Biden nears victory

ELECTION EDITION Emerson College’s student newspaper since 1947 • berkeleybeacon.com

Thursday, Nov. 5, 2020 • Volume 74, Issue 10

@berkeleybeacon // @beaconupdate

BIDEN NEARS VICTORY AS CAMPUS WATCHES ON

Students on ‘pins and needles’ awaiting final tally

Mass. Election Results PRESIDENTIAL RACE

BIDEN 65.7% TRUMP 32.5%

Charlie McKenna & Dana Gerber Beacon Staff

Former Vice President Joe Biden claimed victories in several key battleground states Wednesday, laying clear his path to the presidency while narrowing the chances of incumbent President Donald Trump’s re-election.

With wins in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Arizona, according to calls by the Associated Press, Biden has now accrued 263 electoral votes, just seven votes short of victory. With the exception of Alaska, should he pick up one more of the six states yet to declare a victor, Biden would win the election.

For Trump, the path forward is bleak. At 213 electoral votes, he would need to win Georgia, Pennsylvania, Nevada, and North Carolina—all of the states still with power to influence the election.

At Emerson, the wait for results is one filled with anxiety. A palpable tension settled on the Boston campus Wednesday, with swaths of students worried but cautiously hopeful for a Biden victory.

The Democratic nominee addressed a crowd of supporters in Wilmington, Delaware Wednesday afternoon after clinching Wisconsin and narrowing races in Georgia, Nevada, and Michigan—a state he won later that evening.

Students, Pg 2

SENATE RACE

MARKEY 66.5% O’CONNOR 33.5%

Key Battleground States Results

‘Count Every Vote’ rallies sweep Boston streets

WISCONSIN

Andrew Brinker

Piano Row John Lewis mural remembers late civil right giant Pg. 7 Professor alum wins second World Series ring Pg. 8

Beacon Staff

Massachusetts voters shot down ballot question two on Tuesday, which would have implemented a ranked-choice voting system for select primary and general elections in the state beginning 2022.

Ranked-choice voting allows residents to place candidates in order of preference, with a victor being determined when a candidate reaches a majority rather than a plurality—meaning candidates would need to clear a 50% threshold, rather than simply receiving the most votes.

Voters opted not to adopt the system by a 9.2 percent margin, with 54.6 percent of voters choosing no and 45.4 voting yes. As of publication, 98 percent of precincts have reported results.

According to Fair Vote, 24 states have used ranked-choice voting to a certain degree. But Maine is the only state to adopt the voting system. The state used ranked-choice voting for the 2020 presidential election. Alaska also had a ballot measure that proposed ranked-choice voting.

Massachusetts voters who spoke to The Beacon were split on whether or not a ranked choice voting system should be Ballot Questions, Pg. 3

99% Reporting

Will peace prosper after election day in the U.S.? Pg. 5

Frankie Rowley

FLORIDA

Editorial: Six ways to keep civic engagement up Pg. 4

Mass. voters reject ranked-choice

TEXAS

Faculty members look back at Election Day four years ago Pg. 3

Downtown Boston during and after Election Day. Photos Lizzie Heintz & Domenic Conte

98% Reporting

Baker strengthens COVID-19 guidelines as cases rise in state Pg. 2

99% Reporting

INSIDE THIS EDITION

MICHIGAN

Just one day removed from the culmination of a historically divisive presidential campaign cycle, demonstrators took to the streets of Boston, demanding the proper execution of the country’s vote counting and reporting practices.

Similar rallies appeared in cities around the country Wednesday.

Hundreds of demonstrators gathered downtown around the Parkman Bandstand on Boston Common at around 3:30 p.m. to push public officials in several key battleground states to ensure that all votes cast in the slowly unfolding presidential election are counted.

In Roxbury, a crowd of a couple hundred gathered in Nubian Square to hear impassioned speeches from organizers before marching to Copley Square. There, organizers denounced the U.S. election system, saying it has disenfranchised voters in marginalized communities since its inception.

“I care that every vote gets counted,” Sarah Higginbottham of Lexington, Massachusetts said at the Common demonstration.

The rallies were a direct response to attempts from President Donald Trump and his advisors to cast doubt on the results of his yet-to-be-decided race with former Vice President Joe Biden.

Rallies, Pg. 2

100% Reporting

Beacon Staff

11/05/20 1:00 a.m. Tomás González Beacon Staff

News

The Berkeley Beacon

November 5, 2020

2

Gov. Baker tightens COVID-19 restrictions, limits capacities Charlie McKenna Beacon Staff

Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker implemented stricter restrictions for restaurants, entertainment venues, and informal gatherings Monday in an effort to slow the spread of the coronavirus as numbers see a disturbing rise statewide.

Restaurant table service, gyms, theaters, and casinos must now close at 9:30 p.m., Baker announced in a news conference at the statehouse.

The Department of Public Health is also imposing a new curfew beginning Friday, which encourages the public to remain at home between 10 p.m. and 5 a.m.

The Republican governor also implemented a new cap of 10 people on indoor gatherings. Massachusetts

previously allowed gatherings of up to 25 individuals indoors and up to 50 outdoors.

These restrictions do not affect the way Emerson runs in-person classes Baker also tightened the state’s mask mandate, now requiring anyone above age 5 to wear a face covering when in public regardless of their distance from others. The state will remain in Phase 3 of its reopening plan.

“If we don’t ramp up the fight . . . we will have a serious problem on our hands in the not-too-distant future,” Baker said. “Part of this is about messaging. We want you to go home. We don’t think shutting down our economy is the right thing to do.” charles_mckenna@emerson.edu

Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh Jakob Menendez Beacon Staff

Voters demand fair Presidential candidates in close practices in Boston rallies race two days from election Cont. from Pg. 1 Trump’s camp filed lawsuits Wednesday to stop vote counts in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Georgia.

Those lawsuits concern questions of access to observe ballot-counting centers, and false claims of widespread voter fraud in the mail-in ballot system, adopted by most states largely in response to COVID-19.

In a preface to the afternoon rally, Senator Ed Markey of Massachusetts, fresh off delivering a convincing rout of his Republican challenger, Kevin O’Connor, in Tuesday’s election, disparaged Trump on his false claims about widespread voter fraud.

“We know that Donald Trump is trying to perpetrate a lie,” he told reporters before the rally began. “That lie is that ballots are still being cast. There are no votes being cast right now. The votes are being counted. That is what Donald Trump is afraid of—that the votes are going to be counted.”

Socially distant and wearing masks, demonstrators held up “Count Every Vote” signs, calling on public officials to ensure all votes cast in the election are counted.

“I’m concerned that our president is trying to upend the process that is constitutionally dictated, and I’m furious,” Higginbottham said. “We all have to mobilize to make it really clear that we’re not going to allow that.”

Alex Kates worked at the polls in Marlborough, Mass. on Tuesday, and drove more than two hours from his home to attend Wednesday’s demonstration. He echoed Higginbottham, saying demonstrating was necessary to ensure a fair execution of election procedures.

“It’s important that this is happening in cities all over the country,” Kates said in an interview. “There needs to be enough density of people at each of the gatherings to make it make a difference.”

A heavy police presence surrounded the rally and filled the downtown area, though they never engaged with protestors. A press release from the ACLU of Massachusetts, the NAACP Boston Branch, the Indivisible Mass Coalition, and Massachusetts Peace Action—the organizers of the afternoon event—estimated more than 3,000 would attend the event, a severe overestimation.

Anna Grace, an Emerson sophomore, said she and her friend, junior Queenn McKend, heard about the rally through word of mouth on campus.

While wary of the potential risk of contracting COVID-19 in a large gath-

ering, Grace said the crowd’s efforts to keep six feet of distance made her feel comfortable attending.

“I noticed that when I was walking on the other side of the road, how spaced out everyone was,” she said.

“For the most part, everyone is masked.

