Frigo won’t go away
Given that campus papers could have done a better job keeping up journalistic standards, and since representatives and administrators could have been more considerate and responsible, one could easily make the case that Le Frigo Vert lost its bid unfairly. But I would not say so. I would say that the Frigo has not lost at all.
A great many worthwhile and socially constructive projects would have come about had the Frigo been permitted to update its subsidy. But while some services will likely disappear, I trust that the Frigo will continue to do what it does and then some.
One thing is for sure; those cynical and colonised enough to have thought that a vote against Frigo would serve as a message to re-organise along an “incentive-based” or meritocratic model have certainly made a grave mistake. Adversity is the last thing to ever steer Frigo folks from their mandate, to which they are physically, intellectually and emotionally committed.
Compromise in the name of profit is an attitude that conditions oppression and that we thus position ourselves against. How far-fetched an idea it is to think that we might consider it for ourselves!
Le Frigo Vert responds to power by bringing people in the community together, answering their needs, relating with them on an equal basis, involving them in the development of a strong political ethic beginning with food, offering tools for taking their alienation apart, lending a hand in bringing them to make of food what they can and what they would in ideal conditions, as well as by building bridges to other related struggles for self-determination and empowerment.
Sounds like a big job, eh? That’s why we asked for money, and that’s why we will do what we do even more obstinately than ever before.
_Faiz Abhuani,
Collective member of Le Frigo Vert_
This article originally appeared in Volume 30, Issue 29, published April 6, 2010.
