Activism on Campus

At UC Irvine, its difficult to walk to classes without seeing some group on campus protesting whatever issue is on the menu for the week. Students are constantly getting handed flyers or pamphlets that get thrown into the nearest trash can. The everyday solicting can lead to desensitizing the students. It becomes more bothersome that one begins to ignore solitors regardless to the issue or event at hand.

A major issue with solitciting on campus is that groups tend to falsely advertise their purpose. Last Fall quarter there was an exhibit in the MSTB parking lot advertised as a glimpse into the life of an African child with AIDS. Students partipcated in an interactive experience in which they were given a role as a poor child affected by AIDS. They were shown where the child sleeps, weapons they were forced to use, and what they ate. Although it appeared that the purpose of this exhibit was to emphasize the hardship that African children had to endure and the liklihood of any child in the country contracting AIDS. However, at the end of the exhibit students were met with representatives from a Christian club on campus to reflect upon the exhibit and discuss its connection to religion. They proposed that the solution to this problem was religion.

Some religious groups on campus are missleading in the sense that they use different tatics to attract an audience and then reveal their true intentions once students are already baited.