I wasn’t too worried about it. If I di\\d get uncomfortable or felt uncomfortable, I would have just removed myself from the situation. But I appreciate everyone that came out today.”

The march to Copley took on a different tone. Demonstrators, while hopeful for a Biden victory, offered critiques of the current electoral system.

Flo Ugoagwu, who stood in the crowd observing, held a sign that read “Democracy requires a whole new system.”

“Whatever the result, there’s still a lot of work that needs to be done in changing things for the better,” Ugoagwu said as a news helicopter buzzed overhead. “So coming out here is a good opportunity to build the community and hear from other people. It’s a little cathartic, too, after being stuck home watching everything for a couple days.”

Joe T., an organizer with the Party for Socialism and Liberation, said he organized protests throughout the summer over the police killings of Black people across the U.S. The incumbent president’s lawsuits and campaign against mail-in voting are part of an effort to disenfranchise minority voices, he said.

“We see Donald Trump right now trying to claim that there’s massive voter fraud,” he said. “But it’s people who live in cities—predominantly Black- and brown-dominant cities—that are trying to exercise their very very basic rights. And we demand that those rights be respected.”

The current electoral system, he said, must be replaced. He said he plans to continue protesting and hopes that more will take to the streets in the coming weeks. “We want to say that voter disenfranchisement is part of a war on Black America, and it needs to be combated by an entirely new system,” he said. “We’re in the streets demanding a system that represents all working and oppressed people. Because we’ve seen that the current system can only exploit and oppress us.”

Charlie McKenna and Diti Kohli contributed reporting. andrew_brinker@emerson.edu

Cont. from Pg. 1 “I am here to report that when the count is finished we believe we will be the winners,” he said.

Trump, who delivered a speech to supporters around 2 a.m. Wednesday, filed lawsuits later that day in Pennsylvania, Georgia, and Michigan, calling to temporarily halt ballot counting amid demands of increased campaign access to polling locations in the crucial jurisdictions, and disputes about the handling of absentee ballots.

“Our lawyers have asked for ‘meaningful access,’ but what good does that do?” Trump tweeted Wednesday evening. “The damage has already been done to the integrity of our system, and to the Presidential Election itself. This is what should be discussed!”

Trump has railed against mail-in ballots for months, repeatedly, and falsely suggesting they would lead to widespread voter fraud. There is no evidence to support those claims.

First-year Sara Valentine said she’d been on “pins and needles” the whole day and hadn’t checked the election results since this morning. Valentine, who voted for Biden in her home state of Texas, did not attend her scheduled Zoom class this morning.

“I did not make it out of bed,” she said. “I would feel almost better if we had an outcome, but we’re not going to have that for a couple days. So it’s just waiting, and waiting is the worst part.”

While sitting in the 2B alley at 5 p.m. eating a quesadilla—her first meal of the day—she said she was coping with the news by trying to distract herself.

“It’s been a lot of talking to friends, a lot of trying to listen to music and block everything out,” she said. “This is the first time I’ve left the [Little] Building.”

Jayson Zwahlen, a first-year sitting with Valentine, was half-listening to a Zoom class on his phone.

“The vibe in the class right now is very exhausted,” Zwahlen said.

“Nobody got any sleep last night. Everybody’s not really focused, as they would be normally.”

Zwahlen added that he was cautiously confident that Biden would emerge victorious, especially because outstanding mail-in ballots are expected to lean overwhelmingly blue.

“I was surprised to see that Biden was leading anyways for most of it,” he said. “Trump’s still very close as of the last time I checked. But I haven’t been feeling too worried about it, but it’s still creeping up on me.”

Emerson extended its decision to hold all in-person classes online and limit campus access after 6 p.m. through

Polls in Chinatown on Election Day. Hongyu Liu Beacon Staff Thursday, as administrators braced for civil unrest in the downtown area.

Many of the college’s public facing buildings are boarded up, and local businesses followed suit.

First-year Caden Rodems-Boyd said he wasn’t sure if he would end up participating in any demonstrations that may take place.

“It is definitely weird to see places boarded up,” he said. “We’re all anticipating mass civil unrest, but honestly, for me it almost doesn’t feel as significant. It kind of pales in comparison to what’s actually at stake, and the anxiety that I’m feeling about a million other things.”

Rodems-Boyd added that demonstrations are an understandable reaction to the fear and concern enveloping this election.

“Reasonably, it’s some people’s way of articulating their powerlessness and frustration after their voting is said and done,” he said. “I have spent virtually all of my time either talking to my mom, my sister or my friends, and having people around, whether you’re being miserable together or whatever the case may be, is so helpful. And, in a more macrocosm way, mass demonstrations and civil disobedience may even be a broader example of that support network.”

Charlie Mahoney, who was sporting a Bernie Sanders button outside the Dining Center Wednesday afternoon, said he was more concerned about the ensuing months after the election than the results themselves.

“I personally don’t think the election was the hard part,” he said.

Zwahlen said that he’s been trying to stay off of Instagram leading up to the election, but is concerned for the safety of the downtown area residents if Trump were to lose.

“Somebody said, ‘Don’t go to the Boston Common,’” he said. “Seeing as that’s literally right across from where I live—can get a good view of it—that’s scary, to say the least.”

Allison Valton, who is the co-president of The Communication, Politics, and Law Association, which hosted a results watch party last night over Zoom, said she’s been surprised by the slow trickle of numbers last night and today.

“Everybody in the call, including the professors, were like, ‘Okay, we should know by midnight,’ and then 11:30 crept around, and we were like ‘Oh my gosh, this is really slow,’” she said. “We kind of expected to know more.”

Junior Lee Forrest said they felt encouraged by some of the victories by LGBTQ+ politicians last night, such as Deleware’s Sarah Bride, the country’s first transgender state senator.

“I am, in a strange way, hopeful because I know that a lot of the work that needs to be done to further protect LGBTQ+ people will not automatically happen based on who wins the election,” they said. “This work is going to take a lot of organizing that will continue, no matter who wins the electoral college vote.”

Junior Owen Tambor, who called Trump “a little bit fascist,” said the president’s early claim to victory of several undecided states was the most troubling development of the day. Tambor said he’s not a staunch Democrat but still wanted to see Trump voted out.

“Last night I was more anxious, today I’m better,” he said. “I don’t want it to be blue all the time, but I just don’t like Trump.”

Eric Toalson, a sophomore hoping for Biden victory, said the results that came in throughout the day brightened his spirits after initial returns showed Trump with a lead.

“As of right now, I’m feeling very optimistic,” he said.

Diana Bravo and Karli Wallace contributed reporting.

contact@berkeleybeacon.com

The Berkeley Beacon

November 5, 2020

3

Professors recall ‘grim’ day on campus after 2016 election Charlie McKenna & Dana Gerber Beacon Staff

Mark Leccese never opened his briefcase for class on Nov. 9, 2016.

That day—just after Donald Trump’s election to the U.S. presidency in 2016—a campus mourned.

“The day after the election in 2016 the mood on campus was grim,” Leccese, a journalism professor, said in a phone interview. “When I walked into the classroom, I realized there was no way that I was going to have the class I prepared. Just one look at the faces of everyone in the room, people were in tears.”

In lieu of a lecture, Leccese simply talked to his students and opened the floor for them to vent. “[I] just took a chair and turned it around and sat down and said to the students, ‘Well do you want to talk about this?’ and they said no so I said ‘alright, well, I’ll talk about it,” he said. “It took 20 or 25 minutes and then finally someone spoke up, and now everybody was talking.”

Now as the nation anxiously awaits poll returns for the 2020 election, memories of the last election and the pain it brought the Emerson community loom large for professors who taught on the Boston campus in 2016.

Political Science Professor Mneesha Gellman, who led “Human Rights” and “The U.S. and Latin America” in fall 2016, recalled both the mass demonstration that students joined on Boston Common that week and the devastation in her classroom that Thursday.

