STATEMENT

In conversation with Groundcover: Ann Arbor’s street paper

NATE SHEEHAN Statement Columnist

“Something is being made in this room.”

I hadn’t heard many other people speak as passionately about a space as Groundcover News editor-in-chief Lindsay Calka spoke of their office. I descended late Monday morning into the basement of Bethlehem United Church of Christ: It was a space in motion, a breathing entity. Over text to The Statement’s photographer, I described it as “an office, kitchen, lounge, storage all in one. And people seem to always be there.” All these functions mix the character of the space into its own distinct spirit.

Groundcover News is a ‘street paper’ — meaning that the vendors of the paper are unhoused or housing insecure persons — and in the case of Groundcover, the paper sales serve directly as income for the vendors. Outside of the vendors, the paper is almost completely run by volunteers.

The prevalence of street newspapers may be growing, but still constitute not even a fraction of the news industry. Although the first modern street paper is widely regarded as New York City’s Street News founded in 1989, the unhoused and those afflicted by poverty have used the news as a means to reflect issues not covered by the mainstream at least as far back as the early 20th century (The start date varies based on one’s definition of what qualifies a newspaper as a street paper). Today there are more than 100 street papers published globally in at least 34 countries.

This week I read Groundcover News’s October 1st edition from front to back: it cost two dollars. Stories ranged from a touching obituary for community member Brian Coliton, the conflicting social legacy of the Fleming Administration Building as it’s being torn down, a contemplative historical piece on the meaning behind Indigenous People’s Day and an anonymous contribution on the disturbing conditions inside Michigan prisons that advocates for guard bodycams.

Vendors wrote about half of the pieces in the edition. Lindsay described the paper as representing “hyperlocal community voices.” Groundcover doesn’t attempt to tackle all areas of news reporting, though topics “are always timely,” Lindsay said. “If it’s a big story connected to the social service landscape or conditions of poverty or homelessness, we’re covering that. Social justice news, community opinion and creative pieces are our niche.”

Groundcover vendor Laurzell Washington calls Groundcover a “beautiful process of journalism” and his work “fulfilling in terms of dealing with people. You’ll be surprised who you meet… All sorts of people have a story to tell.”

Laurzell is a great conversationalist; I met him while he was making a sandwich, grabbing lunch in the newsroom. He possesses a thoughtful demeanor, and an empathy that won’t take shit, but will forgive. We took residency in two chairs that sat just right, sinking to comfort. I asked him what made Groundover work.

“The average person tries to work with each other,” he started. “And a lot of employees come from the homeless sector, so I think a lot of people are motivated with Groundcover. If you been somewhere and understand where somewhere is, you ain’t so quick to put someone else down.”

The importance of understanding a place was a common thread throughout a lot of my conversations with the Groundcover team.

As we got to know one another, Laurzell and I realized we both had lived in Massachusetts and Michigan. We reflected on our experiences in both places, similarities and differences. Our conversation also covered politics, from the RussianUkraine war, the FBI seizure in Mar-A-Lago to why people are drawn to Trump. Laurzell recently wrote an article for Groundcover on the war in Ukraine.

In Lindsay’s own words, the biggest piece of Groundcover is that “it invites people into conversation and relationship.” Groundcover has a “dualprong mission of low barrier employment (and uplifting) community voices, voices that are marginalized,” she asserted. How these two parts of Groundcovers’ mission “meet in the middle is you have to buy the paper from someone, and that to people can be revolutionary.”

When I first bought my paper, I was walking back from the pitch meeting for this piece at the Daily. I don’t remember my vendor’s name, but I remember that we laughed about technology. He told me to put his vendor number into the caption for my venmo payment for the paper. QR codes for cashless payment can be found on the bottom right corner of Groundcover papers — a feature Lindsay worked hard for. That night I was just beginning to come down sick, so I preferred to rush home. Still, in an increasingly digital world, unforeseen interactions tinge it a little rosier.

English 126 – “CommunityEngaged Writing” and 221 - “Literature and Writing Outside The Classroom” have both developed relationships with Groundcover over the past few years. I spoke with Prof. John Buckley, instructor of both of these courses, who spoke to the profundity of the interactions street papers like Groundcover initiate.

