Portland State Vanguard Volume 75 Issue 10 by Portland State Vanguard

VOLUME 75 • ISSUE 10 • SEPTEMBER 1, 2020

"The rising tide of social movements responds to a global shift rightward on the part of governments" P. 6-7

NEWS

‘Our goal is for these courses to increase students’ cross-cultural competency’ P. 4

ARTS & CULTURE

‘People think that what I do can’t be done because it’s too simple’ P. 8

OPINION

COVID-19 leaves renters in a lurch P. 9

CONTENTS COVER BY SAM PERSON NEWS HILL TO HALL

P. 3

A NEW WAY TO STUDY ABROAD—WITHOUT GOING ABROAD PSU ATHLETICS UNDER NCAA COVID-19 GUIDELINES

P. 4 P. 5

COVER AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL FINDS U.S. POLICE VIOLATED PROTESTERS’ HUMAN RIGHTS

STAFF

EDIT ORI A L EDITOR IN CHIEF Dylan Jefferies MANAGING EDITOR Justin Grinnell NEWS EDITORS Hanna Anderson Aidan Kennelley INTERNATIONAL EDITOR Isabel Rekow ARTS & CULTURE EDITOR Nick Townsend OPINION EDITOR AJ Earl ONLINE EDITOR Lily Hennings

COPY CHIEF Sophie Concannon CONTRIBUTORS Megan Huddleston Marshall Scheider Meghan Utzman PHO T O & MULTIMEDI A PHOTO EDITOR Annie Schutz PRODUC TION & DE SIGN CREATIVE DIRECTOR Sam Person DESIGNERS Farah Alkayed Shannon Steed

ARTS & CULTURE THE CHILDREN’S MUSICIAN FOR ADULTS

P. 8

OPINION COVID LEAVES RENTERS IN A LURCH

P. 9

P. 6–7

DIS T RIBU TION DISTRIBUTION MANAGER Dylan Jefferies

To contact Portland State Vanguard, email editor@psuvanguard.com

T ECHNOL OGY & W EB SIT E TECHNOLOGY ASSISTANTS Juliana Bigelow Kahela Fickle George Olson John Rojas

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 DV ISING & ACCOUN TING COORDINATOR OF STUDENT MEDIA Reaz Mahmood STUDENT MEDIA ACCOUNTANT Sheri Pitcher STUDENT MEDIA TECHNOLOGY ADVISOR Corrine Nightingale

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.

AUGUST 24–30

HANNA ANDERSON

AUGUST 24: OREGON APPLIES FOR FEDERAL LOST WAGE ASSISTANCE

The Oregon Employment Department applied for a federal payment program covering lost wages, which would pay $300 weekly to unemployed Oregonians. According to AP News, most of the payments will be automatic and retroactive, starting from the beginning of August, and last for about 3–5 weeks. The federal grant was authorized by an executive order from U.S. President Donald Trump, and more than half of the states have applied and been approved for the program. The order includes an optional $100 weekly bonus paid for by the state, which most states—including Oregon—have opted not to include.

AUGUST 29: CLATSOP COUNTY CONSIDERS “SECOND AMENDMENT SANCTUARY” ON NOVEMBER BALLOT

A measure on the Clatsop county November ballot will ask voters whether the country should be a “Second Amendment sanctuary.” According to AP News, if the measure is passed, it will prevent any county resources from being used to enforce any law or regulation that restricts the right to keep and bear firearms, accessories or ammunition. The measure needed and collected over 1,100 signatures in order to qualify for the ballot, led by Jim Hoffman, a leader in the Clatsop County Republican Party. The measure, after earlier versions were considered legally vulnerable, was modeled after immigration sanctuary laws.

AUGUST 30: BROWN RELEASES NEW PLAN FOR POLICING IN PORTLAND

Oregon Governor Kate Brown announced a new “unified law enforcement” plan Sunday to increase the police presence in Portland. According to a press release from Brown’s office, the plan is meant to help end violence and arson during the nightly protests, while protecting free speech. The plan will see Oregon State Police Troopers deployed to Portland in order to allow Portland Police to investigate violent actions during the nightly protests, according to OPB. It will also bring in resources from neighboring jurisdictions, the FBI and the U.S. Attorneys’ office.

