Fresh Perspectives Fall 2016

Volume 8: Essays Selected from Fall 2016 HPU First-Year Writing Courses

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Table of Contents EDITORS’ WELCOME ................................................................................................................. 3 EXPLORING SUBCULTURES Sole Searching ................................................................................................................................ 5 Carlo Paez How Regulated Sport Hunting Benefits North America ................................................................ 9 Jon Davis Tap or Snap?: Mixed Martial Arts ................................................................................................ 15 Nakoa Gabriel GLIMPSE OF CULTURE Losing the Hawaiian Culture and Gaining Religion ..................................................................... 23 Joleen Paul Saving the Bears: Keeping the Yuki Culture Alive ...................................................................... 26 Damon Niesen Common Stereotypes of Filipinos ................................................................................................ 29 Jhumar Ray Domingo Postmodernism and the Revolution of Epistemology and the Arts .............................................. 32 Hajar Tazi DIGGING DEEPER Discrimination against the LGBTQ Community .......................................................................... 41 Austin Zmolek Plastic Surgery in South Korea ..................................................................................................... 50 Kula Kukonu When Gun Policy Becomes Public Safety and Not Self-Indulgence ........................................... 56 Emma Ferguson The Incredible Cannibals .............................................................................................................. 71 Rachel Gonzales BEYOND THE PHARMACY Aya-what-sca? A Brief Overview of the Traditional Amazonian Brew....................................... 80 Sage Bennett Alternative Medicine .................................................................................................................... 86 Mackenzie Otto Advancing Cancer Research ......................................................................................................... 92 Lina Bengtsson MEET THE WRITERS!.............................................................................................................. 98 MAHALO!.................................................................................................................................. 101

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EDITORS’ WELCOME My name is Marian Gentile, and I am from the Philadelphia area of Pennsylvania. I'm a senior at HPU (finally!) and my major is English.

After I graduate, I hope to go to grad school at Lehigh University and earn a higher degree in English, specializing in 19th century British literature.

This is my second year in Hawai`i (I came to HPU as a transfer student), and haven't yet done everything there is to do. However, I can say that my favorite part of HPU is the English department, and my favorite beach on the island is Lanikai. I also enjoy getting ice cream at North Shore and shopping (and eating) in Kailua Town. I love reading, writing, and analyzing, as well as editing, which is why I chose to work as an editorial intern for the second semester in a row! My favorite part of this job is having the chance to read all the essays written by students from around the world, and getting to learn about topics that I hadn't even heard of before.

Aloha, my name is Jun Dennis Mata Sadang. I’m a junior at HPU, majoring in English. I was born in the Philippines but came to Hawai`i at a young age; I’ve been raised here for 18 years and it has become my home.

A lot of people see Hawai`i as a paradise, but since I’ve lived here for almost all of my life, I see the truths behind its sandy palm trees and shady beaches—yes, you read that correctly. Although there are some downsides, the truth is that I can’t imagine living somewhere else. What I love to do here is complain about the traffic. I also love the diversity, especially with food. Just around HPU’s Downtown campus, we have Greek, German, Korean, Japanese, and much more. Someday I plan to get off this rock, but I don’t see that happening any time soon.

After graduating, I’m going to continue my studies in English. I hope to become a great English teacher, just like the English teachers I’ve had over the years. Good luck to me.

Kathleen Cassity, Ph.D.

As Interim Assistant Dean of HPU’s College of Liberal Arts, I’m pleased to introduce our eighth issue of Fresh Perspectives. Once again, we solicited essays from our first-year writing courses, covering a range of topics and approaches. Because these writers are relatively new to the academy, we do not expect disciplinary mastery. Our goal is to provide a venue for dissemination of ideas by our first-year students, who may still be learning the nuances of academic discourse yet who have compelling things to say and who offer, in the words of our title, “fresh perspectives.” Promising student essays were nominated by the students’ instructors and underwent a full editorial process by our interns. You’ll notice a wide range of views here, some of them perhaps even contradictory; these pieces represent the opinions of the writers alone and are not necessarily endorsed (nor denounced) by HPU, the College of Liberal Arts, the Department of English & Applied Linguistics, or the editors. Rather than selecting pieces that toe any particular “party line,” we have attempted—in the spirit of academic freedom—to present a range of perspectives, some of which may be provocative. This is fitting for a first-year writing program that emphasizes argumentation. Whether you agree, disagree, or have a complex reaction, we hope you will enjoy hearing from the newest members of our HPU ohana!

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Sole Searching

By Carlo Paez Imagine yourself camping out at your local Footlocker retailer for six hours or more before they open for business, in order to be one of the first to obtain the new Air Jordan sneaker. Sounds a bit farfetched, right? Apparently, there is a community of people who take this very seriously.

This is a normal occurrence in the lifestyle known as “sneaker culture.” This culture, once not well known to the masses, has now become omnipresent.

Sneaker culture has come a long way since being first introduced in Run DMC’s 1986 hit song, “My Adidas.” While performing their hit single, Run DMC encouraged a crowd of over 16,000 fans at Madison Square Garden to hold up their sneakers as a way to pay homage to their song.

This event introduced a whole new movement into our society. Run DMC sported their Adidas with no laces on, which was also what they conveyed in their lyrics; this fashion statement started a ripple effect that the whole world soon followed because it was “cool” (D. Friendly, 2015). In my opinion, this hit single sparked a whole new generation of people who, although they hailed from different walks of life, could create interpersonal relationships with one another through the shared love of sneakers. Footwear initially designed for basketball players to wear for support playing the game on hardwood soon transitioned into the fashion scene, and eventually made its way onto the streets and became readily available to the general public. Sneakers were not just about sports anymore, but rather about lifestyle and pop culture.

Advocates of this culture are called “sneakerheads.” What is a sneakerhead? It is a person who has a profound knowledge and passion for sneakers through collecting and/or wearing them. Call it an addiction if you must, but those immersed within the culture consider this to be a way of life. The act of collecting sneakers is actually a hobby—a very expensive one, I might add. Compare it to collecting baseball cards, in which a few variables may determine the value of a particular card: the limited quantity of cards distributed, the condition your particular card is in, and the year in which it was produced. Also, take into account that if there is a story, or rather, a history behind a particular player on a card, that will help determine its range of value. With sneakers, it is essentially the same concept; the more limited quantity that is produced and the better the condition of the shoes, the more the value of a particular shoe will increase.

For as long as I can remember, sneakers have played a prominent role in my life. I have always been fascinated by the different designs of sneakers that were being released. To me, it is like wearing art on your feet. My deep appreciation of this culture started out with a legendary NBA player by the name of Michael Jordan; in my opinion, he is the greatest basketball player of all time. Michael Jordan is well-known for his great achievements on the court, inspiring a level of greatness that raised the NBA to a higher standard. He is also well-known for the different types of basketball shoes that he wore on the court. Some controversy occurred when Jordan stepped onto the court with his first pair of Nike-designed basketball shoes. Adorned in a black and red colorway, his shoes were banned from the NBA for not meeting their standards which required all players to be laced up in shoes matching those of their teammates. Being the man that he is, Jordan wore them anyway, and Nike footed the bill each time he wore them on the court and was fined.

Shortly after this incident, the NBA altered that rule, and the rest was history (M. Barias, 2015).

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Seeing this while growing up and watching Jordan perform at his level of greatness made me want to wear the same exact shoes he was wearing. I wanted to be like him in every single way. I often thought, “If I could wear that shoe, then I could fly like Mike.” As ridiculous as this sounds, I am sure hundreds and thousands of kids my age, and even adults for that matter, felt exactly the same way I did. Once Nike initially released the Air Jordan 1, I knew that I just had to have a pair— maybe even two pairs. I just had to be like Mike, which was the popular sales pitch that Nike used to promote his brand of shoes. The whole marketing niche behind the Air Jordan line was solely predicated on the style, performance, and class that Michael Jordan brought onto the basketball court.

Having the newest and rarest sneakers makes people feel very special. Being able to wear that sneaker on their feet is perceived as a status symbol in our society today. In a sense, you can tell a lot about people just by what they are wearing on their feet. It defines who they are, which makes certain pairs of shoes highly sought after. At one point, this ideology created a term that describes what happens when a certain group of people who want something makes others want the same thing. This term is “hype.” Hype is what got many people into collecting sneakers in the first place. Seeing hip-hop icons like Kanye West or Jay-Z wear a particular type of sneaker while sitting courtside during a basketball game gave many fanatics this thirst that needed to be quenched. They needed to have that same shoe in order to feel a sense of belonging. They needed it to gain acceptance into a culture about which they knew little. Sneakerheads refer to these people as “hypebeasts.”

Despite the many upsides within this culture, some recent incidents portray the sneaker community in a negative light. One example is young people in their teens getting beaten up and even murdered for their sneakers. Due to the influences of pop culture and hip-hop on our society, the message that we must wear certain types of shoes in order to be cool, look fresh, and attract the admiration and attention of the opposite sex is being conveyed. Another contributing factor is that our society has fallen into a trap and many have placed a high priority on getting high-status shoes rather than spending money on important things, such as bills. Many of those unfortunate few who could not afford certain sneakers or could not obtain them due to high customer demand and low volume of production have turned to other means of getting their hands on a desired sneaker. Sometimes these people end up stealing or even killing others in order to acquire them.

I am not particularly proud of this side of the culture, as it involves people inflicting bodily harm onto their fellow man. In 2012, an incident occurred in a small Texas county where a 16-year-old boy named Juan Reyna was shot and killed by 19-year-old Yusef Villanueva over an uncommon pair of Air Jordan shoes. Juan was supposed to turn 17 years old a few days later, but instead of his family planning a birthday party, they were faced with the burden that no parent wants to bear—the painstaking process of planning their beloved son’s funeral (KHOU, December 19, 2012). This is just one of many incidents that take place within the sneaker culture. Let this story be a lesson to everyone out there that no shoe—no matter how exclusive and rare it is—is worth another person’s life.

According to an ABC News report, an event took place in 2011 during the Christmas season, in which an enormous group of people waited in line at a local mall for hours to be one of the first to get the newly released Air Jordan retro sneaker. Once the mall opened its doors, the group broke 6

through like a tidal wave and darted towards the stores that had the shoe in stock. Online video coverage depicted images of people pushing and shoving others out of the way. Others were being trampled on, and a few fights even broke out because of holiday shoppers cutting in line. Local law enforcement made their presence known, but even they had some degree of difficulty in trying to maintain order; it was absolute madness (C. Ng, 2011). These images caught everyone in America by surprise because no one could fathom how people could act this way over a pair of shoes. But sneakerheads everywhere already knew that this was more than just a shoe. It was an iconic piece of history, for some a source of their youth, and for others, an opportunity to make money and resell the shoes for up to two times their retail value.

The reselling of sneakers has become a recent problem. During every release, 75% of people who wait in line to purchase shoes have the sole intention of reselling them to those who want the sneakers to add to their collection or wear because they genuinely love them (D. Friendly, 2015).

These are the people who are gradually ruining the culture. To me, it is offensive because they are taking something that I love and have an unrivaled passion for, and using it for their own personal gain. This makes it harder for people like me to get the sneakers that we want. In turn, this forces us to shell out more money just so that we can get them.

Alongside pop culture influences, corporate giants such as Nike, Adidas, and Asics have capitalized on this lifestyle, selling out every single release. As consumers, we have done nothing but consume their products and buy into an already capitalistic society. Due to all the violence, reselling, and hardship, I can honestly say that I am not happy about what the sneaker culture has grown into today. Before all this negativity took place, sneaker culture was much simpler, the campouts were much more civilized and tame, and people did not make such a big fuss about what shoes you had on your feet. All that mattered was that you yourself liked what you were wearing; how much money you spent on a pair of sneakers did not define who you were as a person or how elite your status was.

As distraught as I am about all the negativity that has developed within this culture, I am proud of all the friendships and connections I have made with different groups of people. Many of them come from different backgrounds and share nothing in common with me other than the pure love of sneakers. Assimilating myself with them gives me a sense of belonging. Through the stories and experiences of those who came before us, we gain a deeper understanding and respect for the culture and its members.

I could not imagine myself severing all ties with this culture, as I feel that this is my passion and that I may never get tired of something that I truly love. There is something so pure about the sneaker culture that many people nowadays tend to overlook. The smell of the leather material on a pair of brand-new sneakers is completely addictive, bringing back nostalgic memories of the very first pair of shoes you bought. When you first put them on your feet, you have a feeling of confidence and excitement. The connection you make with a fellow sneakerhead creates a sense of camaraderie and community. The less people get caught up within the hype and that mindset of how many shoes they need to have in their collection, and the less they try to resell rare editions of shoes, the better it is.

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Every pair of sneakers has a story behind it, whether it be that your favorite basketball player has worn them, or that you went through unforgettable lengths in order to acquire them. However, all that matters in the end is that you really like them; they will be on your feet, after all. Do not listen to the opinions of others—just stay true to yourself and your beliefs. Make your own choices and wear what you like.

For sneakerheads, they are always in search of the next best thing to wear on their feet. It is a lifestyle that they pursue. It is an extension of who they are and what they stand for. This is a love and hate type of relationship, but as long as the love outweighs the hate, sneakerheads will continue to push onward and keep on sole searching.

REFERENCES A., M. (2009). Sneaking into pop culture. University Business, 12(5), 20.

Barias, M. (2015, October 16). The true story behind the banned Air Jordan: What sneaker was actually banned by the NBA? Retrieved from http://solecollector.com/news/2015/10/thetrue-story-behind-the-banned-air-jordan Friendly, D. (2015, November 15). How sneaker culture went from subculture to mainstream.

Youtube.com/GQvideos. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gjQLpu8x7g&list=PLmGBjmJf8a3aDOPpxEkLAz0RLIqYVMdZ&index=2 KHOU Staff. (2012, December 19). 16-year-old shot and killed over Air Jordan sneaker [video news report]. Retrieved from http://legacy.khou.com/story/news/2014/07/22/11914836/ Ng, C. (2011). New Air Jordan XI Concord causes shopping frenzy [news article]. Lifestyle.

Retrieved from http://abcnews.go.com/Business/nike-air-jordan-xi-concord-shoppingfrenzy/story?id=15220618 Wilson, B., & Sparks, R. (1996). It's gotta be the shoes: Youth, race, and sneaker commercials. Sociology of Sport Journal, 13(4), 398-427.

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How Regulated Sport Hunting Benefits North America

By Jon Davis For millions of years, hunting has played a vital role in the survival of the human race. During the times of pre-civilization, humans relied on hunting solely for survival, not for sport. The weapons used were primitive spears, slings, and clubs. The hunt was dangerous, and the men who accomplished the task did so by putting their lives on the line. However, the rewards were worth the risk. The materials from every animal were used to their fullest potential. The meat from the animal would feed the hunter’s family, the coats would supply warmth throughout the winter months, and the bones would be used for tools. As time continued, hunting still played its part in survival; however, the domestication of animals and livestock began to supply the human race with a new source of food.

Over time, hunting became an environmental issue on the continent of North America. In the early 1900s, the over-exploitation and the extinction of many species was caused by unregulated hunting and a disregard for wildlife resources. This would eventually change with the development of the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation. The model contains a set of principles that guide conservation and wildlife decisions in order to help preserve the ecosystem, while still enjoying the hunt. Wood, the author of The Delights and Dilemmas of Hunting, says: One needs to distinguish between subsistence hunting, which is defined as hunting for food for survival; commercial hunting, which is defined as hunting with the business purpose of supplying meat for a market; and general sport hunting, which is defined as highly regulated (with seasons and bag limits), noncommercial hunting. Subsistence hunting was done by early people and is practiced by a few scattered cultures today. Commercial hunting was done by the early American frontier businessmen. General sport hunting is practiced by the typical hunter of today. (Wood 5) Wood also states that “‘sport’ hunting means following methods of hunting greatly restricted by law and regulations, such as what time of day to start and to stop, what kind and size of gun, what sex is permitted to be shot, what times of the year, and how many of what species may be taken” (Wood 6). This briefly describes how sport hunting is regulated, and it must also be added that ethical standards, tactics, and techniques are enforced by the individual hunters as well.

In the present day, regulated sport hunting has become a controversial activity. Animal rights groups and individuals have emerged throughout North America and have aimed to put a stop to this type of hunting. By some, sport hunting is seen as a violent form of recreation that is no longer needed for subsistence. These people also believe this way of hunting negatively impacts the environment and is cruel to wildlife.

One of the most well-known activist groups is People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), which has targeted hunters by opposing the hunters’ actions and promoting its own agenda through advertisements and campaigns. PETA says, “Hunting is often called a sport as a way to pass off a cruel, needless killing spree as a socially acceptable, wholesome activity” (PETA). Because early hunting in North America resulted in the loss or extinction of various

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species, it can be easy to understand the efforts of these groups, but since then, hunters have evolved to be more environmentally friendly.

Since there are copious amounts of citizens with guns, it is amazing that hunting has become a positive force in conservation. The Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation was founded in 1984, and is responsible for preserving and enhancing over 6.7 million acres for elk and other wildlife. The foundation states, “North American hunters follow two basic principles: that our fish and wildlife belong to all Americans, and that they need to be managed in a way that their populations will be sustained forever” (“Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation Home”). The two principles are the backbone of the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation and the modern hunter.

The conflict between hunters and animal rights supporters must be resolved by proving that valuable traditions and the conservation efforts will continue to benefit our environment. This essay argues that regulated sport hunting in North America is important for conservation of the environment and wildlife because it passes on valuable traditions, techniques, and education, manages population sizes, and aids in the restoration and preservation for the future inhabitants of our planet through the funds contributed by hunters.

Regulated sport hunting is a family tradition that has been passed on for generations, and has evolved with laws and regulations along the way. Its traditions include skills that are mainly passed on from father to son, and—more recently—even father to daughter. This traditional training, along with educational programs, has established a basis that allows hunters to practice proper hunting techniques, learn and follow laws, and be safe to prevent injuries. Russ Chastain is an expert hunter and author of the article “Hunting: A Tradition.” Chastain states, “The hunter's instinct rests in us all, whether born and raised in the country or city. We are all descended from those cavemen and mighty hunters in the Bible. We hunt to live, we live to hunt” (Chastain). The traditions being passed down are not only to hunt and kill your targeted animal as a trophy. It must also supplement the diet of the hunter.

My father, Rhett Davis, is a veteran hunter from South Alabama who was taught by his father to respect the land and the creatures who inhabit it. When I was young, I remember him saying, “Son, if you want to be a good hunter, you must respect the land and the animals who live here. Feed the deer to keep them on the land and only kill what you intend to eat.” My father was taught to provide for the animals by planting crops for nourishment and taking care of their land. In return, this would provide for both the human race, the species of whitetail deer, and other animals in the ecosystem. The pure skill and technique of being an effective hunter is rarely recognized by those who oppose hunting or those who do not have a full understanding of it.

Although many tactics are used, I will explain the art of stand hunting a whitetail deer, as taught to me by my father and his acquaintances. The first thing that must be understood is that the deer being hunted commonly reside on private land and refuges that are deemed safe and outside of city boundaries. This is to ensure that hunting does not directly affect human society or create any hazards. The land is prepped throughout the year during pre/post-hunting season by setting up feeders and planting crops for the deer to nourish themselves. On our land in particular, this helps feed up to 400 deer annually. While the deer are feeding and reproducing in the off-season, hunters will ensure they have all licenses, tags, and gear, and are proficient in using their desired weapon.

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As hunting season approaches, the hunter will begin to look for common patterns of life, such as tracks in roads, track size (in order to determine the size and gender of the deer), and trails caused by regulatory movement. Once areas of interest have been established, the hunter will pick a tree or ground site that has visual of the entire area as a vantage point. The particular tree or site will then be equipped with either a stand or some type of foliage or blind, and will not be revisited until the season begins.

Now it is that time of the year; deer season has arrived! The hunter will pick the time of day to begin the hunt. Typical times are early in the morning before dawn, or late in the afternoon before dusk. This is to ensure that the hunter is established and undetected at the hunting site prior to the deer beginning or ending their daily feeding and movement. Whitetail deer typically tend to bed down or sleep during mid-day to late afternoon because of high temperatures. The prep for the hunt will include picking proper camouflage that has been scent blocked, using binoculars or range finders if needed, deer calls, and having a properly functioning weapon with ammunition. The hunter must move into this location as quietly as possible, then sit, wait, and listen for movement.

Once the target has been visually acquired, the hunt has now become a matter of law and ethics.

The hunter will decide if this is the proper gender and size of the deer that can be killed according to law. Ethically, the hunter must follow the law and not kill fawn, young adults, or pregnant females. If the deer meets all requirements, a carefully aimed and well-placed shot will then be fired at the upper front shoulder of the deer. This is to ensure a clean kill that penetrates the heart upon impact, and in turn, creates minimal suffering for the animal. When the hunt is complete, the deer will then be cleaned, and meat will be used to supply food for the hunter’s family.

This is just one of many traditional styles, which include dog hunting, still hunting, stalk hunting, and luring male whitetail deer (buck) with scents. Henry David Thoreau is one of America’s most famous poets, essayists, and practical philosophers. He states, “When some of my friends have asked me anxiously about their boys, whether they should let them hunt, I have answered yes— remembering that it was one of the best parts of my education—make them hunters” (Thoreau 158). Although this statement was made prior to development hunter education programs, it provides a look at how the traditions and skills taught by families are an educational benefit in themselves.

Hunter education programs throughout North America have developed an in-depth course that requires training and testing in order to lawfully hunt. The International Hunter Education Association was developed to establish a core curriculum and reduce the safety hazards of hunting.

The goal of this association is to teach and develop safe, ethical, and responsible hunters, and to ensure the continuation of the hunting tradition. James R. Heffelfinger works for the Arizona Game and Fish Department and specializes in plant and animal science, ecology, and evolutionary studies. He stated in the International Journal of Environmental Studies that “North America has an incredible volunteer driven network of hunter education programs delivering structured coursework on wildlife management, hunter ethics, firearms safety and hunting techniques” (Heffelfinger 407). By developing knowledgeable, responsible, and skilled hunters who obey the laws, hunt fairly and ethically, and practice safety, the future of hunting can be secured, and establish its place amongst environmental and conservation efforts for years to come.

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David Rainer works for the Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources. He says, “Hunting accidents have decreased from roughly 52 firearm incidents per season in 1984-1985 to 5 incidents in 2013-2014” (Rainer). The hunter education course has been mandatory since 1993, trains roughly 650,000 students annually, and will continue to educate the youth of our future. The combination of family traditions, skills, and educational programs working together are securing the future for hunting as a safe, reliable, ethical force.

When under regulations, port hunting has proven to be an excellent form of conservation.

According to Heffelfinger, “It is a common misconception that ‘hunting’ caused the extinction or extirpation of some species. Unregulated killing caused such depletions” (Heffelfinger 400).

Today’s hunters are taking care of the land and helping to manage population sizes. Hunting helps reduce numbers in population in order to stop the spread of disease, reduces overeating which causes starvation, and even stops wildlife from inhabiting or migrating through suburban areas.

For example, whitetail deer are known to carry Lyme Disease and Epizootic Hemorrhage Disease (this can harm livestock), to breed at incredibly high rates, and to be ravenous eaters that can strip a forest bare. Therefore, whitetail deer can in turn cause suffering to all forms of wildlife in the ecosystem. When Europeans arrived in North America, the size of the whitetail deer population was estimated to be around thirty million. By the 1900s, the population had dwindled to roughly 300,000 to 400,000 due to unregulated hunting (Heffelfinger 400).

A program known as the Boone and Crockett Club was developed by Theodore Roosevelt and other hunters of the American Frontier in 1887. The mission of the club and its members was the elimination of commercial market hunting; the creation of the National Park and National Forest Services, National Wildlife Refuge system, wildlife reserves, and funding mechanisms for conservation efforts; and overall protection of wildlife in the wake of industrialization. Seasons and bag limits were established in order to provide an allotted amount of time and number of deer that can be killed in a specific region. The length of the season and bag limit numbers are estimated by biologists who conduct population studies in each state, and are then set by the Natural Resources Commission.

The positive results and effectiveness of these factors can be seen in the whitetail deer population, which is roughly 25 million in present day North America. Heffelfinger also states, “Today, hunters are the cornerstone of North American wildlife management not only because of the funds and advocacy they bring to the table, but also because they remain the most effective logistical agents of actual population management” (Heffelfinger 401). This statement enforces the fact that hunters are the primary force in regulating these population sizes, as they are consistently involved with the species and their environment.

The funds being contributed by hunters play a critical role in the conservation of wildlife and the environment. In “Hunting in America: An Economic Force for Conservation,” Tom Allen, Rob Southwick, and Doug Howlett post a survey from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service stating, “13.7 million people aged 16 or older—approximately 6 percent of the United States population—went hunting that year and spent a whopping $38.3 billion on equipment, licenses, trips and more” (Allen, et al. 3). The funds are directly applied to the restoration and management of wildlife and hunter education programs. A breakdown of this study states, “$796 million is spent on license 12

and permit sales, which go directly to the hunter’s respective state wildlife agency, and the $440 million in annual donations goes directly to conservation and sportsmen’s organizations. Hunters contribute over $1.6 million annually to conservation” (Allen et al 6).

To add to the argument against animal rights organizations, in “Right to Hunt vs. Animal Rights,” Jim Amrhein states: “From an ecological point of view, here’s what all this translates into: The needs of wild animals—especially endangered and threatened species—are immeasurably better served by the millions of acres of well-maintained, patrolled habitat that hunters’ dollars are paying for than the lies and propaganda dished out by animal rights groups” (Amrhein).

Hunting is also helpful for the economy, bringing in nearly 680,000 jobs to the people of North America. The vast amounts of income in nearly every state in North America provide insight on how effective and important sport hunters are to the environment and its future. Hunters are contributing nearly $8 million daily to support wildlife agencies and an overall economic output of $86.9 billion (Amrhein).

In conclusion, regulated sport hunting in North America is important for conservation of the environment and wildlife because it passes on valuable traditions, techniques, and education; manages population sizes; and aids in restoration and preservation for the future through funds contributed by hunters. The efforts put forth represent a rich, traditional, and dedicated alliance of individuals who aim to enjoy the great outdoors and preserve the ecosystem in the face of our growing economy. The increasing numbers of human population and economic development are causing global environmental effects that are harmful to every species of wildlife.

In order to maintain the environment, hunters and anti-hunting organizations must form a partnership or develop mutual understanding to focus on the common goals of preservation and restoration. Theodore Roosevelt, the 26th President of the United States, once said, “Here is your country. Cherish these natural wonders, cherish the natural resources, cherish the history and romance as a sacred heritage, for your children and your children's children. Do not let selfish men or greedy interests skin your country of its beauty, its riches or its romance.”

The future of North America, the land, and the wildlife rests in the hands of the people and their dedication to preserving it.

WORKS CITED Allen, Tom, Rob Southwick, and Doug Howlet. “Hunting in America: An Economic Force for Conservation.” National Shooting Sports Foundation. www.nssf.org. 2012. Web. 7 Aug. 2016.

Amrhein, Jim. “Right to Hunt vs. Animal Rights.” Daily Reckoning, 13 Nov. 2015. Web. 7 Aug. 2016.

Chastain, Russ. "The Hunting Tradition." About Sports. About.com, 15 Feb. 2016. Web. 03 Aug. 2016.

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Heffelfinger, James R., Valerius Geist, and William Wishart. “The Role of Hunting in North American Wildlife Conservation.” International Journal of Environmental Studies 70.3 (2013): 399–413. Web. 21 July 2016.

"People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA): The Animal Rights Organization." PETA. Web. 01 Aug. 2016.

Rainer, David. “Hunter Education Has Positive Impact on Accidents." Outdoor Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources. Web. 01 Aug. 2016.

"Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation Home." Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation Home. Web. 01 Aug. 2016.

Thoreau, Henry David. Walden. Electronic Text Center, University of Virginia. Web.

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Tap or Snap?: Mixed Martial Arts

By Nakoa Gabriel The cage door is locked shut behind you. Chanting and screaming by the thousands in attendance gets the adrenaline coursing through your body. Within seconds, the referee starts the bout and you are finally able to confront your opponent: the person you’ve been training to destroy for the past three months. All the time spent in the gym, all the time away from family; it has all led up to this fight.

You immediately employ your game plan: stick the jab, control the distance, and at all costs keep the fight standing. Time ticks on; blow after blow you chip your opponent away, leaving him a bloody mess as your coach is shrieking to “pour it on.” Out of nowhere, your opposition shoots for a quick double leg takedown that scoops you up and brings you hard to the mat. The impact leaves you breathless and slightly disoriented as you struggle to get the fight back standing.