“To make change in society, everyone has to work together,” he said. “In order to get everyone to work together, you need thousands of one-on-one conversations. In order to buy the paper, you are a human talking to another human. Trading compassion fatigue for a moment of empathy.”

Jay, the other vendor I spoke with, who refrained from providing his last name, also identified the ways in which Groundcover fosters social good. He emphasized the economic opportunities Groundcover provides vendors, and how the relative stability of that income generates other opportunities. Cleaning services and boober businesses have both grown from the Groundcover community, Jay said.

“You’re learning things about business and managing money by working here that’s not understood by the average person… What I love about Groundcover (is) if you want to learn, it teaches you how to fish.” Or, it’s better to be taught a skill than just be given the benefits.

Jay emphasized in much of our conversation how transformative it is for one’s mindset to transition from having to constantly think about the next meal and where to sleep, to being able to consider one’s livelihood and the world around them. Employment centers like Groundcover “bridge the gap,” so people can create for themselves thanks to a community of people that genuinely care.

Yet, not all services for the unhoused and housing insecure promote the same opportunities for all. Sometimes the altruistic people running these organizations center themselves via “criteria of helping” that doesn’t always effectively meet the challenges of poverty. One example Jay points to is the prominence of organizations for those struggling with drug or alcohol addiction whose tactics don’t always effectively battle addiction.

Simultaneously, those who are food and housing insecure for less altruistically popular reasons struggle for similar aid. Jay concludes his thoughts, “Forget free college. The idea that everyone can eat, that alone, and basic shelter, those things can change the world.”

I sought from my interviewees how the Daily, a paper so intrinsically tied with a mammoth institution, relates to the city of Ann Arbor. Lindsay gave her praises for the rigorousness and investigative work of our journalism.

JEREMY WEINE/Daily

Read more at MichiganDaily.com

America’s obsession with staying young

REESE MARTIN Statement Columnist

Prior to this semester, I only used the term marathon to describe 26-mile-long runs and a 24-hour viewing of Harry Potter movies. Now, as a sophomore in college, I can add three consecutive days of exams, several all-nighters and the wish that caffeine came in an IV to the list of marathon-level activities in my vocabulary.

Last Friday night, after I lost my self esteem in a lecture hall temporarily titled “exam room three,” I came home to my housemates and neighbors sitting on our living room floor, yelling at each other over an intense game of Cards Against Humanity. While I could have chosen to sleep, or at least nap, I ultimately dropped my backpack for the first time in 72 hours and joined them on a carpet in need of vacuuming.

It was euphoric. The knowledge that I was done choosing between answers A or C amid a harshly-lit auditorium transported me to an elevated plane of pure happiness.

But, before I could stop my consciousness from wandering, I felt a uniquely disturbing pressure to make the most of this moment. After so much wasted time on insanityfueling multiple choice questions and solitary study nights, a heightened need to make up for the youthful, college fun I missed out on the weeks before loomed over my head.

Although I was physically and mentally exhausted, I chose to stay up with my friends — feeling as though my time as a young person was slipping away. Supposedly, I will one day remember these four years as “the best days of my life” — a phenomenon closely correlated with the heavily-documented, distinctlyAmerican obsession with youth.

But why are we so obsessed with staying young anyway? Who does this infatuation really benefit? ***

The promotion of youthfulness in the media goes back decades.

In conversation with Professor Susan Douglas — communications & media professor at the University of Michigan, and author of “In Our Prime: How Older Women are Reinventing the Road Ahead” — I learned about the extensive marketing history supporting the American culture’s infatuation with youth.

According to Professor Douglas, there has always been negative media messaging surrounding aging. However, when the young-adult baby boomers of the post-war era entered the market around the 1960s, media and marketing tools that promoted the value of youthfulness and ageist messages became prolific. Industries targeted this new, large consumer base by endorsing pop-culture and flattering the younger generation — suggesting they were “cooler” or superior to their parents and grandparents.