“I had two young women in one of my classes, one of whom had been an ardent Bernie supporter, the other had been an ardent Clinton supporter, and I remember coming into class and both of them crying,” she said Trump’s victory coming on the heels of the liberal Obama administration made the feeling of shock in 2016 all the more intense for students, Gellman said.

“The feeling of surprise that happened this time four years ago was palpable,” she said. “People weren’t starting from the same traumatic place on elec-

tion night that they are today.”

Gellman added that while students in her classes this semester have chatted about voting plans and remain hopeful for a Democratic win, the past four years have proven to be mentally taxing.

“It was traumatic for students then,” she said, “But we didn’t even know the half of it in 2016.”

Communications professor Vincent Raynauld said the mood on election night shifted drastically as results poured in.

“Right away you saw students at first say ‘Oh well, she’s going to pull a win in other states. and things are gonna change,’” he said. “But as the night progressed and as we saw Trump was winning more and more states, people were in denial, obviously, and shock. Towards the end of the night, it was consternation.”

Raynauld, who flew to Europe the next morning, said Boston’s Logan airport was a ghost town.

“I’ve rarely seen the Boston airport that quiet in my life,” he said. “Usually it’s bustling, there’s a ton of people, it’s always noisy…[But] it was eerily quiet, people were looking at the ground, people were not talking” Leccese, who spent most of his career as a political reporter for various Boston publications, said the results hit students who voted in 2016 for the first time the hardest.

“I’m going into a classroom full of college students, and with very few exceptions they’ve all just voted for the first time,” he said. “I think it hit young people particularly hard.”

The reaction on campus to the 2016 election stood in stark contrast to the 2008 election when Barack Obama was elected president for the first time, Leccese said. Then students flooded Boston Common and Copley Square in celebration instead of anguish.

“When the results came in…college students went out to celebrate like you do when your team wins the championship,” he said. “None of the TV stations had crews there because no one had seen this before.”

Leccese said the results of the election coincided with an increase in the num-

Emerson studens marched against Trump after his election in 2016. Beacon Archives ber of students enrolling in the journalism major. Three hundred thirty four students enrolled in the college’s journalism program in 2015. But by 2017, that number rose to 389. In his public affairs course, Lecesse said half of the students in the class wanted to cover politics and government, whereas prior to 2016, only a few students per class expressed interest.

“The increase in interest in political reporting just shot up among students,” he said. “The 2016 election seems to have created a real interest in young people in journalism and in public affairs journalism.”

Director of Emerson Polling Spencer Kimball spent election night in 2016 with one of the college’s student-run TV stations, WEBN, offering live commentary as results streamed in from states around the country.

“We’re in the show and we’re watching the returns and it’s about 10 o’clock and we see Florida and the panhandle comes in and Pennsylvania comes in and…it was pretty emotional,” he said.

“Our polling students down in the suite [were] looking at the numbers and look-

‘The feeling of surprise that happened this time four years ago was palpable’ Professor Mneesha Gellman

ing at the board and when they realized that things were coming in differently than expected, you could feel that emotion.”

Kimball, whose Road to the White House course met at 10 a.m. the next morning, said he could see the shock on students’ faces in class.

“To be honest, it took like six months to come back and study the election and understand what happened,” he said.

As results roll in, Raynauld said this week has been the culmination of four years of anxiety.

“Everybody is on edge there’s a lot of things that rightfully should get us on edge but there’s things that should not get us on edge,” he said. “I think it’s important for everybody to take a deep breath and really let the process unfold.”

Kimball predicted that Election Day would be particularly distressing for students.

“Regardless of what polls say, or who you voted for… here, we don’t know so we’re certainly going to have some anxiety going into election night,” he said. contact@berkeleybeacon.com

Ballot question two on ranked-choice fails with voters Cont. from Pg. 1 “I did disagree with the current plan for ranked choice voting,” Anais Abrego, a first year student, said. “I disagreed with the fact that after the last person got the least amount of votes, those votes would be reallocated to the second to last person. The whole plan for ranked-choice voting was to eliminate or try to eliminate the spoiler effect and give the voter more of a voice. However, reallocating those votes seems like it’s limiting that voter’s voice.”

Patrick Pierce, a sophomore writing, literature and publishing major, said he voted for question two. He said he felt it was a way to shift away from a two-party system.

“I voted yes on question two,” Pierce said. “I think it’s a very good thing. I believe that’s like a way to expand a person’s voting rights. You don’t really lose anything by doing rank choice voting, you essentially just gain quite a bit.” “In our two-party system, where people more often have to compromise their views and their ideal candidate in the name of going with a candidate that they think is most likely to win, I think rankedchoice voting gives a good alternative for that.”

Pierce said the ballot question was a key motivator for him to vote this year.

“I’d say it was one of the main reasons why [I voted],” he said. “In Massachusetts, the general election won’t be close. For the most part, most local elections are going blue.”

Massachusetts voted decisively in favor of former Vice President Joe

Biden, with 65.7 percent of votes in the state going to Biden, and just 32.5 percent of votes going to President Trump.

For Abrego, the state’s proposed ranked-choice system needs revisions to make it clearer. She also said the proposed system wasn’t explained well to voters.

“I want to see a ranked-choice voting system that didn’t reallocate the votes automatically because it sort of goes against the voter’s free will to me,” Abrego said. “I know that people also had a problem with the setup being confusing. It would harm voters who already have trouble at the polls, for example, voters that don’t speak English, those with learning disabilities or the elderly, because it was never really explained in a way that made sense.”

Pierce too voiced concern about the lack of information made available to voters about question two, especially in comparison to ballot question one, which outlines the “right to repair law.”

That law allows car owners to have access to and share vehicle operation data with independent repair shops and passed after 74.9 percent of voters selected yes.

“I feel like there was really no campaign behind the ranked choice voting,” Pierce said. “It’s a stark contrast of what you saw with question one, where there were ads everywhere...I feel like a lot of younger voters know what [the question] is, but the people who are [campaigning for ranked-choice voting] have to work on their outreach towards more middle-aged and older voters.”

Although only 45.4 percent of the

Massachusetts vote approved of a ranked-choice system, Pierce said it would benefit all voters and is becoming increasingly important for those who vote for third-party candidates.

“Giving people more options is always going to be a good thing,” Pierce said. “In our two-party system, where people more often have to compromise their views and their ideal candidate in the name of going with a candidate that they think is most likely to win, I think ranked-choice voting gives a good alternative for that, where you can pick your ideal candidate.” frankie_rowley@emerson.edu

Mass. Governor Charlie Baker (top) and Anais Abrego (bottom)

The Berkeley Beacon

November 5, 2020

4

Opinion

Thoughts on the Presidential Race

Six ways to keep up civic enagagement Editorial The election may be over, but our job as students, citizens, and politically engaged people is not.

In fact, voting during a presidential election year is the bare minimum. It’s important to keep fighting for our principles and beliefs regardless of who the people in power are when the dust settles this week. The 2016 election forced us to draw the direct line between politics and our lives if we hadn’t already.

Here are just a few things you can do to stay civically engaged until and after Inauguration Day: 1. Vote in local and state elections Legislations far smaller than the executive office decide the fate of ballot propositions and laws that impact the ins and outs of our lives, like taxes and abortion. Democracy doesn’t start and end at the White House. So it’s unacceptable that so many of us pat ourselves on the back for casting our ballot for president and then find excuses not to research city councilors, mayors, state senators, and the like.

More often than not; these next few years, Joe Biden or Donald Trump will not be directly responsible for your individual rights. But local legislators will be.

2. Organize and attend If you’ve shown up for demonstrations and rallies these past few months, good. It doesn’t end there. It’s time to keep supporting movements that align with your values. These coming months, respond “yes” to the Facebook events you see popping up online. Volunteer to make signs and give out water at protests. Share information with your family, friends, and peers. Write about it. Read about it.

