CHAMPS
Michigan wins Big Ten Tournament in Dusty May’s first year
INDIANAPOLIS
— As the confetti rained down on the No. 3 seed Michigan men’s basketball team’s championship celebration, its last two months were all but forgotten. The nailbiting wins, shooting slumps and especially its regular-season-ending three-game losing streak were all back of mind as the plans to hang another banner in Crisler Center were written. But to get to the celebratory podium, the Wolverines had to forget something else: the first half of the championship game.
Battling through poor early shooting in the Big Ten Tournament Championship game, Michigan (25-9 overall, 14-6 Big Ten) turned a sour ending to their season into a sweet entrance into March Madness against No. 5 seed Wisconsin (26-9, 13-7), winning the title game 59-53.
Despite the ugliness of the first half, Michigan’s turnaround mirrored that of its past two weeks: from stone cold to dynamic and at the top of the food chain, this time cutting down the nets.
five minutes of the second half to mount the first strong lead of the game.
“I don’t remember what the details we talked about at halftime were,” Michigan coach Dusty May said. “But I do remember us rallying
Wolverines’ did not. This stronger start got Wisconsin up by as much as nine points six minutes into the half, just in time for Michigan to wake up and rally too. After two deep shots from freshman guard L.J. Cason kept the Wolverines
Twenty minutes before Michigan closed out the Badgers, though, it looked as though the Wolverines had lost all of their offensive mojo. They initially came out in the first half looking like the same team that came to play Friday and Saturday, scoring on three-straight possessions, then the shots stopped falling; Michigan was getting good looks from deep, but couldn’t get them to drop.
This resulted in a 23-21
Wisconsin lead at halftime, as neither the Wolverines nor Badgers were potent offensively. But when the teams came out of the half, Michigan was still slow and the Badgers had awoken. After hitting just eight shots the entire first half, Wisconsin made four in the first
around the fact we don’t know what it’s going to look like, (or) how it’s going to go, but we’re going to dig deep and find a way.”
The Badgers’ percentages still weren’t all that strong, but their offense showed life while the
close while their offense was stagnant, they cut the lead down to just four with 10 minutes to go.
“If you know L.J. Cason, he’s never going to be unaggressive,” May said. “We know him, and that’s the beautiful thing about him. We
know what his DNA is, we know his background, we know who he is to the core.” Michigan, after squandering offensive opportunities away throughout the first 30 minutes, took the next four minutes and made them count. Following countless missed threes, the Wolverines finally got downhill and into the paint, pressuring the Badgers to truly defend and tying the game at 45-45. From there the rubber match ensued. After 35 minutes of offensive struggle, the magnitude of every bucket was amplified. Wisconsin took shots at Michigan, but the Wolverines’ three-big lineup answered right back. The intensity of a championship showdown that was lacking early in the game suddenly came crashing onto the two teams.
“Once LJ got us going, that big lineup with great shooting, size,” May said. “Other than one
defensive error, I thought they played almost perfect basketball where they generated good offense, they worked well together, and defensively they were physical and locked into the scouting report.” Big makes went back and forth in the closing minutes, both teams showing up when the lights shined brightest, although Michigan got it done in the end. Graduate center Vlad Goldin was fouled with 46 seconds left, hitting two at the stripe to take a two-point lead — finishing a possession that included two offensive boards for the Wolverines. All it took to finish was a defensive stop, which
UMich creates support program for researchers impacted by Trump funding freezes
Researchers must have previously had a federal grant ceased by recent stop-work orders
ANNA PIERSON Daily Staff Reporter
The University of Michigan has created a new funding program for researchers in response to federal funding cuts under the Trump administration that have impacted researchers across the University, including at U-M Flint, U-M Dearborn and Michigan Medicine.
In an email sent to the University research community, several administrators, including University President Santa Ono, said the central purpose of the program is to help the University’s research continue despite uncertainties related to federal funding.
“The deans, executive vice presidents, and the VPRI are working closely to offer a transition plan that would allow units to manage uncertainty related to funding stoppages, mitigate impacts to staff, and reduce risk to health and safety with respect to critical research already underway,” the email read.
The press release from the Office of the Vice President for Research website said that to be eligible for the program, researchers must have previously had a federal grant that had been ceased by recent stop-work orders.
“This program includes units whose existing federal grants or contracts have been terminated unexpectedly, have
experienced a disruption to the current level of funding provided via an official stopwork order or non-competing renewal delay, or where funding delays put participant health and safety at risk,” the release read.
The program provides eligible researchers with up to 50% of eligible research costs that were previously federally funded for up to six months, which are coming from a fixed amount of “central resources” that the University has pulled together.
According to the press release, this funding may be used for a variety of purposes as the researcher sees fit.
“Central funding can be used to: Support salaries, benefits,
Department of Education warns
supplies, and other needed direct expenses for employees and PhD students who cannot be reassigned to other work and have lost salary coverage as a result of cancellation of the federal grant,” the release read.
Researchers are encouraged to contact their own research office to investigate if their projects are eligible to use the new central funding.
“Researchers should work through their existing research office/structure to understand if their work is eligible to be funded through this new program,” the release read. “If a dean or the directors of LSI and ISR determine a project merits funding, they will make the request for central funding.”
UMich
should do more to protect Jewish students
‘The Department is deeply disappointed that Jewish students studying on elite U.S. campuses continue to fear for their safety.’
necessary adherence to federal antidiscrimination laws.
The University of Michigan, along with 59 other institutions of higher education, was sent a letter from the Department of Education Monday, warning them of potential enforcement actions if the University does not fulfill their obligations under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act to protect Jewish students on campus.
In a press release, the Department of Education confirmed the letters were addressed to universities currently under investigation by the department’s Office for Civil Rights for antisemitic harassment and discrimination violations. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon said the department is disappointed by the alleged fear faced by Jewish students on college campuses, emphasizing
“The Department is deeply disappointed that Jewish students studying on elite U.S. campuses continue to fear for their safety amid the relentless antisemitic eruptions that have severely disrupted campus life for more than a year,” McMahon said. “University leaders must do better. U.S. colleges and universities benefit from enormous public investments funded by U.S. taxpayers. That support is a privilege and it is contingent on scrupulous adherence to federal antidiscrimination laws.”
The department previously launched directed investigations on Feb. 3 into Columbia University, Northwestern University, Portland State University, University of California, Berkeley and University of Minnesota Twin Cities, in accordance with Title VI and President Donald
Trump’s Jan. 29 Executive Order titled, “Additional Measures to Combat Antisemitism.” The University is among 55 higher education institutions that have since also come under investigation by the OCR.
“The 55 additional universities are under investigation or monitoring in response to complaints filed with OCR,” the press release read.
The department wrote that it looks forward to working with the Department of Justice and the Department of Health and Human Services within the newly developed Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism.
“These investigations build upon the foundational work of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce under then-Chairwoman Virginia Foxx, which found university administrations ‘overwhelmingly failed’ to protect or support their Jewish students, even making
‘astounding concessions’ to illegal, anti-American encampments,” the press release read.
Just three days before the University received the letter, the Trump administration pulled $400 million in federal grants and contracts from Columbia University, citing its failure to combat antisemitism on campus.
“Last week, the Department … announced the immediate cancelation of $400 million in federal grants and contracts to Columbia University due to the school’s continued inaction to protect Jewish students from discrimination,” the press release read. “Last Friday, OCR directed its enforcement staff to make resolving the backlog of complaints alleging antisemitic violence and harassment, many which were allowed to languish unresolved under the previous administration, an immediate priority.”
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PHOTO OF THE WEEK
Randall Xiao/DAILY
The Michigan baseball team listens to the National Anthem prior to their game Friday afternoon.
BARRETT DOLATA Daily News Reporter
KAYLA LUGO Daily Staff Reporter
Ann Arbor for Public Power holds rally before City Council vote on energy resolutions
The resolutions, which did not pass at the meeting, would have furthered A2P2’s ability to fully municipalize Ann Arbor’s power grid
Ann Arbor for Public Power
gathered approximately 50 Ann Arbor residents outside of Larcom City Hall Monday prior to the Ann Arbor City Council meeting for a rally supporting two energy resolutions put up for a vote at the meeting. The resolutions, which did not pass at the meeting, would have furthered A2P2’s ability to fully municipalize Ann Arbor’s power grid and switch its energy source from DTE Energy to public power, a utility owned directly by the city that would prioritize renewable energy.
PUBLIC SAFETY
DPSS
In an interview with The Michigan Daily, A2P2 President Greg Woodring said the resolutions are important in order to prepare the city to purchase the electrical grid infrastructure from DTE.
“We will, in 2026, vote to authorize the city to make the offer to DTE to purchase their infrastructure,” Woodring said.
“These resolutions tonight are preparing the city to enter into that legal battle. Once that legal battle is finished, then voters will have one more chance to vote on it, to authorize the final price.”
The vote was originally scheduled for Feb. 18 but was delayed due to issues with a subcontractor, in addition to concerns about
President Donald Trump’s energy policies which may roll back many renewable power measures. Woodring emphasized the need for these resolutions given the political circumstances under the current presidential administration.
“Now, in this Trump era where we’re seeing a decline of our democratic institutions, we’re seeing complete corporate overreach into all of our daily lives,” Woodring said. “It’s more important than ever for us to stand up and reject that type of corporate control, demand more democratic accountability of our institutions and simply demand a better deal of what we are being asked to pay.”
Members of the University of
Michigan administration were not present at the rally. In an interview with The Daily, LSA senior Casey Weiss said he understood why University leadership did not attend but hoped they would support the initiative.
“Obviously, public power is mostly a municipal issue,” Weiss said. “It’s for the city. But I don’t understand why President (Santa Ono) isn’t here, or the regents, advocating for public power. A lot of them live here, and I know they probably support this. It would be cool to have them involved in some capacity.”
In addition to helping the city generate cleaner energy, Weiss said he blames the frequent power
outages that have occurred at his home on DTE.
“My apartment, which is right downtown, we get power outages all the time,” Weiss said. “The lights flicker on and off. The internet goes out. It happens very frequently, and that’s on DTE. Any improvement from now would be much appreciated.”
Despite the demonstration in support of the resolutions, some councilmembers remained skeptical of moving forward with the municipalization of the power grid.
At the meeting, Councilmember Lisa Disch, D-Ward 1, expressed concern for the plan and said municipalization was risky given the political state of the nation.
“If I and other residents are to vote up or down on municipalization, we need more information,” Disch said. “And I also believe that Phase II study would offer important information to help us consider that vote. But municipalization is a long road, and in the current political climate, an investment of this size to initiate that risk.” DC-2. which would have begun the process of putting municipalization to a vote and preparing a litigation strategy for acquiring DTE assets, failed to reach the minimum six votes needed. This also affected DC-1, which would have established a Phase II municipalization study.
therapy dog Nico celebrates two years of serving Michigan communities
The therapy dog supports survivors of interpersonal violence and domestic assault
Walking around campus with his own Mcard and Division of Public Safety and Security business card, Nico catches everyone’s attention. Nico works directly with DPSS Security Sergeant AnnMarie Vaquera after joining the DPSS team in December 2022. Together, they serve as the liaison to Student Life and have spent more than two years working together. Nico was born May 27, 2021 and is a 30-pound rescued shih tzu, Australian cattle and Australian shepherd mix. The therapy dog’s primary job on campus is supporting survivors of interpersonal violence and domestic assault. Nico also attends community-based events on and around campus, including at C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital, the Ann Arbor Police and Fire Departments and local elementary schools.
In an interview with The Michigan Daily, Vaquera explained that dogs can sense anxiety and body chemistry changes. She described a conversation with a survivor that Nico accompanied in court in which the survivor asked if Nico could sense and react to the intense emotions she was feeling.
LIFE
“They asked me, ‘Will he even come to me?’” Vaquera said. “And I said, ‘Absolutely.’ And he jumped in her lap and slept the entire time while she was waiting to testify.”
Nico was selected by DPSS through an organization in Florida called Paws & Stripes College which rescues dogs for therapy work from the Brevard County
Animal Shelter. As part of his training, Nico spent 12 weeks with carefully selected and trained jail inmates, who worked to teach basic obedience skills like how to sit, stay, come and heel.
Vaquera said Nico’s training and naturally calm temperament allow him to respond well to stressful situations. His first
official day of deployment was on Michigan State University’s campus following the shooting in February 2023.
In an email to The Daily, Margie Pillsbury, lead police officer of the DPSS Special Victims Unit, wrote Nico’s involvement with the unit for survivor meetings and court has been well received.
Holly Burkhart/DAILY
“Nico’s presence seems to help relieve anxiety and bring comfort to survivors,” Pillsbury wrote. “It is enjoyable to watch his interactions with survivors and know that he is making a difference for them in that difficult moment.”
Nico frequently attends resident adviser events on campus, such as his visit to Bursley Residence Hall
Feb. 21. Engineering sophomore Samuel Konigbagbe, a resident adviser in Bursley, said it was his idea to invite Nico to the event.
“It’s been very cold and it’s kind of lonely out here and it’s midterm season,” Konigbagbe said. “So I thought, ‘What better way to help people relax and feel less stressed?’ Bursley is far away from Central (Campus) and there’s not much activity going on. I felt that having Nico here would be a great way to build community and help people find joy.”
