We demand a $15 minimum wage for Ohio University and the city of Athens, and we are willing to fight to get it.
We are willing to organize the people, to protest the employers and to disrupt the society that no longer seems to be ours.
The demand for a $15 minimum wage is about more than ensuring material comfort for those who currently lack it; it is a political tactic — a desperate grab for power for control of our livelihoods.
It is an attack against an undemocratic world; it is a method to construct a new world built on civil participation.
It is no secret that economic and political power is extremely concentrated: a small percentage of the world holds the vast majority of wealth, and they use their wealth to create and influence public policy — most often to benefit themselves at the cost of the rest of us.
If this reality was untrue, then a college education would be achievable without thousands of dollars of debt to powerful economic institutions; people would not struggle to pay their rent and feed themselves on meager wages (there would be no need for the “free lunch” programs abundant in Athens); dining hall workers at Ohio University would not be forced to buy their own shirts and hats; they would be respected as important individuals by their “superiors.”
These are all examples of the disrespect of individual freedom by an unjust system, the undemocratic concentration of power and exertion of economic might, the exploitation of the powerless by the powerful.
Powerless, that is, unless we come together. The fight for a $15 minimum wage, the struggle against tuition, the backlash against concentrated economic wealth — these must be understood as more than ends in themselves but as means to building a democratic society.
When we demand $15 an hour, we demand the right to participate in the outcome of our economic livelihoods (both on an individual and societal basis); when we demand a tuition freeze, we demand freer and more equal access to a liberating education; when we oppose unjustified concentrated wealth, we oppose the notion that any individual should be allowed to impose their will on someone else without consent.
These demands are an attempt to harmonize the idea of a better world with our reality, and this struggle does not end with these demands.
A time will come when you will see fliers for, receive Facebook invitations to and hear through word of mouth about a protest with one of these goals in mind. When you do, I encourage you to come, to participate, to take control of your life.
As was chanted during the recent #HandsUpWalkOut protest, “We are unstoppable; another world is possible!”
I’ll see you on the streets.
Ryan Powers is a sophomore at Ohio University.
