VOLUME 75 • ISSUE 14 • OCTOBER 20, 2020
PSU's financial instability P. 4
Portland through the eyes of Intisar Abioto P. 12
Five reasons why voting matters P. 13
CONTENTS
COVER BY SAM GARCIA
NEWS HILL TO HALL
P. 3
SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY OREGON-BASED ROBOTICS STARTUP ACQUIRES MILLIONS IN INVESTMENT
P. 11
PRESIDENT PERCY AND BOT ADDRESS PSU’S FINANCIAL INSTABILITY
P. 4
ARTS & CULTURE BEABADOOBEE’S NEW RECORD IS GREAT AND CORNY
DIGGING DEEP WITH BLUMENAUER AND AOC
P. 5
P. 12
INTERNATIONAL OVER 21 DAYS LATER, VIOLENCE PERSISTS IN NAGORNO-KARABAKH
WHEN STORIES COLLIDE
P. 13
P. 6
TRICK-OR-TREATING FROM THE LIVING ROOM
P. 13
AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL SHUT DOWN IN INDIA
P. 7
COVER TIME TO ACT: TALKING ABOUT EQUITY AT PSU
OPINION FIVE REASONS WHY VOTING MATTERS
P. 14
P. 8–9
CAN VOTING TRULY CAPTURE THE SENTIMENT OF AMERICANS?
P. 15
INTERNATIONAL THIS WEEK AROUND THE WORLD
P. 10
DESIGNER SHOWCASE FARAH ALKAYED
P. 16
STAFF
EDIT ORI A L EDITOR IN CHIEF Justin Grinnell MANAGING EDITOR Nick Townsend NEWS EDITORS Hanna Anderson Dylan Jefferies
ONLINE EDITOR Lily Hennings COPY CHIEF Sophie Concannon CONTRIBUTORS Rhian Beam Emma Colburn Aineias Engstrom Kai McClary
INTERNATIONAL EDITOR Karisa Yuasa SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY EDITOR Béla Kurzenhauser
PHO T O & MULTIMEDI A PHOTO EDITOR Annie Schutz
ARTS & CULTURE EDITOR Morgan Troper
MULTIMEDIA EDITOR Nick Gatlin
OPINION EDITOR AJ Earl
PRODUC TION & DE SIGN CREATIVE DIRECTOR Sam Person
A DV ISING & ACCOUN TING COORDINATOR OF STUDENT MEDIA Reaz Mahmood
DESIGNERS Farah Alkayed Sam Garcia Shannon Steed
STUDENT MEDIA ACCOUNTANT Sheri Pitcher
DIS T RIBU TION DISTRIBUTION MANAGER Dylan Jefferies T ECHNOL OGY & W EB SIT E TECHNOLOGY ASSISTANTS Juliana Bigelow Kahela Fickle George Olson John Rojas
STUDENT MEDIA TECHNOLOGY ADVISOR Corrine Nightingale To contact Portland State Vanguard, email editor@psuvanguard.com
MIS SION S TAT EMEN T Vanguard ’s mission is to serve the Portland State community with timely, accurate, comprehensive and critical content while upholding high journalistic standards. In the process, we aim to enrich our staff with quality, hands-on journalism education and a number of skills highly valued in today’s job market. A BOU T Vanguard, established in 1946, is published weekly as an independent student newspaper governed by the PSU Student Media Board. Views and editorial content expressed herein are those of the staff,
contributors and readers and do not necessarily represent the PSU student body, faculty, staff or administration. Find us in print Tuesdays and online 24/7 at psuvanguard.com. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram @psuvanguard for multimedia content and breaking news.
OCTOBER 13–17 HANNA ANDERSON
OCTOBER 13: NEW MANAGEMENT PLAN APPROVED FOR THE COLUMBIA RIVER GORGE
A revised management plan for the Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area was approved by the Columbia River Gorge Commission on Tuesday, the second time the management plan has been revised in 29 years, according to OPB. Major parts of the new plan include, for the first time, a climate action strategy in order to help the area adapt to changing temperatures. The plan also includes greater protections for salmon habitats and limits the amount of land that can be used for urban development and expansion. In addition to the new environmental policies, the plan also requires the development of diversity, equity and inclusion policies for the commission and its staff.
OCTOBER 16: PORTLAND POLICE BUREAU OFFICERS TO WEAR CLEARER IDENTIFICATION DURING PROTESTS
Portland Police Bureau officers will be assigned three-digit ID numbers to wear prominently on helmets during protests, following an announcement by the PPB addressing the difficulty protesters have had identifying officers. According to OPB, officers previously switched from wearing name tags to lengthy ID numbers, in order to prevent people from finding and releasing personal information about the officers online. Those ID numbers, however, were difficult to see and remember, making it difficult to hold specific officers accountable. PPB also pulled five officers from its Rapid Response Team, pending investigations into their actions at protests, according to Willamette Week.
OCTOBER 17: REPUBLICAN LAWMAKERS SUE GOVERNOR BROWN OVER EMERGENCY AUTHORITY
Three Republican lawmakers filed a lawsuit against Oregon Governor Kate Brown on Oct. 16, claiming that she was abusing her authority in her response to the coronavirus pandemic by issuing stay-at-home orders and placing restrictions on businesses, according to Willamette Week. The lawsuit was filed by one state senator and two state representatives, who argued the emergency actions taken by Brown stole the authorities granted to lawmakers in the state constitution. A Washington County businessperson, who is filing the suit along with the lawmakers, also claimed to have suffered financial losses due to Brown’s executive orders, according to The Oregonian.
PSU Vanguard • OCTOBER 20, 2020 • psuvanguard.com
NEWS
3
PRESIDENT PERCY AND BOT ADDRESS PSU’S FINANCIAL INSTABILITY $ SAM GARCIA
“STRATEGIES FOR INNOVATION” PERCY LAID OUT PLANS FOR PSU TO ENSURE THE UNIVERSITY’S FINANCIAL SUSTAINABILITY AND RELEVANCE IN THE FUTURE. THESE INCLUDE: ACADEMIC PROGRAM INNOVATION According to Percy, this means creating new academic programs that respond to growing needs in the marketplace, industry and civic center for new and different kinds of programs.
INVESTMENT IN HIGH DEMAND PROGRAMS This means allocating funds and realigning resources to increase instructional capacity in PSU’s most popular programs, such as the school of business and the college of engineering and computer science.
EXPANDING ONLINE LEARNING OPPORTUNITIES “Clearly, the movement to remote learning has had a lot of impacts, and one of them may be an impact on a growing demand for online programs,” Percy said. PSU has invested in fully online academic programs— however, according to Percy, many of these programs need to be expanded and others added in order for PSU to compete with other colleges nationwide.
