AW@L challenges on-campus Olympics themed event at WLU

Laurier students challenge “Campus Clubs Goes for Gold”, encourage a critical look at the Olympics

PRESS RELEASE
Jan 19, 2009
AW@L presents the “dark side” of the Vancouver Olympic Games

WATERLOO—Today, beginning at 10:00am, AW@L will be in the concourse distributing information about the Vancouver Olympic Games in response to the “Campus Clubs Goes for Gold” outreach event. AW@L’s presence is intended to counter myths about the Olympics and present the realities of environmental destruction, stolen native land, security culture, and corporate cooption tied to preparation for the Games.

“Campus Clubs Goes for Gold” is a three day event encouraging campus clubs to have an “Olympic-themed” booth to encourage participation in their clubs. Our action is not directed against campus clubs and the students within, but is rather intended to spur critical and engaged discussion of the Olympics.

The 2010 Olympics are notorious for greenwashing environmental destruction, increasing homelessness, theft of indigenous lands, denial of civil liberties, corporate co-option of culture, and a disturbing billion-dollar security program. The use of the Olympics to promote Campus Clubs is demonstrative of Wilfrid Laurier University’s blatant disregard for the realities of Olympic injustices. WLU has a shameful environmental track record, sits on the traditional territory of the Haudenosaunee people of Six Nations, and welcomes corporate encroachment on a public campus.

“Students have a responsibility to explore and engage with issues actively. Using an event that celebrates corporatism, environmental destruction, and colonialism to promote community efforts such as campus clubs is problematic and dangerous. Where is the critical discussion, the questioning? The dialogue and justice?” says Kelly Grevers of AW@L.

AW@L and the Kitchener-Waterloo community have been resisting the Vancouver Olympics since 2008, when AW@L members joined allies from Six Nations and across Southwestern Ontario to block the Olympic Spirit Train. This past December, over 200 people gathered to resist the City of Kitchener's Olympic torch celebration. Next month, a number of Laurier students and alumnae will be travelling to Vancouver to participate in the convergence against the Olympics.

As an academic institution, Wilfrid Laurier University, as well as student organizations, should be steadfast in forwarding critiques of injustices. The case of the Vancouver 2010 Olympics is no exception.

Rooted in KW, comprised of student activists and community organizers, AW@L is a community based direct action group that targets perpetuators of war and environmental destruction, and stands in solidarity with Indigenous activists who are fighting against colonialism, and all people who struggle against oppression in all its forms.

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For more info see http://peaceculture.org/drupal/no2010
or email no20102peaceculture.org