Vanderbilt University adds Wiccan holidays to calendar, UNCA next?

In our trending and ever-advancing society where equality is constantly a hot topic, it’s shocking to consider there is still religious discrimination present.

Whether you were fortunate enough to have grown up and attended a high school filled with a varied student body, or whether you came from a “white bread” town like me, I think we can all agree differences in race, values, lifestyles and religions make people exciting. 

At Vanderbilt University, religious diversity was recently embraced when professors, students and faculty members opened this year’s academic calendars and spotted its newest addition. 

Fear is the best motivation. It can blind the masses, tricking sensible people into making rash decisions, and can create hate for no other reason than misinformation and propaganda becoming the assumed truth.  

It begins with the smallest accusations; I could say I find the ocean scary.  I could then make the case that the ocean has taken the lives of hundreds of people and show a clip of waves crashing against a pier at the beach during Hurricane Irene, ominously devouring the fragile, wooden structure. I would then present a video of a tsunami destroying an entire city without notice, or Hurricane Katrina victims atop their houses fighting not to drown.

 By presenting these elements together, I have slowly begun to persuade you of my belief of the ocean being scary as hell. 

While you may not have initially agreed with me, after viewing a few tsunami videos with clips of Godzilla thrown in for good measure, it’s safe to say a good fraction of you will say to yourself, “Yeah, the ocean is scary as hell.” 

Tranzmission provides support, resources to prisoners

Tranzmission Prison Project, an offshoot of the Asheville Prison Books Project, has been providing lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer inmates with reading materials, resources and pen pals for about five years.

Despite often working with the LGBTQ organizations of UNC Asheville and Warren Wilson College, Tranzmission is unaffiliated with either institution and operates as its own entity.

“Tranzmission is very much a DIY grassroots organization and there is no real assigned hierarchy,” said Melody Rood, a recent UNCA graduate who has been volunteering with Tranzmission for almost two years.

While the Occupy movement has slowed in downtown Asheville, UNC Asheville Students for a Democratic Society joined protestors last month to rally in celebration of the four-month anniversary of the Occupy Wall Street movement. 

The national rally, which was held on the streets of Washington, D.C., the weekend of Jan. 17, allowed protestors to memorialize the anniversary of the grassroots movement and attempt to bring media attention back to the ongoing occupations. 

“We became the first protesting group to successfully take the steps of the Supreme Court,” said Jozef Lisowski, one of the seven UNCA SDS members who attended the D.C. rally.  “That, in and of itself, is a success to the movement, and I hope brings significant additional attention to Occupy.”

The movement has slowly filtered in and out of the protest, following numerous arrests, both in Asheville and nationwide. 

Occupy has been widely criticized for being a movement without defined goals or structure, two things Lisowski said were also missing from the most recent congregation.

Lisowski said he feels this does not detract from the movement’s power, but rather serves a purpose. 

“Every person's voice in the movement is equal, and there are no official spokespersons or even leaders,” Lisowski said.

The latest D.C. rally was not short on voices either, Lisowski said, who estimates approximately 2,000 people attended. 

“Two things about the trip really astonished me,” Lisowski said. “The first was the inaccuracy of the mainstream media in covering the event.”

Lisowski said he saw ralliers interviewed by the Washington Post while occupying Congress, and the paper reported less in attendance than were actually at the event.

“Every other news outlet picked up (the story),” Lisowski said. “(They) vastly downplayed the actual number of protesters.”

Lisowski said he was also surprised by the unity amongst the protestors, whom at one point banded together in a chant to prevent an arrest by D.C. police. 

While huge numbers showed up for the commemoration rally, the Occupy Asheville movement seems to have slowed down, said UNCA political science Chair and Associate Professor Linda Cornett. 

“Movements like this lose steam,” Cornett said. “There are other things, other issues to address.”

Cornett said, however, that she feels the movement made large strides in the last four months toward social and economical equality. 

“I think the biggest obstacle for these kinds of things is to get your cause on the agenda,” Cornett said. 

This cause, to bring voice and balance back to America, has made it into the minds of political thinkers, Cornett said , changing the tone of the upcoming debates concerning the 2012 federal elections. 

Furthermore, Cornett feels the Occupy movement is not limited to the U.S., but has spread abroad. 

“This is happening all around the world,” Cornett said. “The growing inequalities have made it into the international agenda.”

In Asheville, the Occupy movement most recently made headlines over arrests made for protestors staying after hours on city property. 

SDS also hopes to bring awareness to police authority and action through staging arrests around campus over the course of the semester. 

“Throughout the country, including in Asheville, policemen have been arresting protesters for actions that are not remotely illegal,” Lisowski said.

Lisowski said the organization hopes to bring to light the arrests to students who may be unaware. 

Chief of University Police Eric Boyce said campus police were unaware of the first staged arrest, but have no problems working with SDS to spread awareness. 

“They have the right to demonstrate,” Boyce said. “We don’t have a problem with the message they are trying to send.”

Throughout the Occupy movement’s short history, relationships between police forces and protestors have been tense, despite the goal of peaceful demonstration. Lisowski said the D.C. rally was no exception. 

“Throughout all of this, not a single act of violence even came close to occurring,” Lisowski said.