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NEWS
DYLAN JEFFERIES Portland State President Stephen Percy gave a presentation to the Board of Trustees on Oct. 5 outlining strategies to ensure PSU’s financial sustainability in the future. The presentation was given following a 4.9% tuition increase in June and a recent study released by the Homelessness Research and Action Collaborative, which found that 60% of students struggle with basic needs insecurity. In conjunction, the two events raised a major concern among BOT members; How can PSU continue to annually raise tuition costs while a significant number of students are facing financial distress? “I’d encourage everyone to read [the HRAC report] with some care—it opened my eyes,” said BOT chair Greg Hinckley. “We have a large community within the student body of [PSU] that are under a great deal of difficulty.” Percy said last year, as interim president, many BOT members expressed concerns about the long term financial picture of the institution, and that a sustained period of enrollment decline was generating a serious financial challenge. Annual tuition increases were also a major concern. “I look forward to the opportunity to discuss ideas as well as challenges and strategies regarding the long term financial sustainability of the university,” Percy said. According to Percy, the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated financial difficulties and created an imperative for PSU administration to take action. “In March, the [PSU] executive team became absorbed in responding effectively to the COVID-19 pandemic...while important questions remain, evidence shows that we have weathered the storm better than we might have imagined, and better than several Oregon universities,” Percy said. “Fundamentally, we have recognition on many fronts that a continued pattern of annual 5% tuition increases is unlikely to be affordable to our students and be sustainable for our future.”
GROWING NON-DEGREE PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION
CATCH-22
Like most universities, PSU focuses on degree-based education. However, Percy wants to see more programs based on professional and personal growth separate from traditional academic pathways. “[Non-degree programs] are consistent with our educational mission and an area where I think we can expand,” Percy said. “This is also an area where there isn’t any clear dominance of any other institution, at least in our metropolitan area doing this.”
Hinckley and BOT member Wally Van Valkenburg identified the central issue facing the institution in this exchange: “When you have 46% of your students saying that they’re housing-stressed and living in temporary accommodations provided by friends and others, that means we have enormous price sensitivity by our customers: the students,” Hinckley said. “We need to start introducing things that can reduce that rate of 5%, or, what I’m afraid of is that we will have an avalanche of decline in enrollment and we’ll really be in a fix.” “Today, we’re at a point of urgency,” he said. “I would argue for some scenario where we don’t increase tuition by 5%, where we don’t completely drain our reserves and where we reduce the overall cost [to the university],” Van Valkenburg said. “What’s that going to look like?” “Any change we’d like to make requires the consent of the faculty senate, and that’s a really slow process,” Hinkley said. “We might be able to get rid of a few janitors, but, you know, everybody is unionized.” “If we can’t balance the budget because we can’t reduce costs, and we don’t feel like we can increase tuition because that’s going to drive enrollment down, and we don’t feel like we’ve got any more room to reduce the reserves, than how do we as board members fulfill our fiduciary responsibility to the institution?” Van Valkenburg asked. “We’ve got to come up with alternative sources of revenue, and it’s got to be done sooner, not later,” Hinkley said. “I say there’s a time right now that we’ve got to start doing something differently, or we’re going to be in a heap of trouble.”
INVIGORATING SUMMER SCHOOL PSU has already begun the process of creating more summer school programs, and Percy would like to see even more summer school programs in the future. “We increased summer school by 11% over the previous year, and that has indicated positive revenue both to the last fiscal year, and to this fiscal year as well,” Percy said.
LEARNING FROM PSU’S FUTURES COLLABORATORY PSU’s Futures lab is a relatively new program that brings together educators and students to think about how to identify and address problems of the future. Percy would like to use this program to help PSU move forward. “What we’ve asked them to do this year is to spend more dedicated time looking at the way we offer our programs, the pedagogy of our programs, the way we organize programs, and look at alternatives and try to look at them from a futurist perspective,” Percy said. “What do we expect the future demand for education to be, and how can we put ourselves forward in ways that are beginning to move in that direction?” Lastly, Percy also discussed how altering PSU’s tuition system and state funding will be essential to PSU’s financial sustainability moving forward. According to discussions among BOT members at the meeting, many, if not all of these plans, will take years to implement and to increase revenue and student retention.
PSU Vanguard • OCTOBER 20, 2020 • psuvanguard.com
CONGRESSIONAL REPRESENTATIVES MEET FOR A TOWN HALL ON PUBLIC HOUSING
DIGGING DEEP WITH BLUMENAUER AND AOC
EMMA COLBURN 19 days before the “most important election in U.S. history,” according to U.S. Representative Earl Blumenauer, he and U.S. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who represents New York’s 14th congressional district, are building momentum between constituents in new ways with a virtual town hall. “This is an opportunity for our two districts—separated by 3,000 miles, but sharing so many common concerns,” Blumenauer, who represents Oregon’s 3rd congressional district, said to an audience split between the two coasts, yet united in one Zoom room. The representatives themselves are united on a number of policies and proposals. In central focus at the town hall: public housing. In the Bronx, where Ocasio-Cortez’s constituents live, the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) is an entity spread across all five boroughs, boasting a portfolio of public housing stock that includes some of the city’s most prized, and under-monetized, waterfront real estate. “We have worked on the Green New Deal for Public Housing, which specifically addresses our public housing crisis across the country,” Ocasio-Cortez stated of their work together. “This does not only address NYCHA, but public housing from coast to coast. We are passionate about repealing the Fair Cloth Amendment, a piece of legislation that the U.S. has on the books that restricts us from building any new public housing.” In contrast to these large blocks of public housing visible from the skyline, Portland’s public housing developments are cunningly woven into neighborhoods, making it difficult to read the imprint they make on the city’s social landscape. Yet doing so is imperative to finding a solution to the months-long standstill between city officials and residents protesting against anti-Black racism in Portland. “Housing policy is at the core of some of the racial disparities we see that affects education, health and certainly in terms of the dynamic of the community,” Representative Blumenauer said. “This is why we desperately need to capture the imagination to drive [equity] forward.” Capturing that imagination requires a bit of context. The first government-subsidized housing complex in Portland sits just off Columbia Boulevard. Built to house defense workers
during World War II, the Columbia Villa was converted to low-income housing after the war. The demographics of the Villa, as it came to be known, resulted from racialized lending policy, followed by disinvestment. Responding to a group of 5th grade students at Buckman Elementary during the Q&A, Ocasio-Cortez broke down racial residential segregation: “Many years ago, around the 1930–50s, we had a practice known as redlining. It drew actual red lines on maps around white neighborhoods and black neighborhoods. Black, brown and Native communities were excluded from many beneficial programs that led to home ownership generations ago,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “We used a zoning system to restrict where people could live, particularly people of color,” Blumenauer added. In the face of raciallyrestricted access to home ownership, people of color built resilient communities in rental properties. Redlining was the first step in a series of federal legislation that promoted the decline of these low-income neighborhoods, where communities of color were concentrated. Eventually, the decay of housing and neighborhood infrastructure like the Columbia Villa prompted capital influx from public and private entities, without regard for community members’ individual or collective resilience. “We’ve had problems in terms of law enforcement and in the development of the city that hasn’t respected the integrity of historic Black communities,” Blumenauer stated. In Portland, the 2003 demolition, rebuild and rebrand of Columbia Villa, now called New Columbia, sought to lure a different demographic into its winding streets. “Discrimination in our housing laws is one of the biggest contributing factors to the racial wealth gap in the United States today,” OcasioCortez said.
