Lakeside Dining Hall sucks.

That’s not just me calling them out; it’s a running campus joke mentioned by all those with a meal plan, even making its foray onto Bama Memes. In fact, according to a lot of students, dining hall food sucks in general. Many students feel overcharged and underserved. It’s not like Bama Dining isn’t trying to make improvements — they do a large number of surveys, have expanded vegetarian options, and try their best to give students what they want. And, for almost a year, coordinators and backers of The Real Food Challenge have been showing Bama Dining a way to give students better food.

The Real Food Challenge is a cooperative effort led by students to get 20 percent Real Food into dining halls by 2020. Real Food is defined as food that is local/community-based, ecologically sound, fair and humane. It is a way for individual students who believe in the cause to have an organization and network backing them in their efforts. Real Food Challenge helps students with tools like a Real Food Calculator and provides a contract that schools agree on in order to ensure they follow through with their commitment.

UA’s food system has one obvious contradiction: We consistently ask for healthier food, but continue to choose options like cheeseburgers and pizza. But the Real Food Challenge has an answer for this: attempt to make all options have elements of Real Food. Real Food moves beyond the salad bar and can help the school use local beef in hamburgers or local cheese in pizzas. Instead of taking away freedom of choice, why not make those ‘less healthy’ choices at least taste better by using Real ingredients? This is also important in that students’ reasons for dining halls sucking often aren’t easily put into words. It’s an aesthetic reaction to the look and taste of the food. It just doesn’t seem genuine. Using Real Food can make dining hall food better on a level students can’t even describe yet — by just making it feel better to eat.

But despite all of our efforts, the corporation running UA’s food has decided to stamp out student voices. In a company-wide memo, Aramark told all employees to stop all contact with Real Food coordinators. One of its reasons for this was Real Food Challenge’s parent company, a unionizing group called Unite Here. There is a problem with this: it is a blatant lie. Unite Here isn’t even a challenge partner. Even though Unite Here has occasionally and independently worked with individual schools, Aramark’s citing of Unite Here as a parent company is merely a scare tactic. The fact that this company is using secretive, falsified methods to silence students, whereas before it was glad to work with us, is disrespectful and unfair to University of Alabama students. If our dollars are supporting them, and our school contracting with them, how can we allow them to use such despicable tactics to try to effectively silence us?

While it’s true that individual corporations have the right to their business methods, this is a corporation that is supported by our university. UA has a responsibility to work for students and not censor them, and therefore should not be contracting with companies who actively work against student voices. If we are going to have Aramark run our entire food system, then they should be held accountable by the University and by students. Aramark even violated the beloved Capstone Creed, as it did not “act with fairness, honesty and respect.” If this corporation can’t even be held accountable to our freshman pledge, how can it be expected to best serve students’ needs? How can it be supported by our meal plans and tax dollars?

The solution is simple: the University must hold Aramark responsible for its grievances against students, and reopen the communication between students, Aramark and University employees. Before this memo, students were working hard for the Real Food Challenge, and the University allowed us to have a Food Day that promoted and celebrated Real Food. We are not asking for a coercively signed contract or to censor any other group. We just want fair, equal treatment by a corporation that is serving us our meals every day. If we must pay $9 per meal, we should anticipate respect and care from the University regarding our food system. Students, I urge you to help us. Team up with Real Food Challenge coordinators and participate in our Day of Action on April 10. With your help, we can make Lakeside Dining Hall suck a whole lot less.