OPINIONS

Tuesday, deceMber 7, 2021 OpiNiONs

PAGE 10

Aimee Galaszewski, Executive Director Benjamin Wells, Managing Editor of The Marquette Tribune Skyler Chun, Managing Editor of The Marquette Journal

ediTorial board

Alexandra Garner, Executive Opinions Editor Hope Moses, Assistant Opinions Editor

Megan Woolard, News Executive John Leuzzi, Sports Executive Randi Haseman, A&E Executive Lelah Byron, Projects Editor Eleanor McCaughey, Copy Chief Grace Pionek, Design Chief Izzy Bonebrake, Executive Photo Editor Kate Hyland, Social Media Executive Andrew Amouzou, Station Manager of MUTV Reese Seberg, Station Manager of MURadio Alex Rivera Grant, Editor of Diversity and Inclusion

STAFF EDITORIAL MU community should foster inclusive community for student-athletes

While student-athletes are often known around Marquette University’s campus for playing on the field or court, they are still students first. The Marquette community must work to change the campus culture and create a more inclusive environment for student-athletes in the student body.

The culture of sports often calls for athletes to spend a lot of time with their teammates, whether that is living together, eating together or spending time together outside of practice and games.

While spending the majority of time together can improve team chemistry, students, faculty and staff should work to make sure studentathletes feel they can be part of the Marquette community beyond playing sports.

Many student-athletes are often glorified and praised by the rest of the student population. While these interactions are positive, they may create a divide between the studentathletes and students.

Students can work to break down the barriers with student-athletes by making efforts to talk to them in classrooms and on campus, as well as inviting them to participate in or join student organizations. Students can also attend outreach events hosted around Marquette.

The Marquette men’s basketball team has always hosted several lunches this semester for students who are season ticket holders for the Marquette men’s basketball team. The Marquette men’s basketball team also invited season ticket holders to watch a preseason practice in Fiserv Forum in October.

While hosting these types of events work to bridge gaps between student-athletes and student ticket holders, there should also be efforts to engage students who are non-ticket holders as well.

An example of this was the 5K fun run hosted by student-athletes in November to support University President Michael Lovell through his diagnosis with sarcoma. Another example was when the head coaches of the men’s basketball team and the women’s basketball team, Shaka Smart and Megan Duffy joined Marquette University President Michael Lovell and Sendik’s Fresh2Go owner Ted Balistreri to hand out donated breakfasts to students on the first day of classes for the fall 2021 semester.

A couple other examples of more engagement with non-student-athletes were the block party hosted by Marquette University Athletics in July, and the Rally the Valley event hosted by the Marquette men’s lacrosse team in April 2019.

Hosting more events like this can not only increase the visibility of student-athletes and coaches on campus, but it can also create more opportunities for engagement with other members of the Marquette community.

Another way to engage Marquette students with student-athletes is through outreach with the Milwaukee community.

This September, the Marquette women’s basketball team partnered with the University of WisconsinMilwaukee women’s basketball team and the Milwaukee Police Department to host a free basketball clinic at North Side Washington Park.

The Marquette men’s basketball team also hosted a Haunted Hoops event this October, where it played an intersquad scrimmage in front of fans who could also participate in a costume contest and trick-or-treat. The men’s basketball team also went to the Salvation Army in Waukesha last month to help prepare and serve dinner on Thanksgiving, and donated gifts to the team’s adopted class at St. Catherine’s School.

Marquette’s campus should explore more ways that studentathletes and non-student-athletes can engage and serve in the Milwaukee community.

An example of this occurred last September, when Marquette studentathletes joined students, coaches, faculty and staff in a march for social inequality and injustice from the Athletic and Human Performance Research Center to Valley Fields.

Creating more connections across campus, especially between studentathletes and non-student-athletes, as well as with the Milwaukee community is important to fostering more unity, as well as encouraging more understanding and meaningful relationships. It is important that everyone part of the Marquette community does their part to uphold “cura personalis,” and care for studentathletes beyond the field and court.