PSU Vanguard • OCTOBER 20, 2020 • psuvanguard.com
“When we say we shouldn’t build that tall affordable housing complex in our backyard because it changes the character of the neighborhood. These may be scripts we have inherited, they may not be explicitly racist, but they are racist in their application and impact. They cement and solidify racial disparities between communities.” “We have to really make sure that we aren’t just having these fights and engaging in them from a place of self-perseveration or perceived scarcity. We need to make sure we are approaching these changes from a more holistic view of what is best for our cities overall.” Held on October 15, the town hall coincided with the last day to file census. “When [you] fill out the census, you are able to provide data that helps governments and policy makers meet the needs of your community,” Ocasio-Cortez said. In Portland, the 2010 census revealed demographic shifts and the need for affordable housing; rezoning efforts led by Portland Development Commission, which rebranded to Prosper Portland in 2017, had raised residential prices in North and Northeast Portland, driving poorer, marginalized communities from Portland’s inner core in a process known as gentrification. Yet in the origin of the census as a 17th-century colonial mechanism developed by France to gain political control over Indigenous lands and peoples
remotely, lies an imperative aspect of housing debate bedrock. “It is a scandal that we have an unbroken history of not just discrimination, but active genocidal activities [against] Native people,” Blumenauer said to the press after the town hall. “For me, this is something that should be part of our housing policy.” “Within the Green New Deal, we’ve made special strides to acknowledge the treaty rights of Native peoples,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “That includes ignored treaty rights that have been stomped on.”
OREGON REPRESENTATIVE EARL BLUMENAUER. COURTESY OF FLICKR CREATIVE COMMONS
NEWS
5
OVER 21 DAYS LATER, VIOLENCE PERSISTS IN NAGORNOKARABAKH ARMENIAN FLAGS. COURTESY OF FLICKR CREATIVE COMMONS
KARISA YUASA The Nagorno-Karabakh region in the South Caucasus mountains, also known as Artsakh, has been the cause of violent land disputes between Armenia & Azerbaijan for decades. Nagorno-Karabakh is internationally recognized as Azerbaijani territory—however, it’s inhabited and controlled by an Armenian ethnic majority. The two countries have periodically fought in the region since the Nagorno-Karabakh War ended in a ceasefire in 1994. The most recent deadly altercations occurred in July.
SEPTEMBER 27
Fighting broke out, killing at least 23 people and wounding more than 100, according to BBC. It is unclear what sparked the fighting, but Armenia and Azerbaijan exchanged heavy artillery fire that struck several towns, including the region’s capital city Stepanakert. Armenia and Azerbaijan both declared martial law. Many countries weighed in on the matter shortly after the violence began. “Military action must stop, as a matter of urgency, to prevent a further escalation,” tweeted Charles Michel, president of the European Council, calling for an “immediate return to negotiations, without preconditions.” “Turkey stands in full solidarity with Azerbaijan and unreservedly supports its right to self-defense,” wrote Presidential Spokesperson Ibrahim Kalin on Twitter.
SEPTEMBER 29
The United Nations Security Council called for the immediate end of the fighting in Nagorno-Karabakh and emphasized the importance of returning to negotiation talks. United States Secretary of State Mike Pompeo weighed in on the fighting after discussing the clashes with Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias in Crete, Greece. “The foreign minister and I addressed the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh where both sides need to stop the violence and work with the Minsk Group co-chairs and return to substantive negotiations as quickly as possible,” Pompeo said.
SEPTEMBER 30
Although admitting to not having any proof of direct Turkish involvement, French President Emmanuel Macron said he was
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INTERNATIONAL
worried about Turkey’s “warlike” messaging. “France remains extremely concerned by the warlike messages Turkey had in the last hours, which essentially remove any of Azerbaijan’s inhibitions in reconquering Nagorno-Karabakh, and that we won’t accept,” said Macron at a news conference in Latvia.
OCTOBER 1
Despite influence and push from other countries, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev rejected the idea of holding talks, according to Al Jazeera.
OCTOBER 4
Pashinyan discussed the U.S.’s role in the conflict over a phone call with U.S. National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien, according to The New York Times. “The United States,” Pashinyan said in an interview following the call, “needs to explain whether it gave those F-16s to bomb peaceful villages and peaceful populations.”
OCTOBER 8
American celebrity Kim Kardashian West used her social media presence to show her support of Armenia in the conflict. “I want everyone to remember that despite the distance that separates us, we are not limited by borders,” said Kardashian West in an Instagram post to her 190 million followers. “We are one global Armenian nation together.”
OCTOBER 14
The director of the International Committee of the Red Cross, Martin Schuepp, issued a statement urging the end of conflict. “We project that at least tens of thousands of people across the region will need support over the next few months,” Schuepp said. “Civilians are dying or suffering life-changing injuries. Homes, businesses and once-busy streets are being reduced to rubble. The elderly and babies are among those forced to spend hours in unheated basements or to leave their homes for safety.” Despite accusations, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan denied Turkey sent Syrian fighters to Azerbaijan, according to Al Jazeera.
A historic cathedral in Shusha, Nagorno-Karabakh was caught in the crossfire, according to AP News. Although no one was injured from the attack, two journalists were wounded while inspecting the damage.
OCTOBER 15
OCTOBER 9
OCTOBER 17
Russia announced it would sponsor cease-fire talks between Armenia and Azerbaijan. According to AP News, Armenia said it announced it was open to holding a cease-fire meeting, while Azerbaijan said it would only agree if Armenian forces withdrew from Nagorno-Karabakh. “We only have one condition: Armenian armed forces must unconditionally, fully, and immediately leave our lands,” said Aliyev, according to BBC.
OCTOBER 10
According to AP News, Armenia and Azerbaijan agreed to hold ceasefire talks in Russia. After 10 hours of discussion in Moscow, the two sides signed a cease-fire deal. The deal was intended to stop fighting and allow for the exchange of prisoners and war dead. Immediately after the deal was signed, both countries accused each other of breaking the truce.
Azerbaijani President Aliyev said he believed the conflict would be solved, according to Reuters. Armenia accused Turkey of blocking flights carrying emergency aid from using its airspace. Azerbaijan accused Armenia of a rocket attack that killed at least 13 civilians and wounded more than 50 more. According to CNN, Aliyev referred to the strike as a “cowardly shelling.” Armenian officials denied the attack and subsequently accused Azerbaijan of attacking civilian areas. Later, Armenia and Azerbaijan announced they both agreed to a new ceasefire deal—a week after the Russian-brokered truce failed.
OCTOBER 18
The second ceasefire attempt came into force at midnight. According to Al Jazeera, a spokesperson for Armenia’s defense ministry wrote on Twitter Azerbaijan fired rockets and artillery shells Sunday morning. Later, Azerbaijan’s Ministry of Defense also accused Armenia of not following the truce agreement.
