Soon, a new student body president will be elected. All that’s certain is that he or she will not be part of the amorphous entity that is UNC’s campus left. This is an unusual and troubling development.
At least within recent memory, SBP races have featured at least one candidate identifiable as an activist — think Emilio Vicente or Kevin Claybren — and often a candidate with a strong base in the Campus Y, such as Hetali Lodaya.
Other candidates, such as Christy Lambden or Will Leimenstoll, had campaign teams well-connected with progressive campus groups.
But a review of this year’s candidates betrays a conspicuous lack of experience leading or even participating in liberal student groups.
Why is this a problem? Many of the mainstream causes endorsed by today’s candidates were the ideas of “radicals” only a few years ago. Someone had to push for gender-neutral housing and coal divestment, a better sexual assault policy and more inclusive treatment of students of color. Primarily, though not exclusively, the students who did so came from the political left. Without a leftist candidate, our campus conversation on these issues will be impoverished.
Furthermore, who among this crowd is ready to lead the next fight in the ongoing battle to fulfill UNC’s mandate to be the university of the people? Who will represent student interests to the General Assembly, push back against the Board of Governors and work to improve campus culture?
We don’t yet know, and we fear the answer is none of them. For the candidates, we have a request: go forth and prove us wrong.