Companies found this marketing strategy lucrative, as baby boomer consumers had a large market capture. Professor Douglas explained that as a result, music such as rock ‘n’ roll, young-adult-style films and a host of material products geared toward young people became increasingly prevalent in society. Due to the success of these advertising tools with the decade’s teens, this cultural emphasis on youth persisted through the ’70s, ’80s, ’90s and 2000s.

As a lover of arts and pop-culture content, I’m familiar with a variety of musical sensations, top-rated TV shows and treasured coming-of-age narratives. Songs like “Jack & Diane,” “Summer of ‘69” and “We Are Young,” trained me to idolize my teen and college-aged years as the most valuable time life has to offer.

“Oh yeah / Life goes on, long after the thrill of living is gone…Holdin’ on to sixteen as long as you can / Change is coming ‘round real soon / Make us women and men.”

While “Jack & Diane” earned its spot in the American-anthem repertoire for its catchy tune and clever rhymes, I wonder if John Mellencamp’s lyrics contributed to the song’s allure. According to this beloved ’80s artist, becoming women and men — or more specifically, exiting your teen years — eliminates the possibility of a “thrilling” or enjoyable existence within the latter decades of your life.

However, imagining my 16-yearold self as the peak cumulation of my life is both a horrifying and entirely false concept. Not only am I happier as a 19-year-old in college, but I am also a better person in terms of identity growth and autonomous development.

Therefore, it should be easy to disregard the notion that my late teens and twenties are “the best days of my life,” and I should ignore Pitbull lyrics like, “We might not get tomorrow, so let’s do it tonight.” Yet, nonetheless, I continue to catch myself feeling the need to mimic the wild and spontaneous characters in the latest teen Netflix dramas, in order to ‘have fun while I can.’ But why?

In speaking with Professor Sonya Dal Cin — communications & media professor and adjunct professor of psychology at the University — I learned how compounded marketing messages and societal influence may promote this contradictory selfimage.

“We know from extensive research in psychology and communications that messages prevalent in society often reflect societal values, but they also have an impact on how we see ourselves,” said Dal Cin. “What people are exposed to does impact the way they make sense of their own lives.”

Dal Cin goes on to describe the implications these environmental factors may have on a person’s self esteem.

“There are a range of different ways in which people think about what’s important in life, and, therefore, how they may or may not be meeting what they view as the ideal self,” said Dal Cin.

She delineated how the inconsistencies between what people think they should be versus what they actually are can cause tension.

“In psychology, there is this concept of ideal self versus the actual self. When there is a discrepancy between the ideal self and the actual self, it can cause some difficulties in how people feel about their identity,” Dal Cin said.

Therefore, messages about youth and age can certainly affect personhood and self-image depending on how an individual places value on the media, the culture of their environment and their understanding of actual and ideal selves.

Professor Douglas describes how this concept, deriving from self esteem issues, allows for markets to capitalize on a culturally-produced, collectively-felt fear of aging.

According to Professor Douglas, a binary was created in the 1960s that pinned ‘old’ and ‘young’ against one another. Negative messages about older generations, specifically the women in those generations, were cemented into American culture through television and other public platforms.

Professor Douglas mentioned how Disney often portrayed elderly female characters as crazy grandmothers, hideous witches and evil mothers. I’m reminded of Snow White’s stepmother, the Evil Queen, who disguised herself as an old woman in order to trick the fair princess into eating a poison apple, all because she was jealous of the princess’s beauty.

Characters like Disney’s Evil Queen were juxtaposed with young female characters, often princesses, who represented beauty, kindness, happiness and desirability.

By reinforcing this binary in popular culture, the media capitalizes on the association that old women are ‘bad’ and young women are ‘good.’

“They tell us we can’t be happy with wrinkles and eyebags. And they engrain those beauty standards in the minds of young people early on,” said Douglas. “The job of the entire anti-aging industrial complex is to make everybody phobic about getting older. It’s a great strategy, because everybody is always getting older, and nobody can escape it — creating a constantly renewing and endless market.”

After speaking with both Professor Douglas and Professor Dal Cin, I have a newfound motivation to resist the youth-oriented pressure that the American consumer industry has created.

