12.07.22

The Lumberjack

Wait on weight cutting?

Study brings real-world sports performance data to Humboldt lab.

by Dezmond Remington

Blood as thick as tar. Missed men strual cycles. Skin without life or color. In Mixed Martial Arts, sometimes the biggest trauma to the body happens be fore a fighter even steps into the ring.

For the last year, Cal Poly Humboldt kinesiology professor Dr. Brian Black burn has been conducting a study on MMA athletes and the effects of cut ting weight before a fight, a common practice used to ensure a fighter can compete in their chosen weight class. It’s often a grueling ordeal; fighters will starve themselves of all but the bare minimum of nutrients and exercise in cessantly, often to the point of hospital ization.

Blackburn is intimately familiar with the process. He started fighting at the age of 17, when he started compet ing in the discipline of Muay Thai, even moving to Thailand from his home town of Chicago for a period of several years to train and fight there. He runs a gym with his brother in Chicago called Wrecking Ball Fight Facility, and he also coaches at Lost Boys gym in Arca ta.

Inspiration for the study came two years ago at a UFC fight before the last weigh-in, when he was assisting one

of his fighters who had been cutting weight—an astonishing amount of 18 pounds in a day.

“We were in the elevator and my athlete was leaning against a wall,” Blackburn said. “He looked like he had just undergone chemotherapy. He had no color. His face was sunk in and he couldn’t stand, he couldn’t walk. And right in the elevator and three in the morning, I’m like, ‘I wonder what is go ing on in his body right now…I would love to get a snapshot of that.’”

Said ‘snapshot’ involves quite a va riety of tests, used to determine the physical state of the athlete in ques tion at that moment in time. Athletes are subject to a battery of inspections, such as judging hand grip strength, VO₂ max, and resting metabolic rate. Hydrostatic weighing is used to deter mine body mass, and DEXA scans for body composition. Power is measured with the Wingate Test, and body fluid samples are taken as well.

A week before the cut starts comes the first round of testing, used to get a baseline for the athlete. When the cut ting begins, the athletes are again tested, and then again every day they weigh in. Levels of the roughly 300,000 different

pro teins in the body are ana lyzed by sali va, blood, and urine samples taken every day of the cut.

Anne Rants: lobbyist, activist, and student

by Camille Delany and Steffi Puerto

All students are struggling to make ends meet while finishing out the se mester at this time of year, but some of our peers have more extracurricu lar commitments than others. Anne Rants, a senior at Cal Poly Humboldt, is a Child Development major and a double minor in Critical Race, Gen der, and Sexuality Studies (CRGS) and American Indian Education. But she’s also employed on-campus at the In dian Tribal & Educational Personnel Program (ITEPP) and off-campus as a professional lobbyist with the Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL), a Quaker-based nonprofit.

Lobbyists play a significant but of ten misunderstood role in the legis lative process. In Rants’ words, they work to remind legislative offices of the kinds of laws their constituents want to be passed. Rants enjoys acting

as a connection between communities and the legislative offices that are meant to represent them. Her words influ ence legislative offices to consider the impacts legislation will have on com munities that might not otherwise be well-represented.

“Knowing what the wants and needs of your community are is so important,” Rants said. “In order for a representa tive democracy to actually work and car ry out its functions, the representatives and the senators are supposed to uphold this standard. They’re supposed to care about issues that their constituents, the voting mass, care about.”

For Rants, that’s H.R.5444 & S.2907, which would establish the Truth and Healing Commission on American Indi an Boarding Schools.

“I’m a Karuk and Shasta woman, and my family is from the Salmon River. We’re direct ly impacted by this piece of legislation, and so is ev ery other Na tive person that I know,” Rants said.

“Boarding school era was a huge problem in this country, and unfor tunately it hasn’t been acknowl edged by the

United States yet.”

Rants has been lobbying on H.R.5444 & S.2907 for nearly a year, and is disap pointed that it wasn’t passed this round; she doesn’t expect it to be passed in the lame-duck session, either. Another piece of legislation that concerns Rants is the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA), which will be heading to the floor for oral argu ments sometime in the next month. The Supreme Court will be deciding whether or not it will be overturned.