PSU Vanguard • SEPTEMBER 1, 2020 • psuvanguard.com

NEWS

A NEW WAY TO STUDY ABROAD— WITHOUT GOING ABROAD MEGAN HUDDLESTON

EDUCATION ABROAD OFFERS NEW ONLINE PROGRAMS DURING CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC

As the COVID -19 pandemic continues to disrupt activities and change routines, Portland State’s Education Abroad office did what many other programs were forced to do—it went virtual. Virtual study abroad courses can’t replace physically being in a different culture, but Education Abroad is developing programs it hopes will provide students with cross-cultural experiences. When the pandemic worsened and traveling became too dangerous, Education Abroad worked to create fully online virtual courses to offer in lieu of the travel abroad programs. The virtual courses also came with a surprise benefit: virtual study abroad opened a pathway to international experiences for students who weren’t able to spend the time or money to travel abroad. “We originally developed these [virtual]

SHANNON STEED

NEWS

courses as a way to retain students who were planning to study abroad, but what we found was a new population of students who wanted an international component to their online coursework,” said Hannah Fischer, the facultyled programs coordinator and advisor with Education Abroad. “The bulk of the students participating in these programs were not originally planning to travel with the summer programs.” Education Abroad offered five programs this summer. Students could virtually travel to places such as northern Spain, a Buddhist monastery in Tibet and Edinburgh, Scotland. The courses provided opportunities to speak with international professionals and student language buddies, but they cost the same as a regular online course. “Feedback from students so far has been overwhelmingly positive,” Fischer said. Dr. Rachel Noorda, the director of the book publishing program at PSU, led the virtual program in Edinburgh. “I was really disappointed, as I think many of the students were too, at first, when we had to cancel the in-person study abroad,” Noorda said. “I’d done a lot of work to prepare, and I was excited for the students to have the experience.” Because of the travel restrictions, she decided to create a virtual program. “We wanted to have an online option to be able to at least learn about Scottish publishing,” Noorda said. “Students were still able to hear

Scottish accents and hear about some interesting research that is coming out of Scotland.” One of the speakers specialized in publishing in the Scottish Gaelic language. “[The presentation] opened up a discussion about economic value versus cultural value in publishing,” Noorda said. “We talked about how the Scottish government provides a lot of funding and support to the revitalization of Gaelic.” Selena Harris, a graduate student in the publishing program who attended the virtual study abroad, found the presentation on Gaelic language publishing interesting because it was a topic she’d known nothing about. “It seems impossible to study Scottish book publishing without diving into the rich and proud history of the Scottish people, and this involves Scottish Gaelic,” Harris said. The virtual program provided an opportunity to dive into a culture without the cost of traveling overseas. Education Abroad plans to continue offering fully online, internationally focused courses in addition to traditional study abroad programs. “Our goal is for these courses to increase students’ cross-cultural competency,” Fischer explained. “Students need to have these softer skills of intercultural communication and cultural competency in general, so being able to incorporate a class like this with structured, intentional, cross cultural experiences is really helpful.” With five successful virtual courses now under its belt, the office is planning ways to make next summer’s sessions even more impactful. “We’ll have virtual friendship families instead of homestay families,” Fischer said. “Students will be able to do virtual cooking classes with their family and have cultural interactions that way.” There will also be local guides leading live city tours via Zoom—the next best thing to actually being there. However, according to students, nothing can replace physically experiencing a new culture. “I feel that I missed out on much of the information and connectivity that a traditional study abroad encourages,” Harris said. “An online experience can never replace true immersion in a culture, the networking that comes with in-person interaction and the lessons learned by traveling with a group of students with similar interests.” The book publishing program also plans to do both an overseas and a virtual program next summer, according to Noorda. Even though traveling abroad may be the best way to experience a different culture, the cost, for many, can be prohibitive. Having both options available makes a cross-cultural experience more accessible. “I certainly don’t see [the virtual course] as a long-term replacement for cultural immersion experiencing the history the same way you can when walking down the cobble-stone streets,” Noorda said, “but I think it can be a nice supplement.”