PSU Vanguard • OCTOBER 20, 2020 • psuvanguard.com
AMNESTY
INTERNATIONAL
SHUTS DOWN IN INDIA INDIAN FLAG. COURTESY OF FLICKR CREATIVE COMMONS
KARISA YUASA On Sept. 29, Amnesty International announced it laid off all staff members and is suspending work in India after its bank accounts were frozen by the Indian government. The bank accounts were frozen on Sept. 10, weeks after the organization published reports that were highly critical of the government. The Hindu Nationalist Bharatiya Janata Partyled government accused Amnesty International of breaking laws around foreign funding. “All the glossy statements about humanitarian work and speaking truth to power are nothing but a ploy to divert attention from their activities which were in clear contravention of laid down Indian laws,” the Ministry of Foreign Affairs wrote in a statement. “Amnesty is free to continue humanitarian work in India, as is being done by many other organizations. However, India, by settled law, does not allow interference in domestic political debates by entities funded by foreign donations. This law applies equally to all and it shall apply to Amnesty International as well.” The statement accused Amnesty International of violating the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA). FCRA places restrictions on foreign funding for non-governmental organizations. In
2016, the United Nations issued a statement urging for the repeal of the law as it was “being used more and more to silence organizations involved in advocating civil, political, economic, social, environmental or cultural priorities, which may differ from those backed by the Government.” Amnesty International called the accusation that laws were broken an “incessant witch-hunt.” In a statement, Avinash Kumar, executive director of Amnesty International India, said “Amnesty International India stands in full compliance with all applicable Indian and international laws. For human rights work in India, it operates through a distinct model of raising funds domestically.” Amnesty International believes that the freezing of their bank accounts was a politically motivated move from the Indian government. “The continuing crackdown on Amnesty International India over the last two years and the complete freezing of bank accounts is not accidental,” Kumar said. “The constant harassment by government agencies including the Enforcement Directorate is a result of our unequivocal calls for transparency in the government, more recently for accountability of the Delhi police and the Government of India
PSU Vanguard • OCTOBER 20, 2020 • psuvanguard.com
regarding the grave human rights violations in Delhi riots and Jammu & Kashmir.” In response to the report on the Delhi riots that was released in August, Delhi police told The Hindu Amnesty International’s report was “lopsided, biased and malicious,” as reported by BBC. This was not the first time the Indian government froze Amnesty International India’s bank accounts. In October 2018—following a 10-hour raid—Amnesty International’s bank accounts were frozen, causing a staff layoff. “India has a rich and pluralistic democratic culture with a free press, independent judiciary and tradition of vibrant domestic debate,” the Ministry of Foreign Affairs wrote in a statement. “Amnesty’s failure to comply with local regulations does not entitle them to make comments on the democratic and plural character of India.” “India’s stature as a liberal democracy with free institutions, including media & civil society organizations, accounted for much of its soft power in the world,” wrote Shashi Tharoor, a Congressperson and former diplomat, on Twitter. “Actions like this both undermine our reputation as a democracy & vitiate our soft power.” The only other time Amnesty International shut down operations was in Russia when
authorities locked staff out of their office in 2016. “We are facing a rather unprecedented situation in India,” said Rajat Khosla, Amnesty’s senior director of research, advocacy and policy, according to BBC. “Amnesty International India has been facing an onslaught of attacks, bullying and harassment by the government in a very systematic manner,” Human Rights Watch accused the Indian government of mimicking authoritarian regimes by bringing politically motivated charges against activists and others critical of the government under charges of terrorism and sedition. “India does not stand in good company with these moves it is making,” Khosla said. “I hope people around the world sit up and take notice. We are doing this with a very heavy heart, and a deep sense of anguish and grief.” According to BBC, Amnesty International plans to continue fighting its legal case in India. “As many of our colleagues have lost their jobs this week thanks to the actions of the Government of India, we will look for ways to continue our support to them as we continue to call on the Government to end its shameful crackdown on those who stand up for human rights of Indians,” said Acting Secretary General of Amnesty International Julie Verhaar.
INTERNATIONAL
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TIM
TALKING
AN INTERVIEW WITH V EMMA COLBURN Dr. Ame Lambert is Portland State’s new vice president of Global Diversity and Inclusion (GDI). On Oct. 30, GDI is hosting “Time To Act: Envisioning and Creating a Just and Equitable PSU,” an equity summit created by Lambert and PSU President Stephen Percy. Before the summit, Lambert sat down to talk about diversity, equity and inclusion, and how to best improve equity on campus in the years to come. Portland State Vanguard: Talk a little bit about the position of Global Diversity and Inclusion (GDI), in the context of this moment of these past six months of racial equity work. What do you see as the biggest benefit of being in Portland and doing this work, and the biggest hurdle? Lambert: It started out as a chief DR. AME LAMBERT. COURTESY OF PORTLAND STATE UNIVERSITY
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COVER
PSU Vanguard • OCTOBER 20, 2020 • psuvanguard.com
ME TO ACT :
G ABOUT EQUITY AT PSU
VICE PRESIDENT OF GLOBAL DIVERSITY AND INCLUSION DR. AME LAMBERT diversity officer role, really building out the compliance function of affirmative action, equal employment opportunity, Title IX and then community engagement. Those were the original pillars in terms of the first round of the work. Now that we have the resource centers, it allows GDI to be a place that elevates minoritized students’ success. Increasingly, we also need to focus on employee success as well, to build capacity along the full spectrum of DEI-related pieces: recruitment, retention, success. It’s not enough just to bring people in: What are the experiences that they have in terms of climate? How are we building the capacity for what comes next? Are they advancing within the institution? PSU is incredibly decentralized, and pretty autonomous. In some ways, this allows for innovation and the ability to move faster in this big machine—but what we’re hearing [is that] folks are looking for alignment, but they’re also looking for structure. Is there a framework or model we’re using? How are we assessing them? What are the accountability structures? Those are all things that we get to drive at GDI. Working with [Percy] as president and the executive council, we get to build those things. And then partner with folks across the university to do what they want to do. VG: Perfect segue. Why is this position important to the university’s mission, or slogan, to “let knowledge serve the city?” Lambert: PSU is of Portland and drives Portland. It’s driving the economic vitality of the state in terms of providing talent. It’s educating a lot of people from Portland, and from the state of Oregon, and so it is driving social mobility that way. So I think there’s a responsibility, a special one, that PSU has to the city and the state as a whole. It’s a huge responsibility, but it’s also an incredible opportunity to lean fully into this work. VG: In terms of responsibility, you mentioned [in an email] that there was a noose found on campus. My first layer of shock was from the pain of reading that. And then, the next layer of shock was, how did I not hear about that? Can you share some of the context behind the incident?