3. Donate to causes working to help underrepresented communities If you don’t have the time or ability to physically show up, you can always financially support causes that do. Giving money to mutual aid networks, civil rights organizations, LGBTQ rights, climate change charities, and campaigns are all great ways to be involved. In Boston, Black Boston 2020, ACLU Massachusetts, and Dorchester Art Project are just three of many, many places that would put your money to good use.

4. Join the Boston Intercollegiate Government (BIG) Founded nearly two decades ago, the BIG is a student-led governance organization of the Greater Boston Area that advocates for student inter-

© 2020 The Berkeley Beacon. All rights reserved.

The Beacon is published weekly. The Beacon receives funding from the Student Government Association of Emerson College.

(617) 824–8687 berkeleybeacon.com contact@berkeleybeacon.com 172 Tremont St., Boston, MA 02116

ests on local, state, and federal levels.

During this year’s election season, the organization invited guest speakers, including U.S. Senator Ed Markey, to discuss the issues impacting youth voters. You can connect with the group, join the conversations, and continue to safeguard student-representative democracy.

5. Use social media to raise political awareness Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat are necessary evils at this point.

But that doesn’t mean they can’t also be used for good. These last few years, social media evolved into a major influence over young voters, who use platforms to voice dissent. One study at Tufts University showed that using social media to engage in politics and civic conversations online translated to offline activism during the 2018 midterm elections. Many have posted or shared petitions and initiatives on social media to support the Black Lives Matter movement across the country. Beyond this year’s election, if young people continue to use Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and Snapchat to promote initiatives, the surge to make other youth politically aware will come as a result.

6. Vote in SGA elections Participating in the SGA election season is one way to let the candidates know the issues you care about at Emerson and how they can make positive impacts on student life and the school community. When election season rolls around on campus, pay attention to student campaigns in order to help elect the student leaders who will promote key values you believe in. SGA members may not have the easiest path towards changing college policy, but they handle enough money and represent students enough to deserve broad voting support from those they look out for.

The election is a reminder that we are still part of the community.

It’s easy to feel powerless thinking about what will come of the next four years, but it will feel even more hopeless if we don’t help to create the changes we want. Stay safe and healthy, and do what we can do after the presidential election and beyond.

This editorial was written by the Beacon’s editor-in-chief, managing editors, and opinion editors. The opinions expressed

Illustration Joshua Sun

For an international student, this election sparks fear Jocelyn Yang Beacon Staff

This article reflects the views of the writer on Election Day, Nov. 3.

Tags related to America have only trended once a while on the Chinese Twitter-like social media platform Weibo since the pandemic began.

I remember seeing trending terms like “U.S. COVID-19 cases climb,” “Trump blamed China for coronavirus outbreak,” “Trump tested COVID-19 positive,” and now the U.S. presidential election.

Growing up in a country that limits domestic political conversations, I’m often surprised to see how people in China closely pay close attention to U.S. political news. My parents, too, are watching this election while working during the day in Beijing.

They want to know who gets elected and what their policies for international students look like. And so do I. Anxiousness and uncertain feelings have bugged me. I can hardly sleep after seeing the projected results come out after election night. Standing at the intersection at this historic moment, I feel like I can’t pursue my

future plan the way I wanted.

From one side, the study abroad experience has enhanced my global social awareness. Through classroom learning and daily conversations with friends, I have been able to reflect on social justice and civil rights. I deeply care about climate change and have learned more about environmental issues because of my time in the U.S. But all of the proactive changes I wish to make come along with one obstacle: my time as an international student studying in the U.S. is dependent on someone else’s vote.

Many other international students may feel the same as well. In the past four years, Trump’s administration had repeatedly angled to restrict international students, including the recent DHS proposed rule to eliminate “duration of status” that may affect many students’ visa status. Many of my international friends who come to study in the U.S. have decided to take a gap year or transfer to schools in other countries because of the tougher policies against international students. The Trump administration’s unwelcome attitude towards international students and handling of COVID-19 has driven some of my friends and other international stu-

dents out of the country. According to The Washington Post, Studyportals has tracked a 45 percent drop in interest for international students studying in the United States among its site users year-on-year, largely due to the growing number of COVID-19 cases in the U.S. All of this frustrates me.

When it comes to the election, according to an online poll conducted

by Erudera College News, 71.1 percent of international students in the U.S. prefer Biden over Trump. This preference may or may not be the same for American voters’, as we’re still waiting to see the results. Today, tomorrow, or the next week or so, people across the world watch this presidential race and wonder how the election results would possibly shape the international landscape.

My mom texted me around midnight of election day, when I finished my first draft of this piece, after Trump just won Florida and Ohio.

She asked me “How I’m holding up?” I sipped some water and took a deep breath. I don’t know what will happen. I keep my faith in the heart, so are many international students who are watching. jiaxuan_yang@emerson.edu

by the Editorial Board do not impact the paper’s coverage.

Editor-in-Chief Diti Kohli Managing Editors Domenico Conte (Content) Tomás González (Visual) Dylan Rossiter (Operations) Section Editors Andrew Brinker (News) Taina Millsap (Living Arts) Jocelyn Yang (Opinion) Christopher Williams (Sports) Lizzie Heintz (Photo) Advisor Rachel Layne

How Emerson students watched the election results Joseph Ploscowe

The Berkeley Beacon

November 5, 2020

5

Watching the U.S. Election from the Dominican Republic Shannon Garrido Beacon Staff

Tension is in the air on Election Day. Even across the world, people are anxious to know what lies ahead for the United States and how it will affect them for the next four years.

Here in the Dominican Republic, where I have lived my entire life and am currently quarantining, the atmosphere hours before the election feels desperate at best. People who normally laugh at the proceedings of American politics now hastily look at the polls.

With the country’s new president, Luis Abinader, there have been several public endorsements for the Trump administration. After current business deals between the Trump organization and Dominican resorts and Abinader hiring Trump’s private lawyer Rudy Guiliani, support for the president surfaced. Recently, someone put up a sign on a well-known avenue in the capital Santo Domingo that reads “Dominicans Stand with Trump”.

But there is a much more fundamental feature to Trump’s support amongst Hispanic and Latinos in general, and that is his appeal towards men. Of the 30 percent of eligible Hispanic voters who say they support him, 42 percent are men. His macho appeal and “unapologetic nature” are seen as a sign of strength and superiority amongst this demographic.

“To them, the macho allure of Mr. Trump is undeniable,” according to a New York Times’s story that covers Hispanic males and their support of Trump.

His forceful nature makes him seem invincible, and to many of these men, his stance on the COVID-19 and his disdain

for masks resemble his “toughness”.

Many Dominican men who reside in the DR believe the current president benefited the country immensely. Management consultant and public policy expert Jonathan D’Oleo publicly announced his support for the current president in August of this year. In the well known Dominican paper “Listin Diario,” D’Oleo proclaimed that Trump is a friend to Latinos who “once crossed the border in search of a system of law and order where faith and family are protected and respected as the bulwarks of society,” and that he has done more for the Dominican economy than any other U.S. presidents in history.

For Hispanic men who support Trump in the states, there are shared traits. They are proficient English speakers, they share similar economic ideals that include record unemployment and entrepreneurship, and they consume the same kind of media.

Many of these men do not want to see themselves as oppressed or pitied, and advertisements from Biden’s campaign that focus heavily on the way the Trump administration has targeted Latinos do not resonate with them. Similarly, it’s been noted in a survey conducted by the Times, that Hispanic men “are more likely to prioritize jobs and the economy and less likely to be concerned about immigration and racism.” NBC News finds that Latinos who witnessed economic oppression in Latin American countries especially find comfort in Trump’s economic rhetoric. This mentality can seep through in the Dominican Republic where more than a third of the population lives on less than $1.25 a day.

