2019-11-13

ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-NINE YEARS OF EDITORIAL FREEDOM

Wednesday, November 13, 2019

Ann Arbor, Michigan

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SOFC chairs face recall for mishandling applications

CSG considers removing committee heads over admissions misconduct ATTICUS RAASCH

Emma Mati/Daily

Sharon Waxman, president and CEO of The Fair Labor Association, speaks to students and faculty at Ross Tuesday evening.

Fair Labor Association president talks fair wages, workers’ rights

Sharon Waxman explains how companies prioritize profits over employees EMMA STEIN

Daily Staff Reporter

Sharon Waxman, president and CEO of the Fair Labor Association, gave a presentation Tuesday night on the importance of transparency and enforcing human rights mandates in big corporations. The discussion took place in the Ross School of Business and drew in a crowd of about 40

community members.

Ravi Anupindi, chair of the President’s Advisory Committee on Labor Standards and Human Rights at the University, began by explaining the University’s role in supporting fair labor practices.

“Anything that you buy that has a Michigan logo, as a University we care about the labor standards and human rights and the supply chains that produce these

products,” Anupindi said.

“There is an operational mandate to ensure that companies that we license our logo to actually meet the labor standards of human rights.”

Waxman began her presentation by discussing a past trend in large industries to prioritize profit over the well-being of workers.

However, she said that rhetoric has beg un to change in recent years.

“For decades, the premise that companies exist for the benefit of shareholders has driven a lot of CEOs and boards of directors to make decisions based primarily on profitability,” Waxman said.

“Although not entirely new, the concept that companies have a role to play in society, for the good of society, has emerged as a focal point in recent years.”

See LABOR, Page 3A

Daily Staff Reporter

The University of Michigan Central Student Government met Tuesday to discuss the University budget, Giving Blueday 2019 and to debate the recall of two members of the Student Organization Funding Committee for misconduct during their membership application process. One member has been removed and the second will be debated next week.

Vice Provost for Academic and Budgetary Affairs Amy Dittmar presented on the University budget, including composition, allocation and budgetary models. Dittmar’s presentation included several comparisons between how the University collects and disperses funds versus other public and private universities.

Veterans Blood Battle ramps up as football examine game against OSU approaches LGBTQ+ Students participate in blood drive, work to out-donate rival school inclusion CAMPUS LIFE

MELANIE TAYLOR

Former service members discuss discrimination, experiences in military DELANEY DAHLSTROM For The Daily

A panel of LGBTQ military veterans discussed the political and social issues faced by past and present veterans who identify as LGBTQ in the Michigan League Tuesday.

Three veterans of various military ranks and branches were present, including Captain Michelle Yi, a Business graduate student, Staff Sergeant Lacy Jones, Dentistry junior, and Specialist Necko Fanning, an LSA senior who moderated the panel.

Fanning asked the panelists what can be done to make society more welcoming to members of the LGBTQ community.

Jones said she came from the deep South and was a Southern Baptist Christian. She explained the community was not very accepting of LGBTQ people.

“I would like to see a safe space for individuals that may be struggling with any form of spirituality and accepting their identity, which can be a really challenging thing in and of itself,” Jones said. “Finding a Christian organization that is accepting of the LGBTQ+ community and doesn’t consider gay people to be an abomination can be a battle.”

Read more at See VETERANS, Page 3A MichiganDaily.com GOT A NEWS TIP? Call 734-418-4115 or e-mail news@michigandaily.com and let us know.

Daily Staff Reporter

In the weeks leading up to the Ohio State University football game, University of Michigan staff and students are participating in the 38th annual campus-wide “Blood Battle” blood drive to out-donate OSU. Though the University suffered a defeat against the Buckeyes

on the field last year, Michigan students secured their seventh Blood Battle win in 11 years.

With just over two weeks until the game, University students aim to repeat that victory.

Nursing senior Alex Zeto, executive board member of Blood Drives United, explained that to her and many others, the competition is only one part of the Battle’s purpose.

She said she enjoys how the Battle’s rivalry-driven success is supplemented by the fact each pint of blood is used to help a person in need.

Zeto first attempted to donate blood in high school, but she was turned away due to Red Cross’s eligibility requirements. But she got to campus and saw a drive at her dorm freshman year

and decided to try again. She joined Blood Drives United the following year and has helped the organization plan the Blood Battle annually since then.

“Since high school, I just thought it seemed like a really easy way to give back with people who need my blood more than I do,” Zeto said.

See BLOOD, Page 3A

EMMA MATI/Daily Students decorated the Rock to advertise the annual Blood Drive Battle with Ohio State University.

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INDEX

Vol. CXXIX, No. 27 ©2019 The Michig5n Daily

Topics Dittmar discussed included appropriations and how University’s affordability compares to other public universities.

According to Dittmar, recent tuition increases have helped achieve affordability for many students on campus.

“We also have increasing costs because we invest in it being more affordable,” Dittmar said. “So, now this is a little counterintuitive, because we’re increasing tuition to pay for the cost, and then we have to make it more affordable. So, what it comes down to is that there’s a difference in what the sticker price is and what in any individual student might pay, and that’s purposeful.

That’s purposeful for us to be able to help with the affordability.”

See CSG, Page 3A

VETERANS WEEK

Panelists reflect on diversity in military

Veterans highlight need to increase equity in the armed services NAVYA GUPTA For The Daily

The Un iversit y of M ich ig a n Vetera n a nd M i l it a r y Ser v ices org a n i zed t he “ Diversit y i n t he M i l it a r y ” pa nel on Monday to d isc uss equ it y a nd i nclusion i n t he Un ited St ates M i l it a r y.

The pa nel wa s moderated by Ph i l ip La rson , prog ra m d i rec tor of Vetera n a nd M i l it a r y Ser v ices. The aud ience con sisted of about 15 st udent s a nd vetera n s.

La rson beg a n t he pa nel’s conversat ion by a sk i ng t he pa nel ist s about t hei r decision s to joi n t he m i l it a r y.

R ack ha m st udent Jacob Gra n zow ref lec ted on how 9/ 11 i mpac ted h i m a nd encou ra ged h i m to joi n t he m i l it a r y. “ I wa s 13 when 9/ 11 happened, a nd I g uess t hose i ma ges t hat were on t he news just st uck w it h me,” sa id Gra n zow.

“I joi ned because it just a f fec ted me, a nd I wa nted to help i n a ny way I cou ld .”

Eng i neer i ng g raduate See DIVERSITY, Page 3A

NEWS.........................2 OPINION.....................4 CLASSIFIEDS................6

SUDOKU.....................2 ARTS...................5 SPORTS.................7

News

2A — Wednesday, November 13, 2019

TUESDAY:

By Design

MONDAY: Looking at the Numbers

WEDNESDAY: This Week in History

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FRIDAY: Behind the Story

‘U’ minority student enrollment reaches all-time record Nov. 11, 1994 Asian American enrollment at the University increased 1 percent this year, according to fall enrollment figures released Wednesday the largest increase for a minority group since the Michigan Mandate began in 1987. With this increased enrollment, and slight increases in Black, Hispanic and Native American enrollment, more minority students now attend the University than ever before.

“The continued growth in the number of students of color is gratifying, since their presence enriches this campus,” University President James J. Duderstadt said in a statement. “But we have noted a trend toward slower growth in

the numbers of African American students. I have asked the executive officers to concentrate on ways to improve our attraction and retention of African American students in the coming year.”

Since 1987, the University has worked to increase minority enrollment through the Michigan Mandate.

Minority students now account for 24.2 percent of all students – up from 15.4 percent in 1988. Last year, minority enrollment accounted for 21.4 percent of all students.

But progress in minority enrollment slowed this year. Since 1988, minority enrollment has increased by at least 460 students.

This year, minority enrollment

increased by only 349 students.

University spokeswoman Lisa Baker attributed this to increased competition for minority students.

“Michigan has had a very good track record. You get increased competition and that plays a factor,” she said.

Asian American students account for the largest increase in minority enrollment, now 3,421, or 10.4 percent of the student body, up from 3,126, or 9.4 percent, last year.

“My hope would have been we could have equaled that number for African American students,” said Lester Monts, vice provost for academic and multicultural affairs.

Edgar Ho, chairperson of the United Asian American Organiza-

tions, attributed the increase to the kinds of people applying.

“I think it’s probably just a natural result of the increased number of Asian Americans applying,” he said.

“On the face of it, there’s nothing necessarily good or bad about it.”

Other minority groups also had increases in enrollment, but not nearly as high.

African Americans now number 2,715, or 8.3 percent of the total enrollment, compared with 2,706, or 8.1 percent, last year.

Hispanic student enrollment rose to 1,533, or4.7 percent of all students, up from 1,497, or 4.5 percent, last year.

Enrollment for Native American students grew to 258, or 0.8 percent, this year, up from 249, or 0.7 percent,

last year.

“As a part of the Michigan Mandate, this is a priority and it’s something we’re quite serious about,” Baker said. “It has involved the tireless efforts of many, including the highest level of the University, faculty, staff, faculty, alumni.”

The University’s increase in minorities has been the slowest for Black Students.

In 1988, Black and Asian American enrollment accounted for the same level of the student population – 6.2 percent. The next year, Asian American enrollment surpassed Black enrollment, making them the largest minority group on campus.

Today there are 706 more Asian Americans than Black students on

Campus.

Monts said the University needs to place a greater emphasis on its recruiting efforts to improve Black enrollment.

“I believe it’s going to take a concerted effort across the campus....I’m not pleased with the progress we’re making,” he said.

The University also has been less successful in retaining Black students.

For the entering class of 1987, 65.1 percent of all Black students graduated within six years, compared with 85.4 percent for the University as a whole. For Asian Americans entering the University in 1987, 88.2 percent graduated within six years.

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Editorial Staff CLAIRE MEINGAST/Daily The “Under the Microscope” exhibit at The Museum of Natural History opened this weekend.

Community discusses impact of ‘U’ hosting presidential debate in 2020

Campus groups worry political event will have negative psychological effects on students EMMA STEIN

Daily Staff Reporter

When LSA junior Fareah Fysudeen heard the University of Michigan would be hosting one of the presidential debates in the fall of 2020, she said she assumed it was for publicity.

Upon thinking about it further, she felt like the University was not considering the potential impacts of this decision on marginalized communities.

“It’s a way to establish ourselves as a good school and as the kind of school that would host such a presidential debate,” Fyusdeen said. “So, immediately I thought, oh, this is a selfaggrandizing thing. It’s a way to get out there … my immediate second thought was, after I talked about it with other people Sudoku Syndication who expressed concern, oh, that makes sense. This University is

doing this for a namesake, and it to the intensity of the current exists when these elections happen, especially following the is clear to me that they would not political climate.

“I recognize that it’s going 2016 election.” always consider the implications Fysudeen continued by this would have on marginalized to be a stressful year because the body of politics is very discussing how marginalized communities on campus.”

Since the announcement the polarized, and there’s a lot of fear communities often most strongly University will be hosting the mongering as part of the debate, feel the effects of this tension event, the University has held and we’re all subject to that,” and have to respond or defend multiple town hall events to Schlissel said. “I think that it themselves.

“It just raises the stakes in discuss student involvement and may be of more intensity because safety during the debate. everyone is here in town, but a way that can be very hostile In an interview with The Daily I think it’s going to be pretty sometimes, and marginalized earlier this month, University intense no matter what. We have communities are usually the ones that take the blunt of that President Mark Schlissel said the CAPS.” University would be extremely Christine Asidao, associate tension,” Fysudeen said. “And of community so people of color, people who well-prepared in terms of safety director for the community. engagement and outreach at aren’t represented, people who “It’s not just our DPSS, but Counseling and Psychological constantly have to be at the it’s state police, all the national Services, said she is most forefront of these things are just security apparatus will be here,” concerned about potentially going to be put in places where Schlissel said. “It’ll probably hateful incidents coming from they have to be or represent be the safest place in America, people from outside of Ann themselves or, you know, their physically.”

Arbor visiting for the debate, mere existence is going to have to Schlissel also discussed how making students generally feel be defended.”

Indeed, LSA sophomore the debate might negatively http://sudokusyndication.com/sudoku/generator/print/ more unsafe on campus.

Collado, external impact students mentally due “It really is more what are some Julianna of the protections associated director of La Casa, told The with the debate,” Asidao said. Daily in an email interview that “You know, we’ve seen it in the atmosphere surrounding the past with the previous debate will be difficult to predict, election, things that might but it’s important to prepare occur, like possible hate and communities for anything that MEDIUM bias incidents. That sense of might happen. ““Even though it is a great just, you know, feeling unsafe psychologically as well as opportunity, we are sensitive to physically for some of our the needs of our community on campus,”” Collado said. ““The students.”

Fysudeen said elections Latinx community has been a in general tend to change target of Trump’s administration, the campus climate at the right alongside many of the University and that hosting communities also represented the debate will further on Michigan’s campus. Due to increase the tension in the his rhetoric and others, people feel emboldened to express their community.

“Presidential elections racist and xenophobic sentiments themselves have a profound as well. In many ways, we do effect on the climate on not know what to expect from campus, and I think (the the Presidential Debate being debate) just raises the stakes on campus. We do know that so much higher,” Fysudeen there will be an increase in said. “It turns up the heat, media, security, and people in especially if we’re going to general in Ann Arbor, which is be an epicenter of the eye unpredictable in and of itself. of the entire nation. I feel For this reason, we are already like people feel the need to planning ahead to identify ways perform or to respond or to be to support members of the Latinx For personal use only. puzzle ©bysudokusolver.com. sudokusyndication.com reactive, and so it heightens community on U-M’s campus.” the tension that already See DEBATE, Page 3A

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The Michigan Daily (ISSN 0745-967) is published Monday through Friday during the fall and winter terms by students at the University OF Michigan. One copy is available free of charge to all readers. Additional copies may be picked up at the Daily’s office for $2. Subscriptions for September-April are $250 and year long subscriptions are $275. University affiliates are subject to a reduced subscription rate. On-campus subscriptions for fall term are $35. Subscriptions must be prepaid.

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LABOR From Page 1A This shift has primarily been driven by younger generations, Waxman added.

She said they are more conscious of human rights and make more mindful purchasing decisions.

“While the fight to improve working conditions is far from a new one, it is clear today’s up-andcoming generations are far more aware and mindful of social issues, including the treatment of workers,” Waxman said.