While I’m sure the 2012 version of One Direction believed we needed to “go crazy, crazy, crazy” and “live while we’re young,” I think we can all agree that the band’s former lead singer, Harry Styles, is “living it up” more as he approaches thirty than when he first performed that song at eighteen. His overwhelming popularity and sold-out stadiums certainly serve as evidence to that fact.

And surely John Mellencamp enjoyed life after he made it big with “Jack and Diane.” He did become a musical legacy, after all.

Digital ads: The struggle between gratuity and privacy

CONNOR O’LEARY HERRERAS Statement Columnist

Around every online corner, someone is trying to sell you something. Advertisements for Grammarly play before, during and after YouTube videos. Online shopping ads show up on social media, streaming platforms and message boards. These ads intrude our casual web browsing and interrupt our scrolls through news articles. Just now, I couldn’t look up a synonym for ‘intrude’ without seeing an ad for children’s Zyrtec — and I don’t have allergies nor do I have a kid.

Online ads are everywhere, but the fact that they subtract a couple seconds of my time has always been a minor inconvenience. For most of my life, I dismissed these ads as a normal part of existing half of any given day in front of a screen. But recently I’ve grown a little more skeptical. When I see a Zyrtec ad, I’m left wondering why I was shown their product.

If I’m browsing the web, and I click the little ‘x’ to close out a pop-up ad, Google replaces the image with two links: ‘Stop seeing this ad’ and ‘Why this ad?’ This second link opens a new tab in which Google explains that the ad was selected based off of “(My) activity on Google on this device.”

This sounds innocuous — at least Google would like you to think so.

I think of ads on television as veering into manipulative, but that’s different. Online ads are just there in the background. So what’s the issue?

Well, Google is keeping tabs on our online presences. Many of us take this notion in stride, swallowing our discomfort in exchange for the regular use of our technology, but I want to know exactly how the so-called “Tracking Industry ‘’ came to be — especially because it might be on its way out.

In April of 2021, Apple introduced a pop-up window to their products in which users can “Ask App not to Track” their personal data. At first, I barely bat an eye at the release of this new feature. But now I realize it has massive implications for the future of the internet.

But before I looked to the internet’s future, I had to understand the past. I’m old enough to have grown up alongside the internet, but young enough to have never questioned why and how it’s always been there. To understand how the free online services I use, such as Google, are paid for, I dug into the story of the internet’s origins.

There is no singular answer as to who invented the internet as we know it today. Many individuals contributed to the technology that we are presently familiar with as ‘the web.’ Starting in 1966, The United States Department of Defense funded the Advanced Research Projects Agency Network, or ARPANET, which was one of the technological building blocks for the modern internet. Using this technology, information could be securely transferred between computers at Pentagon-funded research labs.

Access to the ARPANET grew in 1981 when the National Science Foundation funded network access for University computer scientists. At this point in time, what the NSF coined the ‘Computer Science Network’ was still intended primarily for communication among remote computers. By 1990, partnerships with corporations such as IBM and AT&T began the transition of ARPANET technology into the private sector.

Eventually, what was initially a technology intended for secure communication between computers at different locations ballooned into one of the most ubiquitous tools in human history: the internet.

In 1994, Lou Montulli created a way for websites to place a small file on every computer that visited the site, tracking their activity. He named this file the ‘cookie’. The ‘cookie’ turned the average internet user’s personal information into a resource. Companies could now take advantage of internet users’ online activity to market relevant products to them. These digital ads were the rocket fuel that shot the tech giants we’re familiar with today — Facebook, Google and Twitter — to the top of the digital food chain.

But now, the $350 billion digital ad industry is on thinner ice than ever. According to Sheri Bachstein, global head of IBM Watson Advertising and The Weather Company, “With all the changes happening in advertising with privacy, and identifiers and cookies being eliminated by the big tech companies, if all your revenue depends on advertising, that’s going to be challenging in the near future.”

It’s remarkable to think that the internet could undergo such a dramatic shift. Alphabet, Google’s parent company, makes more than 80% of its revenue from advertising.