Your opponent recognizes your shock, immediately locking his bicep around your neck in a “guillotine” attempt. You’ve prepared for this in training countless times; just keep calm and wiggle your way out. However, there is no escape. The grip gets tighter and tighter around your neck, making it harder to breathe. Lack of oxygen causes the cage around you to go blurry. Your coach pleads from the corner, “Stay calm! You got this! Hang in there!” You can’t withstand it anymore; the worlds begin to spin. Are you going to tap out or go to sleep?

In the world of mixed martial arts (MMA), anything can happen. Two humans are locked in an iron cage where they battle each other until one’s will gives in. One technique many fighters employ to subdue their opponent is the use of submissions. This is the manipulation of someone’s joint or neck in order to force them to tap out and forfeit the fight. However, many fighters refuse to tap out; rather, they allow their joint to be separated or pass out due to lack of oxygen. Failing to tap out has resulted in numerous injuries, such as broken arms, hyper-extended knees, and concussions.

So the question arises: why don’t fighters tap out and save themselves from possible permanent injury? This essay plans to delve into the concept of “tap or snap” and explains why some fighters refuse to tap out when placed in a dangerous submission. A common idea many viewers have is that tapping out is weak or “feminine.” This is information I will explore to learn what tapping out really means to different people. Furthermore, I intend to justify refusal to tap out as a means to maintain popularity amongst fans, proving to be a better alternative than giving up.

Before examining the concept of tapping out, it is first important to establish general knowledge of what mixed martial arts is. As stated by the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), the world’s most popular organization: Mixed martial arts means unarmed combat involving the use, subject to any applicable limitations set forth in these Unified Rules and other regulations of the applicable Commission, of a combination of techniques from different disciplines of the martial arts, including, without limitation, grappling, submission holds, kicking and striking. (UFC)

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Fighters will spend years perfecting their technique in one particular fighting style, then moving on to learn others. This is done to prepare themselves in all aspects of fighting for their MMA event.

Dale Spencer published an academic paper, “Body Techniques and Body Callusing: An Ethnography of Mixed Martial Arts,” in order to study the origins of various fighting techniques.

A meticulous training system accounts for a fighter’s astounding skill set, but also how “the fighter’s habitus (general constitution especially bodily build) is continually formed and reformed.

The fighter’s body is continually in a state of flux or metamorphosis” (Spencer 9). With these specially learned skills, fighters take great pride in their ability and status as being a “fighter.”

Spencer describes this mental trophy amongst fighters: “Entering the ring holds a particular significance as a point where the fighter is recognized by his/her peers as becoming a mixed martial artist… a mixed martial artist has the bodily constitution capable of withstanding the rigors and level of competition of the sport” (Spencer 19).

However, fighting as a sport is more than just a physical challenge: “You have to be well rounded physically, mentally and technically. You cannot be just a big guy that is tough …you have champions like Fedor …he has a lot of heart, very strong mentally” (Spencer 19). All of these various aspects build up the psyches of fighters until they truly have the confidence that they are capable of defeating any opponent.

As mentioned, a fighter can win the fight by knockout, submission, referee stoppage, or decision if the fight goes the fully designated time. A submission is “the act of utilizing a grappling technique to force an opponent to concede defeat via tapout or other means” (UFC). This is where the most common question arises when it comes to submissions: Why do fighters not tap out when they clearly know that they are in trouble? Is there a certain advantage to not tapping out?

When a fighter taps out due to a submission, he/she is telling the referee that they are unable to escape and want the fight to be stopped immediately in order to prevent further damage. Here is a short list of some common submissions applied by fighters: Ankle Lock: A leg lock submission where the ankle joint is attacked and hyper-extended.

Armbar: A common submission hold that entails an opponent's arm being straightened out between the instigator's thighs, before being bent and hyper-extended at the elbow to the point of submission.

Kimura: This move occurs when an opponent's arm is isolated and cranked behind their back, thus putting immense pressure on their shoulder.

Rear Naked Choke: This is a common choke applied when an attacker secures the back of their opponent and uses this advantageous position to set up a choke from the opponent's blind spot. (UFC)

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All of these submissions pose extremely dangerous results if one decides not to tap out. With the various joint locks, a person may dislocate their shoulder, knee, arm, or ankle. When it comes to choke holds, a person can lose consciousness, possibly resulting in amnesia.

Bryan Walrod is a professional medical doctor and has published an article in the journal Sportspecific Illness and Injury entitled, “Current Review of Injuries Sustained in Mixed Martial Arts Competition.” Through his research and surveys, Walrod found that “the losing fighter was 2.53 times more likely to be injured than the winning fighter. However, it was noted that age, weight, and fight experience had no significant effect on incidence of injury” (Walrod 2). Regardless of how the fight ends, whether it is by knockout, decision, or submission, the sport in itself produces a high injury rate. What separates knockouts and submissions are the long-lasting effect they have on their victims.

Though a knockout may result in a concussion, submissions by their definition are meant to permanently disarm and injure the opponent. Rickson Gracie is famous in the MMA world, as his family created the discipline of Brazilian jiu-jitsu (BJJ), which introduced the idea of submission fighting. In an online interview, Gracie talks about the history and how it began as a “self-defense prospective, that is for real life situations … it is a part of your being to be able to protect yourself on the street” (Gracie 4:33). BJJ has evolved into a hybrid art that conforms to sports. Yet it is essential to remember that through its roots, BJJ is designed to incapacitate an attacker.

When it comes to MMA as a career, any type of injury can become a major setback. The dislocation of a joint is particularly dangerous, as fighters use all elements of their physical bodies to make themselves successful fighters. It is apparent that with a long-term career in mind, a sensible fighter would tap out as soon as they feel the submission in effect.

Aside from tapping out to save one’s future health, it is proposed that this type of giving up can help a fighter learn and grow. An article by Dr. Carsten Wrosch, “The Importance of Goal Disengagement in Adaptive Self-Regulation: When Giving Up is Beneficial,” goes into lengthy detail as to what positive effects giving up can offer. The essay proposes the concept that “because human life is short and resources are limited, people must make decisions about where, and how much, to invest into those resources … In such cases the goal must be abandoned. This lets the person expand resources on other goals” (Wrosch 1).

Although Wrosch primarily defines goals as an abstract idea that someone may be trying to achieve, the same could be said for fighting. When a fighter taps out, he or she is admitting that they could not escape the technique, which reveals a hole in their fighting style. Upon defeat by tapping out, a fighter may use the defeat as a “resource” to further enhance their ability. From that point on, their goal is redirected to learning how to escape that maneuver and not allow it to defeat them again. Furthermore, Wrosch argues that “giving up on goals is a natural and important part of living … the idea that disengagement is useful and adaptive” (Wrosch 5).

Another key element to consider is the male-dominant aspect promoted by MMA. A strong reason that fighters decide to not tap out in a fight is to maintain their pride and project themselves as someone who is “tough,” regardless of the fact that they may lose the fight. Maintaining this

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“manly” figure, even when faced by the extreme dangers of a submission, creates a fighter’s overall psyche in that he/she is a “beast” and can walk through anything.

With the recent introduction (2013) of female fighters in the UFC, many researchers are studying MMA as a means of examining female interaction in a prominently male dominant sport. “Cage Fighting like a Girl: Exploring Gender Constructions in the Ultimate Fighting Championship” is

by Charlene Weaving is one such study. Weaving’s thesis is that “women’s participation in the UFC challenges traditional stereotypes of female physical passivity and attempts at physical invisibility” (Weaving 1). She goes on to state that “violence is often the single most evident marker of manhood. Submitting to the violent actions of your opponent is considered a humiliating way to lose since losing fighters are required to indicate that they are quitting verbally or by physically tapping” (Weaving 4).

By the nature of the sport, MMA promotes extreme violence, which in turn tends to promote concepts of masculinity. When it comes to ground fighting, it was noted that “being on top of an opponent is technically preferred. A man on top symbolizes the sexually penetrating position as opposed to a man on bottom who is vulnerable of being signified as the penetrated and thus the submitted” (Weaving 6). This evidence suggests that MMA fighting does have a certain aspect that favors male dominance and all that it entails, such as aggression.

It is also fair to conclude that majority of MMA fans prefer to view male fights rather than female fights. After all, up until 2013, the UFC signed only male fighters (Weaving 2), with little to no interest in including females. A statistic from the website MMA Manifesto ranked the top 10selling UFC Pay Per View events. At number one was “UFC 100 Mir vs. Lesnar.” This event brought in 1,600,000 purchases via PPV, as many people wanted to view the spectacle that is Brock Lesnar (6’3 tall and 280 pounds plus) defend his belt from a challenger who stood equal in stature. What this tells us is that masculinity is ever present in MMA, which also tells us what viewers find it more pleasing to watch.

When it comes down to fighting in the UFC, the fighters that tend to gain more popularity are those who display this hyper-masculinity. One of the most popular females in the UFC today is Ronda Rousey, who “in media appearances, does not shy away from emphasizing an aggressive and violent persona, and as a result, is often asked if she has ever fought males” (Weaving 8). If even the female fighters employ masculinity in order to rise to fame, it is easy to make the claim that males attempt to uphold an even higher standard. This is why the proposition of not tapping out might be a viable option for a fighter trying to pursue successful career.

Having a large fan base is what makes any athlete popular and as a result makes their appearances more highly in demand. The same theory is true for UFC fighters in their bouts. As UFC fighter Bryan Caraway stated when interviewed by Fox Sports, “I don't care if people hate me or love me as long as they're buying pay-per-views and they're buying tickets and the sport keeps growing” (Martin). Regardless of if a person is portrayed as a role model or villain, all that matters is that people come to watch their fights. If a person is a role model, fans will flock to the event to support their hero. If a fighter is somewhat of a villain or negative figure, fans will watch the fight in hopes of seeing him/her be defeated.

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Having a successful career in a sport such as the UFC means that the fighter needs to have fans.

No fans means little to no demand for them to fight, which also means they can’t climb the ladder to becoming a champion. When a fighter loses a fight, his or her ranking will drop regardless of whether they tap out or not. But the decision to tap out may be detrimental to the popularity of the fighter—an example being the popular Irishman Conor Mcgregor, who tapped out after his opponent Nate Diaz caught him in a rear-naked choke at UFC 196. Diaz was interviewed postfight by Bloody Elbow, describing the fight as “a fight against the best fighters in the world; you've got to tap to that (expletive). You ain't getting out of it. You can tap out, or you can go to sleep” (Alexander). The betting favorite was criticized heavily for his decision to tap out just seconds after the choke was applied.

Holly Holm is a female UFC fighter who, like McGregor, was defeated by a rear-naked choke ironically on the same night. However, unlike McGregor, Holm decided to ride out the submission and wound up unconscious. McKeever quotes Dana White, president of the UFC: “She went out like a gangster. She gets choked, she held on, she tried to fight the choke” (McKeever 1). Tate was the victor in the fight, yet the article focuses entirely on Holm’s resilience to keep fighting until the very end.

It is shocking to think that the president of the UFC applauded a fighter for not taking the safe route in ending the fight by a tap out. Fighters who choose to fight the submission are, by a fan’s expectation, the definition of true “fighters.” They display this aggressive, masculine entity that never gives in, which gives them such appeal. Fans don’t want to watch a fighter who will immediately tap out once they feel like they are in danger; they want to see their fighter try to escape or get out of it.

Wrosch would argue that admitting defeat by tapping out would be the ultimate tool in effectively altering one’s mind for the better. Nevertheless, it is important to understand the psyche of a fighter and understand why tapping out could ruin one’s mental state. Tracey J. Davenport has done extensive research on combat sports and published countless articles on the matter. One such paper, “Perceptions of the Contribution of Psychology to Success in Elite Kickboxing,” published in the Journal of Sports Science and Medicine, looks into the psychological power of a positive mindset in fighting. One of the most utilized techniques in preparing for competition was selftalking, “a strategy used by participants for instructional, motivational and emotional control” (Davenport 5). Self-talking is essential to the boosting of one’s self-confidence through constant positive affirmations.

When it comes to competitive combat, having this extra motivation could be the difference between dominating or being dominated. Since a strong core mindset is such an important tool when dealing with the rigors of MMA, one could also easily argue that choosing to give up (tapping out) is the ultimate defeat to one’s psyche. If in the heat of battle fighters tap out from a submission, they have no one else to blame but themselves. No one can claim to be the best fighter in the world if they had to give in to their opponent. If they allow the submission to play out, they may be severely injured, but there will always be that hint of doubt; what if time had run out and the round was over before my arm broke? What if I was able to maintain consciousness for another five seconds; would my opponent have gotten tired and given up? These type of questions offer at

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least some doubt as to if they could have gotten out, while tapping out is a clear-cut indicator of giving up.

The inspiration for this essay came to me upon watching UFC 196. On this particular night, the two main events concluded the same way: by a rear naked choke. However, the only difference was that one fighter tapped out while the other went to sleep, becoming unconscious. When the female champion Holly Holm was defeated, I remember looking at my friends’ faces and it was pure shock. We were all in pure amazement and awe that she decided to not tap out. I went so far as to say, “Man, that was some hardcore shit. I give her props.” The small circle of friends surrounding the TV were all in agreement that Holm was tough for not giving up.

In the following fight, many people were anticipating McGregor to walk through Diaz with ease.

Several of my friends who were in attendance on that night loved McGregor, describing themselves as “die-hard fans.” The irony is that as soon as McGregor was defeated by tapping out, they all changed their opinions. When he tapped out in the fight, my friends drastically changed their opinion of their once favorite fighter. Luke Thomas, senior editor for MMAFighting.com and SB Nation, provided his input about the night through a podcast, saying: This idea that there is anything wrong with tapping is madness, we should celebrate fighters for tapping … It is a blessing that Mixed Martial Arts has this and a shame boxing does not. I understand that fighters may disagree with me because it has to do with their values.

There is nothing wrong with tapping if you have had enough, either from a submission or strikes. Without such community pressure (fans) they would do it much more freely.

(Thomas) What Thomas is describing is exactly what I experienced that night, having witnessed my friends change their minds post-fight. Due to McGregor’s willingness to give in, they viewed him as weak, inferior, and even a wimp. The MMA community as a whole has this tendency to highlight scenarios where a fighter does not tap out. My thesis, that not tapping out could prove more beneficial, is based off this idea that the fights we talk about are those who don’t tap out. The fact that Thomas did a podcast to defend fighters for tapping out shows the stigma that it carries. If tapping out made a group of die-hard fans change their view of him, it is easy to see why I believe McGregor could have benefited more by not tapping out.

In conclusion, not tapping out in an MMA fight will benefit one’s career. I believe that as long as the sport of MMA exists, there will always be a debate between those who think it’s absolutely insane not to tap out and those who can see why fighters wouldn’t. Through my observations and studies, the only positive aspect about tapping out is the fact that it reduces damage to your physical body. But tapping out does more than just physical damage, especially in a sport where one’s psyche is a major component. The act of tapping out has a negative connotation, implying weakness. If a fighter is in a submission where they know they can’t escape, defeat is inevitable.

By deciding not to tap out, fighters can, in a sense, cushion their defeat.

Yes, they will lose the fight regardless of which route they choose, but at least a fighter can maintain popularity amongst fans. This popularity is essential for any performing athlete who wants to make a name for himself/herself. After many attempts at contacting professional UFC 20

fighters to ask them about their opinion on the matter, two-time world champion (welterweight and lightweight) B.J. “The Prodigy Penn” Penn gave me a short, but informative response: Before it was considered sport and we really believed that we were the best street fighters in the world, we would never have thought about tapping. Times change, lives change, kids come along. I guess it really depends on what stage the fighter is in his career and where his mindset is. (Penn) Coming from the words of a fighter, I personally feel as though he is correct. It all depends on the situation of a fighter and what he or she believes should be done. There is no doubt that not tapping out from the eyes of fans is more favored, but if a fighter is in the latter part of his/her career, tapping out may be the safest thing to do.

WORKS CITED Alexander, Mookie. “Nate Diaz: McGregor ‘had to tap out because there was no getting out of that’.” Bloody Elbow. SB Nation, 16 Mar. 2016. Web. Davenport, Tracey J. “Perceptions of the Contribution of Psychology to Success in Elite Kickboxing.” Journal of Sports Science and Medicine 99-106: N.p. 1 July 2006. Web. Martin, Damon. "Bryan Caraway: Love Me or Hate Me So Long As You Watch Me." FoxSports. N.p., 1 Oct. 2014. Web. McKeever, Lewis. “Dana White Credits Holly Holm for Being a ‘Gangster’ by Not Tapping Out to Miesha Tate.” Bloody Elbow. N.p., 12 Mar. 2016. Web. Penn, B.J. “Tap or Snap?” Instagram Direct Message. 17 March 2016.

Spencer, Dale. “Habit(us), Body Techniques and Body Callusing: An Ethnography of Mixed Martial Arts.” 10 Dec. 2009. Web. Thomas, Luke. "Tapping in Mixed Martial Arts Shouldn't Be Stigmatized." YouTube. 17 Mar. 2016. Web. Ultimate Fighting Championship. Ufc.com. Web. Walrod, Bryant. “Current Review of Injuries Sustained in Mixed Martial Arts Competition.”

Ovid. Wolters Kluwer, 1 Sept. 2011. Web. Weaving, Charlene. “Cage Fighting like a Girl: Exploring Gender Constructions in the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC).” Journal of the Philosophy of Sport, 20 Oct. 2013. Web. White, Dana. “Ways to Win - Knockout, Submission and Decision.” UFC, 12 Nov. 1993. Web. Wrosch, Carsten. “The Importance of Goal Disengagement in Adaptive Self-Regulation: When Giving Up is Beneficial.” Self and Identity 2(1), 24 Sept. 2010. Web. 21

22

Losing the Hawaiian Culture and Gaining Religion

By Joleen Paul On February 17, 1996, a baby girl was born. She belonged to Rowina Pomaika’i Kuahuia and Joeseph Kuahuia. Her name was Jennifer Leilani Kuahuia. She was their first born, my older sister, and this is with whom the change began. What is this change? It is changing whatever holds us to the past and to be cleansed from the line, not to carry it on.

My parents are both Christians, but my mom’s side of the family are the type of Christians who want to be separated from the ancient Hawaiian ways. Now, if you are familiar with Hawaiian history, you know that missionaries came over to the Hawaiian Islands to convert the Hawaiians to Christianity because they wanted them to believe in only one God, and to change their ways of living because it wasn’t suitable for the missionaries. Hawaiians had so many beliefs, myths, tales, and gods. Many Hawaiians converted to Christianity because they realized their people were dying out, while the visitors who came to the island were increasing. Hawaiians were not only dying, but they were also unable to reproduce due to the spread of diseases from incoming Westerners (Hawaii Alive, 2005).

Queen Ka’ahumanu, who had a great influence in Hawaiian history, wanted her people to live on and become strong as a whole. She was one of King Kamehameha’s many wives, but she was the favorite wife. Ka’ahumanu had the title “Kuhina Nui,” which was similar to prime minister. She and Kamehameha’s sacred wife, Keopu’olani, worked together to overthrow the kapu system, the system followed by the ancient Hawaiians that was strict and worshipped many gods. They believed that the kapu system had to go, and as the kapu system was abolished, then came missionaries (Fullard-Leo).

Missionaries greatly influenced the Hawaiians and spread Christianity to all Hawaiians. It wasn’t easy at first, but the missionaries knew they had to start with the ali‘i since the people wouldn’t follow unless their ali’i were to follow. According to Hawaii Alive, “These Protestants quickly became the new kahuna; spiritual and political advisors to the high chiefs. They effected change in Hawaiian law to fit Christian doctrine, and made ‘Ōlelo Hawai‘i into a written language in order that the Bible be imparted to the masses” (2005).

In order for the missionaries to get through to the Hawaiian people, they had to teach them English and how to write. Education was provided first, and then the Bible was translated for them to read.

Over the years, Christianity has been passed on for the people to continue it into the next generations.

My family has a strong belief in Christianity because many of the ancient Hawaiian ways still have a place in the culture. We had to get rid of anything that connected us to the past in order to thrive.

For example, my father’s last name is Kuahuia, which means “the covering of the altar” and my mother’s last name was Mahiai, which means “farmer of the land and sea.” We could have taken my mom’s last name, but in marriage, the wife takes the man’s last name. Our church didn’t like my father’s last name because of its meaning. My parents changed their last name to get rid of the old Hawaiian ways, so my parents chose the name “Paul” from the Bible. They felt this name was 23

more suitable and prominent. Then, after they changed their last name, they changed my sister’s as well, and she went from being Jennifer Leilani Kuahuia to Jennifer Leilani Paul.

Later on November 18, 1997, another baby girl was born. This little girl was me, Joleen Lokomaika’i Paul. Years later on May 19, 2003, a baby boy named Jeremy Paul was born, and five years after him, another baby girl, Joanna Paul, was born on April 11, 2008. If you noticed, my younger siblings don’t have middle names. The reason why is because our church believed the children shouldn’t have any Hawaiian middle names. Children who already had Hawaiian middle names before the church established this policy were fine, but future children may not have one.

When people hear my name, they automatically think I must be white because my last name is Paul. I often find myself explaining why my last name is Paul. Then I end up with many questions following after asking why, and from there I realize everyone assumes who you are based off of your name and appearance. I’ve been told before, “Why don’t you know this about your culture?” or “Are you sure you’re Hawaiian?”

To be honest, I find the people who question me lack a little respect when they come off as blunt and judgmental. I can’t help the fact that I was raised to not know my Hawaiian culture, but people seem not to register my reasoning. I believe that people shouldn’t judge you before knowing you, which happens to me a lot. I do not speak for all Christians, but this is just how I was brought up.

When people ask me, “What are your ethnicities?” or “Where are you from?”, I reply, “I’m Hawaiian and Japanese and I’m from Maui.” Naturally, they usually assume I dance hula, paddle, speak Hawaiian, or know everything about my culture.

With all respect, I do love the Hawaiian culture and my identity, but I was raised in a faith that didn’t want us to continue the old Hawaiian ways. I am proud to be Hawaiian and know some of the tales, like the Night Marchers, a spooky tale that we always heard growing up. The Night Marchers were “spirits of ancient Hawaiian warriors, bound to protect their ali'i in both life, and the afterlife” (Tanaka, 2014). When I was younger it was always told, and everyone knew about them. This story would always scare me, especially since I’ve seen one with my own eyes in Iao Valley, so I know not to mess with the old ancient Hawaiian ways because they are very much real. Our faith teaches that if we were still to practice them, then misfortune could possibly happen to us. For instance, I wasn’t allowed to do hula, to be put into Hawaiian immersion, to participate in La O’hana, to get Hawaiian tribal tattoos, or to visit ancient Hawaiian burial grounds or any place that was said to have old Hawaiian spirits around. This was for my own protection.

While growing up, I started to understand why we couldn’t participate in certain things. I also knew that the old Hawaiian tales and stories may seem like just stories, but the ancient Hawaiian ways are truer than you may think. We believe Hawaiians converted to Christianity to help thrive because the old religion tied us to many beliefs that would harm us. We are not attached to the old ways, which makes us able to live our lives and flourish.

REFERENCES Fullard-Leo, B. (n.d.). The woman who changed a kingdom - Hawaiian Queen Ka'ahumanu.

Retrieved April 07, 2016, from http://www.coffeetimes.com/july98.htm 24

Hawaii Alive. (2005). Hawaii Alive | Topics: Unification and Monarchy. Retrieved April 07, 2016, from http://www.hawaiialive.org/topics.php?sub=Unification and Monarchy Tanaka, C. (2014, October 30). Exploring the legend of the Night Marchers. Retrieved April 07, 2016, from http://www.hawaiinewsnow.com/story/27171113/exploring-the-legend-ofthe-night-marchers

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Saving the Bears: Keeping the Yuki Culture Alive

By Damon Niesen The clouds had just moved away from the perfect full moon out that night. The smoke from the fire lurked in the still night sky. I could smell the holy smoke of sage and the burning of wood in the center of the sacred dance circle, which had been used for generations. All of a sudden I saw them in a single line, lumbering to where they would perform the dance of the tribe. I could hear them growling and screaming at the evil spirits and the sickness of those who watched and wished to be healed by the sacred bears. These are not real bears, however; they are brave men dancing to heal and bless the tribal people.

The dance that I am describing is specific to my tribe, the Yuki, the people of the bear. The bear dance is our church, it is our hospital, and it is what keeps my people together. The dance has been in our tribe since time began, and there is no other bear dance like ours. The beat of a single drum carries the dance on, and the bears sing for all to hear. Their singing is scary at first because there is a lot of screaming in the songs, plus the men have been taken over by the bear spirit and the spirits of our ancestors. While watching the bears dance, it seems as if the men become bears by the way they move and by making the same sounds as real bears make. It is such a surreal feeling that it does not seem like any human could dance the way these men do. The men stomp their feet on the ground as hard as they can so that all of our ancestors know that the bear dance is beginning.

Becoming a bear is a long journey that not many men can endure. It starts with a cleansing fourday fast and three to four sweats in the sweat lodge. After the men clear their bodies of all evil and bad spirits, then they are able to find a bear. In this process the man must journey out into the woods and face a bear. In this act, the man must look into the bear’s eyes and feel as if he is one with the majestic creature. Once the man has this vision with the bear, then he is able to come down from the mountain and join the other bears in the sweat lodge before the dance, and drink the medicine provided for all bear dancers. This medicine makes the bears able to take in the sickness and evil spirits of the people.

Nobody knows what is in this medicine except for elders and other bears that have danced in the past. In order for the men not to die or throw up while dancing, their dance must be for the right purpose. If dancers have consumed alcohol or drugs, or if they are dancing for selfish reasons, they are considered to be dancing for the wrong purpose. Dancers who are dancing for the right purpose will be able to dance the sickness and spirits away from the people, and back into the rocks that surround the fire in the center of the dance circle.

Ever since I first watched the bear dance when I was younger, I wanted to become one, bring honor to my family, and keep the tradition alive. One of the ways I have taken the first step to becoming a dancer is to alter my body by getting a tattoo of a bear paw on my side. My bear paw tattoo lets people know that I am a bear dancer or that I am going to become one. Almost all bear dancers have a tattoo of something related to a bear. It is not mandatory to have a bear-related tattoo, but having one shows how committed you are to being a bear dancer. The tattoo also makes the dancers feel like they have the strength of the bear spirit within them.

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This dance has been in my tribe since the beginning of time. It has the power to heal, and can also be used to harm others if the bear is dancing for the wrong reasons. Since this dance is so powerful, it is very sacred to my people. To keep the medicine pure, there are rules in place to keep everyone safe and healthy, consistent with keeping respect for the dance and the dancers. People are not allowed to record the dance on any mobile devices and they are not allowed to interact with a bear, unless the bear comes to you, when you are allowed to stand there and embrace their presence.

When I become a bear dancer, I plan on keeping these rules and upholding them, to keep the tradition of my tribe.

This dance is nothing to mess around with because it has been known to kill people or make them sick. This dance is dangerous for the bears because they are absorbing the sicknesses from those who are watching it. As you would imagine, this is very hard on the bears’ bodies because of their action of taking in all the sickness from everyone. In almost every dance, there are bears who throw up in the middle of dancing because it is too much for their bodies to handle. The only way that the dancers are able to get rid of the sickness and spirits is by getting blessed the whole time by the burning of sage. The only people who are able to bless the bears are other bears.

Sage will only help the bears get through the dance, but to make sure that the sickness and spirits do not follow them home to their families or linger inside them, they have to be able to dance all of the sickness and spirits back into the Earth. They do this by focusing on the dance and willing it out of their body, giving it all back to the Earth and to the stones that surround the roaring fire.

The thought process is because sicknesses and spirits come from the Earth, the only way to get rid of them is to give them back to where they came from. This is the only safe way to get rid of the sickness, or else the sickness will go into someone else, or even worse, a child or an elder.

This dance is not just important for the healing abilities that it holds, but also to keep the Yuki tradition’s alive. There are only 50 Yuki people left in the whole world, and after we are gone, there will be no more left on this planet. We have already lost so much of our culture such as language, people, crafts, religion, and the way of life that we used to practice. The bears are one of the last traditions that my people have to give tribute to our past and to our ancestors. That is why it is essential for the younger generations to learn this dance, or at the very least, watch the dance to understand where they come from a little better so they can pass on these traditions to future generations.

