THE AMHERST
THE INDEPENDENT NEWSPAPER OF AMHERST COLLEGE SINCE 1868
STUDENT VOLUME CXLV, ISSUE 5l WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 7, 2015
Volleyball Has Successful Weekend Against Colby and Bates See Sports, Page 9 AMHERSTSTUDENT.AMHERST.EDU
Committee Moves Forward with Mascot Discussion Dan Ahn ’17 and Ryan Cenek ’18 Managing News Editor and Assistant News Editor
Photo courtesy of Kat Hague ‘18
Ralph Nader encouraged students to get involved in local politics and criticized two-party politics at a talk in Stirn Auditorium on Tuesday, Oct. 6.
Nader Criticizes State of American Politics
Ryan Cenek ’18 Assistant News Editor Political activist, lawyer and longtime presidential candidate Ralph Nader spoke in Stirn Auditorium on Tuesday, Oct. 6. Nader urged students to become politically engaged and argued that small groups of committed citizens can bring about change. The Amherst Political Union hosted the event. “We called this event ‘American Juggernaut’ because Ralph Nader has been a tireless advocate for social and political causes for nearly half a century,” said David Atkins ’17, Amherst Political Union co-president. “No matter how you feel about his politics, I think you have to
respect a man who has dedicated himself so tirelessly to this kind of fight.” Prior to the talk, the Amherst Political Union held an hour-long reception for Nader at the Center for Humanistic Inquiry, with several dozen students, many of whom were also political union members, in attendance. There, Nader spoke about the importance of citizen engagement and activism in affecting political change. He also criticized the twoparty system and the power of corporations and the wealthy. “We believe that Mr. Nader can offer tremendous insights into the realm of political campaigns, political parties and the status of partisan politics in American society; this is
particularly salient at the moment given the upcoming election,” said Liam Fine ’17, copresident of the political union. At the main event in Stirn Auditorium later that night, Nader delved straight into current political issues, including the ongoing presidential campaign. “We’ve turned politics into hedonistic spectacles,” Nader said. “Just look at this presidential campaign, especially these past few months. In doing so, we’ve opted out from the essential rudiment of civil society: We’ve got to be engaged.” Nader also talked about more general problems in American electoral politics, such
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Members of the student mascot committee said this week that they plan on taking steps toward holding a college-wide vote on whether or not to replace the Lord Jeff, the college’s current unofficial mascot. Committee members said they also plan to facilitate open discussions about the mascot in conjunction with the Association of Amherst Students. The mascot committee, which is not part of the AAS, was formed informally over the past summer. Virginia Hassell ’16, a senator who had served on that committee throughout last year, decided to create a new group to focus specifically on the mascot. “I reached out to people who I knew were passionate about the issue,” Hassell said. “There were different groups that were pursuing the same goal, so now we’ve just united forces.” Hassell said that the committee aims to hold a campus-wide vote at the end of this semester in which students can decide whether or not to “vacate the mascot.” The AAS senate also announced its intention to hold such a vote, in a letter which Sam Keaser ‘17E, a member of the committee, presented to the senate on Oct. 5. All but four senators at the meeting voted to publish the letter, which also stated that the senate would take a formal stance against using the Lord Jeff as the college’s unofficial mascot. Some senators opposed to the letter questioned whether the senate would be able to effectively facilitate conversations about the mascot if it had already taken a strong stance on the issue. “Even if we hadn’t taken a stance, we would be bringing the exact same biases to the conversation, so I don’t think it’s really changing it hugely because of that,” Keaser said in an in-
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Naomi Klein Visit Draws Focus to Divestment Movement Jacob Pagano ’18 Staff Writer
Naomi Klein, the author of “This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate,” addressed the Amherst community at the annual DeMott Lecture on Wednesday, Sept. 30. Her book was this year’s required reading for incoming first-year and transfer students. After the event, Divest Amherst held a rally to urge the college’s board of trustees to divest from all fossil fuel industries. In “This Changes Everything,” published in fall 2014, Klein argues that the effects of capitalism on the environment will lead to a less habitable and increasingly inequitable planet. “There is still time to avoid catastrophic warming, but not within the rules of capitalism as they are currently constructed,” Klein argues. “Which is surely is the best argument there has ever been for changing those rules.” Klein opened the event by saying that she hoped her book would have the potential to catalyze social change. “I am really excited to see what the class that has read this book chooses to do, and what social issues they mobilize around,”
Klein said. After a brief reading, Klein expanded on her thesis, and discussed what she described as a conflict between an “ideology of growth that has our politicians in its grips, and a need to do something radical about climate change.” Klein also addressed what she perceived as previous failures of the environmental movement. She said that environmental activists fall into the trap of arguing that climate change is the most pressing issue and should therefore be prioritized above all other unresolved problems. “This misses the point that we should see climate change as an accelerant and facilitator of other important social changes,” Klein said. “When you are choosing temperature guidelines, you are literally choosing which countries will survive. For places like Africa, a two Celsius degree increase would be nothing short of a death sentence.” Klein also discussed some of the environmental movement’s recent successes. She pointed to Germany, where citizens are now obtaining 30 percent of their energy from renewable sources. Klein argued that this could not have been achieved had it not been for a major re-
structuring of the economy. “In Germany, they have broken some of the rules of this neoliberal ideology, and there has been a movement there for private towns and governments to take back their energy from the big companies,” Klein said. “This is what we need. It’s not that we need a post-growth economy, but rather we must change the parts of our economy that are going to grow.” Before concluding the talk, Klein characterized activism and grassroots movements as important catalysts for positive change in the environment. Leaders of the student group Divest Amherst held a rally following the event and called for the college to divest its endowment from fossil fuels. Last academic year, the Green Amherst Project asked the board of trustees to divest from the coal industry. The board eventually responded with a “Statement on Sustainability and Investment Policy,” which it released on Feb. 24. The statement expressed the board’s desire to achieve a carbon-neutral footprint on campus. But the board wrote that it “does not endorse divestment of the endowment from fossil fuels.” Although the board’s statement did not directly address
arguments against divestment, critics of the divestment movement contend that divesting would have little impact on the fossil fuel industry, and that colleges should focus on other ways of fighting climate change. This year, the newly formed Divest Amherst has escalated the Green Amherst Project’s previous demand and is now urging the college to divest from all fossil fuel industries. “Amherst is an institution that wants to prepare for the future, but by investing in industries that are harming our future, Amherst contradicts its fundamental mission,” said Ben Walker ’16, a Green Amherst Project and Divest Amherst member. “If the board is so worried about us living lives of consequences, they should consider the consequences of their actions here and now.” Walker said the group decided to be more forceful with its demand after the board released its statement in February. “We have kept our campaign contained up to now,” Walker said. “We thought that by working with the board, we would be likely to win, but what’s clear is that we have to use different tactics and make a more public commitment to the board.”