Waxman then explained one way the Fair Labor Association has been effective in promoting the humane treatment of workers through full transparency of their investigations.

She said it holds the companies accountable in a way many other organizations do not.

“Our commitment to transparency has really been a foundational principle,” Waxman said. “We don’t think of transparency as an end, but rather the means

DIVERSITY From Page 1A st udent Ju l ia Oh Coxen ex pla i ned why she joi ned t he m i l it a r y. “ Why I joi ned wa s ver y d if ferent f rom t he rea son why I wa nted to st ay,” sa id Coxen . “A s a ch i ld of i m m ig ra nt pa rent s, I felt a ver y st rong ca l l i ng to do somet h i ng for t he nat ion t hat had done so much for us.”

The pa nel ist s t hen d isc ussed t hei r decision s to ret i re f rom t he m i l it a r y. Li ke Eng i neer i ng sen ior Stefa ny Escobedo, who lef t t he m i l it a r y to complete her educat ion , R ack ha m st udent Ia n Fishback felt he cou ld cont r ibute more to societ y a s a schola r, rei n forci ng h is decision to leave. On t he ot her ha nd, Gra znow sa id he lef t because he si mply felt it wa s t i me to do so. “ I joi ned t he m i l it a r y when I wa s 18 , a nd I felt when I wa s 24 — when I got out — t hat I had f u lf i l led my persona l rea son s for joi n i ng,” sa id Gra n zow. “ It wa s t i me to do somet h i ng else, to spread out , a nd I’ve been i n school ever si nce.”

Fol low i ng t h is d isc ussion , La rson a sked t he pa nel whet her t hey ’d ex per ienced moment s when t hey ’d

News

to an end. We believe in shining a light on working conditions and global supply chains because it promotes accountability and engenders trust.”

Waxman said there are a variety of challenges facing workers, but one of the most pressing was the fight for a fair wage. She claimed low wages harm both the worker and the company, adding workers have the right to compensation for a reg ular workweek to fit their basic needs and should have some discretionary income.

“One of the most pernicious challenges is fairly compensating workers — in other words, providing a livable wage,” Waxman said.

“It’s not an exaggeration to say that chronically low wages are really an affront to the humanity and dignity of workers. They undermine the success of families and communities, and from the business perspective, can drain productivity, motivation and business success.”

Waxman concluded by discussing how many companies feel the need to

produce as much as they can as fast as they can, which can negatively impact factory workers.

“There’s enormous pressure for brands and factories to produce things super quickly, and it really takes a toll on the people who work in them,” Waxman said.

LSA senior Ryan Rich said he attended the event in order to see how to enact change in these sectors.

He said he came in without knowing much about the Fair Labor Association and was surprised to learn how effective it is in holding companies accountable through transparency.

“I didn’t know too much about this organization, but it really sounds like the people affiliated with them, with the Fair Labor Association, have committed and are being held accountable in a way I had never seen before,” Rich said. “There was a group, a very large group of companies and universities, that are willing to be held accountable. It’s rare.”

been especia l ly awa re of t hei r ow n a nd ot hers’ ident it ies du r i ng t hei r yea rs of ser v ice.

Fishback sa id in h is ex per ience i n t he m ilit a r y, ident it ies of race a nd gender were muted wh i le ot her a spec t s of people’s persona l it ies were h ig h l ig hted .

He ex pla i ned t here wa s a st a rk cont ra st bet ween d iversit y i n t he m i l it a r y a nd out side it . “ There is less of a n empha sis on sk i n color a nd categor ies, a nd more of a n empha sis on seei ng i nd iv idua ls a nd t hei r backg rou nds,” sa id Fishback . “ Dif ferences l i ke race a nd socioeconom ic backg rou nds were muted to a deg ree t hat people over here (at t he Un iversit y) just ca n not u nderst a nd .”

Gra n zow com mented t he foc us on t he job at ha nd overshadows t he idea of ca r i ng about d if ferences a mong com rades. “ No one ca res where you a re f rom ,” Gra n zow sa id . “ No one ca res how r ich you a re, no one ca res about you r rel ig ious bel ief s or pol it ica l bel ief s. You have a job to do a nd you have to get it done.”

Gra n zow sa id t he m i l it a r y helped ex pose h i m to t he d iversit y of t he Un ited St ates. It wa s a st a rk cont ra st to

h is sma l l hometow n in K a n sa s — where ever yone wa s wh ite w it h a Ch r ist ia n backg rou nd a nd si m i la r pol it ica l bel ief s, he sa id . “(In t he m i l it a r y) we had people f rom bot h coa st s, f rom Fi l ipi no backg rou nds, H ispa n ic backg rou nds, black backg rou nds, A sia n backg rou nds — you na me it , someone wa s f rom t hat backg rou nd,” sa id Gra n zow.

“I rea l i zed t hat at a f u nda ment a l level, t h is whole hu ma n t apest r y is not just one t h read .

There (a re) people f rom a l l over t he place.”

The pa nel ca me to a n end when La rson a sked a quest ion about what t he pa nel ist felt t he m i l it a r y does wel l t hat societ y needs to catch up on .

Coxen sa id a lt houg h t he m i l it a r y ha s t a ken steps t hat st reng t hen a spec t s of i nteg rat ion of d iversit y, it is i mpor t a nt to recog n i ze it is a work i n prog ress. “ There is st i l l a lot of work to do. We a re cer t a i n ly not where we cou ld be,” sa id Coxen . “ Where I wou ld say t hat t he m i l it a r y does f ra n k ly ver y wel l is t he gender pay g ap. I wou ld get pa id exac t ly t he sa me a mou nt a s a ma le cou nter pa r t w it h t he sa me level of sk i l l a nd t ra i n i ng.”

Gra n zow a g reed w it h Coxen’s st atement . “ They a re get t i ng r id of t he gender d iv ide i n t he f it ness test s, a nd I t h i n k t hat ’s a good step,” sa id Gra n zow. “ I l i ke how ever yone is held to a cer t a i n objec t ive st a nda rd .”

In an i nter v iew w it h The Da i ly a f ter t he pa nel’s d isc ussion , P resident of t he Un iversit y of M ich ig a n St udent Vetera n s of A mer ica Stefa ny Escobedo, a n Eng i neer i ng sen ior, ex pla i ned st udent s f rom a l l racia l a nd socioeconom ic backg rou nds shou ld feel encou ra ged to joi n t he m i l it a r y due to t he m i l it a r y ’s empha sis on i nd iv idua l cha rac ter rat her t ha n t he socia l con st r uc t s of race or gender. “ In my ex per ience, what ha s cou nted more ha s been work et h ic a nd i nteg r it y (compa red to race or gender),” sa id Escobedo.

“At t he end of t he day t he g reat t h i ng about t he m i l it a r y, i n my opi n ion , is t hat we’re foc used on t he m ission a nd t hat ’s what t a kes pr ior it y.”

CSG From Page 1A Dittmar said the University’s $12.4 billion endowment, which is the ninth largest in the country, alleviates an addition $6,000 in costs per student on campus.

“So, if you were looking at what we use and gifts and proceeds from endowment, there’s about $6,400 that each student on average is not paying, because a donor is paying those costs and either providing the aid or they may just be paying costs; they may be paying part of your faculty salaries; they may be paying for some kind of, you know, operations or programs in the building,” Dittmar said. “Those are costs that don’t have to be paid someplace else.”

CSG President Ben Gerstein presented on Giving Blueday 2019, which CSG will use as a fundraising effort to continue the Leadership Engagement Scholarship that originated in 2016. If fully funded, the

DEBATE From Page 2A As Schlissel said, the debate will bring additional police presence to campus to protect students physically.

However, Asidao said having more security could have an adverse effect on some members of the community.

“I think for some of our students, knowing that the University is really thinking about campus security can be really helpful,” Asidao said.

“For some of our students, the relationship in terms of having, maybe, an increased police presence may actually be more anxiety provoking in some ways because of what has happened for some of our students feeling targeted and feeling like there’s more scrutiny, in terms of their own multiple social identities, and maybe being

BLOOD From Page 1A The competition officially began on Oct. 30. OSU was leading at the time of publication with 1,003 donated pints of blood in comparison to University’s 972. However, neither school has yet to garner half the number of donations they obtained last year, and Michigan has 20 drives scheduled in the coming weeks to continue collecting donations up until the deadline.

This past weekend was one of the Battle’s biggest events: Be a Hero. At this event, which took place on the Big House field, 456 pints of blood were donated.

Megan Podschlne is the program manager for Wolverines for Life, the parent organization to Blood Drives United. Podschlne described Wolverines for Life as a center for organizing “blood, organ, tissue, and bone marrow donations,” under which the domain of Blood Drives United squarely falls.

Podschlne said in her experience at Michigan Medicine’s Transplant Center, donated blood is typically used for ER and surgical patients.

Zeto reiterated the Red Cross’s assertion one pint of blood has the potential to save up to three lives.

LSA sophomore Spencer Wood first heard about the Blood Battle when a faculty member at his high school advised future Wolverines to participate.

Already having been involved in Red Cross volunteer work, Wood said he was excited at the opportunity. He now helps with advertisement for the event.

In third grade, Wood was diagnosed with a blood

Wednesday, November 13, 2019 — 3A scholarship would give $1,000 in need-based aid to student leaders on campus.

Gerstein said there are many barriers that can keep student leaders from succeeding on campus.

“The mission of the scholarship, (that) was created three years ago, was recognizing that there are financial barriers to student leadership on campus, whether that is balancing work with potential involvement or other needs, or the cost of dues to join an organization,” Gerstein said. “There are a bunch of barriers that low socioeconomic status students face to being a student leader on campus, and it ranges from all different types of organizations.”

In addition, Gerstein presented on the importance of an assembly-wide climate demographic survey to assess diversity within the student government before yielding his presentation time to allow for members to fill out the survey.

Gerstein said the survey, and checking in on diversity in student leadership, is critical to understanding the needs of the student body.

“The Leadership Engagement Scholarship was actually born out of one of the first demographic surveys, realizing the lack of socioeconomic diversity in student leadership,” Gerstein said.

“The survey is really important to go out, because it allows for us as an organization — collectively not just separated by an executive branch of the legislative branch — to have a solid assessment about where we need to make our own internal improvements to the inclusivity and diversity of our organization.”

Following executive reports, the assembly discussed and confirmed five members to various CSG positions, including three students as associate justices of the Central Student Judiciary.

targets of what’s perceived as unfair targeting by security. I think it’s going to be a mixed bag.”

Fysudeen said she would appreciate the additional police presence, but doesn’t think it is an allencompassing solution.

Physical safety will not prevent students from feeling unsafe on campus, she said.

“I think as long as our safety is being thought of proactively rather than reactively, as long as those safe spaces are made, I think this tension can be, you know, addressed successfully,” Fysudeen said. “I think that there’s something to be said there positively. And so, I think that’s a great sentiment, but I also think it’s just going to be a lot of psychological and emotional strain on students. And I don’t think that there’s a way that physical safety often can mitigate that.”

Asidao said the potential

psychological impact of this debate on students could manifest itself in a variety of ways, but she predicts there will be an underlying sense of anxiety in many of the feelings that may come up. “(The psychological impact) can come in a variety of different ways, but one of the things we have seen is just this increased sense of anxiety, just worry,” Asidao said. “Worry in terms of personal safety, worry in terms of the future, worry in terms of what might be coming, worry for their own sense of people within their community, being worried about their peers … For some of our students, it may also increase some depressive symptoms, feelings of sadness, feelings of hopelessness. For some of our students, it can also bring up any previous traumatic experiences in their lives.”

disorder that required frequent transfusions and blood work.

“I wouldn’t be here today without that work,” Wood said. “Through that, I just wanted to help out in any way I could. And as long as I have been able, I’ve been donating three to five times a year ever since then.”

Business senior Vijita Kamath shared a similar story, though in her case, it was her mother who had benefited from donations in the past.

“My mother battled cancer for 10+ years, so a lot of my childhood was spent in and around hospitals learning about the need for transfusions and the acute shortage of blood,” Kamath wrote in a message to The Daily. “I learned I was a universal donor (O+) back then and encouraged to donate when I got older.”

As an international student from India, Kamath had not been able to donate prior to this year’s Battle.

“The Red Cross has restrictions on eligibility if you have visited or had prolonged stay in any malaria or other diseaseaffected regions,” Kamath said. “I first learned about this when I tried to donate as a sophomore and was answering the required questions during a walk-in.

But I was ineligible since (I) had been home to India over the summer … This was the first time I had not been home for over 6 months, so I was eligible to donate.”

The annual Blood Battle is not the only opportunity University students and faculty have to donate blood.

Blood Drives United hosts an additional drive in the winter which frequently puts the University into competition with other local or Big 10 schools. Additionally, people are able to make blood

donations as frequently as every eight weeks, according to the Red Cross.

Still, Wood and others said they believe the culture on a college campus, and specifically Michigan’s campus, makes it easier to solicit mass numbers of donations.

“I think there is a difference in doing it on your own, searching for random blood drives … and being a student, because one thing I tell people is, you’re not just donating for yourself,” Wood said. “You’re donating for other people, but on the other hand you’re donating on behalf of the University of Michigan. You’re able to exercise that name and do good will through that as well.”

Zeto said they’ve been trying year after year to make the drives increasingly convenient for students and staff. Especially considering the Union’s closing, Zeto said Blood Drives United has been pushing for the University community to take advantage of dorm drives. They have also set up more opportunities to donate near athletic facilities, on North campus and at the hospital.

“It’s so easy,” Zeto said.

“You go somewhere to study or you’re just hanging out and you have an hour of time to kill. Why not donate blood?”

Zeto noted this year’s Blood Battle comes on the heels of a recent blood shortage in Southeastern Michigan, directly affecting the way Michigan Medicine and other local healthcare entities are able to help their patients.

For more information, interested students are advised to visit this site to view donor eligibility guidelines and a calendar of scheduled drives.

Read more at MichiganDaily.com

Opinion

4A — Wednesday, November 13, 2019

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

BRITTANY BOWMAN | COLUMN

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MARISA WRIGHT | COLUMN

W

They wrote the book on #MeToo

hat do we do with art made by bad men? This is the question many people asked in the aftermath of the #MeToo movement. We collectively turned our attention not to the court cases filed by U.S. attorneys and victims of these bad men’s violent and often illegal behavior, nor to the systems that enabled their predatory behavior to go unpunished for decades, but to the movies, TV shows, books, albums, journalism and poetry they made. What are we to do? Discard our fave’s stand-up special or hit record?