Engineering freshman Esmirna Anguiano applied to be an R.A. for the upcoming school year and said she would request Nico for an R.A. event if she gets the job, agreeing with Konigbagbe that dogs bring students together in a meaningful way.
“Everybody wants to be there, so it just helps you bring up a good chat topic and you’d giggle with someone when the dog does something silly,” Anguiano said. “So it breaks the ice for you, I think. And so you get a bunch of different people that you probably wouldn’t meet and then have something there to ease the conversation.”
Nico can be requested by students and faculty for events through a form on the DPSS website. Updates on him can be seen through his Instagram handle @nicothetherapydog.
UMMA hosts new photography exhibit on the Asian American diaspora
‘Strange You Never Knew’ is Chinese American artist Jarod Lew’s first solo exhibition
SOPHIE FRANK Daily Staff Reporter
The University of Michigan Museum of Art opened their newest exhibition “Strange You Never Knew” Feb. 1, reflecting on the Asian-American diaspora, family and identity. Chinese American artist Jarod Lew’s first solo exhibition is composed of three series of photographs and a multimedia installation. The exhibit opens with Lew’s photo series “Please Take Off Your Shoes,” which includes portraits of second-generation Asian Americans in their parents’ homes. The series’ title refers to the widespread practice in Asian culture of removing one’s shoes before entering a home. These photographs highlight the dual identities the second-generation community must navigate, often believing that they are perceived as “American” by their immigrant parents but “Asian” outside of their domestic spaces. Angela Chen, assistant professor at the Stamps School of Art &
Design and the exhibit’s tour guide, said in an interview with The Daily that Lew’s work is representative of both the individual families documented and a broader narrative about Asian American households.
“All of the objects, they feel so particular to this particular family and, at the same time, there is a way in which the way we present ourselves, and what we learn about ourselves, is not just from our immediate family but from these larger histories and people’s projections of us,” Chen said. “There’s something about how there’s not just what happens in your private life, but it’s all sort of connected to larger political histories.”
Jennifer Friess, the associate curator of photography and associate director of curatorial affairs at UMMA, told The Michigan Daily Lew aims to prompt viewers to think about family, community and heritage through the exhibition.
“I think he’s very keen to step back and say, ‘OK, I’ve given you this content, now you take away what feels important to you,’”
Friess said. “I think that’s really a sincere way of allowing people to ask, ‘Do you have a connection? Do you see yourself in these images? Do you see your family? Are you thinking about your own family’s experience and history in a critical way?’ He just opens doors.”
Another series in the exhibit, titled “In Between You and Your Shadow,” is made up of photos of Lew’s family in their domestic spaces. Lew tells the audience of his mother’s engagement to Vincent Chin, a Chinese American man who was killed by two white autoworkers that sparked a wave of protests for Asian American civil rights.
Chen reflected on the title of the exhibition, “Strange You Never Knew,” by connecting it to Lew’s discovery later in life that his mother had been engaged to Chin.
“I think it’s really important that (the exhibit is) photographic, because the way that (Lew) learned about this history was not really through, initially, dialogue with his mom,” Chen said. “It was through reading news articles and seeing photographs, like journalistic photographs, that had his family
members in them. And so there’s this way that his relationship or his knowledge or his experience of this story was first through photographs.”
Neil Van Houten, assistant director of operations at UMMA, said going through the
exhibition evoked memories of his own family, specifically Lew’s photo series on his mother.
“A lot of the images that just have to do with family and relationships really resonated with me,” Van Houten said. “I mean, for me, just even the one photograph that’s the plate of fruit that (Lew’s mother) cut, with a little note to her children, almost moved me to tears. It was just kind of very personal and very beautiful, and made me think of things my mother did for me.” CONTINUED AT MICHIGANDAILY.COM
TALIA VARSANO Daily Staff Reporter
Students pet Nico the DPSS therapy dog at Bursley Residence Hall Feb. 21.
LOLA D’ONOFRIO Senior Arts Editor
The first time I saw a naked body, it was made of stone. I was in an art museum gallery, staring up at a Roman statue of Hercules. I remember the carved arc of his muscles, the tilt of his chin, the veins down his arms. A strange energy moved through me — understanding a body like his made me feel grown up. That same rush of maturity returned to me several years later. I was watching “Titanic,” dazzled by the film’s sweeping central love story. I remember my stomach twisting as the romance reached its climax. I watched as windows steamed
up and shirts were unbuttoned. I began to understand how bodies worked together. A few years later, I was given another window into my own burgeoning adulthood. I opened the book “Outlander,” a pulpy historical fiction novel, and shocked myself with graphic depictions of wedding nights and ravishing pleasure. For myself and many others, art was the first thing to turn “sex” from a dirty, amorphous word to an understandable human act. These statues, films and novels teach us how to kiss, how to yearn, how to feel. Art gives humanity back to punchline words like orgasm and blowjob. Even now, I use art to parse my own desires. I want to be kissed with the
‘Hallelujah’:
The only way I know God — and perhaps the best evidence of Him — is through the beauty of the world.
The Sex B-Side
same hunger that Westley kisses Buttercup with in “The Princess Bride.” I want foreplay to come in the form of witty banter like it does in “The Apartment.”
In The Sex B-Side, writers share their own experiences with art and sexual discovery. They celebrate bodies, touch, emotion and honesty. They deconstruct shame and bring new meaning to overused terms. They step into the shoes of the artists that have inspired them, adding their own voices to the ongoing conversation surrounding sex and desire. It is my hope that The Sex B-Side continues the artistic work that we celebrate here, condensing the pluralities of sexual desire into singular personal truths.
Reconciling the holy and the horny
of faith for Leonard Cohen in his 1984 song “Hallelujah.”
I know nothing about God. He reads as amorphous, but the paintings make Him seem so static. He’s a trinity and one being at the same time — He’s confusing.
I’m tempted to believe that following beauty and loving many things will lead me to knowing God — but what if such a love is a sin?
What is an existential crisis for me is framed instead as a declaration
On the surface, it’s clear why Cohen’s song is so widely beloved. There are so many sonic treasures throughout: the waltz-like opening, Cohen’s otherworldly baritone, the mounting choir chanting the track name. As a Catholic, I was more interested in the song’s biblical allusions to the Books of Judges and Psalms. But what is going on below all of this? What is so vivid in this song that keeps me returning to it as if it is a comforting psalm?
I have found the most salient answer to be how Cohen combines his sexuality and spirituality. The distinction between the sacred and profane becomes porous in “Hallelujah,” fully blurred during the act of sex. A theme echoed throughout the songwriter’s discography (namely in “Suzanne”
and “Master Song”) is that of a split desire to simultaneously serve women and God, typically choosing the former. Yet in “Hallelujah,” we see that Cohen has successfully married the two desires, singing of the holy dove moving just as he does in a woman.
“Hallelujah” proposes that in love, nothing can be obscene — even sex becomes a sacrament. But how can this be true when a single Google search instantly shows you 100 Bible verses against lust? Am I just blaspheming and throwing away my soul for a school newspaper by proposing that embracing sexuality does not have to be a sin? Hopefully not. I believe so because this song is concerned with more than enjoying intercourse — it’s about surrendering to the act and its Creator. Throughout the song,
Cohen chants “hallelujah” not just during verses about sex, but also while navigating a failing relationship — yielding to God through rapture and distress.
Today, the word “hallelujah” has gained an iconicity, meaning more than just the exaltation of God, becoming instead a sign of joyful relief. However, in Cohen’s Jewish faith, it is not just an expression of glorification but a command to praise the Lord. Whether at the behest of his lover or the “lord of song,” Cohen is compelled to thank God for the beauty of eroticism. Through the confusion of seeking the fruits of heaven and the flesh, the singer surrenders to his faith. By the end of the song, after everything goes wrong, with “nothing on (his) tongue,” Cohen kneels in humility, powerless to the face of God’s glory in the form of a
woman. In “Hallelujah,” sex is not an act against God but, conversely, a way to find Him. I currently find myself in a similar predicament to Cohen. My priorities don’t lie solely with my body or heaven, but somewhere in between, wanting both — unable to truly satisfy myself with either. Caught between guilt and ecstasy, I’m postponing a very important decision between holiness and horniness.
How can I reconcile this divergent will? How could I possibly justify being a Catholic and having sex without sounding hypocritical and self-serving? I can’t. In the same way I can’t explain why I believe there’s a God above or that little wafers in church are the body of Christ.
CONTINUED AT MICHIGANDAILY.COM
Caroline Xi/DAILY
LORENZO NORBIS Daily Arts Contributor
Selena Zou/DAILY
Fuck-me boots and granny panties: Examining the embodiment of women’s sexuality in clothing
It’s a Friday night (without the lights) and you’re on the streets of Ann Arbor. I hate the cold, so let’s say it’s a crisp, early summer night.
Basement frat speakers echo in the distance as the light blue sky defies the fallen sun. You’ve just passed a group of friends emerging from an ice cream shop
(pick your favorite). Then, BAM.
A group of girls struts around the corner, and they are absolutely eating it up. One girl is wearing a beautiful black top with amazing eyeliner. Another one is sporting a stunning blouse. And does that girl have on bedazzled sneakers?
You are absolutely floored by their collective style. You would immediately compliment them if you weren’t a block away (and if it wouldn’t induce a mild amount of social awkwardness).
You continue past the girls in silent admiration, ready to head home and settle down for a lovely night. Maybe you’ll watch a movie or start that book that’s been staring at you from your desk for the past month. Then, just as you round the corner to head back to your place, you spot a group of guys in front of you.
They’re, uh, maybe going out?
One has on a polo, which is kinda nice, except for the shitty jeans he’s wearing with them. Another has on a sweatshirt (a go-to male look for seemingly any occasion).
The third boy looks like he rolled out of bed wearing that crumpled flannel. Judgy comments aside, the group appears as if they came straight from a bro session of
screaming at the TV — maybe they were watching a baseball game?
Is it that time of year? But hey, at least they probably work out.
Unnecessarily long vignette aside, the difference in effort level between these two poorly constructed, stereotypically gendered groups should surprise absolutely nobody. After all, we live in a patriarchy. Case closed, article over. Another win for second-wave feminism. Yet if you take a moment to acknowledge the careful placement of description in my story, you’ll notice an emphasis on the clothing of each group. It’s hard to ignore how large of a role clothing plays in female presentation, not to mention sexuality, compared to men’s clothing.
A typical Ann Arbor night illustrates just one manifestation of this wider social fact. A woman is often reduced to what she is wearing. Countless examples immediately come to mind, including school dress codes, beauty pageants and even workplace uniforms. In our patriarchal society, the material cultural items a woman puts on do more than just signal elements
of her personality — they become her personality. Instead of wearing what they want, women consistently must also consider how other people will evaluate them for their choice of what to wear. While certainly this is a fact for everyone living in a society, for women and feminine-presenting people, the stakes are significantly higher.
One consequence of the collapsing of female traits into feminine clothing is that female sexuality becomes embodied in clothing. Sexuality here goes beyond just sexual orientation, but encompasses the entire repertoire of sexual desires and behaviors we exhibit — “Capital S Sexuality” if you will. I’m sure you’ve heard of granny panties and fuck-me boots, or can imagine a multitude of tops with “great flirting power” (my editor named hers the “The **** Top”). These items act as cultural symbols, appearing to inform others on the wearer’s views and attitudes toward sex. Despite rarely being bright red, wearers of granny panties take on the character of a blaring sexual stop sign. On the other hand, fuck-me boots
The superiority of the slow burn
The best writing advice I ever received was: If your two main characters have to kiss to show that they’re in love, they’re not in love.
Maybe this should have been an easy conclusion to reach for someone who hopes to publish a lot of novels one day. Yet, in a literary world diluted with steamy romances and “smut” — a term coined for books, movies and other media that contain explicit sexual content — it’s a truth that’s easy to lose sight of. Nowadays, the love stories we idealize on screen and on page are often measured not by the depth of their emotional connection, but instead by their physical chemistry. In the notorious online space known as BookTok, smut has become a commodity. Readers highlight “spicy” chapters in their favorite books and craft entire videos dedicated to their favorite smutty romances. Many have nicknamed this mindset shift the Smut Epidemic of TikTok. Users have even begun posting videos to the app mourning the old BookTok, one that valued carefully crafted stories of friendship, family and fantasy — not just sex. I would be lying if I said this trend hasn’t also influenced my own writing, bleeding into the romances I craft and the characters I build, even if only subconsciously.
This increased interest in smut isn’t necessarily surprising. The publishing industry’s obsession with marketing steamy romances, coupled with the rise of hookup culture has brought us to a point where sex is everything: It’s a rite of passage, a sign of physical beauty and a box to be checked off on a list of milestones. It should stun no one that it is also an integral part of the art we consume.
And integral it should be. I will never be afraid to admit that many of the stories that fill my bookshelves are romance novels, some of which do contain smut. Romance novels are a key outlet for showcasing female sexual autonomy and romantic fulfillment, a critical form of artistic expression in a world that often shames women for even thinking about sex. As a writer, reader and lover of all things romance, I can get behind a well-timed and intentional sex scene, especially when the author knows how to properly craft one.
What I cannot get behind, however, is using these physically intimate moments as substitutes for emotionally intimate ones. Asking readers to root for a relationship that is built on a foundation of onenight stands and hookups delegitimizes what the romance genre is really about: showcasing deep romantic and emotional connection that goes beyond the physical. There is space for sex and physical intimacy in art, but it cannot be used as a filler for authentic emotional connection, especially when we are supposed to believe that the characters in question are in love with one another.
