The College Hill Independent—Vol 47 Issue 5

the

October

20

2023

Volume 47 Issue 05

07 TESTIMONIES FOR PALESTINE 08 RETURN OF THE REPRESSED 11 CHINESE & LESBIAN

THE RIVER ISSUE

* The College Hill Independent

47 05 10.20

This Issue 00 “62” OC

02 WEEK IN GHOSTS AL

03 ON SWIMMING BEHIND MY BROTHER ET

04 THE TRUTH ABOUT BLACK HOLES AL

Masthead* MANAGING EDITORS AQ LS WEEK IN REVIEW CP JW ARTS CB NM KS EPHEMERA QE LG FEATURES MC LS ES LITERARY ED TS EMT

05 WELLNESS IN THE AGE OF INTELLIGENCE

METRO KB CL NM

07 TESTIMONIES FOR PALESTINE

SCIENCE + TECH MF LKS CS

VR

08 “RETURN OF THE REPRESSED” AA

10 STATEMENT

11 CHINESE & LESBIAN

X CC JK

14 MOTOR CITY, MASSACHUSETTS

DEAR INDY SA

16 HOT AND SPICY PLOTTING

LIST CB SF

AL

BBK CU

17 “I’M A BOSS, YOU A WORKER BITCH”

COPY EDITORS / FACT-CHECKERS RA EB MD BF AF DG SH BMW NM AN DEVELOPMENT COORDINATORS CL AL ES

WORLD TA AD AL

Brown Students for Justice in Palestine

STAFF WRITERS AA MA BBK BB DdF KG JG EG YH DH JH AK CL PM SM KM AN LS JV KW ZZ DZ

SOCIAL MEDIA TEAM JB KB AL KS YS

BULLETIN BOARD QC ARG

DdF

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COVER COORDINATOR MT DESIGN EDITORS GK AM SS DESIGNERS JC RC SG KH SH AL AL TQ ZRL ES SY ILLUSTRATION EDITORS JC IRD LW ILLUSTRATORS SB AC AD MD AF LF HG SH NK AL ML RL JR MS SS IS LS WEB EDITORS KB HD MD MM MVP IYKYK — The College Hill Independent is printed in Seekonk, MA

DEAR INDY: SMS SOS SA

19 BULLETIN QC & ARG

From the Editors An impossible FTE: the brainstorming process.

A: You should write about the chickens… in your grandmother’s bathroom cupboard.

T: What about everyone’s footwear? Like the slippers. And S’s bowling shoes.

And—and I don’t even know if these are my Blundstones.

A: How about everything that’s been consumed in this room since last night?”

[Portuguese sweetbread, pita chips, chocolate chips, a Spindrift, a “copious amount” of chicken wings, a bag of plain tortilla chips, half a plate of roasted veggies, and 21 hours.]

T: You know, L and C are in a shoemaking class…

L: No, no more lists. No more shoes!

S: Why’d you leave this to the last minute?

*Our Beloved Staff

Mission Statement The College Hill Independent is a Providence-based publication written, illustrated, designed, and edited by students from Brown University and the Rhode Island School of Design. Our paper is distributed throughout the East Side, Downtown, and online. The Indy also functions as an open, leftist, consciousness-raising workshop for writers and artists, and from this collaborative space we publish 20 pages of politically-engaged and thoughtful content once a week. We want to create work that is generative for and accountable to the Providence community—a commitment that needs consistent and persistent attention.

While the Indy is predominantly financed by Brown, we independently fundraise to support a stipend program to compensate staff who need financial support, which the University refuses to provide. Beyond making both the spaces we occupy and the creation process more accessible, we must also work to make our writing legible and relevant to our readers.

The Indy strives to disrupt dominant narratives of power.

We reject content that perpetuates homophobia, transphobia, xenophobia, misogyny, ableism and/or classism. We aim to produce work that is abolitionist, anti-racist, anti-capitalist, and anti-imperialist, and we want to generate spaces for radical thought, care, and futures. Though these lists are not exhaustive, we challenge each other to be intentional and selfcritical within and beyond the workshop setting, and to find beauty and sustenance in creating and working together.

Letters to the editor are welcome; scan the QR code here or email us at theindy@gmail.com!

01

THE COLLEGE HILL INDEPENDENT

WIR

Week in

Ghosts ( TEXT AL DESIGN SG ILLUSTRATION MS )

→

I am 18 years old and I still hold my breath when I drive past cemeteries.

When I was eight or nine, two girls I considered my honorary older sisters told me—with utmost sincerity—about the superstition: If you don’t hold your breath when you pass a cemetery, you’ll breathe in the dead souls, the evil dead souls, maybe even become possessed. The details of the myth are muddy, but the instinct is crystal.

For the past 13 years, I’ve lived next to a cemetery, yet I’ve refused to set foot in one—until now. Swan Point Cemetery, listed on Tripadvisor as #10 of 187 things to do in Providence, is just a half-hour RIPTA away: a golden opportunity to learn to breathe again. I wonder if my honorary sisters have let go of the superstition yet. I wouldn’t know.