PSU Vanguard • SEPTEMBER 1, 2020 • psuvanguard.com

PSU ATHLETICS UNDER NCAA COVID-19 GUIDELINES PSU VIKINGS FOOTBALL TEAM. ANNIE SCHUTZ/PSU VANGUARD

MEGHAN UTZMAN With 156 postponed or cancelled sporting events, five seasons abruptly upended and over 215 student athletes affected, COVID-19 has left its mark on Portland State athletics. Where do the Vikings go from here? “There’s no playbook for this,” said PSU Athletics Director Valerie Cleary. She and her staff were in Boise, Idaho for the men’s basketball championship tournament back in March when the call was made to cancel their quarter-final game only hours before tip-off. “When we got sent home we thought, okay this will last a couple weeks, but we'll be back," Cleary said. That was almost six months ago. Since then, the Big Sky conference made the decision to postpone all fall sports, affecting cross country, soccer, volleyball and football at PSU until the spring of next year. Over 50% of teams within the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) have done the same. Coaches, trainers, doctors, athletes and staff across PSU’s athletic department have felt the impact of COVID-19 and its trail of uncertainty. The women’s tennis team was forced to cancel 12 matches, more than half the players’ season. “The players really felt like the rug was pulled out from under them,” said Kyle Russell, head tennis coach at PSU. “They were so excited for the back half of our season so the reaction was, predictably, utter disappointment.” “It’s been really difficult. Everyone on my team has been playing since they were three or four years old. With everything going on, it seems like a frivolous thing to be so upset about sports, but it’s really tough,” said Emily Rees, a sophomore who plays under Russell on the tennis team. PSU has 26 international student athletes that come from 15 different countries, which has made the experience of quarantine especially unique and challenging for them. “The hardest part for me was when the borders closed,” said Savannah Dhaliwal, forward for the women’s basketball team. “I was in Canada when I got the notification that the [United States] was shutting them down, and month after month it kept getting extended by another 30 days. Since I had my student visa, I was able to come back, but it made everything much more stressful.” Even without PSU’s athletic department operating at usual capacity, it still has its hands full. The department formed a COVID-19 planning team, which meets remotely each week to track the various health updates. The team consists of Cleary, PSU director of strength and conditioning Scott Fabian, PSU sports medicine staff and doctors from OHSU. The planning team has been working in partnership with OHSU to integrate up-to-date pandemic information into the safest and healthiest plan for their athletes’ return to campus.

PSU Vanguard • SEPTEMBER 1, 2020 • psuvanguard.com

During a May press conference, Oregon Governor Kate Brown said, “the Oregon Health Authority (OHA) is advising that any large gatherings at least through September should either be canceled or significantly modified.” However, the OHA hasn’t released any student athlete specific guidelines pertaining to coronavirus precautions, so the athletic department’s planning team relies on information coming from Multnomah County officials and the NCAA. "The NCAA finally came out with actual rules and guidelines, because the first couple of months it was only recommendations, so that’s been helpful,” Cleary said. Between May and August, the NCAA provided a template of resources for colleges and universities, but no concrete rules for how athletic departments should proceed with their athletes during quarantine. However, in mid-August, the NCAA laid out a strict protocol for colleges and universities to follow titled “Resocialization of Collegiate Sport: Developing Standards for Practice and Competition.” Since then, all student athletes must adhere to measures laid out in the 16-page document such as wearing masks, undergoing tests and practicing safe social distancing regardless of who they play for or which state they’re competing in. “They’ve made it clear what you have to do if you want to practice and compete,” Cleary said. According to Cleary, 25–30 student athletes have trickled back to campus for strength and conditioning sessions at the Peter W. Stott Athletic Center, while more have plans to return. “We prioritized fall sports, as they were scheduled to have the first competition dates and allowable NCAA activities—football and soccer made up the first groups [for training],” Cleary said. “[Multnomah County is] still sitting in phase one, so that really hinders what we're able to do,” Cleary said. “We have to limit group size and avoid high-contact activities, so for now we’ve only had our athletes doing strength and conditioning training." Cleary added, “We developed a protocol called our ‘Phase One Return to Training’ so we could ensure that we're meeting all the guidelines through Multnomah County and the NCAA.” The first piece of that protocol is testing.“We were out on the frontlines of testing, much before our peers,” Cleary said. PSU began testing their student athletes in June, while other universities weren’t required to until mid-August. “Our medical professionals felt strongly that we shouldn't have students engaging in any activity unless they had a baseline test,” Cleary