My favorite fictional couples don’t have stories filled with
encourage — well, you get the point. Of course, the impressions are solely that: impressions. By no means can clothing ever stand in for consent or even interest on behalf of the wearer. Yet, in a society that loves to dehumanize and objectify women, clothing takes center stage, leaving little room for any actual displays of sexual intent.
Because women are only as sexual as their outfits say they are, going to the club in a sweatshirt won’t do. Instead, women who want to be seen as “sexy” must dress themselves accordingly. Hence, when feminine-presenting people go to Skeeps, they face a much greater pressure to put on a cute outfit. Their clothing becomes a requirement for entry to these spaces. Whereas men can wear almost anything and still be considered “sexual” based on their actions, women must have the “costume” to match their sexiness.
While certainly this phenomenon is not necessarily gender exclusive, a simple exercise in trying to name “sexy” male clothing demonstrates a gendered difference. Masculine sex appeal is simply held to a much lower standard. Want to look sexy? Unbutton a button. Or just take the damn shirt off. That’s about it. On the other hand, feminine sexuality relies on clothing, accessories, makeup and hair styling. Comparing the two immediately feels foolish. Men and women may be playing the same game, but they are given completely different rules.
CONTINUED AT MICHIGANDAILY.COM
Asexuality in Music
MIVICK SMITH Senior Arts Editor
Between the hypersexuality of recession pop and the borderline nymphomania of rap, asexuality is a tragically neglected topic in our musical world. This isn’t necessarily surprising — our reality is wonderfully sexual. Those who experience desire are nearly suffocated by insistent media flaunting bodies and carnal familiarity, but it leaves those uninterested asking themselves: “Where’s mine?”
I’m not the first asexual to be confused by the confectionary sex imagery of ’90s glam bands, or the first to miss the point of metal’s infatuation with dominatrices. To a certain extent, I’m thankful for how painfully allosexual these genres have been, how thirsty the entirety of music was around me as I grew up. In a way, this hypersexuality helped me realize my own disinterest in sexual relationships.
Still, that doesn’t mean I’ve lost the desire for something musical that I feel like I can relate to, something that describes my asexuality. It is in this space, this confusingly horny modernity, that I’ve decided to collect a handful of songs that have managed to resonate with me — songs my teenage self would have felt finally described my wants.
“Asexual Anger” by Love Sex Machine
“Asexual Anger,” the title track of Love Sex Machine’s 2016 album of the same name, is a sludgy tromp into oblivion that screams about the rage of asexuality. Alone, it’s a cataclysmic track; a buried rhythm, a melody
The Michigan Daily Crossword Sunday, March 16, 2025
ACROSS
1. Zombie's craving
6. Takes a chair
10. The ___ (game with virtual people)
14. Creepy
15. Like some blankets
endless sex scenes. In fact, some of them never did more than share an innocent kiss. Some of them took an entire book to just do that; some of them, an entire series. Alex and Poppy from Emily Henry’s “People We Meet on Vacation” — one of my favorite fictional couples ever — are friends for years before they ever kiss or declare their love for one another. Jim Halpert (John Krasinski, “Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan”) and Pam Beesly (Jenna Fischer, “Splitting Up Together”) from “The Office” take three whole seasons of back and forth before finally getting together.
The waiting and yearning is what makes these relationships meaningful. Instead of relying on heated moments of physical intimacy to prove their love, these characters gain the adoration of their audience through all the other things: the deep conversations, the unending emotional support, the passing glances and the brushing of hands. Though these moments may not mean much individually, over time, they build up to form a scaffolding of friendship and emotional intimacy that makes it easy to exclaim “Well, duh!” when the two finally get together.
CONTINUED AT MICHIGANDAILY.COM
Wicked 17. Seismic disturbance 19. Spilt tea? 20. For each 21. Hard-to-control blaze 23. Nickelodeon explorer 26. Not-so-big pizza mascot 28. Decay
29. Uncharged subatomic particle
31. Taxi alternatives
33.
Sicilian spouter
Trillion, in metric prefixes 69. Princess's headwear 70. Lion's warning
Come off as
The Devil, by another name
pitched uncomfortably low and vocals that scratch into the subconscious. With the context of the album, a crawling wriggling creature of distortion and gain, it references the world of asexuality under patriarchal expectations, touching on everything from reproductive responsibility to a masculine entitlement to all bodies. Anger about sexuality was something I always felt but could never articulate. I didn’t know how to tell people I wasn’t scared of sex or ashamed of it — I just didn’t feel this supposedly natural desire. When I was younger, I would get so angry when wellintentioned friends interrupted themselves just to make sure I didn’t hear any reference to sex; the self-censorship drove me insane. I didn’t know how to explain that I wasn’t this fragile, vulnerable thing that would crumble at the mere reference to genitals. Machine’s song finally exhibited this feeling I had been internalizing; it gave it a name. A name filled with feminism and underscored by the slow tonality of a paralytic mother genre.
“Asexual” by Billy Clone and the Same Countering the sludge metal of Love Sex Machine, Billy Clone and the Same’s “Asexual” is a rompy punk track from the ’70s, bouncing melodically from its new wave origins and sharing the story of asexuals navigating the social world. Sonically, the song is both nostalgically unserious and energetically supportive. Beachy guitars and playful call-and-response solos interrupt the verses, giving the listener a reprieve from both the monotone lyrics and vocalist Mike Corte’s nasally theatrics. CONTINUED AT MICHIGANDAILY.COM
Charge
Grazing ground
Mess up
Hang tight
[giggle] 6. Product identifier, much like a U.P.C.
Dazzled
Carved pillar
Narcissist's love
Côte d'___
Funhouse fixture
It includes a snare
REBECCA SMITH Daily Arts Writer
Caroline Xi/DAILY
Caroline Xi/DAILY
ZHANE YAMIN AND MARY COREY Co-Editors in Chief
Zach Ajluni
Jack Brady
Gabe Efros
Lucas Feller
Liv Frey
Seth Gabrielson
JACK BRADY AND SOPHIA PERRAULT Editorial Page Editors
FIONA LACROIX AND CECILIA LEDEZMA Managing Editors
EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS
Jovanna Gallegos
Jack Kapcar
Tate Moyer
Tom Muha
Sophia Perrault
Hunter Ryerson
Maximilian Schenke
Lindsey Spencer Audra Woehle
Zhane Yamin
Sarah Zhang
Unsigned editorials reflect the of f icial position of The Daily’s Editorial Board. All other signed articles and illustrations represent solely the views of their authors.
From The Daily: Dear WaPo Opinion section
THE MICHIGAN DAILY EDITORIAL BOARD
Dear Washington Post Opinion section,
In the fall of 2024, Will Lewis, The Washington Post’s publisher and CEO, made the decision to not endorse a presidential candidate in the 2024 general election. Since 1976, the paper’s editorial board would select one ticket to endorse prior to the election, detailing their accomplishments, ideas and their potential impact on the nation. Less than a month later, President Donald Trump won the election in a landslide, while the unpublished endorsement of former Vice President Kamala Harris got left by the wayside. A similar suppression of editorial freedom was made by the paper’s leaders late last month. Jeff Bezos, billionaire and owner of The Washington Post, sent a directive to opinion staff to shift their content to topics in support of “personal liberties and free markets,” stating that any unrelated content would be left to columnists at other publications. The decision was met with multiple resignations, including the opinion section’s editor David Shipley and career columnist Ruth Marcus. The move will undoubtedly change opinion journalism at The Post, but also represents a deeper issue with the fate of editorial independence. The press cannot be free while billionaires use it as a vanity project. This editorial board can only speculate as to why Bezos decided to take The Post’s content in a different direction, though we highly doubt his motives were pure. Whatever his reasoning, the result is the same. The hardworking opinion writers on his staff can now only espouse one view: Bezos’. The question now is how the remaining opinion columnists at The Washington Post will respond. Twenty-one columnists denounced the decision not to endorse Harris.
They made it clear that they didn’t agree with the paper’s editorial silence. So far, Marcus is the only columnist that has publicly resigned; there have been no other public statements made. This also comes at a time where alternative, independent forms of media, like podcasting or posting on Substack, are on the rise. Yet, Post columnists have mostly remained committed to their newspaper, despite its eroded editorial freedoms.
If the remaining columnists cared about journalistic integrity and freedom of speech — which many frequently write about and which The Washington Post itself claims to care about — then they would resign their positions. It is not only incongruent for writers claiming to care about freedom of speech to submit to having their own taken away, but undermines the sanctified connection between the audience and the paper. Readers can no longer be sure whether a given piece is representative of the columnists’ view, or whether it is representative of Bezos’ view.
The lack of mass resignations begs the question: If The Post’s opinion writers are willing to give up their editorial freedom, how can they be trusted going forward? Being content with losing their voice, especially amid Bezos’ budding relationship with Trump, is the first step to being willing propagandists for Trump and the Republican Party. Furthermore, if Post columnists aren’t willing to resign, then they are tacitly, if not explicitly, declaring agreement to Bezos’ mandate on what can and cannot be said. If, at heart, they really agree with Bezos, then they compromise all of their future writing and any writing prior to Bezos’ takeover of the paper. If members of the editorial board truly cannot find it in themselves to protest these attacks on opinion journalism now, then their journalistic integrity is called into question. Ultimately, what does this
mean for us as opinion journalists?
Student journalists like us look up to these professional editorial writers. The Michigan Daily Opinion section is blessed to have editorial freedom. Nobody controls the topics we write about, and in a world where opinion journalism is increasingly policed, it’s something that is top of mind for the section. We know we’re lucky, and we detest any decisions that make other newspapers less fortunate.
In light of Bezos’ draconian decision regarding publishable content, we cannot continue to support journalists that allow this to occur. The Post’s columnists do not only write — they also inspire young journalists. When they remain complicit in decisions like those made by Bezos, they create a world where journalistic inspiration suddenly includes the policing of content. This editorial board is inspired by Marcus’ decision to resign. There are, of course, other ways to show one’s discontent with Bezos’ reorientation of the paper — such as making a statement, at the very least — but doing nothing is not among them. This industry must protect itself from the predations of the powerful, and Marcus sets a prime example in that regard.
The field of opinion journalism is ever-changing. In the face of increasing content policing, her choice can give us all the courage to do something similar if the need arises. The real lesson from Bezos’ decision is that the remaining Post opinion columnists must join Marcus in the protection of opinion journalism. Young writers, like those of us at The Daily, looked up to them. Now, that has changed. Marcus, and other columnists like her, are the new inspiration for this section. We abhor the policing of opinion content and will always commend those who continue to protect our field.
Sincerely,
The Michigan Daily Editorial Board.
The flipped classroom model isn’t working
ELIZA PHARES Opinion Columnist
During my freshman year at the University of Michigan, I had the displeasure of taking Math 105. Like all intro-level math courses at the University, this class is taught using a “flipped classroom” model, meaning students watch the lecture before class. I’d spend an hour and a half watching previous lectures before class only to experience the same lecture in person later that week. This often left me lost and confused due to inadequate lecture recordings.
Now that I’ve entered the Ford School of Public Policy, I’ve avoided these types of classes. The Public Policy School emphasizes personalized instruction in small classes rather than a standardized curriculum for thousands of students at the University. While I have been lucky enough to avoid these types of classes due to the nature of my major, many of my peers have not.
The current “flipped classroom” model that many university professors use isn’t working because it lacks vital in-person engagement mechanisms, places an overwhelming amount of responsibility on students for independent learning and disadvantages students with little knowledge of the topic. This can result in disengagement and a decline in academic performance.
Flipped classrooms are predicated on the idea that lecturing isn’t the best use of class time. Instead, students are given the information before class and spend class time adding to the baseline material to achieve higher levels of learning and student engagement. Advocates for flipped classrooms argue that they bring more flexibility to the classroom, decrease wasted class time and increase student-teacher collaboration in the classroom.
In theory, I agree that the flipped classroom model works
to the student’s benefit. But in its current practice, students are left worse off because professors aren’t actually using flipped classroom models effectively. Instead, professors are forgetting to engage students through thought-out pre-class lectures and in-class activities. Students instead are burdened with watching hours of lecture recordings, usually from online lectures during the pandemic as well as doing pre-class readings.
The current flipped classroom model advocates for mini-lectures that break down content simply. It relies on prior knowledge, and while students can gain that by watching recorded lectures, the situation isn’t ideal. Students aren’t able to ask questions during lectures and professors aren’t able to get adequate feedback on what subjects students need more support in.
A study of flipped classrooms at the United States Military Academy West Point shows this achievement gap. White, male students with a greater educational background benefited significantly more from flipped lectures than their peers. Flipped classrooms had a 69% larger racial gap and a 23% larger baseline academic ability gap than normal classrooms did while finding little sustainable gains in learning through the flipped classroom trial. This disparity also puts students at a greater risk of falling behind as they now need to make up a larger amount of academic knowledge than their peers.
