Take Back NYU! » Blog Archive » Study Breakdown Takes Back Bobst!

Dec 12th, 2008 by Take Back NYU!

Tonight, with the help of Take Back NYU!, one hundred and fifty funky students got down to some ill jams in Bobst library! If you were there, you might have noticed the energetic mob bouncing around while singing to MIA and Le Tigre. Onlookers quickly joined in, and we danced like there was no tomorrow for the better part of an hour. Security tried to shut our party down, but we kept it real.

This dance party comes with a message. We at Take Back NYU! thought it was time to demonstrate our power to re-create the university as we imagine it. The library, usually dominated by the pall of isolated students slaving away under the shadow of the 12th floor administration, needed a makeover. The dance party was a celebration of community and free expression, a reminder that even in the face of final exams we can’t forget how to have fun.

Thank to everyone who showed up! Tonight was a blast—let’s do it again sometime. Don’t let the monotony of finals get you down—or rather, let it get you down!…if you know what we mean.

(And to those friends who were disturbed by the noise— we apologize for the disruption - we hope you’ll join us next time, we had a lot of fun)

Posted in Reflections

16 Responses to “Study Breakdown Takes Back Bobst!”

on 12 Dec 2008 at 10:55 am1Study Breakdown! « Politics as Puppetry

[...] the TBNYU! blog for a word from the folks who made it [...]
on 12 Dec 2008 at 12:43 pm2Frank

Yo everyone’s smiling. This is real.
on 12 Dec 2008 at 5:18 pm3Will Solomon

You know, the only people who were exposed to your hi-jinx were your fellow students who were trying to study for their final exams. I suggest if you kids don’t have any homework and want to rage against the machine, you go find the machine instead of penalizing your friends and classmates by forcing them to listen to you yell for 40 minutes. You made no point, no political slogans were said. All you did was hurt the students.

I don’t know what you guys are about or what your agenda is but whatever it is you will never accomplish it. You are immature, ignorant brats whose only interest in civil rights and equality comes after you’ve taken all the benefits that living an upper-class lifestyle has to offer. You’re pathetic, worse than pathetic because you’re also rude.

Have fun pretending to be real people
on 13 Dec 2008 at 1:37 am4Emma

It was 40 minutes of your life, lame-o.
on 13 Dec 2008 at 3:13 am5Chris

Will-
I would like to point out that you are a terrific bore.
on 13 Dec 2008 at 3:24 am6Farah

@ Will Solomon:
umm…yeah i was actually at the library studying since about 3pm that day. i took one hour out of my studying to go downstairs and fight for student empowerment. afterwards, i went right back up and kept working on my papers. and as for being ignorant and immature — how mature or informed is it to get all pissed off over this little thing when you self-admittedly don’t even know what it’s all about? and i am offended by your implication that we’re all disingenuous brats “whose only interest in civil rights and equality comes after you’ve taken all the benefits that living an upper-class lifestyle has to offer.” i am most certainly NOT upper-class, i work several hours a week to get by, and i’m accruing tens of thousands of dollars in debt to go to this school. i am fighting for my rights and the rights of students like me, right here, right now.

if you bothered to read our fliers or literature you would know what we were all about, but instead you’d rather make really offensive statements just because you were disturbed for 40 minutes? really? tell me, how is that not pathetic?
on 13 Dec 2008 at 3:37 am7Maria

Dear friend,

I’m sorry you were so upset by the Study Breakdown. It sounds like you are super stressed, and getting a little cranky. Just remember, finals will be over soon. I would be happy to give you a free massage or some cookies if it would help you relax.

As far as political messaging goes, taking back Bobst WAS our message. This is our school. We fund it, we give it life, and we have the power to take it back. Our “agenda,” as this website makes pretty clear, is transparency and democracy at NYU. We the students ARE the university, and we should have a say in how it operates.

Hope you feel better, and good luck with finals. I would suggest a warm bath and a nice cup of tea.

Peace,
Maria
on 13 Dec 2008 at 4:27 am8Ericka

Actually, political slogans were said. We chanted “Take Back NYU”. Flyers were also passed out.