I encounter my first ghost before I even get on the bus to Swan Point. My path to the stop takes me past the John Brown House, and just like every other time I’ve passed it, I remember the boy I was best friends with for all of middle and high school. He wrote an almost-ironic musical about the other John Brown; he’d have something funny to say about the house, the cemetery, about anything in Providence, anything at all. For most of my teenage years, half of my humor was borrowed (stolen) from his.

We haven’t spoken in a year.

The RIPTA takes me past a tiny, partially overgrown playground. I wonder if I’ve ever played on it. I have no way of knowing, but my gut tells me that, a decade and a half ago, I conquered every existing set of monkey bars in the city. Between living in China and Pennsylvania, I was a Providencian for three years. Sometimes I pretend that my four-year-old self still lives with my parents, grandparents, and baby sister in that tiny North Providence apartment—

caught in an atemporal bubble in Unit O8. Her favorite hobby is, of course, the monkey bars, and her biggest worry is that the girl who borrowed her Littlest Pet Shop Tamagotchi hasn’t given it back yet (she will never give it back).

On my most recent move-in day, toward the end of our six-hour drive, my family took a detour to North Providence, just to drive into the old neighborhood, see my old preschool, the old apartment. “It’s that one,” my mom pointed.

I nodded and pretended to recognize the indistinguishable beige block surrounded by beige blocks; the car parked in the driveway wasn’t a 2004 blue Camry. Later, alone, I looked up the apartment on Zillow, entertaining the possibility of a visit. It was off-market.

We then visited my mom’s old friend, Laura—basically my aunt during my time in Providence, but I was too young to remember her husband’s name or what her house looked like.

She made us pasta salad and her house smelled like floral linen spray and I didn’t have to ask where the bathroom was.

I get off the bus at Hope after North. It’s a 10-minute walk from there to the cemetery.

Swan Point is gorgeous, just as Tripadvisor promised, all green grass and golden leaves, the warm light hitting the headstones just so. Aside from the standard flowers, several graves bear odd offerings to the dead: a lighter, a rubber

lizard, a single rose in a venti Starbucks cup.

I am reminded of my ghosts—he would have loved this, she would have found this so funny, people who are still alive in the conditional past tense. I fight the urge to hold my breath.

Swan Point hosts a strange collection of visitors: mourners paying their respects, families taking a walk, runners just passing through. I am none of those things. I am a voyeur in a field of death, I am tired and cold and a little creeped out, I am regretting taking this trip already. And I don’t really know how I ended up here, in a cemetery full of strangers alive and dead.

AL B’26 is never far from hospitals. indywir@gmail.com

VOLUME 47 ISSUE 05

02

On Swimming Behind My Brother LIT

( TEXT ET DESIGN AL ILLUSTRATION HG )

→

And suddenly the memory emerges, sharp as tinnitus—high noon, when the sun is its cruelest. My brother, standing in its open eye. When I think of him, I think of midday, which is to say, he belonged in a world without shadows.

I will not name the beach; it is always empty and I would like to keep it that way. What I will say is that this memory exists in an endless summer. That this land is surrounded by trees, green from fresh rain. Here is our private apostrophe of sand, the wrinkled skin of the ocean, the foam soft as velvet.

My brother and I had not spent time together like this since we were children, back when we were forced to. He had many friends and I did not. I was surprised when he invited me to the beach and no one else. He never told me why he wanted to go, but I suspect it had something to do with the fact that we had both just turned seventeen.

Our father has a story about his beach, the kind of story he repeats over and over, like rubbing your thumb over the face of a quarter until the surface becomes smooth and the face fades away. As a young man he came here at low tide and tried to swim to another island. He nearly drowned. Instead of losing his life, he lost his car keys. Our father had not returned to the beach since.

Now we were seventeen, the same age as our father was when he was last here. At this point my brother and I were still pretending not to know about the affair, about the nights our father had slept on the couch, about the nights he had slept in another woman’s bed. I wanted to tell our mother, but my brother did not. My brother—young enough to still worship our father but old enough to be ashamed of him.

I never asked why he wanted to go to the beach, and he never told me. That day I watched him wade into the ocean. Sunburn was draped over his shoulders. The water sucked his footsteps away. He looked up at the arc of rocks closing around the cove and began to swim, arms curved like dorsal fins. I dove after him.

I have never been a good swimmer. I have never been able to forget my body. When you open your eyes underwater you see a world softened and yet your eyes still sting. You and the sound of your own body fighting for air. I have been told that lifeless-looking things are often alive underwater, and that day I could not tell if the ocean floor was breathing. That day, swimming behind my brother, the water smothered me.

My eyes were open. The sand dropped off the bottom. The depth of the ocean rushed up at me, and so did these thoughts: my brother had outgrown this place, the way he had outgrown the womb, and now he was searching for another island. He was searching in all the wrong places. We would both be old one day, if we were lucky. I needed to find him and bring him home.

But I did not follow him. I was too afraid. The ocean is an unforgiving thing. I swam back to shore, against the current, over the shallow reef. My brother swam in the other direction, toward the rocks.

