So, they're goig to start enforcing parking regs. on UNM campus on Saturdays. The DJs are up in arms. One volunteer is demanding $5/per parking passes and stamping her little foot that our "countless hours" of volunteer work aren't appreciated.Here's my reply:
Well, don't count ME in on this. For one thing, I detest it when someone offers to do somethig and then complains about doing it, as though one's posterior requires affectionate licking for one's efforts. People all over the planet perform countless hours of gut-wrenching, dangerous, unappreciated volunteer efforts to their communities -- often at risk to their liberty and lives -- because it's necessary and it's the right thing to do.
I'm a volunteer to the COMMUNITY, not to the administration of some cheesy, smug, corrupt, mediocre "university." I call UNM the best community college in the state. I tolerate the institution to get at the medium, to contribute to the community. I CERTAINLY don't volunteer for the university.
And this community is so apathetic, so cliquish, so defeatist because it's IGNORANT -- therefore, it needs the medium far MORE than any other community in which I've ever lived (except Pekin, Indiana -- a KKK town -- where you can't even check out a book from the county library, because the alderman doesn't think it's necssary for the town to pay the county fee). So, I have a LOT of volunteer work to do here.
Parking is just another example of the fact that the old boys' network is going to exploit those of us who use its resources -- OUR resources: we PAId for them! -- for every drop of blood it can get out of us. Paper-pushing, butt-covering and penny-pinching are FAR more important to the administration than are education, community building, health, safety, justice . . . you know, the stuff we try to broadcast?
It's just more evidence for my argument that real community radio can't be done in a self-determined, self-reliant fashion at a station that's controlled and funded by a university.
It's also more evidence for my argument in favor of alternative transportation: electric bicycles, gasoline scooters, etc. can be chained to bike racks or hidden from theft in the basement or the shrubbery. There are no parking fees or large gasoline payments. In fact, under 49CCs, there are no: licenses, insurance or registrations required, either. And the environmental impact is negligible. Who cares what Cheney's cronies do to the price of crude with reckless speculation, when one is not under their thumbs?
Even if one lives far away, such as the East Mountains, one can drive into town, park free almost anywhere else in Albuquerque and ride to UNM via alternative transportation one has packed in one's car or truck.
Note: I carry pepper spray on my key chain. I also have a tazer. Each are easily purchased for less money or hassle than a gun and are purely defensive. Of course, when one uses alternative transpo, one can usually outrun an attacker with ease, and drive it RIGHT to the door. Walking through parking lots alone isn't safe, either.
We can't depend on that university for ANYthing. We MUST take care of OURSELVES! We must NEVER believe the institution: wants, needs, respects or cares about US! THAT IS A LIE! The university cares about MONEY, not people. Defense contracts outweigh our petty needs, every time. Community radio cares about PEOPLE. Never confuse the two.
As for being appreciated as a volunteer: I appreciate what I do, what I create, what I make available to my neighbors when I do community radio. Occassionally, someone will say something supportive -- that's usually not another volunteer and it's CERTAINLY not university administration! But, generally, I do my work in cold silence. Nobody licks my posterior for my efforts and -- while I'm generally a rather peaceful person - I'd smack them in the face if they tried. I seldom hear that my work has even been HEAED, let alone appreciated. I didn't get into community radio to be famous; I got into it because its cheaper, fewer YEARS of training and less beholden to an insttution than a teaching degree. Just because I don't have sheep skin hanging on my walls doesn't mean I don't have anythig useul to contribute, or shouldn't bother to try.
If I want to be told how wonderful I am, I could turn tricks down on Central and get more appreciation than I'll ever get for doing community radio. I KNOW this is true; I've been around poor women, pimps and johns for decades. I've also been around university administrators and politically correct cliques for decades. This isn't a theoretical statement; I know this for a fact.
I've been: hit, screamed at, cursed, falsly accused of the craziest stuff, viewed with suspicion and contempt by people at the station -- and hassled by campus police, as an extra bonus, for bothering to volunteer. And I STILL come back, because the work is more important than my little ego.
I gratify my ego elsewhere.
If one needs to be appreciatd, community radio is NOT the first place I'd recommend to anybody.
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