Rooted in Community. Empowered by Action. Upholding Goldsmith’s Legacy
No one comes to University to be treated like disposable income for jet-setting management who use your debt to pay for their hotel fees, only to have your course change every year, be treated horrifically by overpromoted academic bigots, and study at a University where the buildings are falling apart while the number of highly-paid technocrats keeps growing. With the ‘AI’ crisis taking hold, graduates are now unable to realise any tangible career benefits from coming to University, instead we will remain poor for the rest of our lives working the same hospitality jobs we have to work just to support ourselves through our degrees.
To fix this crisis, we won’t get anywhere by complaining to the manager - court cases and complaints might get you a few hundred pounds, but that means nothing when we have taken tens of thousands of pounds of student loans, when our rents keep rising faster than our wages, and when the only way to make ends meet is to take out a credit card. We need to recognise our collective strength and dare to object to the status quo. This is the only way things will change.
As an officer, I have already proven that I will not capitulate to University bureaucrats - it is my job to be in opposition to power, not to placate it. No change will come by me sitting on committees, pretending to represent students’ interests while management rams through more cuts regardless. As an officer, I’d rather use my time to create spaces for students on campus to realise their collective strength and to build solidarity and community.
My biggest achievement has been a monthly Community Kitchen, where students can come and have a free hot meal, discuss how to resist, and to build strength through collectivity. These events have been hugely successful and have offered vital refuge from the neoimperial late Capitalist hell we are living through, and importantly just a space for a kiki and a chinwag!
My politics extend beyond just this role, as an experienced activist, I’ve been arrested for demanding that we stop endlessley extracting fossil fuels while the planet burns, undertaken civil disobedience against wealthy elites, and occupied buildings to make sure there is no business-as-usual during a genocide.
There is literally no one more Goldsmiths than me - I studied Applied Theatre and Community Arts Practice (a course that the management cut because it's not data driven); I worked at the SU bar before I became an officer, serving people cheap cocktails at Trashies; and being generally mischievous around campus. I came to Goldsmiths because I could see that it was a genuinely unique place full of radical and creative people. Throughout my time here, I’ve only seen that vision disappear through budget cuts. We still need to fight for that Goldsmiths, because as much as this is a silly imperfect place, the world without it will be much more miserable, grey, and plain. So vote Starr, you will get one free dinner a month and also you will acquire social capital to bank at SET social or adjacent artsy goldsmiths student social spaces.