If the people let the dance die out, then it is basically killing a very valuable part of the Yuki tradition, which makes the Yuki people unique. That is the reason I am passionate about preserving what little culture my people have left. I know that this seems to be an impossible task, but I feel like it is my duty to keep it going and to share my knowledge because I know that soon enough, there won’t be any Yuki people left. I don’t want this world to just go on without even blinking an eye about the fact that a whole race has been wiped off the earth. Although members of the tribe can share our knowledge with specific outsiders who have earned that privilege, the outsiders cannot perform the dance because they are not of the tribe.

After watching the bears dance and learning the information that I have shared with you, it has completely changed my life, and I know what it means to be native and to have pride for my people. When I was younger, I used to not want to be Native American and I would despise my 27

own people who were of Native American descent. I knew it was wrong at the time. But I also knew it would be hard for me to fit in, inside this white country that we live in, because I am half white and half Native American, so it seemed to me that I would never really fit in because both sides of the spectrum dislike each other.

Since I have gained knowledge about my people and the dances we do and just how special we are, I am so proud to be a Yuki Indian. That is why I try to dedicate my life to helping my people and other Native people. I also believe that I should share the knowledge of my people, so after I and my people leave this earth and go to our heaven, our history will be preserved by people who have heard of my people and the knowledge I have shared with them.

My name is Damon Niesen and I am a proud member of a small tribe in Mendocino County, Covelo, California. I belong to the Yuki tribe of 50 people, still keeping the culture alive and known.

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Common Stereotypes of Filipinos

By Jhumar Ray Domingo Wherever you go outside the Philippines, no matter which country you visit, there are likely to be Filipinos living there. Where there are Filipinos, there are also a lot of stereotypes associated with them. Sometimes stereotypes can be complimentary, but often they are derogatory. Whether they are good or bad, it is not helpful to resort to stereotypes because people, of any nationality, cannot be categorized into little boxes. You always have a mixture of good and bad people around the world, and they all have their good and bad habits. The same is true with Filipinos. As with all other nationalities and cultures, it is never good to stereotype people for what they eat, what jobs they have, how they speak, or how their names sound. It can be insulting and degrading.

One of the Filipino stereotypes that often offends me is that Filipinos eat dogs. This is certainly not true because Filipino staple food is rice and corn, or what any other normal human being on this planet eats. I myself don’t eat dogs or any kind of pets. Eating dogs is against the law in the Philippines. Although there may be a few Filipinos who get arrested because they partake of canine flesh and break the law, these type of people are usually poor, homeless, or destitute. This could be true of any people around the world known to be so desperate as to eat rats, squirrels, or other creatures. Regardless of this, Filipinos are the brunt of many dog jokes. The following is taken from Frank De Lima’s Joke Book (1991, 68-70), “The Filipino Culinary Tastes”: Did you hear about the new Filipino cookbook?

101 Ways to Wok your dog.

What do Filipinos call a dogcatcher’s truck?

Meals on Wheels.

What’s a Filipino’s favorite meal?

Mutt loaf.

What do you call a Filipino family without a dog?

Vegetarians.

What do you call a family with one dog?

A family that doesn’t know where the next meal is coming from.

What do you call a Filipino family with five dogs?

Ranchers.

While these type of jokes are cleverly written, they directly make fun of Filipinos. I had an experience with this kind of joke myself when I was staying in Denmark. A stranger asked me what Filipinos eat: “Isn’t it true that Filipinos eat dogs?” I smiled at him and responded that we Filipinos eat what normal people eat and told him that we don’t eat pets.

Another Filipino stereotype is that when Filipinos speak English, we have a thick accent. While this may be true for some Filipinos, there are many, many more Filipinos who do not know how 29

to speak English with an accent. This could be related to where they grew up, or if they emigrated later in life. And who is to say which accent is correct? There are Filipinos living in Australia who speak English with an Australian accent, or in New Zealand who speak with a Kiwi accent, or even in London who speak with a British accent. Although it is quite funny sometimes, discriminating against people because they don’t speak like everyone else is almost a hate crime.

One of the Filipino linguistic problems is differentiating between the letters “P” and “F.” According to the Ask A Filipino! blog, the reason why Filipinos have a hard time with P and F, is that in the “Pilipino Alpabeto,” the letter F does not exist. This makes it difficult for Filipinos to pronounce words that start with “F”. Letter “F” was only added to the new Filipino alphabet when American missionaries came to the Philippines, yet still Filipinos have problems with these letters.

There is one joke about Filipinos mispronouncing P and F from (Buzzfeed): “Paul, be care-paul!

You’ll might paul in the swimming paul.” I can relate to that. Sometimes I pronounce “French fries” as “French pries,” or “fried chicken” as “pride chicken.” It doesn’t bother me when people call me out. But what’s the big deal?

Many stereotypes exist regarding Filipino jobs. Filipinos work all over the world because life is difficult in the Philippines, and many take the opportunity to provide better lives for their families by leaving the country to find a better job. There is a worldwide shortage of caregivers and IT technicians. A lot of companies all over the world, especially health care providers, hire Filipino nurses, caregivers, and sometimes nannies. Filipinos are known for being hospitable people, and are especially known for caring younger children and taking care of the elderly. However, just because Filipinos have found employment opportunities in these fields, it does not mean that they are not qualified to have different types of jobs. There are also many Filipino carpenters, lawyers, doctors, and engineers, living both in the Philippines and abroad.

Often Filipinos are being discriminated against because of the type of job they have, such as being a housemaid. A lot of Filipinos work as housemaids abroad, and because of this many people from different nationalities look down on them and think that most housemaids come from the Philippines. Many people think Filipinos are living so poorly and that this is why they are cleaning other people’s houses, so that they can get even the smallest amount of money to provide for their families. The book Racial Harmony, published in Hong Kong, describes the racial diversity of Hong Kong and its high percentage of Filipino domestic helpers. The book includes quote, “I am Filipino. I am a domestic helper in Hong Kong.” A photo of this quote was posted online and it provoked outrage within the international Filipino community. There are many more Filipino stereotypes when it comes to having a nursing job abroad, such as “Let me guess you’re a nurse, correct?” (Buzzfeed) Another stereotype concerns why Filipinos often have Spanish family names. People ask, “Isn’t the Philippines part of Asia?” I was asked one time the very same question, and I simply responded that the Philippines was under Spanish rule for 333 years. That’s why Filipinos have Spanish family names. Certainly the Philippines is part of Asia, Southeast Asia to be exact. The Philippines is recognized as “the Latin country of Asia,” which explains why we have Spanish family names and mixed racial features.

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Here are some typical questions that Filipinos get asked from people who don’t have an idea about the Philippines (Buzzfeed): 1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

You’re Asian? No way!

If you’re Asian, why are you brown?

If you’re Filipino, why are you white?

You look Mexican, is your dad Antonio?

Your beauty queens are half-Filipinos? They should be disqualified!

I find that these types of questions center more on a general lack of knowledge of geography and world history. Friends of mine who ask these questions demonstrate their ignorance on these subjects. But then again, isn’t that the problem with stereotypes in general? I find that people who don’t understand Filipino culture typically have not traveled or studied up on people, cultures, or different places around the world.

What we eat, how we talk, what jobs we have, and the names we possess, these are the common stereotypes that Filipinos are associated with. Whether they are good or bad, it is not good to stereotype a person or nationality. We Filipinos do not eat dogs; our staple foods are rice and corn just like many other human beings in this world. Also, just because Filipinos are caring and hospitable, we’re not always nurses or even housemaids who like to clean up someone else’s dirt.

Most of all, stereotypes are not good for Filipinos; they are also not good for any country or nationality.

REFERENCES Ask A Filipino!: Why do Filipinos use "F" and why do they confuse their "fees" and "epps"? (n.d.). Retrieved April 02, 2016, from http://askthepinoy.blogspot.com/2011/02/why-dofilipinos-use-f-and-why-do-they.html Community Post: 15 Funny Filipino Stereotypes. (n.d.). Retrieved April 02, 2016, from http://www.buzzfeed.com/nujbax/15-funny-filipino-stereotypes-sxgg#.esGN285oo De Lima, F., & Hopkins, J. (1991). Frank De Lima's joke book. Honolulu: Bess Press.

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Postmodernism and the Revolution of Epistemology and the Arts

By Hajar Tazi What always surprised me about ethnography is that the word itself and its meaning are totally unknown by a large number of people—even some of my most educated and cultured acquaintances. Contrary to what one might think, this discipline is easy to understand, as it only aims to determine and analyze the beliefs, customs, ideas and traditions of societies with all their particularities, according to ethnographer Vannini (Vannini 4). Although this discipline is at the heart of understanding human beings, and even though ethnography plays an essential social role by increasing cultural understanding, shaping tolerant and open-minded societies and preserving peace, its centrality is often unrecognized and disregarded.

Nowadays, it seems like the study of ethnography can be summed up as an aggregation of complex theories expressed in a jargon only intelligible to—and that can only benefit—scholars or academics. Furthermore, any effort to make ethnographic knowledge accessible to all seems to be perceived as a trivial attempt to vulgarize a field of study that is too arduous and complex to be understood by the general public. Indubitably, if one goes beyond this preconceived idea of the nature of ethnography, one will probably find out that there is nothing to be repulsed by.

Nonetheless, one should not despair: what appears as an unfortunate, tragic and inexorable fate for the field of ethnography can actually be averted. Indeed, there exist several ways to democratize cultural knowledge and turn it into a more accessible, appealing, and beneficial discipline. The postmodernist documentary, whose lack of popularity does not reflect its worth, is one of the means by which to successfully open the ethnographic discipline to the general public, and by the same token, to address political issues related to the modern era. The particularities of this medium enable the production of works that not only have epistemological worth, but that also correspond to works of art with high aesthetic value—as the movie Human, directed by French filmmaker Yann Arthus-Bertrand, shows.

Trying to define postmodernism is a complex task because postmodernists reject rigid boundaries and predefined truths, considering all knowledge as socially constructed, and therefore, relative and subjective (Cornell). The definition that seems the more accurate and clear to me is Dr. Sweetman’s, which characterizes postmodernism as “a movement whose central theme is the critique of objective rationality and identity, and a working out of the implications of this critique for central questions in philosophy, literature and culture” (Sweetman 5).

Some argue that postmodernism is a mere nihilist philosophy full of “inconsistencies and absurdities,” a movement that created a “pessimistic mood of skepticism and uncertainty” (Cornell). One of the most powerful arguments against postmodernism is that it is a theory basing its principles on premises and arguments while negating all theories and asserting that all arguments are relative, subjective and invalid (Cornell). This objection is relevant, bringing to light the weakness of postmodernism as an abstract theory. However, in practice, it is not consistent enough to counter the many strengths of the postmodern movement.

Indeed, postmodernism is everything but a destructive theory made to plunge the world in a whirlwind of uncertainty. The German philosopher Nietzsche was one who understood the 32

principles of postmodernism even before its creation. He rejected the idea that humans could ever reach an objective knowledge about reality. He assumed the impossibility of ever being able to know anything with certainty, and instead of lamenting, saw this as an occasion to leave free reins to artistic creativity (Nietzsche, qtd. in Kaufmann 2). The skepticism inherent to this movement is nothing to be despondent about, because if mankind does not have access to absolute truth, it means that truth has to be created. Therefore, postmodernism might be seen as a call for humility and creativity, as a way to free the human mind from rigid and useless constraints, and as a celebration of variety.

Now that the core principles of postmodern philosophy appear more clear and well-founded, several objections could reasonably be made about the thesis. Some might doubt the reliability of the medium of cinema and its subgenre of documentary, and question its ability to accurately and objectively generate ethnographic knowledge. Effectively, the medium of cinema allows ethnographic knowledge to be displayed visually only through description and illustration, which results in a lack of the “synthetic, analytic and explanatory” quality inherent to written ethnography (Ruby 104). Nonetheless, for ethnography, showing instead of arguing can be more valuable for the audience: Rather than rendering an ethnographic context verbally, the strength of ethnographic documentaries is that they offer the viewer an audio-visual exploration of a person’s life (…) In order to represent an ethnicity or identity, the filmmaker has to return to a kind of “visual theory” using images that embody these concepts. (Cubero 33) In the movie Human, this point is perfectly illustrated. The close portraits center on people’s faces during the interviews, and the footages of cultural practices or activities provide precious and captivating visual information that would have been hard to convey through written ethnography.

Some might argue that even if cinema represents a strong medium for displaying cultural knowledge, the documentary is still not reliable because it pretends to provide a faithful account of reality, while it is really a mere subjective representation of the filmmaker’s point of view.

Thus, the medium will be distorted, misleading, and unable to provide an objective portrayal of reality. The answer to this objection is that the influence of postmodernism makes it possible to free the documentary from its inconsistencies and solve the problem of subjectivity by introducing a new style of documentary, referred to as the “participatory” genre.

Vannini exposes the several benefits of this documentary style, which is mainly composed of interviews, by emphasizing the passive role of the filmmaker and his spectator and observer position (Vannini 401). Therefore, because the role of the filmmaker and his team is minimal, the documentary is less likely to be a mere subjective, one-sided interpretation of events. This type of documentary, contrary to other genres that will be discussed later, does not pretend to reach objectiveness or truth, but is rather openly biased, and entirely assumes the subjectiveness of its interviews. In the participatory documentary, “the act of filming allows [the] encounters [with the interviewees] to come to life before the spectator’s eyes and ears in all their partiality, contingency and complexity” (Vannini 402). The filmmaker of Human totally recognizes that his movie is “not objective” (“The Documentary that Found Humanity”) but rather “political” (Rothe).

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Moreover, one traditional criticism of visual ethnography is that documentaries dealing with cultural diversity have to be produced by scholars and specialists who have a training in ethnography, rather than by unskilled filmmakers who are subject to the commercial market (Ruby 1). I partially agree insofar as the study of cultures—regardless of the medium—implies a minimum knowledge about anthropological and ethnographic theories. However, postmodern documentaries that follow the participatory style are able to avoid the issue of proficiency and expertness, as they minimize the role of the filmmaker and favor an approach of the discipline from several angles—which explains the interviewees’ different ages, genres, cultures and values, as the movie Human shows. This translates a desire to paint a reality from different standpoints, which makes it less incomplete and subjective, and therefore more reliable.

This is a central idea to the postmodernist movement, which states that because there is no predefined truth, the best way to reach a less distorted idea of reality is by approaching it from different sides. Furthermore, postmodern philosophers would argue that Ruby’s objection is not relevant because science is not as objective and disinterested as it presents itself, but is rather, as is any kind of knowledge, socially constructed. For postmodernists, all scientific disciplines are altered by the identity and subjectivity of the ethnographer or scientist. Therefore, as there is no privileged standpoint, the status of the scientist is desacralized.

It is essential to highlight the benefits related to the democratization of ethnography and its opening to non-scholars. First, ethnography enables people to introduce essential theories and concepts— such as cultural relativism or structuralism—to a larger audience that is more likely to watch an entertaining documentary than open an encyclopedia or read a scholarly article. Thus, it increases the audience’s acceptance and tolerance of different cultures. By the same token, the participatory style can also benefit ethnographers and anthropologists for their research, as the documentary will not be as biased or distorted by the filmmaker’s point of view as in other documentary genres (Vannini 402).

Finally, some might fairly argue that the approach favored by postmodernism can make an argument less straightforward and clear. For instance, in the documentary Human, a child engaged in the Syrian war who belongs to the rebel side states, “I am not afraid of death. I am not afraid if it’s for Syria. I am not afraid of death if it’s for my [dead] father” (Human). This sequence hides a real appeal for emotion. For a couple of seconds, the audience is entirely immersed in the internal landscape of the Syrian child, and is able to wonder: “What if it was me? Would I react differently if my father was killed and my country ruined? Wouldn’t I take up arms as well?”

A couple minutes later, a Palestinian father tells us about the day his daughter was killed by Israeli bullets. He states that killing Israelis will not give him back his daughter, but will only cause more sorrow. He says, “I decided to break this circle of violence and blood and revenge” (Human).

Right after this interview, an Israeli father who lost his daughter in a Palestinian suicide bombing attack says, “Today on my side are all those who want peace and are willing to pay the price of peace” (Human).

These two perceptions of the purpose of war are completely opposing, but are both extremely pertinent. In my opinion, to a certain extent, showing us different opinions can effectively be misleading and less straightforward than stating clearly a thesis and showing images and 34

interviews that will support it. However, I believe that the freedom of interpretation provided by the participatory style is priceless.

Watching Human, or any postmodern documentary, will mean engaging oneself in an active and deep reflection. Choosing peace or forgiveness is the spectator’s dilemma; the role of the filmmaker is not to teach the audience what is bad or good, but to provide the audience with the material to choose wisely, while being perfectly aware of the other side’s opinion and motives.

Human can be contrasted with a movie like Fahrenheit 9/11, produced by Michael Moore. That movie explores the consequences of Bush’s presidency and the war in Iraq. Even if the subject is the same as a part of Human, Moore’s documentary appears as a mere “one sided-interpretation of events,” a “political propaganda” (Toplin), while Human provides several possible interpretations and readings of the same event.

Fahrenheit 9/11’s documentary style is different from Human’s, as it corresponds to an expository style in which “collations of the social and cultural world are accompanied by a clear and authoritative voiceover —sometimes known as ‘the voice of God’— which, from a distance, makes sense of the images for the viewer” (Vannini 398). This “patronizing attitude” (Vannini 398) reveals that the intended audience of expository documentaries like Fahrenheit 9/11 is different from that of participatory documentaries such as Human. Moore seems to consider that his audience has to be passively led like a herd of sheep, while Arthus-Bertrand seems to consider his audience as capable of active critical judgment and discernment. Therefore, the difference between Moore’s documentary and Arthus-Bertrand’s is that Fahrenheit 9/11 pretends to reach and teach an ultimate truth, while Human follows the postmodernist philosophy and seems to emphasize the relativity and subjectivity of every standpoint, value and opinion.

Furthermore, the participatory documentary presents another essential advantage, which is that of avoiding criticism and controversy. This is contrary to the expository documentary, where the filmmaker has to take responsibility for everything that is said because the audience is aware that the “voice of God” is actually the filmmaker’s. Even if Fahrenheit 9/11 presented a humanist and anti-war argument, it was at the center of debates for a long period, and was forcefully rejected by a wide audience, since it was judged as being too condescending and controversial. On the other hand, although Human obviously makes an argument, the choice to use a different approach of offering a space for interviewees to express themselves seems wiser. This softer approach makes Human more successful in terms of audience reception, and makes this documentary unique in its genre.

Indeed, most of the people who watched Human will tell you that this movie is not a common one.

This is certainly the reason why it was the first movie to ever premiere in the General Assembly Hall of the United Nations in September 2015 (Anderson). Human—as its name suggests—is a humanist documentary that celebrates cultural differences and promotes unity.

Indeed, Human advocates for a multiculturalist view of the world, as it seems to emphasize on the richness and beauty of human diversity despite its numerous divergences. Multiculturalism is usually defined as the possibility for people from different ethnicities who do not share the same values, beliefs, and opinions to peacefully coexist in a given territory or global scale, and to actively cooperate in the development of society (“Multiculturalism”). This concept emphasizes 35

the importance of preserving the “cultural mosaïc” of the world, and considers cultural diversity as a “model” and an occasion to celebrate all the different features that compose our species rather than as a problem that has to be fixed (“Multiculturalism”).

Indubitably, postmodernism had a great influence on cultural anthropology. Several concepts, such as structuralism or cultural relativism, are shaped by the skepticism inherent to postmodernism, emphasizing the idea that no culture is superior to another—that all of them are equally essential and beautiful. In the article appearing in the Unesco Declaration on Race, the French structuralist Claude Lévi-Strauss stated that “the essential task taken on by anthropology is to overcome the apparent antinomy between the oneness of the human condition and the inexhaustible plurality of the forms in which we apprehend it” (Lévi-Strauss). He states that cultural diversity is as important to protect and take care of as biodiversity; a culture that disappears is as dramatic as a species that vanishes (Lévi-Strauss 1).

In Human, we notice that multiculturalism is a value to be promoted and praised. During several hours—the long version of the movie—interviewees of all colors and religions are gathered to share their experiences and opinions. No ethnicity is left aside, and all the nuances that form the portrait of humanity are present.

Besides the social importance of multiculturalism, this ideology also argues that there is an epistemological necessity for adopting a multiculturalist approach. Effectively, multiculturalism rejects the idea according to which the only valid and reliable standpoint is the white male’s. In Human, there is an extraordinary range of cultures, and we feel the importance granted to women’s points of view. The filmmaker chose not to specify the places where the interviewees came from or anything else related to the interviewees’ identities. He even decided to put a black background behind every person interviewed to hide their respective environment, because “[he] wanted to concentrate on what [all humans] share” (“The Documentary that Found Humanity”).

Thus, Human raises essential social, environmental, political and existential issues of our time, all while illustrating the postmodernist epistemological necessity of having multigenerational, multigenre, and primarily multicultural standpoints. The result is extremely interesting: we hear and see people who look like us, who have similar lives and ideas, but also people whose opinions and ideas are rarely or never heard.

For instance, I was surprised to hear a man saying that he loved three women at the same time, and that he loved the three of them with all his heart (Human). Usually, some people—including me— would judge this man, saying that he is a womanizer who lacks sincerity and loyalty. However, this interview is powerful because it forces the audience to immerse in the man’s feelings, and to discover that one’s values and ethics might be biased by one’s culture or other contingent factors.

This prompts one to wonder if love is really only sincere if it’s dedicated to one single person, or if this power is untamable and can have multiple sources.

I found another interview very heart-touching when a poor woman talks directly to the audience: “What would I like to ask? What the hell am I doing here? Why can’t I be where you are to see what the hell is going on? Let’s switch for a minute. Let’s switch. You come here and be me and I’ll go there and be you” (Human).

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These interviews give voices to people who are not usually heard, and that nobody really wants to hear. For this reason, in my opinion, Human reveals something about the enigma of humankind.

Poverty is no longer a mere statistic, an abstract word, but it instead becomes a reality. The audience is forced to experience other people’s reality, and to discover that the foundations of what one takes to be truth are extremely fragile.

The part of the documentary about women seems to illustrate important ethnographic concepts derived from the postmodern movement. Indeed, while some—especially Muslim or African women—seem willing to accept everything and anything that men and patriarchal society impose on them (polygamy, violence, lack of freedom), Western women seem more independent and claim that they would not like to be men because men have easy lives and “easy lives are boring” (Human). This introduces the concepts of cultural relativism and structuralism, which means that traditions and beliefs, as well as values and knowledge, differ from one society to another, and we have to study an environment to understand its inhabitants (Lévi-Strauss).

However, the differences are not only cultural, and Human’s argument would be too simple if it only affirmed that. That is why it also presents us Muslim and African women who come from traditional societies, but who have refused to submit to males’ or patriarchal society’s rules. For instance, a Syrian woman wearing the veil tells us with laughter how she left her cousin whom she was forced to marry and escaped to another country. Therefore, values, opinions and beliefs are not only relative culturally, but also at the personal, individual scale, which shows that not only is humanity culturally diverse, but also that every single individual is unique.

Besides postmodernism’s influence as a philosophy, this movement has also revolutionized the artistic realm. Indeed, postmodern artists refuse to restrict themselves to a single theory or artistic movement. The keywords are diversity, variety, mixture, and pluralism, as well as harmony, paradox and beauty. Postmodernism frees artists from tons of rules and codes that restricted their imagination and creativity. This is the reason why Human is full of artistic diversity.

First, the filmmaker refused to confine his movie to a single documentary style. He chose to combine the participatory style with the poetic one, defined by Vannini as a style of documentary which “pays a great deal of attention to form, focusing on aesthetic considerations at every step of the way” (Vannini 397). For instance, aerial sequences of the Earth from the sky were filmed to “free the mind to wander and reflect,” and to provide a “breathing space in the film that provides relief from stories that remind us of personal sorrow” (The Making of Human). Terrestrial sequences that represent military marches and cultural practices are also incorporated. All of these shots represent real “random cinematic ‘slices of life’ that attract the viewer for their enchanting visual (and at times aural) beauty as much as anything else” (Vannini, 397).

Playing with paradoxes and making them look harmonious is also a postmodern artistic principle.

Sometimes during the interviews, while someone is speaking, a portrait of another person would appear (Human). In my opinion, this artistic choice of overlapping someone’s words with someone else’s face is really pertinent. It releases an emotional power and shows that despite the diversity that makes up our species, there is a universal quality and unity to all values and opinions.

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Finally, music is a central feature of the film. It “highlights the diversity and richness of all that Human recounts” (Amar). The Franco-Moroccan composer, Armand Amar, gathered musicians from all around the world to “create an overwhelmingly moving musical landscape that taps deep into the heart of humanity itself” (Amar). Besides the cultural diversity of the musicians and the variety of genres of music, there is also an interesting array of emotions conveyed in Amar’s music, corresponding to the postmodern artistic method of combining different feelings and impressions.

This offers high aesthetic value and allows the audience to plunge into the depth of the human soul.

Therefore, we can say that postmodernism is much more than a mere philosophical and artistic movement that will eventually vanish with the passing of time. It is a vision, an ideal for humanity, a yearning for a truth that is no longer reachable by one’s self, but that necessitates the presence of others. This ideology’s substantial influence on all disciplines allows the common concept of knowledge to be deconstructed and rebuilt anew in a more democratic and inclusive way.

Indubitably, postmodernism will leave an abiding mark on the path of human artistic expression and human relations.

WORKS CITED Amar, Armand. "The Music of HUMAN." Human Soundtrack. Web. Anderson, Ariston. “Yann Arthus-Bertrand's ‘Human’ to Get United Nations Screening.”

Hollywood Reporter. 03 Sept. 2015. Web. Cornell, Steve. “What Does Postmodern Mean?” Summit. 24 Oct. 2008. Web. Cubero, Carlo A. “Picturing Transnationalism: Towards a Cinematic Logic of Transnationalism.” The Journal of the Finnish Anthropological Society 35.4 (2010): 2634. Web. Fahrenheit 9/11. Dir. Michael Moore. 2004. Film.

Human. Dir. Yan Arthus-Bertrand. 2015. Film.

Kaufmann, Walter. The Portable Nietzsche: On Truth and Lie in an Extra-Moral Sense. Penguin Books: 1976. Print.

Lévi-Strauss, Claude, et al. The Elementary Structures of Kinship (Les structures élémentaires de la parenté). 1969. Web. Lévi-Strauss, Claude. "View from Afar." Unesco Declaration on Race. Web. 1950.

"Multiculturalism." International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences. Ed. William A. Darity, Jr. 2nd ed. Vol. 5. Detroit: Macmillan Reference USA, 2008. 316-318. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web.

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Rothe, Nina. "Yann Arthus-Bertrand's Human: ‘Love Is the Answer.’" Huffington Post. Dec.Jan. 2015. Web. Ruby, Jay. "Is an Ethnographic Film a Filmic Ethnography?" Studies in the Anthropology of Visual Communication 2 (1975). Astro Temple. Web. Ruby, Jay. The Death of Ethnographic Film. Philadelphia: American Anthropological Association, 1998. Swansea University. Web. Sweetman, Brendan. “Postmodernism, Derrida and Différance: A Critique.” International Philosophical Quarterly XXXIX (March 1999): 5-18. Academia. Web. “The Documentary That Found Humanity by Interviewing 2,000 People.” Wired. 16 Sept. 2015.

Web. The HUMAN Adventure (Making of). Dir. Yann Arthus BertRand. Vimeo. Goodplanet, Jan. 2016. Web. Vannini, Phillip. "Ethnographic Film and Video On Hybrid Television: Learning from the Content, Style, and Distribution of Popular Ethnographic Documentaries." Journal of Contemporary Ethnography 44.4 (2015): 391-416. Web.

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Discrimination against the LGBTQ Community

By Austin Zmolek Key terms: cisgender (gender identification that matches with gender at birth), transgender (gender identification that does not match with gender at birth, or gender identification that does not confine to male or female), gender binary (categorizing gender as opposite male or female sexes with no in between), androgyny (possessing physical characteristics of both binary sexes).

Introduction: We have made great headway in acknowledging and accepting the wide variety of people that compose our society. The LGBTQ community makes up a minority part of our society that has been progressive in both social and political concerns. LGBTQ is an acronym that stands for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer. It is a community composed of sexual minorities and individuals who identify with different genders.

Although the understanding and acceptance of LGBTQ lifestyles has immensely improved, there is still a great deal of discrimination that the individuals of this community suffer from in many aspects of their lives. Discriminatory factors that still remain include discrimination in educational systems, youth homelessness, and public accommodations.