Activism and politics have long been an important part of Rants’ life. As a young teen she began to get involved in political protests, and worked with Ríos to Rivers, an organization whose proj ects in the Klamath River are geared towards Indigenous communities and water rights protection. At the age of fif teen, she had the opportunity to speak about the project on the Cal Poly Hum boldt and UC Berkeley campuses.

“When I got involved with Ríos to Rivers, I was just a kid that really want ed to go kayaking, but it turned out to be more than that,” Rants said. “Now my sister is also involved in that program, and she’ll be among the few Indigenous kids to kayak down the free-flowing riv er for the first time.”

Her family and community encour aged Rants to pursue her interest in ac tivism and politics. She says that grow ing up, there was no shortage of role models engaged in work ranging from cultural and language revitalization to environmental efforts.

“Both my parents are fisheries biolo gists on the Klamath River, and I think that they were a big source of inspira

tion for me growing up,” Rants said. “Just knowing that they were trying to make our watersheds more clean and accessible to fish.”

For Indigenous people, “being alive and doing our cultural practices and re vitalizing our language is a huge form of resistance,” Rants said. “I’ve just been so lucky to grow up where I grew up.”

Balancing her lobbying career and her work at ITEPP with her last years of college has been a challenge, but Rants says the importance of the work she’s doing makes it all seem more possible.

“It’s hard being a college student because you aren’t just stressed about school,” Rants said. “You’re stressed about money, and getting to class on time, and even purchasing books can be stressful. But knowing that you are working towards a bigger goal has really helped me out.”

Rants looks forward to getting her teaching credential, and applying to grad school to continue her education. Ultimately she intends to be an educa tor in her community, but this doesn’t mean stepping away from politics.

“Part of being a good teacher is standing by your beliefs, having that political engagement on the policy lev el, because policy always affects teach ers. They always affect schools and the kids in your schools,” Rants said. “If you care about your community, children, and their families, you should always be pushing for political measures that you feel would benefit their quality of life. I definitely always want to be engaged in politics.”

Graphic by Ione Dellos

Photo by Steffi Puerto | Anne Rants sits gracefully, smiling on the ITEPP house couch.

by Jake Knoeller

Oh SNAP! Student Food Program has brought a lot of Cal Poly Hum boldt students assistance with their nutrition and raised a lot of awareness about food insecurity in the local com munity.

It all started in 2013 when Jen nifer Maguire, Associate Professor of Social Work at Humboldt, was apply ing for external funds to gain support surrounding food insecurity.

Maguire and her colleagues were able to win a grant from the Humboldt County Department of Health and Hu man Services so that students could apply for CalFresh to buy healthy food. This service would eventually get the name Oh SNAP!

“With ongoing funds, I was able to hire students every year for the first

Snaps for Oh SNAP!

four years of Oh SNAP! to run the ser vice and to collect baseline data on food security among HSU students,” said Maguire.

Oh SNAP! started to generate buzz in 2015. The message of the program was, “food is a right and not a privi lege.” The program opened a food pan try, which is now open several days a week and bringing in many students.

“I think it’s a good program that provides free food,” said Luke Fisher, a junior majoring in journalism. “It’s open to anyone so that’s nice.”

Mira Friedman, Lead for Health Ed ucation and Clinic Support Services, provides oversight of our university’s health education programs including Oh SNAP!

“I have been involved with Oh

Speak on your Title IX experience

by Angel Barker

Cozen O’Connor, an international law firm and institutional response group, is investigating all of the Cali fornia State University campuses Ti tle IX & Discrimination, Harassment, and Retaliation (DHR) programs as part of a system-wide probe. They will be on the Cal Poly Humboldt campus through Dec. 8, and students, faculty, and staff are encouraged to voice their experiences with and concerns about the current system.

A group of eight institutional re sponse attorneys from the firm are going through all 23 CSU campuses to see what is working and what is not in each of the Title IX and DHR pro grams

On Wednesday Dec. 7 from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. there will be a Student Sur vivor Speakout on the SAC Quad in solidarity for those who have survived

violence and discrimination.

Students can voice their experiences and concerns on Thursday in an open forum. “Students are invited to meet and interact with the Cozen Team in an open forum for Students on Thurs day, December 8th from 11:00 a.m. until noon in the Great Hall,” said an email from the University. “Students are encouraged to provide input and share their experiences or observa tions regarding Cal Poly Humboldt’s Title IX & DHR Prevention programs during this session.”

