Spring Break
10/14 Column: Princeton: Protest Paradise
James Coan '09
Issue date: 11/3/08 Section: Opinion
The spring before I arrived on campus, a group of Princetonians began the "Frist Filibuster," a 24-hour-a-day protest outside of Frist Campus Center. Students publicly criticized Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist's plan to implement the "nuclear option" that would have effectively ended the tradition of filibustering in the Senate.
The Frist Filibuster very quickly gained campus and national media attention. On the first day dozens of observers watched on the lawn outside of Frist. After its third day, it had already made a brief appearance on CNN. Within one week, New Jersey Representatives Rush Holt and Frank Pallone participated, and it had been covered by CNN, AP, and the Washington Post. By its end, students had raised $10,000 to rent a bus to protest in Washington, DC for one day, and one of the organizers, Asheesh Siddique '07, debated on Hardball a certain Republican freshman, Rob Biederman '08. (Freshmen: Rob was the previous USG president.)
In the end, Sen. Frist dropped his plan. While it is unclear how much of an impact the Princeton students had, they certainly commanded a great deal of media attention.
One reason for the Frist Filibuster's media success is that Princeton is the best campus in the entire nation to stage a public display of support for a cause. Elite universities like ours already command the most media attention; what happens at Harvard, Yale, Stanford, and Princeton gets more attention than similar actions at other schools. Yet unlike these other "liberal" schools, nobody expects a protest out of Princeton. We are supposed to be a quiet, apathetic, and vaguely conservative student body content with the status quo. The Frist Filibuster was an eye-catching anomaly rather than the norm. The presence of a public display or protest on campus signals that something is very wrong if it can arouse the attention of such an insulated student body. Then, consider that Princeton is so close to major media outlets in New York, Philadelphia, and Washington, DC, and Princeton is Protest Paradise.
The Frist Filibuster very quickly gained campus and national media attention. On the first day dozens of observers watched on the lawn outside of Frist. After its third day, it had already made a brief appearance on CNN. Within one week, New Jersey Representatives Rush Holt and Frank Pallone participated, and it had been covered by CNN, AP, and the Washington Post. By its end, students had raised $10,000 to rent a bus to protest in Washington, DC for one day, and one of the organizers, Asheesh Siddique '07, debated on Hardball a certain Republican freshman, Rob Biederman '08. (Freshmen: Rob was the previous USG president.)
In the end, Sen. Frist dropped his plan. While it is unclear how much of an impact the Princeton students had, they certainly commanded a great deal of media attention.
One reason for the Frist Filibuster's media success is that Princeton is the best campus in the entire nation to stage a public display of support for a cause. Elite universities like ours already command the most media attention; what happens at Harvard, Yale, Stanford, and Princeton gets more attention than similar actions at other schools. Yet unlike these other "liberal" schools, nobody expects a protest out of Princeton. We are supposed to be a quiet, apathetic, and vaguely conservative student body content with the status quo. The Frist Filibuster was an eye-catching anomaly rather than the norm. The presence of a public display or protest on campus signals that something is very wrong if it can arouse the attention of such an insulated student body. Then, consider that Princeton is so close to major media outlets in New York, Philadelphia, and Washington, DC, and Princeton is Protest Paradise.
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