Lambert: It was at the Fourth and Montgomery building site. That site is a partnership between OHSU, PSU, PCC and the city. There has been a pattern of nooses at construction sites, and so there has been activation of the construction industry with an initiative to stamp out hate. Dr. Marvin Lynn, who is the dean of the College of Education [at PSU], led a process to refocus the energy on the possibilities of the partnerships in the building and away from the hate and the disruption that the noose created. So it was a powerful, powerful ceremony. It happened about two weeks ago and folks spoke, there was poetry, and music. VG: How do you talk about something without giving it more power? Lambert: We’ll never act like it’s not impactful, but we’re not going to spend all of our time and energy responding to anything. You could spend three, four months chasing after one incident, when that’s energy that could be spent on uplifting BIPOC communities. And so you’re exactly right. We will acknowledge the harm done, but we’re not going to dwell, we’re just not. It’s not worth our time and our attention. We will spend our attention constructing. VG: In that spirit, do you want to share anything more about the October 30 event—what’s on the table, where the planning for that event came from, and why somebody should attend? Lambert: There are a couple reasons for it happening and it happening now. In the summer, emails were fast and furious, in terms of sending a list of demands or recommendations for things to do. But it was like, “This person doesn’t know what that person is saying, so, if you do this one, then what about that one?” We were trying to figure out how to prioritize, and the challenge was: “Why would [the executive council] get to [decide]?” The community should get to prioritize their own recommendations. It is important for the community to come together and co-create a vision of what it means for us to be racially just and equitable [at PSU]. Everybody is sure that that’s a good idea—so what does it mean? What does it look like? What
PSU Vanguard • OCTOBER 20, 2020 • psuvanguard.com
does it feel like? And what will it take to get there? And so that’s what October 30 is about. It’s really critical that the community is fully represented at the table as we have these conversations. We’re talking about the future. We’re doing it for students, and students are doing it for the folks who come after them. So really, students need to be at the table fully present, fully voiced, so that we build the institution we want. As you know, when people co-create something, there’s a little bit more buy in. This is what we’re going to hold ourselves accountable to. VG: You’re doing it in a way that will last beyond the momentum and energy of the moment. Someone in your position, getting all these requests, could just take that moment to bring the solution themselves. Along the way, you have picked up a different perspective on leadership. Lambert: In the idea about leadership being about kind of collective engagement, there is a theory I appreciate very much. It distinguishes between technical challenges and adaptive challenges. Technical challenges are the ones that are easy to identify, and very quickly the solutions are apparent. There are lots of things related to DEI, for example, that could be like that. If you were going to get a search advocate program, we don’t need to talk to a million and one people to do it. You just do it. But the core of the work, the kind of transformation that is needed for equity, is adaptive. Adaptive challenges take a really long time. People forget what the heck is going on, because it’s pretty amorphous. In order to solve adaptive challenges, it requires change in multiple places. And not just change in places, it requires a change in paradigm, a change in relationships. So the only way to solve adaptive challenges is the collective leaning in together. Taking some risks. You’re going to screw up, because, you know, we’re not even sure what the problem is. In my mind, and in my experience, the reason that we have not made enough progress on DEI work is not that we don’t care. It’s that we don’t care enough, and we don’t understand how complex it is. Because it’s adaptive. We [make] a declaration,
“This will be the solution!” and that has never worked. It’s not sustained, it’s not deep enough. There are five shepherding groups that are organized according to a framework and are engaged in meaning-making. Then we’ll continue to get feedback from the campus. It really is important that whatever we come up with is a partnership, a collective voice, because if not, we’re not getting to any real solutions. VG: And what about the role of story ownership and storytelling—both an individual owning their own story, and then also our collective story of this institution—in that process? Lambert: On the individual level, our journey is about a search for our story. What I love about college is that there are all of these moments outside the classroom when life is speaking to you, calling out to you, and you are activated. When something really angers you, or something really ignites your passion, that is the world and your life speaking to you about what you’re supposed to do in the areas of multiple impact. This is the reason that I’m such a passionate believer in the integration of professions in the liberal arts: the opportunity to build capacity in different areas through these moments that speak to you and ignite you. On an institutional level, when we coalesce around who we want to be, what does that mean in terms of who we have been? Systems are wired to go back to the status quo, and so understanding who we have been or what’s in our core, in our DNA—or in our birth date—is a very important part of moving towards where we want to be. VG: That’s a bigger topic than we thought. Lambert: I am excited to be here, I am excited to partner so I invite folks to partner. I invite folks to lean in for the long haul, because we’re not talking about a quick journey here. And so lean in, and just hold on as we move through.
More information on the Equity summit, or to reserve your virtual spot at the event, can be found on the summit’s webpage.
COVER
9
THIS WEEK
around the
WORLD
Oct. 13–17
2 1
3 4
5
1
October 13
CYPRUS
The Cyprus government announced the end of an investment visa program known as “golden passports” in a tweet. The program—which allowed foreigners to obtain Cyprus citizenship by investing over $2 million in the country—had raised approximately $7 billion dollars since its inception in 2008. However, it was also criticized as a gateway to corruption. The policy was under scrutiny after an undercover investigation from Al Jazeera appeared to show politicians agreeing to help a fictional businessman obtain a passport, despite having a criminal record. Both lawmakers in the video denied any wrongdoing, but have since resigned from their positions according to The New York Times. “The proposal was based on the long-standing weaknesses but also on the abusive exploitation of the provisions of the programme,” stated the interior and finance ministries in Tuesday’s tweet. 2
October 14
PARIS, FRANCE
French President Emmanuel Macron declared a state of emergency and announced a 9 p.m. curfew in nine regions—including Paris—following an uptick in COVID-19 cases. The French government originally declared a state of emergency in March before lifting it in July when case numbers decreased. As of Oct. 16, France had reported 834,770 confirmed coronavirus
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INTERNATIONAL
cases and 33,303 deaths. “The COVID-19 epidemic constitutes a public health disaster which, by its character and its severity, puts at risk the health of the population,” the government said in a statement, as reported by Reuters. The curfew affects 18 million French citizens and will run through Dec. 1. 3
October 15
INDIA
Flooding from heavy rainfall has killed at least 60 people in western and southern India. According to The Times of India, the army was called in to help with rescue and relief following the storm. The hardest-hit state was Telangana, where 50 people died according to Reuters. Telangana’s capital, home to companies such as Microsoft, Amazon and TCS, flooded due to the out-of-season rainfall. According to The Indian Express, the 24 hours of rain in the capital was the highest October rainfall since 1903. Crops were also damaged in the flooding and the losses are worth an estimated 20 billion Indian rupees, or $272 million, according to the Telangana Chief Minister’s office. 4
October 16
SANA’A, YEMEN
Hundreds of prisoners were exchanged between the internationally recognized Yemeni government and its opponent, Yemen’s Houthi movement, on the second and final day of the
largest prisoner swap between the two groups. According to Al Jazeera, the two sides agreed last month to exchange 1,081 prisoners over the course of two days. 1056 people were released according to the International Committee of the Red Cross, which facilitated the exchange. “This is an important step in the implementation of the Stockholm Agreement and is the largest prisoner exchange since the start of the conflict,” stated Stéphane Dujarric, spokesperson for the United Nations Secretary General, in a statement for the UN. “It is proof that important breakthroughs can be achieved through dialogue and compromise.” 5
October 17
WELLINGTON, NEW ZEALAND
Prime Minister Jacinda Arden of New Zealand’s Labor Party won reelection when her strongest opponent conceded defeat after only 77% of votes were counted. During her first term as New Zealand’s youngest prime minister in over a century, Arden faced a deadly church massacre, a major volcano eruption and a global pandemic, according to Reuters. Arden has been praised for her handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, as New Zealand has seen consistently low case counts. “People were very grateful and very happy with how we’ve handled [coronavirus], they like the shape of the plan that we’ve got going forward from here for the economy,” said Finance Minister Grant Robertson, according to Al Jazeera.