Virgilio Vidal, a Dominican resident and owner of the restaurant “Don Pinchos,” supports Trump’s reelection.

When I had a conversation with him, he

said, “First, because I am naturally conservative, second because as a Dominican, I face the same thing as the Americans with Mexico, with Haiti. If I said otherwise, I would be lying.”

Vidal is referring to Trump’s tough approach on undocumented immigration, and how, according to him, Trump’s campaign advocates for “nationalism and sovereignty”—two qualities he values.

The Dominican Republic has a long history of systemic racism divided between “anti-Haitians” and “pro-Haitians.” Many Haitians migrate to the Dominican Republic to escape poverty in Haiti, where in 2003 alone 80 percent of all Haitians were impoverished. After the 2010 earthquake struck Haiti, the number of immigrants doubled to two million, most of whom illegally crossed after the border opened for international aid.

In 2013, the Dominican State invalidated the immigration status of hundreds of thousands of Haitians and set a deadline on June 17, 2015 for affected people to leave the Dominican Republic. In addition, nighttime “bandits” started threatening them with violence and deportation. Since then our country has seen much debate on how the immigration process should be handled and has led many Dominicans to “admire” the current US administration’s stance on immigration.

According to Vidal, before the pandemic, the U.S. had the best economic period under Trump’s leadership it had seen in ages.

I wondered as to whether racist rhetoric mattered to him or even held weight when discussing the economy. Without hesitation, he said, “No.” Vidal’s wife, who sat next to him, wondered whether the rumors of

Illustration Joshua Sun

Trump’s pedophilic acts or his treatment of women had any factor in his opinions. Vidal simply stated that while he did not agree with those sentiments, it doesn’t change his opinion on the Trump administration.

For Hispanic men who support Trump’s presidency, his rhetoric can be a main contributor to this decision because it resembles power and strength.

But for others, it’s not about who he is but what he represents.

For a lot of Hispanic male Trump supporters, it’s easy to overlook his xenophobic or racist comments because they put more weight on the economy.

And if you’re a native in a country like the Dominican Republic, chances are his immigration policies agree with you. Overall, Latino and Hispanic men who are eligible to vote in the U.S. have more say on the outcome of this election, but sometimes their opinions

cross borders.

A record 32 million Hispanics are projected to be eligible to vote in 2020, making up 13 percent of all the country. In an earlier survey this summer, Latino voters said the economy, health care and the coronavirus outbreak were three of the most important issues on their ballot.

Only about three in 10 Latino voters say they are confident that Trump can handle the health impact of the coronavirus outbreak, but 44 percent are confident that Trump can make good decisions about economic policy. Hispanic male voters have a more positive view of the nation’s economy than Hispanic women voters, 34 percent versus 23 percent. But one thing is certain: Latino voters are ‘fearful’ about the state of the nation. shannon_garrido@emerson.edu

Will there be massive violence after Election Day? Claire Rodenbush

Beacon Correspondent While I am cautiously optimistic about the outcome of this year’s election, I am not optimistic about the potential fallout. No matter what the results are, a lot of heavily-armed people may be really angry, and anger plus ammunition is not a good combination.

From watching the news or even looking outside, a conflict seems inevitable. Political polarization is up, gun and ammunition sales have spiked, killers like Kyle Rittenhouse are being made a hero by the far-right, and protests have been ongoing since June. Police continue to kill unarmed Black people in the street, and our institutions are being sabotaged from the inside. Armed far-right militias patrol U.S. streets and groups like the Boogaloo Boys and Atomwaffen have been rooting for and plotting the collapse of society in order to usher in a white ethno-state. This leads me to believe the probability of an American civil war is not unlikely.

A civil war can be defined as when two or more groups of people with political differences start to kill each other with weapons. Firearms are now more evenly distributed now than they were just a year ago. This can mean two things. One possibility, of course, with a greater number of guns in the hands of a violent far-right, in combination with the furthering political divide, is an increase in domestic terror.

White supremacists were responsible for the majority of US domestic terror attacks in 2020, with only one attack being perpetrated by a self-described “anti-fascist.” Said attack was the first killing in the US linked to an antifascist in 25 years. The point is that the American far-right is violent, has been violent for years, and will continue to be violent for years to come.

Illustration Joshua Sun

However, the threat of violence from an insurgent group against a dominant group puts the dominant group’s power in check. With more guns in the possession of the left, the right may be deterred from carrying out acts of violence. This is mutually assured destruction on a smaller scale.

While mutually assured destruction is not a policy I’d advocate for under any circumstance, one cannot deny that when it was last put into practice, the world did not face nuclear war. While armed far-right militias and “lone gunmen” have carried out shootings at protests, the lack of an organized follow-up of mass violence could be due in part to the fact that violence is no longer one-sided.

There is a left-wing resistance, and they are not afraid to speak the language of violence. The threat of violence itself is a potential deterrent. These far-right wingers who have a motive to kill their political enemies know that there is a significant risk that they too may die–and

they’re not willing to. But as we’ve seen in the past with the likes of Timothy McVeigh, perpetrator of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, maybe that person willing to die just hasn’t come around yet.

The question raised in the title of this piece is one that is almost unanswerable, and that is due in part to the fact that everything is on the line. In four years, everything will be on the line again, because our democracy is so fragile that everything is always on the line. And when everything is always on the line, the line is pulled so tautly that eventually it’ll snap.

One thing I notice that is different about America now compared to other countries that have been plagued by civil war in the past is that there is a not an insignificant number of Americans who believe that civil war is a very real possibility. They see the threat and see it coming, and this awareness is something unique. But much like how the increased presence of firearms could both deter violence

or catapult us towards it, the increased awareness of tragedy in America can lead to desensitization.

It’s incredibly easy for the majority of Americans to separate themselves from an imminent threat and carry on living life as normal. In Portland, Oregon, bars remain open while fascists and antifascists clash in the streets.

Another way to look at it is through the lens of what I call “the brunch problem.” There’s a certain allure to the idea of “returning to normalcy.”

In the midst of a pandemic and rising social unrest, those who had the privilege of ignoring politics want nothing more than to be able to get away with it again, to the point of such a fantasy being Biden’s main campaign promise. People want normalcy in a country where “normal” is a problem. Those who want to be able to ignore politics because political unrest does not directly affect them, and instead go back to eating brunch.

According to BuzzFeed’s Peter Aldhous, “the nation will still be a

powder keg that is waiting to blow, even if a Biden landslide means that Trump has little choice but to step aside.” A Biden victory is not the be-all, end-all. If you look at other countries who’ve had civil wars, they are generally much more economically unstable. And while America is a wealthy country on paper, it’s a wealthy country with a lot of poor people, ridden with income inequality, made only worse when the rich get richer and do everything in their power to ensure the poor get poorer.

To put it simply, America was broken under every president, and it will continue to be broken under either Trump or Biden. A Democratic president isn’t going to be the solution to years of systemic failings on behalf of the government. The government hasn’t taken care of its people, and its people do not trust it. You can’t compare America to other countries, because the circumstances that could lead to a second American civil war are uniquely rooted in our history.

A modern American civil war isn’t going to look like a stereotypical war.

It isn’t going to be one army versus another. It’s going to be an amplification of what we’ve already seen in these past few months. Imagine the Rittenhouse shooting, but with a higher body count, happening somewhere every week, and involving exchanges of fire between multiple nonstate groups. According to Bellingcat’s Robert Evans, that’s the second American civil war.

However, such a thing is preventable. I assume most people don’t want to die, and most people don’t want a civil war. As awareness of the possibility rises, the chance for a de-escalation of the threat comes with it. So, will we see a second American Civil War? I don’t know, and none of us will until it happens. claire_rodenbush@emerson.edu

The Berkeley Beacon

Living Arts

November 5, 2020

6

4 resources to help with election-induced stress As the country awaits remaining election results, political anxiety is much higher than previous elections—up 25 percent compared to the 2016 general election.

