JUSTIN ANDREW GUTIERREZ

I originally am from Whittier, California (b. 1987). Whittier, like the rest of the Los Angeleno sprawl, is part of a monstrous spread of suburbia. I grew up with music. I started on violin when I was 5. Now I play mostly guitar, write lyrics and sing. Though I was always inspired by events which occured in my life, what had always troubled me was that I felt unable to aleiviate myself from the dull and sterile middle class lifestyle within a placid community.

Los Angeles has brought to me knowledge of the commercial importantce of cities now. No longer is a city an enclosed and concentrated culture, but is a huge grid connected by commercial centers to its very end.

These center of capitalism function to control lives. People are forced to drive long distances everyday, work in an enclosed space, and go home, only to do it again the next day. It is hard for me to believe we have put up with this unfulfilling destiny for this long! I now see that we are approaching a new age, where we have the opportunity to work as a society to again become a functioning society, free from the reigns of capitalism and standardization. Humanity is approaching a time when profound change must occur if we are to continue life on Earth. These changes must come through social movements.

I am expressing to you extreme interest in this class out of necessity. I feel I need to be in this class if I am to understand the undercurrents of events in the future.

From this class, I hope to gain experience with creating a genuine, uncommercialized social action event. Within UCSD, there is a mechanical grip on student life and student voice. I will this class in order to learn what steps need to lead UCSD into a more student-orientated direction.