There’s also a disparity between the student experience and how much lecturers think students benefit. Lecturers see the data that shows flipped classrooms increase active learning and allow for deeper engagement in topics. But the data only looks at flipped classrooms that follow the conventional model and doesn’t take into account flipped classrooms that don’t employ best teaching practices. These types
of models leave students more confused and frustrated with the lack of thought in content. In years past, students at the University have voiced disapproval of the flipped classroom model, particularly in math classes. Students have expressed frustration with the little in-person instruction time as class periods were spent doing group work rather than receiving new information. Advocates for the model, primarily lecturers, argue that the flipped classroom style actually does benefit students as it increases active engagement with the material. There’s a clear disconnect here between the student and the instructor. And in teaching environments, lecturers must listen to their students. After all, isn’t an education what we are paying for? However, there’s strong evidence that shows flipped lectures that are well run produce the results that lectures are looking for, like higher engagement levels and deeper learning. Resources like Edpuzzle, where students watch videos and take miniature quizzes are good models of flipped lectures. Lecturers can check for student understanding before class and adjust lectures based on that data. But flipping a classroom does not automatically make it better. In recent years, flipped classrooms have just become an excuse for lazy teaching. Professors’ reliance on pre recorded lectures is damaging students’ educations. While reusing a lecture is not inherently a bad thing — in fact in most cases effective lectures should be reused — professors must be flexible based on the needs of their students. Many are not taking time to prepare for class and adjust lectures and in-class activities based on student feedback. This results in greater confusion over topics, especially given that students aren’t able to ask questions when they are learning the material for the first time. CONTINUED AT MICHIGANDAILY.COM
The University of Severance
Afew months ago, University of Michigan Provost Laurie McCauley banned diversity statements in hiring. Diversity statements, the argument went, imposed inappropriate ideological litmus tests. And a few days ago, University President Santa Ono told the audience at an event hosted by the Anti-Defamation League, “We have to intentionally diversify our faculty to have a broad set of ideologies.” In other words, our president wants to hire faculty not based on the quality of their research and teaching but on the basis of their ideological commitments. The question becomes:
Which ones, exactly?
Like University Regent Sarah Hubbard (R), who has made “viewpoint diversity” one of her
most strident demands, Ono does not tell us which “ideologies” are under-represented at the University — all we know is that our new colleagues will be housed at the yet to be established Institute for Civil Discourse. The entity, according to President Ono, will not be devoted to strengthening civil society or defending the civil service but to teaching students to confront different arguments and perspectives — as if a university were a debating club rather than a truth-seeking enterprise, as if “discoursing civilly” were an academic discipline rather than a secondary virtue.
It is certainly true that University faculty skew heavily liberal, probably because Republicans and conservatives oppose so many well-supported theories about the world and human societies: that climate change is real and threatens our survival, that racism has significantly impeded the economic
success and well-being of those it targets and continues to do so, that it is wrong to force women to stay pregnant against their will, that vaccines save lives, that neither sex nor gender are binary and so on. Most of us believe these things not because we are liberals — rather, we are liberals because the best data, the most cogent arguments and the best historical evidence tell us they are true.
We already passed an institutional neutrality bylaw to prevent anybody who wields institutional power here on campus to take a public stance “on political or social issues and events not directly related to its internal governance,” an odd directive seeing that decisions on University policy demands such a stance every day: we either allow our community members to choose their pronouns or we don’t; we either pursue carbon-neutral campus or we don’t; we either offer
transgender care and abortions at our hospitals and clinics or we don’t; we either pursue admissions and hiring policies that seek to address past injustice or we don’t; we either arrest students protesting the war in Gaza and support their criminal prosecution or we don’t. A policy that prevents the University from articulating the very values and convictions that guide its policies creates a campus world resembling the TV show “Severance,” a bleak workplace allegory that splits the consciousness of workers into “innies” and “outies,” creating a neurological disconnect between the work they do and the world they inhabit.
The full absurdity of institutional neutrality is emerging now that MAGA politics most decisively are directly related to our internal operations. A vandalist government in Washington D.C. is dictating hiring and admissions decisions as well as
free speech rights on campus, and we have yet to hear a single critical word about this demolition of all we hold dear here from the president, the provost or the University Board of Regents, confirming what critics of institutional neutrality warned against when the bylaw was hastily written and passed without consulting either elected student or faculty governance: that neutrality is a policy designed to shield the right-wing from the critique of one of the most powerful institutions in American life — the home of expert researchers and rigorous thinkers. While every email we receive from the central administration signals both vague reassurances about “our values” (whatever they are, we no longer dare say) and secret meetings of powerful people from whose discussions the campus community must apparently be shielded, Ono appeared at the ADL event to promise the powerful lobbying
organization that he will submit to their wishes. The ugliest moment of his performance came when moderator Dan Senor, a Republican, claimed that U-M staff is antisemitic.
“The one thing I heard over and over is the discomfort many students feel in the classroom with professors who are hostile to Israel and, as you articulated, hostile to Jews,” Senor said.
Surely, when an ideologue claims that your faculty is teeming with antisemites, you angrily demand proof and, absent of such proof, an immediate retraction of the slander. Instead, Ono boasts of the firing of Rachel Dawson, the former director of the University’s Office of Academic and Multicultural Initiatives, whose career was sacrificed after a shoddy investigation I wrote about in “The Chronicle of Higher Education.”
Hannah Willingham/DAILY
SILKE-MARIA WEINECK Opinion Contributor
It’s easy to get lost in a European city. The streets here are centuries older than those in the United States, so they bend, break off and rejoin for seemingly no reason — far removed from the quintessential blocks and right angles of the gridded American city. When I walk or run through Freiburg, taking random turns to my heart’s content, I quickly find I don’t know the simplest way back. While it’s easy to feel a bit uncomfortable in this situation, I’ve started taking it in stride. Instead of immediately taking my phone out to search for directions back home, I take in my surroundings and consider where I am. Maybe I’ll retrace my steps, or maybe I’ll go a bit further. In any case, losing myself has allowed me to find new places I wouldn’t have known of otherwise, from a cute brunch spot to a riverside trail to countless cute shops and cafes.
Getting lost intentionally has allowed me to see new things in my temporary home, giving me a break from the usual routes I
take between classes, home and errands. While I still have lots of the city to explore, getting a little lost means seeing my city from a new perspective and gaining a better understanding of both its layout and its aesthetics. But this practice doesn’t need to be limited to Freiburg — most people can do it anywhere, whether they’re close to home or in a foreign place.
GPS is, without a doubt, an invaluable technology that has made traveling more simple. At the same time, breaking it out the moment we’re inconvenienced or disorientated does us few favors. Using it means we don’t have to give attention to our immediate surroundings or develop a perception of where we are — in other words, our spatial memory.
Researchers at McGill University have even observed that greater use of GPS is associated with a sharper decline in the spatial memory associated with the hippocampus. When we’re obligated to figure out exactly where we are, we build our own mental map we can rely on. Turning off the GPS, then, means rebuilding spatial memory to our own benefits. Still, letting GPS go doesn’t mean we have to let go of all navi-
Get lost on purpose
gational aids. A classic paper map will work just fine, but if you’d still prefer to go paperless, Apple and Google each have the option to download maps for offline use. Since they act more like traditional maps, showing only landmarks and not where you are at a given time, you have to consider where you are in relation to everything else and go from there. This way, you can build a stronger connection to the place you’re exploring as you notice the monument here, the restaurant over there and where the street begins and ends.
Doing this every so often, in places both unknown and familiar, means building not only spatial memory but also confidence. Going just slightly out of your comfort zone will make you feel more confident in your surroundings and yourself. Your hometown, city or favorite nature reserve will feel all the more familiar as you map it out on your own. The next place you visit could be more vivid if you take the time to memorize the streets surrounding you.
Of course, it’s important to recognize that purposefully getting lost requires caution and thoughtfulness. In the worst-case scenario, losing yourself can
Political quizzes don’t give us any answers
MATEO ALVAREZ Opinion Columnist
Afew days ago, some of my fellow writers at The Michigan Daily writers and I took the Political Compass test for fun. The test plots users onto a two-dimensional graph: Left versus Right on the horizontal axis and Libertarian versus Authoritarian on the vertical axis. As we took the tests, we realized how little we identified with our respective placements. As a result, some of us started to question the test’s neutrality, while others just rejected their results altogether.
Non-political tests are often meaningless fun; just ways to
find out whether your friends are Gryffindors or Ravenclaws, or bananas or apples. However, the Political Compass feels much more consequential, with your dot on the grid feeling more like a social designation than a funny label.
Reducing an individual’s entire ideology and philosophy to a singular plot on a graph encourages the belief that there are only two types of people, liberals and conservatives, and widens our current political schism. In America today, pretty much the only thing that everyone can agree on is the fact that the country is experiencing an unrivaled amount of political polarization. Far from simply disagreeing, it feels like both sides of the political
binary are not even living in the same world. Now, tribalism — a culture that encourages people to be exceptionally loyal to their social group or faction — has set itself at the heart of America’s political identity, and flexibility or curiosity regarding how “the other side” might think or feel is not only rejected, but antagonized. Political tests seem inconsequential, but they inadvertently push a narrative that everyone, at their core, is one political affiliation. In this culture of partisan allegiance, where talking to people of different leanings has become harder than ever, tests like the Political Compass only work to divide people into broad and ambiguous subgroups. Now, instead of talking to a student, employee or business owner, you are talking to an “authoritarian liberal” or “libertarian conservative.”
While the Political Compass Test claims to accurately diagnose an individual’s political leaning, the test fails to capture nuance. By placing people into one singular point on the graph, the test fails to account for the fact that most people’s opinions don’t always fall down ideological lines.
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be dangerous, which is especially important to consider in foreign places. Pickpocketing, harassment and the like are unfortunate realities for travelers and locals alike.
If we want to get lost intentionally, we must also have tools at our disposal should we need them.
Put GPS away, but pull up Maps if you feel yourself getting too far off the beaten path. Keep a portable charger with you. Be adventurous
but also smart. In short, get lost within safe limits. Should spatial memory and self-confidence not motivate you to go get lost, then perhaps the simple thrill of discovery will.
It’s easy to fall into the feeling of knowing a place like Ann Arbor after even just a few months there. The campus setup becomes familiar and the blocks of old houses all start to look the same. But if
we set our sights on simply walking through a new area of town, sometimes we find something unexpected. If we get too settled, we can challenge ourselves to memorize the pathways of the Nichols Arboretum or the layout of our next neighborhood. Our time in Ann Arbor is limited, so committing even a fraction of the city to memory gives us something to hold on to for the years to come.
Stop making historical comparisons
Afew weeks ago, I watched a video that compared President Donald Trump’s tariff agenda with former President William McKinley’s, whomTrump often cites as political inspiration. Although I appreciated learning about the current president’s policy rationale and the international impacts of tariffs, I questioned the validity of the comparison. Why do we assume that comparisons between events separated by more than a century will add value to our present-day discussions?
In reality, while both presidents share an affinity for tariffs, the contexts in which they used this tool were drastically different.
In our modern globalized economy and integrated supply chain, tariffs would create more disruption within international trade networks, and potentially more damage, than they would in our country’s isolationist era of the 1800s. Even though the headlines across centuries mimic each other, both presidents’ agendas show that there are many differences which lie below the surface.
While events in the past do indeed mimic the present, making
historical comparisons flattens the nuances between different periods. Rather than cherrypicking similarities between historical eras, we should strive to understand the unique context surrounding each event and apply a more critical lens to our analogies. Therefore, connecting 2025 and 1890 overlooks the stark differences between historical periods.
In most cases, historical comparisons contain many false equivalences. A false equivalence is a type of cognitive bias in which situations are assumed to be the same because of their few similarities within many differences. Calling both serial embezzlers and jaywalkers “criminals,” for instance, equates the severity of two starkly different crimes and overlooks the range of harm they both enact.
False equivalences also appear when we read the news and make us more susceptible to bothsidesism. This phenomenon refers to providing equal coverage of various political perspectives even when one political party or actor has caused a greater amount of harm or more issues than the other.
Regarding historical analogies, practicing false equivalences means that we fixate on the few similarities between two
historical events and assume an equality of impacts between those situations. False equivalences also leave us susceptible to black-andwhite thinking, where we assume a near-identical or unidentical nature between two time periods while ignoring that similarity occurs on a scale.
These cognitive biases shield us from realizing the full extent of change over the past centuries, decades and even years. We are living through the Fourth Industrial Revolution, where digital technology and automation are reshaping the global economy. This constant change means that the concept of history repeating itself is nearly impossible. To draw similarities between today and even a first, second or third industrial revolution, for instance, already means that we take for granted the massive technological progress and changes in our dayto-day just over the past decades.
Given the inaccuracies of many historical comparisons, we should take a step back and question why we opt for these analogies. Oftentimes, the tendency for comparison stems not from a desire to engage with history, but rather, to co-opt it for political gain — even if the present moment doesn’t relate to the past at all.
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From The Daily: Full speed ahead on the Campus Connector
Last year, the University of Michigan rolled out a series of campus renovation and improvement projections dubbed Campus Plan 2050. Throughout the next 25 years, the University plans to transform the school grounds — especially North Campus — into a center of innovation that houses academic variety. The plans stress the importance of school-wide unity and aims to connect the main Ann Arbor campuses. To do so, the University has proposed the construction of a Campus Connector uniting Central, Medical and North campus grounds. This editorial board believes the train would be a valuable asset to the University with its environmentally friendly objectives and its integration into Ann Arbor’s broader public transit system. Our campus has long been divided by distance and inefficient transportation. Students with classes on Central Campus rarely make their way to North Campus and
vice versa. Perhaps you have been the victim of being stranded after the buses stopped running. For these reasons and more, investing in campus connectivity is crucial. Introducing a train system connecting cross-campus locations is an exciting and necessary step forward that aligns with the University’s vision of an optimized, environmentally friendly and well-connected campus. Students could reach classes more efficiently, access more social events and engage with the broader U-M community with this potential development. Future Wolverines will have a reliable, timely transportation system without having to wait for overcrowded buses.
