David: Last year during all of the program cuts and the closure of Malcolm Price Lab School I was a part of the protest movements where we would sit-in at Seerley [Hall], we marched to protest the closing of Price Lab and I noticed at that time that the student government was oddly silent during a time that was really a crisis of the student body, when people's majors were being cut, people's programs were being eliminated or re-structured and students' ability to teach at Price Lab was being taken away. I just found that really disappointing and really frustrating that the student government, who is supposed to represent students, was leaving the students to their fate and unable to advocate for themselves to the administration. And so that is a continuation of a trend that I think I've been seeing where student government doesn't actually advocate for students or represent students. I know with a lot of communities at UNI, we're marginalized, like the LGBT community and veterans have felt really marginalized, like our voices just aren't being heard. Students of color and things like that, so I think Katie and I really wanted a chance to speak up about what has been going on with NISG and a chance to say, hey, I don't think NISG has really been representing students when we've needed them most, like when our majors are being cut or when we need vital resources at UNI, like an LGBT Center.
Q: You have passions, rather than a typical platform. Can you talk about that a little bit?
David: Katie and I have already been working on a lot of these issues and we felt that it was sort of impersonal to say that we crafted this platform by thinking about this and that and what we people want to hear. Instead, we just wanted to put what we're passionate about out there and what we've been working on. So, one of our passions is student voices, which ties into how NISG really hasn't been representing students, in our opinion, and just making sure that we are representing students and making sure that if something does happen, like last year where there were cuts, that we're at the forefront of a protest movement and talking to administrators and saying that they have to involve to students in these decisions, rather than staying silent. We have a passion for the Earth, so that is just green-ing up campus and continuing the trend that UNI has been on in becoming more green, which is really positive. We have a passion for women's empowerment. Obviously, Kate is a woman and I'm a feminist, so we're really passionate about trying to empower women at UNI. And then we have a passion for equality too, and so that is like implementing things like an LGBT Center, getting open housing and bathrooms, making sure that we can work with veterans to get all their needs met, implementing the Safe Zone Ally Quiz, creating a new one for racial identities. So those are our passions and those are things that we've already been working on and those are things that we're willing to work on, whether or not we get elected.
Q: Your slogan is "David and Katie are different." Obviously, you're trying to set yourselves apart from the other candidates, but do you worry that you might run the risk of being too different? Or do you not see that as being an issue?
David: Well we don't really have a choice whether or not to be different, because we are openly gay, so our thought with that was partly cheeky, just acknowledging that we know we're different, we know we don't look like the people you might sit next to in class every day, but it was also a deeper statement about our ideology and our vision for student. It was saying that we are not going to say one thing and do another, we are not going to say one thing and do nothing and we are not going to let students half to deal with things like [program] cuts and with their needs not being met without us adding our voices to theirs and speaking up about it. It works on a couple of levels, in our opinion. It just acknowledges that we're different, we're gay, we do drag, we're not what you expect, but it is also saying something really important about who we are as people, deep down, and what we believe.
Q: Establishing a lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender center on campus is clearly a high priority for your campaign. Can you talk about why that is so important?
David: Well, students with unique and complex challenges at UNI often have services that will help them get access to the resources they need and the treatment that they deserve to be successful at UNI. So we have Disabilities Services, we have specific people in the Dean of Students' office whose job is to make sure that students of color on campus feel safe and welcome and have their needs met, we have Veterans Services now, but there aren't any LGBT services on campus. There just aren't any that are specifically an employee meant to help out our community and things like that. And so we have some really important issues that aren't currently being addressed. Finding a doctor at the Student Health Center who understands a transgender person's body and can understand what effects there might be if you're taking testosterone as a trans-man. Or how to go about reporting incidents of harassment or violence against you without necessarily coming out if you're not out of the closet. And then also finding counselors who will not pathologize your sexuality, but will just help you through your process. Things like that, there is no centralized place where students can go to get access to those resources and to make sure that who they're talking to is actually going to be responsive to their identity, because there are people on this campus who are homophobic and it's really intimidating to walk into Gilchrist, for example, and get help with something that relates to your sexuality or gender identity and to have to out yourself to a complete stranger and not know how they feel about your community. So getting an LGBT Center would help us with those services and it'd also just be a cultural center, like the CME operates as, that could help us educate the wider UNI community about LGBT identities, so I think it'd be a positive for everyone.
Q: You and Katie still do not have a recognized student organization for your campaign. Do you plan on having one and, if so, why the delay?
David: We do not have a student organization recognized and we will not get one because of the time frame. The other campaigns' obviously get their student orgs represented so they can table and put posters up. We've talked with student group allies of ours that believe in our vision and they've officially endorsed us and they've allowed us to put our posters up in their name and reserve tabling in their name, so we will not be an officially recognized student group.
Q: Anything else you want to say before we finish up here?
David: Katie and I really feel like this is about vision. We think all three tickets are competent, intelligent people on campus and that we'd all be great leaders, but we think this is really about what we want to achieve and the overarching vision and what we really believe and not just what we've done in the past or the bullet points on the platform.
And there you have it, in the words of David! In the coming days, I'll be doing platform analyses for each of the tickets and Morgan Johnson will be doing website analyses as well. So there are plenty of reasons to keep checking back as we reach the halfway point of campaigning!
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