Christopher Peak Photo
On the second day of protest, fasters said their hunger pangs had grown far more painful.
Yale graduate student teachers have a right to a union, but their most recent protest fast might not be the best method to obtain one, in the view of a candidate seeking to represent the campus on New Haven’s Board of Alders.
The candidate, Hacibey Catalbasoglou, a sophomore running on an unaffiliated line to represent Ward 1, made the comment during an appearance on WNHH radio’s “Dateline New Haven” program.
He was asked about this week’s fast by eight organizers from UNITE HERE Local 33 over Yale’s refusal to negotiate a first contract for graduate student teachers in six academic departments despite the union’s victory in some elections. (Click here and here for more about the fast and about the broader issues.)
“I’m a fan of labor unions. And I think the right to unionize, it should be a right for everyone,” Catalbasoglou said at the very end of the WNHH program (as an ultimately false report came in to the studio that Yale was dismantling the protesters’ temporary encampment on Beinecke Plaza). “I just don’t know if I necessarily agree with a hunger strike when you swap out when you don’t feel comfortable. The methods by which this is being approached, I“m not sure I completely agree with.
“But, that being said, labor unions are good.”
Ward 1’s current alder, Democrat Sarah Eidelson, supports the effort; she works as spokesperson for Yale’s UNITE HERE locals. (She declined an invitation to join Catalbasoglou on the program.) Eidelson has not yet said if she will run for reelection.
In the interview, Catalbasoglou also questioned the way the UNITE HERE-backed majority operates on the Board of Alders. He argued that student voters in Ward 1 would be disappointed “if they knew that when you go the Boar of Alders, you don’t argue, you don’t deliberate.” He said he believes “there is a need to have more voices on the board.”
The Local 33 fast has prompted passionate arguments from partisans on both sides of the debate, such as on these two comments threads to Independent articles.
Participants in the weekly WNHH “Pundit Friday” program took up the debate.
“Am I supposed to feel sorry for them? I just don’t feel sorry for them,” remarked WNHH Station Manager Harry Droz.
“They want to be heard,” said Inner City News Managing Editor Babz Rawls-Ivy.
“They can eat and still be heard,” Droz responded.
“Obviously, Harry,” argued morning radio host Joe Ugly, “they don’t feel like they’re being heard if they go on a hunger strike.”
The panel also debated whether the Local 33 cause is part of a civil rights struggle similar to Martin Luther King’s protests.
“You know why it’s not the same? Because [the Civil Rights Movement] was about treating people like human beings,” Droz argued. “Every time you’re equating something that people want because they feel a certain way — everybody likes to equate it with the civil rights struggle it’s not the same.”
“People in the Civil Rights Movement, people were offended that they equated it with Gandhi,” Rawls-Ivy responded.
“You know? These people feel disenfranchised. We have to respect their feelings,” Joe Ugly remarked.
Norma Rodriguez questioned if it made sense to have a protest “close to a place where they’re going to be smelling food” (Yale’s Commons dining hall) because the “temptation is too big.”
Click on or download the above audio file to listen to the full interview on WNHH’s “Dateline New Haven” program with Hacibey Catalbasoglou about his campaign for alder. In addition to discuss the Yale unions, he calls for a city micro-loan program to help immigrants and other New Haveners start businesses; for more support for young people; and to do more to connect people at the university and in the city at large. He also speaks about growing up in New Haven as the son of an immigrant small businessman.
Click on or download the above audio file to listen to the full episode of “Pundit Friday.” The crew looked at not just the Yale graduate student teacher protest, but also the controversy over a data breach at the city health department and the final round in the search for a new police chief.