Another way to speak with the law yers about your experience is to email CalStateReview@cozen.com and re quest a Zoom meeting. The University also stated that in the fall there will be a survey where students can anony mously share their experiences.

SNAP! since the inception as was Jen Maguire, students, and many others,” said Friedman.

As the years go by, word about the pantry spreads, which has led to a high amount of students visiting.

“Since the inception the program has helped thousands and thousands of students,” said Friedman. “This year alone we have had nearly 8000 visits since opening in September.”

Maguire appreciates all of the help she has received from coworkers and students. She specifically mentioned Friedman, as well as Ravin Craig, who worked with Maguire and worked at Oh SNAP! for years, and Heather King, who helped start the food pantry as a student.

“None of this would have happened without Mira, Ravin, or Heather,” said Maguire. “They are so dedicated to the lives of students and committed wholeheartedly to this work!”

Maguire takes time to do fun things and spend time with the people she

loves. She stops to celebrate small suc cesses along the way because, to her, they are how large transformational change happens.

“Being good at failing means you will bounce back, learn from it, and be better prepared for future challenges,” said Maguire.

The Oh SNAP! pantry allows stu dents who don’t have access to their meal plan’s benefits every day to have some extra food.

“I did the five day meal plan and I’ve been able to get food from there so I can actually eat on the weekends,” said Hannah Siemer, a freshman ma joring in wildlife.

The story of Oh SNAP! and how Jen Maguire got it started is a great one. The welcoming atmosphere and nu tritious food has been monumental at Cal Poly Humboldt.

“I hope that it stays around for a good, long time,” said Fisher. “I hope that it gets proper funding.”

I am writing in response to the pub lication on 11/16/22, “Faculty Union Challenges TimelyMD.” While I was frustrated by the one-sided tone of the article, most of all I came away from it feeling sad and disheartened as I believe that the article was damaging to our students. The article essential ly discouraged students from seeking after-hours support due to its unfair characterization of TimelyCare, ini tially calling it an “online faith based counseling service” (albeit later in the article acknowledging that this char acterization was untrue). TimelyCare has a breadth of providers to appeal to and serve the breadth of their popula tion base. To learn more about them, including their guiding principles, see: https://timely.md/about-us/.

The University contracted with TimelyMD in order to expand health services during a period of very high need, through special one-time pan demic funding. The company doesn’t just offer counseling, they provide medical, psychiatry, health coaching,

and psychoeducational services too. The CAPS faculty counselors were not replaced or harmed by the contract, instead they gained a partner in caring for our students. Contract or no con tract, on-site counseling at CAPS will be expanding in the years to come.

The article implies that students who come to CAPS are automatical ly referred to TimelyCare. The truth is that referrals are commonplace in the health industry. Like any mental health facility, we must triage and fig ure out how to make the best use of all of our resources. Typically, at this busy time of year, we would be making some referrals to off-campus practitioners. Now, with TimelyCare, we are able to offer these students a referral that will have no added expense, where they are guaranteed access, and that will work closely with CAPS on collaborative care.

The claim that the contract “poses a new risk to students engaging with TimelyCare” is unsubstantiated. In fact, the ratings of TimelyCare counsel

ors have been consistently high (aver age rating is 4.97 out of 5). If any stu dent has concerns about the care that they received from TimelyCare clini cians, I encourage them to talk to me or a CAPS clinician to address it. We want to assure high quality and compassion ate care whether it is through CAPS, TimelyCare, or an off-campus referral.

The statement that the university is “outsourcing responsibility for our students’ wellbeing” is simply unfair. With the addition of this service, our students of color have a greater diver sity of clinicians to choose from; trav eling athletes can get care while away; students with busy schedules can seek care in the evenings and weekends; students in crisis can get immediate help; and out of state students are not turned away due to licensing regula tions. The campus has assured that our students simply have “more”-- more access, more choice, services over the winter and summer breaks, & the usual in person services at CAPS. In my view, the campus is displaying great commit

ment to our students’ wellbeing by of fering these expanded services during a national mental health crisis.

As always, we encourage students to be informed participants in their health care, whether with us, Timely Care, or outside practitioners or agen cies. When students are seeking ther apy through TimelyCare, I encourage them to look through the clinician bios or call the customer support line to find a therapist that is likely to be a good match.