The Connector is a clear win for sustainability efforts as well: It reduces the University’s reliance on traditional methods of transportation and lowers overall carbon emissions. This helps the University move closer to its longterm environmental goals.
It would also be revolutionary for campus transportation and for far more than just the student body. The Connector could reduce traffic
congestion and lessen the burden our current public transportation system faces. A more efficient University-run transit option means fewer cars on the road, less pollution and a more seamless integration of the University into the city’s broader infrastructure, making it the right investment for the future of both the University and the city of Ann Arbor as a whole.
It is critical that this project lives up to its high expectations and, despite our excitement for the train, this editorial board still has some lingering questions. Starting with ecological concerns, one proposed route for the Connector cuts through portions of the Nichols Arboretum, presenting the possibility of deforestation and ecosystem destruction. This editorial board urges the University to properly and clearly ensure the protection of the Arb and to clarify exactly how these plans fit into their environmentally friendly objectives, like hitting net zero emissions.
There are also questions related to how an autonomous transit line would work on campus. Would
anyone in Ann Arbor have access to the train, or only students at the University? Would the train have dedicated staff to check student and personal IDs? Would it have any staff at all? Only by answering these questions, clearly, can the University truly demonstrate their commitment to safety for the campus community.
Another simple, yet critical, question for the University administration is the hours that the Connector will operate; it has not yet confirmed if it will operate on a similar timetable to the current bus system, which runs 7:30 a.m. to 2:15-3:00 a.m. (depending on the day). For many, the current system presents a hard time constraint on studying, social activity and commuting between campuses. A 24-hour train system would increase the logistical ease of movement between campuses and ease frustrations of isolation by those on North Campus
With such an ambitious project, it is crucial that the University continues to consider community feedback during every step of the planning and building proces-
ses for the train to properly serve everyone on campus.
There are many other proposed transportation components of the Campus Plan 2050 that are also critical to the success of the Connector. One of the main goals of the Connector and restructured bus system is to reduce congestion on roadways by making students and staff less reliant on commuting by automobile. First, as the Connector is only currently planned to extend as far south as the current location of the CCTC, the bus system must be efficient enough for students residing south of the Diag to avoid relying on cars for commuting to North Campus.
Furthermore, many students rely on other modes of transportation between other satellite elements of the University, including cars. Alongside the Connector, redistributing buses from Bursley Baits routes to connect other satellite elements of the University, such as the School of Nursing or Ross Athletic Campus, as well as adjacent neighborhoods like Kerrytown and Burns Park, could significantly increase ease of
movement for students in addition to decreasing automotive reliance.
For many commuter students, it is critical that the train is integrated with other public transit infrastructure, new and existing parking lots and perhaps even the Amtrak station.
The transit plan also references efforts to improve routes for pedestrians and cyclists between campuses, including new footbridges and pathways. Currently, many students who prefer using bikes or electric scooters have to travel to North Campus on sidewalks along Fuller Road, which can be very dangerous. On the north side of this four-lane road, the concrete pathway is severely deteriorated and extremely close to the road, posing many dangers to potential commuters. In addition to rehabilitating these routes, constructing more footbridges and pathways across the Huron River and in the Mitchell Field area would also complement the train well and add to the overall interconnectedness of both campuses.
AUDRA WOEHLE Opinion Columnist
Abigail Schad/DAILY
Natasha Eliya/DAILY
THE MICHIGAN DAILY EDITORIAL BOARD
SARAH ZHANG Opinion Analyst
In this space, we invite our contributors to be vulnerable and authentic about our experiences and the important issues in our world today.
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The weight of a promise
The scent of Ka’ak bread still lingers in my memory: warm, yeasty, a promise of provision wrapped in the echoes of my father’s childhood. In those early years, before he could even grasp the complexities of chemistry, he had already mastered the art of survival. At ten years old, he wasn’t just a boy–he was a provider, balancing trays of Ka’ak bread on his head as he threaded through the streets of Jordan, his small feet moving with purpose. Each sale was more than a transaction; it was a thread in the fragile fabric of his family’s survival.
“Yalla, habibi,” the locals would call, some with pity in their eyes, others with admiration for this child who moved with the determination of a man. The coins would jingle in his pocket, one dinar, two dinars, each sound a small victory in the war against desperation that raged in his household. His younger brother trailed behind him like a shadow, their footsteps creating a rhythm against the dusty streets. 40 loaves to sell, 40 chances to keep his promise, to prove he could help their family survive.
Survival runs in my father’s blood like an ancient river, its waters carved by generations of loss. His father grew up in an orphanage after losing both his parents to war. He learned early that survival meant resilience and strength lived in solitude. His mother’s story was shaped by what was taken, her parents and her closest sister dead in a single moment on a dusty
unpaved road to her brother’s pharmacy school graduation, a celebration turned to mourning by the screech of bus brakes. Once the youngest in her family, she suddenly found herself needing to become her own parent overnight. Forced to abandon her education, she moved to Jordan with her older brother and sisters, where she worked at a clothing factory while her sisters became housemaids, their combined income supporting them all.
His parents met in their small village Rammun in Palestine, two souls shaped by loss who found each other in a world that had taught them nothing stays. After marriage at 18, they sought opportunity in Kuwait, where his father worked under the strict sponsorship system that controlled every aspect of their lives, and his mother rarely left their home. But when they returned to visit Rammun, where the morning call to prayer had mingled with the scent of baking bread for generations, they found their vessel of heritage ripped from generations of sacred soil. The Nakba turned familiar streets into escape routes, family homes into abandoned shells, morning greetings into hurried goodbyes. They crossed the border into Jordan as refugees, carrying with them only memories and determination. And when my father was born into this new life they’d been forced to build, he inherited not just their blood, but their resilience. They built their family in their first home in a one-bedroom apartment in Jordan. My father and his five siblings slept on the living
RUTA HAILU MiC Columnist
When I was 13, I started therapy — not because I was seeking healing, but because I wanted to fit into a world that demanded constant selfimprovement. I convinced myself that if I just worked hard enough, I could smooth away any rough edges that made me “inconvenient” to others. If I could just be more patient, more agreeable, and less affected by the things that weighed on me, then maybe I wouldn’t feel like a burden.
But the more time I spent in therapy, the more something felt off. I wasn’t being given the tools to change the things that made it difficult to cope — I was only learning how to tolerate them. Every frustration, every exhaustion, every time I felt like I didn’t fit into the world was presented as something I needed to work through rather than something worth questioning. It was as if struggling under oppressive systems was a personal failure rather than a reflection of a system working exactly as it was designed — to pathologize resistance, not protect me.
Audre Lorde, one of the most influential poets and authors in history, often wrote about her lived experience as a Black lesbian and radical feminist. In her later years, she wrote about living through liver cancer and popularized the idea of self-care in her 1988 book, A Burst of Light: Essays.
“I had to examine, in my dreams as well as in my immune-function tests, the devastating effects of overextension.” Lorde wrote. “Overextending myself is not stretching myself. I had to accept how difficult it is to monitor the difference. Necessary for me as cutting down on sugar. Crucial. Physically. Psychically. Caring for
room floor while their parents took the bedroom. On my grandfather’s monthly income of $130, they survived on bare minimums, but my grandmother made sure her children never forgot to say alhamdulillah for everything they had. Her own loss had taught her that everything: parents, security, dreams, could vanish in a single moment.
This inheritance of resilience wasn’t just a legacy–it was a necessity for survival. At 13, his hands already knew the weight of toil, the burn of cold metal juice carts against calloused palms, the ache of shoulders after hours of standing. While other boys dreamed of games, he dreamed of stability. My father refused to let history echo, looking at his younger siblings and seeing not burdens, but responsibilities, a chance to rewrite their family’s story. And rewrite it he did. “I’m the oldest,” he would say, his voice filled with quiet resolve. Those words became both his shield and his sword. They drove him through the long walks to school in rain and snow, through days when lunch was just a single sandwich–if there was even bread to make one. They carried him through summers of selling juice outside hospital buildings, where he and his younger brother would slip past doorkeepers, offering cold juices to tired families waiting for news of loved ones. Each day’s earnings meant another meal on the table, a mattress to sleep on, another step toward giving his mother and siblings a better life.
CONTINUED AT MICHIGANDAILY.COM
My new Ypsilanti neighbors
One of the many expansions of my college experience, now that I’m in my second year in the Midwest, has been moving out of the dorms into my apartment building, which I lovingly coined “my favorite hole in the wall.” This also meant I had to mourn the loss of my unlimited Michigan Dining meal plan and start cooking my own food. At this point, I was confronted with reality: Most of the dishes I have regularly at home and know how to prepare are Mexican.
I began brainstorming quick and simple meals I could take with me on the go and my mind instantly went to one of my childhood favorites: tortas. It was perfect; I could buy some teleras (Mexican sandwich bread) and assemble them easily — all I had to do was get some basic ingredients to stuff them with and I was set. My go-to would always be tortas de milanesa de pollo, which was easy to shop for at Meijer, but I also wanted chorizo and quesillo, which is where my problems began. I scoured the internet and to my shock, didn’t find much in terms of options. The Kroger on South Maple Road had bolillos, which were a good substitute, but I was still craving quesillo and chorizo.
My adventure led me and two friends to the only store in Ann Arbor with a wider variety of Hispanic products: Tienda La Libertad on West Liberty Street. I thought all my problems were solved — though I was limited to this one store, I didn’t mind as long as I could get what I needed. However, a new issue emerged — there was no proper carnicero within the store. I was already missing the taste of cecina a week into being back in Michigan and I was starting to dread the thought of learning how to live without all the foods I get to eat at home. I had to go back to the drawing board and stumbled upon a hidden gem of the area: the historic Depot Town district of neighboring Ypsilanti. It was here that I found a little pocket of home that to this day, continues to remind me of the carnicerías, panaderías and tienditas of my childhood. I took TheRide Route 4 all the way to the end of the line and reached my first stop: Dos Hermanos Market, a place I now frequent. This was the spark that ignited my curiosity for other ways I could interact with the local Hispanic community. I began to familiarize myself with the workers throughout my first couple weeks of going there, and had an easy time connecting with them over conversations about traditions,
Reclaiming the ‘we’ in wellness
myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.”
As Lorde experiences living with cancer, pushing her to slow down, experience and move through the world differently, she questions the urgency in which the world forced her and other Black, Queer, and Disabled women to move, directly resisting capitalism’s everexpanding essence. To Lorde, selfcare was her politicized practice of caring for herself in her remaining years. By prioritizing her well-being, she resisted a culture that devalues Black, disabled, Queer, and women’s bodies. This act of self-preservation became a form of political warfare against a society intent on erasure.
Now in the present day mainstream world world, self-care, as described by Lorde, has been co-opted and commercialized into the hashtags we see today. Under the logic of “healthism,” wellness and personal health become a moral duty, failure to be “healthy” is seen as a personal failing and the solution is framed as consumption. Whether it’s moisturizers that cost $150-plus, 10-step skin-care routines, $35 pilates classes that tend to last less than an hour or the clean girl aesthetic: It’s not a coincidence that “natural” beauty just so happens to require all these expensive transactions. How did we go from Lorde’s call for self-preservation as a political resistance to a $40 lip gloss being sold as the solution to mental well-being? This isn’t to say that taking care of oneself or resting are unhelpful; they often can provide temporary relief, but they will never be enough. We can’t buy our way out of systems of oppression. Healing cannot be bottled. Care cannot be commodified. We were never meant to do this alone. Somewhere along the way, self-care became a replacement
for community care. The focus shifted from collective survival to individual maintenance, creating an endless cycle of “selfimprovement.” The responsibility of healing lies on the individual, oftentimes ignoring the structures that caused the harm in the first place.
But care has never been an individual pursuit. The Black Panther Party, a few years before Lorde, led by Huey P. Newton, created the idea of revolutionary intercommunalism. They recognized that traditional nationstates were being fragmented due to global capitalism and imperialism, leaving communities disconnected from political and economic control. Instead of relying on failing institutions, they argued that people must build power through mutual aid and survival programs, creating networks of care that operate beyond the state.
But we’ve been taught to resist
community. We internalize the idea that relying on others is a weakness and that self-sufficiency is the goal. We hear it in messages like “no new friends” or “take your problems to your therapist” as if our struggles are meant to be handled alone, neatly contained within individual situations. We’re encouraged to cut people off at the first sign of conflict, to view relationships as disposable, to curate our relationships like mood boards, ensuring our communities are aesthetically pleasing and never too demanding. Capitalism keeps us working and isolated, essentially making it harder for us to build and sustain community. But community isn’t necessarily about convenience, even though we are so quick to optimize our community for whatever works for our schedules. It’s not about surrounding ourselves only with people who fit a carefully crafted vision of ease and comfort. It’s recognizing that we have a responsibility for the health and
well-being of not just ourselves but our community. Interdependence and reciprocity is how we get through and survive isolation. Community is messy, unlocatable and sometimes inconvenient. It means offering support not just when we have excess to give but when it requires sacrifice. That isn’t to say that people shouldn’t have boundaries. Community isn’t about abandoning yourself for others, constantly being at everyone’s beck and call or believing that your time and labor belong to everyone. It doesn’t mean forgiving abusers or tolerating harm. Community care exists in the moments and spaces when we show up for each other not out of obligation but out of a shared commitment to something bigger than ourselves.
