City College welcomed the first day of May with a “speakout” organized by M.E.Ch.A, Students for Justice in Palestine and Students for Housing Justice in the MS quad.
May Day demonstrations are scheduled around the country and the world to mark International Workers Day, including in San Diego with multiple events scheduled throughout the day.
The event’s flyer highlights issues of trans rights, affordable housing and deportation. Students and faculty will speak, read poetry and perform teatro.
Live Updates
11:46 a.m., Leon Nelson III
Vice President of Students for Housing Justice Alanna Rountree told the crowd of roughly 75 people she’s protesting in hopes of creating a safer place for unhoused students.
“20% of students in our district face housing insecurity and not knowing where they are going to sleep each night,” Rountree said.
Students for Housing Justice is a new student organization at City College. It plans to sponsor workshops and write resolutions supporting unhoused students, according to Rountree.
12:16 p.m., Danny Straus
Professor Manuel Paul Lopez read “Last Poem of December.” He said the poem contrasted the joy of the holidays with the suffering unfolding in Gaza. The poem is inspired by famous Palestinian poet Eva Bunara and Peruvian poet Blanca Varela.
“A solemn voice thinks of loss when 1000 tongues are sewn to silence, shuttered eyes like abandoned library windows that no longer offer their impeccable light,” Lopez read.
12:30 p.m., Dwight Byrum, Leon Nelson
International Workers Day traces its roots back to the Haymarket Riots of 1886.
“May Day began as working-class people coming together to go on strike about the eight-hour work day,” Chicano Studies professor Justin Akers told the crowd. “Seven members of the original strike were arrested and killed due to a bomb going off in the crowd.”
Engineering student Venegas, who asked to be referred to by his last name, explained what brought him to the event.
“I made a promise to myself that any chance I get I would use my person to speak out for the rights of undocumented people and this is a great opportunity to do so,” Venegas said.
12:45 p.m., Jay Yepez, Connor Jewett
1:30 p.m., Tresean Osgood, Blaze Bailey
Actors from the Chicano theater group Teatro Voices performed lines from a play they have been rehearsing. The perfomance was an adaptation of a Vietnam War-era story about a soldier who loses faith in the government that has sent him to fight.
Performer Erik Montij hopes their performance is seen as more than just anti-war propaganda.
“I want to use theatre to get the message across,” Montij said. “To me, this is not just an anti-war message. This is for the Chicano community to say, ‘enough is enough.’”
The main character, Johnny, played by Eddie Alcazar, gets deployed to Gaza. While there, he begins to question the morality of the U.S. Government as he sees the destruction it causes.
He warns his loved ones he’s been fighting for selfish gains. When he is killed in action, his family weeps for the son they lost to a senseless war.
1:36 p.m., Javier Hernandez
ICC President and M.E.Ch.A. member Sergio Montiel addressed the crowd before speaking to City Times on the importance of the “Speakout.”
“We’re trying to bring awareness to worker’s rights,” Montiel said, “and as well, bringing the intersectionality of worker’s rights are human rights, and human rights are everyone’s rights.”
Montiel wants to hold our government and campuses accountable and ensure that free speech and the rights of students are protected.
“We want to be able to know that when we transfer to these campuses, we will be able to speak freely and that they will support us in that cause,” Montiel said.