I sincerely hope that students will take full advantage of the wellbeing re sources available to them. I have ded icated my career to the health of our students and I would hate for anyone to be deterred from getting the support they deserve.

Sincerely, Jennifer Sanford, PhD, Int. Execu tive Director, Student Health & Well being Services

World Percussion and Calypso

by Victoria Olsen and Cash Rion

Cal Poly Humboldt’s music depart ment hosted their semesterly World Percussion and Calypso event on Dec. 3 at Fulkerson Recital Hall.

Three groups performed in this ensemble. The first was the Cal Poly Humboldt Percussion Ensemble, made up of nine people.Led by Dr. Eugene Novotney, the group performed five different pieces covering a wide variety of musical styles.

The centerpiece of the ensemble performance was Edgard Varèse’s 1933 composition, “Ionisation”, which fea tured an eclectic assortment of instru ments including whips, sirens, sleigh bells, a gong, and even a cowbell. The ensemble also performed John Cage’s “Second Percussion for Construction” and “Prepared-Piano”, the latter of which involved a grand piano with nuts, bolts, washers, rubber, and paper added to the piano strings and soundboard.

The second group was the Humboldt World Percussion Group. This group was made up of 13 musicians led by the director Dr. Howard Kauffman. They performed a ten minute arrangement of Samba Reggae based in the folkloric traditions of Salvador, Brazil.

The third performance was by the Humboldt Calypso band, wearing a sea of blue t-shirts. The group stood behind a stage full of steel drums mak ing up the calypso. The group was led by Novotney. This passionate group of musicians played six Caribbean-in spired songs, wrapping the audience in a blanket of rhythm.

Ally Houghton, a junior at CPH ma joring in percussion and performance and a member of the calypso band said that she joined the ensemble “on a whim.”

“It’s so much fun, it’s just like the music is great, the vibes are great,” Houghton said. “Playing music with

other people is just so fun.”

Novotney is the director and found er of the ensemble. He has been teach ing at Cal Poly Humboldt for 37 years. He has also performed and presented lectures and master classes in North America, South America, the Caribbe an, Europe, Asia, and Africa. Before re locating to the area, Novotney did not know anything about Humboldt.

“I just took the job,” Novotney said.

Novotney has traveled to the Carib bean 11 times, where, on trips to Trin idad and Tobago, he played with steel pan bands and was inspired to start his own. He saw the move to Humboldt county as a great opportunity to start a steel band of his own. After starting a calypso band in spring of 1986, the band became the first steel band in the California University system. Among the first steel bands at any U.S. uni versity, Novotney’s band is still going strong 36 years later.

“I knew it would be a great success if I could just get it started,” Novotney said.

The group consists of talented CPH students of all majors, alumni, faculty, community members, and local high school students.

Community member and 2018 CPH geology graduate Kathleen Johnston joined the calypso ensemble in 2014.

“I have been playing in the music department for years,” Johnston said. “This particular group is so accept ing of anyone who can read a little bit of music, maybe even not, and learn a completely new art form.”

Novotney wants everyone involved to experience “the power of a collective identity.” He believes it is a good model for life, that a feeling of togetherness is something participants can take with them in everything they do. He has seen many of the participants be inspired to go off and start their own groups.

Food Sovereignty Film Nights

by Lidia Grande-Ruiz

On Thursday, December 1, the Rou Dalagurr Food Sovereignty Lab screened the film, “Rhymes for Young Ghouls”, as part of the 2022 Fall Film Series. “Rhymes for Young Ghouls” is written and directed by Mi’gmaq film maker Jeff Barnaby, who died on Oc tober 13, 2022. The film touches on a fictional account of Indigenous agency in the face of the horrors of Canada’s Indian Residential Schools.

“For this year, we wanted to feature various films from across the Ameri cas,” said Karley Rojas, a research as sociate of the Rou Dalagurr Food Sov ereignty Lab and Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) Institute in the NAS Department. “This film portrayed the horrors of boarding schools for Indige nous people that were forced to go and the impact they have on generations on communities.”

“We have hosted films every year since 2019 ever since the lab opened,” Rojas said. “For this screening, we hoped to do a Halloween theme but we couldn’t get screening rights for those films, and then we thought, why don’t we screen films from across the Ameri cas and these were accessible to us and very different because they offered di versity.”