We chose to simultaneously turn away from the survivors looking us in the eye, the g utsy and courageous women who came forward to recount how these bad men sexually violated them, from workplace harassment to rape. Instead, we asked what all this meant for us. Is it OK to listen to that song or watch that movie? Am I still allowed to read that book or stream that podcast? Is it unethical to call an Uber or shop at Barnes & Noble?

In a way, this is understandable. How could we not? Our entire world is constructed out of an androcratic order, by the work of men who sit untouched on thrones of power. If we had to discard their work, what would we have left?

In some realms, practically nothing.

Almost two years after the initial reporting that led to the #MeToo movement — the original phrase coined by activist Tarana Burke — we’re getting a peek at a world in which predatory men are not emboldened, and those courageous enough to challenge their power are not silenced.

“She Said” was published on Sept. 10, 2019. The book was written by New York Times journalists Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey who detailed their reporting on movie producer Harvey Weinstein’s sexual misconduct and Prof.

Christine Blasey Ford’s Senate testimony. Two weeks later, “Know My Name” was published, revealing the identity of Chanel Miller, who was raped by Brock Turner.

Turner was infamously

sentenced to only six months in jail after being convicted of three counts of sexual assault.

Until the book’s publication, Miller had only been publicly identified as Emily Doe, and was known for the powerful victim statement she made at Turner’s sentencing hearing.

On Oct. 15, “Catch and Kill,” written by Ronan Farrow and detailing his reporting on Weinstein and how NBC executives tried to kill the story, was also published.

Each of these books is distinct, offering different perspectives of the same gruesome, complex system in which powerful men are protected and empowered to violate women. “She Said,” written in the third person, offers an extensive probe into exactly how men like Harvey Weinstein were protected by secretive settlements paid for by their employers, severe nondisclosure agreements and aggressive lawyers.

These lawyers include include Lisa Bloom, who proclaims herself a feminist advocate.

Contrastingly, Ronan Farrow’s “Catch and Kill” reads like a spy novel, illustrating just how cloak-and-dagger his reporting process was, from being followed by former Mossad agents to being warned to get a gun. “Know My Name,” though, is a tender, stunning book written by a gifted writer about the interiority of being a survivor, as well as undergoing Turner’s rape trial and living publicly as Emily Doe. Yet, together, the trio join as one refrain, melodious in its force and efficacy. For decades, women, as survivors of gender-based violence from intimate partner violence to sexual assault, have written about how men have violently and illegally violated them.

And in many cases, women continue to be silenced. This is precisely why these books are so important.

It is important to note that these books are a part of a long tradition of women writing about sexual traumas from more recent books like “Not That Bad,” edited by Roxane Gay, “Indelible in the Hippocampus,” edited

by Shelly Oria and “Nobody’s Victim,” by Carrie Goldberg, to older works such as the

1994 National Book Award for Nonfiction finalist “Strange Justice: The Selling of Clarence Thomas” by Jill Abramson and Jane Mayer.

Abramson and Mayer’s work is particularly relevant today for detailing the mishandling of Anita Hill’s testimony during Clarence Thomas’s U.S. Supreme Court nomination hearings by the Senate — and, in particular, thenSenate Judiciary Committee chairman Joe Biden.

“She Said” and “Catch and Kill” are journalistic in nature. All three of these books pick up the work of past generations of women — second- and third-wave feminists who attended consciousness-raising groups and women’s liberation rallies and in turn pushed forward progress for generations of women after them. These books exist as monuments to their progress and painful reminders of the work still to be done.

All of these books are — or at least should be — required reading. While I am prone to eye rolling and groaning when a man whines about #MeToo going too far or laments the suddenly-terminated careers of bad men as if they have been mortally wounded, I am receptive to what New York Magazine journalist Rebecca Traister explains as men who will inevitably be penalized for behavior that was once socially tolerated but is no longer accepted in 2019. With #MeToo, we are changing the rules in the middle of the game. There are some men raised to understand certain behaviors as common and accepted (though it should be noted Weinstein was probably never raised to believe rape was OK) who find that those same behaviors are no longer acceptable and might actually be punishable.

For these men, and for the boys growing up in the next generation, the would-be Brock Turners and Harvey Weinsteins of the world, these books are an essential roadmap to a world in which they are not owed sex and access to women’s bodies by virtue of their rights as men.

Marisa Wright can be reached at marisadw@umich.edu.

MADISON COPLEY | CONTACT CARTOONIST AT MICOPLEY@UMICH.EDU

O

Being progressively all-female

f the three campus tours I took prior to enrolling at the University of Michigan, the most memorable highlight from each trip up to Ann Arbor was the Martha Cook Residence Hall. The tour guides I had as a high schooler emphasized how this building was the embodiment of pure feminine class at the University and one of the only all-female dormitories left. As a result, I’ve had this magical ideal of the women who live in Martha Cook cemented as oldfashioned, proper students who have mandatory tea times and cannot speak to boys past 10 p.m.

Attending my first ever Friday teatime, I realized the stark inaccuracy of my assumptions about these women. Many sported U-M Computer Science or Biology T-shirts, and I saw an M-Boxing backpack. I also heard chats about Ross classes and biological anthropology lectures. The atmosphere of Martha Cook is welcoming, and immediately when you walk into Martha Cook, you are greeted by the sweet smells of delectable baked goods set out in the main hall and the warm smiles on everyone’s faces.

On your right, there is the magnificent Red Room with deep, soft, red carpet and the larger-than-life-size portrait of Martha Cook herself. The Sparking Room connects the Red and Gold Rooms, where men from the Law Quad used to wait on their ladies and chat in the late hours of the early 1900s. Under the high-arching ceilings of the Gold Room, everyone sits together on sofas, armchairs or on the floor at the feet of their friends, sipping on Friday tea. The century-old books and records showcased in each of these rooms are telling of the vast history the building possesses. Beautiful woodwork of the early 20th century envelopes each room, and the white, geometric ceilings declare they’ve heard a hundred years of conversation beneath them.

Over the past century, Martha Cook has housed countless women who have contributed much to the University. Reflecting on the 100th-anniversary celebration

of Martha Cook in 2015, I wondered just what it meant for the three all-female dorms on campus to be just that: all-female. The exclusivity raises potential quarrels, and I questioned what this may mean for nonbinary or transgender students wanting to live in non-coed dorms. Researching gender-inclusive housing at Michigan, I found a partnership between the University and the Spectrum Center called the Gender Inclusive Living Experience. GILE is located in East Quad, and students of any gender are allowed to be a part of the community. Upon joining GILE, residents agree to respect and use desired names and pronouns, value all social identities, support each other and commit to expanding inclusivity, among other things.

This program is especially great for first-year students, allowing a family environment where everyone is accepting and aware — something that can be incorporated into the rest of their undergraduate experience. However, GILE is one of the only residential programs on campus that exists to fully emulate genderinclusivity and deconstruct the binary nature of gender.

Even more so, if students who identify with the residents of GILE want a non-coed dorm, there are currently no options for them.

Consequently, Martha Cooks’s board has held recent discussions of what being an all-female dorm on Michigan’s campus means and how the definition of gender may need to change in order to be more inclusive for nonbinary and transgender students.

University housing has made a push in the right direction for inclusive restrooms and coed halls, but accessibility can be difficult to navigate. While it really sucks having to go up to the third floor of the Shapiro Undergraduate Library to find a restroom, it sucks way more when there isn’t a single gender-inclusive restroom in the entire building. The “dear colleague” letter in 2016 from the Obama administration pushed residential colleges and universities to provide adequate housing for transgender students or

potentially risk losing federal funding. The policies are not just for transgender student accommodations, but they also push for the negation of the gender-binary in general, with university housing and communal situations.

Thinking back to our own room-assignment application process prior to freshman year, many students were only allowed to select samesex roommates. These “dear colleague” policies also work to help siblings who want to live together, gay students wanting to live with heterosexual friends of the opposite gender and even friend groups comfortable with mixed-gender dormitory situations.

Though there are select residential programs on campus that are strictly gender-inclusive, the goal is to make each residential program on campus welcoming and safe for all students. Housing policies and traditional practices on campus that assume students are either rigidly male or female fail to represent nonbinary and transgender students. College administrators, housing applications and residential board members must adopt procedures that recognize diverse gender identities, expressions and transitions.

Applications that solely ask if a student is male or female fail to recognize the inherent and full complexity of gender identity, but they also miss the opportunity to provide sufficient data for roommate assignments and comprehensive comfort.

Addressing gender-inclusive issues and beginning to welcome transgender students would effectively work to strengthen the history of powerful women within the residences’ halls. For this reason, Martha Cook certainly appears to be moving in the right direction, and the powerful, progressive women in this dormitory act to consolidate the process and verify the importance of gender inclusiveness.

Brittany Bowman can be reached at babowm@umich.edu.

JOSHUA KIM | COLUMN

O

Buybacks are not the solution

n Oct. 27, a shooting near Greenville, Texas, left two dead and at least 14 injured. Maybe it’s just a stroke of callousness, but is anyone really surprised at this point? If anyone was going to be surprised by anything regarding this mass shooting, it would be that more people didn’t fall victim. In October 2017, a shooting at a music festival in Las Vegas took the lives of 58 people and injured almost 500 others. In February 2018, 17 Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School students and staff died at the hands of a deranged killer, marking one of the most traumatic times in modern American history.

This year, on Aug. 3 and Aug. 4, 22 people died and 24 were injured in a shooting in El Paso, Texas, and nine people died and 27 were injured in a shooting in Dayton, Ohio. Also this year, in Odessa, Texas, on Sept. 1, seven people were killed and 22 were injured.

How can anyone be surprised? It’s not that people don’t care for the lives lost. Quite the opposite.

People have been caring, but nothing has been done to address the clear epidemic of mass shootings in America.

The issue of g uns has been stuck in legislative gridlock.

Democrats continue to beg for stronger, more stringent g un control. Republicans arg ue g uns are an ingrained aspect of American history.

Instead of defaulting to the ever-present straw manning that dominates the current political landscape, it’s time to take an honest look at both sides of the g un control debate, and in particular, the proposal of a g un buyback.

Some arg ue that if g uns

were removed from American society, criminals would use other means to endanger the innocent. That might be true on an individual scale, but not so true on a national one. After the shooting in El Paso, former Democratic presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke spoke passionately about g un reform, proposing a national buyback program.

Most people on both sides of the aisle point to the Australian buyback program of 1996.

Progressives point to the fact that after the buyback, Australian homicide plummeted.

However, conservatives look to the fact that the homicide rate actually spiked shortly after the buyback and then declined at a similar rate to before the buyback.

At this point, a buyback program doesn’t look to significantly affect the number of homicides on a national scale. If there could be any association made with homicides, it wouldn’t be with g uns, but rather with the eras in which these homicides were occuring.

Homicides spiked in the U.S. during the late 1990s, but in the 2000s subsequently declined with no comparable national g un control reform to that of Australia.

Additionally, some arg ue the overabundance of g uns in America is a contributing factor to the current g un crisis. At first, it would seem that way. Admittedly, America has an obsession with g uns.

There are currently more g uns than there are people in the U.S. Think about that. When looking at that statistic, any sensible person would think the prevalence of g uns

would have an undeniable link to g un violence in America. But it doesn’t. In data published by the FBI listing the number of g uns and events of g un violence per year in 2010, they found that the data establishing the connection between g uns and g un-murder rate exhibits an R-squared value of 0.0031.

This suggests the possibility of correlation between g un murder and g un possession is close to none.

Obviously, the biggest issue with g uns is their capacity to kill. In the Dayton shooting, the shooter was able to kill nine people just in 32 seconds before being neutralized by authorities.

In 10 minutes, 58 were dead during the Las Vegas shooting. With the removal of g uns from American society, surely threats to the public could be minimized.

On the other hand, g uns give the people the right to defend themselves against threats.

Over time, g un purchases have skyrocketed, but certain types of g un-related crime have plummeted. Enshrined in the Constitution, arms are an afforded right, and the only way to remove g uns as such would be through near impossible bipartisan support. Even more so, such a constitutional shakeup would continue to destabilize the current political space.

The solution, as of now, is not clear, and it’s asinine to suggest that one broad buyback program would solve anything regarding the expansive crisis that involves g uns, mental health and culture.

Joshua Kim can be reached at joshica@umich.edu.

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

Arts

Wednesday, November 13, 2019 — 5A

ALBUM REVIEW

‘Moon Trip Radio’ is Clams Casino at his most inviting JIM WILSON

Daily Arts Writer

When most people think of the phrase “clams casino,” they think of the popular clam dish. In this case, clams casino is a clam on the half shell, covered in butter, garlic, peppers, bacon and breadcrumbs. It is an exceedingly popular appetizer in New England, and who can blame them? If you like clams and bacon and peppers and butter, I’m sure it’s the perfect dish, but in my mind, clams casino the appetizer is only the second most important Clams Casino.

The most important and most inf luential clams casino is, of course, the now-legendary cloud-rap producer. Clams Casino got his start crafting ethereal, sample-driven beats for the likes of Lil B, A$AP Rocky and Mac Miller in 2011. At the time, no other producer was making beats like Clams, and if they tried, they wouldn’t sound anywhere near as good as Clams. In 2016, he released his solo debut album 32 Levels featuring the usual

Moon Trip Radio Clams Casino Clams Casino Productions

suspect (Lil B, ASAP Rocky and Vince Staples) and some new collaborators like Kelela, Alt-J’s Joe Newman and Future Islands’s Samuel T. Herring. It was a spectacle. A damn good one at that, too.

With his most recent release, Moon Trip Radio, Clams Casino has decided to take a different approach. Rather than creating an album f looded with outside voices, he decided to keep things in-house and let the beats speak for themselves. Evidently, this decision was a good one because Moon Trip Radio is, no doubt, Clams Casino’s most cohesive and infectious work to date.

Lead single and album opener “Rune” is a slow-burning track, but once it gets going, it is white-hot. It’s classic Clams in the best way possible. A down-pitched vocal sample dominates the track and is backed by stuttering drums and warm bell tones. It takes almost two minutes and 40 seconds to reach the drop, but when the time finally comes, there’s nothing better.