said. For the athletes who have been tested on campus by PSU, every result has been negative for COVID-19. However, testing also presents the greatest challenge to PSU’s athletic department at the moment: who will pay the bill? “The cost of testing has been a concern since day one, because no one yet knows how it will play out with insurance companies,” Cleary said. When a student athlete is injured, their primary insurance provider covers the initial cost, and then the university’s coverage covers the difference. However, insurance companies haven’t settled on whether they’ll be covering coronavirus tests for student athletes, or if there’s a limitation on the number of tests they’ll provide. With over 215 athletes and $53 per test, the numbers add up quickly. “The current estimate for weekly surveillance testing of men and women’s basketball is [$60,000] for the whole season,” Cleary said. “When you roll in other high-contact sports like volleyball, football and soccer, then the costs could go upwards of $1 million, so we’re currently working on how to carve out money in the budget to make those tests happen.” Another piece of the protocol is modified training. Teammates work-out in groups no larger than eight, which have been strategically formed into clusters based on position groups and athletes who live together. Before entering the Stott Center, athletes are screened for symptoms and have a temperature check administered by their athletic trainer. Once they’re cleared, they head directly to a hand-washing station inside, before proceeding straight to the weight room—all while wearing a mask and remaining a six-foot distance from each other. “We're clear right now for conducting baseline tests and then a check for symptoms,” Cleary said. “However, once student athletes get into the calendar season, then we'll begin weekly surveillance testing for 25% of all athletes and staff.” For Cleary, implementing the new protocol isn’t the only challenge she faces—it’s also simply missing the flow of a regular season. “By now we should have played a few volleyball games, a couple soccer games and be gearing up for our first football road trip,” Cleary said. “I want to be talking to you about how we’re excited to leave town for a big game, not the various types of COVID tests.” Tatiana Streun, PSU senior and forward for the women’s basketball team, shared a similar sentiment. “We don’t know life without sports, so it’s been really difficult,” Streun said. “I just want to play one more year. I didn’t know that my last game could have technically been my last game, none of us did.”

NEWS

AMNESTY INTERNATIONA VIOLATED PROTESTE MARSHALL SCHEIDER

SHANNON STEED

COVER

Since the killing of George Floyd by Minneapolis police on May 25, the Black Lives Matter movement has swelled to become one of the largest social movements in United States history, according to The New York Times. Protests, which are ongoing in Portland, erupted across the country in May and June. Soon after, solidarity protests spread around the world. Protesters demanded large scale reforms or wholesale abolition of police departments, as well as an end to police violence against Black people. In many cases, U.S. protests were met with violent repression by state and local authorities. A recent Amnesty International report documented 125 human rights violations committed by U.S. police and federal troops responding to protests in 40 states and the District of Columbia between May 26–June 5. Released on Aug. 4, the report cited “widespread and egregious human rights violations by police officers against protesters, medics, journalists and legal observers.” Among the violations cited were “beatings, the misuse of tear gas and pepper spray, and the inappropriate and, at times, indiscriminate firing of less-lethal projectiles,” such as rubber bullets. The report offers an interactive online map charting each of the alleged infractions. While Amnesty’s report covered only 10 days of protests, many of the abuses flagged by the group as human rights violations—such as the indiscriminate use of tear gas and less-lethal impact munitions—continue to be experienced by protesters on a nightly basis in Portland. According to Amnesty International, most U.S. protests since late May have been peaceful. However, the organization stated in some instances “a minority of protesters have committed unlawful acts,” and added, “in such cases, security forces have routinely used disproportionate and indiscriminate force against entire demonstrations—without distinguishing, as legally required, between peaceful protesters and individuals committing unlawful acts.” While property damage and vandalism occurred at some Black Lives Matter protests over the last several months, a recent article in Current Affairs warned against conflating non-violent property crime with bodily violence against individuals or groups. “If protesters can be classified as violent, it’s easier to justify police violence as proportionate or defensive,” Editor-in-Chief Nathan J. Robinson wrote. “The word ‘violence’ should be reserved