Looking out over the audience, var ious people had all the same reaction: shock and horror. The film touches on topics like boarding school and author ity abuse. While hard to watch, this is reality to millions of Indigenous com munities, and the trauma and effects remain to this day.

The Rou Dalagurr Food Sovereignty Lab and TEK Institute is dedicated to the study and hands-on practice and preservation of food sovereignty. They offer opportunities for students and volunteers to learn about food sover eignty. Students can go out and volun teer every week. Next semester, volun teers can go out into the community to help in the gardens or in the green house here on campus. Students can also enroll in NAS 333, a one unit lab course of volunteer work that is offered every semester along with internships.

“I would encourage everyone to get engaged in the food sovereignty move ment because we eat the landscape and none of us can be divorced from our foods like how we have continued to be,” Rojas said. “So we all have to work to connect to our foods and that… means engaging in food justice for our communities.”

Photo by Lidia Grande-Ruiz | Karley Rojas addresses the audience at the Rou Dalagurr Food Sovereignty Lab film night on Thursday.

Photo by Victoria Olsen | Calypso ensemble performs at Fulkerson Recital Hall Dec. 3.

Photo by Victoria Olsen | Contemporary Percussion ensemble performs at Fulkerson Recital Hall Dec. 3.

WEIGHT CUTTING

FROM PAGE 1

These protein counts are important, as they can tell researchers if muscle is being broken down and the levels of inflammation present in the body. It’s also a marker of kidney function.

Fighters often dehydrate themselves to dangerous levels during weight cuts. It’s not easy on the kidneys. The results from these tests have been fascinating.

“What we’ve seen so far on our pre liminary data is when [the fighters] begin to cut weight, all of their ath letic performance markers are off the chart,” Blackwell said. “They have a tremendous amount of power, they have a very high VO₂ max, very lean body mass, lots of strength. And then

when we measure it again, with the weight cutting, all of those things drop about 30-40%. And they don’t really recover from that. They don’t really recover 100%. So what we’re seeing is that every fighter in the world is doing a weight cut, and they’re not recover ing from that weight cut. They’re going in at about 60% of the athlete they tru ly can be. So now we’re questioning. Is the weight cut really worth it if they’re losing that much of their athleticism?”

So far 11 athletes have been studied. Conducting the study is hard, as the researchers are often at the mercy of fight promoters and opponents, both of whom can decide if a fight happens or not. If the fight doesn’t happen, lots

of time-intensive research is wasted. Blackburn said ideally the study will continue until they have around 20 fighters who all lost roughly the same amount of weight.

This study has real-world implica tions. Weight cutting can be danger ous. Blackburn has had fighters who cut too much weight and went to the hospital with heart arrhythmias. Many female fighters stop having their pe riod. Ideally, this study will lead to general guidelines about when to stop cutting weight, and when it’s safe to continue.

“I’d like to create a metric that shows that ‘hey, you know, if you have this much three-methyl histamine in your urine, you might want to stop the weight cut,” Blackburn said. “So kind of a preventative medicine approach where we can measure these things in the blood or in the urine pretty quickly

and track these athletes to make sure that they are being safe while they’re weight cutting and we’re not overdo ing it.”

Although there have been oth er studies looking at fighters cutting weight in different disciplines such as taekwondo or boxing, this is the first study of its kind to look at MMA fight ers specifically, and Blackburn is very excited to bring it to the world.

“Right now, in Humboldt, we have this unique situation where we have the university, the lab, and all these fighters that I coach,” Blackburn said. “It’s just a perfect opportunity to put all these things together and, for the first time, see what’s happening during these really intense four or five days of weight cutting. [It’s just in] the preliminary stages right now, but this will definitely be a seminal paper once we publish it.”

Men’s rugby team set to compete at Nationals for first time since 2005

by Jazmin Pacheco

The Cal Poly Humboldt Men’s Rug by team will be headed to Nationals in Houston, Texas after an undefeated season. This will be the first time since 2005 that the team has made it to the National Championships. That team back in 2005 unfortunately didn’t win, but this team is determined to win the National Championship title.

adis, a junior in the wildland fire man agement major.

Logan Zampa, a mechanical engi neering major, said that “making it to nationals when everyone doubted us and said our team was too unfit to make it to Houston,” was a rewarding moment for him.