Not only is Moon Trip Radio Clams’s most cohesive work, but it’s also the warmest and most inviting. Clams brings listeners into his world and encourages them to stay awhile and explore the landscape. Songs like “Healing” and “Twilit” have so many layers for listeners to pick apart, from field recordings to resonating piano tones. In particular, though, “Fire Blue” begs to be explored. It’s almost cavernous in a way; it’s contained far below the surfaces of the earth, but it’s also monumental in size. Clams gives the droning main sample plenty of room to breath by utilizing minimalistic drum hits and synth blasts. The only problem is, once the song begins to show its true colors, it abruptly ends, sending listeners to the next soundscape.

The f laws (if they’re even there) of Moon Trip Radio never make themselves apparent. Sometimes though, it can be hard

CLAMS CASINO PRODUCTIONS / INSTAGRAM

to maintain focus on songs like “Lyre” and “In a Mirror.”

They’re a little too ambient, a little too aimless, especially when surrounded by chillers like “Twilit” and “Soliloquy.” To be certain, they’re good tracks, but they should’ve been scattered throughout the album rather than back-to-back on the album’s backend.

The beats on Moon Trip Radio are definitely chill, but no one should ever attempt to study while listening to them — there’s just too much to explore. Someone could listen to this album fifty times and continue to find new pieces or textures that they never noticed before. Moon Trip Radio presents a vast soundscape in which everyone is welcome to explore at their leisure, and that’s a good thing, because after one listen you’ll never want to leave.

TV REVIEW

‘His Dark Materials’ debuts with a lackluster premiere ANYA SOLLER Daily Arts Writer

Pulling off fantasy in movies is hard enough. Adapting an entire trilog y to TV is harder. When the 2007 film “The Golden Compass” received harsh reviews, it seemed that may have been the end of attempting to adapt Phillip Pullman’s wildly popular fantasy series. “His Dark Materials” however, seeks to revisit the series and explore the world it creates.

Based off the popular trilog y of the same name, “His Dark Materials” follows a young girl named Lyra Belacqua (Dafne Keen, “Logan”) as she investigates the many secrets within her society, run by the oppressive Magisterium. Inspired by her uncle, Lord Asriel (James McAvoy, “It Chapter Two”), and his work in the northern territories, Lyra learns of a mysterious “Dust” that the Magisterium is hiding from the public and Asriel’s fellow scholars.

In the midst of her life at Jordan College in Oxford, England, Lyra discovers that her childhood friend, Roger, and a boy from a neighboring communit y have been kidnapped, presumably by a group called “The Gobblers.” With the help of her animal familiar Pantalaimon (Kit Connor, “Rocketman”) and the gift of a golden compass, Lyra and a fellow explorer Marisa Coulter (Ruth Wilson, “Luther”) sets out to uncover the truth being concealed from the people.

While the visuals and world built in “His Dark Materials” are undoubtedly beautiful, nothing about the show so far sticks out as particularly incredible. In the backdrop of a magical, Lyra’s world is more akin to “Harry Potter” or

“Lord of the Rings” than a fresh take on the fantasy genre.

The show’s relationship with its source material seems to be its greatest weakness: Every piece of dialog ue and exposition

His Dark Materials Series Premiere HBO Mondays @ 9 p.m.

feels inaccessible to viewers not familiar with the book series, yet “His Dark Materials” feels far too generic to be unique.

Within the series premiere, very little about the main characters or their world is explained, which may be fine for a better-known series, but Pullman’s fantasy trilog y seems too niche to be understood by a wide audience automatically.

“His Dark Materials” doesn’t seem interested in answering questions and would rather revel in its magical imagery and government conspiracy subplot than make its storyline clear.

“His Dark Materials” has a lot of wonderful elements, but seems to struggle with how best to put them together for an undefined target audience. Not quite a kids’ show and definitely not “adult” by any HBO standards, the series doesn’t seem to know what its purpose is. The only thing propelling the story forward so far is a vag ue prophecy purposefully kept from the audience for suspense. In concealing the plot like this, “His Dark Materials” has lowered its own stakes in an attempt to raise them. With a sig nificant reliance on these t ypes of fantasy tropes, the show fails to bring a unique or nuanced take on its own genre.

After an underwhelming first episode, “His Dark Materials” could redeem itself with a more self-aware first season that acknowledges the well-worn territory of fantasy while leaning into what separates Pullman’s original trilog y from the pack. Instead of simply mentioning “Dust” or the “Magisterium” or “Gobblers,” “His Dark Materials” could embrace its own mytholog y directly and focus on its most compelling details without overusing broader themes. With some modifications, this adaptation could work. Without revision, the show may fade into the same obscurity its film equivalent “The Golden Compass” did.

ALBUM REVIEW

‘Get the Money’ plays with the nostalgia of classic rock

Queen inf luences tinged many tracks on the album.

And perhaps it was Hawkins’s destined inferiority to Dave Daily Arts Writer Grohl, or the waning traction for grunge rock, or the important business of keeping up as Foo Fighters’s drummer, but the followTaylor Hawkins and the Coattail Riders emerged from the up for Fever seemed out of scope. Nearly a decade passed without stylings of Foo Fighters in the same way the latter did from so much of a mention. However, at the very tail end of 2019, we Nirvana. In 2004, before Foo Fighters even started working on In finally reach a continuation with Get the Money.

If Red Hot Fever was star-spattered, Get the Money is the Ringo’s Your Honor, drummer Hawkins pulled together a group of himself, Chris Chaney and Gannin Arnold for their debut self-titled album. All-Stars of punk-rock. The album features contributions from The 2006 release bubbled under the radar but generated a steady Dave Grohl, Jon Davison, Nancy Wilson, LeAnn Rimes, Roger interest with rock fans and Foo Fighters devotees. It placed rock’s Taylor, Pat Smear and Mark King. Queen is yet again a touchstone favorite grungy surfer dude at the forefront with more leisure for for Hawkins’s work, squealing guitar tips marking up track “Don’t humor in rock music than Foo Fighters could ever permit — albeit Look at Me That Way.” Classic rock inf luences touch nearly every with a not too dissimilar sound. The Coattail Riders made their track. “Middle Age” beckons back to the rock age ruled by David return in 2010 with Red Light Fever, reuniting the trio alongside Bowie in the ’80s. A loving dedication to Hawkins’s daughter, a star spangled set of features including Brian May, Roger Taylor, the track carries itself on angle-grinder guitars and thrashing Elliot Easton and, you guessed it, Dave Grohl. Not surprisingly, harmonies that feed into a synthy outro. It shouldn’t work given the lyrical content, and it’s arguably doesn’t by the end of the song.

Maybe the coattails he’s riding on are his own; synth-laden metal intro “Crossed the Line” burrows a snippet of Foo Fighters’s “Best to You.” Grohl makes three appearances across the album. Most notable is his feature on lead single “I Really Blew It,” not so much for his impressive, shrieking guitar but for his screaming “I really blew it” repeatedly throughout the intro. This is encapsulated perfectly in the track’s music video, with his disembodied head in a fireplace yelling.

Title track “Get the Money,” much like the rest of the album, is a labyrinth of genres. A psych-inf licted folk intro settles into a reggae groove that reverts back before an absolute guitar freakout that carries the last quarter of the song. Similarly, “C U in Hell” begins with a classic rock edge that morphs into a psych rock element with spattered piano keys before locking into a classic Fighters-esquechorus.

The lyrics, however, run trite. Hawkins croons cliches throughout the song and especially in the chorus: “Maybe these oaths were made/ To GEFFEN RECORDS / WIKIMEDIA COMMONS be broken/ Maybe these paths we take/ Have DIANA YASSIN

been chosen.” The same unfortunately rings true for the rest of the album. “Kiss the Ring” presents perhaps the most creative and crude rework, “You’re my queen/ And I’m your King/ I wanna give you everything/ All you gotta do is kiss the ring.”

Despite its shortcomings, Get the Money does enough with its classic rock worship and synth to not reinvent but toy with the wheel a bit. In an age of music absolutely regulated by the push and pull of media, rock is in a vulnerable state; it makes sense for rock albums with classic artists like Taylor Hawkins to beckon back to the sound of rock from the past. This is not to say that rock is dead so much as it is to suggest that the shifts of the playing field permit more variety in the ways we consume and consider music — there’s no classic or grunge rock categories that prevail anymore. Rather, rock and its newest artists have made names for themselves by implementing newer elements. Hawkins, however, has no interest in this and there’s nothing wrong with that.

Inspired by the oldies, the album feels a lot like it’s for fans of the classics too.

Get the Money Taylor Hawkins and the Coattail Riders Geffen Records

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6A — Wednesday, November 13, 2019

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

MIDWESTERN COLUMN

BOOK REVIEW

Warm up to the winter and find the beauty in the snow MAXWELL SCHWARZ

Daily Midwestern Columnist

In 1965, Michigan boldly declared itself a “Water Winter Wonderland.” They even slapped it on their license plates. This is awfully brazen, given that man has hated winter since long before Jack London snuffed a man out in the Yukon for his inability to build a fire. The fact of the matter is that the Upper Midwest is a cold place. Michigan is shaped like a form of winter attire, so I’m not sure what you expected.

Winter is an institution, stubbornly persisting from November to March. With it comes the trusted fundamentals: the ghostly white film on our clothes left by slush, the ice clinging to our windows, the cold that squeezes our toes and fingers. The first snow is upon us, and I promise this is a good thing.

Winter is more than hellish, white-knuckled driving conditions. It comes every year, for more better than worse, if only you’d let yourself get lost in it.

The cold doesn’t hurt so bad if you keep moving. The frigid sting of winter is a lethargic miscreant, easily outwitted and dodged. The most effective method of evasion is purely up to your preference. For the daring, go to Muskegon, where you can slide down an Olympic-sized luge track, which will send you hurtling down 750 winding feet of ice. If you prefer less of a downhill slope, Muskegon also has a quarter-mile ice track that ambles through the woods between skinny evergreens. Or perhaps you’d rather traverse one of Michigan’s 6,500 snowmobile trails, say in Cadillac or Grayling. You could also spend

a winter with man’s best friend, heading to McMillian in the U.P. for a 20-mile dog sled trip.

Many see snow as a glacial blanket, suffocating and snuffing out the beauty of fall. But my fellow midwesterners tell me that waking up to a yard full of snow where there was none the night before — with the trees lined with little white clumps and the car covered so heavily that only its imprint is recognizable — is one of the most beautiful things ever. Especially when it’s followed by a surprise phone call from the school district, freeing you from your societal burden of school.

I have only ever fallen in love in wintertime.

I have fallen in love with tall firs and pinecones and the way you can feel hot coffee warm you all the way down to your toes when you sip it outside. I have fallen in love with people and places, with words like “blustery” and “boreal,” with the sight of foxes dancing alone in a heimal field. Where there are cold ears and fingers, there are warm hearts, begging to be warmer still.

Have you ever followed deer tracks through a snowy field? Have you heard an elk call echo through the barren trees? Have you ever held someone’s hand and it started snowing? Snow is what you make it. Snow is an opportunity to be reminded that there is beauty here. Maybe it isn’t always obvious. Maybe it stings a little if you throw a ball of it at someone’s face (that goes for snow and beauty). But it’s there. It’s there and it wants you to know it, to follow it, to trace it out in your front yard by laying down in a big pile of it and coming back up an angel.

Have you played in the snow yet? Have you reminded yourself what it means to be alive?

But my fellow midwesterners tell me that waking up to a yard full of snow where there was none before — with the trees lined with little white clumps and the car covered so heavily that only its imprint is recognizable — is one of the most beautiful things ever.

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Release Date: Wednesday, November 13, 2019

Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle

FOR RENT

Edited by Rich Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis

ACROSS 1 Big name in wax museums 8 Surpasses 14 Worldwide law enforcement group 16 Eradicate 17 *Place for an eruption in Hawaii 18 Supreme Egyptian god 19 *Place for memorabilia about the 44th President 21 Eight British kings 24 Disney doe 25 Middling mark 26 Cries of pain 27 Lab work 30 Sondheim’s “Sweeney __” 31 “Robinson Crusoe” novelist 34 Shooting star 36 Money ... and, in three parts, a hint to the answers to starred clues 39 Like some dress shirts 40 Digital video files 43 Part of P.R. 46 Dix plus dix 48 Agua, across the Pyrenees 49 Smart-whip link 50 Saigon New Year 51 Badger at the comedy club 54 *Place on “Desperate Housewives” 58 Put in a pyramid 59 *Place for a space cadet 63 Treeless tract 64 Monty Python member 65 Like many a salad 66 Record collection?

DOWN 1 Allen of TV’s “Last Man Standing” 2 Spanish “a”

3 Name spelled with an alphabet sequence 4 Tijuana title 5 Sheikdom of song 6 Batting ninth 7 Ruination 8 Compact cars?

9 Latin dance 10 Car service app 11 Mediterranean gambling mecca 12 Sounded content 13 Hung around 15 A.L. West team, on scoreboards 20 Allowing 21 Mortar carrier 22 Wool coat wearer 23 Brief warning accompanying a link 28 Academic retirees 29 Stitch into place 30 Mouth, in slang 32 Cry of woe 33 Fair-hiring abbr.

35 Omega, to an electrician 37 Area between banks

38 Vichyssoise veggie 41 “Wonder Woman” actress Gadot 42 Seek damages 43 Least refined 44 Has a passion for 45 Social strata 47 Name shared by a Grace and a Muse 50 Phoenix neighbor

52 Put on the books 53 Salsa singer Cruz 55 Surpasses 56 Smithwick’s brew 57 Fat used in baking 60 Free-app interrupters 61 Div. won by the Braves in 2019 62 City of Lions and Tigers: Abbr.

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‘Intangibles’ is out of touch EMILIA FERRANTE For The Daily

The overarching themes of Elaine Equi’s poetry collection “The Intangibles” are not difficult to grasp: critiques of materialism and technological dependence. But in a world saturated by older generations bemoaning the death of social interactions and demonizing younger adults for using technology, Equi’s claims seem tired and outdated. Take, for example, part of her poem “Hello”: “I remember when people / used their hands to gesture / and would meet each other’s eyes / with curiosity or annoyance.” It’s a clear “back in my day” moment. She continues, referring to smartphones, “but now everyone looks down, / studying their palms intently.” Her point is understandable and culturally relevant, but that does not prevent it from feeling like an old woman wagging her finger at “kids these days.”