And I think you’re being a bit dramatic. “Hurt the students”?. It 25 minutes a students dancing, taking a break (key word) from their finals and having some final. Taking a space where people have committed suicide, where people have had breakdowns because of crazy and in many ways unnceccessary pressure to be “good students” and making that space a place of joy, fun and empowerment, if only for 25 minutes. Everyone who participated felt great and I’m sure they are all doing great on their finals. Too bad you didn’t join in.

Also, I take great offense to your comment: “You are immature, ignorant brats whose only interest in civil rights and equality comes after you’ve taken all the benefits that living an upper-class lifestyle has to offer”.

Actually, I am interested in Taking Back NYU because as a black person from a low-income community I am disgusted by how NYU supports gentrification. I am disgusted by how NYU takes advantages of its working class workers and workers of color (have you notice the NYU bus drivers aren’t too happy lately). I am disgusted by how NYU can’t find more money for financial aid but they can find money for move the fountain a few inches and find money to buy more buildings (that they often don’t need) and find money to pay John Sexton 1.3 million. I am disgusted by how NYU does business with companies that are complicit in genocide and war profiteering. As a women, I am worried about pay equality. I someone who hates gender binaries, I am concerned about the men and women’s bathrooms at NYU.

I want NYU to change so that it can be better for everyone, it’s students (including you) and for the larger community.

I’m not ignorant and I’m not immature. I suggest you research about NYU, its policies and its practices. I hope you’ll be disgusted as well. I hope you’ll care less about 25 minutes of studying and more about people enjoying themselves, people living without unnneccessary regulations, people having fair wages, people just living. You should re-evaluate your priorities. The kids who were dancing have finals too. But we also have fun, we also have concerns, we also have guts to challenge this institution.
on 13 Dec 2008 at 4:56 am9beet

http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/video/video.php?v=657960160409 >> check it out!
on 13 Dec 2008 at 5:18 am10Roger

I actually agree with you Will. I was there at the dance party, and what you said was correct: we actually were “pretending to be real people”. Pretending, because we (as you astutely observed) are not people–we are aliens. Would you like to come to the dance party on our mothership tonight?
on 14 Dec 2008 at 9:31 am11Claire

Uh oh, I’m starting to feel some cranky stress time coming… can I have cookies and a massage, too, Maria?
on 15 Dec 2008 at 2:45 am12Maria

Absofreakinglutely. Anytime. <3
on 16 Dec 2008 at 2:49 am13Jordan Meisner

Will, I don’t even see how it was that distracting. The dance party was in the lobby of Bobst. Generally, people study on the lower levels and floors above the ground floor. Noise contagion was probably fairly limited. Anyone studying in the lobby is probably used to some noise anyway. Unless you have a severe case of ADD and forgot to take your meds that day, all the dance party should have caused you to do is peer over the edge through the glass and say, “Huh. Look at that. Cool.”

Also, this study breakdown was an inspiring display of some sort of campus identity, something you hardly ever see at NYU. Are you really going to look back at your experience at this university that so sorely lacks character and say, “BAH HUMBUG, I wish less interesting, spontaneous things happened while I was there!”
on 17 Dec 2008 at 1:45 am14emily

i would like to note that there is not a person in any of these photos who is not COMPLETELY FUCKING ADORABLE. we are some cuties when we are radically reclaiming student space, y’all. and also generally.
on 19 Feb 2009 at 10:28 am15Sir Miles

You privileged little twirps should be taught your place.
on 28 Feb 2009 at 1:25 am16hopeful

I think you are very self-absorbed if you think your 25-40 mins of dance party was not distracting to others. Just because a handful of you needed/wanted a break doesn’t mean you had to impose it on others. Furthermore, because you’re so unapologetic does make your actions immature.
Your words become meaningless when your actions are contradictory.
Please next time do not generalize your own thoughts/feelings to the whole of NYU. Your mission requires you to think about the well being of others yet this dance party suggests otherwise.