This season the team consisted of

the game for some of the new players on the team.

“I would say some challenging mo ments for me were just learning how to play my position as fullback. This is my first season playing 15’s and only my second season playing rugby so the learning curve has been pretty steep,” Paradis said.

like to take this opportunity to thank the Cal Poly Humboldt athletics depart ment and the rec sports department for making all this possible, for not only me but the people who put their blood, sweat, and tears on the field.”

As the president and senior student athlete, in his last official rugby season, Celotto is happy to see all the hard work

“We just gotta keep that rolling… being undefeated and showcase the talent that we do have,” Justin Celot to, senior and President of the CPH Men’s Rugby team said. “The job’s not done yet, each of us pushing ourselves and each other because we really want to come home with a national cham pionship.”

A long season of hard work and battling for wins led to this point for the team. They now have a chance to crown their special achievements with a championship.

“I would say the most rewarding moment of this season was beating Western Oregon. It was a tough game and they definitely played pretty hard, which made winning that game feel better than the rest, “said Bridger Par

a leadership group of seniors, players with talent, and dedicated players who collectively worked together to bring out the best out of each other.

“We can commemorate our coaches, our overcoming of injuries, and every body coming in and doing their job, day in and day out,” Celotto said.

Celotto said that it was nice seeing some of the seniors of the team help train those who were new to rugby. Working together as a team has helped them become a winning team this sea son, along with the hard work they put in all their practices.

“We work our butts off every single week so I would say we have earned our spots at the top thus far,” Zampa said.

Some challenges that the team faced were overcoming injuries and learning

Rugby is an intense and fun contact sport. Celotto describes it as a combi nation of soccer and football. It’s a fast paced game; you pass the ball back wards but you kick it forward.

Zampa said his size, speed, and knowledge of the game make it hard for his opponents to guard him and make tackles to keep the team and Zampa out of the try zone.

Paradis adds that another reason for the undefeated season is their defense. They have only let up a handful of tries this year.

“They have only scored on us in the regional tournament and even then we made it pretty difficult. I’m usually be hind the line waiting for kicks or break throughs, and I rarely see the offense break our line,” Paradis said. “I would

that the team has contributed has been paying off. Making it into the National Championships is proof of that.

“I’m proud of this team, where we’ve come and the dedication of the players on this team,” Celotto said. The Na tional Championships will be played on December 9 in Houston, Texas.

Photo used courtesy of Humboldt Rugby | The Humboldt men’s rugby team posing with their trophy after winning the Western Regional Championships on Nov. 19 in Salt Lake City against the Colorado School of Mines.

Reconnecting with my culture through ballet folklórico

by Sophia Escudero

Hanging on my wall, I have a print of Las dos Fridas, a self-portrait by Fri da Kahlo. Two versions of her sit beside each other, holding hands and connect ed by shared blood vessels between their visible hearts. One Frida wears a white Victorian gown, the other a mul ticolored Tehuana dress. The Europe an Frida holds a pair of scissors on her lap, with which she has cut their own artery. Though the two women are in extricably bonded, she has severed half of herself, leaving both to bleed out.

I signed up for ballet folklórico this semester partially because I needed an extra unit, and partially because I wanted to be closer to Mexican culture in some small way. As a white-passing mixed-race person, I have often felt a disconnect, like a pretender to my own heritage. I grew up with a white Ameri can-born mother and a Mexican immi grant father. While I grew up eating my dad’s food and listening to his stories about Aztec mythology and his child hood in Acapulco, at the same time I lived in the overwhelmingly white Humboldt community, dying my hair blonde and getting a B in Spanish class es. My parents had tried to raise me bi lingual, I’d often say, but it didn’t take.

I was somewhat anxious when I walked into my first folklórico class. I half expected to be required to defend my presence, to pull up a family pho to or my Ancestry.com results to prove I was supposed to be there. Logically, I knew that wasn’t the case– it was an

entry-level dance class, not some 16th century relic of Spanish colonialism–but I have always feared being an out sider.

Ballet folklórico is a form of dance

a dancer or any sort of athlete. Despite this, dancing folklórico came easily to me. I could understand the steps, the rhythm, the cues in the music as nat urally as I could understand tying my

was stabbed or set on fire– and after I changed out of my costume and drank some water, I went to go see my family and friends.