Equi is in danger of losing entire audiences as she is dismissed with an “OK, boomer” (She was born in 1953, making this statement accurate). Her poetry on the subject of technology is only marginally more eloquent than the comics about tech-addicted teenagers that Gen Z’s grandparents post to Facebook.

She yearns for the glory days, when people “radiated oneness” and “knew how to inhabit a moment.” Now, of course, in a world populated by the youth, this world has all but disappeared. It has been replaced — according to Equi — with one populated by materialistic, unthinking, tech-addled masses with minute attention spans and no appreciation for poetry. We are merely “f litting from screen to screen,” and “if something was unpleasant, we deleted it.” Her platitudinous argument would not be complete without a critique of social relations and how they have been affected by technology, so the lines “And if we happened to lose a friend, / hundreds more were ready to take their place” barely even register. Hers is an argument the world has heard a thousand times over.

Her poetry on this point is also sometimes too clunky to be impactful. When her point is more understated, the resulting poetry is more beautiful: “We will not need the old language / they took and ground to numeric sand.” But the lines, and entire poems, that seek to contribute to her larger message of the dangers of technology often fall f lat, like “The big stories — peckish news / gets told in tweets.” Her heavy-handedness impedes poems that have nothing to do with technology as well. The lines describing a perfume bottle “a forest, an ocean, / a mountain — / a whole kingdom / in these glass towers” are thoughtful and defamiliarizing, summoning an everyday object in a completely new and more imaginative way. But her poetry is only effective up until the point of overexplanation. In the same poem as the perfume bottle description, she says, “No shape / takes place / in time / without smell.” These lines are especially frustrating because they exist so close to the other more strange and wonderful lines about the same exact feeling. But while the first description makes the reader think and presents an emotion or concept in a new way, the second simply states that emotion.

Where the first is dexterous, the second is graceless. Equi underestimates her audience’s ability to understand — perhaps because she

The Intangibles Elaine Equi Coffee House Press Nov. 12, 2019

thinks we are tech-obsessed sheep — and therefore her poetry sacrifices some emotional power to the grail of complete understanding.

Equi actually does her best work in this collection when she is not trying to make a point. The most memorable and remarkable poems in the book are also the most subtle.

For instance, almost no poems discuss family, but the one that does — an outlier — does so elegantly. Equi describes a recurring dream that both she and her mom have as a “genetic trait, a locket / handed from one generation to the next.” She captures the nonsensical quality of a dream and distills it to a particular feeling of loneliness that could only be remedied by a mother. She yearns for a moment in this lonely, wandering dream in which she and her mother “stopped for a moment, embraced, / and shared a cup of tea.” The poem does not necessarily fit into the larger themes of the collection, but it still manages to hold its own better than most of the ones that do fit.

Equi’s other strength has nothing to do with content and everything to do with sound.

Some of her poems focus exclusively on sonic portrayal, with little or no thought given to meaning. In her poem “C-notes,” she simply lists words starting with the letter C that have completely disparate definitions but have some connection sonically, like “corners / and coroners” or “caliphs / and calipers.”

In other poems, she deftly connects ideas using similar consonant sounds, like “the rabbit / of the alphabet,” and internal rhyme, like “drops back / into the void / of the black hat.” This appreciation for sound hearkens back to the earliest days of poetry in the form of oral tradition, and it is often overlooked or considered as an afterthought by modern poets. One might even say Equi’s attention to sonic detail brings us back to the “good old days” of poetry, before technology got in the way, but that would be cliched and dismissive of the leaps and bounds we have made since then — a lesson that perhaps Equi herself could learn.

The most memorable and remarkable poems in the book are also the most subtle. For instance, almost no poems here discuss family, but the one that does — an outlier — does so elegantly ...

She captures the nonsensical quality of a dream and distills it to a particular feeling of loneliness that could only be remedied by a mother.

Sports

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

Wednesday, November 13, 2019 — 7A

Will the Spartans?

Over in East Lansing, hope dwindling, MSU confronts a crossroads in its identity, and what this game might mean BAILEY JOHNSON

ETHAN SEARS

Daily Sports Writer

Managing Sports Editor

EAST LANSING — Cody White has only one message for Michigan State’s underclassmen this week.

“Going into this week, we know we have a mission to do and that’s to win the football game,” the wide receiver said Tuesday. “At any means possible, win the football game, so I feel like that’s what we’re gonna drive through every day in practice until the game day.”

It’s safe to say the Spartans haven’t completed the mission KATELYN MULCAHY/Daily they began the year with. At just four wins heading into The Michigan State football team comes into the game 4-5 this season.

“Right now, for me, my main the 112th meeting between game time, and then the lion’s consideration is our football Michigan and Michigan State, going to just unleash itself.” the Spartans are hoping for Added Williams: “This is team and getting them down Saturday’s game to provide the biggest game of the year. and football-game ready,” a spark to a season that’s It’s the next one up and we Dantonio said. “We’ve come vacillating between generally didn’t have the season that we and competed. We’ll compete. disappointing and outright wanted, so this game will be a We’ll play hard. We just lot for us emotionally. You will can’t make mistakes to beat dismal.

In the media room at see a lot of emotion for this ourselves.”

Taken out of context, Spartan Stadium on Tuesday, game.” the Spartans made it clear that For linebacker Antjuan Dantonio could be talking while this week is a chance Simmons, who went to high about any game on the to regroup from blowing a school across the street from Spartans’ schedule this year.

25-point lead to Illinois last Michigan Stadium at Pioneer, He made a handful of more Saturday, the bigger emphasis his first introduction to the specific comments about the is on the chance to beat the intensity of preparation in Wolverines, but the overall rivalry week came in practice tone was one of a coach who team 60 miles down the road.

In the midst of what is before his first game of the mostly just wants to talk about the game, not everything else shaping up to be, at best, a rivalry as a freshman in 2017.

“I think it was my first play,” that goes along with it. mediocre season for Michigan It was clear Dantonio didn’t State, a win in the rivalry game Simmons said. “I got hit by an and everything that comes with upperclassman — like whacked feel the need to make a splashy it would soften the blow for — and he’s like, ‘Yeah, it’s statement that dominates the the players. Defensive tackle Michigan week!’ and I’m like, headlines leading into the Raequan Williams referenced ‘Alright, it’s Michigan week.’ … game.

This iteration of the the emotion that comes with And then when I got out there facing off in a hotly-contested in the game, it didn’t matter. matchup brings a game with matchup, and Williams and Every player, it was nasty. It different stakes for each side, but the bottom line of what White both mentioned the was a nasty game.”

But while the players went each team is truly playing for is extra edge that comes with on about the extra emotion the rivalry. this game.

“This game means “(Michigan State coach Mark and the level of intensity that Dantonio) always tries to tell comes with Michigan week, everything,” Williams said. us to keep the lion in the cage,” Dantonio had little to say “It depends on if you own White said. “Everything’s beyond the typical platitudes Michigan or you don’t, so you gotta go out and win this one.” going to be calmed down until of rivalry week.

Are good bounces enough?

A

s practice wound down late Tuesday afternoon at Yost Ice Arena, Michigan coach Mel Pearson gathered his players for the typical end-of-day huddle.

That huddle lasted ROHAN longer than KUMAR normal, though, as Pearson got his players more involved. He asked the group to discuss things they liked about the team, and comments ranged from work ethic and commitment to perseverance and defensive success.

It was a moment to pause and look within — a chance to reflect on the past and mentally prepare for what is to come.

An exchange of this sort fits the script of this Michigan hockey team (3-5-2 overall, 0-3-1-0 Big Ten). The Wolverines have struggled to score consistently over the past two weekends, slipping into second to last in the conference standings.

Despite the tribulations, Pearson wants his squad to think about the positives. The common theme around the team is that bad breaks have been holding it back.

“Pucks are going to start falling in for us,” said senior forward Jake Slaker about the power play.

“And I think that’s going to translate to five-on-five, too. I think we are right there where things are going to start going our way.”

But that raises the following question: Is it realistic to expect a couple good bounces of the puck to fix the woes? To that, I’d argue yes. But the margin for error is slim, and the team must figure out how to play through obstacles beyond bounces.

First, it’s key to dissect Michigan’s losses to see what exactly can be attributed to bad luck. The Wolverines’ tough stretch spans back to the 4-1 road loss against then-No. 18 Western Michigan.

From then on, Michigan got swept by then-No. 13 Ohio State on the road, before tallying just

one point in the recent home series against Minnesota.

Against the Broncos and Buckeyes, bad bounces were not the key issue. The Wolverines dug themselves into an early deficit in Kalamazoo and couldn’t climb back. And against Ohio State, the main issues were lackluster puck possession on offense, foolish penalties and a poor forecheck.

In the recent series, though, it’s fair to blame bad breaks. On Friday, Michigan generated chances and outshot the Golden Gophers 34-27 but didn’t get the breaks it needed to capitalize.

That was true Saturday, too, only that the bad bounces extended to the defensive side as the Wolverines’ first two conceded goals involved a fair amount of poor luck. And that view is shared by outsiders, too. For instance, Michigan State coach Danton Cole — whose team is the Wolverines’ next opponent — mentioned Michigan’s struggles have to do with ‘puck luck.’

The underlying trend is that despite the lack of scoring, the offense has made strides since the loss against Western Michigan.

All the while, defense and goaltending have remained steady.

If the offense continues to make strides and the defense remains stingy, then it’s logical that better bounces could help this team unleash its potential.

Pearson is no stranger to early season struggles. In his first season at the helm, Michigan fell two games under .500 in January after getting swept

by Notre Dame. Regardless, in those two contests he recognized the potential of his team and knew it wasn’t too late. That group went on to make the Frozen Four.

“And that’s similar to now,” Pearson said. “We’re doing some really good things. We played hard against Minnesota when the games on the line, we just

couldn’t quite get that next goal, that next break, to make a difference.”

Better bounces likely will come for the Wolverines; in such a long season, there will always be some spurts of good luck.

Those might not come right away, though, and in the meantime Pearson doesn’t want to force things on the attack.

He sees offense as a balance between urgency and poise, but understands that balance doesn’t come easy.

Given that there will be bad breaks during every season, Pearson is quick to say he would rather have them early on, as has been the case. There’s value in learning early how to play when things don’t go your way as this can pay dividends in the games that really matter.

“These tight games, these close games, aren’t a bad thing,” Pearson said. “You wanna win your share of them, but we will. Usually (in sports) it evens out at some point.

We just have to make sure we stay with it.

“We know where we wanna get to, it’s how we wanna get there. Right now we’re just making a little detour.

It’s not the fastest way to where we wanna get to, but we’re on a detour, so we just got to manage the detour and find our way there.”

For Michigan to reach its destination, it must follow through on the good bounces immediately when they come, because the team cannot afford to dig more of a hole.

But the Wolverines must also learn to weather the storm when things go south. Luck doesn’t last forever, and the best teams know how to win even when bounces don’t go their way.

And if Michigan can figure this out, when the team gathers to culminate future practices the shared sentiments will be more profound.

Right now we’re just making a little detour.

EAST LANSING — Nearly 13 minutes into a press conference three days after one of the most disastrous losses of his tenure as Michigan State’s coach and four days before a game that could put an exclamation mark on a season from hell, Mark Dantonio was asked about Larry Caper.

On the 10-year anniversary of Caper’s overtime run against Michigan, it was fitting. The picture of Caper bouncing off defenders and into the end zone, the 1-3 Spartans knocking off the undefeated Wolverines, beating them in consecutive years for the first time since 1967, still sets a tone for this rivalry. It’s cast as a turning point, and with good reason — including that streak, Michigan has beaten Michigan State all of three times since 2008.

Dantonio spent a minute recalling details of the game, the Spartans blowing a 14-point lead, then recapturing it on with Caper’s run. Then Dantonio said this: “I think it’s good to have a little bit of history, but you gotta focus on the moment.”

That takes us to the next question. One about Dantonio’s future. One that brought the room rushing towards the present, where Dantonio’s Spartans are 4-5 just one year after they were 7-6 and three years after they were 3-9.

Where they blew a 25-point first-half lead at home to Illinois last week, and where Dantonio’s hands moved to his pockets and his lips pursed as a reporter probed at whether he will still be in East Lansing next year.

He told a story about meeting with Michigan State’s freshmen on Monday. One of them asked how he handled the criticism that comes with his position.

“Hey, when you’re the head of the program, you’re the head of something big. And things don’t go as well, that person’s gonna be criticized,” Dantonio recalled saying. “And that’s part of it.

“But what people need to understand out there is, I had as much information as I can to do the job that I’m doing and I’m gonna try to do it with your players in mind. We’re gonna work hard, we’re gonna always stay positive, we’re gonna rise above it. And that’s the only thing that I can do. I can continue to rise above it or I can take another direction and start to go below that. And I’m not gonna go that direction.”

This matters because Dantonio is about to lead his team into the biggest game of its season. And, perhaps more than any other point in his 13-year tenure as Michigan State’s coach, the Spartans’ season is tied into the result.

It would be hyperbolic and uninformed to say Dantonio’s job rides on Saturday’s outcome. But with his program stumbling on and off the field, with another headache on Tuesday when Dantonio said quarterback Brian Lewerke didn’t go through any concussion protocol before coming back into Saturday’s game after taking a hit to the head and with a $4.3 million retention bonus in Dantonio’s contract set to trigger in midJanuary, it’s not unfair to say a win over Michigan — a reminder of what Dantonio brought to Michigan State — would go a long way.

The Wolverines have a considerable talent advantage over the Spartans. The game is in Ann Arbor. Michigan opened as a 12-point favorite, and it feels like there is as much builtin expectation that it should win this game as ever.

None of that stopped the usual platitudes from being uttered about the MichiganMichigan State rivalry on Tuesday underneath Spartan Stadium. They sounded just the same as in Schembechler Hall on Monday.

But, standing in contrast to a Michigan program that wants to at least cloak this week under the veil of normalcy, there was little masking how much this game means.

“I think everyone (puts more into this game),” Lewerke said. “Top to bottom. Coaches, players, the training staff, everyone. They’re trying to be something a little bit better and play a little bit better.”

“I knew that if we were gonna be successful here, ultimately, that we were gonna have to win down the road (in Ann Arbor) some, and here at home, and we were gonna have to measure up in every time we played that football game,” Dantonio said.