Background: Homosexuality is nothing new; evidence leads most historians to agree that homosexual romantic behavior has existed in every documented culture (Morris, 2015). Before the 20th century, homosexuality, gender nonconformity, and androgyny were thoroughly documented among the tribes inhabited the very land that our society has developed on. The indigenous people of the Native American tribes spanning across the continent viewed homosexuality and androgynous individuals as blessings in their communities because they saw them as spirits with the opportunity to benefit from abilities of both genders (Williams, 2010). They referred to gay individuals, or what we now label the LGBTQ community, as “two-spirited” individuals.

Native American tribes also issued same-sex marriages across the land. Walter L. Williams, Professor of Anthropology, History and Gender Studies at the University of Southern California, suggests that “the imposition of Euro-American marriage laws” caused gay marriage and homosexuality as a whole to lack legal recognition (Williams, 2010).

In earlier centuries, Europeans incorporated their homophobic ideologies into the foundation of their new land which gave rise to our present-day American society. Integrating Catholicism and Christianity into the development of our country has caused controversial issues regarding the presence of homosexuality and androgyny. Homosexual, androgynous, and transgender individuals, who were once recognized as religious leaders and teachers by indigenous tribes, were classified as “sodomites” by the U.S. government (Williams, 2010). Sodomy laws, which outlawed any engagement of oral or anal sex between two individuals of the same gender, were established under the U.S. legal system in order to enforce the morals of European settlers.

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According to the American Psychological Association (APA), “Throughout the 1950’s and 60’s, gay men and lesbians continue to be at risk for psychiatric lockup and jail, and for losing jobs or child custody when courts and clinics defined gay love as sick, criminal or immoral” (Morris, 2015). The APA publishes a diagnostic manual annually in order to outline the classifications of mental disorders in a common language. Up until 1973, the APA classified homosexuality as a mental disorder in their published literature (Morris, 2015).

Removing homosexuality from the list of APA-published mental disorders was one of the major steps in acknowledging LGBTQ community members as sane individuals among our society. In 1993, President Bill Clinton signed the “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” (DADT) policy in order to lift the ban of all homosexuals from the United States Armed Forces. Although this policy allowed gay individuals to enlist in the military, it prohibited homosexual soldiers from being open about their sexuality during their enlistment. DADT was a contradictory policy because it gave the gay community the right to serve, but was a loophole to continue to permit discrimination by banning the acknowledgment of homosexual individuals (Don't Ask, 2016). The government was essentially encouraging all citizens to serve in the military, as long as they kept their sexuality a secret.

The LGBTQ population became liberated from all sodomic restrictions in 2003 through the court case of Lawrence v. Texas, when the Supreme Court declared it unconstitutional to criminalize sexual conduct engaged in privacy (Lawrence v. Texas). In 2009, President Barack Obama was inaugurated and became the first sitting president of the United States to announce support for marriage equality. In 2010, soon after being elected into office, President Barack Obama repealed the DADT policy initially signed by Clinton, which ended the legal condoning of discrimination in the U.S. military (Don't Ask, 2016).

Furthermore, in June of 2015, the Supreme Court ruled that the bans on same sex marriages were unconstitutional. All same-sex couples were legally allowed to marry in each of the 50 states.

According to the Huffington Post, President Obama, the first president of the United States to support marriage equality, called the ruling by the Supreme Court “a victory for America” (Terkel, 2015, pg. 1). This was a major landmark in the progress of LGBTQ equality. According to Pew Social Trends, about 92 percent of the LGBTQ community in the United States believes that society has become more accepting throughout the past decade (Taylor, 2013). The government has started to affirm the worthiness of their civil rights.

As we can see throughout the history and development of our present-day society, homophobia is more recent newer than homosexuality. However, many androgynous, gender-nonconforming, and homosexual individuals who make up the LGBTQ community still experience a number of discriminatory challenges in their everyday lives.

Discussion: Discrimination in Education Education is essential for individuals in our society. Development of social acquaintances, cultural aptitude, awareness of current events, and the capability to function in society are all ripened through educational institutions. Providing a quality education to society’s youth is essential for our country’s economy as well.

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The American Psychological Association reports that high school dropouts experience higher rates of poverty, unemployment, and incarceration (APA, 2012). In 2009, the average income for students who dropped out before earning their high school diplomas was $19,540, compared to the average high school graduate income of $27,380 (APA, 2012). Compared to males with a high school diploma, male dropouts ages 16 to 24 are over six times more prone to incarceration, and 63 times more prone to incarceration than males with bachelor’s degrees (APA, 2012). The national economy is negatively affected by high school dropout rates. The data reported by the APA suggests that keeping students in educational institutions would be in the best interests of both individuals themselves, and in our prosperity.

Establishing a secure environment for students in public learning institutions should be a main concern. Providing a safe environment would not only prevent dropout triggers, but also would provide support systems for students who are currently suffering in the schooling system. LGBTQ youth, as one of the most vulnerable subcultures, should be protected—as well as supported—by the institutions themselves. According to the Center for American Progress, more than half of LGBTQ students enrolled in middle and high schools across the nation feel unsafe in the school environment due to their sexual orientation or gender expression (Hussey, 2015). The dropout rate among the LGBTQ community, while it is difficult to acquire precisely accurate data, is approximated to be more than triple the national rate (Bart, 1998).

The National Transgender Discrimination Survey (NTDS) published information retrieved from transgender respondents across the country. The results of the survey show the correlation between certain experiences or triggers and suicide rates. 659 of the transgender survey respondents reported that they experienced bullying and victimization throughout their experience in high school, and 52 percent of them reported having attempted suicide (Haas, Rodgers & Herman, 2014). Both teachers and other students listed the source as bullying.

Bullying is a major cause of insecurity among LGBTQ youth in the educational system. Rejection and exclusion within the schools can be a trigger that causes students to drop out of school due to rejection. It is clear that there is a wide variety of individuals making up our student bodies, and this diversity must be tolerated and accommodated.

Discussion: Youth Homelessness Our society promotes mainstream cisgenderism and binary gender classification, which many individuals in the LGBTQ community have difficulty conforming to. Coming “out of the closet,” or revealing your non-heterosexuality and/or gender non-conformity, is a tough process for anyone who finds themselves in that situation. Unfortunately, there are many cases where an individual comes out to family or friends, and the support or closure that they were seeking does not come as hoped for. Rejection from family on the basis of sexual orientation or gender nonconformity is a major trigger for youth homelessness among the LGBTQ community.

The LGBT Homeless Youth Provider Survey helps us to better understand both qualitative and quantitative aspects of homelessness among LGBTQ youth who were surveyed by homelessness agencies across the country. Family rejection due to sexual orientation or gender identity was the number one cause (46%) of homelessness (Durso & Gates, 2012). Of the homeless agencies surveyed, 94% reported working with LGBTQ youth in their centers at some point in the past year; 43

nearly all reported a lack of government funding to address LGBTQ youth homelessness (Durso & Gates, 2012).

Youth homelessness is clearly a major problem affecting the LGBTQ community. Becoming homeless at a young age includes taking on a lot of responsibilities at a very young age on top of being introduced to a totally foreign environment during a very vulnerable stage. According to the Journal of Gay & Lesbian Social Services, over 11% of trans college students reported having experienced homelessness at some point during their life, and over 16% experienced the need to seek out temporary alternative sleeping arrangements (Begun & Kattari, 2016). Even more shocking are the results from the NTDS, which published results stating that 69% of the transgender respondents to their survey had experienced homelessness at some point in their life (Durso & Gates, 2012).

The youth of the LGBTQ community, especially the homeless, have needs that are unique compared to the standard population. Most homeless agencies are struggling with providing the proper assistance to homeless LGBTQ youth due to the lack of government funding. The homeless population of the LGBTQ youth is unique compared to other parts of the population. Dealing with homeless youth in the first place is critical because they are such young individuals, in vulnerable mental and emotional states. Properly catering to the predicaments of their specific situations is crucial because of how vital their decisions are in this stage of their lives.

LGBTQ homeless youth are even more unique due to the dilemmas they must deal with as a result of their less common sexualities and gender identities. In most cases of LGBTQ youth homelessness, not having a permanent home is a result of them coming out, which requires special education and instructions to deal with their rejection. Making the proper arrangements and offering them the proper help is very important to their well-being and future path.

Discussion: Segregation of Public Facilities While some individuals within the LGBTQ community are most comfortable with a male or female identification, not everyone sees gender as binary. Sexual orientation and gender identification both span a wide spectrum that people choose to pick their most comfortable spot within. Many people who are sexual and/or gender minorities believe it is necessary to vocalize or “come out” to their family members and peers due to misinterpretation, assumptions, or to affirm who they are and define themselves in a way that makes them most comfortable: While some young people of transgender experience may prefer a binary classification of their gender, the utilization of a binary classification becomes problematic when the classification is imposed and does not align with one's understanding of their gender, also referred to as their self-designated gender. (Shelton, 2015) In the process of integrating and including LGBTQ people properly into our society, institutions and public accommodations must include options for transgender individuals. The largest risk for harassment and victimization of trans individuals arises in “sex-segregated bathrooms, locker rooms, and housing where transgender people regularly are harassed and challenged about their gender identity” (Begun & Kattari, 2016).

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There are two major issues that transgender individuals encounter when using public restrooms.

One is the lack of appropriate bathrooms for their identification. In most public restrooms, we see the options of male restroom or female restroom. Often, trans people have a difficult time identifying within binary gender classification options. Lack of handicapped, family, or individual structures uphold the binary approach to meeting the needs of the genders of our population. Many institutions have a difficult time providing the appropriate spaces for the spectrum of students that encompasses their student body. Problematic situations that happen in these public spaces cause the environments to turn into unsafe places that the LGBTQ community refrains from entering. In a national survey, almost 24% of trans college students reported that they encountered difficulty with finding appropriate bathrooms and other facilities at their educational institutions (Begun & Kattari, 2016).

The other major problem that the trans community encounters from the prevalence of genderbinary public facilities is their ability to use them legally, or problems with other people using the facilities. Utilizing facilities can become controversial when someone’s gender choice does not match the appearance of the individual or the gender assigned at birth. CNN discussed the North Carolina State law that has brought controversy about public restroom utilization into the legal system, stating that the House Bill 2 of the Public Facilities Privacy & Security Act requires that all individuals utilizing the public bathrooms within the state are required to use the bathroom that corresponds to the sex that they were assigned at birth (Ellis, 2016).

Requiring conformance to biological sex or birth gender in public facilities violates the rights of the individual. Classifying oneself as a specific gender, whether or not someone displays expected physical characteristics of the gender or not, is a personal choice that should be respected under the law. The main argument against the freedom to use the restroom of one’s choice is the belief that transgender men and women will cause sexual harassment and safety problems in the environment (Ellis, 2016). Unfortunately, this argument lacks understanding of transgender individuals and neglects their own comfort in the utilization of public facilities or their concerns for personal safety. State legislatures like North Carolina’s, who fail to acknowledge transgender individuals and their freedom of self-expression and comfort, may foreshadow wider problems with gender-segregated bathrooms in public schools and agencies, because gender choice and identity should be decided on the basis of comfort and confidence in self-expression.

One positive example of transgender concerns in public restroom facilities is the recent corporate decision by Target Corporation. Fox News reported that Target is moving to provide genderneutral signage, labeling, and facilities for transgender customers (Derespina, 2015). Segregation in signage, from bedding sheets to children’s toys, is being converted to include gender neutrality or nonconformity. Molly Snyder, Target spokesperson, explained that, “Barbies are still going to be with Barbies and Legos will still be with Legos. We just didn’t feel like having a sign that said ‘boys bedding’ was necessary” (Derespina, 2015).

Very often, we see signs that hang on the front window of shops or restaurants that state, “We reserve the right to refuse service.” These signs give power to the owners of the business to refuse service to someone for no specific reason. They may create a stigma against a specific crowd or behavior to be abided by on the property of the facility, without overtly claiming to discriminate against certain individuals or behaviors.

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Next Steps: Education Educational institutions, as one of the most important environments for development in intelligence and functionality among society’s youth, should be in favor of all actions furthering the comfort of their students. Keeping children in schools is something that the government benefits from economically. Measures should be taken to integrate the wide variety of students that embody the student population.

Cisgenderism and gender-binary facilities, such as restrooms and locker rooms, can be a very uncomfortable environment for LGBTQ youth in the schooling system. Since it is proven that harassment and bullying are most prominent towards the LGBTQ youth in gender-specified areas, measures should be taken to alleviate the safety problems that this is causing for students. It would improve the problems with bullying in gender-specified areas if there were alternative changing rooms or restrooms in these institutions. In locker rooms, bullying could decrease if there was a teacher present during use.

Participation in the schooling system is another major problem that plagues LGBTQ youth across the nation. Students of minority sexual orientations and gender identities are often intimidated by the schooling systems. The faculty of the schools also needs support. In many schools, there are clubs like Gay-Straight Relations or LGBTQ clubs. These are good places to seek support from students and teachers.

Ironically, in my personal experience as a college student at Hawai`i Pacific University, finding an LGBTQ club has been difficult. The Gay-Straight Alliance club on the HPU campus has been underrepresented and underfunded in the past years, causing it to be lost among the student body.

Homelessness: The results published by national surveys make it clear that youth homelessness among the LGBTQ community is a major problem. Homelessness at a young age is a major responsibility for young people in an especially vulnerable state. Measures should be taken by the government both to prevent homelessness from occurring among LGBTQ youth, as well as to aid the individuals who are homeless due to their sexual orientation or gender identification.

The government should increase programs in the homeless agencies across the country that cater to LGBTQ youth. Dealing with these individuals in the proper manner is critical to their wellbeing and confidence. Getting the homeless LGBTQ youth back on their feet and onto a path of education (or something of equivalence) is important to their well-being, as well as to the economic prosperity of our nation.

By studying the history of the LGBTQ community, we recognize that homophobia is much newer than homosexuality or androgyny. “Fear� of same-sex attractions or choice of gender to aid in personal comfort is something that can be relieved by education. There needs to be more education among the population regarding the LGBTQ community. Homosexuality is only a problem if you are a homophobe, and homophobia is only a problem if you are not educated.

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Segregation in Public Facilities: Self-expression is a basic civil right that should be granted to the entire population. Public restrooms, changing rooms, and so forth, are environments that have been reported as areas with increased victimization of the LGBTQ community. Utilization of a restroom should be granted as a choice to the transgender community, not confined to an individual’s birth gender. The perspectives of the trans community continuously fail to be recognized. Arguments against their freedom to use facilities project fears that trans individuals will be tempted to commit sexual or violent acts towards other individuals in the restroom. However, people never look at the situation from the point of view of the oppressed individual. Imagine how a transgender female, someone with a similar appearance as Caitlyn Jenner, would be treated in a men’s public restroom. In reality, who would the victim most likely be in that situation? The transgender community lacks acceptance among the broader community, and laws need to be passed to grant them the freedom to express themselves in terms of gender or sexual orientation.

Campaigns like “It Gets Better” work to contradict the tendencies of society to return to what they are comfortable with. All our society has believed for the past several hundred years is that homosexual and gender non-conforming individuals are not living under the same morals that most people were raised with. “It Gets Better” promotes information from those in the media, sports, or other respected roles, to display the success of certain LGBTQ individuals and to compensate for the misrepresentation and underrepresentation of LGBTQ members in the media (What is the It Gets Better Project?, 2016). “It Gets Better” sends a message to the LGBTQ population that being a non-heterosexual or non-cisgendered individual gets easier as you go through life.

This message implies that the discriminatory challenges alleviate with time and that resolution becomes easier as life continues. Although it is important to include optimistic views about LGBTQ people, the linear progression that this campaign introduces to the LGBTQ community fails to recognize the suicide rates and the family rejections, suggesting that queer lives eventually end happily. However, that is often not the case.

Conclusion: The LGBTQ community continuously faces discrimination in everyday life that deserves to be addressed by governmental and educational institutions. LGBTQ youth are struggling with rejection and, in many cases, are resorting to attempted suicide or homelessness. Plenty of progress has been made in recent years in terms of acceptance and understanding of LGBTQ people.

Though we have improved immensely in terms of inclusion and equality, individuals in this community still suffer from a great deal of discrimination that needs to be further addressed.

REFERENCES American Psychological Association (2012). Facing the school dropout dilemma. Washington, DC. Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/pi/families/resources/school-dropoutprevention.aspx Bart, M. (1998, September). Creating a safer school for gay students. Counseling Today, 26, 36, 39.

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Begun, S., & Kattari, S. K. (2016). Conforming for survival: Associations between transgender visual conformity/passing and homelessness experiences. Journal of Gay & Lesbian Social Services, 28(1), 54-66. doi:10.1080/10538720.2016.1125821 Derespina, C. (2015). Target going gender neutral in some sections. Fox News. Retrieved from http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/08/13/target-going-gender-neutral-in-somesections.html Don't Ask, Don't Tell (DADT) (2016). In EncyclopĂŚdia Britannica. Retrieved from http://www.britannica.com/event/Dont-Ask-Dont-Tell Durso, L. & Gates, G. (2012). Serving our youth: findings from a national survey of service providers working with lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender youth who are homeless or at risk of becoming homeless. The Williams Institute with True Colors Fund and The Palette Fund.

Ellis, R. (2016). Justice Department challenges North Carolina transgender law. Retrieved from http://www.cnn.com/2016/05/04/us/north-carolina-transgender-law-challenge/ Haas, A., Rodgers, P., & Herman, J. (2014). Suicide attempts among transgender and gender non-conforming adults: findings of the national transgender discrimination survey.

Williams Institute, UCLA School of Law with the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. Retrieved from http://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/wpcontent/uploads/AFSP-Williams-Suicide-Report-Final.pdf Hussey, H. (2015). We the people: LGBT Americans and education. Retrieved from https://cdn.americanprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/NonDisc-Education4.10.pdf Lawrence v. Texas. (2016). Retrieved from http://civilrights.org/lgbt/lawrence.html Morris, B. J. (2015). History of lesbian, gay, & bisexual social movements. American Psychological Association LGBT Resources and Publication. Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/pi/lgbt/resources/history.aspx Shelton, J. (2015). Transgender youth homelessness: Understanding programmatic barriers through the lens of cisgenderism. Children & Youth Services Review, 5910-18. doi:10.1016/j.childyouth.2015.10.006 Taylor, P. (2013). A survey of LGBT Americans: attitudes, experiences and values in changing times. Retrieved from http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2013/06/13/a-survey-of-lgbtamericans/ Terkel, A. (2015). Supreme Court legalizes gay marriage nationwide. The Huffington Post.

Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/06/26/supreme-court-gaymarriage_n_7470036.html

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What is the It Gets Better Project? (2016). Retrieved from http://www.itgetsbetter.org/pages/about-it-gets-better-project/ Williams, W. L. (2010). The ‘two-spirit’ people of indigenous North Americans. The Guardian.

Retrieved from http://www.theguardian.com/music/2010/oct/11/two-spirit-people-northamerica

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Plastic Surgery in South Korea

By Kula Kukonu Her twin stares back at her with gleaming eyes. “Mom and Dad are going to give me the best graduation present tomorrow,” she thinks to herself. Bringing her thumbs and index fingers to her eyes, she slightly frames the skin around her vision to bring out her eyes. The excitement generates small levels of dopamine rippling within her brain and increases her heartbeat to the point where it could burst, but she wouldn’t feel the pain due to the sublime joy. “I’ll be successful and beautiful; I’ll have a high-paying job, marry a financially stable man, and have children.” “I can’t believe I’m getting the best gift possible,” she whispers back to the mirror, turning up a smile.

“I’m getting plastic surgery.”

Plastic surgery, in the perspective of the public has received both positive and derogatory feedback.

In American culture, negative attitudes outweigh the numbers of supporters, and as a result, receiving aesthetic procedures suggests to outsider representations a damaging representation of an individual: insecurity, counterfeit personality, unnatural, loss of identity, and lack of selfrespect and self-confidence. Although a boost in self-esteem and self-confidence could occur, this will not inhibit the negative judgments others will make against this individual.

In South Korea, however, the public’s attitudes are reflected on the opposite spectrum—aesthetic procedures are highly encouraged for various reasons. In fact, according to an online article on a plastic surgeon’s website, “South Korea has the highest rate of plastic surgery procedures per capita in the world” (“Korean Plastic Surgery,” par. 1). As mentioned above, in American culture there is a sense of lost identity after receiving cosmetic surgery. The purpose of this essay is to argue that plastic surgery is weakening South Korean ethnic identity to the extent that Westernization motivates South Koreans to pursue plastic surgery as a portal towards acceptance.

Before examining the motivations to receive South Korean cosmetic procedures and the subconscious messages presented, let’s explore the definition of ethnic identity. According to an encyclopedia article by Joseph E. Trimble, PhD and Ryan Dickson, PhD, the definition varies because of different foundational theories. In its most common use, ethnic identity is an “affiliative construct, where an individual is viewed by themselves and by others as belonging to a particular ethnic or cultural group” (Trimble and Dickson, par. 2). This is the underlying definition of ethnic identity that will be addressed, with acknowledgment of South Korean ethnic identities.

Trimble and Dickson also identify that affiliation with a specific ethnic group is influenced by four different factors: racial, natal, cultural, and symbolic (Trimble and Dickson, par. 2). Racial factors are defined through the physical expressions and structures of an individual, while natal factors are a reference to the ancestral origins of an individual’s family. The symbolic factors of affiliation include characteristics that express a representation or illustration of an ethnic group (i.e. traditional clothing, holidays, etc.). The authors state that although symbolic influences typically result in an individual selecting which ethnic group is the best fit, to a certain extent, cultural factors have a minor influence over an individual’s behavior (Trimble and Dickson, par. 2).

With a stronger understanding of ethnic identity, it will be easier to explore the complex subject of how cosmetic surgery may be weakening South Korean identity. To acquire a basic 50

understanding of South Korean plastic surgery, one should be familiar with the most popular types of aesthetic procedures South Koreans pursue. Ruth Holliday, and Jo Elfving-Hwang define several of these most common surgeries: double eyelid surgeries (blepharoplasty) and nose jobs (rhinoplasty). Other popular procedures are listed on a popular website focusing on beauty and plastic surgery: chin surgery (mentoplasty), breast amplifications, liposuction, tummy tucks (abdominoplasty), face lifts (rhytidectomy), cheek surgery (malarplasty), and Botox injections (Zhu, par. 9-25).

The top cosmetic procedure among South Koreans and other Asian groups is blepharoplasty, also known as double eyelid surgery. Asian facial structures often include smaller eyes, due to a monolid, and the purpose of blepharoplasty is to create a wider and rounder eye shape (Zhu, par.

9). To complete this procedure, three different surgical methods can be utilized to achieve a natural-looking double eyelid: the “suture” method, the full incision method, and the double stranded twist method (Zhu, par. 11-13).

The suture method consists of creating small incisions on the eyelid to create a new crease, and then placing sutures (stitches) below the skin. Once this is completed, the skin is lifted and folded over to create a “natural” fold (Zhu, par.11). The full-incision method involves creating a crescentshaped incision where the new crease will be located, while also removing small slivers of muscle, orbital septum, and, occasionally, fat. The height and shape of the new crease is determined by the amount of tissue that is removed during the procedure. Finally, the sides are then sewn together permanently (Zhu, par. 12). The third method, the double standard twist, is a blended technique between suture and incisional methods in which small incisions are created to remove tissue, and the skin is lifted and placed through sutures (Zhu, par. 13).

The second most popular procedure, rhinoplasty or nose reshaping, is also pursued heavily because, according to plastic surgeon Dr. James Penoff, the Asian facial structure involves “flat or low nose bridges” and “poorly projected nose tips” (Zhu, par. 16). As a result, many Asians resort to this procedure as a means of what they consider to be improvement of these characteristics.

Rhinoplasty works to reduce the size and shape of the nose, while also creating a proportional balance of the facial landscape.

To further enhance the work of rhinoplasties, a mentoplasty typically accompanies the nose reshaping procedure. Mentoplasty is also known as chin surgery, and is performed because rhinoplasty has the potential to distort the overall proportions of the visage (Zhu, par. 19). This procedure can allow for chin augmentations or reductions with different procedures. For augmentations, a synthetic material capable of being molded to the desired form is implanted from an incision along the lower jawline, or between the lip and gum on the inside of the lower lip.

Chin reductions, on the other hand, involve shaping and shifting of the bones into the desired mold.

From there, the incision is closed with reported minimal scarring (Zhu, par. 19).

With a deeper understanding of the procedures South Koreans and other Asian ethnic groups desire, this knowledge can be applied to understand why South Koreans are increasingly determined to seek a more Westernized appearance. The primary motivations are to gain acceptance and avoid racism. When comparing Western cosmetic surgeries to ethnically based aesthetic procedures, there is a heavier emphasis on “breast augmentations, tummy tucks and anti51

ageing facial surgery as attempts to normalise women’s bodies to unrealistic feminine ideals” (Holliday and Elfving-Hwang 7). On the other hand, when exploring South Korean plastic surgeries, the procedures mentioned earlier are portals to achieve the Western approach as closely as possible.

For the feminine recipients, the strongest argument is that cosmetic surgery is a portal towards improving the body for personal desires, as opposed to ethnic or Western beauty standards.

Cosmetic procedures are viewed as methods to mold and create an improved figure that will further bring out confidence, accentuating and creating certain features to the best possible form. In “Medicalization of Racial Features,” cultural anthropologist Eugenia Kaw contradicts this argument. When discussing cosmetic procedures undertaken by Asian American women, Kaw noted: “Most agreed, however, that their decision to alter their features was primarily a result of their awareness that as women they are expected to look their best and that this meant, in a certain sense, less stereotypically Asian” (78). In translation, although these women understand that they are expected to present their best appearance, this also suggest that their “best” appearance involves diluting their Asian appearance.

An alternative is argument was presented by John W. Schouten, whose 1991 article presents three main themes promoting the positive aspects of cosmetic surgery: an increase in self-confidence and attractiveness, stronger impression management profile, and improved self-presentation and persuasion when individual role drastically shifted (415). Evaluating these points, it is appropriate to state that positive outcomes can result from cosmetic procedures, and Kaw would agree on these terms.

However, Schouten’s article does not analyze connections between these benefits and damaging an ethnic identity. In fact, the participants in his study are all Western, thus ignoring the aspects of these benefits for ethnic minorities. The primary focus of Schouten’s article is analyzing how cosmetic surgery serves as a portal for identity reconstruction and improvement in selfrepresentation for Westerners, as opposed to a South Korean individuals with stereotypically Asian facial features.

Motivations for altering a natural South Korean appearance include improving success in personal areas—acquiring a more desirable job, attracting a partner, or solidifying a date (Kaw 78). The female participants in Kaw’s study acknowledged that pursuing plastic surgery was never fully based on aesthetic improvement, but was also leverage to improve “their social status as women who are racial minorities” (Kaw 78). From the perceptions of these women, cosmetic surgery presents the opportunity to mold and shift their natural appearances into a model holding a more prestigious standard.

An example would be a participant in Kaw’s study under the name “Jane,” who underwent blepharoplasty and rhinoplasty between the ages of 16 and 17. Her argument for having these completed at an early age was that once she reached college age, her primary focus would be a career scope. “Jane” continued her argument by saying, “Especially if you go into business, whatever, you kind of have to have a Western facial type and you have to have like their features and stature—you know, be tall and stuff. In a way you can see it is an investment in your future” (Kaw 78). Evaluating this quote reveals the raw underlying message that success in a professional 52

discipline is influenced by how Westernized one looks. However, it also takes a moment to realize that this has been the case over the course of history.

The media has a significant influence over societies, over the course of decades. In old Hollywood films, the lead characters in all major productions were of Caucasian descent, such as Ann Sheridan, Barbara Stanwyck, Clark Gable, and Errol Flynn. Very few were people of color. The most prominent celebrities who descended from a lineage of color include Hattie McDaniel and Anna May Wong. As a result of this, Asian features are subconsciously portrayed and viewed as a minority and are considered insignificant compared to the more respected “white” race. Holliday and Elfving-Hwang discuss how the media has influenced the inferiority of Asian groups: As a non-white race, Korean women’s bodies were branded as inferior and flawed under the images of white women conveyed through mass media in such forums as Miss Universe competitions and Hollywood movies, presenting a beauty ideal that Korean women felt obliged to pursue. (qtd. in Woo, 60) These representations only further encourage and motivate minority women to shape themselves into the women seen by popular Western media as considered to be attractive, stunning, and successful.

Not only has popular U.S. media encouraged surgical modifications for South Koreans, but also the Western medical system, since this is “legitimized by scientific rationality and technical efficiency, both of which hold prestige in the West and increasingly all over the world” (Kaw 81).