That understanding of care — as something communal, not individual — continues today. We see it when people start and sustain mutual aid funds for neighbors who need groceries, when friends check
homesickness, religion and food. It was nice to be able to speak in Spanish — something I mostly get to do over the phone here at college — and have a reminder of one of the things I cherish most about my hometown: the proximity to my family, my culture and the customs that they brought with them when they emigrated from Mexico. Many people have told me about Midwestern hospitality, and I have definitely felt this warmth from some of my friends who grew up in Michigan and its surrounding states, but it doesn’t feel the same as the type of generosity that I’ve always been used to. I especially noticed how customers would make small talk to the storekeepers in Ypsilanti, which I don’t see typically happen in Ann Arbor. It was at this point that I noticed a deficit in the numbers: Black and brown individuals account for a much larger portion of the population in Ypsilanti than the more affluent Ann Arbor. This is visible even when taking the bus there and getting to know some of the regulars on Route 4, where the frequent riders (mainly people of Color) seem to have bonded over this shared use of public transportation, a livelihood that is rarely seen near campus.
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in on each other emotionally and materially and when community friends pop up on street corners. Care networks exist around us, even if they don’t always get named as such.
In “Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice,” Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha calls these networks care webs: interconnected systems of support where people collectively share care, not as charity, but as a commitment to each other’s survival. So, what does that look like in practice? It’s asking a friend what kind of support actually feels helpful instead of assuming. It’s also learning to accept care without guilt, saying yes when someone offers to help, letting a friend support you emotionally without feeling like you owe them something and understanding that needing care doesn’t make you weak.
The question isn’t whether these forms of care exist, it’s whether we choose to participate in them — to reject the idea that we must handle everything alone. We see care as something we give and receive, not just when it’s easy or convenient, but because none of us can thrive in isolation.
Whether it’s my working group at Michigan Environmental Justice Coalition who makes sure I’ve eaten, my Eritrean/Ethiopian community in metro Detroit who’ve given me more rides than I can count, the regular, “what can I do to support you” text I send to my friends, the times my neighbors would watch my brother and me when I was little or packing the court during Encampment 11’s charges brought by Dana Nessel, building a better world built on connection rooted in a continuous commitment is possible. CONTINUED AT
Alisha Razi/MiC
GAEL
GONZALEZ-DELALUZ MiC Columnist
Ananya Prashar/DAILY
YASMEEN NIMER MiC Columnist
Michigan in Color is The Michigan Daily’s section by and for People of Color.
My therapist told me I should write more. I don’t want to because this means admitting and coming to terms with my trauma. I’d rather distract myself by pulling away from my reality. But here I am, doing what my Asian mom would probably hate most, telling her story and trying to heal mine.
My mom was the type of person who was good at everything: She was gorgeous, smart, and the kindest person I knew. She had thin, jet-black, pin-straight hair that always fell slightly below her shoulders. She was naturally beautiful; her skin was dotted with freckles and the only makeup she would reach for was black Maybelline eyeliner on her top lid and lipstick if it was a special occasion — she didn’t need more. Her friendly eyes and inviting smile with dimples inherited from her mother radiated happiness. She would tell me about how she never really studied in high school, yet she was a straight-A student. She went on to get her undergrad in business from the University of Southern California and her MBA from the University of California, Los Angeles, lending her a career in corporate finance.
The quantitative aspect of the job interested her and she could do mental math unlike anyone I’ve ever met. She was my biggest role model and my best friend growing up. Everyone who knew us said that we looked the same, had the same mannerisms, sounded the same, and had the same personality.
On a vacation to Hawaii where we stayed in separate rooms, we emerged, ready to go to a museum, wearing the same thing — a black tank top, long white
The day my mom died, I stopped living
Bermuda shorts, white shoes, and our straight, black hair pulled back into a low ponytail. Unlike most mother-and-daughter relationships I grew up observing in the media, my mom and I never got into fights. We were so much alike that nothing got on our nerves. I could spend two weeks abroad with her in the same cramped room on a trip and never get annoyed. She would text me a recipe for a dish while I was thinking about how I was craving that exact dish. We just had this strange telepathic relationship where we were always on the same page.
The COVID-19 pandemic, a stressful time for most, was catastrophic for me as a hypochondriac with crippling social anxiety. The anxiety I felt from going to school and the grocery store was amplified by the fear of catching a virus, and my anxiety worsened overall. As the pandemic began to let up a bit, my mom and I had plans with my childhood best friend and her mom, planned a few weeks prior. The anxiety did not cross my mind
until right before the lunch date, and I sat sobbing in my bed unable to explain what I was feeling and what was fueling my anxiety about the most simple thing. Between sobs and catching my breath, I tried to explain my irrational fears and thoughts. I’m sure my mom didn’t understand half of it, but without hesitation, she called off the lunch and immediately found me the best anxiety therapist in the area.
For years after, I spent endless conversations with her about my anxiety. She always tried to understand and check up on me. The differences in our upbringings manifested themselves in the way we viewed therapy and medication. Although we never fought, this was the one topic we couldn’t see eye-to-eye on. We went back and forth about medication on our daily walks and I always ended up feeling more frustrated than when we started the conversation, but I knew she meant well. I knew my immigrant mom didn’t understand how these things could help, but she always tried and her love never
wavered. Any anxiety attack or breakdown, she was by my side cheering me on. She always put her stigmas and opinions aside to do what was best for me. When my anxiety was at its worst, I created this term called “comfort people,” the people I could be around and still feel at peace, the people who understood me, even if they couldn’t understand my anxiety. My mom was my comfort person. My mom was the youngest of three children, growing up in Taipei, Taiwan. My Gong Gong was a photojournalist and my Po Po a nurse at a hospital, the place where she and my Gong Gong met. As my mom grew older, my grandparents knew that they needed to move to America to give their kids a better life. The San Gabriel Valley in Southern California, became their new home. My mom was placed in first grade and eventually moved up to second once they realized her inability to speak English did not equate to an inability to learn and succeed in school. Despite being scolded for not understanding English and being
accused of cheating since she was academically ahead of the other students, she fit in well.
She was what she described as a “latchkey” kid, a word foreign to me. Frankly, I found it strange that kids would walk miles to school and back alone. I would freak out the second I lost sight of my mom in the grocery store, tears welling in my eyes, for her to be one aisle over. She would tell me about how she would walk a mile home from school, let herself in and cook a hamburger every day after school, a delicacy she discovered after her parents got a Costco membership. She was used to coming home to an empty house with her older siblings in middle school and high school, her mom a nurse at a local hospital and her dad working at his photo shop on Sunset Boulevard. One day, my mom came home dreaming of her normal routine — cooking a hamburger or canned ravioli and starting on homework until the rest of her family returned home much later. To her surprise, my Po Po was waiting after getting off of work early, and my mom ran into her arms,
bursting into happy tears. She was a hyper-independent child — the polar opposite of how I was raised. Maybe she missed having her parents there when she got home from school and wanted different for my me and my brother. When I got to middle school, she started working part time to spend more time with us. When I got to high school, she took a job closer to my high school just so she could make it to my 3 p.m. tennis matches. She was always in the crowd when I needed her most. My worst fear growing up and moving away for college was losing my mother. When she first dropped me off at college, I watched every minute of the Delta flight map as she was on the plane back home, just waiting for her “I landed” text to know she was still alive. She told me before she left me in my dorm freshman year that she had booked a window seat. She was used to being a pillow in the middle seat cramped between her two kids, a true symbol of a mother’s sacrifice. A window seat was her ticket to cry herself to sleep where fewer people could see. I, on the other hand, was in my dorm, throwing up in the communal bathroom from being too physically sick to say bye to my favorite person in the world, the only person who could ease my anxiety and make any place feel like home. She was my home, my safe space.The thought of losing her was unbearable, but the thought of losing her while I was in college, unable to say goodbye or spend her final moments with her, was gut-wrenching. I knew that the day I lost my mom, my world would change. And frankly I didn’t think I could live without her. Yet here I am. Not living, just barely surviving.
CONTINUED AT MICHIGANDAILY.COM
On culture and distance: What we leave across the ocean
AMY XIU MiC Columnist
I am not close with my extended family. I suppose that’s inevitable, considering they live an ocean away, speak a different language and grew up in a different generation. There is often too little to connect over, too much unable to be said. But that wasn’t always the case for me.
For the first two years of my life, I was raised by my grandparents in China. I’m told that I was a mischievous child but a fast learner — my grandparents were both teachers, and they spent much of their time teaching me Chinese language and culture when they weren’t wrangling me into behaving. When I wasn’t watching 喜羊羊 on the TV and climbing up and down the walls of the small apartment, my favorite thing to do was to memorize “ 絕句,” classic Chinese four line poems. My grandpa and I would compete to see who could name more while my grandma sat beside us, quick to point out any characters we missed.
When I left China to live with my actual parents, I quickly adapted into my new environment. I ate up PBS kids cartoons (I still love Dinosaur Train), fell in love with Pizza Rolls and picked up
the English language. I went to an American school, made American friends, used American slang. As my life took root in Michigan, my time spent in China with my grandparents became a distant memory.
Our family would visit China every two years to see our extended family and friends.
Those trips were my favorite part of summer vacation, when all of my older relatives would dote on me (being the youngest really does have its perks). I’d pig out on baozi and noodles and wander through Chinese malls where my uncle would buy any toy I wanted. It was also my time to finally show off what I’d learned in American Chinese school — I jumped to recite all the idioms, vocabulary and poems from my textbooks any chance I got. My relatives were charmed by my eagerness, love of food and American anecdotes. When I was in China, I was undoubtedly Chinese, and I fit in with my extended family seamlessly.
Every time I returned to Michigan, the first few weeks back would be a jarring adjustment. Chinese would once again become a secondary language, spoken only with my parents. The food would taste just a little duller, unable to compare with the mouthwatering delicacies I’d enjoyed daily on
CLASSIFIED
vacation. And I’d miss all my family in China deeply. My parents would video call them weekly, but a phone screen is a poor substitute for seeing them every day. I cherished every China trip, holding onto the memories as I counted down the days until I could return. After the COVID-19 pandemic hit, those biyearly visits to China stopped. And, as the world shut down, so did any real connection I had to my relatives, to China, to being Chinese at all. Without Chinese school or the familiar routine of seeing my Chinese community every week, I lost the structured ways I once had to explore my heritage. Without practice, my Chinese also began to devolve. Where I once had full conversations in Chinese with my parents, slowly that shifted into broken “Chinglish” and eventually just English entirely. My Chinese wasn’t strong enough to understand the C-dramas or reality shows my parents loved, and I didn’t have it in me to open my Chinese textbooks out of my own volition. The only poem I could now remember from my childhood was the famous “床 前明月光…”, and the video calls with my relatives happened less and less often as we all became preoccupied with our own lives. CONTINUED AT MICHIGANDAILY.COM
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AMANDA VENCLOVAITE-PIRANI Statement Correspondent
It was never a question to the adults around me whether or not I’d go to college. For my immigrant mother, college was always the obvious path to success. By attending an American university, you unlock American opportunities. My high school honors program cultivated a similar mindset, and the most complex decision of young adult life was made simple: If you were smart, you went to college. If you didn’t, you were an aberration. A failure. As a teenager, I bought into this toxic logic until it came time to make my own college decision in the midst of COVID19. At the same time that I was questioning what kind of person I wanted to be in the world, my daily life was transformed by the first lockdown. Nothing, not even my faith in the promises of higher education, felt like solid ground. Suddenly I was looking at online courses and inflated tuition prices, and I wondered whether I should spend thousands of dollars while still uncertain of what I wanted to pursue. College, the default, obvious choice I’d been drawn to since childhood became complicated. What did the four-year bachelor’s degree program really mean to me, beyond another achievement to check off? If all I wanted was a job, which schools and programs mattered? If the point was education, what did that actually mean? Five years later, I find myself once again considering the same questions as a second-semester senior. I try to recall the version of
MADISON HAMMOND Statement Correspondent
Content warning: this article contains mentions of suicidal ideation.
I love my birthday. Not for what it means literally — another rotation around the sun — but for what it represents: a chance to shed the weight of the winter and start over.
Each spring, Frederik Meijer Gardens in my hometown of Grand Rapids hosts the United States’ largest temporary butterfly exhibition in its glass house. The enclosure, which is filled with tropical plants and humid air year-round, houses hundreds of chrysalises that break into colorful butterflies.
Every March, as butterflies burst from their chrysalises, I feel myself shedding the weight of winter, breathing in warmth and color after months of gray. My birthday, which falls at the same time, marks this transformation. It reminds me that even after the darkest seasons, life begins again — a cyclical renewal that mirrors my own rebirth after winter when my mental health is at its lowest.
Caterpillar
When I visited the gardens this past spring break, most of the visitors were toddlers. They swarmed in between my sister and I, ignoring advice from their caretakers to try and stay still so a butterfly might land on their colorful shirts. I felt old. I can’t remember the first time I went to the gardens, or when it became a staple trip for me. I do remember one eventful visit where my younger brother threw up on the marble floors outside the greenhouse, overwhelmed by the heat and humidity. I remember eagerly collecting booklets describing what butterflies I could possibly see, and scouring the trees, bushes and butterfly feeding stations to catch sight of every one of the 60-some species.