“And so that’s what we put into effect. That we were gonna measure up in this football game.”

The need to measure up against Michigan has as much to do with Michigan State’s ethos, one that existed long before Dantonio and will exist long after, as it does with the program’s current situation. On Tuesday, the notion that this year’s game should be treated with more urgency because of the Spartans’ lackluster record was thrown out.

“This is one that, again, we need to measure up on and then we gotta let this one go,” Dantonio said. “And I’ve always tried to say, OK, what do we do after Michigan?”

Without an upset of the same variety Dantonio has pulled off before, though, he may not be the only one person around Michigan State asking that question after Saturday.

Michigan’s length key to defense

ALEC COHEN/Daily

Senior guard Akinereh Johnson recorded 27 steals off the bench last season, spearheading a talented defense.

BRENDAN ROOSE Daily Sports Writer

The players on the Michigan women’s basketball team shuffled off the court Sunday bearing smiles from their second blowout win of the weekend. Though the victories came against weak opponents — neither Western Michigan nor Bradley made the NCAA tournament last season — the Wolverines’ lockdown defensive performances earned them the right to celebrate, as they held both opponents under 60 points.

For Michigan to achieve its goals of competing for a Big Ten championship and passing the second round of the NCAA Tournament, it will have to sustain this level of defense against tougher opponents.

And the key to that lies in the Wolverines’ length.

All five of Michigan’s starters this season measure in at 6-feet or taller, a rarity in women’s basketball. This kind of length means that players can more easily block shots and move into passing lanes to disrupt plays and intercept passes. “(Coach Kim Barnes Arico stresses) using the ability of our

length,” said sophomore guard Amy Dilk. “Our starting lineup, we all have tremendous length, so just really focusing on keeping our hands up, sliding our feet and not fouling.”

Senior Akienreh Johnson seems poised to make more disruptive plays on defense this year. The 6-foot shooting guard recorded 27 steals coming off the bench last season. If she can continue to move quickly on defense, clog lanes and force opposing teams into mistakes, she can expect to pick up a few more steals from her new starting spot.

“Our length is ridiculous this year for our starting lineup,” Johnson said. “It’s actually really crazy how many steals and deflections we get without even knowing that we’re getting them.”

A defense that can continue to pick up steals would help the Wolverines to improve off of a lackluster 2018-19 campaign, during which they allowed 63.6 points per game — 148th in the country.

Freshman center Izabel Varejão exemplifies how length can have an impact on the game, even with limited minutes. Standing at 6-foot-

4, she recorded four blocks in just 13 minutes against Bradley.

While her height allows her to shut down opposing players in the post, she also has enough quickness and athleticism to defend guards on switches.

At the same time, Michigan’s guards will need to lean on their length and quickness on switches as they face bigger and more athletic teams this season. If the Wolverines can rely on players like Johnson or Dilk to play sound defense against taller forwards, it will take pressure off of their own bigs allow them to comfortably make switches when defending the pick-and-roll.

“We want to be able to … switch one through five,” Johnson said. “A lot of teams aren’t able to do that because their guards are little and they can’t guard a post, or their posts don’t have quick enough feet to guard guards, so I think that’s one thing that our team really has, is the ability to guard one through five on defense.”

The talent is there. This team is fully capable of playing defense at a high level, if they can play smart and use its length.

8A — Wednesday, November 13, 2019

Sports

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

Test passed Michigan runs away from Creighton late, tops Bluejays 79-69 behind career night from Livers, moving to 2-0 DANIEL DASH

Daily Sports Writer

The Michigan basketball team knew its early-season matchup against Creighton would be telling.

In the wake of a programaltering offseason that saw a head coaching change and the departure of three players that accounted for over half of the Wolverines’ offense last season, questions arose. On Tuesday night, Michigan (2-0) continued its search for answers in a 79-69 win against the Bluejays (1-1).

Those answers, as it turns out, are still a work in progress.

When first-year coach Juwan Howard was hired, it wasn’t a secret that the Wolverines were going to try their hand at an NBA brand of offense. As for what that means, exactly, Michigan has shown an emphasis on pushing the ball and generating 3-pointers thus far.

Against Creighton, not even Howard’s team’s overwhelming height advantage changed that approach. Thirteen of the Wolverines’ first 18 shots came from beyond the arc, a streak that culminated in senior point guard Zavier Simpson — a sub-30-percent career 3-point shooter — dropping his defender and draining a stepback triple.

In the early stages of the first half, Michigan looked like a welloiled machine. But when the well went dry, frustration mounted.

The Bluejays pounced on the Wolverines’ miscues, closing the half on an 18-7 run en route to a 41-38 advantage at the break.

For Michigan, poor rebounding and sloppy turnovers erased an otherwise positive opening few minutes.

By the end of the first half, the Wolverines had been outscored in the paint, 24-10, against a team with only one healthy player taller than 6-foot-8. Even with three rotational big men taller than that, Michigan’s first free throws came over 18 minutes into the game, as it seldom attacked the rim.

From the look of the halftime box score, you’d think Creighton had the upper-hand in height given

its 23-10 rebounding advantage.

Though 10 of those boards came on the offensive glass, Michigan only surrendered six second-chance points.

“We have to crack back and not allow those (opposing) bigs to run in freely to get offensive rebounds,” Howard said, “because I’m asking (Teske) to go after shots and alter shots and not allow guys just to walk down the lane and score layups. Now, the players have to do a better job covering up for him by blocking guys out on rebounds and not allowing guys to fly in and get extra possessions.”

With prized freshman wing Franz Wagner on the shelf due to a wrist fracture, the Wolverines didn’t know who would create offense on their own. A week after junior guard Eli Brooks posted a career-high 24 in the seasonopener and senior center Jon Teske chipped in 17, it was junior forward Isaiah Livers who answered the call against the Bluejays. He scored a career-high 22 points on 8-of-12 shooting, while Simpson and Teske each added 17 of their own. “(Livers) made some big shots for us,” Howard said. “He’s a super confident player. For his height, he does a really good job of getting elevation on his jump shot. … I think he’s done a fantastic job of

embracing (his role) because with the confidence and as well as how we’re going to lean on him from an offensive end and defensive end.”

Coming out of halftime, the Wolverines took control of the game’s pace. Simpson finished a pair of transition layups that helped Michigan open the stanza on an 8-2 run, while the Wolverines only attempted seven second-half threes after shooting 16 in the first.

Backed by an effort to get the ball to the interior, Michigan ultimately built its 8-2 spurt into a crucial 26-14 run and, most importantly, a lead it wouldn’t relinquish.

By the time the final buzzer sounded, the double-digit halftime deficit felt like a mere afterthought. And with Livers, Simpson and Teske combining for 56 of the Wolverines’ 79 points against a Big East defense, so did the offensive load of last year’s early departures.

Tuesday night was far from a season-defining win, and Michigan’s most pressing questions will remain unanswered for another month or so. But after narrowly avoiding a crisis against Appalachian State, the Wolverines’ performance against a respectable Bluejays team sure could be a springboard to immediate success.

JACOB KOPNICK Daily Sports Writer

On Tuesday, intentional or not, each half of basketball represented a different plan of attack — and with it, different identities of the Michigan men’s basketball team.

During a hard-fought 79-69 win against Creighton (1-1 overall), the Wolverines (2-0) used nearly every weapon they had in their arsenal, but switched its strategy as the game carried on.

In the first half, the 3-point shot was the saving grace for the offense.

To kick things off against the Bluejays, Michigan let it f ly early and often. The Wolverines went 7-for-16 from deep throughout the half and were not shy about announcing their plan of attack. Leading this offensive barrage from 3-point land was junior forward Isaiah Livers who hit four from downtown, three in the first half alone and finished the night with a career-high 22 points.

Whether it was in transition or a product of senior guard Zavier Simpson driving to the hoop and finding an open

ALEXIS RANKIN/Daily

Junior forward Isaiah Livers scored a career-high 22 points in Michigan’s 79-69 win over Creighton on Tuesday night.

man in the corner, the 3-point shot was instrumental to Michigan’s offense in the first half — closing out the first 20 minutes down, 38-41.

The first half was also characterized by clean basketball. The Wolverines fouled just three times and turned the ball over on four occasions — a trend that would largely carry the whole game with Michigan committing just seven fouls and 11 turnovers all game. This play represents a marked departure from its season opener where the Wolverines handed the ball to their opponents 17 times.

In the second half, play from the big men dominated.

The hot hands would cool down in the final 20 minutes in favor of Michigan’s clear size advantage. In the second half, the Wolverines attempted as many threes as they made in the first.

With the change in attack brought more deliberate possessions. The guards fed senior center Jon Teske in the post who led the team with 12 points and finished the night with 17. Further shaping this tact, Simpson found success near the basket due to relentless drives to the hoop and an unmatched ability to finish.

Now, there is just one simple question to answer: Was this strategy intentional?

The answer, almost certainly, is no.

It is hard to question the idea that Michigan wanted to control the post early against the Bluejays — a team who only had one player over 6-foot-8.

While Michigan coach Juwan Howard may feed lines about how the team is always looking for the best shot and that the open man is going to dictate that offensive possession, in the context of this game, it’s not always applicable. Take this one, for example.

“We always try to get the best shot possible whether

it’s the first or second half,” Howard said. “Overall, we want to make sure that we establish a balanced basketball game so that we can compete.”

The Wolverines were able to find that balance — and their ideal shot selection — in the second half due to the re-establishment of its big men, the change of fortune for 50/50 balls and an increased defensive intensity.

In the game, Creighton outscored Michigan on second chance points, 13-4, with most of these looks coming in the first 20 minutes. At the break, the emphasis from Howard pointed to transition defense and two tenants of play down low — offensive rebounding and defense around the basket.

“We got backdoored a lot,” Livers said. “I got backdoored once, ( junior guard Eli Brooks) got once, (sophomore guard David DeJulius) once, and it’s just small plays like that for an easy two is gonna be troublesome because I feel like we’re gonna be like, ‘Damn, we just got a stop, we forgot about the backdoor.’ It was just the little things we gotta clean up.”

Perhaps in a different game against a different team, these lapses on the defensive end cost Michigan the game.

In this instance, though, the Wolverines were lucky that shots were falling from deep or else they would have been staring down a much larger deficit.

But when it comes down to figuring out what changed at the half-way point in the contest, Livers claims that it all comes down to remembering what this team is all about.

“We kinda just treated it like it was practice,” Livers said. “Our scout team did a tremendous job all week of running their offense, and I guess we were overthinking it in the first half. Just things you do in basketball, and you come together and get that speech from coach Howard, things are gonna come out clicking.”

For in-state players, MSU rivalry game is friend against friend ARIA GERSON

Daily Sports Editor

AN EVENING WITH SAFA AL AHMAD NOVEMBER 19, 2019 | 7:30 P.M. | RACKHAM AUDITORIUM

FREE | NO REGISTRATION | WALLENBERG.UMICH.EDU

“If it’s people you know personally, it kinda goes for you,” Onwenu said. “Because you might know their tells or know their tendencies even better.”

Peoples-Jones, also an alumnus of Cass Tech, was close with Spartan defensive back Kalon Gervin in high school but said Tuesday the two haven’t spoken ahead of Saturday’s matchup. Sophomore defensive end Aidan Hutchinson — who attended Divine Child High School in Dearborn, Mich. — has the opposite approach.

Hutchinson, one of the loudest and brashest players on the team, doesn’t shy away from the chippier aspects of “Hate Week,” and that includes lots of trash talk. Michigan State backup quarterback Theo Day also attended Divine Child and is one of Hutchinson’s best friends.

And while Hutchinson listened to Day air his frustrations about the Spartans’ collapse against Illinois, he also made it known that come Saturday, he’d show no mercy.

“I don’t know if I can tell you what he said, but some words were said between us,”

Hutchinson said. “He was talking a little bit about the game, but yeah, I’m just pumped to play him.”

When you consider the connections that lie in every corner of this rivalry, it’s no surprise that MichiganMichigan State is known as one of the ugliest matchups in college football. As much as both teams sometimes downplay it — with Onwenu referring to the Spartans as “another team on the schedule we’ve gotta beat” — those born and bred on either side know this is much more than that.

For players throughout the state who grew up devout in this rivalry, whose lives are ingrained in this rivalry, this is their holy grail.

“Owning the state of Michigan is always a big thing for the two programs who battle for it every single year,” said senior guard Ben Bredeson. “There’s the Paul Bunyan Trophy involved as well.

There’s a lot of pride that goes into it as well for the fanbases.

It’s a cool rivalry just because you have the in-state factor of it and you get bragging rights for the year.”

In this state, Michigan and Michigan State football are religions. Their annual matchup is like a holy war. And local players were baptized in it early, sometimes from birth.

Nearly every football fan in the state bleeds either green and white or maize and blue. Many high school players imagine themselves in Ann Arbor or East Lansing, making plays that will eventually appear on the ever-expanding highlight reel of rivalry moments.

And then, when it’s time to head off to college, the rivalry inevitably becomes more personal. Some players become Wolverines. Others become Spartans.

Once a year, those players see each other again — the eyes of an entire state on them.

“This is a great game for me cause I’m from the state of Michigan,” said junior defensive back Ambry Thomas, who attended Martin Luther King High in Detroit, the same school as Michigan State linebacker Tyriq Thompson. “I know a lot of their players.”

Senior guard Michael Onwenu attended Detroit’s Cass Technical, the same high school as fellow Michigan players Donovan Peoples-Jones and Jaylen Kelly-Powell. Two Spartans went there as well, and Onwenu knows others on the roster from camps or high school rivalries.