Elizabeth Pine. Courtesy

Lucia Thorne Beacon Staff

Community Ambassador Elizabeth Pine hosted an Election Day Decompression Zoom Tuesday night from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.

“I wanted to create a space of essentially escapism just for a moment,” Pine said in a phone interview. “For myself personally, I’m gonna need a decompression space. So I thought I might want to extend that out to the student body in general.”

Pine chose the stress-relieving activities based on what she felt was needed for the most relaxing event possible. Pine decided chatting and playing Among Us fit the mood of the call.

“It’s just gonna be games of some sort, just funny goofy games or a guided meditation or origami,” Pine said. “I’m going to be reading the room and trying to gauge what people need. I wanna be able to provide what anyone needs if they come through the Zoom door, as it were.”

Community Ambassadors and Off-Campus Student Services, who mainly help students transition from on-campus to off-campus living, hosted the event, which was open to everyone.

“I hope that everyone stays informed to a healthy extent as it pertains to them, and that everyone is minding their emotional limits and recognizing that it’s not a bad thing,” Pine said. “If you need to step away for a moment and take a deep breath.”

Emerson Counseling and Psychological Services recommended Monday that students create a “self-care tool box.” Staff Psychologist and Outreach Coordinator Kyle Rundles, who co-hosted the Zoom event, said creating a tool box of alternative coping techniques can help when you are unable to access usual coping skills like socially gathering with loved ones.

“Sometimes it’s helpful to have these items already gathered in a specific place that you can go to,” Rundles said in a phone interview. “If you feel particularly distressed, you can go to this one place, rather than having to remember a lot of different things or ways of coping, to remind you of coping strategies that you have or that would put you in contact with some of these things that bring you joy or comfort.”

The tool box includesf lists of words of affirmation, coping skills, ways to connect with loved ones, as well as photos of loved ones, reminders to listen to music playlists, an object that inspires you, and your favorite snacks or teas.

ECAPS held a similar event during freshman orientation this year, and Rundles said they will do similar activities in the future.

Rundles also said ECAPS collaborates with other departments likes Intercultural Student Affairs and Center for Spiritual Life on campus through social media using #mindbodysouljustice, where you can find posts leading to different mental health resources.

ECAPS offers free and confidential individual, couple, and group therapy, as well as workshops and consultations.

The Healing and Advocacy Collective is a counseling service at Emerson that came into existence as a result of student activism. The Collective is a part of the Social Justice Center and addresses the connection between power-based interpersonal violence and structural oppression.

Director of Healing and Advocacy Collective Melanie Matson said the Collective will be available to those who need help, but their approach to mental health help during the election is to “reach out” if you need it, in order to avoid bringing up trauma for those who aren’t ready to discuss it.

Matson said this is due to power-based interpersonal violence and the ways that this can play into the election for some.

“We recognize that for some folks, with the election, it might be bringing [trauma] up,” Matson said in a phone interview.

They described the ways in which the election may bring up those painful memories and feelings because the government can mirror the interpersonal violence one has experienced.

“Within a community, there are various ways that power-based interpersonal violence can play out,” Matson said. “One person or a group of persons uses a pattern of conduct to seek power and control over another person or persons, which is also what we see playing out with the state and governments in trying to control people whether its with laws and policies, how resources are distributed or can be accessed.”

Reaching out the Healing and Advocacy Collective is always welcome, Matson said, and you can find self care tips from them on their website.

“Wisdom Wednesday” is a guided meditation held each week by the Center for Spiritual Life over Zoom. This week, the meditation will focus on relaxing after a stressful election.

Director of Religious and Spiritual Life & Campus Chaplain Rev. Julie Avis Rogers said in an emailed statement that the meditation sessions often focus on current themes or events that have an emotional impact on the community. Recent “Wisdom Wednesday” sessions have focused on the deaths of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg and civil rights leaders CT Vivian and John Lewis. This focus on the election fits within our tradition of paying close attention to themes that are important in the community,” Rogers said in the email. “But more specifically, it felt important to acknowledge that many in our Emerson community may feel an extra need for community, grounding, and care this week.”

Rogers also said that there will be two more post-election meditations held from 11:30 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. on Thursday and Friday. These meditations will be similar in structure to the center’s regularly scheduled meditations, but they will feature an election-centric mindset.

“The difference will be that I’ll lead us through guided meditations that specifically speak to our current moment and the needs of our community as we make our way through election week,” Rogers said in the email.

You can RSVP to the event on EmConnect. lucia_thorne@emerson.edu

Emo never dies: The Black Parade keeps marching on

Kaitlyn Fehr Beacon Correspondent This October, I celebrated the birthday of an emo icon. My Chemical Romance’s third album, The Black Parade, officially turned 14 years old in October 2020, meaning the album beloved by angsty teenagers everywhere is old enough to be an angsty teenager in its own right.

Even though most of the angsty teenagers and preteens who listened to My Chemical Romance during the band’s prime have grown up and likely moved out of their emo phases by now, The Black Parade remains an important album in the hearts of countless (former) emos.

Despite the fact that I always call myself emo trash, I went through a long period of time after MCR broke up where I didn’t listen to any of MCR’s music. That was until they announced their reunion tour almost a year ago today. The news shocked former emo kids everywhere.

I wasn’t able to attend their first reunion performance in Los Angeles during December 2019, but the announcement of the band’s reunion and eventual tour threw me head-first back into my emo phase. For the first time since middle school, I sat in my room and listened to their albums on repeat, digging into their backstories and absorbing the lyrics.

Now in 2020, as the album’s birthday passes, I find myself listening to The Black Parade once again. Everything about my life is different from when I first listened to the album as ayoung teen—but at the same time, so much is the same. No, I’m not a depressed 13-year-old with no friends, but I am a stressed out college student living through a global pandemic and the most important election in U.S. history. Just like in 2013, MCR’s iconic album is guiding me through the world at a time when I need help to get through it all.

Whenever I want to escape from the world, now and in 2013, The Black Parade offers me a different world to run to for the 51 minute and 53 second run time. Between the lyrics and the beautiful story that unfolds over the course of 14 songs, I can forget who I am. I come out on the other side of the album with its final words “I am not afraid to keep on living/I am not afraid to walk this world alone,” ringing in my ears. The lyrics give me the encouragement I need to keep marching on.

In “Welcome to the Black Parade,” their top song with more than 370 million streams on Spotify, lead singer Gerard Way asks,“Son, when you grow up would you be / The savior of the broken, the beaten and the damned?”

Even though Gerard is talking about a character in this line, for former emo kids like myself, MCR became the saviors that we needed to get through rough times. As Paper Magazine wrote in 2019, “MCR’s music was and is a lifeline for teenagers and adults struggling with their mental health.”

For a long time, the opening G note, played on the piano in “Welcome to the Black Parade,” was

enough to send former emo kids crying in despair over the fact that MCR broke up. Now that most of us are older, and MCR is back together again, the G note, and the album itself, represent hope. For most of my life, I could never picture a future where I lived past 16, it just didn’t seem possible to me. Today, at twenty years old, hearing that infamous note reminds me that I survived, and that as the song says, “We’ll carry on.”

Even if you personally never fell into an emo phase, there’s still a good chance that you have The Black Parade to thank for the music you listen to today. From rock music, to rap and pop, MCR has infiltrated the music industry. The Black Parade is now certified triple-platinum, and as MCR’s best known album, it’s arguably the album that served as a top influence for future generations of musicians.

In the alternative scene, bands and musicians like Twenty One Pilots, Lil Peep, and Palaye Royale have all expressed love for MCR. Both Twenty One Pilots and Palaye Royale, an upand-coming rock band, have covered MCR songs on stage, and the musical influence of The Black Parade shows in many of their songs.

