6 The Voice, For Students, By Students I March 30, 2011 | www.fsuvoice.com | send news tips to the editor; agarcia1@broncos.uncfsu.edu
COMMENTARY
Model United Nations loses its appeal
Voice photo by Alicia Bayat
Students at the 22nd Annual Model United Nations Conference work through the
afternoon on Saturday, to catch up on a late start. The conference was held at the
Holiday Inn Bordeaux, March 17-22. It was hosted by Fayetteville State University
and sponsored by the National Geo-Spatial Intelligence Agency.
By Alicia Bayat
Voice Editor-in-Chief
Every year I look forward to participating
in the North Carohna Consortium for Inter
national and Inter-Cultural Education Model
United Nations conference (NCIIE) spon
sored by National Geo-Spatial intelligence
Agency (NGA).. I look forward to the con
nections, and networking, but what I look for
ward to most is that late night call that initi
ates the “crisis” where students get together
to solve that last minute mock world crisis.
The debates are passionate, time consuming
and exhausting. But you always come out of
this feeling accomplished.
The Model United Nations is a simulation
of the United Nations. It is designed to edu
cate students on the intricacies of debate and
decision-making at the international level.
Students act as delegates of select na
tions to help solve international affairs and
through diplomatic means. The exercise en
gages critical thinking, communication and
leadership skills.
It is beneficial to understand the process
and decision making that goes into being part
of the international community.
The weekend of March 17-20, FSU stu
dents along with other univerities participat
ed in the 22nd annual Model United Nations
conference.
The feel of the whole event was differ
ent this year. There was a cloud over the
event. With the wave of revolution spreading
throughout North Africa and the Middle East
you would think there would be a lot for stu
dent delegates to discuss and draw from.
Instead it was a lackluster with little en
ergy. In past conferences you could feel the
passionate debates, the reverberations of
emotional investment. This seemed more like
a whole community going through the mo
tions or trying to get through the process.
This is not the conference I am accustomed
to attending. NGA who usually interviews at
these conferences did not whole "any inter
views, but was a small presence as usual.
I didn’t get the late night call that usually
comes with the inevitable crisis. I walked
around the hotel fort three hours Saturday
looking for delegates to interview and pic
tures to take. I found a few stragglers wan
dering the halls, but no sign of any life or
urgency.
In past conferences, early the next day after
a crisis people would still be milling about,
working on resolution papers in the work
room or walking around trying to obtain
signatories and create alliances. I remember
students laughing, and joking about the long
night of debates, but this time there was none
of that energy. There was only a dull, quiet
emptiness to the whole event.
The few students I did find later in the day
were usually from one of the other universi
ties.
The event was plagued with issues, such as
lost hotel accomadations, late starts, empty^
conference rooms and missing delegates.
The energy was gone. The passion wasn’t
there. There was no congregation of student
delegates hanging around the restaurant or
hallways.
These events add to the educational expe
rience and understanding of international af
fairs.
FSU makes an investment in the educa
tional process by providing these events. It’s
important understand the commitment that
comes with participation. The rewards, and
experiences that arise from the interaction,
research, writing, critical thinking and debate
process.
For those who stayed and worked hard it
was a rewarding night.
MLK continued front page
revolutions in North Africa and the Middle
East and U.S. involvement; Japan’s growing
technological nuclear catastrophe; mounting
economic disparities across the country as
well as the world; or the continuing existence
of racial inequities expressed through the so
cioeconomic, health, and educational gaps,
this question is most pertinent, today.
“A true revolution of values will soon look
uneasily on the glaring contrast of poverty
and wealth. With righteous indignation, it
will look at thousands of working people dis
placed from their jobs with reduced incomes
as a result of automation while the profits of
the employers remain intact, and say: ‘This
is not just.’ It will look across the oceans
and see individual capitalist of the West in
vesting huge sums of money in Asia, Afnca
and South America, only to take the profits
out with no concern for the social betterment
of the countries, and say: ‘This is not just.’”
These words speak to the heart of modem so
cial disparities.
In what some have called his most vision
ary work, Dr. King began chapter one with
“Where Are We” and ended with a 10 page
appendix mapping out his suggestions in
“Programs and Prospects.”
In a chapter titled “Where We Are Going,”
Dr. King writes, “In the days to come, orga
nized labor will increase its importance... Au
tomation is imperceptibly but inexorably pro
ducing dislocations, skimming off unskilled
labor from the industrial force. The displaced
are flowing into proliferating service occupa
tions. These enterprises are traditionally un
organized and provide low wage scales with
longer hours.”
“The value in pulling racism out of its ob
scurity and stripping it of its rationalizations
lies in the confidence that it can be changed.
To live with the pretense that racism is a doc
trine of a very few is to disarm us in fighting
it frontally as scientifically unsound, morally
repugnant and socially destructive. The pre
scription for the cure rests with the accurate
diagnosis of the disease.” Dr. King recog
nizes and describes the need for vigilance in
rooting out this most caustic condition still
afflicting our nation.
What might Dr. King say today, about “the
Dream?” The answer’s are found in his work
published a year prior to his asssassination
and four years after the “I have a dream”
speech. Looking past the dated terminology
as Afiican-American replaces Negro, the en
emy is now terrorism instead of communism,
his work speaks to today’s challenges.
Dr. King made a profound distinction in
his dedication of the book, “To the commit
ted supporters of the civil rights movement,
Negro and white whose steadfastness amid
confusions and setbacks gives assurance that
brotherhood will be the condition of man, not
the dream of man.”
“ In 1967, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., iso
lated himself from the demands of the civil
rights movement, rented a house in Jamaica
with no telephone, and labored over his final
manuscript. In this prophetic work, which has
been unavailable for more than ten years, he
lays out his thoughts, plans, and dreams for
America’s future, including the need for bet
ter jobs, higher wages, decent housing, and
quality education. With a universal message
of hope that continues to resonate, King de
manded an end to global suffering, asserting
that humankind—.for the first time—has the
resources and technology to eradicate pov
erty,” as described by Beacon Publishers.
August 28, visitors will be able to attend
the unveiling dedication of the “Martin Lu
ther King, Jr. National Memorial On the
Mall,” in Washington D.C. Between now
and then,you would do well to read his work.
. If you haven’t read it, pick up a copy and
see where Dr. King saw us going then, and,
where he sees us today.