Op-Ed: As a UC professor, I support the strikers. Our schools shouldn’t have let it come to this.”
“How did you feel on November 9 when you read the strike’s first report?”
“Somber. But I am also happy that people are taking action to prevent a terrible attack on our democracy.”
“What makes you optimistic about the future?”
“I am optimistic about the United States of America. When I came to the University of California in 1990—when I found out that we had a UC Regents’ meeting about the strike—I immediately went to the campus bookstore and bought every book I could get my hands on about the future of America. Every book that predicted the end of industrialism and the beginning of a new industrial age. Every book that told us that the United States—the very same country that took me in as a refugee, that took in my family as refugees, that rescued me from the hell of war—would one day become the most powerful country on Earth.
“And each and every book was right. The truth is that what we need to stop is not the end of an industrial age, but a second industrial age.
“The second industrial age we need will be in the service of a global consciousness and world government. Those who work to build that second industrial age—not only for this country, but for the whole world—have been ignored and dismissed since the days of the first industrial age. And this new industrial age—this new age—will be about empowering people and ending the greed and corruption of the few.
“The same people who ignore this new industrial age, and who would rather use us as tools to destroy the very foundation of this new industrial age, are also the same people who will be most at risk when this new industrial age comes to pass. And the only way to protect people from being exploited is to build an organization that is in constant communication with the people and uses their power and influence to create an environment where all people can find the