Delegates vote to oust de Russy

UUP delegates asked their union to seek the immediate removal of Candace de Russy from the SUNY Board of Trustees.

In a Feb. 4 Newsday article, Trustee de Russy characterized black studies departments at America’s universities as “flabby, feel-good programs that carry anti-American bias and do little to advance hard knowledge.” Delegates attending the union’s 2002 Winter Delegate Assembly in Albany resoundingly adopted a resolution that urges UUP to “condemn the ignorance, bigotry, intolerance and anti-Americanism inherent in Trustee de Russy’s public comments” and to convey to SUNY and state lawmakers the union’s “strong condemnation of such unacceptable behavior.”

The resolution — which was submitted by the union’s statewide Affirmative Action Committee — received a standing ovation from the 267 delegates in attendance.

UUP President William Scheuerman responded to the Newsday article in a letter to the editor: “The trustees have tried to force-feed SUNY campuses their Euro-centric vision of society and a one-size-fits-all approach to higher education since they took office in the mid-1990s. In so doing, they thumbed their noses at academe’s time-honored principles of academic freedom and shared governance, while ignoring the historical realities of our civilization.”

Stony Brook UUPer William McAdoo summed it up best for delegates. “I think de Russy has to go and we have to make it our task that she go,” he said. “She is the ‘un-American.’ She is the bigot. ... She is an embarrassment to our system, our state and our nation.”

Sweatshop realities

Keynote speaker Charles Kernaghan, executive director of the National Labor Council (NLC), believes there will never be peace in the world without social justice.

In his impassioned address to delegates, Kernaghan rattled off dozens of worker and human rights injustices around the globe, from China and Bangladesh to El Salvador and American Samoa.

“There is such greed in this global economy that it’s frightening,” Kernaghan said. “It’s beyond imagination.”

Among the alarming facts:

• Women working in El Salvador are paid 29 cents for each Nike NBA jersey they make; the shirts have a retail value of $140 in the U.S.;
• There are 3,500 factories in Bangladesh and no worker unions; and
• The $29 billion toy industry produces 3.6 billion toys a year. Seventy-five percent of the toys are made in China, where women and children work 101 hours a week to earn $12.14.

— Karen L. Mattison