While progress has been made, there is a clear divide between student-athletes and non-student-athletes on Marquette’s campus. This gap can be bridged if all students, faculty and staff make intentional efforts to engage across campus and the Milwaukee community.

Nurses deserve higher pay

Krisha Patel

When COVID-19 was declared a global pandemic by the World Health Organization in March 2020, everyone was advised to stay at home to prevent the spread of the life-threatening virus. That is, everyone except for essential workers, such as health care workers, protective service workers and grocery store workers.

Health care workers, specifically nurses, reported being “overworked” and “exhausted” during the pandemic. However, despite all their hard work, the current salary nurses get doesn’t reflect all the work they put in to save people’s lives. Even in a pandemic, their salary has barely gone up. There has only been an increase of 6.2% in salary, or $6,730, according to Nurse Journal.

Furthermore, there is a current shortage of nurses, further worsened by the pandemic. Data shows that due to the severity of the pandemic, 18% of health careworkers have quit their job. There is always a shortage and many nurses actually report quitting due to unfair wages that don’t reflect all the work they put in and lives that they have helped to save.

The role of a nurse is to be at the patient’s bedside upon admission to the hospital to even after the patient leaves. Nurses often perform a medical background history and physical exams, monitor changes to the patient’s body, administer medications and treatments and collaborate with a team for proper care. They even provide care for the family of the patient with counseling, support and education. Marquette University’s mission statement provided by the College of Nursing states that, “nurse leaders to promote health, healing and social justice for all people through clinical practice and development of nursing knowledge.”

Nurses work on average 40 hours a week, with shifts as long as 12 hours. The starting salary for nurses is $75,000. Certain specialties within the field of nursing can make more, such as critical care nurses as they are on the frontline and the patients have sudden, life-threatening injuries.

During the pandemic, nurses have to work at least 10 hours overtime with shift changes and more sick patients as a result of the high transmission rate of COVID-19. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, nearly 1.2 million people have been hospitalized with COVID-19 through the year 2020.

While nurses deserve a pay raise, it doesn’t accurately reflect just how important they are, especially during 2020. They have continued to deal with understaffing, a lack of personal protective equipment, excessive numbers of patients, increase in deaths and putting their lives at risk everyday.

Other medical professions have experienced the same thing in terms of raises during the pandemic. Physician salaries went up $6,000, or about 3%, which doesn’t accurately reflect the work that they are putting in during this time.

Nurses go to school for three to four years to become registered. During those years, the coursework is often fast-paced and rigorous, followed by many hours spent at clinical sites to perfect their skills. Some examples included classes heavily based on anatomy, disease processes, drug classes and priority nursing interventions.

Without pursuing additional education, such as graduate or medical school to become a health care provider, nurses will only make a minimum raise of $12 more during their career, which potentially won’t even reach six figures.

Additionally, the lower pay mostly affects female nurses. In the field, 87% of nurses are female. With the shortage of male nurses and to attract more males into the profession, they are given a significant wage increase of $6,000.

Nurses make up an integral part of the health care team. Without an adequate amount of nurses, many other members of the medical staff would not be able to do their job. While doctors diagnose and prescribe, nurses carry out the orders of health care providers such as identify the complications of the disease or injury, administer medications, change wound dressings, and care for the overall wellbeing of the patient. Doctors would not be able to treat their patients around the clock, surgeries wouldn’t take place and hidden complications may be overlooked in patients resulting in often fatal results.

Increasing wages will have more benefits to nursing beyond improving their financial situations. It will make nurses feel more valued for their role as part of the health care team as well as in patient and family lives. It ensures stronger job security which is crucial after going through the COVID-19 pandemic, having more nurses employed will help keep any potential disease outbreaks under control. Nurses are an important factor to why the COVID-19 pandemic is almost over and it’s imperative that they get the appreciation for all that they’ve done.

