After nearly 2 weeks of planning and a few days of hard work to promote a massive protest against budget cuts and tuition hikes, we had the event in modern Stony Brook style; the style that has earned us the title “Most Unhappy Students” for several years now. Make no mistake, these recent protests are nothing like those that once made Stony Brook “The Berkley of the East.” Something indeed has been missing for a long time since then, and it has been my mission to determine what it is.

1. Motivation: This recent economic crisis has been the most recent driving force for outrage at Stony Brook, although not dissent. Even outrage may be too a strong word considering that only a small percentage of students seem to care enough to rally for an hour of their day when nobody has class.

2. Number of affected students: Statistically this is much better today than it was a few decades ago, because a tuition hike directly affects most of the students and a budget cut affects 100% of the students, faculty and staff. Yet we see statistically insignificant crowds showing up. Compared to a protest against a war or the administration, where very few students are directly affected, this hardly counts as a protest.

3. Promotion Method: Again we see a clear advantage today with the advances of the Internet and Facebook, as well as easy and free printing for posters. I spent all day yesterday putting up more than 80 posters around campus and promoting it everywhere on Facebook and through email lists. At least we know that a massive number of people were aware of the event.

4. Organization: The Students for a Democratic Society at Stony Brook of the 1960’s would bring out 300 students and faculty just to a meeting, just imagine how many they would have at a protest. We are lucky to get that many just to click “join” on Facebook. Our events are also planned differently. They are sponsored by the Undergraduate Student Government (yeah, quite lame). There is more of a focus on crappy music and speakers than student activism. Modern Stony Brook protests are too passive. Perhaps students would be more committed if it involved a risk or some immediate call to action.

5. Context: This gets more into my own speculation, but I think context is important. There once was a trend of activism among young people, espicially for civil rights which was a major issue at Stony Brook. We protested about issues that were both national and local. Although that dissenting spirit may have helped to start major protests on smaller issues as well. Students were in a dissenting mindset. Today we have less activity in general, and a greater trust in authority.

6. Generation: Without any hard facts and numbers left, I will refer to an interesting article that I read about our generation. We grew up in a fairly peaceful decade and we were raised by the television and the internet. Students are so busy they they “don’t have time” to care about important issues any more. We are a selfish generation. We have been spoiled for so long that we don’t know what it means to dissent from authority and cause real change. Why is it that we only protest against people who are too far away to care? When was the last time you heard of an occupation at Stony Brook? The better the school gets, the more people like to complain. We went from being mudville and the Berkley of the east, to having a beautiful campus and some of the least happy students in the nation.

So then the question remains; what is wrong with kids these days? Stop worrying so much about little things like conformity and time management, and start worrying about #1 and #2: Rights and Money! We are rapidly losing both every day.