An Open Letter to the UC

As the leaders of the radical-reformist “Dismantle the UC” UC Presidential campaign, T.R. Hwang 08’ and Alex Wong 08’, we hereby issue a public challenge against the candidates in this race and to the UC as a whole. If the UC is able to successfully and satisfactorily answer these three simple questions to the Harvard community as a whole, we publicly promise to step down and withdraw from the race. Our mission is simply the cause of social justice, not another line on our resume or another future business connection.

We feel if the UC is unable to give answers for these questions to not only account for their present, ephemeral promises but past history as well, they will be sorely pressed to justify their claims to legitimacy. Moreover, the inability to answer these questions successfully will reveal some deep structural problems with the UC that we feel necessitate wholesale structural revolution in student government.

We are willing to publicly engage any candidate in a debate over these issues if they would like to answer our challenge. Alternatively, if they would like to discuss this in some other public medium, we certainly encourage it and will respond vigorously. To do any less, we feel, would be intellectually unsound.

THREE QUESTIONS --
1) How does the UC justify the lack of a significant participation of women, minorities, and BGLT students on the UC council? How does it answer to claims that the women’s campaigning workshops were ‘patronizing’?

2) Why do people hate you so much?

3) How can the UC claim any legitimate student mandate of representation given the average 34% voter turnout rate in House UC elections?

We would like to know. Our mission remains to dismantle the UC until it can answer to these problems.

Best,
Tim Hwang
Alex Wong