News outlets must realize the impact of their words

Laura Niezgoda

Amidst the loss, tragedy, illness and devastation of the past 22 months, mental health has been negatively affected by the overwhelming presence of the media

Another variant of COVID-19, Omicron, was reported to the World Health Organization Nov. 24. Since then, it is now the latest COVID-19 topic to report on, dominating pages of media outlets. Headlines such as “We won’t know how bad Omicron is for another month” and “Omicron will likely ‘dominate and overwhelm’ the world in the next 3-6 months, doctor says” insight uncertainty and danger of a new variant of COVID-19.

After the Waukesha tragedy of two weeks ago, the media quickly reported on the disaster, with some headlines sympathizing with the accused killer. These articles said he feels as if he is being treated like a “monster” and report that his mother said this incident was caused by a “lack of mental health services.” Another incident happened Nov.30 at Oxford High School in Michigan where a 15-year-old boy shot 11 people. While there seems to be an increase in recent tragic events across the country, their impact on us may be more severe due to the sensationalization and exploitation from the media.

In the 1970s, Dr. George Gerbner, a professor of communication at the University of Pennsylvania, theorized that humans begin to develop a cognitive bias where they start to see the world more dangerous than it actually is due to overexposure to media-related violence, more commonly known as the “mean world syndrome.” Mean world syndrome leads people to have heightened anxiety, fear, general pessimism and heightened alertness. Many studies have supported this, most notably the idea that violent video games increase aggressive behaviors.

Crime rates have dropped dramatically since the 1990s, but public perception of crime has risen as 60% of surveyed U.S. adults say that crime has increased in the past years, according to a 2020 Pew Research Center survey.

The mean world syndrome offers an explanation for why people believe the world is more dangerous than it actually may be. The media that people consume directly impacts how they view and interact with the world around them.

In 2020, the FBI reported a 5.6% increase in violent crimes from the previous year while property crimes declined for the 18th consecutive year across the country. 2020 was not a good year. From COVID-19 to police brutality to the 2020 presidential election, news outlets appeared to have a terrible report every day.

This increase of hostile media led to “doomscrolling,” a phenomenon where users continuously scroll through news that is disheartening and depressing without the ability to pull themselves back.

Today, people often have a dependency on their cell phones and the ability to have any information at the touch of their fingertips. According to a Pew Research Study, 86% of surveyed Americans say that they receive their news from a smartphone, tablet or computer. People receive news quicker than ever before with the increased use of social media, connecting them with every area of the world. While the ability to have information at their demand can create a more informed and aware society, it may also bring the world into a perpetual state of despair due to the overwhelming amount of negative information regarding current events.

This is not always the public’s fault. News outlets know how to engage readers.

Fear sells. Violence sells. Outrage sells.

All of the headlines ranging from the Omicron variant, the Waukesha tragedy and the Michigan school shooting compete with other news sources and attempt to gain the most readers. To do so, some media outlets must gain the reader’s

attention with preposterous headlines such as inciting the fear of COVID-19, sympathizing with an accused killer and infantilizing a school shooter.

The United States media coverage is highly scrutinized. The media does not attempt to sensationalize itself, the business model must do that. In order to stay relevant, privatized news outlets are under

Staying informed “ and staying educated is crucial to our progress as a nation.”

financial pressure to deliver what their audiences want to read. It is a marketing tactic for media outlets to use emotional pulls to engage their audience.

Staying informed and staying educated is crucial to our development of society. Still, feeling as though there is a threat due to the influx of overwhelming media we consume does not move us in a positive direction as a society.

News can become overwhelming, and the responsibility is on people to protect their mental health in the wake of a global pandemic and further tragedies. Obtain your information from news outlets that provide balance in your news feed; this balance serves as a buffer between the positive and negative news. People could also take a break from their phones to avoid scrolling through depressing media.

News outlets that resort to sensationalization need to revise how they develop stories. These outlets need ethical headlines that don’t exploit tragedies for the pursuit of profit. The news must understand the impact their words have on their audiences.

