Protest Interrupting Yale/Harvard Game was Out of Bounds

Protest+Interrupting+Yale%2FHarvard+Game+was+Out+of+Bounds

Jack Heydorn, Staff Writer

Jack Heydorn, Opinion Writer

Just after the first half of the biggest Ivy League rivalry, athletically and academically, an activist group stormed the field in protest against climate change. It began with 70 protestors, but that quickly changed as many from the stands joined in, leading to a peak of 500 people altogether.

The call for protest sprouted from the two universities’ investments in fossil fuels. Protesters wanted the universities to pull these investments because of the negative effects fossil fuels have on the Earth. When burned, fossil fuels produce massive amounts of carbon dioxide and the emissions from them trap heat into the atmosphere. In the United States, fossil fuels account for three-fourths of our total carbon emissions.

For the students at Yale, this was their call to action, oddly enough at a football game.

While the protesters’s hearts are in the right place, this protest was the wrong time and place. Plus, they won’t make a difference. Whether Harvard or Yale divest in fossil fuels, the problem will still be there. Those same people who were protesting will probably still be flying planes home before Winter Break or driving their cars home after the game.

It seemed more as a publicity stunt rather than for the schools to actually divest.

This hour long protest did not produce great reactions from the crowd. The crowd began to boo. The Yale police got involved in the action, arresting 42 protesters.

Harvard disregarded the protest, and is continuing to invest in fossil fuels, while Yale has had some divestment pledges.

Nevertheless, the two schools finished the game out, with Yale coming out on top and putting up a big 50 points to Harvard’s 43 in the double overtime thriller.