for harm done to people. Otherwise, we risk making the term conceptually incoherent and—much more importantly—conflating acts that do very serious physical harm to people with acts that have not physically harmed anyone.” Amnesty International’s report highlighted the fact that in the case of recent demonstrations, police have repeatedly engaged in acts of violence, whereas illegal conduct on the part of protesters tends to be limited to property crime. Recent incidents in Seattle, Portland and Kenosha, WI also show a pattern of disproportionate violence against Black Lives Matter supporters emerging among rightwing counter-protesters. American citizens possess a constitutional right to free speech and peaceful assembly. This prerogative is also recognized as an international human right by Article 20 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The Inter-American Commission of Human Rights considers the police repression of political dissent to be an authoritarian move, and American journalists, pundits and lawmakers routinely criticize America’s geopolitical adversaries, such as Russia and China, for such infractions. Portland State Professor of International Studies Dr. Gerald Sussman called this an “obvious double standard in U.S. foreign policy.” “Efforts on the part of the U.S. to discredit other countries, even those that lack democratic foundations, is quite hypocritical,” Sussman said. “If the U.S. were serious about human rights, [it] would not be supporting regimes such as Saudi Arabia, UAE, Egypt and others, including Israel’s illegal settlements in Palestinian territory.” Dr. Priya Kapoor, professor of International and Global studies at PSU, concurred. Kapoor said human rights “are things the U.S. has always upheld as ideals for other nations, but over the years it has not felt it needed to uphold some of these protections for its own citizens.” “We are in a nation-state where citizenship itself has come under fire,” Kapoor said. “The nation-state has become weaker than ever before, and whenever nation-states lose their hold, the main way they uphold authority is through brute force, through the constabulary, or the police, or the military.” According to Amnesty International, the group’s report constitutes the most comprehensive analysis of police violence against protesters ever compiled by an international human rights group. Unprecedented in its scope, the report also demonstrates a growing willingness