PSU Vanguard • OCTOBER 20, 2020 • psuvanguard.com
OREGON-BASED ROBOTICS STARTUP ACQUIRES MILLIONS IN INVESTMENT BÉLA KURZENHAUSER Agility Robotics acquired $20 million from investors in their latest investment round co-led by California investment collective DCVC and venture fund Playground Global, according to their latest press release. This new investment pool will allow the Oregon-based robotics startup to increase production numbers of their highly-celebrated bipedal robots designed to work alongside humans in logistics, retailer and manufacturing environments. Agility was founded in 2015 on the backs of 11 years of robotics development at Oregon State University’s Dynamic Robotics Laboratory by Carnegie Mellon graduates Dr. Jonathan Hurst and Dr. Damion Shelton. One of their earliest models was the ATRIAS robot, a bipedal robot that made headlines in 2015 for being the first bipedal robot to accurately reproduce human gait. ATRIAS was able to withstand physical force, such as kicks and impacts, without falling over. Their next model was the Cassie robot, also developed in the Dynamic Robotics Laboratory. Cassie was a massive leap forward in bipedal locomotion in comparison to ATRIAS. It was around this time Agility was formed from the team that worked on Cassie at OSU, existing as a subsidiary of the university, which still owns a part of the company to this day. Agility sold and distributed Cassie models to some of the top universities throughout the world, implementing them in logistical environments as well as robotics labs for further research and development. Cassie helped put Agility on the map, securing them $8 million in funding in a 2018 investor pool led by Playground Global. Using the new funding, Agility upgraded Cassie, developing new features and an enhanced sense of locomotion, allowing for outdoor traversal and complex behavior such as navigating up and down stairs. Although not particularly useful as a robotic assistant, Cassie fulfilled an important role in the development of Agility’s next robot. Since the retirement of the Cassie model in 2019, Agility has produced the Digit model, a complete anthropomorphic robot akin to
those developed by MIT’s Boston Dynamics Laboratory. Digit is capable of more advanced spatial awareness as well as locomotion of the arms, picking up objects and transporting them with a similar form factor to that of a human. Agility has since partnered with Ford Motors to continue development on automated package delivery systems using Digit. “If robots are going to be effective and useful to us, they’re going to have to work on our terms in our space,” said Hurst, CTO and cofounder of the company, in a new video about Agility’s mission moving forward. “Digit is going to be able to do a wide variety of different tasks—things like package handling in warehouses, indoor and outdoor delivery, inspecting hazardous workplaces or any application that requires the basic abilities and shape of a person.” In the near future, Agility plans to implement Digit robots into more environments and situations throughout the globe. However, rather than a substitutive measure of replacing human workers with robots, Agility aims to integrate Digit alongside humans. “Over time, we believe Agility’s robots will transform the way we deliver goods, essential items like food and medicine, and even services to more people for less money, all while safely and respectfully empowering human co-workers along the way,” stated DCVC Managing Partner Matt Ocko in the company’s press release on the new investment. Board member Bruce Leak added “[...] we know all too well the challenges facing retailers and logistics companies in hiring hundreds of thousands of people during surges in demand like the current pandemic.” With the high price point of $250,000 for a Digit unit, the $20 million investment should allow the 34-person team to increase their workforce as well as up their production numbers, distributing more units to universities and companies across the globe. “You’re going to see robots delivering packages, [you’re going to see them] back in warehouses doing the back room work, getting to be more and more useful and helpful in our lives,” Hurst said.
PSU Vanguard • OCTOBER 20, 2020 • psuvanguard.com
AGILITY ROBOTICS' DIGIT ROBOT PICKS UP A CARDBOARD BOX. COURTESY OF FLICKR CREATIVE COMMONS
SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
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NOSTALGIA IN REVERSE BEABADOOBEE’S NEW RECORD IS GREAT AND CORNY AND WHO CARES? MORGAN TROPER In late 2017, Pitchfork ran a prescient feature on the unlikely resurgence of rap rock—aptly titled, “The Unlikely Resurgence of Rap Rock.” The piece's premise is that rap rock—historically one of pop music’s most maligned sub-genres—had begun to resurface via the work of young rappers like Lil Uzi Vert and Lil Peep. Disingenuous canonization of Korn frontman Jonathan Davis notwithstanding, it’s an article that makes some enduringly great points (and it was, freakily and sadly, published a mere four days before Peep’s tragic death.) Young people are able to experience old music unencumbered by the cultural baggage that makes it seem corny to the people who lived through it, and this oscillation is a defining characteristic of the pop music continuum, if not the pop culture continuum in general. It is nostalgia in reverse. British-Filipino singer-songwriter Beabadoobee’s first full-length release, Fake It Flowers, wasn’t explicitly influenced by rap rock or nu-metal or anything, really, that would have made the main stage at Woodstock ’99. But—with its evocations of mall-core pop-punk, midtempo radio emo bands like All-American Rejects and Let Go-era Avril Lavigne—it still feels like a twist on this dynamic. Born in the year 2000, Beabadoobee was fortunate enough to come of age during poptimism’s big boom. For those who don’t spend virtually all their free time ambling the endless hall of mirrors that is music Twitter, that term broadly refers to the concept that pop music deserves the same level of critical respect and analysis paid to rock. I did not come of age in this era, exactly, but I felt its ideological ripples. It was the period when Pitchfork et al. began covering hip hop and mainstream pop music proper; front page reviews of Carly Rae Jepsen’s E•MO•TION would run alongside retrospectives on mildewed and decidedly unsexy albums like The Bends, or whatever. Not to give a handful of blogs too much credit, but this juxtaposition
likely played a part in molding the diverse tastes and inclusive dispositions of fledgling rock, pop and rap artists alike—including, of course, artists such as Beabadoobee. Fake It Flowers is a saccharine morass of influences that all generally fall under the rock umbrella. First track and lead single “Care” is still the album highlight and the record’s statement of theme—with an intro verse reminiscent of the Cranberries, a hook that evokes Kelly Clarkson’s “Since U Been Gone” and an extremely brief, flanger-laden guitar solo that sounds like Billy Corgan playing blindfolded before accidentally walking into oncoming traffic. “Charlie Brown’’ brings to mind the emo somnolence of Jimmy Eat World—that is, until it launches into its Herculean, Lady Gaga-caliber chorus. Beabadoobee’s maximalist, arena-filling musical leanings are offset by wry and often deeply personal post-adolescent musings. “I think I want to marry him, but I really don’t want to freak him out,” she sings during album closer “Yoshimi, Forest, Magdalene,” which are also the names she’s given to her and her crush’s imaginary children in the song. “I’m scared he’s gonna leave me, ‘cause when I’m mad I get pretty scary,’’ she continues—“but he won’t, and he won’t because I’m pretty, and we’ll have lots and lots and lots and lots of babies.” The whole thing is funny, heartrending and unflinchingly forthright; it’s like Weezer’s “No One Else” without the sexism. There is this fancy, post-modern idea that if a writer makes too many comparisons to an old thing in a review of a new thing, they are being reductive or lazy or that the work in question is somehow not being judged on the merits of its own, unique properties. This flies in the face of the philosophies guiding so much contemporary pop music, though. Take, for example, hyperpop—a Gen Z Frankenstein puree of EDM, rap and top 40 pop that is as catchy as it is burdensome. This fairytale— that a mythical gestalt exists at the core of all art—is, ironically, reductive itself; not only can hyperpop be divided by the sum of its parts, that is precisely the point.