Medical professionals interviewed by Kaw noticed a correlation between perspectives of Asian facial structure and patients who receive aesthetic surgery. To summarize these descriptions, Kaw quotes a surgeon: The social reasons [for Asian Americans to want double eyelids and nose bridges] are undoubtedly continued exposure to Western culture and the realization that the upper eyelid without a fold tends to give a sleepy appearance, and therefore a more dull look to the patient. Likewise, the flat nasal bridge and lack of nasal projection can signify weakness in one’s personality and by lack of extension, a lack of force in one’s character.

(Kaw 81) These powerful statements originating from medical professionals confirm that typical Asian facial features are not only deemed unattractive in the perspective of patients of Asian descent, but also from the position of a Western doctor. Furthermore, these claims are taken seriously due to the credibility of medical and scientific diagnosis. In an online article written by Kathleen Rees for Brandeis University, Rees mentions that several doctors and surgeons do not perceive cosmetic surgery as methods of “erasing ethnic identity,” but as surgical modifications and technical touchups. These surgeons insist that “each procedure is carefully tailored to the patient; surgeons are enhancing the aesthetic options for minorities while striving to reduce the risk for ‘ethnically incongruent outcomes” (“Ethical Inquiry” par. 8).

While these statements are damaging to the confidence of women regardless of ethnic make-up, why is cosmetic surgery encouraged? From the perspective of Western surgeons, the Asian facial 53

structure is deemed “unattractive” because it does not match the standards of Western beauty. As a result, these surgeons highly encourage the Asian population to pursue surgical procedures in order to be perceived as “beautiful” within Western society. Western beauty standards and surgeons provide the requirements and diagnosis, while South Korean medical professionals provide the means for patients to achieve a more Westernized appearance.

Up to this point, this essay has focused on the contemporary influence of Western society on South Korean plastic surgery. However, unbeknownst to many, there are also historical influences that have led South Koreans into desiring a Western appearance. To understand the complexities underlying South Korean ethnic identity, we must acknowledge and analyze the era of Japanese colonization, which lasted from 1910 until 1945 (Holliday and Elfving-Hwang 11). Western-style modernization, during the time when Korea was one entity, became enforced by Japanese colonization throughout the country. Naturally, when Korea became free from the clenches of Japanese rule, a significant amount of effort was enacted to highlight the “un-Japanese-ness” of the Korean population.

In particular, on a national scale, writings and oral communication praised the West as a way of rejecting Japan’s claims of superiority over Korea (Holliday and Elfving-Hwang 11). For example, one of Korea’s most noted anthropologists wrote in 1964 about the similarities the physical body structure of a Korean shares with a Western or Caucasian: “The calf is long, and since every part of the body’s measurements are very even, the Korean resembles the very wellproportioned stature of Europeans and Americans [as opposed to the Japanese]” (qtd. in Pai 206).

Producing connections to the Western figure under positive terms was used to campaign against Japanese beauty standards, and to protest against Japanese colonial rule (Holliday and ElfvingHwang 11). In doing so, South Koreans were most likely attempting to rebuild and solidify their own national identity by reinforcing the country’s independence with similarities to Western figures.

In conclusion, South Koreans are encouraged and motivated to undergo aesthetic surgeries as leverage to avoid racism and stereotypical attitudes from outsiders, and to improve social and economic status. To achieve these “benefits,” South Koreans take advantage of plastic surgery to modify Asian facial features into a closer resemblance of Western features. The underlying influential factors encouraging this ethnic group are popular Western media, Western medical professionals, various careers within the Western professional field, and the era of Japanese colonial rule.

Beauty standards within Western society subconsciously present messages that to be successful and beautiful, one’s facial features should reflect beauty standards of the Westernized society. As a result, South Koreans pursue aesthetic surgery to find acceptance within this exclusive inner circle, claiming their decisions to modify their natural features are founded upon selfimprovement. These claims are contradicted in their admission that there is a “certain” look desired to achieve success and acceptance. To benefit and thrive within Western society, South Koreans are willingly erasing their ethnic identity and this raises the question, “What is the future of South Korean people?”

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WORKS CITED Holliday, R., and J. Elfving-Hwang. "Gender, Globalization and Aesthetic Surgery in South Korea." Body & Society 18.2 (2012): 2+. Web. Kaw, Eugenia. "Medicalization of Racial Features: Asian American Women and Cosmetic Surgery." Medical Anthropology Quarterly7.1 (1993): 78+. Web. ""Korean Plastic Surgery Rates Highest in the World" - Dr. Haena Kim Facial Plastic Surgery." N.p., 04 Nov. 2014. Web. Rees, Kathleen. “Is ‘Ethnic Modification’ Surgery Ethical?” Brandeis University, May 2011.

Web. Schouten, John W. "Selves in Transition: Symbolic Consumption in Personal Rites of Passage and Identity Reconstruction." Journal of Consumer Research 17.4 (1991): 415. Web. Trimble, Joseph E., and Ryan Dickson. "Ethnic Identity.” Western Washington University.

N.p., 2005. Web. Zhu, Anni. "Is Asian Plastic Surgery Erasing Ethnic Identity?" MakeMeHeal. N.p., 26 Apr. 2007. Web.

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When Gun Policy Becomes Public Safety and Not Self-Indulgence

By Emma Ferguson On Friday, February 26, 2016, the state of Washington was in shock when a man in Mason County made headline news for fatally shooting his neighbor, wife, and two adopted teenage sons before committing suicide. A young girl of 12, presumably the adopted daughter of the shooter (the information was never publicly released due to her status as a minor), was the only survivor of the murder-suicide, as she had managed to escape from the house and hide in the woods nearby. She was taken into custody and remains in the care of a state-run social service program (The Seattle Times, 2016).

The crime was initially reported when David Wayne Campbell, age 51, called 911 in peril shortly after 9:00 am on Friday morning, confessing that he had killed his family and was holding a gun to his head. Trained negotiators and the Mason County sheriffs arrived at the property shortly after the call was made, and desperately attempted to save Campbell from taking his life. The trained officials spent over three hours pleading with Campbell, who spent almost the entire time pacing inside of his house, occasionally bringing the handgun to his head. About three hours after the sheriffs had arrived, the SWAT team intervened and made a final effort to forcibly and safely take Campbell into custody without provoking any self-harm. But that was the last straw: Campbell, agitated, walked outside of his home in Mason County and shot himself in front of those who had tried to save him (Kiro 7, 2016).

David Wayne Campbell, as it turns out, had a considerably extensive criminal history. A combined total of 47 counts of felonies and misdemeanors appear on Campbell’s delinquency record dating back to 1996, and the all charges he was convicted of were related to forgery and theft. Agents from the BATFE stated that the handgun used in the murder-suicide, and a long-barreled gun that was retrieved from the home, were not obtained legally due to Campbell’s previous conviction record (Bellisle, 2016).

This shooting took place in a very small and remote town in Mason County named Belfair. This is the town in which I grew up and where I had spent most of my life. Belfair is so small and far from any major cities that most of the population of Washington State does not even realize that it exists, but this incident really put us on the map. People mourned over this for a long time. My newsfeed on Facebook was plastered with the latest updates on the case, mostly about the little girl who was brave enough to do what she needed to survive. This was a major tragedy that occurred only a few minutes away from the house that I spent nearly 18 years in, and it affected just about everyone I know; it affected me, thousands of miles away.

Of course there have been other horrifying cases like this, or stories like the Columbine shooting where many more lives were taken. We hear of mass shootings happening in bigger places like Seattle or Tacoma, but never in Belfair. And it is always sad. But I think that this case specifically impacted me and so many people that I know because it completely shattered our sense of security within our own homes and community. We all realize that bad things can happen anywhere, at any time, and for any reason, but no one thinks that tragedies as devastating and gruesome as this will happen to ourselves until they do. When they do happen, we are all lost, and petrified with disbelief.

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Something that has been particularly bothering me about the Campbell murder-suicide case is that one of the neighbors, Jack Pigott, told authorities he had heard the gunshots fired late night on Thursday, February 24th, when Campbell killed his family and neighbor, but did not even think about reporting it. Pigott had just attributed the gunshots to a product target practice and nothing more (The Seattle Times, 2016). Jack Pigott could not have possibly known the difference between a gun being fired for recreation and a gun being fired for murder because our society, at least the community within Mason County, has taught him and many others that the sound of a gunshot is normal. Have guns become so ordinary to us that hearing them fired is simply routine; they have been so engraved into our lives and culture as Americans that we do not even think about it when they go off?

Whether or not we can all agree on what new laws the United States needs, I am sure most of us acknowledge that something in the gun policy has got to change. I know that many people do not want to talk about it because Americans have a unique and arguably disturbing attachment to their guns. But how many more people need to die or be injured, how many more people need to threaten or actually commit suicide before we initiate a change? Enough American citizens have been robbed of a life and future, and it is time that the rest of us start treating this as the serious matter it is, without any of our own self-interests getting in the way. The restriction and limitation of public access to guns (law enforcement and military being omitted) in the United States is a reasonable solution to decrease the rates of domestic gun violence while continuing to provide American citizens with the opportunity for gun ownership, and without violating or changing the Constitution.

Before we can develop a plan of action, we first need to look at what is currently going on in the United States as far as gun policy and gun violence. This means that we must overview some of the most important restrictions and regulations the United States federal and state governments place on the transfer and purchase of firearms, as well as analyzing domestic statistics on gunrelated homicide, suicide, and other forms of gun violence.

One of the major current federal policies on gun ownership in the United States, instituted by the National Firearms Act (NFA), places restrictions on the possession and sale of machine guns, short-barreled shotguns, and silencers (BATFE, 2005, p. 74). An extensive background check, purchase of a tax stamp from the manufacturer of the device or firearm, and registry with the BATFE (ATFE) is required to purchase a gun (BATFE, 2005, p. 74).

Another major federal policy on gun ownership is the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act (Brady Act), which specifically names groups of people prohibited from gun ownership and the use of a firearm for business or personal use. Those subject to this federal restriction include: Fugitives of justice, people who are or were convicted of a crime and sentenced to over one year in prison, illegal aliens, renounced citizens of the United States, people who have a restraining order against children or an intimate partner, people convicted of domestic violence, people with addiction to (or who illegally use) any controlled substance, people who have been committed to a mental institution or have been ruled “mentally defective� by the court, or any person who has been dishonorably discharged from the United States Armed Forces. (BATFE, 2005, p.9) 57

The United States federal government also uses other laws and limitations, such as the Gun Control Act of 1968, which essentially places initial regulation on firearm industries and gun owners, primarily focusing on regulating interstate commerce in firearms by means of prohibiting interstate transfer of weapons (which it also defines) except among licensed sellers and importers (BATFE, 2005, p.4).

The last important federal policy involving gun control in America is Title 28, CFR Chapter I: Part 25: Subpart A: the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) Regulations. The purpose of the NICS Regulations is to establish the procedures and policies that implement the Brady Act, as well as to require that the Attorney General of the NICS be contacted by any licensed manufacturer, dealer, or importer about the transfer of a firearm to any person under 18 who is not licensed. (BATFE, 2005, p.111-112). It is important to note that because Title 28 CFR is federally regulated, each state is responsible for following the same standards.

The federal regulations on gun policy are supplemented by state laws, which may or may not further restrict the guidelines already put in place by the national government, depending on what state is in question. For instance, California and New York have completely prohibited the ownership of machine guns, short-barreled shotguns, and silencers, even if the registry, purchase of a tax stamp, and background check that federal laws require have been completed and approved (FindLaw.com, 2016). Interestingly enough, no state has entirely denied the right to acquire a concealed weapon permit. However, contrary to the states, U.S. territories American Samoa and the Mariana Islands have prohibited concealed weapon permits as a part of their policies (USA Carry, 2016).

Other laws include laws regarding the waiting period on the purchase of a firearm and how long it can be, as well as who can be approved for a concealed weapon permit—residents of the state, nonresidents of the state, or other restrictions—and how long it would take to acquire one (Findlaw.com, 2016). State laws also decide whether or not the state will be a permissive open carry, licensed open carry, anomalous open carry, or non-permissive open carry state—which describes if, when, or where the open carry of a firearm in public is lawful (FindLaw.com, 2016).

A current example of state gun control laws is that Washington has a five-day waiting period for the purchase of a handgun by a state resident, and up to a 60-day waiting period if the buyer is not a state resident. An additional state restriction prohibits minors from lawful gun purchase or possession. It is a permissive open carry state, which means that there is no license required to openly carry a firearm (with the limitations that it must be a pistol, shotgun, or rifle) in public, and permits a concealed weapon permit to both state residents and nonresidents. Washington laws remain the same throughout the state, including within large and heavily populated cities like Seattle. A Washington State concealed weapons permit requires that applicants are: Over 21 years old, are a United States citizen or legal alien, have no convictions for domestic violence against a family member, have no mental health issues that prohibit from having a license, have had no illegal substance abuse within the last year, have had no felony convictions, and have no outstanding warrants. (Washington Gun Control Laws, ¶13) 58

However, it does not require applicants to submit a NICS background check (FindLaw.com, 2016).

Reasonably, we can wonder how often these background checks are processed.

The FBI reportedly processed a record-breaking 185,345 background checks on Black Friday alone for the year of 2015, and in general, the number of gun sales throughout the entire year consistently increased at an alarming rate (Mascia, 2015). By the end of 2015, the United States was the leading nation in the number of guns per capita, at about 88.8 guns per every 100 people.

No other country stood as a close second to this statistic (Simon & Sanchez, 2015). Also, a recent survey conducted by Harvard’s Injury Control Research Center estimates that about eight percent of all gun owners in the United States own 10 or more guns; meaning, more Americans have their own stockpile of firearms than there are people in the whole country of Denmark (Mascia, 2015).

With such an abundant number of guns in circulation, it’s no wonder America experiences a considerably high amount of gun violence every year, and, even each day. In 2015, there were a total of 53,169 gun-related incidents, with an average of about 146 incidents daily. Since the beginning of 2016, there have been over 12,200 gun-related incidents in the United States alone so far (just as a reminder, at the time that I am writing this, 2016 is only one-third over). A little over one-fourth of these incidents (3,121 and counting) resulted in death (Gun Violence Archive, 2016).

Using a more statistically analytical approach, the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence has provided the nation with some shocking data about gun violence in the United States. An estimated 297 Americans, 48 being children and teenagers, are shot in assault, suicide or suicide attempt, murder, police intervention, and accidental shootings every day. While most victims survive, 89 Americans, seven being children and teenagers, die in the shootings that occur each day (Brady Campaign, 2016). To further analyze this data, handguns kill on average 20 times more people than rifles, and about 60% of all gun-related deaths in the United States are suicides (Simon & Sanchez, 2015).

In comparison to terrorism, which dominates headline news in America, fatalities in domestic gun violence significantly trump those of terrorist attacks on United States soil. And while most of our country remains totally oblivious, an observed 71 Americans were killed in acts of terrorism inside our own country during the span of 2005 to 2015, while 301,797 (over 4,250 times more) were killed due to acts of gun violence by other Americans (Mascia, 2015). To make matters even worse, as if that were not shocking enough on its own, between the years 2001 to 2013, 3,380 Americans were killed by terrorism, whereas 406,496 Americans were killed by a gun in the same span of time. This statistic includes the aftermath of 9/11, thought to be the worst tragedy in recent American history (Simon & Sanchez, 2015). So who should we really be afraid of: terrorists, or our own people?

The current statistics on gun violence in this country are very disturbing. Not only are many Americans dying, but many more are injured because of these weapons against which our bodies are rendered entirely defenseless. It is time that we as Americans commit ourselves to a new perspective that enables the betterment of our society, and the first step to this is the recognition and acknowledgement that our current position on guns is hurting us and our youth.

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One of the biggest factors preventing more restrictive gun policies from being adopted in the United States is our population’s obsession with guns, with many citizens wanting it to remain relatively easy to obtain a firearm. However, the problem with this is that if it is too easy to get a gun, the chance increase of a gun falling into the hands of a high-risk individual (that is, someone who is violent, aggressive, has a high tendency to be frequently under heavy influence of drugs or alcohol, depressed, and/or mentally unstable in any other way). That is when our gun policy becomes problematic. The fact that many of us value our own rights to acquire a firearm as conveniently as possible, more than public safety within our own country, is embarrassing.

I am not about to suggest that we should place a large-scale or nationwide ban on the ownership of guns, nor am I going to suggest that any authority figure forcibly remove the guns from any person’s home (which both are arguments that I hear frequently or see often through posts or comments on social media like Facebook). I am, however, going to suggest that things need to change a considerable amount. There are a lot of arguments for and against a stricter gun control policy, and being from a small, primarily conservative town in a fairly liberal and progressive state, I think that I have pretty much heard them all (or at least a vast majority of them).

The argument that gets to me the most—and we have all heard it—is that “guns don’t kill people, people kill people.” “Guns don’t just shoot people on their own, it takes a person to power them, to pull the trigger, to kill someone.” “The people who commit homicide are unstable individuals or were not properly trained in gun use and safety.” This argument relies on the belief that the general population of the United States does not deserve to get “punished” because a few individuals are ill and get trigger happy.

Actually, guns are the only cause in gun-related death—it’s just that simple. The argument that “guns don’t kill people, people kill people” is a logical fallacy, and should be thrown out of the gun control debate. While shooting a person does not ensure his or her death, it is an inarguable fact that the purpose of a gun is to kill; that is what it is literally designed to do. And what about the fact that without the gun, all of those killed by a firearm would still be alive? Sure, there are many other weapons used to commit murder, but most homicides are carried out by the use of a gun because it takes the least amount of effort and conscious decision (Webster & Vernick, 2013, p.14-17). America is unique in the sense that it has very strong rights of gun ownership, and a high homicide rate compared to other developed countries (Ludwig & Cook, 2003). This is not a coincidence either, despite false and skewed statistics.

Republican figureheads and conservative American citizens often bring up the Second Amendment in the Bill of Rights of the United States Constitution: that we are granted certain unalienable rights from the time that we are born, and one of those rights includes the right to bear arms—the right to gun ownership. That’s a reasonable claim, right? The Constitution, the single most important document of this country’s history, gives us this right specifically, so who has authority to take it away from Americans who have not done anything criminal to deserve limitation of this freedom?

Well, let’s talk about the Second Amendment. This article of the Bill of Rights was amended to the Constitution to preserve the liberty of the United States and its citizens. It specifically says, 60

“A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed,” (Madison, 1789). We have to remember that this document was written a mere thirteen years after the U.S. gained independence from England in 1776. The right of the people to bear firearms was granted because America was a newly organized nation that had no standing army, and it was necessary to be able to assemble a militia in the event of foreign invaders or to overthrow a corrupt government (to prevent against another monarchy or other dictatorship/totalitarian rule). Today, we have a full military with an army, consisting of many enlisted men and women who are properly trained, provided with guns, and designated to go to battle if it is necessary. Additionally, using the force of guns as means of removing corruption from a governmental system today would not only be an inappropriate manner to resolve issues, but would be considered barbaric and unethical.

Another popular argument that many gun-loving Americans make against a stricter gun policy is that they are tools necessary for the sport of hunting, because any other method of killing game would be inhumane. For many people in the United States, hunting is an important practice of the American culture, and limiting the accessibility to firearms is seen as a threat to the sport.

However, hunting is no longer necessary for human survival in almost all of the United States, and because of that, the sport is a privilege and not a right. Due to its status as such, the United States should not neglect adopting more effective gun control policies because people want to hunt.

Protecting our citizens’ entitlement to live is more important than protecting the right for everyone who wants to legally kill animals.

The last major argument that frequently surfaces when discussing whether or not the United States should enforce more restrictive gun control is that we need to allow public access to guns as a protective service against home invaders, or otherwise dangerous individuals. That, too, is a logical reason why we should allow access to guns for those who aren’t labeled as “high-risk individuals,” right? Certainly, we deserve protection against outside forces that are dangerous or even deadly, and we deserve to have a sense of security. No one will watch over us and our families better than ourselves, so we need to take the appropriate measures to ensure our own safety.

But here’s what bothers me about this. As New York Times journalist Lawrence Downes (2016) stated, the argument that we need guns for self-defense drifts away from logic and more towards being paranoid. I have to agree. Think about it. The chance that your house will get broken into or that you will be held at gunpoint at any time in your life is relatively small, and holding onto that fear is somewhat irrational. Not only can this seemingly pendulous fear of a threat that you have convinced yourself only a gun can efficiently protect you from be considered absurd, but having a gun for these reasons could actually be what is promoting this fear. This paranoia becomes detrimental, and it may override sensibility, blurring the line that supposedly determines when it is okay to pull a gun out on someone and when it is not.

Just a few years ago in 2012, the people of the United States broke out in overwhelming emotion when George Zimmerman fatally shot a 17-year-old black American, Trayvon Martin, in Florida for uncertain reasons. Allegedly, Zimmerman and Martin were in the midst of a physical dispute prompted by an aggravated Trayvon, when Zimmerman shot the unarmed teen in an act of selfdefense. The screams heard in the background of the second 911 call arguably question that claim, 61

as family and friends identify the pleas for help as Trayvon Martin’s (CNN, 2012). But even if Trayvon were responsible for the conflict, did he really deserve to lose his life? Could he have reasonably been considered enough of a posing threat, unarmed, that shooting him was justifiable or validated?

As mentioned before, the total number of gun-related incidents last year was 53,169, and only about 3,639 of those incidents related to home invasion or self-defense. To put that in perspective, home invasion and self-defensive acts of gun violence made up only 14.61% of all shootings that injured or killed people in the year 2015 (Gun Violence Archive, 2016). While the number of shootings prompted by home invasion or any other means of self-defense last year does not completely display the unlikeliness of these events occurring, they do show that they make up only a relatively small amount of the reasons that we shoot at our own people.

The biggest problem with keeping a gun inside of the home is that firearms are too easily obtainable by children. Nearly 1.7 million American children live in a home with at least one gun, and one out of every three homes with children in the United States also have at least one gun (Brady Campaign, 2016). A statistic current in December of 2015 showed that at a rate of about two times a day, an American youth under the age of 18 is killed by a firearm in the United States, and 75% of the youth who are killed are children under the age of 12. An even more shocking statistic of 2015 showed that about once a week, a toddler (defined as a child younger than three years of age) shoots someone or themselves. By the end of last year, 19 toddlers had accidentally killed themselves, 25 had injured themselves, 13 had injured other people, and two had killed other people (Mascia, 2015). These tragedies happen because all too often, the guns that we keep at home to “protect” ourselves are left unsecured or unlocked, loaded, and easily accessible.

Simply talking about guns and gun safety is not enough. While it may seem like a simple concept that guns are dangerous, many children do not understand that they are weapons and not toys.

There are many things that could contribute to this, but I think that one of the biggest factors leading youth to this misunderstanding is that firearms are over-glorified in this country. Our society has become far too accustomed to guns being a part of our day-to-day lives—and not only that, but many Americans are totally okay with it.

If we recall, in August 2014, a nine-year-old girl accidentally shot and killed her instructor with a submachine Uzi at a shooting range in Arizona. However, charges were never filed, as the shooting was ruled as a “work-related accident”. The negligence that allowed the girl’s parents and instructor to find it appropriate and acceptable to place an assault weapon in the hands of a small, frail girl turned an “innocent” gun safety lesson into deadly and traumatizing accident (Almasy, Stapleton, & Sanchez, 2014).

My personal interest in gun control started shortly after a series of events involving three unsupervised children and handguns that happened during my sophomore year in high school, about four years ago. This is when I came to fully understand the sad reality of the United States gun policy that plagues our country.

The first event was when a man named Todd Stabelfeldt came to my high school and presented an emotional speech during an assembly. He was nine years old when his friend shot him in a game 62

that they played in his backyard after his single mother left for work. The incident left him as a C4 quadriplegic. Todd went on to say that for a long time, he resented life after his accident. He became angry and depressed, he lost his motivation, and he lost a lot of his will to live. He never thought that the day he played in his backyard with his mother’s gun would be the last day that he would use his arms and legs. While Todd Stabelfeldt has since grown into a successful man and has come to make peace with himself after his incident, he pleaded with me and my peers to understand that guns are weapons and they are dangerous. At no point are firearms a game or a toy, and neglecting to fully realize this cost Todd the mobility of most of his body for the rest of his life.

But Todd’s speech can only impact those who hear it, and those who are old enough and mature enough to comprehend the seriousness of this issue. On Wednesday, February 22, 2012, a nineyear-old boy shot an eight-year-old girl in the abdomen in his classroom when he brought a handgun to school and it accidentally went off from inside of his backpack. The shooting covered the victim’s neighbor in blood, shocked the classroom, immediately set the entire school into lockdown, and scared many concerned and anxious parents. The girl was airlifted to the hospital, and remained in critical condition for several days after emergency surgery (CBS News, 2012).

She did eventually end up making a full recovery, but that does not necessarily take away from the danger that had occurred (CBS News, 2012).

The boy reportedly stole the gun from his mother’s house (who had lost custody of him due to an unspecified extensive history with the courts), and told a classmate the week before the incident that he intended to take the gun and run away (Murphy, 2012, February 4). This shooting took place at Armin Jahr Elementary school in Bremerton, Washington, a community very close to the one in which I grew up. I remember this story making headline news and sending all of us into shock. When something so horrible happens to such a young person, it becomes very apparent just how pressing and serious the issue is.

We tried to make sense of this disaster, but we all fell short. For days, all anyone talked about in class was gun control, gun education for America’s youth, and, of course, the little girl who became the sole victim of an elementary school shooting. We were constantly being updated on the victim’s condition, and the status of the charges for the boy responsible. This event scared us, and furthermore, many of us became concerned for the safety of children and ourselves. We began to reevaluate the effectiveness of Washington’s gun control policies, which recent events had proven to be loosely regulated.

Not even three weeks later, Washington got another wave of shock and distress when a three-yearold boy fatally shot himself in the head while left unattended in the car with a loaded and unsecured handgun he had found underneath the driver’s seat. The boy’s parents had parked outside of a gas station and left their toddler son with their infant daughter, who was not injured by the accident (Blankinship & Esser, 2012, March 13).

The parents of the toddler who fell victim had only stepped out of the car for a minute, but that was all it took to end his life and change theirs forever. By this point, more Washington citizens, including many members of law enforcement, emphasized the dire need for a change in gun policy, and more accountability for the negligence of the parents when incidents like these happen. It 63

seems so irresponsible to just leave a loaded gun out, and I would like to hope that parents especially would care more about unsecured weapons—not less. Innocent children in the “great” United States of America are dying or being seriously injured because we have failed to equip our nation with a stronger and more effectively regulated gun control system.

Early in the following academic year, October 24, 2014, five more Washington youth fell victim to a school shooting at the hand of one of their peers. Jaylen Fryberg opened fire that Friday morning, killing two girls, two boys, and wounding another before turning the gun on himself (Kreamer, 2014). It is apparent that the shootings of the previous school year had not yet made enough of an impact to provoke any sort of measurable, effective change.

If factual, statistical evidence and the likelihood of the inevitable and reckless endangerment of youth in the United States were not enough grounds for a more limited and restricted gun policy, the fact that Americans are willing to kill other human beings over notably unworthy causes or in relatively low-risk situations should be all by itself. Even without a person being under a legitimate and immediate threat, it is largely socially acceptable to seriously injure another living person, or even worse, end someone’s life by the use of a firearm.

George Zimmerman was found not guilty of murder in Trayvon Martin’s death due to a lack of evidence to implement the teen as a victim of a hostile and hasty action, despite the fact that Trayvon was unarmed and essentially defenseless (Botelho & Yan, 2013). Even in the case that Martin had created the conflict, he was in no position to put Zimmerman in a legitimate lifethreatening danger, and the trial that was set to bring Trayvon justice had failed him.

While each state has laws that describe at what point people may use deadly force as self-defense, many states, including Florida and Texas, are incredibly lenient when defining a threat against which it would be reasonable to use lethal force. Many states also fail to implicate a “duty to retreat” law, which requires that those under threat retreat to a safer place (if at all possible) before any force, deadly or not, is used in an act of self-defense, and this arguably provokes people to take more drastic measures to protect themselves (Currier, 2012).

The “Stand Your Ground” law in Florida constitutes this concept, permitting people to use lethal force against an intruder who “unlawfully enters, attempts to enter, or refuses to leave a dwelling, residence, or vehicle owned or lawfully occupied by another person, the owner or occupant is presumed to have held a reasonable fear of death or great bodily harm,” or furthermore is presumed to have the intent to commit an act involving force or violence (H&W, 2014). This law provides immunity from prosecution if a person can exhibit that his or her act of “self-defense” fell within the guidelines of the ordinance.