MCR’s influence even seeped into rap, with musicians like Post Malone and Machine Gun Kelly referencing the band. At an Emo Nite LA event in 2017, Post Malone played “Welcome to the Black Parade,” reinforcing his connections and love of the alternative music world. In his appreciation for MCR, Machine Gun Kelly referenced The Black Parade on his new pop-punk album, put title in.

Halsey and Billie Eilish are also huge fans of MCR, with both of them expressing excitement over the 2019 reunion on social media. When you listen to Halsey and Eilish with the knowledge of their love for the band, it’s easy to hear MCR’s musical influence seeping through, with deeply personal lyrics and gloomy melodies mixed with theatrical elements and a message of hope.

The musical influence of My Chemical Romance surrounds me even when I drift away from them, and with the G note acting as my homing beacon, I find my way back to My Chemical Romance time and time again. Just like the final song says, “Nothing you can say can stop me going home.” kaitlyn_fehr@emerson.edu

The Berkeley Beacon

November 5, 2020

7

Piano Row’s Quiet Room now home to John Lewis mural

Campbell Parish, Beacon Correspondent If you take a peek inside Emerson’s Quiet Room on the second floor of Piano Row, a new 20-foot mural in honor of the late Congressman and Civil Rights Movement leader John Lewis stands tall.

Emerson Contemporary Curator-in-Residence Leonie Bradbury commissioned Brazilian American artist Julia Csekö to design the mural, “A Coney Island of the Mind”, which features excerpts from Lewis’ New York Times July 30 op-ed, published on the day of his funeral.

As a prominent figure in the Civil Rights Movement, Lewis was an inspiration to many who left a powerful legacy of social justice behind him. He was also a Freedom Rider, one of dozens of civil rights activists that protested against segregated bus terminals in the South.

The Beacon spoke with Csekö

The mural includes excerpts from John Lewis’ New York Times op-ed, which was published on the day of his funeral. Lizzie Heintz / Beacon Staff about her newest work, where she discussed the mural she painted in Piano Row. Q. How did you get started with this project?

A. In March, I got an email from Bradbury saying, ‘Hey, I need to talk to you, we want to see if you want to do a mural for us.’ Out of the blue, totally unexpected. I reached out to her, and she told me the story about how [anti-Semetic graffiti] was found and how the [Emerson] students wanted to respond in part, and they thought of me because I did these past murals.

Q. Why did you choose this specific John Lewis excerpt?

A. Whenever I pick a text to work with, I find the same challenge— there’s a lot to pick from, lots of topics to pull from. In this particular case, I was looking for a certain timelessness in John Lewis’ words.

The piece is responding to hateful white supremacist and anti-Semitic graffiti. I was looking for quotes that would turn this hateful act around, proposing alternatives and instilling optimism for Emerson students.

What amazes me about John Lewis is his resilience and his unfaltering faith in radical pacifism as a change agent. I wanted that in particular to be at the forefront in this piece.

Even though he went through so much hurt and suffering during his life as an activist, he kept a positive outlook.

Q. Did you have students help you pick the quote?

A. The students were an essential voice in picking the author. Bradbury led the conversation with a student advisory board. As for picking the particular quotes, it is a very time-consuming process. Although I really enjoy understanding the people and space that each of my

public murals will be made for, I know that there is only so much time the students could put into meetings and Zoom calls. I am very grateful for the time the students were able to offer and to Leonie for her thoughtfulness and leading the conversation.

I hope the quotes I chose resonate with the student body.

Q. How do you pick the text and the colors for each of your pieces of art?

A. There is one with the subject and one with the space. If it’s site-specific, like the one at Emerson, I want it to speak to the space and to add to the space, not to feel like it’s lost in there or not supposed to be in there. I wanted [this one] to feel timeless, so I went with all metallic colors. John Lewis, to me, has the Holy Spirit about him. I wanted it to be a sacred space. I wanted it to be homage to his life, his work, and his memory.

Q. What was your favorite part

about living in Brazil?

A. I do miss the warmth of people.

You greet people by kissing them on the cheek. When I moved here, it was so strange because I came here and, in total innocence, I wanted to greet people like this, by kissing them on the cheek, and people would freak out. People are getting more political here but, I gotta say, I had way more success doing activism-based work related to my artwork there than here.

Q. What’s your favorite part about being an artist?

A. I can be a constant learner. That can be part of my career, essentially, as an artist. As an artist, you are required to keep learning. You are required to be inquisitive. That’s one of my favorite parts—I work a lot with texts, all of my paintings are written. campbell_parish@emerson.edu

Junior launches ‘Wonderboy’ clothing brand in midst of pandemic

Junior Will Dean (right) selling “Wonderboy” merch in the Boston Common. Alec Klusza / Beacon Staff

Shawna Koniecszy Beacon Correspondent Junior Will Dean started Wonderboy Clothing LLC, a streetwear clothing line that sells shirts and hoodies featuring designs from artists, with a friend while taking classes remotely this semester.

In the coming months, the brand hopes to sell clothes with a distinct meaning and raise revenue that they can give back to the community.

“The idea is to tell a story or represent some culture, community, or specific individual,” Dean’s business partner and University of Miami stu-

dent Will Grattan-Smith said in an Zoom interview. “We’re not trying to be the typical logo-heavy, hypebeast sort of brand, but it’s really focused on giving really talented artists a platform to share meaningful stories. To create this authentic brand that tells stories and then donate back and try to help people who really need it.”

In late October, Dean and Grattan-Smith came to Boston from their homes in Atlanta, Georgia, where they both currently are staying, to visit a friend. While here, they set up a table in Boston Common to promote their new brand, which works to be separate from the hypebeast culture of name-brand street fashion

companies. Their shirts are currently being sold for $25, and their hoodies are being sold for $40.

Wonderboy plans to donate 10 percent of sales to organizations that reflect the stories the brand aims to tell.

The revenue from one of their future designs, featuring the perimeter of Atlanta with the homes of different rappers mapped out within it, will go to downtown Atlanta music-related nonprofit groups that help underprivileged children.

Grattan-Smith, a senior finance major, approached Dean, a sports communication major, with the idea for Wonderboy in May 2020, when he pitched the new clothing compa-

ny as a quarantine project. The pair went to high school together in Atlanta, maintaining their friendship after landing at separate colleges.

With both of them spending the fall semester at their homes, Dean and Grattan-Smith said they saw this as a chance to create something positive out of their summer.

“It’s been a cool opportunity,” Dean said. “While we would much rather be at our respective colleges, we were presented with this unique opportunity to be home at the same time together and to go in on something creative.”

Wonderboy launched at the beginning of the semester, with their first clothing drop announced on their Instagram (@wonderboyco) on Sept. 7. Their website, wonderboyco. com, currently offers three different designs, including the Thunderbolt Skull design drawn by senior journalism major Vicky Echeverria, who went to high school with the founders.

“Grattan-Smith was the one that reached out to me a few months back,” Echeverria said. “[He was] telling me that he wanted to start a streetwear brand, and he was hoping that I’d want to contribute because we’ve known each other for a while, and he knows that I’ve gone into digital art recently.”

Dean and Grattan-Smith wish to include a variety of different artists in their company as they move forward.

But for now, the majority of their designs are currently done by Dean’s

17-year-old sister, Virginia.

“We have an idea, we have this vision, and we bring it to my sister,” Dean said. “We sit down with her, provide a sketch or two, and then she brings it to life. To see her transform our vision and bring it into reality, it feels like magic.”

As they expand and grow as a company, the duo said they hope to establish a platform for artists to share their stories.

“Long term, if we start to build this platform for telling stories that people will buy into, it’ll be really cool to have artists come to us and say, ‘I have this story that I really care about, and I want to share it. Can you help us?’ That’s what we want,” Dean said.

Moving forward, Dean and Grattan-Smith said they hope to start a podcast to talk to different artists who contribute to Wonderboy.