Laura Niezgoda is a sophomore studying communication studies and criminology and law studies. She can be reached at

laura.niezgoda@marquette.edu

Be mindful of eating disorders during holidays

Grace Cady

Gathering, cooking and connecting with family through food is often a way to spend quality time together during the holiday season in America. For Americans who struggle with eating disorders, however, it may be difficult, especially in a country that often emphasizes overindulgence.

Approximately 28.8 million Americans struggle with eating disorders in their lifetimes. For many people who endure struggles with eating, the holidays can be a very triggering and difficult time. Between holidays that have become centered around food and inherent pressure from family, it is important that people are more mindful of how people could be struggling with their eating disorders and not make comments about body image or the amount someone is eating.

According to the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders, second to opioid addictions, eating disorders are among the most deadly mental illnesses. Sometimes it can be difficult to detect eating disorders because someone with an eating disorder may not be technically underweight; and it can be even more difficult to acknowledge them because loved ones may not know what to say or do, but there are some notable warning signs.

According to the Mayo Clinic, somebody who struggles with anorexia nervosa may experience dizziness, insomnia and develop a fear of gaining weight. Other common

eating disorders include bulimia, binge eating disorder and rumination disorder. Rumination disorder is a condition where a person will spit up undigested food and either swallow it or spit it out again. These eating disorders can include purging behaviors, eating large amounts of food rapidly and restricting one’s food intake.

It has become normal to fixate on eating large amounts of food during the holiday season. Food plays a central role in holidays, such as Thanksgiving or Christmas; this can be troublesome for an individual with anorexia who wants to restrict

how much they eat and can also be difficult for an individual with binge eating disorder and can result in feelings of guilt or shame.

Families often gather during the holiday season. Sometimes, the family presence itself can be difficult for people who struggle with eating. Simple comments from family regarding their weight or mentioning how much or little they are eating can really cause negative effects on the psyche of people with eating disorders.

Especially for women and girls, there is a lot of emphasis on physical appearance, and thinness has been a long-standing symbol of attractiveness; because of this, it is easy to take what may seem to be innocent comments to heart because we are so fixated on our body image.

On top of this, sometimes the people enduring the eating disorder are careful not to worry their family.

“I hated holidays when I was in my eating disorder. I felt like I was in a minefield of panic,” Robyn Cruze and Espra Andrus, writers for the National Eating Disorder Association blog, in 2017 said. “I would tiptoe through the eating disorder detonators only to have to deal with a worried family.”

People must be mindful of what they say about eating habits during the holidays. If people know others who have eating disorders they should strive for empathy and refrain from making comments about what they eat.

There is a common phrase that says “be kind, you never know what someone else is going through,” and that is especially true for those who struggle with mental illness. Eating disorders are not a choice, they are not selfish or for attention, they are nothing other than a mental health issue that millions of people face every day.

Nobody deserves to live in the fear of food, fear of their bodies or the fear of a lack of control; but the reality is, many people do. Many people endure eating disorders in silence and that silence does not lessen the severity of their struggle. If there is one thing we should all keep in mind, it is that we are better off to air on the side of being considerate than putting somebody in an uncomfortable situation that may trigger them or their disorder.

It is important that people consider what they say to someone about their body image or how much food they are eating, especially during the holidays, because it could be very harmful regardless of the intention. In order for us to be sensitive to other people’s struggles, we must always have empathy.

Graphic by Alexandra Garner alexandra.garner@marquette.edu

Grace Cady is a sophomore studying journalism. She can be be reached at grace.cady@mar-

quette.edu

Statement of Opinion Policy

The opinions expressed on the Opinions page reflect the opinions of the Opinions staff. The editorials do not represent the opinions of Marquette University nor its administrators, but those of the editorial board.

The Marquette Tribune prints guest submissions at its discretion. The Tribune strives to give all sides of an issue an equal voice over the course of a reasonable time period. An author’s contribution will not be published more than once in a four-week period. Submissions with obvious relevance to the Marquette community will be given priority consideration.

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