Roommates Divided Over Presidential Signs

In the window of Canaday A-34 hangs a poster bearing the familiar red, white and blue logo of George Bush and Dan Quayle.

And in the three windows surrounding it, black and white signs respond with the Wayne and Garth answer to political conservatism: Not!

With the presidential election a mere 24 hours away, Harvard students are engaged in a rapidly escalating propaganda war. And recently, their posters have begun to speak not only to their viewers but also to each other.

The Republican poster on Canaday's third floor has divided not just the dorm, but the suite as well.

"My roommate put up a Bush-Quayle sign and the rest of us, who are more liberal, decided to put up the `Not!' sign. We finally convinced the people above us and our proctor downstairs to put up `Not!' signs also," said Tai U. Truong '96, a Clinton supporter in the controversial suite.

"It's really funny, we've had tons of tourists to Harvard Yard taking pictures of the posters," added Truong.

The interactive Canaday signs have prompted poster debates in other parts of the Harvard campus as well. Most are restricted to battling Bush-Quayle and Clinton-Gore signs, but some are slightly more sophisticated, such as the "Don't vote for" sign placed next to a Clinton-Gore poster outside Thayer Hall.

In two third-floor windows of a Quincy House suite, a whole set of presidential candidate posters and bumper stickers fight it out. "Not!" signs in the windows have arrows pointing from one window into the other.

"My roommate Livia put up the [Clinton-Gore] bumper sticker. Then I put up the Bush-Quayle poster. Then she put up a poster. Then I put up a bumper sticker. But the `Not!' signs were put up simultaneously," said Elizabeth S. DiNonno '95, who supports President Bush "because of his pro-life stance."

Fortunately for the two roommates, their political disagreements have not created any conflict or tension. But they haven't promoted much political discussion either.

"We don't really talk politics much. There's nopoint in it--we're not going to change eachother's mind anyway," said Livia M.Santiago-Rosado '95

"We don't really talk politics much. There's nopoint in it--we're not going to change eachother's mind anyway," said Livia M.Santiago-Rosado '95