Beabadoobee doesn’t approach hyperpop levels of aesthetic restlessness on Fake It Flowers, and if you aren’t listening carefully, it might not even seem like a particularly adventurous rock record. Yet it is a patchwork of disparate influences, some of which are very corny. Beabadoobee was four years old when Ashlee Simpson—a fairly identifiable reference point throughout Fake It Flowers—was exposed lip-syncing during a performance on Saturday Night Live. That event was essentially a career killer for Simpson; CD copies of her debut Autobiography were summarily thrown in budget bins (if not the garbage), and her music was widely dismissed as flavor of the week baby food. For millennials, it is likely impossible to engage with “Pieces of Me” without subconsciously recalling that incident. It colors the way we listen to the song, which is too bad, because the song is very good. But for someone such as Beabadoobee, who doesn’t share that collective cultural memory, the Ashlee Simpson lip-syncing debacle is probably just a yawn-inducing footnote. When young artists plunder those bargain bins and trash cans and find something redemptive about music the preceding generation has deemed corny, older adults and bad critics default to “kids these days” haughtiness; we call it revisionist and we feel like it affirms the worthiness of our tastes. “If only they knew how much we used to make fun of Ashlee Simpson,” we’ll think to ourselves (or say publicly, if we’re really old and still use Facebook.) But really, this just affirms our oldness and the tenacity of our biases—and taste is nothing if not accumulated bias. Fake It Flowers is a great and fun rock record on its own, but maybe more meaningfully, it helps recontextualize a particular era of corny-yet-secretly-great music. I listened to Fake It Flowers three times and then immediately put on “Sk8er Boi”— because, as a general rule, if the kids like it, then there’s probably just something we missed the first time.
BRITISH-FILIPINO SINGER-SONGWRITER BEABADOOBEE. COURTESY OF CALLUM HARRISON
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ARTS & CULTURE
PSU Vanguard • OCTOBER 20, 2020 • psuvanguard.com
Trick -ortreating
from the living room ANIMAL CROSSING: NEW HORIZONS. COURTESY OF NINTENDOLIFE
ANIMAL CROSSING GETS A SPOOKY MAKEOVER RHIAN BEAM Everyone is desperate for an ounce of happiness as a treat for getting through these past six months. Thankfully, the fall update to Animal Crossing: New Horizons is here. This time around, there aren’t many new fish and bugs to catch, but there are plenty of other ways to modify your island and villagers to make your spooky aesthetic a virtual reality. You can also acquire many recipes for new Halloween DIY items. So far, I’ve seen the spooky arch, the spooky table—replete with spooky chairs, of course—the spooky lantern, carved pumpkins and pumpkins with hay barrels. Depending on the day, some of these items are already available for sale at Nook’s Cranny. Probably the most anticipated feature of the update was the ability to plant and harvest pumpkins. You can buy pumpkin starters from the character Leif when he comes to your island, and you can buy them any day thereafter from Nook’s Cranny. They function similarly to flowers—you water them and they grow, and then they stay that way. They never go bad, even after you pick them. Another less obvious aspect of this autumnal update is the addition of pine cones and acorns to trees. You can create unique DIY items from pumpkins, pine cones, and acorns. Also, don’t miss buying candy once a day at Nook’s Cranny. You want to have enough to give to your villagers on Halloween, and some of the new DIY items require candy as building materials as well.
Included in the update are also new skin tones and eye color options, which allow you to enhance your outfits. While the skin tones aren’t really my thing, I use the lovely new orange-hazel eye color, which almost looks like my own. In addition to a daily visit to Able Sisters for some fall fits, I also recommend going to the creator kiosk and searching for some custom outfits and sweaters. The creator community in New Horizons constantly amazes, and the new criteria search system is intuitive. You can even favorite creators, allowing you to return to their page and see their whole collection during other seasons. On this in-game Halloween, festivities can be had across your island as your villagers dress up in costumes of their own and prance about in the leaves. Jack—an iconic villager with a pumpkin head, and New Horizons’ very own Halloween ambassador—will be in your town square, providing treats (and tricks). This year, my personal Halloween plans include a horror movie marathon with my partner, inviting friends over to my island and handing out candy to my villagers. By the standards of 2020, that constitutes a pretty good day. Fall this year might be devoid of our usual autumnal traditions, but I’m trying to do what I can to stay happy—and right now, that means dressing up an anthropomorphic baby blue goat in a maid’s outfit and giving him candy.
PSU Vanguard • OCTOBER 20, 2020 • psuvanguard.com
WHEN STORIES COLLIDE
VIEWING TIME AND SPACE WITH INTISAR ABIOTO
EMMA COLBURN In 1986—the year Halley’s comet was first observed by a spacecraft—a star was born: Intisar Abioto, whose photographs have garnered their own sphere of influence since the artist moved to Portland back in 2010. “It’s not just about the photographs,” Abioto said at a recent lecture hosted by the King School Museum of Contemporary Art (KSMoCA) earlier this month. “It’s about the engagement and the conversations you can have with people, and then how those conversations influence how you see the world.” During the hour-long livestream, Abioto invoked stories mined from her own life. These stories influenced her work heavily. “Photography is a work of detail and intention,” Abioto said. “[It’s about paying] attention to the tiny details and letting them flow into your body and your mind, and [then you] interpreting it. It’s powerful.” Throughout the artist talk, Abioto’s words were devoid of condescension as she addressed the diverse audience as if it were one—regarding the individuals in both elementary and college classes as being engaged in the universal struggle of finding one’s voice. “Think about finding the stories where you are, because they’re going to be so valuable to you later,” she said. “We’re carrying our own story, carrying the dreams that we dream at night and the dreams that we wish for our lives. We also carry the dreams of so many people before us and our community members.” For Abioto, tuning into personal stories is a way to access collective experience. “I’m interested in art as a way to make space and [to better] the communities [we] live in,” she said. Growing up in Memphis, the role that art plays in community empowerment comes
PORTLAND PHOTOGRAPHER INTISAR ABIOTO. COURTESY OF RENEE LOPEZ naturally to Abioto. When she first moved to Portland, she landed in the Alberta district before it was an “arts district”—before the gentrification and the “purposeful history of moving Black Portlanders out of their communities,” as Abioto put it, afflicted the neighborhood en masse. “Being someone of African descent who comes from a family of Black people who were brought here as slaves, I think a lot about Black history and culture,” Abioto said. “And so when I came here, I didn’t really understand what [Black culture looked like in Portland] because I wasn’t from here. And one way I began to find out was [by taking] my camera, and talking to Black Portlanders that I met on the street.” Abioto’s photos from the last year are not wrapped in or informed by the tired tope of nostalgia. The photos are concerned with the present tense, but we look because we can feel the magic—the magic from an awareness that what we are doing will matter in a future moment. “I think about these pictures and how they’ll be important to us in the future,” Abioto said. The process of making art and documenting it is central to KSMoCA and PSU’s Social Practice MFA program that coordinates it. Founded by professors Harrell Fletcher and Lisa Jarret, the museum inside an elementary school emphasizes collaborations between young people and contemporary artists. Their stories—which inevitably permeate the art they create—are how these young people touch the world. “Paying attention to the stories around you and the people around you—it’s never unimportant,” Abioto said. “This is how I love my community, by paying deep attention and holding on to these words and sharing them with you all so that we can see and feel how valuable and important we are.”
ARTS & CULTURE
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FIVE REASONS WHY VOTING MATTERS AINEIAS ENGSTROM
YOUR VOTE MATTERS!
