The student challenges of student activism

The tumultuous events of this past year have prompted a wave of student activism on campus, an increase that asks for a close assessment of student activism at Duke. An event held last week, titled “What is Wrong with Duke’s Activist Culture?,” examined the flaws of Duke’s activism scene, focusing on advice in the spirit of more effective activism. This inwards analysis is timely and important for addressing Duke’s recent scandals but, also, raises questions about our student activism.

Whenever we discuss the efficacy of activism on campus, we should keep in mind significant qualifiers. Duke students face substantial challenges when trying to change the status quo. Unlike society writ large, the University is a place of constant flux. The ebb and flow of students makes mustering and maintaining momentum from year to year extremely difficult. These institutional constraints complicate preserving long-term memory.

These issues are especially important as our attention spans shrink. Issues come and go with alacrity as outlets vie for our attention on the Internet and television. The news cycle, with its exhausting frequency of “Duke scandals,” diminishes the engagement of students as they echo past problems and activist movements for race, campus sexual assault and identity every few years. What is happening now has most likely already happened before, but activists must overcome this fatigue and encourage students to react and feel for these issues freshly.

Further, as campus activism has increased, so has ambiguity about what qualifies as “activism.” Some people use the term without fully diving into it and its background scholarship and, then, there are others who set the bar too high, intimidating other students with hardline positions that alienate them as either fully for the cause or as a part of the problem.

To explore the former, there is a kind of soft activism that has crept into activist culture. Social media has proven itself to be a potent tool for social change, but it can also siphon sincerity from a movement. Sharing articles, photos and changing one’s profile picture are all well and good, but activism they do not make. Effective student activism needs to go beyond the checklist activism of social media and make hearts-and-minds change in others.

Yet, despite these challenges to progress, we have made significant strides because of the efforts of our fellow student activists, past and present. The list of achievements is long. From changing the sexual misconduct policy to sparking conversation about race relations and policy brutality, from renaming Aycock to showing solidarity with Duke’s Muslim community, Duke student activists have managed to make sure progress on long-term issues that cannot be easily fully resolved in a four year career.

So what can we, as students, do to become better activists? In our short time here, we should look to follow through more often, asking how often our conversations and campaigns translate into real effects on others. We also should not have unrealistic expectations for ourselves, given the constraints of our limited time here and the pressures of completing our college education. Overall, we believe we are now better prepared as student activists and engaged citizens than in prior years. There is a silver lining in national media coverage as we turn inwards and question where we stand on contentious issues. Through criticism, from without and within, we have become better advocates and activists.