Of course I hoped for a positive re action. Anyone who goes up on a stage wants to be told they did a good job. More than that, however, I wanted to know what my dad had thought. He had grown up in Mexico, he had kept pre-Hispanic styles alive through his paintings, he had taught me everything I knew about our shared culture and history. I wanted to hear from him that I did it the way I was supposed to, that I did it right.

My dad has always been an emotion al person. Seeing me dance, he began to cry. His mother, my abuela, had once wanted to be an actress or a dancer, but was unable to follow that dream due to social pressure and financial hardship. Watching me up there, he told me, was seeing her dreams fulfilled.

based in Mexican folk dancing with ballet influences, such as stylized movements for the stage and heavy choreography. Some movements can be traced back to Aztec dance, others to Spanish flamenco, and still others to social dances and everyday life in ru ral Mexico. The style is known for dra matic skirt work, shoes striking loudly against the floor, and a wide variety in traditions from across the Mexican states.

I don’t consider myself to be much of

laces or that two and two make four. It made sense, in some difficult to define way, like I was meant to be there.

I invited my dad to come see the class dance at a local school’s Multicul tural Night fair. I would be part of two dances: La Bruja, a slower piece orig inating in the state of Veracruz, tra ditionally done balancing candles on one’s head, and Los Machetes, a more energetic one from Jalisco involving whirling skirts and clashing blades. The performance went off well– no one

Culture is a difficult thing to define. It’s not just based on blood or uni form traditions, but a complex web of all the people around you and the lit tle things we pick up from them. I may not have grown up the way my dad did, but I remember making tortillas in the kitchen on a foggy evening, listening to rancheras on the radio, and putting my Halloween candy on the ofrenda for Día de los Muertos. Ballet folklórico is a truly mestizo art form: combining Indigenous and European roots into something entirely new.

Should you feel bad about watching the World Cup?

by Jake Knoeller

I consider myself a big soccer fan. You’d think that whenever the World Cup comes around, I would be the most excited I’ve been in 4 years. This year wasn’t as simple though.

I struggled a bit with being excited for the packed stadiums and back-andforth matchups in Qatar. I was look ing forward to seeing the young team representing the United States and the powerhouses of Brazil and Spain take the field again. But something felt dif ferent, knowing of the human rights violations behind the big game and fes tivities.

A high number of migrant workers died building the stadiums, now esti mated to be somewhere between 400 and 500. Women don’t have human rights and homosexuality is illegal in the nation where FIFA chose to hold the Cup.

There is a long list of problems with FIFA, the World Cup organization, combined with Qatar’s government. The extremely unethical treatment of citizens of Qatar raised concerns over fans and players that are traveling there for this World Cup.

It’s ridiculous for someone to be sent to jail for their sexuality. It’s also ri diculous that women need permission from their guardians to do practically anything, and that if a woman living in or visiting Qatar is pregnant and needs medical attention, she has to provide a marriage certificate.

This is the country that FIFA de cided would be a good place to host the World Cup. Their greed has led to

many players and fans feeling unsafe to express their beliefs or who they are. It has also led to so many deaths because Qatar’s worker rights are heinous as well.

With all of this going on, there has been pressure put on fans to boycott the World Cup to make a statement. This idea is problematic; it teaches the fans that they have a responsibility to clean up the mess that was made by FIFA and Qatar.

I’m not saying that we, as viewers of the sport, don’t have any responsi bility surrounding this at all. It’s up to us to be aware of what’s going on and have dialogue about it, because chang es need to be made. We have to learn from this how to hold organizations like FIFA accountable.

However, our viewership is not the problem. The outdated agenda that ho mosexuality is not okay is the problem. The disregard for human rights is the problem.

If you love soccer, watch the biggest event in the sport if it makes you happy. If you don’t feel comfortable watching because of everything that’s happened, that’s super understandable, and I feel the same way. However you feel, don’t listen if someone tells you you’re the problem.

That being said, make sure to stay educated on this topic. These are un acceptable conditions and we should not be okay with it. But the issue is on a massive scale and the response must be too; whether or not an individual chooses to watch doesn’t matter.

Photo by Jeff O’Connor | Members of the Cal Poly Humboldt ballet folklórico class and club pose alongside members of the Danza Azteca class at Zane Middle School’s Multicultural Night.

Graphic by Ione Dellos