Many people who commit what is commonly known as “justifiable homicide” arguably are not justified in their actions at all. However, some states will often still falsely validate this type of violence for something as simple or harmless as a person just being on somebody else’s property even without any lethal or obvious threat. People have become much more willing to shoot and kill another person. Between the years of 2007-2011, the “justifiable homicide” rate in Texas increased more than 50% from 146 to 224, after Governor Rick Perry further expanded the already expansive lethal force laws in 2007. For the other states that have “stand your ground”-type laws 64

resembling Florida’s, similar increases in homicide have occurred in the last several years (Graham, 2013).

Our media often demonstrates the somber reality of other countries that attack their own people with the use of deadly weapons, but no news stations dare to broadcast that we may also be in the midst of our own civil war. Disaster is happening right here, right in front of our eyes, and we continue to do very little about it; isn’t it about time that we should?

The Second Amendment gives us the right to keep and bear arms, and I am not going to suggest that we revoke what the founding fathers of America granted to us. But I am going to stress that gun ownership is a privilege and not a justifiable right, and we have grossly taken advantage of it.

We can make changes to the gun control policy that will drastically decrease gun violence and the number of guns that are illegally bought and sold by enforcing a higher minimum standard of gun regulations through by the federal government, without overriding or changing the United States Constitution. I would also like to mention that what I am about to propose exempts the military and law enforcement, as the gun policies for these types of employment are their own, separate issue.

The first thing that we need to do is prohibit fully automatic and semi-automatic weapons and their ammunition from being sold, bought, and otherwise distributed at a federal level with zero exceptions—permit and background check included. The fact is, there is no legitimate reason why anyone needs to own a weapon of this nature, especially considering that fully and semi-automatic machine guns are designed to kill people specifically; they are not even hunting weapons. The only valid (and I use the term loosely) reason anyone could have for wanting guns of this caliber would be because they enjoy shooting them recreationally, in which case they can be provided by and used only in a regulated and monitored gun range. This provides people with the ability to continue to shoot any gun recreationally without the weapons being released into the public.

Another form of regulation that the federal government needs to enforce is to mandate that all people buying and/or registering a firearm undergo a basic, non-biased psych evaluation and a moderately extensive background check that would look for criminal history as well as history of any involuntary outpatient hospitalization. The psych evaluation would help to determine, classify, and prevent high-risk individuals, who are or can become mentally or otherwise emotionally unstable and potentially dangerous, from obtaining a firearm. Ideally, the evaluation would flag things such as manic depression, high levels of hostility or aggression, and psychopathic and sociopathic tendencies. Of course, applicants would also have the option to appeal their declination if they believe that the psych evaluation were invalid.

The background checks, too, will prevent people with a violent criminal history or history of involuntary hospitalization from further being a threat to others or themselves. This could also be appealed, and the right to gun ownership could potentially be regained if the applicant has not committed violence or crime, or has not been hospitalized for mental or emotional instability for a minimum, federally regulated period of time—preferably five years or more, to allow for enough time for proper rehabilitation. (Institute, 2014, p.4-6).

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The state of California has already inaugurated a bill to this effect. California Bill AB-1014 authorizes courts to issue temporary gun violence restraining orders in cases where a person is considered by concerned family members, law enforcement officers, and judges to be a reasonable, immediate danger to his or herself or another person. The bill permits any person who imposes an immediate threat or danger to be restricted from “custody or control, owning, purchasing, possessing, or receiving a firearm,” and any firearms obtained to be seized (California Rifle & Pistol Association, 2015).

As well, there should be a minimum, federally regulated waiting period on all purchases of firearms of at least 30 days. Most states have very short waiting periods—if they have waiting periods at all (FindLaw.com, 2016). It is important to extend the minimum waiting period because it will allow the background checks and psych evaluations sufficient time to be processed, with the least chance of inaccurate results. Also, as another benefit, a longer waiting period on the purchase of weapons will ultimately deter criminal activity, specifically crimes of passion (typically consisting of second degree murder and aggravated assault committed by a person who is well-acquainted with the victim), which make up the majority of all gun-related violence in the United States (Webster & Vernick, 2013, p.13).

In an attempt to lessen American dependence on firearms and reduce the number of gun-related incidents in the United States, the number of weapons (especially handguns) that any single person may own at one time should be limited to a federal maximum no greater than five. There is no reasonable basis for anyone to possess a full artillery, but many people have the desire to own more than one firearm because they are either huntsmen, or are just generally passionate for the sport of shooting. This is acceptable so long as it does not get excessive. The purpose of this policy is to better limit the availability of guns to children or youth by reducing the number of guns within the home, and to help deter gun theft or the flow of guns to an illegal market.

The last challenge of gun control is to limit the number of guns available and granted to the general public, and still be able to reduce the number of weapons that are distributed through an illegal market. There are a couple of ways we can successfully accomplish that. First, federal law can start requiring that all private (unlicensed) gun sellers report with the NFA that any weapons sold are no longer in their possession, and that the new owner re-registers the weapon under his or her own name. This policy will not only deter the illegal exchange of weapons, but it can also be beneficial when solving crimes relating to gun violence, because it will more accurately track where the guns are going.

Secondly, we can require at a federal level that all licensed gun dealers install and monitor security cameras, as well as keep computerized inventory and sales records. The reason for this is simple— they deter theft and more accurately measure how much shrink (items that cannot be sold for a number of various reasons) or theft gun dealers are subject to (Webster & Vernick, 2013, p.112118).

Lastly, the federal government should require that all information regarding the safety records of gun dealers be released to the public. It has been proven that by doing this, licensed sellers were more likely to make greater efforts to reduce their flow of weapons to the illegal market, and as a

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result, theft and other illegal exchange that provided criminals with weapons decreased significantly (Webster, 2014).

According to the U.S. Constitution, all citizens are granted unalienable rights, one of which provides us with the freedom to own and possess firearms. While we have remained true to the original doctrine that provided our nation with a strong foundation, I have a very hard time believing that the current status of the gun policy in America is what our founding fathers wanted for our country. The Constitution specifies the right of the American people to keep and bear arms, but it also mentions that part of the purpose of the document is to promote the general welfare and insure domestic tranquility. As a country, we fall short on both of those concepts.

One of my peers from high school beautifully illustrated what I believe to be true regarding America’s cavalier attitude on gun violence within our own country through a post on Facebook: “I think what really gets to me about the idea of having a gun at home to protect against home invaders isn’t the statistical unlikeliness or even the fear-based philosophy. It’s the valuing of personal possessions over a human life, and the willingness and acceptance to a potential fire-fight over what are most likely mass-produced items” (Guthrie, 2016, January 11). Anecdotally, Washington State Representative Sam Hunt stated, “We think guns are dangerous, but they are not treated as dangerous by our society or by laws or by our regulations. We regard guns as some sort of sacred object that should not be subject to regulation” (Blankinship & Esser, 2014).

I have heard several times that gun control is just a slippery slope to only criminals having guns, leaving the good and common people of the United States defenseless, or even that the statistical evidence supporting the theory that having more firearms in circulation results in higher rates of gun violence is just “liberal propaganda.” The reality is that the more guns and more narrow the denial criteria for the purchase and possession of firearms is, the more dangerous our society becomes.

Gun control does not mean violation of the Second Amendment, though many people act like it does. All of the general federal requirements that I proposed do not infringe on any of the rights granted by the United States Constitution. All they do is limit the number of guns available to the public in order to promote more general safety within our society, and make more of an effort to keep firearms from people that should not have them. If most Americans are truly law-abiding citizens who are mentally and emotionally stable and have good intentions, then there should be no problem with complying.

We need to set things straight—for us, and for the future generations of this country. Things need to change, and we shouldn’t stop trying to change them. It all starts when we decide, when we set aside the selfishness of our own personal desires to promote social welfare. It is not about us as individuals anymore—it’s about us as one whole, united nation.

REFERENCES AB-1014-Gun violence restraining orders. (2015). California Rifle & Pistol Association.

Retrieved from: http://crpa.org/ab-1014/

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Almasy, S., Stapleton, A., & Sanchez, R., (2014). Child firing Uzi at Arizona shooting range accidentally kills instructor, police say. CNN. Retrieved from: http://www.cnn.com/2014/ 08/26/us/arizona-girl-fatal-shooting-accident/ Bellisle, M., (2016, February 29). Man who killed 4 in Mason County had a long criminal history. The Seattle Times. http://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/ crime/fourthvictim-of-belfair-shooting-identified-as-neighbor/ Blankinship, D., & Esser, D., (2012, March 13). Boy, 3, kills himself with a gun found in family’s car. KOMO News. Retrieved from: http://komonews.com/news/local/boy- 3kills-himself-with-gun-found-in-familys-car-11-20-2015 Botelho, G., & Yan H., (2013, July 14). George Zimmerman found not guilty of murder in Trayvon Martin’s death. CNN. Retrieved from: http://www.cnn.com/2013/07/13/ justice/zimmerman-trial/ Brady Campaign. (2016). Key gun violence statistics. Brady Campaign to Prevent Against Gun Violence. Retrieved from: http://www.bradycampaign.org/key-gun-violencestatistics BATFE (2005). Federal firearms regulations reference guide. Office of Enforcement Programs and Services, Firearms Programs Division. Retrieved from: https://www.atf.gov/file/58686/download CBS News. Washington boy, 9, to be charged in shooting of girl, 8. (2012, February 23).

Retrieved from: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/wash-boy-9-to-be-charged -in-shootingof-girl-8/ Concealed carry permit reciprocity maps. (2016). USA Carry. Retrieved from: http://www.usacarry.com/concealed_carry_permit_reciprocity_maps.html Currier, C., (2012, March 22). The 24 states that have sweeping self-defense laws just like Florida’s. ProPublica: Journalism in the Public Interest. Retrieved from: https://www. propublica.org/article/the-23-states-that-have-sweeping-self-defense-laws-just-likefloridas Downes, L., (2016, February 8). Reaching across the gun divide in New Hampshire. The New York Times. Retrieved from: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/09/opinion/reachingacross-the-gun-divide-in-new-hampshire.html?ref=topics Family devastated after Belfair murder-suicide. KIRO 7 News. (2016, February 28). KIRO 7 News. Retrieved from: http://www.kiro7.com/news/deputies-responding-to-report-of-4shot-in- belfair-area/117882010 Florida’s “stand your ground law”. (2014). H&W. Retrieved from: http://www.husseinand webber.com/case-work/criminal-defense-articles/floridas-stand-ground-law/ 68

FindLaw. (2016). Learn about the law: Gun laws. FindLaw. Retrieved from: http://injury. findlaw.com/product-liability/gun-laws.html Graham, M., (2013, June 3). When you can kill in Texas. Time. Retrieved from: http://nation. time.com/2013/06/13/when-you-can-kill-in-texas/ Gun Violence Archive. (2016). Gun violence archive. [Data file]. Retrieved from: http:// www. gunviolencearchive.org Guthrie, M., (2016, January 11). [Personal social media post]. Retrieved from: https://www. facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=216770591991166&id=100009746803008 Institute of Law, Psychiatry & Public Policy - The University of Virginia Consortium for riskbased firearms policy recommends evidence-based changes to state and federal gun policies (2014, February). Developments in Mental Health and Law, 33(1), 1-10. http://web.a.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?sid=7eb5436b-f8f8-43c2-b6b2741cc874eedd%40sessionmgr4003&vid=26&hid=4112 Kreamer, M., (2014, October 24). 2 dead, 4 wounded in shooting at Marysville-Pilchuck High School. The Seattle Times. Retrieved from: http://blogs.seattletimes.com/today/2014/ 10/shooting-reported-at-marysville-pilchuck-high-school/ Ludwig, J., & Cook, P. J. (Eds.). (2003). Evaluating gun policy: Effects on crime and violence.

Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press.

Madison, J., (1789). Amendment II: The bill of rights. The United States Constitution.

Philadelphia, PA. Retrieved from: http://www.ushistory.org/documents/amendments.htm Mascia, J., (2015, December 23). 15 statistics that tell the story of gun violence this year. The Trace. Retrieved from: http://www.thetrace.org/2015/12/gun-violence-stats-2015/ Murphy, K., (2012, February 24). 3rd-grader charged in classmate shooting made ‘terrible mistake.’ The Los Angeles Times. Retrieved from: http://articles.latimes.com/2012/feb/ 24/nation/la-na-nn-bremerton-boy-shooting-20120224 Seattle Times. Family shot to death in Mason County ID’d by coroner. (2016, February 27)..

Retrieved from: http://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/crime/officials-investigating mans-claim-he-shot-4-people-in-belfair/ Simon, M., & Sanchez, R., (2015, December 4). U.S. gun violence: The story in charts and graphs. CNN. Retrieved from: http://www.cnn.com/2015/12/04/us/gun-violencegraphics/ Trayvon Martin’s last minutes. (2012, April 2). CNN. [Video]. Atlanta. Video retrieved from: http://www.cnn.com/videos/bestoftv/2012/04/02/nr-trayvon-martin-timeline.cnn 69

Webster, D. W., (2014). How a better policy will trigger fewer gun deaths. Ted Talks: TEDMED. [Podcast]. Washington DC. Podcast retrieved from: http://www.tedmed.com/talks/ show?id=309140 Webster, D. W., & Vernick, J. S. (Eds.). (2013). Reducing gun violence in America: Informing policy with evidence and analysis. Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University Press.

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The Incredible Cannibals

By Rachel Gonzales Cannibalism strikes the human conscience as a horrific act because the extreme behavior of humans eating their own kind brings nausea to the stomach. However, a human consuming the innards of other humans (relatives included) has long been part of our ancestral history. Now labeled as “immoral,” “disgusting,” and “why?”, this paper will provide the reasoning why some, such as the Korowai tribe in New Guinea or survivalist Roberto Canessa, believe cannibalism is valid.

There are no laws against cannibalism, but the act is considered unlawful. Yet, while widespread cross-culturally, cannibalism is also exhibited among our closest relatives, the chimpanzees.

Chimps are territorial and so are humans, and both are hunter-gatherers, bound to do anything to claim dominance. Gathering genetic components between the two, we are no different when it comes to cannibalism. Still, most argue that cannibalism is immoral because it’s a conscious decision even in desperate times of need, such as the need to stay alive and or the belief of keeping away demons. The consumption of another human is considered atrocious. However, the Alphas, Korowai tribe, and Roberto Canessa are among those who argue otherwise.

George Woodwell is an ecologist who studies cannibalism from an ecocritical perspective. He states that the earliest evidence of cannibalism originated in Southern Europe, some 780,000 years ago (Woodwell, 1967). He condenses two reports, “Lower Pleistocene hominids and artifacts from Atapuerca-TD,” by E. Carbonell, and “Paleomagnetic age for hominid fossils at Atapuerca archaeological site,” by J. M. Pares and A. Perez-Gonzalez, explaining the historical beginning of cannibalism. As noted in these reports, Carbonell, Pares and Perez-Gonzalez, who are European Pleistocene experts, reveal the most interesting discovery of all—human tooth-marks penetrated into human skin: Scanning electron microscope analysis of replicas obtained from these human bones shows clear features characteristic of cut-marks… Location and distribution of cut marks are suggestive of dismembering (detachment of the head) and defleshing activities…. Faunal remains exhibit similar patterns of butchering techniques, which suggests that human and animal carcasses were similarly processed, with no special or ceremonial treatment to humans, indicating, therefore, cannibalism. (Woodwell, 1967) The elements of the human body were found mixed in with herbivore (human) bone fragments.

This discovery gave an eerie feeling to the reporters because of the unusual findings of high abundance of bone fragments and bone flakes. Carbonell, Pares and Perez-Gonzalez also discovered that the dead carcasses had human bite marks where the joints between the bones attached. These findings proved that the bone fragments were still fresh and that there was some sort of marrow extraction, therefore making the scene a butchering process for consumption of human tissues (Woodwell, 1967).

Cannibalism has been part of Homo antecessor, a species of our ancestors who are no longer living. Our H. antecessor suggests that hunting strategies and human consumption were habitual actions, and were accepted in the social system. Archeologist Kris Hirst explains where 71

cannibalism was first discovered in Gran Dolina, a cave in the Sierra de Atapuerca region of central Spain that is now the most important Paleolithic site in the history of cannibalism: Earliest evidence for human cannibalism was discovered here with six individuals of H. antecessor who were all butchered not by tools, but by teething that matched the marks of human canines. Gran Dolina holds 19 meters of rich, archaeological remains in mostly human bones. The oldest layer of the cave is called the “Aurora Stratum or TD6.” (Hirst, 1999) Archaeostratigraphic (also known as archaea stratigraphic), or the study of composition in soil, claims that cannibalism in TD6 was nutritional, leading our ancestors into seeing consumption of human meat as a good thing (Carbonell, 2010). Discoveries in TD6 revealed that cannibalism was a strategy, and was often labeled as a successful behavior for competition over resources and territories. H. antecessor consisted of cannibalistic behaviors and the practice was transmitted between generations for territorial reasons. These hunter-gatherer groups then became more creative and complex in their strategies, giving each group a functional strategy. This was a cultural response. It was a way of survival.

Humans aren’t the only cannibalistic hunter-gathers—chimpanzees are too. Comparing ourselves to our closest living relatives, chimpanzees are meat- and plant-eating primates who practice cannibalism. Chimpanzees contain 98.8% of the same DNA as humans, having the same genetic component of survival techniques—to protect what is theirs. Just like humans, chimps live in a community where hierarchies are formed. Each territory consists of six chimps and each group is led by one Alpha, the dominant male chimp whom no one can defeat. Adolescent females are allowed to roam freely, but territory is strictly patrolled by other Alphas. If one were to cross over another group’s territory, conflicts are bound to occur (Nonhuman, 2013).

Michael Wilson, a primatologist from the University of Minnesota, analyzed data from 18 different chimpanzee communities across Africa. With his 426-researcher team, he concluded that 152 chimps are killed each year; 58 chimps who are directly killed, 41 chimps who interfere to stop a fight, and 53 chimps who die of injuries consistent with fighting (Wilson, 2014). In 2013, the non-profit organization Nonhuman Rights Project filed a lawsuit in the New York Supreme Court on behalf of four chimps who were used for research by Stony Brook University. The U.S. Court decided that chimps are acknowledged to have rights of their own, not as persons with full human rights, but as beings with a right not to be held in captivity and a right to not be owned: The fact is that chimpanzees really are almost human. Modern genetic studies have shown that this relationship is much closer than people thought. We have nearly 99% of our genetic material in common. And if that one-and-a-bit percent is unquestionably significant, the rest of it takes a fair amount of thinking about. Chimpanzees are more closely related to us than to their—or should it be ou—fellow apes, the gorillas and orangutans. (Nonhuman, 2013) Jane Goodall, British primatologist, ethologist and anthropologist, always had a passion for animals. Therefore she went off to Africa to observe the ways of chimpanzees and changed the way we look at them. During her studies in Gombe National Park in the Western part of Africa in 72

1977, she recorded that Alpha chimps were killing and cannibalizing “strangers” from other family groups whom violated their territory boundaries: It is also well known that chimpanzee males are extremely territorial and that they often have border patrol and hunting parties to defend their territories. Chimpanzee males are the only other species, besides human beings, that exhibit homicidal aggression towards their own species … Male chimpanzees are physically aggressively territorial against other out-groups … Intra-community aggression is commonly witnessed in the chimpanzee world, and this is where primate cannibalism may have its roots. (Goodall, 1977) Although a chimp killing another chimp is natural behavior, the consumption of another chimp isn’t natural. In fact, this was the type of tactic that chimpanzees used to exhibit aggression towards their own species to set the rules. Cannibalism is only executed when territories are invaded. As evolution took place from animal to human, the gradual development of cannibalism became like a gene passed down, starting from the small island of Papua New Guinea.

Papua New Guinea is the last known area where human cannibalism took place as a mortuary ritual in 1959 (Carbonell, 2010). According to Papua New Guinea Tourism, human remains date back to about 50,000 years ago. New Guinea is the oldest territory after Africa and Eurasia became populated by humans and agriculture was independently developed, making it one of the few areas of original plant domestication in the world, starting with sweet potatoes and taro (Papua, 2015).

European navigator Don Jorge de Meneses explored the South Pacific in the early 16th century, and passed by the area of New Guinea. Germany took over in 1884 and called it “German New Guinea.” As Germany settled, Australian military troops barged in and fought off the Germans in 1921 for the country’s coconut oil—a sacred resource. By 1941, Japan snuck into the country and was caught by the Australian military. Then, Australia was forced to surrender in 1945 by the civil administration. Papua New Guinea’s independence was then restored under Papua New Guinea Provisional Administration Act, 1945-46 (Papua, 2015).

The island of New Guinea’s landmass is divided between two countries: the East of Papua New Guinea, where independence was restored, and the West, where Indonesian provinces of Papua are located. In the past, headhunting and cannibalism occurred in this area, and little was known of the inhabitants of Papua until the late 19th century. Currently, Papua New Guinea’s population is seven million Papuans, and more than third of them live in the highlands, where cultures are kept alive. Papua New Guinea Tourism continues to explain that “the traditional Melanesian (Papuans) cultures are kept alive in elaborate rituals that accompany deaths, feasts, marriages, compensation ceremonies and initiation rites” (Paupa, 2015). 80% of Papua New Guinea’s population lives in rural areas, and many tribes are isolated, therefore having little contact with one another and the outside world. The jungles in Southeastern Papua New Guinea are the most sacred, and these are where members of the Korowai tribe are found (Raffaele, 2006).

The Korowai tribe is the last known people on earth to practice cannibalism, as recently as 1959.

Paul Raffaele is an American traveler and researcher who finds new discoveries for the famous Smithsonian, a well-known institution established in 1846 to increase diffusion of knowledge. In 2006, Raffaele traveled to New Guinea on a quest to visit the cannibals along the Ndeiram Kabur River, a river so discrete that you can’t find it on the map of New Guinea. Along Raffaele’s side 73

is Kornelius Kembaren, a 46-year-old native Papuan who has traveled up and down the river for 13 years with little sight of the Korowai. He has very little knowledge of their culture and language, but has picked it up throughout the years. Raffaele says: [Kembaren] has never been this far upriver, because, he says, some Korowai threaten to kill outsiders who enter their territory. Some clans are said to fear those of us with pale skin … Korowai have never laid eyes on a white person. They call outsiders, laleo or “ghost-demons.” (Raffaele, 2006) Paddling up the riverbank, Raffaele spots a naked man waving sharp bows and arrows in the air facing towards him and Kembaren. At this moment, the naked man, who seems to be part of the Korowai, has informed the rest of the tribe. The tribe is now angry because of trespassers. The traditional naked man, however, isn’t naked. He only appears naked because the Korowai push their penises inside their legs, cover them using a hard shell of a fruit, and wrap them off with leaves (Novak, 2011). Kembaren tells the boatmen to stop paddling and whispers to Raffaele, “They’re ordering us to come to their side of the river ... It looks bad, but we can’t escape. They’d quickly catch us if we tried.” Kembaren shouts in Korowai language, “We come in peace. We don’t want to hurt you.” Suddenly, more naked men of the tribe show up and start paddling towards Raffaele and Kembaren. Kembaren ends with, “Keep calm” (Raffaele, 2006).

Korowai is one of the very few tribes believed to eat human flesh, and most of them still live with little knowledge of the outside world. All they know are their homelands. According to Raffaele’s research data, the best estimate is that there are at least 4,000 Korowai. They are traditionally known to have lived in tree houses in groups of dozens, compared to the chimpanzees, who also live in groups. While most Korowai carry bows and arrows, others stay home in the tree houses keeping an eye out for laleo. The laleo, translated to “ghost-demons,” often refers to the lightskinned population such as Europeans and Americans. The Korowai, mentioned earlier, only know their homelands and the appearance of their people, so spotting white people is considered unusual, therefore they are outsiders. With little knowledge of the world, laleo are not welcomed into Korowai territory because they are not one of them. Some tourists have ventured into the Korowai lands, but the deeper the tourists go in, the fewer come out. Dutch missionaries in the 1970’s came to Korowai lands to convert people to Christianity, but were kicked out instantly.

Dutch missionaries then called Papua New Guinea “the hell in the south.”

Raffaele and Kembaren were not able to cross the border within Ndeiram Kabur River, but were able to have close enough contact with a true tribesman of the Korowai (Raffaele, 2006). Korowai are, however, not cannibalistic because of dominance. They are cannibalistic because of cultural beliefs. The “hell in the south” is only called hell because of how territorial and condensed the Korowai are, and how unaccepting they are to white, Dutch missionaries. The Korowai don’t know much beyond their own environment. In fact, the idea of buildings, automobiles, and any other type of technology-based item is considered “an invasion from another galaxy” (Raffaele, 2011). Therefore, whoever they don’t recognize is consider ghost-demons—people whom the tribesmen should fear.

According to Knowledgenuts.com, a website that draws the line between what is said and what is actually true, in the article “The Culture that Still Practices Cannibalism,” Debra Kelly talks about 74

the southeastern Papua New Guinea tribe. To the Korowai, consumption of another human is part of a ritual to keep the members of their tribe safe from a demon called the “Khakhua, a creature that disguises itself as a close friend or family member. He then chooses a person to summon.

When the victim is asleep, the creature, who is now inside someone, will slowly begin to eat other people. In other words, the Khakhua is disguised as a tribesman, who will start devouring the innards of another tribesmen. While the victim is dying, he will mention the name of the Khakhua who devoured him. That person is now no longer considered a close friend or family member, but considered a demon. The Khakhua is then killed by the tribe with a bone arrow, carved with deep barbs on each side of the arrowhead, then consumed. The preparation of the Khakhua is almost similar to the way pigs are cooked at a fiesta. The Khakhua is dismembered and cooked, then almost entirely consumed by the tribe’s adults, from the Khakhua’s soft innards such as organs, lungs, heart, and so forth. The rest, such as teeth, hair, genitals, fingernails, toenails and bones, are left outside the tribe’s tree house as a warning to future Khakhua. The website explains that: It’s important to distinguish that to the Korowai, they do not believe they’re eating a person—they are eating the khakhua. To a culture that holds revenge in very high regard, they are doing to the witch what that witch did to one of their human tribesmen. To them, this cannibalism is justice, and will be served no matter who the person was. Even children can become khakhua, but they are traditionally not killed and eaten until puberty. Children do not, however, take part in the eating of a Khakhua (Kelly, 2013).

As human cannibalism is considered horrific in an average person’s eye, the Korowai believe that the consumption of another person is considered as a “strengthener” to the family. The ritual of the Khakhua is becoming less common as the Korowai are slowly being exposed to the outside world. In some areas of Papua New Guinea, law enforcement is now being stricter about the ritual killings (Kelly, 2013). White people are also still not accepted in the area, and are still referred as laleos. Since the Korowai live deep in into the jungles of Papua New Guinea, they are more prone and commonly exposed to infectious diseases such as malaria and tuberculosis. However, the Korowai do not believe diseases exist, but instead, believe that if someone is almost to their end of life, the presence of a Khakhua is nearby (Kelly, 2013).

There are no laws against cannibalism, but the act is considered unlawful. Samantha Pegg at Nottingham Trent University says that offenses of cannibalism are barely brought up; therefore, laws against it don’t exist. This could possibly relate to the fact that human cannibalism is “immoral,” therefore the law doesn’t worry too much about people committing the act. However, the process of preparing for cannibalism is unlawful (Khaleeli, 2015). For example, let’s say the Korowai live in Lae, the second-largest city in Papua New Guinea, and they are familiar with the laleos. If one of the tribesmen in the Korowai were to see a dead person on the road, they would be able to consume their innards. Of course public shaming and horrific responses from the Papuans will be negative, but the Korowai won’t be charged with murder because the person is already dead. However, put the Korowai in a position when they are on a mission to purposely target and kill someone with a bone arrow, then consume their innards. That’s when the law will get involved and the tribesman will be charged with murder.

Another place where the law won’t get involved is when it comes to survival. Dr. Roberto Canessa is a survivor of the October 12, 1972, Andes flight disaster. On his website dedicated to the plane 75

crash, he explains in detail how he had no choice but to eat the flesh of the deceased who were on the flight with him. Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571 was transporting a team of 45 rugby players to Santiago de Chile to compete in a competition, but extreme weather had to force the plane down for an overnight delay in Mendoza, Argentina (Canessa, 2016). The next morning, the plane departed and continued towards Santiago de Chile. A couple hours into the flight, Flight 571 crashed into an unnamed peak within the Andes Mountains. Five people died and seven people were declared missing. Thirty-three players survived the flight; the two pilots did not.

Two weeks later, with still no signs of missing people or help, an avalanche drowned the plane, killing eight more people. Twenty-five survivors were left. Two months in, help was yet to come and the remaining survivors had little food and no source of heat in the harsh conditions of being 11,800 feet above ground. Food consisted of alcohol, granola bars, chocolate, and airplane food.

