With this in mind, on behalf of myself and their supporters at Michigan, I would like to praise the PSLM for their dedication to justice.

Ari Paul

Ann Arbor, Mich.

May 12, 2001

The writer is a student at the University of Michigan and a member of Students Organizing for Labor and Economic Equality.

Seizure was Justified

To the editors:

I appreciate the staff’s comments that a PSLM member should be included on the committee (Editorial, “Welcome Resolution to Sit-In,” May 9), as I agree that the group has important knowledge and interests that would merit inclusion. However, I take issue with your description of the seizure as “unjustified” and your assertion that “whatever their punishment, PSLM would have no right to complain.”

First, the sit-in in Massachusetts Hall was completely justified. The University thought that it could ignore its lowest paid workers and continue to pay them wages that are an insult to human dignity. Without the sit-in, the University would have continued to ignore this problem. The real question is why anyone should let the University to operate normally when it is violating human rights.

Second, anyone involved in the sit-in should have the right to complain if punished, since what we did was attempt to make this University a better place, to stand up against unjust practices.

How would The Crimson have gotten the University to acknowledge the fundamental moral injustice of paying poverty wages? By politely writing letters to them? That’s not the way power operates. The staff should move past the naive belief that it is.

Dan DiMaggio ’04

May 9, 2001

The writer is a member of the PSLM and participated in the sit-in.