For Onwenu, it’s easy to separate his friendships off the field with his enemies on the field. As soon as anyone puts on a Michigan State uniform, they’re just another foe to vanquish. But games against familiar faces add ALEXIS RANKIN/Daily Junior Ambry Thomas played high school with multiple MSU players. another layer to the matchup.

statement T H E M I C H I G A N DA I LY | N OV E M B E R 1 3 , 2 0 1 9

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

PHOTO BY DANYEL THARAKAN

2B Wednesday, November 13, 2019 // The Statement

statement T H E M I CH I GA N DAI LY | N OV E M B E R 1 3 , 2019

Managing Statement Editor Andrea Pérez Balderrama Deputy Editors Matthew Harmon Shannon Ors

Designers Liz Bigham Kate Glad Copy Editors Silas Lee Emily Stillman

Associate Editor Eli Rallo

Photo Editor Danyel Tharakan Editor in Chief Maya Goldman Managing Editor Finntan Storer

Eye contact BY IVY CAI, STATEMENT COLUMNIST I

t was a typical Oxford Monday morning. I was sitting in my favorite coffee shop sipping my Americano, when a man with a giant cowboy hat walked in. He was dressed in a dashing suit jacket paired up with bootcut jeans, pointy leather boots and round sunglasses. It was distinctive, but curious style — a combination of mod and cowboy. I was sure that he was already accustomed to attention, evidenced by how he would automatically ignore anyone’s stare. But as my eyes were following his hat around, he caught my gaze and smiled back.

His smile was effortlessly beautiful. The man seemed unworried about rent, groceries or working overtime. I was immediately struck. Having been working days and nights on the 2,000-word philosophy essay in front of me, I had nothing but exhaustion on my face. With that effortless action, the man with a giant cowboy hat helped me let go of my annoyances for a while.

I remained static in my seat, and couldn’t help but start reflecting on this simple, yet miraculous interaction. Smiling at strangers? I hated even making eye contact with them. It’s automatic, almost precognitive, how I’d gaze elsewhere after only milliseconds of staring. People’s responses to my eye contact drive me crazy: They look back at you with their wrinkled eyebrows and frowning lips, as if you’re the reason for their bad mood. I might be overthinking, but nevertheless, their reactions impact my good mood. Truthfully, I’d prefer staring at the pavement. Not only does it help to avoid tripping, but also prevents anyone from turning me into a frazzled, introverted mess.

On my way back home from the coffee shop, I paid attention to every person walking past me. It was December. Everybody spends their calories keeping themselves warm. People buried their faces in their scarves, focused on the song blasting in their AirPods. Winter increases efficiency – it’s always one destination straight to the next. That man’s smile, however, punched everyone who only wanted to move quickly in the face (including me). It was simply infectious. I should be able to smile like

that and lift up someone else’s spirit in a snap of a finger.

So I prescribed myself a mission: master the art of smiling. Having been accustomed to staring at the bricks on the pavement, it was quite hard to lift my head up. In the cold December of Oxford, the wind was fierce. My eyes, sensitive as they are, started to get watery. I started out my mission with some easy targets: grandmas. They walked slowly, leaving a good amount of time for them to realize my gaze. Then I moved to young girls, but avoiding the ones who seemed to me like drama queens. From there, I started to gaze upon every person that walked pass by — the sharp dressed middle-aged man, the backpack dude with giant headphones and the exhausted mom with a stroller.

The wind was still blowing, and my disappointment was piling up — every single person looked away immediately when our

eyes met.

Just as I stood on the edge of giving up, there was one exception.

On the narrow Oxford pavement, a man with a beautiful German shepherd by his side was walking towards me, together in their healthy, fast-paced steps. He seemed quite friendly. “Last one of today,” I spoke to myself. I looked into his eyes and smiled. Unfortunately, an amusing scene occurred: a strong wind suddenly swept through, and my hair flew all over my face. But in between strands of my hair, the whooshing of the wind, and my embarrassment, I saw a huge smile and heard the word “Hello!” from him. At the moment, this most commonly-used word in the world sounded more beautiful than any song on my iPod. The wind didn’t slow down its pace, nor did the man and his dog. But the sound of ‘hello’ lingered in the air. There it was —

the genuineness that occurred easily and truthfully between two strangers. Nothing can sabotage the beauty, not even the most terrible, windy English weather.

On my way back home, something familiar suddenly leaped into my eyes – the cowboy hat! That man, in his usual suits, boots and sunglasses, was standing on the high steps of his hair salon. The salon is located at a busy crossroad. He has the perfect spot to watch the busy, fast paced, mind-their-own-business pedestrians. It was peculiar of him to stand outside on such a windy day, despite how fun people-watching can be. But that was the least of my concern, since it offered me a perfect opportunity. The wind — since I was walking in the opposite direction — swept all the messy hair away from my face. Everything seemed to work in my favor.

It was my chance to light up his day.

ILLUSTRATION BY MAGGIE WIEBE

Wednesday, November 13, 2019 // The Statement 3B 3B

Love letters to Ann Arbor: Beginnings and endings at Elixir Vitae

I

BY MEGHANN NORDEN-BRIGHT, STATEMENT COLUMNIST

didn’t get to know Elixir Vitae Coffee and Tea until it was almost too late.

In the Ann Arbor coffee shop scene, Elixir Vitae is an outlier. Maybe it’s the location, tucked away on Maynard Street, a part of Ann Arbor that only gets frequented by student traffic on Saturday nights when the Scorekeepers line stretches into the parking garage. Or the storefront, unassuming and almost drab. But it’s something else, too — it feels like you have to be invited to step foot in Elixir for the first time. It’s not a place you just happen into by accident.

It’s difficult to conceptualize what exactly sets Elixir apart. Maybe it’s the haphazard swirls and eyes painted on the wall or the long-haired barista more often than not found lounging out front smoking his cigarette. Or maybe it’s the bathroom, covered in hand-scrawled poetry, calls to activism, professions of love and quips on the futility of existence. Elixir is a conscious response to its Ann Arbor coffee shop peers claiming to be alternative, quirky and counter-culture with their mismatched furniture, racks of minimalist greeting cards and $6 oat milk lattes.

Elixir is not a $6 oat milk latte coffee shop. Elixir is a $2 local brew coffee shop.

I only found Elixir Vitae earlier this semester — my senior year at the University of Michigan, after having already lived in this city for three years. My first visit was by invitation, of course. A friend was meeting another friend there, and I was generously permitted to tag along.

In those few short months since my introduction to Elixir, I’ve fallen hard. It’s a fixture of my daily routine now, a reflex — a given destination rather than a conscious decision. Most days, I’ll set up shop at one of the tables by the window with my mug of Roos Roast Lobster Butter Love coffee, and hammer out an essay, some emails, whatever’s on the list for the day. It’s gotten to the point where it’s hard for me to get certain tasks done if I’m not at Elixir, like writing pretty much anything that’s not a dry response paper.

Something about the overall aura gets the creative juices flowing in a manner the Ugli could never — the majority of this column, for example, was written at the window table closest to the door. It’s objectively best table in Elixir — unobstructed view of street traffic for people-watching breaks and right next to the outlet.

How did I let Elixir take me over so completely, so quickly?

I think my sudden, all-consuming attachment to Elixir is due in large part to being a senior. I have a few months left in Ann Arbor, and then my undergraduate career will be over — done, finished.

Elixir is the kind of place that my ideally constructed college student — the Rory Gilmore that high school Meghann strived to be — would have spent all her time. This character would be casually artistic and creative in all the right ways, a person thoroughly engaged in activism and changing the world, constantly surrounded by huge circles of inspiring and high-achieving friends.

And I don’t feel like that person — at least not in the way that my naïve, high school self imagined I would be.

I have wonderful friends. I’m involved in organizations that feel relevant and inspiring. I do recognize that I’ve grown immensely from the person I was when I got to Michigan. I have a much better sense of self, of what I like and who I want to be around, and I’m proud of the person I am now — I truly am.

But I don’t feel like I’ve achieved all the goals out there, grown in all the possible ways, become that elusive accomplished, worldly college student that I was supposed to be by now, in my final year of undergrad — even if that student is, and always was, nothing but a construct pieced together from books and TV shows and my academic parents’ dinner table conversations growing up.

It’s hard to shake the sense that it’s too late. I’m trying to grasp at all the straws that will make me that person in my last couple semesters living in Ann Arbor and doing the college thing. Spending all my time at Elixir Vitae, prioritizing time with friends that inspire me and make me laugh, writing (this column), playing my guitar more often.

I’m well aware that it’s absurdly unrealistic to expect that of myself, to live up to some ideal of what I think the perfect college student should be — after all, aren’t we all just constant works in progress? Isn’t that what every selfhelp book/motivational speaker/therapist ever has said, over and over? But that doesn’t make it any less difficult for me to accept that I haven’t done everything that I wanted to in college — and college is ending in only a few short months.

And when it does, there will be club meetings I never went to, stories I never wrote, friendships that were never deepened past superficial hello’s.

So I’m clinging to Elixir for the moment, and any semblance of idealized identity I have attached to it. Keeping in mind that my days spent between these electric teal walls are numbered, and trying not to think too much about what will happen when those days inevitably run out.

But am I allowed to be upset about my time with this coffee shop coming to an end? Can I claim Elixir for my own, claim whatever passing fling we’ve had over the past couple months as an affair serious enough to warrant the overwhelming sadness I feel for leaving its comforts?

In the end, all I can say is that I hope students continue to embrace Elixir — even after I’ve gone, despite the reflexive twinge of jealousy that accompanies the realization

that I’ll have to relinquish my space to a new generation. I hope a new wave of college students manage to spend their formative years sitting around these tables, talking about socialism and climate change — spending their whole college experience having those conversations and being those people, not just their senior year.

And maybe it wouldn’t make a difference. Maybe this new wave of Elixir devotees would leave college feeling just as disillusioned as I’m currently feeling, struggling with at once recognizing how transformed they’ve become over the past four years and being terrified that there’s only so much time left for that change to continue happening.

But I’d like Elixir to be there for them, anyway.

ILLUSTRATION BY MAGGIE WIEBE

4B Wednesday, November 13, 2019 // The Statement

Wednesday, November 13, 2019 // The Statement 5B

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

PHOTOS BY DANYEL THARAKAN

BY REECE MEYHOEFER, SENIOR COPY EDITOR

T

he old adage goes, “You eat with your eyes first.”

This happened to be the case for my mom when she skimmed the Food Network magazine and discovered a picture of cookies that looked irresistible. With gooey chocolate chunks and crunchy oat flakes, they were worthy of a “phone eats first” Instagram post. She immediately turned the page for the recipe, which read “Vegan Cowgirl Cookies.” Vegan. She didn’t even know what that meant, but she was curious about vegan baking and compelled to try this recipe. After sampling her final results, she decided that they tasted “legit.”

Before “Vegan Cowgirl Cookies,” I hadn’t given the legitimacy of veganism or plant-based diets much thought.

When my second grade gym teacher reviewed the food pyramid and taught us the importance of a balanced diet, including the staples of meat, dairy, grains etc, the word vegan wasn’t mentioned once.

Upon hearing someone call themselves vegan, my knowledge of the colored food pyramid grounded my initial impression: a vegan diet was a flawed nutritional lifestyle. I was under the impression that a strong sentiment for animal rights was the only thing that drove people to become vegan.

When my younger sister, Tatum, returned home from her freshman year at Columbia University and declared she was vegan, I watched her choose not to consume any meat or animal products (poultry, fish, eggs, milk, cheese, gelatin) or even purchase any animal byproducts, such as leather clothing.

Slight chaos ensued in our household thereafter. Tatum’s

vegan options took up too much space in the freezer and she’d inconveniently make her own meals concurrent with my mom’s dinner preparations, leaving a mess in the kitchen.

At the family dinner table, my other sister Geena, an avid, unapologetic steak lover, would comically fight with Tatum over their respective food choices. As for me, I was confused why Tatum would eat all these “imitation,” or alternative products — all of which contained ingredients that seemed so fake, unnatural and unhealthy.

Nothing was more complicated than deciding what restaurant to eat at as a family. Even though Tatum vowed she could find something to eat on any menu, we’d still cater our restaurant choice to meet her dietary restrictions. One could say veganism caused some beef in the Meyhoefer household.

Despite our mealtime dilemmas and the occasional joke, our family was respectful and accommodating of Tatum’s lifestyle choices but it still took us a while before completely understanding the reasoning behind them. To be fair, Tatum didn’t want to cause any inconvenience: She didn’t want to act arrogantly about her view or appear high maintenance, conscious of the way some vegans are perceived in society.

At one point, Tatum explained how she physically felt better based on what she was eating. The logic of that reasoning for a vegan lifestyle piqued my attention and made me think how the ethical sense of veganism merges with the physical sense.

Tatum mentioned how she now has more energy after meals as well as how she is less stressed in regards to what she eats, since it is now in line with her beliefs. Eating clean isn’t necessarily

the same as eating healthy.

The inner “foodie” in me is always excited by the opportunity to try new foods and restaurants, so I adjusted to my rationale on what I thought was restrictive about veganism and embraced the possibility of the new foods I could expose myself to and now include in my diet. With an academic’s mind and adventurous spirit — I hit the books and went grocery shopping.

After scouring a multitude of websites on the internet, I began to unravel the layers of veganism.

Someone’s reasoning for living a vegan lifestyle could range from ethical, to religious, to health, to sustainability reasons. I was primarily drawn to the subset of environmental veganism; I was astonished by the environmental implications of a plant-based diet, especially with the recent devastation of the Amazon. In alignment with that revelation, studies have revealed correlations between raising animals and the exertion of resources such as water, land and greenhouse gases. Some studies go even further, claiming a vegan diet is “essential” to avoid climate change. My research also yielded information on how large of a spectrum veganism is in regards to the environmental impact of meat and dairy production.

Veganism is nuanced in this way, since no two vegan lifestyles look the same. The term “vegan” is nebulous, and the intensity of a vegan lifestyle may vary given it is an individual decision.

Honey, for instance, is contentiously debated among vegans as to whether or not it should be avoided.

Whether or not I chose to eat vegan at a particular meal, I became intrigued by the ingredients of what I consumed and where they were being sourced. To me, veganism is substantiated on the knowledge of where and how products are sourced, rather than a list of what one can and cannot consume.

I’m reminded of the chickens in my friend’s backyard, whose eggs would not technically fit into the plant-based category yet are ethically sourced and humanely harvested. Alternatively, a product such as coffee, which is undeniably plant-based, could be deemed unethical when grown on deforested rainforests that emit higher greenhouse gases compared to coffee grown

on suitable land under sustainable practices.

Veganism isn’t all salads and tofu. With the rise of plantbased alternatives, including Beyond Meat and Daiya “cheese,” it’s easy to assume veganism is merely a trend. However, a closer look at the history of veganism reveals otherwise. Diets like veganism have ties back to over 2,000 years ago in eastern Mediterranean and ancient Indian societies, who resorted to plant-based food for religious and philosophical intentions.

