You got that right.
They were not adversarial from the get-go.
Also it should be clear to anyone who read the Oberlin article that the Post’s version of the story is exaggerated. And who refers to Oberlin as “Lena Dunham’s college” in the title of a newspaper article? Especially when this has nothing to do with Lena Dunham at all.
I can get 500 signatures on a petition saying that tuition should be reduced to $100/year and that puppies should be distributed to every class member and chocolate milk should flow from the fountains. That doesn’t mean the administration ought to take it seriously. “Didn’t do exactly what I wanted, on my timetable” doesn’t equal “no one took me seriously.”
I sure don’t want to pay what it would cost to get fresh raw sushi fish to rural Ohio. They’re smart to serve California roll or whatever cooked American interpretation of sushi. But it sounds to me like they’ve got a labeling problem, not a food problem. “Steamed chicken with black bean sauce” or whatever wouldn’t have pissed anyone off.
My son is a first year at Oberlin. He’s also a picky eater. He is still alive after his first semester. College food is college food.
I do not know of any college that gets “ethnic” food right. That just isn’t the mission of a college. Feed kids nutritious food as cheaply as possible so that parents don’t have to pay any more than they already do.
Copying my own response to the “Yoga as cultural appropriation” thread 
since that one and this seem to be converging…
“I do not know of any college that gets “ethnic” food right.”
Because they can never get enough credit…the new dining hall at the University of Colorado Boulder is a superb exception. My meal from the Persian station was killer and even impressed my Persian friends.
Oh look, a new list of demands have been put out at Oberlin.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/293326897/Oberlin-College-Black-Student-Union-Institutional-Demands
It’s more of the same, though you likely well be hearing more about this one…
Yes! Please pay us to protest you (and anyone else we choose, on the campus, city or beyond!).
And of course…
It’s getting to the point you can’t tell if this stuff is real or if it’s someone’s idea of a joke.
Or what? Violence?
They can go to hell as far as i’m concerned. How dare they. No better than kidnappers holding someone ransom.
I could get behind the food thing. I have grown to love Banh Mi sandwiches (which, oddly, I discovered at a great sandwich shop after moving to MN), and ordered one from a new restaurant that I went to with a friend. It was that coleslaw ciabatta thing. I was very disappointed. I never would have ordered it, had I known! I grew up eating terrible food, at home, and then in college dorms. We have made strides in the past decades.Let’s not go backwards, people! J/k sort of . . . I do like good food.
However, asking, er, DEMANDING the institution you are protesting against to pay you to do so, seems um, I don’t know, delusional? Scary? Maybe not real? Could this be a brilliant piece of satire? I can’t tell anymore. I’ve been fooled many times by Onion articles.
What I’m not getting is how international students have been admitted into a US college and are then outraged that they are not getting food like back home. I studied internationally for 3 years and as a guest it never occurred to me to be miffed at my hosts because of how they ran their country or university. The only option for me if I wasn’t happy would have been to come back home!
Hmmm…
Some of their other demands:
The immediate firing of 7 specific staff/faculty members.
The immediate granting of tenure to 3 specific faculty members.
A guaranteed tenure upon review for 8 specific faculty members
The renaming of 4 campus buildings
“The creation of a department that focuses on languages of the Africana peoples to include a minimum of one language each from the African continent, Caribbean, and the Americas: ● The continent of Africa: Kiswahili, Igbo, Yoruba, Hausa/Fulani, Mende, Xhosa, Zulu, Shona, Ndebele, Lingala etc ● The Americas: Black English, Creole, Gullah Dialect etc ● The Caribbean: Haitian Creole, Jamaican Patois, etc.”
For every required course in Western civilization, an equivalent required course in the African Diaspora.
“For example, in the Dance Department students are required to take Ballet & Contemporary I & II, therefore students should be required to take West African I & II. ● For example, in the Conservatory majors are required to take a course in Music History whose content is heavily westernized, but we DEMAND that it be mandatory for all Conservatory students to take African-American Music History.”
The hiring of “Black healers/non western health practitioners.”
The immediate implementation of a free bussing system for Oberlin Elementary, Middle & High School students, paid for by the College.
The implementation of a program allowing willing community members to take one course per semester at Oberlin College for free.
I wonder how students are going to feel when they can’t get antibiotics from the health practitioner on call, can’t get the courses they want because they’re crammed with senior citizens from the town, and have their services cut so the school can pay to bus the town’s kids to school.
Hint: The population of Oberlin is around 8,400. If only 10% of the town’s citizens decided to take Oberlin up on their offer of a free class it would mean 1/3 of Oberlin’s current students would not have a seat.
One complaint in the other thread about cultural appropriation was that white people were speaking and acting on behalf of minorities. Here we are hearing from minorities themselves about how they feel their culture is being portrayed. Yet people are still being dismissive. Does this mean that the opinions of minorities on cultural appropriation only matter if they do not think cultural appropriation is a big deal? And just to be clear, I am in agreement with everyone else that one can not expect very much from dining halls in college campuses.
@Sue22 - funny you should mention the Chinese food. My husband travels to India a few times a year for work and he just loves the Indian Chinese food. He says it is quite different from what we get here.
I’m dismissive because these are ridiculous demands.
We’ve created a mon-stah, doctor!
I like the idea of being paid for protesting. Really love it!
RE: International students.
Do you remember the “yoga appropriation” discussion? Discussion about serving / not serving watermelons to African-Americans (nobody is served watermelons in our department now. Melons are OK, watermelons are not).
International students have the same right to complain as US students. Actually, they are paying for their education, whether lots of other students are getting education for free.