers can be,” said Valencia, a 21-year-old business and Spanish major.

The mothers of Cruz and Cazarez oppose the hunger strike but cannot persuade their sons to stop.

“I’m so worried about him,” said Cruz’s mother, Martha Gomez, who flew down from a reservation in Yakima, Wash. “But he is a man now.”

No matter what happens next or how much longer the fast goes, the four hunger strikers say the experience has brought them as close together as a family.

“We are risking our lives together,” said Cervantes. “It’s like combat. We are like brothers.”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Holding On

Four hunger strikers remain dedicated to fighting a rollback of affirmative action at the University of California. Their backgrounds:

Cesar Cruz

Age: 21

School: UC Irvine

Major: Spanish, history, women’s studies

Quote: “My mother is here, and I don’t want to die. But I’m prepared to go as long as it takes for social justice.”

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Enrique Valencia

Age: 21

School: UC Irvine

Major: Spanish and business

Quote: “If this was a colorblind society, I wouldn’t see any need for affirmative action. That would be great. But it’s not that way, and we need it.”

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Juan Cazarez

Age: 21

School: UC Irvine

Major: Spanish

Quote: “I think nonviolence is stronger than violence. I think when you get violent, people back off.”

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Angel Cervantes

Age: 23 (celebrated 23rd birthday during fast)

School: Claremont Colleges, graduate student of history

Area of study: American social movements since World War II

Quote: “We are trying to raise the struggle to another level by appealing to people’s humanity. Of course, we worry, ‘What if people have no humanity?’ ”

Researched by MARTIN MILLER / Los Angeles Times