PSU Vanguard • SEPTEMBER 1, 2020 • psuvanguard.com

AL FINDS U.S. POLICE ERS’ HUMAN RIGHTS

PSU PROFESSORS WEIGH IN ON GEOPOLITICAL IMPLICATIONS

on the part of the international community to movements, governmental strategies used to hold powerful states accountable for human police and surveil activists are also beginning rights violations. to converge. “We see the U.S. and Russia dove“It has previously been assumed that the Western tail into very similar tactics when it comes to democracies were beyond reproach when it comes [their] own citizenry and [their] neighbors,” to human rights,” Sussman said. “But when com- Kapoor told the Vanguard. pared to the Western democracies in northern Kapoor noted the situation in Hong Kong is Europe, the U.S. fares very badly on almost ev- also similar. According to her, when federal ofery measure of basic human rights, including the ficers came to Portland, her students actively rights to housing, health care, education, security participated in protests. “[Federal officers] and even press freedom. The U.S. is currently would just pick people up and create these long 45th in press freedom, as reported by Reporters dossiers on them, so that they would know who Without Borders.” they were in the future. For young people to In Sussman’s view, the report does not go far have that sort of record that has been taken by enough in its inquiry into basic human rights viola- the authorities is a very big deal. And the same tions in the U.S. “I think [Amnesty International] thing is happening in Hong Kong.” should go further than just investigating police Lengthy prison sentences faced by Hong Kong violence against Blacks, BLM and other activ- activists mirror the arrests of Black Lives Matter ists,” Sussman said. organizers like Tiana Arata, who faces charges According to Sussman, Amnesty International that could result in a 15-year prison sentence, “should also investigate the denial of voting rights and Urooj Rahman and Colinford Mattis, New to people of color through the mechanisms of ger- York attorneys and activists whose federal rymandering; reducing charges are backed by 45voting stations in Black year mandatory minimum "WE ARE SEEING PROTESTS communities, resulting sentences. in extremely long waitAdditionally, Belarusian BECOME MORE COHERENT, ing lines; the use of voter President Alexander BORROW FROM EACH OTHER, ID laws and the current Lukashenko’s mobilizaACT IN WAYS THAT ARE efforts to block vote-bytion of military forces in TRANSNATIONAL." mail during this pandemic. defense of national monThese practices directly uments recalled similar violate the 15th Amendment to the Constitution.” deployments by the Trump administration earArticle 21 of the Universal Declaration of Human lier this summer, including in Portland. “We are Rights likewise guarantees the voting and elec- living this nightmare of authoritarian leaders toral rights of citizens. around the world,” Kapoor said. Amnesty’s report comes in an international Amnesty International offered specific guidecontext marked by protest movements from Hong lines for reforming U.S. police toward compliance Kong to Belarus which have faced police violence with international human rights standards. “In and state repression. The rising tide of social order to prevent impunity and the repetition of movements responds to a global shift rightward abuses, authorities in the U.S. must investigate, on the part of governments, according to Kapoor. prosecute, and punish the unlawful use of force “There is an almost opaque authoritarian situa- by police or others, and provide full reparations tion set up through either police structures or to the victims of such violence,” according to the military structures, but people [are] penetrating organization’s website. nevertheless,” Kapoor said. Yet non-governmental human rights organiza“Protests are taking cues from each other. We’re tions exercise no legal authority, and the seeing Hong Kong, parts of Europe, parts of Universal Declaration of Human Rights is South Asia, parts of Latin America have very not a legally binding document, according similar patterns of protest,” Kapoor added. to the Office of the High Commissioner When the Black Lives Matter movement on Human Rights at the U.N. reignited in the U.S. in late May, protestStill, the report may have significant ers from Hong Kong to Lebanon began implications, according to Sussman and sharing protest tips online, mirroring Kapoor. “Amnesty International reports acts of solidarity between American may not have any enforcement mechanisms and Palestinian activists following behind them,” Sussman said, “but they the 2014 killing of Michael Brown are highly influential, often indirectly, by Ferguson police. “We are seein shaping public opinion.” In this way, ing protests become more coherhuman rights reports can have both ent, borrow from each other, act domestic and international effects. in ways that are transnational,” “[Amnesty International] reports do Kapoor said. reach the media, which in turn can emYet amid burgeoning internabarrass governments that act in blatant tional solidarity among dissident violation of human rights.”

PSU Vanguard • SEPTEMBER 1, 2020 • psuvanguard.com

According to Kapoor, reports such as the one released by Amnesty International can have a serious impact on countries’ geopolitical positions. “An Amnesty International report that has this long list [of allegations] against U.S. authorities is very important at this time, before the time of the election,” Kapoor said. According to her, the report could influence the way foreign leaders choose to create diplomatic relations or alliances with the U.S. Amnesty’s report came in the wake of a U.N. Human Rights Council decision to open an investigation into anti-Black racism and racial violence, sparked by George Floyd’s killing in late May; and last year, the U.N. High Commissioner on Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, called the conditions in U.S. immigrant detention facilities “appalling.” Mounting concerns about human rights violations by the U.S. government may “define the path of how the rest of the world will respond to U.S. leadership and relate to the U.S. as a nation-state,” according to Kapoor. While human rights reports influence public opinion and geopolitics, U.S. lawmakers may not take the recommendations of international human rights groups seriously. “The U.S. government would never admit to [Amnesty International]’s influence,” Sussman said. “We have to recognize that the U.S. acts as an imperialist power that will not be deterred in its pursuit of what it considers its national interests.” According to Sussman, this state of affairs can’t be reduced to the politics of a single party. “As long as the Senate and White House are controlled by the right wing in this country, little attention will be given to [Amnesty International] reports,” Sussman said. “But one should not assume that the Democrats have a good record on human rights.” Sussman highlighted major violations of human rights and the perpetuation of war crimes in Korea and Vietnam under the aegis of Democratic administrations. “Clinton and Biden both voted for the invasion of Iraq in 2003 and have been ardent supporters for military intervention in Syria,” he added. Kapoor concurred with Sussman’s view of U.S. lawmakers’ regard for human rights reports. “It is true that within the U.S. some of these reports do not have much value. That has got to change,” Kapoor said. “It is going to change. It must change, if the U.S. is to regain its moral authority in the world.”

