STRIKE:
FACULTY UNION TO VOTE ON NEXT COURSE OF ACTION ch3no2@mail.sfsu.edu
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FTER YEARS OF TENSION, the California Faculty Association is voting today on whether or not it should move forward with its proposed one-day strike set to take place on two California State University campuses Nov. 17. The strike is in response to the 20082009 and 2009-2010 CFA contracts in which faculty members were promised a raise, but due to the economic crisis, were later denied the pay increase. The CSU system defended its actions by saying that the contract states that it can be altered due to economic conditions. Cal State East Bay and Cal State Dominguez Hills were the selected locations to strike because they represent the true demographics of the CSU population
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in terms of student and faculty demographics and composition, said Brian Ferguson, CFA spokesman. “Faculty will strike at CSU East Bay and Dominguez Hills and faculty from other schools will join if they are not doing action on their own campus,” said Joe Tran, CFA spokesman. “Faculty have joined students in budget protest before, but they can’t strike for any reasons other than pay. Right now, that’s their only weapon.” The CFA is currently working through with the proposals it has been given. Other forms of striking will begin either Nov. 8 or 9 on the other 21 campuses, respectively. “Different forms of striking can vary
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and don’t necessarily have to be full-on protests and boycotting,” Ferguson said. “The other 21 CSU campuses will hold informational strikes the week before, which can vary between wearing union T-shirts and holding signs. But these forms are not concerted actions demanded by the CFA but rather each individual CSU chapter.” According to Wei Ming Dariotis, president of the CFA’s SF State chapter, SF State faculty would join the one day striking professors at CSU East Bay, if the effort materializes. “Our participation in concerted action would be to travel to Cal State East Bay for our colleagues there but visibly as
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STUDENT-RUN NEWSPAPER PROUDLY SERVING THE SAN FRANCISCO STATE UNIVERSITY COMMUNITY SINCE 1927.
Board members will decide today whether or not to protest the denial of wage increases in the past two years.
// 10.05.11
VOLUME LXXXXI ISSUE 7
Balancing obligations
COMING OUT: Art student shares his story Ricardo De La Torre was always afraid to tell his family that he is gay, but after several years he now knows that he does not need to hide who he is any longer. bbalisi@mail.sfsu.edu rubyp@mail.sfsu.edu
with the burden of high tuition costs, long work hours and an endless amount of homework assignments. While most students struggle to carry the heavy load associated with going to school, SF State student Khay Hembrador takes it in stride while holding her 2-year-old. Hembrador, 23, sets her eyes toward graduating in the spring with a degree in Asian American studies; however the situation is proving to ferent jobs and does her homework while her son Kairese constantly craves her attention. “I hate letting go of my time
SF State art major Ricardo De La Torre always wanted to tell his parents about his sexuality, but other horror stories about coming out kept him postponing the date. “A lot of my friends who had come out to their Latin families said they went through drama, and they went through arguing, and getting temporarily kicked out of home,” De La Torre, 21, said. “They told me ‘don’t do it, just wait. I went through hell.’” As for De La Torre, it’s safe to say his own coming out story was not ideal. De La Torre was usually comfortable sharing information about his new life in San Francisco. He never thought any negative backlash would occur when he became open about his sexuality on Myspace several years back. Then in October of 2007 De La Torre found himself “outed” by a cousin who had come across his page and took it upon herself to inform De La Torre’s parents about their gay son.
De La Torre was scared. He had heard all about Latino friends and their families’ reactions. He didn’t want to be kicked out of his home or to be treated differently by his parents. “I’m Mexican and being gay isn’t a good thing. It’s really looked down upon and I thought it was going to be an intense confrontation I was going to have with my dad but he was actually very understanding about the whole thing,” De La Torre said. “They were just kind of waiting for it. My mom’s biggest issue was that I never talked to her about it because growing up with her I was very close to her and I told her everything.” According to De La Torre, gender roles were given to him at a very early age. Men are expected to follow the rules of “machismo,” the Spanish term to describe masculinity, he said. De La Torre was raised to think that to be a homosexual man means to be a failed man because of the religious teachings he received growing up Catholic. prejudice against LGBT people,” said SF State liberal studies major Victoria Guzman. “I remember protesting against Prop 8 and my mom would be mad that I was out there because she said it wasn’t right, that we’re Catholic.” People in Latino communities have to deal with an extra layer of racism in America in addition to homophobia, ac-