>> To me when I look at a march and think about a march, it is a symbol, a symbol of
the journey you are taking with a person next to you, with the group you are going with.
It's a metaphor for your political stance that you are taking. This is a journey. You
assume that it's going to take a long time. You assume that there will be difficulty in
whatever you are trying to do. And with Martin Luther King, whether you are talking about
the marches in Birmingham and all throughout the south, wherever you are talking about.
These marches were long and these marches were a lot of times during the day, and it
was hot, and it was difficult. It was a metaphor for the journey that they were taking that
you start from one location and you are hoping to get to another. You do not know how far
it is. You do not know where it is going to be. You are going to do whatever it takes.
It's kind of a testament to your determination to get there.
>> We are going to live on this legacy of MLK in the sense that we are going to be active.
We are going to be conscious, and we are going to live for something, together in solidarity.
Because if we look around the school, just to have the school in general and to have
some many different types of people from all sorts of backgrounds and communities. It's
kind of a product of the legacy of MLK, who fought for the diversity that we do have.
>> Politics have come to affect students. Students have felt no choice but to engage
in certain things. Recently our student fees have gone up by 32 percent. So now students
are starting to question their political identity and their political status.
>> So every MLK day now you open up the newspaper and you see ads from department stores having
a sale. MLK Sale! 20% off furniture!
>> I think that often we begin to get caught up in the image, and with what we have heard.
People need to personalize it for themselves, and really consider where they're at in their
life. How they are going to shape their lives to effect change, whichever way they want.
>> Doctor King was about giving to others. He was all about this idea, this concept of
people serving one another. In that belief, he thought that there would be equity in the
United States of America.
>> I have done stuff like this before, and it makes you feel really good at the end of
the day, so I wanted to do it today. It is really great to see some diversity out here,
a lot of people just come out of the wood works. It is really crazy how it works, but
people just want to give back. It's true all over. They realize they have the extra time.
They're grateful for what they have. Considering the situation down in Haiti right now, I think
we are all grateful.
>> Students now are stepping into social activism, at least tentatively and starting really to
question different things. Right now, it is the beginning of what I feel like is a groundswell
for different political movements and social activism for students - especially in relation
to so many issues that affect them directly.
>> What I am trying to create with this drum circle and this solidarity march is supposed
to be greater than that. And I would love for other schools to see that and say, "Look
at what UC Irvine is doing. They're coming together in solidarity for Martin Luther King
Jr., and it is not just the Cross-Cultural Center, not just the Black Student Union.
It's the Greeks, it's ASUCI, it’s people from everywhere."