COVER

THE CHILDREN’S MUSICIAN FOR ADULTS 1979. BESERKELY RECORDS.

JONATHAN RICHMAN’S EFFERVESCENT CAREER, EXAMINED NICK TOWNSEND Everyone has experienced a song perfectly capturing a mood and sustaining that feeling for its entire length. What’s rarer is an album that can perform the same trick, not only exploring an emotion but maintaining interest and becoming more complex over the course of a series of songs without becoming trite. Even rarer than that is shaping a musical career around a feeling, an energy as an artist that carries through every melody and note in an entire discography. But that’s just what Jonathan Richman has done with his life. Jonathan Richman got his start as the lead singer of the Modern Lovers, an influential proto-punk band with members who would go on to join Cars and the Talking Heads. Richman headed the group and wrote most of the lyrics on their first and only album, self-titled. The album features the breakout hit “Roadrunner,” which became the most recognizable song from the group, making it onto Rolling Stone’s “500 Greatest Songs of All Time” list. The group disbanded in 1974, two years before their debut album was officially released. Although a collaborative effort and not truly representative of Richman’s later work, the album bears early signs of Richman’s trademark qualities. His quavering voice begins to take shape on tracks like “Hospital” and “Astral Plane,” both of which he’d later re-record. His goofy, innocent lyricism is perhaps most evident on the single “Pablo Picasso,” featuring near-nonsensical lines like “Well he was only 5’3” / But girls could not resist his stare / Pablo Picasso never got called an asshole.” The Modern Lovers’ slightly grungy, Velvet Underground-inspired sound quickly began to rub Richman the wrong way, and the rest of his career is marked by a significantly softer acoustic style. By 1979, five years after the dissolution of Modern Lovers, Richman had fully developed his sound. He released Back in Your Life, an album that eschewed any early punk elements in exchange for pure, childlike wonder and enthusiasm that remained for the rest of Richman’s solo career. Released under the name “Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers,” the album features Richman and a totally different, only partially present backingband.

ARTS & CULTURE

Back in Your Life is Jonathan Richman at peak performance. It’s not quite folk, but it’s not quite children’s music either, although it’s easy to forget that on tracks like “I’m Nature’s Mosquito,” which prominently features kazoo and the lyric “and that means I better go bite-bite-bitie-witie-wite-sir.” It’s on this album that Richman is able to stretch the boundaries of genre and land in a unique, uncategorizable space of his own, marked by sincerity and a joy for life that’s absent from his early punk-rock roots. “People think that what I do can’t be done because it’s too simple,” Richman said to art critic Kristine McKenna in 1980, according to Pitchfork. “But if people can see that I’m not afraid to entertain them just by being myself...then that’s my mission.” It’s this simplicity that makes Richman such an effective agent of that mission. Every note, every word rings with that simplicity, and therefore with that mission. It’s evident on Back in Your Life and later in Richman’s career on tracks such as “I Was Dancing in the Lesbian Bar,” a 1992 song demonstrative of Richman’s ability to fit in in any setting through attitude and charm. The joking, rhyming lyrics are thrilling and engaging, without a trace of sarcasm or self-doubt. The titular single of the album, “Back in Your Life,” is a warm and cozy plea to a lover to take Richman back. In his signature quavering, meandering voice Richman sings silly rhymes such as “I will wait a long time, if that’s what it takes / But someday I wanna help your mamma when she brings out the pancakes / I wanna be back in your life.” Richman isn’t afraid to make a fool of himself at the expense of love, dishing out enough charm to counterbalance the absurdity of his lyrics. This is evident on songs about others, such as “Abdul and Cleopatra” where Richman rhymes “Cleopatra” with “wonder where she’s at-ra” without missing a beat. Richman’s charm lies in his ability to be true to himself at the expense of dignity and decent rhyme structure. He’s willing to drop the electric guitar and throbbing bass and bare his soul over a simple three-chord structure, and he doesn’t if that doesn’t lead to immediate gratification. It’s this charm that makes Richman a constant companion, even though Back in Your Life is over 40 years old.

PSU Vanguard • SEPTEMBER 1, 2020 • psuvanguard.com

SAM PERSON

AJ EARL

The Rules Only Apply To You.