Faintly overheard from the radio, the search for Flight 571 had been abandoned. The survivors were now considered missing by the public. A couple of days after the announcement, nine people died from starvation, and 16 remained left. Freezing cold, hungry and desperate, Canessa and four of his teammates were all holding razor blades and broken glass and gathered around their dead friend: Our common goal was to survive … After just a few days we were feeling the sensation of our own bodies consuming themselves just to remain alive. Before long we would become too weak to recover from starvation. We knew the answer, but it was too terrible to contemplate. The bodies of our friends and team-mates, preserved outside in the snow and ice, contained vital, life-giving protein that could help us survive. But could we do it? ... I will never forget that first incision nine days after the crash .We laid the thin strips of frozen flesh aside on a piece of sheet metal. Each of us came to our own decision in our own time and once we had done so, it was irreversible. (Canessa, 2016) Deciding as a group to eat the innards of another teammate was the hardest decision of surviving.

The rest of the survivors refused to eat human flesh because of their strong religious convictions (since most of the survivors were Roman Catholic), but then followed Canessa and his team in cannibalistic behaviors in order to stay alive. The traumatized remaining nine passengers from Flight 571 were then rescued on December 12, 1972—72 days after the accident—by a patrol helicopter. They were brought to the city of Santiago, their original destination. Canessa, his teammates, and the remaining passengers missed their competition and were not charged with murder, for the reason of survival (Canessa, 2016).

Papua New Guinea and the 1972 Andes flight disaster aren’t the only known cannibalistic stories.

Other sites of evidence for human cannibalism are located in the Neanderthal of Moula-Guercy, France; Middle Paleolithic Klasies River Caves, South Africa; Neolithic Fontbregoua, France; Anasazi Cowboy Wash, United States; Aztecs of 15th Century, Mexico; and the Donner Party, United States (Hirst, 1999). The classical human cannibalism of our Homo species of ancestry, the endocannibalism of primates, and the exocannibalism of Papua New Guinea Korowai tribe all show evidence of consumption of one of the same species. The Alpha and the Khakhua all share territorial expression in different ways, whether physically fighting to one’s death or spiritually enduring to one’s end of life. However, positive outcomes result from the three cannibalisms.

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First, there is no law against consumption of another human being, but there are restrictions against it, such as you cannot kill someone purposely to consume their innards. The person would have to be legally dead already in order to devour some one’s internal organs. Second, Alpha chimpanzees are very territorial when it comes to family, almost like us humans when we protect what is ours. The consumption of another primate shows dominance to the Alpha and the family, that no other Alpha or family member from a different group should cross borders with one another. Finally, people from “the hell from the south,” the Korowai, are the last known tribe to practice cannibalism under ritual circumstances in 1959. The return of the Khakhua is extremely feared in their culture; therefore, the consumption of the demon strengthens the family to keep the Khakhua away from their tree house.

Arguably, cannibalism isn’t always as immoral as it might seem. Eating the innards of your own kind can make you become the Alpha and shield your family from predators to display dominance, could protect your loved ones from harm and warn the next Khakhua against entering your tree house, and could help you survive in desperate times in need. Under the right circumstances, cannibalism is, and could be your next, last resort. Just ask Roberto Canessa and his teammates, who are still alive from eating the un-alive (Bever, 2016).

REFERENCES Bever, L. (2016). Cannibalism: Survivor of the 1972 Andes plane crash describes the “terrible” decision he had to make to stay alive. Independent. Retrieved from http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/cannibalism-andes-plane-crash1972-survivors-terrible-decision-stay-alive-a6895781.html in 2016. Web. Hirst, K. (2013). Gran Dolina (Spain). Lower and middle Paleoithic cave site. Retrieved from http://archaeology.about.com/od/gterms/qt/gran_dolina.htm in 2016. Web. Canessa, R. (2016). The Andes. I Had to Survive: How A Plane Crash in the Andes Inspired My Calling to Save Lives. Retrieved from http://www.drcanessa.com in 2016. Web. Carbonell, E., Caceres, I., Lozano, M., Saladie, P., Rosell, J., Lorenzo, R., Castro, J. (2010).

Cultural cannibalism as a paleoeconomic system in European lower Pleistocene. The Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research. Retrieved from http://www.unl.edu/rhames/courses/current/readings/antecessor-canibal.pdf in 2016.

Web. Khaleeli, H. (2015). Eating people is wrong, but is it against the law? The Guardian. Retrieved from http://www.theguardian.com/law/shortcuts/2015/dec/16/eating-people-is-wrongbut-is-it-against-the-law in 2016. Web. Kelly, D. (2013). The culture that still practices cannibalism. Differences. Knowledge Nuts.

Retrieved fromhttp://knowledgenuts.com/2013/10/28/the-culture-that-still-practicescannibalism/ in 2016. Web. Novak, J. (2011). Before writing about the Korowai, I have to say this. Vanishing World 77

Photography. Retrieved from http://vanishingworldphotography.com/korowai-kombaitribe.html in 2016. Web. Papua New Guinea. (2015). About Papua New Guinea. Papua New Guinea history. A Million Different Journeys. Retrieved from http://www.papuanewguinea.travel/papuanewguineaculture in 2016. Web. Raffaele, P. (2006). Sleeping with cannibals. Smithsonian.com. Retrieved from http://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel/sleeping-with-cannibals-128958913/?no-ist in 2016. Web. Stanford, C. (2011). The predatory behavior and ecology of wild chimpanzees. University of California. Retrieved from https://www-bcf.usc.edu/~stanford/chimphunt.html in 2016.

Web. Woodwell, G. (1967). Evidence of early cannibalism. Woods Hole Research Center. Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Yolanda_Fernandez_Jalvo/publication/14647581_E vidence_of_Early_Cannibalism/links/0046353bc34d48019d000000.pdf in 2016. Web.

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Aya-what-sca? A Brief Overview of the Traditional Amazonian Brew

By Sage Bennett It was a warm August evening in California—nothing special or out of the ordinary. My little old Victorian style abode smelled like fresh spaghetti that I had slaved away on all day. My tiny little kitchen permeated with the mouthwatering scent of authentic Italian garlic bread toasting away in the oven. My young son, Kyle, was rustling around upstairs on our squeaky, maple-stained wooden floors as he vigorously packed his lightly used bags to venture out on his “life changing” Amazonian escape. Being a concerned mother of triplets, I knew that this attempt for my youngest to “find himself” would lead to nothing but problems. He had recently dropped out of junior college, and felt like his life was going nowhere. He was only eighteen years old (well, when compared to me, I guess you could say eighteen years young) — eighteen years way too young.

This little boy, my little boy that I once rocked back and forth as he cried through the night when he was just a precious baby, was so convinced that this newly trending concoction I had never even heard of could change his life. This Amazonian brew was called ayahuasca, and my 18-yearold son would soon be hopping on a plane to fly thousands of miles away in search of some very serious solutions.

I am a pretty level-headed mother. I tried to be understanding, but I knew that something so strange and out of the ordinary would lead to no good. I forced him to do research. I told him that this idea scared me, but this was his life to live. I let him go. I spent the next few days endlessly seeking evidence that would prove that this was all a bunch of “BS.” From the initial research, I found that ayahuasca is made from the “vine Banisteriopsis caapi (called caapi) and the leaf Psychotria viridis, (known as chakruna). Ayahuasca is considered among natives in the Amazon to be a sacred plant medicine” ("Ayahuasca: A Plant for Healing the Soul”). Why is this plant so special? The vine that gives birth to this transitive experience contains harmala alkaloids.

These compounds are MAO inhibitors. They prevent the activity of naturally-occurring agents in our bodies called monoamine oxidase. Think of MAO’s as doormen standing in front of the nightclub of your brain. Psychoactive compounds, notably the potent visioninducing agent DMT, want to get into the club and attach themselves to your brain’s receptors. But the MAO doormen prevent this from happening. The harmala alkaloids in Banisteriopsis caapi, however, tell the doormen to take a nice long coffee break. They do.

That’s when the Psychotria viridis, rich in DMT (N,N Dimethyl Tryptamine), comes into play. DMT is the most potent vision-inducing agent known. And oddly, DMT is not only found in many hundreds of plants all around the world, but it is also manufactured in our own bodies. But thanks to MAO’s, we do not trip on DMT all day long. ("Ayahuasca: A Plant for Healing the Soul”) Ayahuasca is said to produce very intense visuals, and completely alter reality as we know it. This is no party drug, this is a deep-rooted psychedelic adventure — generally too intense for the average recreational drug user. According to Kenneth W. Tupper of the Clinical & Scientific Advisory Board of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies and contributor to The Healing 80

Power of Spirituality: How Faith Helps Humans Thrive, the use of ayahuasca or other psychedelics may seem unheard of or even taboo, but “substances used in psychedelic medicine come from plants that have an older history of therapeutic use, in cultural traditions that long predate the Enlightenment and its emphasis on materialist understandings of the body” (Tupper 3). It is said that shamans have been practicing the use of ayahuasca for thousands of years, but its use by the general public did not come about until around 30 years ago.

Many individuals who do not understand the concept of using psychedelics for medicinal use may not know that in the history of American health, the idea of mind-altering treatments was greatly considered. Tupper mentioned that: Among the drugs that were held to have considerable promise were chemicals that became known as “hallucinogens” or psychedelics. By the mid-1960s, early clinical investigations into these novel compounds had yielded positive results for some patients, and psychedelic medicine was widely regarded as a promising branch of psychiatry. (Tupper 2) This unconventional new idea was quickly shut down as “drug use trends among young people in the late 1960s and 1970s provoked … reactions that resulted in strict prohibitions on any kind of use of these substances or their natural plant forms, making even controlled scientific research impossible” (Tupper 2). This abuse and exploitation of drugs destroyed any possible chance for proving to Western society that unconventional, non-allopathic, or entheogenic medicine such as psychedelics should be considered for medicinal use like common prescription drugs.

In recent years, we have seen a new age of thrill chasers. These individuals are considered “drug tourists.” They travel the world to experience drugs such as ayahuasca that are illegal where they live. If people are so willing to travel all around the world to experience this mystical concoction, why has there not been more research released to explain whether or not claims for its effects are legitimate? As I anxiously sit here practically begging for answers, I desperately wish that I could find more information so that somehow, just maybe, some case study would convince me that my son would be okay.

As my research continued, I found that many figures in modern culture have joined this movement towards so-called “self-healing” and “spiritual enlightenment.” Lindsay Lohan and Sting have acted as front-runners in the race for change. Lohan recently mentioned on her reality TV show that she dealt with her miscarriage through the use of ayahuasca in a shamanic experience (Alexander). In an article for Today magazine, journalist Brian Alexander stated that Lohan is “among several celebrities who say they have turned to ayahuasca in the belief that drinking it can help resolve the confusions of modern life, ease addictions or boost a person’s spiritual and mental well-being” (Alexander).

This shift of attitudes in Western society suggests the legitimacy and validity of ayahuasca, but this still is not completely convincing of its safety. People would not flock to remote areas of the world to experience something that would not change them in some way or another, but at the same time, why would such famous figures openly speak out positively about something so illegal?

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While digging deeper into the mysterious tale of Amazonian ayahuasca, I found several horror stories about how painful and invasive this drug can be. I wondered if these stories would hold true for my beloved son. According to Kelly Hearn, correspondent to National Geographic News and writer at Men’s Journal, ayahuasca can be a killer. This is a terrifying idea. Hearn mentions that the world of ayahuasca tourism has shown quite a dark side in recent years, creating fake forms of the drugs, facilitating manipulative activities, and scamming people out of thousands of dollars (Hearn). Several stories in particular are extremely shocking: In the past few years alone, a young German woman was allegedly raped and beaten by two men who had administered ayahuasca to her, two French citizens died while staying at ayahuasca lodges, and stories persist about unwanted sexual advances and people losing their marbles after being given overly potent doses. The age of ayahuasca as purely a medicinal, consciousness-raising pursuit seems like a quaint and distant past. (Hearn) Hearing of these terrifying occurrences is very alarming to most. These terrifying testimonies are enough to cause a mother to jump on a plane and save her open-minded children before they could take their first sip of this mistake.

Another fairly recent story discusses a Canadian man stabbing another man to death during a ceremony. In Newsweek Magazine, Lucy Wescott, a United Nations correspondent, was able to obtain a comment from the man who allegedly stabbed another man to death. This story shocked drug enthusiasts, researchers, and readers all over the world. Most sources emphasize the fact that ayahuasca is not a violent drug, but the actions that occurred at this particular retreat were far more than violent. A young Canadian man named Joshua Stevens claimed in an interview with CTV News that Unais Gomes, the man who attacked him, had indeed taken a double dose of the tea, and became fairly reckless (Wescott).

The interview continues to paint a harsh and petrifying story. Stevens used a “big butcher knife” to stab Gomes in the chest and stomach, which he says was in self-defense: “‘If he gets his knife back, he’s either going to kill me or the other two men here,’ said Stevens; ‘that’s when I made the decision to stab Unais’” (Wescott). Essentially, Stevens hardly had a choice about whether or not to act on his instincts. Not only was this decision difficult, but Stevens was also under the influence of a highly psychoactive drug.

This story raises a very serious question: If Stevens was able to kill, if many shamans rape and mutilate, and if drug tourists continue to go missing, is ayahuasca actually worth it? All of these instances point toward a very simply drawn conclusion: Ayahuasca is just too risky and untested, and there is just not enough evidence to back its safety.

To balance out these disgusting tales of murder, death, and mistreatment, I tried to find out why exactly these tourists (much like my son) give their hearts and souls to this foreign drink. It was easy to find that many people all over the world have been positively affected by the power of ayahuasca, despite the inherent risks associated with it. In addition, despite negative push-back from Western society, no statistics on ayahuasca-related deaths are recorded or documented anywhere by the U.S. Little has been done to prove that all the testimonies and proclamations of ayahuasca as a savior and medicinal healer are not true. There is virtually no hard evidence.

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In the case of the recent death of a young California boy, as reported by Tricia Escobedo, CNN editor, writer, and curator, it was found that this young man passed away and was hidden by the shaman while panicking (Escobedo). The shaman did not intentionally kill him. It is said that “It's still unclear how ayahuasca can kill someone,” after autopsies of the young man were still inconclusive (Escobedo).

Very little is known about ayahuasca and its effects and many shamanic centers, including the Shimbre Shamanic Center (where the young man died), require participants to cleanse their bodies for several months before taking ayahuasca—a regiment that Oswald (his mother) said her son followed very closely. (Escobedo) Despite this horrible instance, his mother continues to speak out in an attempt to cry for help. She desires further research and wants to warn other ayahuasca followers around the world to be weary of the misunderstandings, uncertainties, and riskiness of unregulated ayahuasca (Escobedo). This hunger for answers has the potential to light a forest fire of knowledge. More information must be released.

Though there have only been a handful of proclaimed ayahuasca death stories, those few instances have completely destroyed the overall perception of what ayahuasca is and how safe or dangerous it may be. Many declared “deaths” by ayahuasca have strange twists to them, often skewing the interpretation of the story. In Time and Mind, the Journal of Archaeology, Consciousness and Culture, the topic of contrived and bogus tales of drugs deaths is discussed. David Luke, a specialist in psychology and ethnobotany, addressed the issue of deceptive stories in the media, stating that misinterpretations of alleged deaths as due to ayahuasca are detrimental to the image of the medicine. He mentions a case where “‘an epileptic informant in Iquitos was given ayahuasca, and during a seizure that followed, she fell into the river and drowned,’” thus giving the impression that the death was a result of ayahuasca (Luke). However, the original report says that the girl had epilepsy, and after taking ayahuasca twice, travelled to Brazil, where she drowned in a river during a convulsion (Luke).

More often than not, media sways readers to misinterpret what really happened, as is seen in the above example. Society has created an “anti-drug” or western-focused medical system, and any foreign idea that has astronomical potential could quite possibly destroy the money-making system we call American health care. By falsely blaming ayahuasca for deaths, more and more individuals begin to wrongly believe that this so-called “drug” is highly dangerous, despite significant scientific evidence stating otherwise. To combat this anti-drug propaganda, many individuals reach out to explain just how life-changing ayahuasca can be. This has shown to be effective in drawing a bigger following of the medicine each year. After reading about the misunderstandings, it is easy to see just how desirable this quick fix may seem to someone desperately in need—my son.

As strange as this all sounds, I am not the mother of a young boy who ventured out into the strange and perplexing world of psychedelic entheogenic healing. While dipping my toes into the world of unconventional medicine and spiritual enlightenment, I began researching all aspects of my new found interest, ayahuasca. I stumbled upon many success stories, but desired some harsh examples of what could happen in case things go wrong. During this research, I found a story in Time 83

Magazine by journalist Kharunya Paramaguru that explained the story of an 18-year-old California boy, Kyle Nolan, mentioned earlier. During an ayahuasca ceremony, Nolan passed away and his shaman hid his body for fear of trouble with the government: I am a 19 year old college student who was merely seeking some sort of strange and transitive enlightenment. My mind-blowing experience is a very different tale when compared to the various horror and success stories that are invading the World Wide Web as we know it. My story is nothing like that of Kyle Nolan. When asked about ayahuasca, I generally proclaim that beautiful things can blossom from excruciating pain and angst.

When a mother sends her young child out to learn to ride his first two-wheeled bike, she knows that the child will fall. She knows that her lovely son or daughter will shed tears, and maybe even a little blood. She knows that by falling and getting up over and over again, her child will eventually figure things out and in the end, will grasp the concept.

Learning to ride a bike is much like my personal experience with the alluring vine of the soul. In preparation for my respective affair with mother aya, I reminded myself that everything would be okay in the end, and if everything was not okay, it would not be the end of my plunge into the hallucinogenic canyon of doom.

After quickly downing the festering dark brown concoction, I slowly dove into a deep overbearing psychedelic trance. I knew that I would fall time and time again. “Let yourself fall, Sage,” I would tell myself, “fall, fall hard, learn something.” I knew from the moment I was given that little yellow purging bucket and a fluffy memory foam mat that I would be in for a very rough ride. Mama aya grabbed me by my throat and beat the living crap out of me; she left bruises and even swollen eyes from crying. She left me with a terrible stomach ache, a sore throat, and the most disgusting rotting taste that I had ever had permeating my mouth. All of the unbearable pain and agony was for a reason—that is why people take ayahuasca. That is why shamans have used this peculiar medley for thousands of years. The suffering and misery produces a later feeling of bliss, harmony, and health.

The suffering made me glow.

When I finally awoke from my transcendent experience, I reminisced on the moment when I rode down my perennial-lined gravel driveway for the first time in the middle of August, when I was only four years old. All of the falls and skinned knees were totally worth it. If I had never fallen, I would have never been able to experience the highest of all sober highs, soaring and racing down neighborhood hills with my childhood best friends on my little blue two-wheeled bike. Riding a bike and taking an Amazonian brew are fairly similar in my freshly awoken eyes.

I am awake. I am very awake. I fell so hard just to stand back up stronger than ever.

Sometimes you have to go to hell and back only to warm your soul. Sometimes you have to fall a few times before you can truly learn. Sometimes you have to get knocked down lower than you have ever been to stand up taller than you ever were. (Paramaguru) Ayahuasca has changed and impacted so many lives around the world, undeniably, it should be further researched. One source states that “ethnobotanical organizations are trying to raise money to study ayahuasca and its medicinal qualities, as well as create a health guide for tourists interested 84

in traveling to shamanic centers in the Amazon, but the efforts are few and far between. This is why the government must step off of its high horse and try to understand the severity of this ‘drug’ or ‘medicine’” (Escobedo).

The fact that there have been alleged deaths as well as diseases cured by this mysterious ancient drink gives all the reason there should be extensive analysis and reconsideration for its potential in the medical field, more specifically in the western medical field. If ayahuasca were not worth understanding, there would be no ancestry, there would be no shamans, and there would be no following. Regardless of whether one believes that it is a killer or a life saver, mothers who have lost children to it, struggling individuals considering trying it, and just about anyone else in the world deserves to understand just how it works.

The fact that this impactful “drug” or “medicine” lacks sufficient research due to biased ideologies birthed by the “War on Drugs” is disgusting. We the people deserve to know. It is a valid statement to say that ayahuasca is a drug and can be potentially dangerous. Anyone would agree that hearing stories of death and mistreatment is concerning, but this is exactly why there needs to be clarification.

Mother Nature offers endless cures and remedies that defy what we call medicine today.

Ayahuasca could be something that humans should avoid, but the world will never know or understand unless there is more effort put towards research. It is not fair to judge the ability of anything or any person without giving it or them a chance. Ayahuasca could be the answer to many problems, but we will never know until we learn more about it.

WORKS CITED Alexander, Brian. "What Is Ayahuasca? Lindsay Lohan's 'cleanse' is Probably Illegal, Causes Vomiting." Today Health and Wellness. N.p., 25 Apr. 2014. Web. "Ayahuasca: A Plant for Healing the Soul | Fox News." Fox News. 05 Jan. 2011. Web. Escobedo, Tricia. "Could This Be the Next Medicinal Marijuana?" CNN. n.d. Web. Hearn, Kelly. "The Dark Side of Ayahuasca." Men's Journal. N.p., 15 Feb. 2013. Web. Luke, David. "A Hallucinogenic Tea, Laced with Controversy: Ayahuasca in the Amazon and the United States." Time and Mind 4.1 (2011): 115-18. Web. Paramaguru, Kharunya. "U.S. Teen Dies After Taking Hallucinogenic Drug, Ayahuasca, in Peru | TIME.com." TIME Health, n.d. Web. 25 Tupper, Kenneth W. The Healing Power of Spirituality: How Faith Helps Humans Thrive. Vol. 3. Santa Barbara, CA: Praeger/ABC-CLIO, 2010. 269-82. Print.

Wescott, Lucy. "‘I Really Thought I Was Going To Die’: Canadian Man Speaks About Killing At Ayahuasca Retreat." NewsWeek. N.p., 13 Jan. 2016. Web. 85

Alternative Medicine

By Mackenzie Otto Medicine has been around for thousands of years. It is only recently that Western medicine came up with more science-based treatments for our bodily problems. However, an option that more and more people are choosing to explore is alternative medicine. Alternative medicine includes just about everything other than what is practiced within the medical method; it includes everything from music therapy to sensory deprivation to chiropractors, and beyond. According to the Webster Dictionary, alternative medicine is defined as “any of various systems of healing or treating disease (as chiropractic, homeopathy, or faith healing) not included in the traditional medical curricula of the United States and Britain.”

Now, some of these forms of medical practices were around long before any sort of conventional medicine developed, but due to the success of conventional treatments, these have been overlooked or simply forgotten by many until recently. More and more people are looking to experiment with these other options due to personal beliefs, desire to have control over one’s own body, or even just dissatisfaction with conventional methods.

It is understandable why alternative methods may be overlooked by conventional methods.

Conventional medicine is “the usual methods of healing or treating disease that are taught in Western medical schools.” Some of the world’s greatest medical discoveries have been through these conventional methods; countless lives have been saved. A big difference between alternative and conventional medical treatments has to do with the person seeking treatment. If a person is looking for a quick fix and not willing to make a lifestyle change, then he or she may opt for the conventional method. On the contrary, if someone is willing to put in some work and make changes in their life for the better, they may be more open to alternative methods. Granted, not all problems can necessarily be fixed by one method alone. More serious issues such as cancer usually require conventional methods, but can often be accompanied by some alternative methods.

Alternative or “complementary” medicine has been around for many years, and there are plenty of reasons that individuals choose to go this route. One reason is dissatisfaction with conventional medicine. I interviewed a woman by the name of Bertha Jung, who dealt with an instance of being unsatisfied with conventional medicine. Mrs. Jung is in her early 60s and her mother, Dorothy, in her early eighties, lives with her in order that she can keep an eye on her due to her age and declining health. Dorothy has, for the most part, lived a healthy life, with the exception of some minor heart problems. Within the last few years Dorothy has been having trouble with her memory and often forgets her own family members. Her daughter, Mrs. Jung, took her to see her doctor and mentioned to him the recent memory loss. In return the doctor prescribed a long list of medication, with one to help improve her memory being among them.

After a few days of taking this medicine, Mrs. Jung noticed a quick decline in her mother’s health.

Dorothy grew very weak and was thought to be on her deathbed. Her family was extremely worried about her and did not want to see her suffer. Dorothy has always, for the most part, been in good health, so this decline was especially unexpected. Fortunately, her daughter is in the health field and decided to limit the amount of medicine Dorothy taking and began to eliminate the prescriptions that she didn’t think were crucial to her life, such as the memory loss one. Within 86

days, Dorothy was much stronger than in previous weeks, and she started to become more of her old, sassy self again.

I asked Mrs. Jung how she felt about almost losing her mother to a medicine prescribed by a doctor and her response was, “It was scary. I’m not usually one to doubt medical doctors, but I now find myself questioning what motivates them to prescribe the medications that they do.” It is troublesome to have such a worry when you are putting your life in the hands of these individuals.

This raises the argument of whether doctors are doing what is best for their patients or what is best for their bank accounts. But what could have been done to help with Dorothy’s memory loss that is safe for her as well?

There have been other treatment methods found to help improve the memory of those suffering from dementia, such as music therapy (MT). Dementia is defined by the Alzheimer’s Foundation of America (AFA) as “a general term that describes a group of symptoms—such as loss of memory, judgment, language, complex motor skills, and other intellectual function—caused by the permanent damage or death of the brain's nerve cells, or neurons” (AFA). There are millions of Americans who suffer from this disease every day. Because of this, there should be more research conducted in order to prevent an increase, and MT may help. According to the American Music Therapy Association, or AMTA, music therapy is “the clinical and evidence-based use of music interventions to accomplish individualized goals within a therapeutic relationship by a credentialed professional who has completed an approved music therapy program” (AMTA).

Music therapy is obviously a safer choice to treating dementia compared to using antipsychotic drugs. According to R. Blackburn, Senior Lecturer at the School of Nursing, Midwifery and Social Work at the University of Manchester, antipsychotic drugs are often prescribed to those with mild forms of dementia to help deal with “challenging” behaviors, and often cause dizziness and fatigue, which can in turn lead to increased amounts of falling and injuries (Blackburn 880). By putting more research into music therapy and its benefits, we can hopefully avoid the need to prescribe these kinds of medicines. There are plenty of cases in which taking medication results in side effects that are worse than what the medicine is actually supposed to be healing, Dorothy being one example. However, with this new concept of music therapy, maybe we can avoid more of these cases and have more confidence in what is being prescribed by our doctors.

There are two forms of music therapy that can be used in order to improve the condition of patients developing dementia. These types are known as active MT and passive MT. Active MT involves the patient participating in the making of the music through singing or playing an instrument.

Passive MT has the patient focus more on listening to music. Both of these methods include using music that is individualized to the preferences of the patient. Genres are based on what music was popular during the early adulthood phase of the patient’s life (Blackburn 881).

Music therapy offers a variety of positive effects for someone dealing with dementia, such as “positive changes in mood, reduction in depression and reduced frequency of agitated or aggressive behaviors, increased awareness of self and environment, non-pharmacological management of pain” (AMTA). Music therapy is a risk-free treatment that doctors should suggest before deciding to write a prescription with a hard-to-pronounce name that comes with a long list of side effects. Knowing some of the benefits of music therapy for treating dementia, why are 87

medical doctors not trying to research more of this instead of prescribing the medications that they so often do? Is there an incentive to recommending a certain drug rather than having patients simply listen to music?

In a video on TEDMED called “What Your Doctor Won’t Disclose,” I learned about some of the things that doctors do not want disclosed to their patients, such as how they are being paid. The narrator, Leana Wen, is a medical doctor who came up with the idea to start a campaign called “Who’s My Doctor?” This was intended for doctors to voluntarily disclose information about themselves that a patient may find useful to know when deciding who they can trust with their health. What Wen did not expect was all the backlash directed at her. Doctors were angry at her for making them feel like they had to tell their patients information that may reflect back negatively on them (Wen). For example, the doctors did not want their patients knowing about endorsements they may be getting from pharmaceutical companies, in fear that they will lose the trust of their patients. It even went so far as Wen receiving bomb threats. All of this is suggesting that some of our doctors may have something to hide.

Although the doctors brought up arguments such as having loans to pay off and that they should not have to disclose where the money for that is coming from, Wen pointed out that participation was meant to be voluntary. Another argument made by these doctors was that patients do not have to disclose where their income comes from, so they should not have to, either. Once again, Wen mentioned that this was voluntary, but also that the patients’ income does not affect the doctors’ health.