Then again, it’s not uncommon for companies who provide an online service to make their money independently of digital advertising.

As a University of Michigan Student, my access to Canvas plays a significant role in my success. Fortunately, my data appears to be in good hands. A brief inquiry into the Canvas Privacy Policy reveals that Instructure, the developer of Canvas, does not “sell or rent your personal information to third parties.” As a Learning Management Software, Canvas makes money by charging ‘a one-time implementation fee and an annual subscription fee based on an institution’s total number of users.’

With personal data becoming more difficult to justify as a means to generate revenue for tech companies, subscription fees and other charges may become more commonplace on the internet. Services such as YouTube Premium may become the norm, wherein users pay a subscription fee in order to access an ad-free platform, or otherwise continue to use YouTube for free in exchange for constant advertising.

And there’s power in marketing. Ads become a part of our collective consciousness. If I asked someone how much fifteen minutes could save me on car insurance, they’d know. Nevertheless, digital ads might not be as effective as their creators think — like that Zyrtec ad I keep coming back to. I could speculate that Zyrtec picked up on some slight indication from one of my Google searches that I was looking for allergy medicine.

But the kicker is that I don’t know whether Zyrtec had my data or not, and that is concerning enough.

In theory, the targeting of ads based on a user’s expressed interests seems like an efficient way to get more people to buy more things. So it would seem counterintuitive that in 2018 when the New York Times ended its behavioral targeting in Europe, its advertising revenue did not decrease. Anecdotally, I rarely ever buy the products that are advertised digitally to me, even when they do fit my interests.

But the truth is, this isn’t about me. It’s about how much my data will sell for.

In 2014, when Cambridge Analytica obtained the Facebook data of tens of millions of users to ‘sell psychological profiles of American voters to political campaigns,’ the hashtag #DeleteFacebook started trending on Twitter. Herein lies the problem; When one online platform violated the privacy of its users, the public took to another online platform to criticize the first one. When we live our lives ‘chronically online,’ our data is always at stake.

Deleting Facebook doesn’t sound so bad, but deleting the internet is not an option. The vast reservoir of information available to me is like having a second brain. I’m constantly one firing of a motor neuron away from all the information I need.

So, as wary as I am of corporations preying on my data, I’m equally aware that using the internet requires individual action on my part to protect that data. Knowing which companies I can trust with my information and which I cannot make all the difference for a secure interaction with the world wide web.

At the end of the day, data privacy will win me over faster than any online ad ever could.

The rise and fall of genuine hobbies

ELLA KOPELMAN Statement Columnist

Last month, I applied to a study abroad program in Paris and had to fill out an application with an “activities” section. My heart sank. I got the same feeling as when a professor, attempting an icebreaker, asks: “What do you like to do for fun?” To be truthful, what I like to do for fun is send TikToks to my roommates as they sit right next to me doing the same, but that didn’t seem like an acceptable answer to present to my upper level psychology course on the first day.

The application question forced me to ask myself a question that I sadly had no immediate answer to: What do I choose to actively do for fun, with no social, economic or otherwise measurable reward involved?

I used to have hobbies. I used to play softball and volleyball, write poems and creative stories and play guitar and bass. So what changed?

Answering this question made me sad. I hadn’t realized how this noticeable lack of hobbies in my life has made me feel less fulfilled until I had to confront it, and now I haven’t stopped thinking about it.

As it turns out, American hobbies are a byproduct of the historical context in which they were created. During the Industrial Revolution, as long, dreadful hours in factory lines became more normalized, labor unions began forming, advocating for shorter working hours and five-day work weeks. The result was an increase in free time. People began picking up hobbies as a way to fill the hours in between work with something pleasurable, while still not wasting the day away.

Additionally, the Great Depression and World War II in the mid 20th century created a national landscape of tension and apprehensiveness. As the author of an article about “How Hobbies Infiltrated American Life” describes, anxiety and low employment are the perfect cocktail to ensure a rise in hobbies.