In the lead-up to the COVID-19 crisis, it was a common refrain from housing activists that tenant protections have always been lacking and needed some beefing up. Landlords and large corporate property owners are able to take advantage of numerous schemes to protect themselves, all while making sure their tenants have few options if the rent comes short. Landlords will contend this issue is not necessarily dire for renters, pointing to assistance programs and additional funding, but their fear of rent strikes and jubilees is telling. Now that coronavirus has made its move, the rapid response by landlords to any assistance measure or rent moratorium is increasingly telling. Many of these tenants have one goal: survive a pandemic. Landlords, meanwhile, have a different goal: your rent check. Announced in late March as the virus began to spread far more rapidly, the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act, or the CARES Act, has been the most acute worry for landlords of late. Long-demanded rent moratoriums and strikes materialized soon after the pandemic began to spread, and thus landlords’ long-promised welfare calamity was tested as federal limitations on evictions went into effect. The result strains the credulity of anyone who took investor and landlord fears seriously; many tenants got a respite and landlords were able to take advantage of the very carve-outs they demanded. Nobody, really, was hurt in this respect.

MORTGAGES ARE NOT RENT

To better understand why landlords get so completely protected, it’s important to look back at the history of property ownership in this country, specifically residential, mortgagebacked properties. In the United States, the current mortgage system has roots in the Progressive Era, when people began to flock to the cities to buy homes, creating a surge in mortgages.

PSU Vanguard • SEPTEMBER 1, 2020 • psuvanguard.com

These eventually were dominated by specific, portfolio-based mortgages that allowed for cheaper, bulk mortgage of properties, facilitating a rise in landlords and corporate lenders that dominated the market, locking out smaller owners. The system that emerges from this kind of giveaway is pernicious, of course; it allows landlords to amass small empires of properties as short or mid-term investments. The federal government established such a system with all the fanfare of a rescuing army saving a town, adding on bonuses and treats to help buoy what was fast becoming a great moneymaker for banks. Through the Great Depression and World War II, home sales were slow, but the aftermath of both was a loud boom of sales and swaps as people fled the cities again, heading to polis-hugging suburbs where their money no longer intermingled with less desirable borrowers. Levittown saved the industry. That brings us to today. Landlords have simply kept their hands out all this time.

A DIFFERENT CRISIS

When the 2008 subprime mortgage crisis and subsequent recession struck, it was all but assured that either the feds would bail out lenders or there would be a financial apocalypse that could potentially favor the working poor. Naturally, the former won out. TARP loans and the like ensured the value of assets, while at the same time working to untangle the self-made subprime mess for banks. For renters, the establishment of support for landlords offered little in the way of comfort. Evictions, fairly stable at around one million a year since the late 1990s, saw little fluctuation during the housing crisis of the mid-2000s. Landlords, then, were granted a reprieve their tenants never got, keeping two things the same: mortgage approval and annual eviction counts.

This time around, the financial crisis is not borne out of a liquidity problem or defaults, but rather, a virus. Although corporations are people. they cannot die from COVID-19. Yet all the same, many that are property owners are kept on life support by the government in order to preserve a mortgage market that is only fair to investors and puts renters at risk.

LET IT FAIL

What hasn’t been tried yet has been a renter-first approach. The system is not built for that, of course, and a renter-first approach would be seen as just more welfare, more handouts and so on. Never mind, of course, that landlords would never have survived the wild fluctuation between suburb and city pre-World War II without welfare and handouts aimed at their bottom line. The resulting investor chaos would drive values down, harm investor confidence and certainly cause a financial panic. But that’s not a bad thing. Providing the system an out from its current means of dealing with renters in times of personal or public crisis is a humane approach. Bankruptcy protections and other financial buoyancy more than adequately protect landlords, and within a few years, their investment value will be as if it never dropped a cent. On the other hand, rewarding bad actors with a second chance does little to reform a system. What ultimately results from all this social upheaval should not resurrect the conditions that led to such suffering: in other words, protect renters from not only current troubles, but systemic ones. The rules of the system have long been tilted heavily toward landlords, but with inequalities and poverty at the fore again during COVID-19, it would be inhumane to not reform now.

OPINION