I remember learning about the lifecycle of a butterfly from the interactive children’s exhibits — egg, caterpillar, chrysalis
STATEMENT
What’s in a bachelor’s degree? Contemplating the meaning of my four-year education
myself that existed at 19, and how the past four years have shaped her. When I think of education or enlightenment, I imagine that scene in “Cinderella,” when she’s wearing a tattered pink dress and crying. The Fairy Godmother waves her wand and suddenly, Cinderella is a princess, sophisticated and beautiful. As a teenager, I imagined college was something like this. You entered riddled with intellectual inferiority and ignorance, and exit as something shiny and superior. But the change of four years is subtle, and I’m not sure I’d notice how exactly I differ from my 19-year-old self without looking back at old journals or essays. Rather than attend school online, I decided to take a gap year the summer after my senior year of high school. I worked full-time and allowed myself the freedom to consider that perhaps there were options beyond the four-year degree. If college was just the path to a career, maybe I’d continue working and enroll once I knew what I wanted to do. Or maybe I’d find a job I enjoyed, and I’d never get around to it.
In reflecting on my own journey through college, I felt myself drawn to hearing from someone who’d made the opposite decision from mine, and chose not to return to school. Surrounded by the bright, tropical-blue walls of Playa Bowls Ann Arbor, I sat down with General Manager Vinny Sanchez to talk about their relationship to the idea of higher education. Sanchez is three years younger than me, but it’s not something I noticed until they pointed it out. As a general manager, Sanchez holds far more responsibility than I’ve ever had at a job, juggling leadership, financial responsibilities and managing a team of employees.
Sanchez, like me, did well in school. During their freshman year, college classes often felt easy, and Sanchez made extra money in school by tutoring peers in chemistry. Also like me, they were uncertain of what to study, and were pushed toward college by parents who thought it was the best path toward success. However, they ultimately decided that college wasn’t the best fit for them. They didn’t feel engaged by their courses and were skeptical of whether the cost was worth it.
“I’m looking at every single job market and it’s so oversaturated and you need minimum two years experience,” Sanchez said. “If you’re really dedicated to getting a degree or any higher education, that’s all you have. You don’t have job experience, and it’s just like it feels like a scam. It feels like you’re going down this loop of, well, I’ve paid this much money, and I learned all this stuff, but I can’t get a job, and I still have to pay money on this.”
As a soon-to-be college graduate, Sanchez’s analysis stressed me out, but it feels accurate. Nationally, only 22% of adults believe that college is worth the cost if one has to take out loans. At 16, I met anyone who questioned my dream of college with frustration — I resented the idea that higher education was only for those trying to be doctors or engineers. However, with rising tuition costs, student debt and an increasingly challenging job market, I can’t blame anyone for thinking twice about their decision to attend university. Much of my small talk these days involves questions like “What did you study?” followed by “What do you want to do with that?” As a double major in political science and creative writing, I am constantly trying to justify my degrees — even
to myself. While I’ve fallen in love with the University of Michigan, I cannot help but wonder if transferring from my cheaper, in-state school was worth it.
Sanchez said that they still value education, and try to pursue learning in their free time through online resources like documentaries or YouTube videos. They still want to receive further education one day, but said it’s important that it’s affordable.
“I think college is great if people get free college education,” Sanchez said. “That’s what I’m trying to go for. I’m waiting to turn 21 to go to community college. I think community college needs to be less stigmatized because most jobs … are just looking to see that you have a degree.”
Our conversation was a reminder that it is far more difficult to build a successful career with a bachelor’s degree than it used to be. While I often hear one’s choice in major used as a scapegoat, I’ve worked in food service alongside computer science program graduates and English majors alike. While some majors might have a more obvious career track, federal reserve data suggests the labor market is challenging for all college graduates. What finally drew me back to college, other than pressure from my parents, wasn’t finally settling on a career. It was a genuine desire to learn — and the privilege to do so. During my gap year, I read and wrote voraciously, and found myself longing for the high school classes I once barely remained awake for. I longed for an academic community, one where there would be opportunities for discussion and feedback.
In the digital age, I know that there are other ways to learn. Some of my favorite writers, like Mary
Birthdays & butterflies
Oliver, never completed college.
But from my own experiences during my gap year, I know that to dedicate most of one’s schedule to learning is different from attempting to teach oneself a skill or topic while working fulltime. It’s easy to lose momentum or sight of one’s goals among the other demands of daily life.
I think for someone like me, who enjoys structure, school has been beneficial towards an education. But in a bubble of students whose parents are CEOs and lawyers, who’ve been working toward an exclusive college since they could walk, I think it’s important to acknowledge there are ways to become fulfilled and “enlightened” outside the selective gates of elite universities. I’ve spent four years working part-time through school and doing my best to ease the financial burden of my education on my parents and my future self. A few days a week, I trudge down the street, still dark, and unlock the door to work.
For the next five hours, I prepare and serve the same food I did the
and butterfly. Depending on the species and whether or not they migrate during the winter, the life cycle of a butterfly can be as short as a few weeks or as long as several months, but never longer than a year. Thus, the butterfly’s life cycle tends to mimic the cyclic nature of both the seasons and mental health, cycles of growth and struggle that inevitably give way to new beginnings. There is something wondrous about the gardens. The sweet smell of rotting fruit and sugar pots for the butterflies to feed on, a trickling waterfall echoing shrieks of kids spotting a monarch sipping on a flower — these things never change. But the person visiting the gardens does change year after year. As I got older, I got wrapped up in teenage things (as teenagers do) and the butterflies took a backseat. Visiting the exhibit each spring became less of a tradition and more of a fond memory, overshadowed by hours of competitive cheerleading practices and dual-enrollment
coursework. My birthday, which had always felt like a hopeful marker of growth, started to feel like a reminder of yet another year falling further and further behind on my self-imposed goals. Winter was never my favorite time of year, but as I grew up, the anxiety and depression that set in each season compounded my resentment towards my birthday, tucked right at the edge of spring. It became less of a celebration and more of a checkpoint, a marker of another year transforming into the person I wanted to be.
Everything felt heavy, like I was dragging through the last stretch of winter while the world around me was poised to blossom. I used to love the gardens, just like I used to love my birthday, but both felt distant — overshadowed by everything else demanding my attention, energy and ability to simply exist without feeling overwhelmed.
Chrysalis
The month before my 16th birthday, my world fell apart. The year had already been
tough. The week after I turned 15, schools announced they were shutting down as the world went into lockdown for the COVID-19 pandemic. To make matters worse, in the following months, I transferred to a school where I knew no one and only interacted with classmates twice a week due to a hybrid schedule.
In February 2021, I walked back from the bus towards my house staring at the snowbanks alongside the mailboxes and wished I could just lay down in one and go to sleep forever.
I sat in the basement, logged on to my virtual therapy appointment and told my therapist the honest truth: I was suicidal. The next two days were a horrific whirl of telling my parents that I was not okay and, ultimately, being hospitalized.
I was released with a stack of medications and an obsessivecompulsive disorder diagnosis. It was horrible timing for this to manifest, with the pandemic in full force and only rumors of a potential vaccine. The next day, I took my driver’s test and
passed, then began a partial hospitalization program, before transitioning back into full hospitalization. By the time I was no longer considered a risk to myself, it was a few weeks after my birthday. Determined to do something fun, my family brought me to none other than the Frederik Meijer Gardens butterfly exhibit. I sat in the car, wearing a pink fleece sweatshirt that was way too warm for the tropical climate of the glass house, wishing I was anywhere but there.
I sat on a bench inside, fully masked and sweating, to watch a blue morpho flutter amid the foliage. To the side was a box of unhatched chrysalises, still waiting to fully mature. In a few weeks, they would all be dead; and in a year, there would be a whole new set.
I considered how things can change so quickly. In a few weeks, the sun would start coming out and my allergies would be back in full force. The blue jay and cardinal that live in my backyard would reappear
morning before, chopping, stirring and slicing. In the midst of exams and assignments, running off just a few hours of sleep, I’ll smile at customers and ask them about their day. More than anything, I’ve arrived at the conclusion of my bachelor’s degree … exhausted. Having juggled 20 hours of work with my extracurricular ambitions and coursework, I simply cannot imagine what it’s like for my peers who work nearly full-time to get through school. I cannot imagine what it was like for my own mother, who, in addition to raising me and working full-time, attended college classes online in her late 20s. Each night, I watched as she spent hours craned over an oak desk, sticky-tabbing 800-paged textbooks. She graduated top of her class, and later continued on to graduate school. Looking back, I wonder if part of my mother’s dedication towards her education was due to opportunities her own mother was denied. CONTINUED AT MICHIGANDAILY.COM
and the bird’s nest on the porch would be rebuilt. It was a reminder that at the end of a grueling season of life, time still progresses and there are other things to look forward to. I didn’t know it then, but sitting on that bench watching the butterflies push their way out of chrysalises, I was watching my own transformation begin — one that would be messy, slow and often painful, but inevitable all the same.
Butterfly
When I walk into the gardens every spring, it feels like a reminder that winter always ends, both literally and emotionally. Mental health flows in cycles. It’s never a linear experience — there are always ups and downs — and transformation is never immediate. It doesn’t have to be grand or sudden; sometimes, it’s just the quiet decision to keep pushing forward, even when it feels impossible.
During my last visit, I think I saw more blue morphos than I ever have before. While my younger sister took pictures of me and the butterflies, alternating between her phone and digital camera, it struck me that she is the same age I was when it took everything I had to push through the transition out of winter. I have changed so much in these four years, but the life cycle of both my mental health and the butterflies remains constant. I am just better prepared to handle it these days.
The new year both reminds me of a hellish time in my life and signals a season of gray skies, icy streets and bitter winds. This is why March 7, my birthday, is when my year truly begins. When winter stretches on and on, it is easy to forget that anything could bloom again. I’d spend weeks feeling like I was crawling through thick mud, the days blurring together. But then spring comes, and it brings my birthday and the butterflies — tiny, fragile creatures fighting their way out of their chrysalises, just as I fight to feel like myself again.
Emma Sortor/DAILY
Avery Nelson/DAILY
STATEMENT
Who holds the keys to The Palace: On student cleanliness & a conversation with dorm custodians
OUMMU KABBA Statement Columnist
The Palace sits atop the hill. People near and far revere the wonders shuttered behind its encrypted gates. It is rumored to hold a furnished kitchen fit for kingly feastings, stimulating halls to buttress blooming artists and grand bedchambers, the likes of which are only suited for royalty. But those of us on the inside know the truth. Whenever people find out I live in the Palace, more commonly referred to as Alice Lloyd Residence Hall, they break out into jealous accolades of how great the building is. And they’re right. This modernly renovated dorm is flush with study spaces, classrooms, a dance studio and a game room. To top it all off, it’s located in a prime spot on Central Campus. Yet, take a good look around and you’ll see that all that glitters is not gold.
The lounges on each floor are always stocked with a full collection of stolen dining hall dishware: oil-kissed to-go boxes, crusted flatware and rings of mystery sauce encircling the bowls and cups. Our laundry room floor is carpeted with gnawed up dryer sheets while chunky gray lint is matted inside the trap of every dryer. Our bathrooms are a marshland with dry paper towels flooding the entrance, cloudy water pooled around the lip of every sink and wads of hair like chewed-up gum entangled in the shower drains. Tell me, are you still jealous? Now, this is not intended to solely dog the students of Alice Lloyd — as a resident myself, this is just the dorm I have the most intimate contact with. And through its observance I began to uncover a dirty truth.
The Tragedy of the Commons: a phenomenon not applicable only to U-M students, but the world at large. This term, originally coined by William Forster Lloyd in 1833, was reintroduced by Garrett Hardin in a 1968 article of the same name in which he explains the psychological processes behind how and why communal spaces are ill-treated. According to Hardin, “Freedom in a commons brings ruin to all.”
Put simply, when a resource is public and largely unmanaged,
Like practically every other incoming freshman, I spent the summer prior to my fall semester comparing every “University of Michigan Dorm Ranking List” on the internet in an attempt to determine which was undeniably the best. But I now realize that if you peer inside the inner workings of any dorm on campus, you will find the same grimy traces of student negligence — like with the recent notorious flooding in North Campus’ Bursley Residence Hall after a student burst a pipe with a football. This begs the question: If even in “Alice Palace” — one of campus’ nicest residential halls — there are still rampant issues with maintaining the space, then perhaps the problem is not rooted in specific dorms as much as in the general campus culture. ***
self-interest overrides thoughts of public good or the sustenance of the resource. We believe that others will participate in indulging behaviors and fear we’ll be left without resources which catalyzes a greedy instinct to ensure we get our share. We take and take from this resource, and since it doesn’t belong to us by virtue of being public, we feel no responsibility to give back and think we hold no blame if it becomes unmaintainable. The public resource becomes increasingly depleted in quantity and quality, only reinforcing the already widespread lack of care to conserve it. There is a cognitive dissonance between our behaviors and how it affects our realities, as explained by Hardin: “The individual benefits as an individual from his ability to deny the truth even though society as a whole, of which he is a part, suffers.”
