Referendum causes debate
By Vanessa Renderman
Features
Editor
One student organization
is claiming victory because of the results of a Purdue Student Government
referendum.
Students had the
option last week to vote on three referendums after voting for a PSG
ticket. The third referendum asked for votes concerning Purdue's involvement
with sweatshops.
The referendum
stated, "In regards to the sweatshop issue, Purdue University should
insist on the verification of work conditions in the plants with a manufacturing
license to make and sell goods with Purdue's name on them."
Ryan Travis, president
of Purdue's University Conservative Action Network, said, "We lobbied
hard against that referendum."
Travis said the
result of the vote — 1,530 votes in support and 1,594 against the
referendum — shows strong opposition by the students.
But PSG senator
Greg Martin doesn't see the 64-vote difference as a win for either side.
If garments are still being made by sweatshop labor, Martin said, then
there are no winners in the situation.
"I think (the number
of votes in support) shows there's a definite concern at Purdue for
the issue," Martin said.
Ben Holmes agreed.
Holmes, a member of Purdue Students Against Sweatshops and a senior
in the School of Liberal Arts, said, "I definitely don’t take
64 votes as a lot."
Holmes said he
didn’t feel that the voter turnout was an accurate representation
of the student body’s feelings. What matters, he said, is that
Purdue Students Against Sweatshops and the administration have agreed
that Purdue needs a monitoring agency.
Another person
argued that the question itself was not valid for the same reason.
Fouad Jaber, PSG
senator and a member of Purdue Students Against Sweatshops, objected
to the question.
"It was already
agreed upon that we do need a monitoring agency," he said. "It
was asking a question that wasn't an issue between us and the administration."
Jaber said that
if the question were phrased differently — such as "Should
Purdue join the Worker Rights Consortium?" — the results would
have been significantly different.
Travis thought
just the opposite.
The fact that the
referendum didn't pass, even at the peak of anti-sweatshop demonstrations,
shows how little student-body support is, he said.
"This is a
devastating defeat for (Purdue Students Against Sweatshops)," he
said.
The referendum,
he said, was so liberal and broad that anything more specific in regards
to Purdue Students Against Sweatshops would have been "resoundingly
defeated."
Travis said he
and other members of University Conservative Action Network tried to
educate students about the referendum before they voted.