SAM GARCIA
14
OPINION
With the Nov. 3 election coming up, political campaigns, advocacy groups, universities and even social media platforms are engaging in extensive efforts to increase voter registration and remind people to fill out their ballots. Clearly, there is concern that too many Americans will once again stay away from the polls, considering voter turnout has hovered around a measly 55% of the voting age population during the last few presidential elections. Low turnout in the United States is probably the result of multiple factors, but one frequently cited is many people are simply disillusioned with politics or don’t think their votes really make a difference. Considering The Economist estimated each Oregon voter only has a 1 in 390 million chance of being the decisive vote in the 2020 presidential election, it seems fair to ask the question: Does voting even matter? The answer is yes, and there are at least five reasons for that. First, voting matters because our ballots are a lot more valuable in local elections. Unlike the presidential race that drew nearly 139 million votes in 2016, many smaller elections are decided by a few thousand votes and therefore our participation is really significant in those contests. Take, for example, the 2020 Portland mayoral election. If Ted Wheeler had received just 1539 more votes in the May primary, there wouldn’t be a run-off between him and his main challenger Sarah Iannarone right now. If you live in a smaller community, some elections are decided by a margin even narrower than that. And not only does your vote count more in local elections, the results of local races also often have more direct impact on our daily lives than federal or state elections. Second, voting matters because it gives us the power to elevate people into positions of power who support our vision for the future. If you’re part of a movement or a dedicated advocate of a cause, you almost certainly need allies in elected office to see your ideas come to fruition. Although protests, strikes and boycotts can have an impact, most social movement theorists argue there is a time when movements need to institutionalize and have advocates in city halls, statehouses and congressional offices in order to effectively enshrine their vision through policy reform. The civil rights movement, for example, brought former U.S. Representative John Lewis to Congress, who carried the movement’s legacy into the 21st century. Black Lives Matter will most likely gain a seat in the Capitol soon, thanks to Cori Bush, an activist expected to
win in Missouri’s first congressional district on Nov. 3. As in protests, numbers empower, and the more people turn out for a particular cause, the better the chance representatives of that cause will attain positions of power where they can change policy. Third, voting matters because it is our civic duty. No matter your ideology, political participation is key to any democratic system and one of our responsibilities as citizens. While there are many important forms of participation, casting a ballot is the most basic one and the bare minimum we can do to hold state officials accountable, influence how we are governed and bolster our common values. If you have the right to vote, you enjoy a privilege that more than 2 billion people worldwide don’t have. Unlike in other parts of the U.S., it’s also easy and comfortable to vote for most—although not for all—Oregonians, thanks to our universal mail-in voting system. For anyone who gets the ballot delivered to their doorstep, there is no real excuse for opting out of democratic participation. Fourth, voting matters because—no matter what people say—it does produce change. Most dramatically, we saw this in 2016 when U.S. President Donald Trump shocked people around the world with his surprising election win. Although the Republican Party eventually fell in line behind him, he was certainly not the favorite candidate of the party elites. Instead, it was the Republican base and its votes that propelled him to victory. Yes, a foreign adversary meddled in that election and Trump benefited from a deeply flawed voting system. Nonetheless, by far the most important reason why Trump won was because nearly 63 million people cast their ballot for him. And the Trump presidency has most certainly brought change and disruption to most of our lives. Lastly, voting matters because this is a time when we need to make a collective statement in support of democracy. The Economist Intelligence Unit already downgraded the U.S. to a “flawed democracy” and this democracy is ever-more eroding in the face of voter suppression and gerrymandering, as well as Trump’s refusal to commit to a peaceful transfer of power and not-so-veiled calls for voter intimidation. Senator Mike Lee recently even said democracy should not be “the objective” of the U.S. political system. Not voting when you can means surrendering to these threats and acquiescing in efforts to silence us. Exercising and therefore reaffirming our right to vote is one important way to show that we, the people, will not relinquish that right.
PSU Vanguard • OCTOBER 20, 2020 • psuvanguard.com
CAN VOTING TRULY CAPTURE THE
SENTIMENT OF AMERICANS? AJ EARL In the race to the 2020 elections, much hay has been made over the demographics of voters. White Americans made up the bulk of President Donald Trump’s 2016 support, pushing him toward a win in several rust belt states, while BIPOC voters mostly broke for Clinton. To say nothing of voter disenfranchisement, can voting really reflect the demographics of the country and their sentiments? Ever since the United States Supreme Court disastrous Shelby v. Holder ruling in 2013, holding that the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was invalid in several areas, voting lines have gotten longer and disenfranchisement bolder. If Black voters in the southern U.S. can’t access the polls reliably and in a reasonable time, then it’s impossible to say they are rightly represented in our current electoral system. If Indigenous voters in South Dakota must sue for ballot drop boxes, then how is this system anything but restrictive? The Trump administration has been working to cement this new electoral regime, packing courts with its picks to ensure favorable electoral rulings while at the same time it attacks mail-in voting, demanding people vote in person. This kind of overt, systemic discrimination is a threat to democracy, but it is the goal of opponents of enfranchisement and universal suffrage. Without a fair, open electoral process, the country is left with a political direction aimed squarely at the status quo. Voters should not be told their vote matters if that is not
SHANNON STEED
PSU Vanguard • OCTOBER 20, 2020 • psuvanguard.com
true. Anyone who makes your ability to vote more difficult, whether by the courts or through intimidation, is trying to justify and secure their idea of who deserves to vote. No, voting does not capture the sentiment of Americans. When a country must pass laws to bar discrimination at the polls but then turns around and, via the courts, curtails these laws, the idea of who is served by voting becomes crystal clear. Make no mistake, the kind of interference and restrictions put in place by the GOP are meant to do little more than ensure people of means, white people especially, can vote without having to worry about their vote being weighed against that of a Black voter. Imagine if you were Black and disabled and needed either bussing to the polls or ballot pickup, and these were blocked. Do you even have a vote at that point?
Election Day, too, provides a massive barrier, blocking the working class from making it out to the polls before they close. On a Tuesday, Election Day limits the ability for many to vote. If you work, asking off to vote can raise suspicions, make employers cagey about letting one person go lest they inspire others and just generally raise interest and suspicion into your political positions.
Solutions to these inequities exist in large numbers, many of them relatively easy in principle, but blocked by a stubborn Congress and state legislatures. Moving Election Day, increasing the length of time to vote, mail-in ballots, the list goes on. With even a modest effort, the country could reduce disenfranchisement. The clear benefit of this kind of expansion of the right to vote, a better reflection of the sentiments of voters, however, is simply too inclusive and may cause the balance of voter preference to shift dramatically. All things considered, the complicated nature of voting in the U.S. at present is to blame for our current state of affairs: a pandemic, unchecked racism, a failing economy that only serves to enrich the wealthy. It would be easy to urge people to try hard to overcome the barriers as they exist, but these barriers should be destroyed. That there are not more election access cases in high courts right now suggests a country that has accepted this dynamic. It is the only real reflection of national sentiment right now—and that should not be.
OPINION
15
VANGUARD
DESIGNER SHOWCASE
16
DESIGNER SHOWCASE
FARAH ALKAYED
INFRACTUM TEXTILES
Hi, my name is Farah. I’m a student in the Graphic Design program at Portland State and a designer at Vanguard. These images are from a project I worked on last year. Using patterns I painted and scanned, I created a brand and a series of textile patterns to sell to furniture retailers. Below is a logo for the brand as well as an example of a product mock-up.
PSU Vanguard • OCTOBER 20, 2020 • psuvanguard.com
