Speakers who did not disclose their identities during the protest are referred to as spokespersons in this article.
This article was updated at 10:16 a.m. on Sept. 28.
Students and members of pro-Palestine activist groups gathered at the library steps Friday afternoon to call for an end to new UC-wide policy that bans the use of face masks to conceal identity, wearing N95+ masks in dissent. The rally was the first pro-Palestine protest of the fall quarter.
Posters included the phrases “NO JUSTICE NO PEACE NO UC POLICE, and Henry Yang you’re a LIAR! Students set the world on FIRE” among others. Maddy Fangio / Daily Nexus
UCSB People’s University, UCSB Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), UCSB Jewish Voice for Peace, UCSB Muslim Student Association, and UCSB Liberated Zone organized the protest.
“One of the UC’s newest policies outlaws masking with complete disregard for immuno-compromised students. Let’s show them that we still intend to keep them safe no matter what,” a member of UCSB People’s University said. People’s University is a student-led group established this quarter focused on educating and supporting the campus community by “building solidarity and stronger mutual aid networks,” according to its Instagram.
In a letter to the UC chancellors on Aug. 19, UC President Michael V. Drake outlined established policies that ban putting up tents and campsites on university property, blocking access to university buildings and masking to avoid being identified. The policy also required people on campus to identify themselves when asked by university officials “in situations where assistance or intervention is needed.”
The policy follows protests and encampments at several UC campuses over the past year regarding the continued siege of the Gaza Strip by the State of Israel following an Oct. 7 attack on Israel by militant group Hamas.
UCSB had the last-standing and longest-running encampment at any UC, called the UCSB “Liberated Zone,” which lasted from May 1 to June 23 until police stormed the zone and arrested five undergraduate students.
According to a joint Instagram post made by the participating groups a week before the action, the rally was a means of “standing up to the UC’s disgusting conduct over the past year.” The post called for the protestors to “mask up,” and organizers distributed KN95+ masks during the rally.
Beginning at approximately 11:50, around 50 people chanted at the library steps, proclaiming “Disclose, divest, we will not stop we will not rest” and “UC, UC you can’t hide, we can see your greedy side,” among others.
No Community Service Organization officers were present during the protest. Associate Vice Chancellor of Student Life and Belonging Katya Armistead, Dean of Students Joaquin Becerra and Associate Dean of Student Academic Support Services Mark Shishim were present near the rally.
A People’s University spokesperson initiated protest speeches. The spokesperson said they would highlight student issues, tuition, student cost of living and “everything the UC doesn’t want to talk about.”
“Last spring, college students across the country took their administrators and the world by storm. The people of Gaza asked us to escalate, and we did. In solidarity with Palestinian resistance, encampments, marches, demonstrations of every kind popped up all across America and the world,” they said. “…the landscape we are navigating today is more dynamic and dangerous than ever.”
They dissented the University’s new policies and not acknowledging student demands for divestment.
“There are estimated to be over 300,000 Palestinians who have been murdered, and the world stands by watching,” the spokesperson said. “We are here to tell them that enough is enough. Tell them to divest our money from war. Show them why they must repeal these ableist, racist and draconian policies.”
A member from SJP said both America and Israel have historically carried out and sustained the displacement of Indigenous populations, including Chumash land that UCSB sits upon.
“Our work as Palestinian resistance organizers is not achieved until all oppressed people are liberated,” they said.
Another speaker from SJP pointed to the current state of Gaza, which has been affected by violence for 11 months and now has no universities left standing.
“As the UC invests in the war industry and works to strip academic freedom, students must be a part of people’s fight against imperialism,” they said.
Members of Researchers Against War, an organization aiming to end university research for military contractors, and a member of UCSB Liberated Zone drew attention to connections between research and military contractors such as Lockheed Martin and Raytheon, who construct military weapons and recruit recent graduates.
“Ask yourself, who is funding your work? Ask yourself, why does the [Department of Defense] and these military contractors get to decide which research gets funded?” one speaker from Researchers Against War said. “Don’t become complicit with the idea that the military and its contractors tend to use students as cheap labor to achieve its goals.”
“Action is the antidote to hopelessness,” a speaker from UCSB Liberated Zone said.
Associated Students Off-Campus Senator Dan Siddiqui spoke on the organization’s progress with the divestment resolution passed on May 1 and a bill on “ethical spending” passed on June 5. The resolution called for UCSB and the UC system at large to condemn “war crimes and atrocities resulting in immense civilian casualties by the Israeli government and the [Israeli Defense Forces],” as well as call for a ceasefire in Gaza. The bill aims to ban A.S. funds, nearly $19 million for the 2024-’25 academic year, from being used on products or vendors on the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement’s list.
He said that almost a month after the passing of the ethical spending bill they were notified by the university that the bill couldn’t be implemented until further notice due to legal reasons. He also noted that meeting requests with campus legal counsel have been rejected since they can only meet with administrators.
“The reality is that the regents and UC [Office of the President] don’t want us to implement the policy, and they are engaging in a draconian effort to suppress our freedom of expression and suppress a over 75% threshold to pass a piece of legislation by our undergraduate Senate that was elected to represent all of you,” he said.
In addition, Siddiqui said “a week after we passed the historic ethical spending bill, divesting all $19 million of our budget from war, someone from the Senate staff approached me, and they told me that ‘between you and me’ — and I won’t say their name — [they were] ‘offered a one-week long paid vacation to Israel this summer.’”
He added that two other senators had been offered paid vacations to Washington, D.C., and other locations.
“This kind of top-down corruption is rampant, absolutely rampant, within our association and within our Senate,” he said.
At 1.p.m, the demonstrators led a march to Cheadle Hall, where UCSB Chancellor Henry T. Yang’s office is located. Upon arrival, the group chanted, “300,000 people dead, you’re arresting us instead” and “Henry Yang you’re a liar, students set the world on fire.”
A speaker for People’s University thanked the crowd for coming and delivered a message from the organization.
“This year, they will try and silence us. They will try and stop us from making our voices heard. They will try and demoralize us. Tell us that what we’re doing has no place here, but they’re wrong, and never for a moment should any of us feel scared to express the beliefs that we truly believe that, if anything, we should fight harder for now than we ever did before,” the speaker said.
The final speaker discussed the recent mask restrictions and personal experience with COVID-19-related policies.
“I, like, many people I know was not able to finish my higher education goals due to inflexibility and inaccessibility at UCSB,” the speaker said. “I encourage you, for the love of critical thought and academic inquiry, to explore issues with curiosity, from pandemics here to genocide in Palestine, we are ecologically intertwined.”
In response to a Nexus inquiry on how the masking policies would be enforced at UC Santa Barbara, UCSB spokesperson Kiki Reyes said “masks are permissible on campus” but “UC policy is that no person shall wear a mask or personal disguise or otherwise conceal their identity with the intent of intimidating any person or group, or for the purpose of evading or escaping discovery, recognition, or identification in the commission of violations of law or policy.”
Armistead also told the Nexus in an interview that masking at the protest today was not against UC policy.
“It’s not against policy if we are not asking for them to identify themselves. In this situation, there was no reason to ask for them to identify themselves. So, therefore, they were not concealing their identity from us,” she said.
Students gathered at Cheadle for the final hour of the rally. Maddy Fangio / Daily Nexus
Missed the part where they demanded that Hamas release the hostages and stop using schools, hospitals and children’s bedrooms as ammo dumps and bases of operation