Even when Dean and Grattan-Smith return to their respective campuses in the spring, the two hope to watch their business grow. Dean said that he hopes to expand the audience of Wonderboy, which is mostly marketed towards college students at the moment.

“What we want is to create genuine art that is meaningful and accessible to literally everyone, whether you’re a 65-year-old woman just interested in this really cool tree [design] or if you’re a 16-year-old in high school,” Dean said. shawna_konieczny@emerson.edu

The Berkeley Beacon

Sports

November 5, 2020

8

NEWMAC cancels winter season in unanimous vote

Men’s and women’s basketball players meet the expected decision to cancel comeptition Christopher Williams Beacon Staff Emerson’s basketball teams will not be competing in the New England Women’s and Men’s Athletic Conference this winter season, to the dismay of athletes who say the cancelation is disappointing but not unexpected.

“We could kind of see it coming,” sophomore men’s basketball guard James Beckwith said in an interview. “We had been mentally preparing just because our coaches were growing less and less optimistic, and they were telling us in the weeks leading up to it there’s a very small chance we have the season.”

The NEWMAC Presidents Council unanimously cancelled the 2020-21 winter sports season on Monday, Nov. 3 due to changes in academic calendars and campus protocols enforced to limit COVID-19 exposure. The decision impacts 11 local institutions’ basketball and swimming and diving teams. Both Emerson teams impacted are currently in their third week of practice.

Monday’s decision closely mirrors the July decision that canceled fall sports due to the enduring effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.

That move impacted men’s and women’s cross-country, men’s and women’s soccer, men’s and women’s tennis, and women’s volleyball.

Women’s basketball head coach Bill Gould said his team will still hold some practices despite the season’s official cancellation.

“We are practicing right now, as there are severe limitations, restrictions, and protocols we have to follow,” Gould said. “It’s pretty much going to be just working on our skills and skill development.”

Senior women’s basketball guard Rachel Davey said she will use the practice time to savor her final moments with the team.

“I’m just trying to go to have fun, hang out with the team, and help the younger girls prepare for next year,” Davey said.

The men’s basketball team, on the other hand, is not practicing this week and might not return to the court this semester, Beckwith said.

“We may practice again the last two weeks of the semester, but we’re not even really sure what we’re going to do,” Beckwith said.

“People are split on what they re-

ally want to do going forward because we’re obviously not going to play a game for a year.”

Beckwith added that motivation has dwindled since the cancellation, but the team’s goal is to keep improving in this extra time.

“Right now, it’s just about keeping our heads down and just trying to get a little bit better and doing what we can,” Beckwith said. “It’s obviously a little bit harder to stay motivated by taking the long view of ‘eventually we’re going to have a season to prepare for,’ but right now it’s just getting a little bit better every day.”

The NEWMAC President’s Council said teams have the ability to arrange out-of-conference competition at their discretion, in accordance with institutional, state, and local health and safety guidelines. Despite remaining hopeful, Gould said it’s unlikely Emerson decides to allow outside competition.

Due to the cancellation, seniors on the men’s and women’s basketball teams are able to receive an additional year of NCAA eligibility. Gould, however, does not envision many players exercising that option.

“At Division III, this is not a scholarship division, so kids pay their own way to go to school,” Gould said. “It’s not cheap. Kids had in their mind, especially the seniors, that they were going to graduate, so to totally flip that on its head and have them come back for another year and pay an extra year of tuition is unlikely.”

Although given the chance, Davey said she does not plan to exercise the option to extend her eligibility, citing tuition expenses and the desire to graduate this year.

She said her favorite moments with the team were on bus rides to and from games, as well as all the other times the team hung out together.

She plans to stay involved in basketball following graduation.

For those senior student athletes who choose not to extend their eligibility, Monday’s decision ended their careers as Lions. Gould expressed his sympathy for his seniors.

“It’s hard because they’re not going onto the WNBA, so this is the end of their career as a team athlete,” Gould said. “They’ve been a part of a team since they were like six years old, so to have it end so abruptly is very tough.” christopher_williams@emerson.edu

The women’s team lining up for the National Anthem. Anissa Gardizy / Beacon Staff

Tim Neverett (left) with Dodgers co-broadcaster and ex-Red Sox shortstop Nomar Garciappara. Courtesy Tim Neverett

Professor and alum earns second World Series ring Tim Neverett ‘88 gains second ring in three seasons after Dodgers win Tyler Foy

Beacon Correspondent Emerson professor and alumnus Tim Neverett ‘88 earned his second World Series ring last month as a play-by-play broadcaster with the freshly-crowned Los Angeles Dodgers, just months after starting teaching at Emerson.

Neverett joined the Dodgers’ broadcast team in Dec. 2018 following three years of broadcasting with WEEI Red Sox Radio. He won his first World Series ring after calling the Boston Red Sox’s ninth World Series title in 2018 and celebrated the championship from atop a Duck Boat during the team’s victory parade.

In addition to a successful fall semester in the baseball world, Neverett marked his first semester as a professor in the sports communication department, teaching one sports agenting course. He began the semester remotely while stationed in Los Angeles but returned to Boston to teach during the last week of September.

Neverett said working for the Dodgers is a much more hands-on experience than what he experienced during his stint with WEEI. “With the Red Sox, you don’t work for the team,” Neverett said in an interview. “With the Dodgers, you work for the ballclub, and you’re treated in a much different manner.

There’s many more advantages to it. Working for the club, they assign who broadcasts what. That’s why I’m able to go back and forth between TV and radio, where in Boston, I did radio, but I couldn’t even talk to anybody at NESN—never mind to TV.” During the pandemic, Neverett and the Dodgers’ broadcasters were not able to work with the team the way commentators usually do. The broadcast team was not permitted to travel with the team, so instead, Neverett had to watch the game on multiple monitors from a luxury suite in Dodger Stadium.

“It was different for sure because, first of all, we were taken out of our

regular radio booth and put into a luxury suite,” Neverett said. “We had to be at least six feet apart, so I would be in the front row of the suite, my partner, Rick Monday, would be three rows behind me at a bar table, and then our producer, Duane McDonald, would be at a table setup well into the suite.”

Not being able to call the game directly from the stadium became a challenge for Neverett, who said he wasn’t able to see the ball come off

crew shrunk in size. Neverett didn’t have a role in covering the playoffs, which allowed him to return to New England to teach his course in person.

Although his class often ran close to the start of Dodgers games, Neverett said he found success balancing the two jobs.

“The times when the class time came close to the time I had to be at the stadium, I was able to work it out in advance,” Neverett said. “Instead of doing it at the normal time, we would do it at a different time so that I could still do what I had to do for class, and then I could jump in the car and drive to Dodger Stadium, which was only 10 minutes away from where I stayed.”

Tim Neverett (center) speaks to students in 2018. Beacon Archives

the bat the same way he was able to in person. Normally, his judgement was rather good, but watching through the screens meant he couldn’t make calls with conviction.

“I remember a game that I did against the [Los Angeles] Angels,” Neverett said. “We were not allowed to go, so we called it from Dodger Stadium. Mike Trout hit a ball, and it looked like he hit it pretty well, sounded like he hit it pretty well, but we didn’t know… the next time I saw the ball was when it hit behind the wall. It was really, really difficult as opposed to when you’re at a game watching it for real.”

Network television took over the playoff coverage following the end of the regular season, so the radio

But the two-time World Series winner appeared in Emerson classes well before formally teaching his own course. He served as a guest speaker multiple times and once hosted a workshop. In the spring, he plans to teach a sports public relations course.

Neverett said the idea of teaching attracted him because it’s an opportunity for him to give back to the Emerson community.

“This is one of those ways where I could share my experiences with students who are there now,” Neverett said. “They’re hearing it from somebody who went through what they’re going through and can tell them what Emerson can do for them.” tyler_foy@emerson.edu