Not only were hobbies used to kill time, they also acted as an escape from whatever reality plagued the country or one’s individual anxieties. COVID-19 is a prime example of how national and personal distress led people to find refuge in kitchen hacks like whipped coffee and making sourdough bread. Hobbies give people a sense of purpose and enrichment. Research even shows that engagement in hobbies for personal pleasure is associated with higher levels of psychological and physical health.

As illustrated by the book “Hobbies: Leisure and the Culture of Work in America,” it is clear that in times of distress, the American public turns to hobbies as a means of “productive leisure.” There is a clear oxymoron here, and it seems that 21st century capitalism has put an emphasis on the “productive” part of hobby creation and maintenance.

Maybe this is the reason I don’t have hobbies the way I used to. I am too busy being “productive,” keeping myself busy with other things society has deemed more beneficial and important than unnecessary activities of pleasure. I have a full school schedule, a job and engage in extracurricular activities that would look impressive on a resume. Hobbies, without any monetary or professional benefit to myself, have been put on the backburner.

It’s not that the activities I do engage in don’t bring me joy – they do. But, adding extrinsic rewards (i.e. money, good grades, a job interview) to something that one already finds pleasurable changes the nature of the activity and decreases the intrinsic value from engaging in the activity.

This isn’t to say that my experience of losing interest in hobbies as life has gotten busier is the norm. If someone spent approximately ten minutes scrolling on TikTok, they would be bombarded with extremely talented painters, dancers and bakers, all showing off their skills in an entertaining, accessible format. It’s not that hobbies don’t exist anymore, but they have become something to gawk at and commercialize, rather than something to find intrinsic, personal pleasure from.

As content creators showcase their talents and hobbies online, consumers gobble up this media with delight. Sometimes just watching another person engage in a hobby satisfies the creative itch that instigates a desire for hobbies in the first place. Watching someone crochet a hat and shirt entertains me to no end, but doesn’t necessarily encourage me to engage in a similar act myself.

The fact is, leisure time is spent very differently today than it was even just two decades ago. In a study conducted by Swedish researchers that analyzed three cohorts of young adults from 1990-2011, they found that there has been a decrease in time spent on in-person social interactions, reading and other offline activities. All the while, time spent online increased considerably, including activities like watching TV.

Findings from the Pew Research Center corroborate this idea, showing that teens experience less leisure time than they did a decade or two ago. Current teens spend more time on homework and sleeping than their peers did in the 90s. But, besides those two activities, the majority of the former group’s time is spent on screens.

In addition to this, time spent by teens in other activities such as socializing and enjoying extracurriculars has declined, reaching barely over an hour a day. With screens readily available to entertain, captivate and distract, the drive to spend this limited leisure time creating and actively doing instead of consuming has become less appealing.

Even though we know that hobbies provide immeasurable color to our lives and actually contain health benefits, they are harder to maintain in a society that values productivity and money-making.

In an article advocating for the importance of hobbies in the 21st century, a section is dedicated to how easy it is to turn a hobby into a career. But, doesn’t that defeat the purpose of hobbies in the first place? Hobbies, at their essence and origin, were an escape from work. Using the incentive of a career as a reason to adopt a hobby shows just how much the meaning and purpose of hobbies has changed.

At the same time, if social clout or monetary rewards are incentivizing people to maintain and showcase their hobbies, I can’t claim that this is necessarily a bad thing. If anything, I applaud and admire people who create careers based on activities they truly enjoy. Work should be enjoyable, but I wonder if once a hobby becomes “work,” can it still be classified as a hobby?

It can’t be deliberately concluded that in an age of technology and productivity, hobbies have completely fallen to the wayside. But, they have shifted from their original purpose as personallymotivated, anxiety-quenchers and free-time-fillers.

Obviously, we live in a completely different society than the 19th century Industrial Revolution, and the way we spend our leisure time has changed and adapted with it. As long as we keep creating and continue to find pleasure in these activities (whether we get paid for them or not), hobbies will remain an essential lifeline for those bogged down with work and the sad realities of our modern world.

So, to answer the question on my study abroad application, I guess writing about the collapse of genuine, intrinsically motivated hobbies is what I “do for fun”...in addition to watching TikToks with my friends.

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