While the term “tragedy of the commons” may be unfamiliar, the behaviors it describes are ones that can be easily observed at a campus-wide level in ways that we may not even be cognizant of. I, for one, quickly became aware of this during the fall semester of my freshman year. Everyday when crossing the bridge to and from The Hill, I would pass the puma statues outside the University’s Museum of Natural History. For more than a month, I saw the same dining hall bowl and spoon sitting at the foot of the second statue, unmoving as if part of the exhibit. Eventually, they disappeared, but I couldn’t help but wonder who put them there and why it took so long for someone to finally clean it up. Why do the trash cans lining the street have more waste pancaked on the ground around them than actually inside of them? Why do people carelessly
Mirrored worlds
leave dining hall tables with a thick film of crumbs for others to take care of? Why do students have such varying ideas on the level of responsibility we have in keeping this campus going?
I must admit that I too am guilty of the mentality that somehow my actions are not also my responsibility. Sometime during August, when Ann Arbor was melting and campus became soup, I went to take a cool shower before bed. Drain flies were drinking up all the sweat and monopolizing the showers, one of them being particularly bold. Annoyed, I whacked the fly down with the side of my shower shoe and watched its mushy black guts spread along the wall. I could have easily flushed it down with a splash of water. But I decided to let it stay there. And there it stayed. For four days and nights I watched this corpse dry and cake over and remain. But instead
of questioning why I didn’t just clean it on that first day or any of the ones following, I instead asked why no one else had cleaned it. “Tsk tsk tsk,” I thought, “Why were others so okay with ignoring such an eyesore.” Now, I ask myself what my mom would have said. For more than a decade, my mom has worked as a custodian at a retirement home. Though truthfully, if asked to give any comprehensive statement on her job duties, my mind would draw a blank. When I look at my mom, I don’t see her work. Not because her job is anything to be ashamed of, but because it is not who she is. Instead, I see a woman who loves Bollywood, thick eyeliner and Facebook. I see a woman who, despite her tiny stature, breathes scorching fire down me and my siblings’ necks if we try to evade her seemingly endless cleaning tasks. I see a woman who I wish younger me was more appreciative of because all she ever lived for was her family. I see her. I think this is the missing piece in our campus culture. Society at large treats cleaners like expendable parts of our daily lives. Why care about the messes left behind when it’ll always be clean the next day? We excuse carelessness because “it’s their job,” but fail to denote that it is not their life. This ignorant mentality — while observed all throughout campus — is often worse inside the residential halls as that is where many students, namely freshman, spend most of their time. The lack of necessity to take care of communal dorm spaces is only bolstered by the fact that these resources don’t ever truly deplete. And that is because of the unseen burdens placed upon the custodians and janitorial staff who are single-handedly tasked with counteracting the “tragedy of the commons”. So, where do we go from here? Acknowledging patterns of behavior is the first step, but true change calls for action. To gain more insight, I set out to talk to a custodian in my own dorm, Alice Lloyd, to hear the realities of student negligence first-hand and better understand how we can move forward as a unit. CONTINUED AT MICHIGANDAILY.COM
TIFFANY SUDIJONO Statement Correspondent
Budding at the intersection of abundance and deficiency lies an inglorious battle.
On one side, there live unspoken tales hidden behind bars, both figuratively and literally. There are stories buried under the force of metal chains. There are feet cold to the touch and eyes left unmet, to the point that bones become too frail to support one’s weight and bodies become too broken to sit upright.
On the other side, there are skyscrapers climbing toward the heavens. There are traffic lights radiating across the cityscape like stars filling the night sky. There is a relentless rhythm of wealth and ambition pulsing through laughter and commotion, as bold dreams become spoken realities.
One story is untamed, while the other is tamed. One home is well-furnished, while the other struggles to stay afloat on bricks and dirt. One child is loved, while the other is silenced. These are two realities that make up West Java — a province that perfectly captures the dichotomy of the urban and rural, the liberated and chained, the so-called “healthy” and “unhealthy.” Whenever I dwell in my room, both complaining about and celebrating staying inside, I can do so at ease knowing a vast world awaits me at my mere fingertips.
I can phone a friend, knot up my running shoes for a jog or stop by a nearby bakery to savor a decadent treat. Sometimes I love my room and sometimes I hate it. Yet, for the people forced into
pasung — the inhumane act of being physically confined due to mental health conditions — there is no room for ambiguity. There is only black and white, and their monochromatic story only unfolds within a box. There is no vastness to be explored, no oceans with depth, no future to pray for, no life beyond the contour of a cube.
When one is shackled in a wooden cage, being labelled as “gila (crazy)” and “sakit jiwa (sick soul)” their whole life, there is no escape to this climax, no conclusion to their narrative but an incessant cycle of shame and confinement. Pasung is a byproduct of a failed national mental health care system that presents psychosocial disabilities as unviable, flawfilled traits. Inherently rooted in historical pseudo-science, many Javanese villagers believe that neurodivergent characteristics such as hyperfocus, pattern recognition and dyspraxia stem from spiritual possession as a punishment against insufficient faith, sinfulness and innate immorality. Being constrained, stripped of one’s clothes and shackled by the ankles with padlocks are the hallmarks of this practice’s supposed soulrenewal treatment treatment. Ironically, to re-instill their humanity, one’s own family willingly dehumanizes their children behind wire walls in an attempt to exorcise the spirit from evil. With only a few grains to eat and drops of water to drink, malnourishment is a tell-tale sign of how long a villager has been caged since their disability was uncovered. These cages are not only a
divide of the physical, but also of the relational. They are the separation between blood and duty, as family unknowingly turns into foe. They are the barriers that make predators and prey. They are the symbols that continue to accentuate the growing economic disparity in West Java — a society filled with affluent individuals born in the “included,” while some unluckily suffer the fate of the “excluded.”
Due to a lack of education, pasung remains prevalent and is a problem that has faced public backlash with unmet resolution. Social workers often find themselves in a pit of hopelessness, as pasung is deeply embedded in decades of systematic shortcomings, educational deficiencies, political neglect and retrogressive science. Dismantling this culturally-held notion of mental disorders as blemishes feels just as impossible as reversing history because of society’s deeply rooted stigmatization of neurodivergence. While many volunteers have developed antipasung initiatives, the process of transferring each villager held in these cages to a well-operated health campaign, neurodiversity community or mental health hospital is plainly unfeasible. The numbers are simply too high for everyone to be fairly accounted for. Whenever I crouch on the floor of my bedroom, knees pressed up against my chest and enveloped in a silent embrace, I have come to imagine myself as a woman named Indah. Indah — one of the young pasung survivors I met during my 2019 mission trip visiting West Java kampungs (villages) — is used
to the constant of life in a cage. Every day she sits with her knees huddled and feet perpendicular to the ground so precisely that her stillness feels eerie. The more I observed her as weeks went by, her feeble body looked hollow and emotionless. Indah has verbal apraxia and tritanopia, and when the ketua kampung (village head) found out from her parents, her delicate body was immediately locked into a harsh reality.
“Whenever I crouch on the floor of my bedroom, knees pressed up against my chest and enveloped in a silent embrace, I have come to imagine myself as a woman named Indah.”
For me, whenever I hug my knees, it is for comfort and warmth, to become smaller when the world feels too big. If I want to stop dreaming of toil glamour, to just be content with myself at any instant, devoid of ambitions, I tighten the grip around my knees with ears enclosed to filter the noise of the outside world. But for Indah, her hugged knees serve a practical purpose. She is cold and frail. Her rib cage penetrates her skin like daggers longing to tear through her chest. Her loose skin hangs over her elbows as she itches at her wrinkled cheek, brushing off the dusty particles that accumulated from the unsanitary cage. The surface of her hands and feet are unblemished because she neither stands to go on walks nor feel the sun’s warmth against her skin. She hugs her knees because she is socialized to feel small, while I
hug mine to exercise my freedom of wanting to feel smaller than the world I occupy. In Indah’s confinement, there are boards covering the sunlight from seeping through. The sounds of birds chirping to her feel like a mere illusion — a sound that she must use to craft an illustration of what burung serins (Indonesian serin birds) look like. Her stories of the world are finite, confined to her imagination, while mine expressively gain momentum with each step I take. There were days throughout my visit to the kampungs where I had the opportunity to see distant relatives, explore new hiking paths or simply stop by a local market to buy ingredients for a new recipe, yet chose not to out of laziness. But for Indah, those days of liberty are not even extant. They are “should-be” pages torn from the chapters of her narrative, left to burn into ashes.
I sometimes long to do nothing, to be nothing and to disappear, even when there is a world waiting for my next chapter to unravel. I want to stop writing, but there are people who do not even have the chance to pick up a pen. I want to erase previous moments of my life while there are children in pasung who wishfully yearn for the life they had before being caged. I want to have life write my story for me by steering the wheel when I yearn not to, but there are young girls like Indah who would sacrifice everything to be the writers of their own story.
Indah and I live in mirrored worlds. We are both young girls that carry dreams on our shoulders, wear our hearts on our sleeves and long to experience life-long elation. Yet, for Indah,
the opportunities for these ambitions are barricaded by things more than cages. Her goals are obstructed by people, family and a failed national health care system. In Jakarta, my resources are manifold, and I can gain access to mental health care that is not stigmatized but instead valued. I have the choice to sit in my room when I love it, and leave to a nearby ocean when I want a breath of fresh air. I can trace the footprints of my feet in the sand and feel the sun’s radiance glistening on my skin because I have the freedom to move, to be. I have the opportunity to become somebody because my parents and society never told me that I am nobody. Because my speech is neither slurred nor is my vision blurred, I am automatically perceived as “healthy.” I am not in a cage because I have feet that stride firmly, hands that draw properly and ears that hear clearly. When I press my knees against my chest, people tell me they are here for me. They tell me that things will be okay and that if the self-comfort did not work, I could always get an embrace from them. But if I am shackled to a box in this position, with arms now spotted by dust and in a body that is severely malnourished, would people still utter the words “I’m here”? Would they vanish into the vastness of the world as if I am an outcast? Would I become the physical manifestation of ostracization? Would I become an empty vessel with lost hopes, hidden dreams, an unnamed identity and unfulfilled wishes? Would my life amount to nothing? CONTINUED AT MICHIGANDAILY.COM
Courtesy of Oummu Kabba
INDIANAPOLIS — One year ago, after one of the worst seasons in program history, no one would’ve believed where the Michigan men’s basketball team is now. Five months ago, when the Wolverines started a new season under a new coach with just two regularly contributing returners, no one could’ve fathomed the outcome. Even one week ago, most would’ve doubted a turn around like Michigan pulled off. Now, the legacy has been cemented. There will forever be a 2025 Big Ten Tournament Champion banner hanging in the rafters of Crisler Center.
“I know that these guys are going to come back in 10 years and tell stories about this tournament,” Wolverines coach Dusty May said. “They’re gonna tell stories about the time we got knocked on our tails in the last three games of the regular season and how we responded. Ultimately, we’re very proud.”
But who’s to say this is the end of the road? What’s to say that May and this year’s Michigan squad can’t continue their run into the NCAA Tournament through to the beginning of April? Just by looking at the Wolverines’ last three games of the regular season compared to the three games they played in three days at the Big Ten Tournament, it’s easy to tell that Michigan looks revitalized.
The Wolverines are heating up at the right time and are entering the big dance hotter than ever. So as you fill out your bracket, don’t count them out early — because Michigan is a contender for a national championship and it should be treated that way.
“All time high man, feeling very excited,” graduate guard Nimari Burnett said about the Wolverines’ confidence. “We believe in ourselves, individually and as a team, and that we can pull off any win as long as we’re playing cohesive basketball.” Michigan has every right to feel confident right now. But that feeling wasn’t flowing through
the Wolverines’ locker room at the beginning of March. Michigan lost a demoralizing game at home on Senior Night to Illinois, it failed to comeback after a first-half beat down against Maryland and ended the season getting embarrassed on the road against its in-state rival Michigan State. A three-game stretch of bad games that, by the Wolverines’ own doing, cost them a regular-season Big Ten Championship. The demeanor of the entire season had shifted, not just in the locker room. Michigan knew that when it mattered most in the regular season, the Wolverines weren’t performing to the same standard as earlier in the season.
The
“good enough,” Michigan took the week to reignite the flame. The Wolverines were playing their best basketball in December and January. Even when things slowed down through February, though, Michigan still found ways to win. A combined 28 points was all the Wolverines needed to win nine games out of an 11-game stretch in the middle of conference play. That same spark at the turn of the calendar year and tenacity in their tough stretch provided crucial experience for the Big Ten Tournament. Taking down Purdue handily in the quarterfinal exemplified a renewed offense, like the one originally highlighted in January. Michigan then relied on key plays and players to secure
victories over Maryland and Wisconsin to bring home the hardware, the same as it did during its stretch of close games.
That experience in games that are either blowouts or close until the end is now evidence that the Wolverines can win with a title on the line, and it is all you should need to feel confident in them — the same way they do in themselves right now.
Despite the fact that Michigan is playing more together and offensively sound than it has since early January, it is considered by many to be on upset watch against UC San Diego in the first round.
People might look at the Wolverines pulling a No. 5 seed in the NCAA Tournament and raise an eyebrow after they won the conference tournament convincingly —
Rather than shying away or
ZACH EDWARDS Managing Sports Editor
Emily Alberts/DAILY Design by Lys Goldman