The term “vegetarian” was later coined in the mid-1800s and in November 1944, Donald Watson established the Vegan Society, in which an early definition of modern veganism originated. The definition has since been slightly modified and eventually grew into how veganism is thought of today.

Inevitably with my deepened understanding of veganism, when returning to campus in September for my senior year, one of my first stops was The Lunch Room, a popular vegan spot in Ann Arbor. As I was enjoying every bite of my vegan pad thai, I couldn’t help but take in the atmosphere and overhear the conversations around me. Their welcoming staff seemed to attract all demographics and the tables were filled with families, students, first dates and old friends catching up.

Comments on the food casually slipped into the conversation, whether it was simply on how tasty the food was or how they couldn’t believe the mac and “cheese” was vegan. And, of course, I caught others taking pictures of their food, myself guilty of doing so too.

Phillis Engelbert and Joel Panozzo, co-owners of The Lunch Room and Detroit Filling Station restaurants, epitomize the unifying dynamic of veganism in the hospitality industry.

“The restaurant is sort of a combination of vegan diet and cooking, plus community organizing, plus liking to plan and have parties,” Engelbert said. When describing the extensive range of people the restaurant entertains, quite literally with live music events, Engelbert added, “Vegans are probably a small minority of our customer base.”

As much as I agree and support such a lifestyle that leaves a greener footprint, I am still perplexed by how veganism fits into other narratives of society. Food is a language of its own; food speaks to us when we don’t know what to say. Similar to how some cultures or religions refrain from meat, specific foods are expected in the traditions of other cultures. In my Italian background at least, Thanksgiving isn’t complete until Grandma Francine’s meatballs and mostaccioli are on the table.

Also on the issue of a vegan lifestyle, I’m an advocate for listening to one’s own body — even if that encompasses the

need to consume non-vegan foods or products. For instance, certain individuals have blood types that recommend a higher meat or dairy intake. Additionally, most vegan alternatives rely heavily on soy ingredients. In that case, for individuals with soy or gluten allergies and medical conditions, a completely vegan diet may not be realistic. Veganism also brings up questions of accessibility to everyone on the basis of food inequalities.

Especially in today’s society of “diet culture” and the “wellness industry” there is also an underlying pressure to make food decisions not based on biological instincts, but rather through guilt based on what people eat or don’t eat.

So where does this leave me now? Vegan? Flexitarian?

Pescetarian? Non-vegan? “Naughty” vegan? In all honesty, I’m not sure. But, I like knowing that I can make a marginal environmental impact with some of my efforts to reduce meat and dairy intake. I find satisfaction in opting for vegan alternatives, especially with today’s luxuries of so many options, even in the milk aisle alone. However, given the multi-dimensionality to veganism, there doesn’t need to be any identities or labels assigned to it that would continue to perpetuate stigmas and divisiveness.

I suppose I’m taking a stance on no stance; I may sound hypocritical as a non-vegan in support of veganism, but I like to think my awareness counts for something.

I’m still hungry for knowledge, though, and when it comes to learning, one can never be overly satiated.

But really, who am I to tell anyone what to do or eat or not eat? I realize not everyone will be stocking their freezers with veggie burgers and Ben and Jerry’s vegan ice cream after reading this, but I like to hope there’s some take away from my own meandering

conclusions about veganism – even if it’s one less eye roll upon the mention of someone saying they’re vegan.

Or it could be an open door to another way of thinking about sustainability efforts; such as, but not confined to, limiting one’s single-use plastics, cleaning the beaches of trash, planting a tree, composting or simply remembering to turn off the light when leaving a room. Sustainability looks different for everyone, but regardless of what one brings to the table it all makes a difference.

By the end of the summer, my family learned how to agree to disagree. We visited vegan-only restaurants as well as steak restaurants that included a tasty vegan alternative on their menus. If Geena and Tatum can get along over veganism, and if restaurants like the Detroit Filling Station can find success in their communities, I think veganism can be more unifying than people imagine.

And whether you’ve labeled yourself vegan, not vegan, somewhere or nowhere in between, my mom’s vegan cookies are incontestably a favorite. So, I leave you with some food for thought:

ILLUSTRATION BY JONATHAN WALSH

6B

Wednesday, November 13, 2019 // The Statement

A pointe shoe and a pencil: How a dancer learned to use her words

T

BY ZOE PHILLIPS, STATEMENT CONTRIBUTOR

he day after Thanksgiving my senior year of high school, I boarded a 15-hour flight from San Francisco to Sydney, Australia. On my shoulder I carried a pink Adidas sports bag with eight carefully folded leotards, four pairs of satin pointe shoes, and a metal container full of bobby pins. In my left hand I held the top of a suit bag — borrowed from my dad — where I’d hung a sparkling white costume dress that would inevitably shed glitter everywhere.

Around me, passengers shoved duffel bags into overhead bins as they squeezed into their spots for the impending journey.

I remember looking around the plane and wondering what everyone’s story was. I wondered if anyone else was on their way to fulfill a lifelong dream. Had anyone else spent their childhood inside a ballet studio? I wiggled my toes in my sneakers. The edge of a bruised toenail — collateral damage from a pointe shoe earlier that week — twinged in pain. I ignored it. I was too excited.

I was on my way to the Geneé International Ballet Competition, an event which served as the capstone of my 16-year-long relationship with classical ballet.

My mom started me in ballet shortly after my third birthday. I don’t remember asking her for lessons nor do I recall falling in love after my first trip to the studio. But over the course of the following decade, ballet would become my closest friend. I spent hours in the studio learning how to mold my growing body into the shapes, positions and lines required of classical technique. I fell in love with leotards and drooled over satin shoes. I learned how to make my hair into a bun that would stay back even during the fastest turns.

I sacrificed sleepovers and sports games to perfect my pointed feet. The exacting nature of classical technique fed my eager work ethic unlike anything else my young self knew, and the focus it required gave me direction when I didn’t know where else to look.

Despite that direction, I knew from an early age that I wasn’t going to be a professional ballerina. I was too tall and I wanted to go to college – two barriers in the world of classical ballet. This decision, however, did not stop me from wanting to get as close as I possibly could to those professional dreams.

The Geneé is a competition sponsored by the Royal Academy of Dance, designed for the best ballet students across the globe. I was a sophomore in high school when I decided I had a shot. It would be over a year until I even qualified. The day that I found out, I sat in the car next to my brother and cried ugly tears of joy.

Today, the pictures I have of me onstage seem like they come from a dream. Dressed

in a simple leotard and tights with the number 54 pinned to my front, I am a facade of clam set against an imposing black stage. My face hides its nerves behind an expression of rehearsed serenity and a layer of heavy makeup that I’d applied in an underground dressing room. When I came offstage after my second solo, there was an email waiting for me from one of my teachers telling me how proud she was. Her kind words were reward enough for me.

As we boarded the bus back to the hotel the last night, all 80 of us began to sing “Let it Go” from “Frozen.” Even the girls who didn’t speak English knew the words. We smiled and laughed and screamed the words in unison. Many of my new acquaintances had been offered scholarships to professional-track academies and others would go on to be dancers at world-renowned companies. The level of talent in that vehicle was unimaginable, but for that short moment we all existed together in one crazy obsession with a children’s song.

My flight back to the U.S. was delayed, and by the time the wheels hit the ground I was ready to crawl into bed and sleep for a long time. When I woke up, I let it all set in: the competition, the training, the lifetime of hours. I’d accomplished my goal, so when I graduated high school the following spring, I put my leotards in a box at the bottom of my closet.

After almost two decades of tunnelvisioned dedication, I freed myself for other things. Ballet could be one of them, but it wasn’t going to be the only one.

In this spirit, I darted in and out of the ballet classes I could find in college. But the further removed I became from my time onstage at Geneé, the more my muscles began to forget their training. The strength and control I’d once maintained through hours of daily classes began to dissolve. When I looked in the mirror at the front of the ballet studio, I saw only a shadow of the dancer I used to be.

Ballet class became something to fear.

What would upset me today? Which body part would fail me? Would this leotard still look as good as it used to? I allowed the voice in the back of my head to tell me that my changing body was a representation of failure — that my decreasing flexibility was a sign of my own lack of discipline. Ballet is a visual art. I spent years learning how to move my body in order to make the unnatural look natural. As my strength atrophied, I no longer looked like the sum of that knowledge. Brick by emotionallytaxing brick, I built a wall between body and mind that left me blind on where to turn next.

Last summer I caught in the midst of one of these arguments, upset with myself over my decreasing range of motion, I decided I

needed a new coping mechanism. Fighting dancing with dancing wasn’t cutting it anymore and the mirror wasn’t getting any nicer.

I sat on my bed with my computer and thought about all the balletic knowledge I’d gained in the last two decades. I wondered if I would ever find a use for it.

On a whim, I started to write. My fingers clicked across the loud laptop keyboard as I wrote about my favorite steps and the secrets I knew about them. I explained why certain things look easy but are actually hard and I wrote about the dance history I’d learned from years of watching grainy YouTube videos of famous stars from decades ago. I explained why I loved my favorite ballets (Swan Lake, anyone?) and I tried to articulate what made them so important.

Before starting to write, I had never given myself the authority to embrace all that knowledge, telling myself that I had to have made it professionally to have some sort of opinion. When it dawned on me that this was stupid, I basked in the confidence I got in return. As I strung words together on a page, I became free of the physical limitations of my body.

On paper, I was as malleable and flexible and strong as I wished I could be in the mirror. I was free to move — to fly — without challenge or pain.

Upon making this discovery, I have since sat on couches and coffee shops, sometimes at odd hours of the night, figuring out how to tell others why all this means so much to me. And as I slowly explain to the world what I love about ballet, I remind the voice in the back of my head that she loves it too.

The system is not perfect.

The mirror still isn’t always kind and the writing doesn’t always flow (writing this piece, in fact, involved a substantial amount of pacing and complaining). Despite the occasional curse word muttered under my breath, however, this intermingling of expression — of writing and of dancing — gives me the peace of mind that allows me to do both with pride.

ILLUSTRATION BY CHRISTINE JEGARL

7B Wednesday, 2019////The The Statement 7B Wednesday,November January 16,13,2019 Statement

Pushing the barriers of language

BY MARTINA VILLALOBOS, STATEMENT COLUMNIST

ILLUSTRATION BY JONATHAN WALSH

T

here is a bar in Berlin, hidden in one of my favorite neighborhoods, that I would have overlooked if someone had not pointed it out to me. The lighting was dim, not because the owners were trying to set a mood, but because the bar had no lights. The chairs all looked like they had come from dumpster diving adventures. It was always crowded, and it reeked of tobacco. The only thing noteworthy, was a blue neon sign, that in English read “I lie that I am an artist.”

I remember chuckling as I read the sign out loud. But for me, the phrase would be, “I lie that I am a writer.” I say that I am a writer, but this phrase does not roll off my tongue with ease. It feels like a lie because still, something deep within me has not come to terms with the title: writer. I do not feel like I have earned the right to call myself a writer.

I had multiple journals as a child. I wrote in the margins of my school books.

I have a box full of sticky notes with ideas of things I want to write. I wrote during class and on my commute to school. I write long letters to my friends. But even so, I have never felt like a writer.

Am I a writer because, within my friend group, I am known for writing long and weirdly candid Instagram captions? Or am I a writer only when I have something published? Or does that something have to be published by someone with a fancy New York office?

I have always been at odds with my writing, often failing to find my voice in the words I type across the page. I am always afraid to write. And yet, here you are reading my words, maybe even enjoying them?

When people ask why I study French when I already know English and Spanish I shrug off the question with a soft smile. Then when people started asking why I was adding German to the list, I began to wonder. I think the truth of it all is that I am still seeking to find my voice.

I grew up with two languages: Spanish and English. The rules that govern these two are so different that I often get lost between them. Spanish is notorious for long sentences that take up more than one page. English, not so much. I remember the bright red letters at the top of my essay from an old teacher, reading: “You push the barriers of the English language

too far” and “Your ideas get lost in a swarm of subordinate clauses.”

With every sentence I write, I remember these words. They are permanently etched in my mind. They are a condemnation, a decree that I would never be a writer.

For a long time, I worked hard to erase Spanish from my mind so that I could write well and in native-English — something I am not so sure I have learned to do. I have learned to push away the words that come naturally to me and, by doing so, I began erasing the memories of my childhood. In choosing English I began rewriting my history, writing over the Spanish. Eventually my dreams, too, are in English. In an attempt to grow into English, I began to bend myself into the acceptable use of the language.

I think I found peace in the words of the German poet Rainer Maria Rilke.

These are the words that echoed in my mind: “There is only one thing you should do.

Go into yourself. Find out the reason that commands you to write; see whether it has spread its roots into the very depths of your heart; confess to yourself whether

you would have to die if you were forbidden to write. This most of all: ask yourself in the most silent hour of your night: must I write? Dig into yourself for a deep answer. And if this answer rings out in assent, if you meet this solemn question with a strong, simple ‘I must,’ then build your life in accordance with this necessity.”

But how would I be able to write about a past that is written in Spanish, I don’t think I could translate the love I had known in Spanish to English. I need to find a way to let both exist at peace with my voice as a writer.

I don’t think I am any more of a writer now than I was before. I just think I have used Rilke to justify the silent force inside me that wants to write. I am starting to think that what makes you a writer is the choice. The choice that pushes you to keep writing even after rejections. The choice to keep writing through the fear.

Maybe I haven’t found the voice that can balance all the parts of who I am, but that doesn’t make the statement “I am a writer” a lie, it just means “I am a writer, and I am still growing.” And I think for now that is enough...

8B

Wednesday, November 13, 2019 // The Statement

VISUAL STATEMENT: NYAH PROJECT, BALI

BY RITA VEGA

THE NYAH PROJECT BELIEVES THAT “TRAVEL AWAKENS LEADERS”. THIS SUMMER I TOOK AN ALL-EXPENSES PAID TRIP TO BALI, INDONESIA THROUGH MY FELLOWSHIP WITH THE PROJECT. NYAH MEANS PURPOSE, AND THROUGHOUT MY TIME IN BALI, I COULD DEFINETLY SAY I’VE FOUND MY PURPOSE IN LIFE. BEING SURROUNDED BY THE BALINESE CULTURE AND PEOPLE I NOW CALL MY FAMILY MADE THIS TRIP ONE I’LL NEVER FORGET.