It could be argued that all of these complaints are make patients wonder what it is that their doctors feel the need to hide. Wen went on to ask, “Don’t we have the right to know whether our doctor is being paid $5,000 for spinal surgery as opposed to $25 for a physical therapist referral?” (Wen).

If they are not taking “bribes” from pharmaceutical companies or making decisions based on how much money they will make, then why should they be ashamed of where their income is coming from? Why are doctors not recommending other, preventative forms of health care as opposed to prescribing a pill? These suspicions make it difficult to fully trust our doctors, and can therefore lead to patients seeking alternative methods to healing.

As mentioned in the TED video, our relationships with our doctors are “deeply personal,” and “just because the doctor sees every patient, doesn’t mean the patient should see every doctor” (Wen).

We share information with our doctors that we would not share with anyone else. Therefore, trust is a big deal. Many times, doctors know some “embarrassing” things about their patients’ health, sensitive information their patients would not want disclosed. That being said, patients are putting all their trust in their doctors, and they should feel confident in their health care providers. When patients lack trust in their doctors, they may go looking for other ways to solve their health problems. For example, if a person is dealing with migraines, they may go to the doctor for advice on how to “fix” the problem. They should be able to trust that their doctor is going to give them advice that is relevant to them specifically, and not just recommend whatever is going to make them the most money.

This is why more and more patients are choosing to go the alternative route and not just fix the symptom, but actually heal their whole bodies. If you ease a symptom, it is easy to assume the 88

problem is gone, but that is not always the case. This is the difference between conventional and alternative methods. However, conventional methods are not completely bad. There is, in fact, a plus side to using them.

In the book Trick or Treatment by Simon Singh and Edzard Ernest, MD., we can explore whether one method—alternative or conventional—is better than the other. One of the first quotes from this book reads, “If someone proposed a new medical treatment, then Hippocrates declared that we should use science to decide whether or not it works, rather than relying on somebody’s opinion” (Singh & Ernest). Singh and Ernest make a good point about how medicine should be researched. We have such advanced science these days, and when something is scientifically proven, it is almost impossible to deny it. That is where a big problem between alternative and conventional medicine comes into play: “Without evidence-based medicine, we risk falling into the trap of considering useless treatments as helpful and helpful treatments as useless” (Singh and Ernest 35).

When researching alternative medicine, we often come across words such as “natural” or “ancient,” and automatically assume that there is no harm in trying these methods. What we sometimes fail to realize is that in some more serious cases, time is crucial, and we may not have enough time to explore other options that may or may not work. For example, if someone has cancer and opts to try a more “natural” remedy instead of going for chemotherapy or radiation first, and that alternative method fails, it may be too late for them to recover using conventional methods. That is one of the problems with exploring alternative options—there is usually not enough evidence to prove that it will work, and it is therefore often a gamble. Because there is so much research and evidence behind conventional medicine, it is hard to deny its success.

Countless lives are saved every day due to the success of evidence-based medicine, and for that, many are grateful.

Conventional medicine is science-based and can be proven to work, but alternative medicine is much harder to prove due to lack of understanding. It is hard to deny the helpfulness of conventional methods. However, with a little more effort by the patient, alternative medicine can be just as effective—if not more. A quality often associated with the conventional method of medicine is laziness because, while alternative medicine is often used as a preventive treatment and often could require lifestyle changes, conventional medicine usually fixes symptoms with a simple pill that, while effective, causes almost no inconvenience to the patient.

There are plenty of pros and cons to each of these methods, but one con to alternative medicine is health insurance. Many patients do not get the opportunity to try alternative health methods because in most cases they are not covered. Millions of people use Medicaid, a governmentfunded health care program, as their main source of health ,insurance for various reasons such as having a low income, being disabled, and so forth (“New and Notable”). While this is an important program that provides security to those who cannot afford better health coverage, there are a lot of missed opportunities under this plan. Terrance E. Streyer, assistant professor of family medicine at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston, states that many forms of alternative medicine are not covered by these government-funded health programs, but the form that seems to be covered the most is chiropractic care (Streyer 86). In the data collected, 71.7% of programs that responded cover chiropractic services.

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While having your chiropractor covered by Medicaid is a good thing, there are so many other methods of medicine that some unfortunate patients will not get the opportunity to try because they cannot afford it. Although some states do cover more than one form of alternative medicine, many times patients have to go to great lengths to get it approved. Streyer states that “the most common limitations included allowing only specific diagnoses to be covered, e.g., chiropractic services allowed only for low back pain; limiting the number of visits to a CAM practitioner; and requiring referral from an allopathic primary care physician” (Streyer 85). Some methods of CAM, complementary and alternative medicine, that are covered less commonly include acupressure, faith healers, herbal remedies, homeopathy, and massage therapy (Streyer 85).

Why is it that those methods are the ones that are covered less? Should it not be up to the patient to decide what works best for them? At the very least, the patient seeking treatment under state health insurance should be the one to decide which form of alternative medicine is covered.

Medicaid coverage of alternative medical methods has increased, but the percentages of what/how much states cover is still very low. One reason is because there is still lack of research within CAM. One theory is because many people do not get the opportunity to try it. If patients are not experimenting with CAM, they will not see the effects of it, and therefore there will be no push for increased research.

A big factor in who tries alternative medicine and who does not is people’s level of education.

Data shows that those with higher education are more likely to try alternative methods of medicine.

Because education plays a big role, we can conclude that income may be a predictor as well. In the JAMA article “Why Patients Use Alternative Medicine: Results of a National Study,” Stanford University researcher John A. Astin writes that “31% of those with high school education or less reported use compared with 50% of those with graduate degrees …“Education emerged as the one sociodemographic variable that predicted use of alternative medicine; individuals with higher educational attainment were more likely to use alternative forms of health care” (Astin).

It is clear that those who have had more education are more likely to use an alternative health treatment, and another aspect is that those who are more educated tend to be higher up on the economic scale. Because it costs money to further your education, it seems as though those with higher income can afford to try these alternative options. It is often said that life is not fair, and that is clearly the case when it comes to which patients receive better health care. However, this does not make the situation right. As humans we are all equal, and all we deserve to try different health care methods if it means bettering ourselves—especially in life-or-death situations.

An obvious solution would be to have more research conducted in order to better understand how these methods work to get the best health results. Unfortunately, it is not as easy as it seems to conduct research for medical treatments, due to factors such as funding and time. A solution that could be helpful would be taking to social media. It is the twenty-first century, and most of our lives depend highly on the internet. Social media is a powerful tool used to connect people on a global scale. When it comes to alternative medicine, patients should do their research and make the importance of CAM known through sources such as blogs, Facebook, YouTube, and other platforms. If people were to take a stand and make their efforts go viral, change could happen.

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The internet is a powerful place, and it is hard to avoid seeing things that go viral. Not only do adults with declining health need to worry about this, but the younger generation, who will most likely have the same problems as their elders if they don’t begin preventative treatments now, have to worry also. If we can get people interested and expand their knowledge, then there is real hope for the future of alternative and complementary medicine not only being more accessible, but also for accumulating the funds to support research.

It is clear that there is still a long way to go for alternative and complementary medicine to be accepted, but without patients pushing for it, it will never advance. If you are to take anything from this essay, make it the fact that alternative medicine could be worth your time and energy if you give it a chance. We should be able to trust our doctors and not have any doubt that our best interest is at heart when we confide in them. No one should have to wonder if the pill they are prescribed is necessary, or if it is just another check going into the doctor’s pocket. Imagine that Dorothy was your own great-grandmother, and you had to watch her suffer due to a pill her doctor prescribed her when something as risk-free as listening to some music could have done the same job. Alternative medicine is worth the time and funding, but we need to speak up in order to make its importance known.

WORKS CITED "Alzheimer's Foundation of America - Alzheimer's Disease and Caregiving Support." Alzheimer's Foundation of America - Alzheimer's Disease and Caregiving Support. N.p., n.d. Web. "American Music Therapy Association." American Music Therapy Association. N.p., n.d. Web. Astin, John A. "Why Patients Use Alternative Medicine." JAMA: Journal of the American Medical Association 279.19 (n.d.): n.p. Web. Blackburn, R. "Music Therapy for Service Users with Dementia: A Critical Review of the Literature." Journal of Psychiatric & Mental Health Nursing 21.10 (2014): 879-88.

EBSCOHOST. Dec. 2014. Web. "New & Notable." Medicaid Home. N.p., n.d. Web. Singh, Simon, and E. Ernst. Trick or Treatment: The Undeniable Facts about Alternative Medicine. New York: W.W. Norton, 2008. Print.

Streyer, Terrence. "Medicaid Reimbursement for Alternative Therapies." Alternative Therapies in Health & Medicine 8.6 (2002): n.p. Nov.-Dec. 2002. Web. Wen, Leana, MD. "What Your Doctor Won’t Disclose." TEDMED. N.p., Nov. 2015. Web.

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Advancing Cancer Research

By Lina Bengtsson Cancer is a destructive disease that is unpredictable and simply horrifying. The majority of people most likely know someone who has been diagnosed with cancer. As a result, it is a touchy subject, but one that we need to talk about. There are numerous types of cancer diagnoses, and they sometimes leave doctors baffled. That is where trials come in. Trials for advanced cancer are important because they can help doctors find new cures—perhaps better and more effective ones.

According to World Health Organization (WHO) (2015), there were around 8.2 million cancerrelated deaths in 2012, and the number is just going to rise, as the total of new cases is expected to increase by 70% in the next two decades (WHO).

I have seen firsthand the possibilities of a successful trial, but also how much suffering too little participation can cause. My mother was diagnosed with a particularly rare disease called Mazabraud’s Syndrome, which greatly resemblances cancer, yet differs in many ways. Since the diagnosis is very rare, there was hardly any research for her doctor to rely on, so she had to participate in several trials alone. This made it a long, complicated, and destructive process. After seven long years and many different trials, the doctors finally reached a breakthrough. Due to my experience, I believe that society should work together to find cures, because just one small trial or conducting more research could make a tremendous difference and save lives.

Cancer differs from person to person because everyone is built differently, and therefore reacts differently to both the cancer itself and the treatments for it. This shows that more research needs to be conducted. Trials are the most relevant way to make progress in finding cures, because they help doctors and oncologists find new ways to fight cancer from different angles. Cancer is a disease that can recur, and there are so many different types of cancer. It is crucial that everyone in society participates in the fight against cancer, whether they are patients or not.

First of all, the participation in cancer trials is extremely low. According to the American Association for Cancer Research, only 3 % of US cancer patients participate in trials (Mangskau, 2015). Not even half of the world’s cancer patients participate, and this prevents research from advancing. In addition, whether the outcomes of the trials are good or bad, the results are still helpful. Many times the outcomes are unclear, and modifications needs to be made. A trial has many stages, and alterations are constantly made to improve medications. It takes a lot of trials to find a working cure with the fewest number of side effects. According to the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), almost all of the treatments available, both for children and adults, are the result of clinical trials (ASCO, 2016). The majority of medication that is now on the market for cancer patients is the product of clinical trials.

To ensure patients’ safety during trials, the government has established federal laws to create a safe environment for patients. These laws include an information consent process for participants to make sure that they are informed about every part of the trial. Also, review boards made up primarily of doctors and oncologists ensure that the trials are conducted ethically, and that they are conducted safely (National Cancer Institute, 2012). The safety of the trial depends on how the trial is conducted, and review boards are involved to make sure that all of the rules are followed.

Regardless, there are also restrictions on the patients who may be allowed to participate, to ensure 92

their safety. The issue in this case is to make sure that the patient does not suffer from any unexpected side effects, and this is ensured by certain restrictions that were established to make sure that the patients participating were in the right stage of their disease and in good enough health to avoid complications. An example of one complication is that mixed medications from a previous condition could cause unexpected side effects.

A book by the Institute of Medicine entitled Transforming Clinical Research in the United States: Challenges and Opportunities: Workshop Summary states that a lot of women have been rejected because of previous treatments, stages of the disease, or the drugs’ effect on their current health.

For example, if the trial was in phase one, two or three, some women were rejected (Institute of Medicine, 2010). “Phases” refers to the different stages of success for the treatment. Normally phases one and two are “cautious phases,” where doctors make sure that the treatment slows down tumor growth. Also, doctors want to make sure that the treatment has no serious side effects. Then in stage 3, they compare the new treatment to treatments already out on the market.

This method, however, has caused trouble, and might be doing more harm than good. If the trial is to follow all of these restrictions, the options for finding participants are very limited. The optimal candidate is relatively young and healthy aside from having cancer, which means that there should be no present previous conditions or diseases that might affect the result of the treatment. Another issue is that no previous treatments should have been given (in other words, untreated cancer patients are preferred), and the patients should be in the appropriate stage of their cancer. Unfortunately, to find all of this in one patient is rare. Having all of these restrictions to protect the patients is good, but it also causes the number of participants to decrease, and prevents a great deal of patients who want to participate from doing so. A lot of these restrictions could be changed in favor of the trials because now they are simply working against the progress of trials.

If restrictions were changed so as not to reject unsuitable patients for that trial but to categorize them to create more varied trials, results might be better.

Despite all of these restrictions and possible side effects, however, the effectiveness of clinical trials has evolved. This is discussed in Cancer on Trial: Oncology as a New Style of Practice by Peter Keating and Alberto Cambrosio. The authors discuss the history of trials, and explain how trials have changed from being small testing devices to now being important experiments for finding treatments that have changed the entire practice of advanced oncology. It was not until the 1960s that methods for treating cancer evolved. Before the 1960s, the treatments mostly consisted of radiation or surgery (Keating and Cambrosio, p. 121). Additionally, cancer trials have helped to improve the search for a cure for leukemia, as well as demonstrated how it helps to have different approaches to help fight the same disease (Keating and Cambrosio, p. 153).

What is more, several types of trials can be conducted to help progress in the search for a cure.

The National Cancer Institute discusses different types of trials and the key factors for a successful trial. The first is a treatment trial, the most common one. This is for people who have cancer and this is the most common type of trial, since it affects the diagnosed people. It is also used to test new treatments and to improve old ones. Prevention trials are another example. These are trials in which researchers figure out how to reduce the risk of cancer. They involve healthy people, meaning who have had cancer and risk developing a new form, or people who have never had it but have a high risk of developing it. The third type is screening trials, and the goal is to find new 93

ways to detect diseases earlier. The final type of trial is a palliative trial—or quality of life trial, as it also may be called. The goal for this type is to improve the life quality for those who may suffer from bad side effects caused by either their cancer or the treatments. All forms of cancer trials are important in the fight against cancer, and more participants are needed (National Cancer Institute).

Moreover, the research procedure in cancer trials has evolved immensely, especially in the area of using placebos. It is normal to use a neutral variable to help interpret the results of the independent variable better—the independent variable being patients in these situations. In most trials, half of the participants receive a new drug and the other half gets the standard treatment currently on the market. If there is no standard treatment, placebos are used. However, the word “placebo” has been turned into a word that strikes fear and unease with people because of lack of knowledge.

The results of using placebos in cancer trials is usually for the better. The results are more varied, and the doctors can distinguish the tumor's behavior from what is simply the behavior of the rest of the patient’s body.

Toni Kay Mangskau is a clinical trial referral coordinator who lost her brother-in-law to cancer.

She has worked with cancer patients for 28 years, and she strongly believes that clinical trials are the answer to advancing cancer research. A common saying is, “The clinical trials of today are the treatments of tomorrow” (Mangskau). She states that with more trials, the doctors would get better answers to the patients’ questions. When her brother-in-law Bruce was diagnosed with cancer, the family searched for trials for him to participate in. However, there were none, and shortly after his diagnosis, Bruce passed away. Mangskau says that Bruce would have travelled anywhere for a clinical trial, and done anything to get more time with his family. Another important thing she mentions is that her story is not unique; she hears similar stories all the time.

This shows that trials are something that needs to be discussed more often; 70% of patients said that their doctors did not inform them about clinical trials, and this has to change.

It is important that doctors not only inform patients but also encourage them to participate in trials.

In a study conducted by the American Association of Cancer Research, only about 30% of cancer patients are even being told about different trials (Mangskau). In addition, if the doctors do inform the patients about certain trials, they often neglect to encourage them to participate. It is important for the patients to hear recommendations from their doctors about cancer trials because they are putting their lives into their doctors’ hands. If doctors do not recommend or encourage someone to participate, then it is barely considered by the patients. Doctors should be providing more information and encouragement for participation in cancer trials.

Since cancer trials demand a great deal from the patients, the majority of patients think that it is not worth the effort. It is possible that certain trials are taking place somewhere else, and that means missing work, spending money for travel expenses, and being away from family—all of which are sacrifices that most patients are not willing to make at this critical time in their life. In addition, a lot of patients might be afraid of the unknown, the new treatments that no one knows anything about so far. Also, there is the fear that it might not work, and that the sacrifices were just a waste of time. However, all of these fears are simply just that—fears. If the fear of not being helped is a cause for not participating, then one could argue that it might be far worse to do nothing. Trials do not always help all of the participants, but if the results are good, they could 94

potentially help numerous others in the future. A lot of patients volunteer in clinical trials solely for the purpose of helping others and advancing the research.

Additionally, if more people participate, patients would not have to fly across countries and leave their families in order to participate. A lot of trials are funded by numerous foundations, as well as by the government. If more trials were wanted and demanded, the funds would have to expand.

There are already many foundations to help find cures, and cancer cases are increasing. If the demand for trials is growing, the government will feel the need to expand the funding.

Christopher Beck is a man who had terminal cancer. Beck chose to write a blog, and many of his blog posts show his general thoughts about cancer. However, in a lot of his posts, Beck also writes about his thought process, and his new ways of seeing life since he was diagnosed. One instance is when he says, “I realize that the entire purpose of my treatment is to exact an extra month at a time. The whole purpose is to focus on the small gains, with each new drug pushing the envelope, thereby giving me additional time” (Beck).

This describes how he sees treatments, and from reading his blog, it is obvious that everyone with advanced cancer has a different mindset. One thing that ties them together is the search for more time. Everyone wants more time, but when talking to someone with terminal cancer, the meaning of “time” is different. Cancer research needs to advance to assure cancer patients more time and possible cures in the near future.

Many might say that cancer trials are dangerous and could possibly harm the patient more than doing nothing, but I believe this is false. On one hand, there are possible side effects with every new treatment, and participating in a cancer trial is not something anyone wants to do. On the other hand, being diagnosed with cancer is not optimal either, and if trials could help find cures, then that is something that everyone should take interest in.

Additionally, a study was conducted regarding how much patients and people in general know about cancer trials (Miller 2011). The purpose of this research was to investigate how much people knew about trials because understanding is the key to effective and ethical trials. Only 36% of cancer survivors understood the key factors of trials, and only 26% of the general public understood. These results point to a very low understanding of what cancer trials really are and what they can achieve. I believe it is this half-knowledge that keeps patients and their families from seeing the true potential of cancer trials.

Nevertheless, ensuring that the trials are ethical is crucially important. For trials to be ethical, the patients need to be aware of all of the risks and exactly how the trial is set up. As mentioned before, the federal government has instituted several laws to keep research and trials ethical and to protect patients. Patients need to be aware of all of the elements of the trial, and during the trial, multiple review boards help ensure every patient's safety. It is unethical to withhold information about the trial, and one thing that worries many is the use of placebos. However, the government has made sure that every trial is safe and ethical.

Nevertheless, hearing that placebos are involved, a great deal of patients get scared and hesitant.

However, placebos are simply a neutral variable to help interpret the results and get a better view 95

on how the medicine works. An article in the New York Times by Gina Kolata (2003) reported a breakthrough in a cancer trial for recurring breast cancer (Kolata). The trial reached a breakthrough where the women taking the new drug only had half the risk of a relapse than the women taking placebos. Although it might seem unethical to let one-half of the women take placebos, this is proven to give better results which the doctors can interpret more easily. Even though half of the women were given placebos, they will be given the opportunity to receive the treatment when it hits the market. This article shows how much of a difference placebos can make, and that there is no harm to it. In fact, placebos might speed up the research.

Additionally, another study was conducted that focused on the quality of life and health of cancer survivors. There was an increase in life expectancy among cancer patients who participated in trials, and researchers wanted to switch the focus from finding a cure to improving quality life of the patients, because quality of life matters. Quality of life for cancer patients has a different meaning than it does for others. Patients diagnosed with cancer suffer through a lot, and the disease affects the patients not only physically, but also mentally (Li, Lin, Liu, & Xu, 2014). To conduct studies like this is a step in the right direction, and should help prove that patients do matter. They are not just objects in experiments; the experiments are a tool to help them get better.

In conclusion, seeing my mom suffer firsthand from lack of research and participants gives me a clear perspective on the issue of the cancer research. The best way to advance research is to increase the number of clinical trials. In order to do that, restrictions need to be lifted for the patients so that more can participate in cancer trials. Restrictions should work in favor of trials, and by increasing participation, more trials can be created. Patients should not be rejected because of their stage of cancer or previous treatments, but should simply be put in another group where their participation can help fight cancer. It is important that the government adjust the laws and restrictions to help ensure the progress, while still protecting patients. Without trials, cancer research will not advance at the same pace as it could. Restrictions are keeping us from finding cures that would help save more lives.

I would like to argue that there are no such thing as an optimal candidate since you never know how the patient's body might respond to the treatment, no matter the age and previous conditions.

Cancer trials strive to help each patient get better, and most importantly, could help future patients.

There is so much more research that could be done, and the public should be more invested in the fight against cancer because this disease is becoming more common and is already responsible for many deaths. The numbers are just going to increase if the research does not advance. Only 3% of U.S. cancer patients participate in trials. Despite that, the majority of the treatments for both children and adults are the results of previous trials. Just imagine what could be accomplished if participation increased.

REFERENCES American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO). (2016) Deciding to participate in a clinical trial. Retrieved from http://www.cancer.net/navigatingcancercare/howcancertreated/clinicaltrials/decidingparticipateclinicaltrial

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Beck, C. (2016, February 11). Existing with cancer. [web blog post]. Retrieved from http://existingwithcancer.blogspot.com/ Keating, P., & Cambrosio, A. (2011). Cancer on trial: Oncology as a new style of practice.

Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

Kolata, G. (2003, October 10). New drug regimen greatly cuts risk of recurring breast cancer.

New York Times. pp. A1A22.

Li, Q., Lin, Y., Liu, X., & Xu, Y. (2014). A systematic review on patient-reported outcomes in cancer survivors of randomised clinical trials: Direction for future research. PsychoOncology, 23(7), 721730.

Mangskau, T. (2015). A simple act: Increasing clinical trial participation. American Association for Cancer Research. Retrieved from http://blog.aacr.org/asimpleactincreasingclinicaltrialparticipation/ Miller, J. D., Kotowski, M. R., Comis, R. L., Smith, S. W., Silk, K. J., Colaizzi, D. D., & Kimmel, L. G. (2011). Measuring cancer clinical trial understanding. Health Communication, 26(1), 8293.

National Cancer Institute. (2012). Types of clinical trials. Retrieved from http://www.cancer.gov/aboutcancer/treatment/clinicaltrials/whataretrials/types Transforming clinical research in the United States: Challenges and opportunities: Workshop summary. (2010). Institute of Medicine (US) Forum on Drug Discovery, Development, and Translation. Washington, (DC): National Academies Press (US).

World Health Organization. (2015). Cancer. Retrieved from http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs297/en/

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MEET THE WRITERS! Lina Bengtsson is originally from Sweden and is majoring in Marine Biology.

Her goal is to become a shark specialist, and her favorite thing about living in Hawai`i is the sunsets.

Sage Bennett grew up in the Metro D.C. area—Silver Spring, Maryland, to be exact. An International Business major, Sage hopes to someday own a business or work for an international corporation that allows her to travel as well as tap into her creative side through digital marketing. Her favorite thing about HPU is how diverse our student population is: “Coming from a very diverse area, moving to Hawai`i and attending HPU was such a relief. There are so many students and staff from all over the world, and it is so refreshing.”

Jon Davis is originally from Dothan, Alabama, where he was born and raised until leaving for the military in 2009. His major is Business Management, and his career plans are to work at the S.E.R.E, (Survival Evasion Resistance Escape) school in Alabama, to train soldiers in these tactics while preparing to open his own business in the construction industry. His favorite thing about attending HPU is the small class sizes that allow students to be directly engaged with their professors: “This provides an exceptional learning experience in an ideal environment.”

Jhumar Ray Domingo is from Dumaguete Negros Oriental, Philippines.

He is majoring in Criminal Justice, with the goal of working for the Department of Homeland Security. His favorite thing about living in Hawai`i is that it is like “home away from home,” with good food and friendly people.

Emma Ferguson is from Bremerton, Washington, but has lived in Belfair, Washington, for the majority of her life. She is majoring in Biology with a minor in Psychology, with the goal of becoming a zookeeper specializing in large cats. Her favorite thing about living in Hawai`i is the extraordinary opportunity to meet so many amazing and inspiring people that she never would have had the pleasure of meeting had she not come to such a culturally and ethnically diverse location: “It has changed my life.”

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Nakoa Gabriel was born and raised in Waipahu, Hawai`i, where he still lives.

When not working at the pet hospital in Waipahu, he is pursuing his major in Criminal Justice with a minor in Writing. Upon graduation he plans either to work with the FBI or pursue a degree in law and start his own firm. His favorite thing about living in Hawai`i is its natural beauty: “I’ve lived here for 19 years and have never gotten tired of seeing the ocean. It is important to know your roots and where you come from.”

Rachel Gonzales is from Guam and is majoring in Public Health. Her intended career plans are to align herself with a global health community to promote understanding based on public health principles. Her favorite thing about living in Hawai`i and attending Hawai`i Pacific University is “feeling the aloha spirit everywhere I go.”

Kula Kukonu is originally from Honolulu and is a Communication Studies major who intends to work for the federal government. Her favorite thing about attending HPU is being surrounded by diverse cultures and peoples: “We live in a world of mixed cultures and it's amazing to have a small part of that within the HPU community.”

[Not pictured] Damon Niesen is originally from Round Valley Indian Reservation in Northern California. His major is Nursing and he plans to work in the E.R at Frank R. Howard Memorial Hospital in Willis, to help his people. His favorite part of Hawai`i is “getting away from the reservation and not seeing poverty everywhere you look.”

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Mackenzie Otto is originally from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. A Public Health major, she hopes to join the Peace Corps. Her favorite thing about living in Hawai`i and attending HPU is the diversity: “I get the chance to have classes with and meet people from so many parts of the world. It is fascinating to hear about what other cultures are like. I hope to get some opportunities to travel, and hearing about all these wonderful places motivates me to work hard to be able to experience some of them firsthand.”

Carlo Paez is originally from the Philippines and moved to Hawai’i when he was three years old. He is am currently majoring in Business Administration with a concentration in Management Information Systems. He intends to pursue a career within the realm of information technologies, and plans to someday become the CIO or CTO of a major corporation. His favorite thing about living in Hawai’i is the different types of people he gets to meet each day: “Hawai’i is indeed a unique place, and there really is no other place like it in the world.”

Joleen Paul is originally from Maui and is majoring in Pre-Nursing. She plans to move back home to Maui to work at the local hospital or clinics. She has also considered moving to the mainland. Her favorite thing about Hawai`i is that “it is always going to be home,” and her favorite thing about attending HPU is meeting people from all over.

Hajar Tazi is originally from Casablanca, Morocco. She is double majoring in Humanities with a concentration in Philosophy, and in International Studies with a concentration in Peace and Security. She would like to work with an intergovernmental organization or do research in ethnography. Her favorite thing about living in Hawai`i is that she can surf whenever she wants: “The waves are perfect!”

Austin Zmolek is originally from Syracuse, New York. He major is Biology – Human Health and Psychology. He changes his mind about the future every day: “Pat of me wants to be a gender reconstruction surgeon, part of me wants to move to the forest and live in a tree, part of me wants to get another degree in fashion, and part of me wants to be a Cross Fit instructor; I'll figure that out later.” His favorite thing about living in Hawai`i is “when I hear people cheee-hoo.” His favorite thing about HPU would be the Kaneohe campus.

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Mahalo!

The editors and contributors would like to acknowledge the support of the following people: William Potter, Interim Dean, College of Liberal Arts Joan Ishaque, Assistant to the Dean Mikael Ladegaard, HPU Web Services Marian Gentile, Editorial Intern Jun Sadang, Editorial Intern Lorraine Jimenez, Cover Artist Nominating Instructors: Kathleen Cassity David Falgout Angela Gili Lisa Kawai Laurie Leach Deborah Ross Micheline Soong Christy Williams

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