When I turned around the sun was low and blinding. I had to squint to see him standing on the jagged horizon. The rocks pierced a bloodied sky. I was facing him, and he away from me. His body a burn mark on the skin of the sun.

He didn’t jump, just stepped into the open air. He fell silently, like light through a window. The water opened around him. I waited for him to swim back to me.

ET B’25 is buying a pressure cooker off Facebook Marketplace.

03

THE COLLEGE HILL INDEPENDENT

LIT

the truth about black holes ( TEXT AL DESIGN AL ILLUSTRATION HG )

→

six years before my grandmother’s belly began to swell, when her womb was an empty shell not yet occupied by my mother, Stephen Hawking proposed the black hole theorem. back then, black holes were suckers and hoodlums; great creatures of chaos and calamity. information was lost in black-hole evaporation, not preserved in Hawking’s radiation. like mites and mosquitoes, they were takers—the takers of our cosmos. my mother was born with the knowledge that something was eating the universe, something other than the political and economic decay surrounding her. my grandmother grew to know this. my illiterate great-grandmother would have had an inkling of it, an intuitive knowledge of being eaten that would be passed down through her blood. but there was no warmth in my mother’s womb, i’m Leonard Susskind’s daughter. i’m the daughter of an era where disorder and stability walk hand-in-hand on a tightrope. when i said my first word, the scientific consensus had already changed. black holes do in fact preserve information, preserve the circus act between armageddon and utopia. their chaos is precisely what restores balance to the universe. havoc, it seems, is synonymous with security and re-

liability. without mites and mosquitoes there would be no survivors; something needs to take in order for us to give. and i don’t fear sticking my finger in our cosmos’ greatest abomination, teasing it with my fragile humanity like nectar in front of a hummingbird. i don’t cower before the galaxy’s vast mouth, worried i’ll get lost in all its teeth. the fear of my foremothers is visceral within me, but does not make sense in the books i read. it’s hidden somewhere under the theories of Susskind and i don’t want to find it—i don’t even try. my fist is clenched, i’m either unwilling or unable to open my hand. my great-grandmother’s fist was also clenched, her palms never touched my grandmother’s. just as my grandmother’s palms never touched my mother’s. every now and again my mother will look at me with wide, uneasy eyes, like she is trying to tell me: there is something eating the universe. it’s coming for me, too. i’m sure in her twenties she watched the news with those same eyes, watched as war ravaged the land around her. and that was all she could do: watch. watch as it spread nearer and deadlier. watch her door, terrified that soldiers would kick it down. taking her. just like there is something taking, taking, taking in the

universe, she thinks. i am selfish in my ability to be objective and callous, the privileges of peace. the events of her past are too distant, too cold, too scientific to me. i study them with numbers, my fist still clenched, the intuitive fear of my great-grandmother overpowered by the rationality i was born into. i am the first woman in generations who does not have to fear being taken. but how do i tell her? how do i tell her the truth about black holes?

AL B’28 thinks about distant realities more than her own. indyliterary@gmail.com

VOLUME 47 ISSUE 05

04

S+T

01010101 11010111 01101001 WELLNESS IN THE AGE OF INTELLIGENCE Are humans incompatible with the technology we have designed for ourselves?

→ We’re currently in the course of tran-

sitioning from the Information Age into the forthcoming Age of Intelligence. The term “smartphone” was first used in 1992 to describe what we can only think of today as an ancient ancestor of our 21st century mobiles: in a span of three decades, we went from the 1.3 kilogram ugly IBM Simon with its bulky charging base to the compact, slick, titanium-lined iPhone 15. It is quite surprising, then, that the advancements in AI are enveloped in an atmosphere of hype and eager anticipation (interest in the word “AI” skyrocketed to 100 points on Google searches, up from two points between September 2022 and September 2023). We can only begin to fathom the ways in which the world and human lifestyle will unfold in the next three decades—who knows, maybe my prized rose gold MacBook Pro will be a primordial appendage to the currently unimaginable personal electronic devices (PEDs) of the 22nd century.

The positive impacts of the astronomical and dynamic evolutions in technology on human life are self evident: nitrogen fertilizers feed 3.5 billion people across the globe that would’ve otherwise died; online learning has reduced the cost of a college credit by over 50 percent, from $1400 to $600; and finally, the 30 minutes I’ve saved every day this semester plugging in matrix multiplications into Wolfram Alpha instead of computing them by hand (as they did in the dark, sad 1800s) is a value-add that one simply cannot put a price on.

Concurrently: an average American spends about seven hours a day hooked to their screens (more than the average amount of nightly sleep), and screen use in excess of four hours has been linked with increased anxiety, and a 35 percent increased risk of suicide in adolescent girls. Task shifting due to push notifications reportedly reduces our productivity by 40 percent. Increased social media usage has been strongly and independently associated with increased feelings of social isolation and loneliness. With this array of statistics laid out in front of us, it is not astonishing that as of 2022, happiness has hit a record low, with only 14 percent of American adults feeling truly happy with their lives.

There’s been an influx of conversation about the relationship between technology and well-being, accompanied by research on healthy integration of electronic devices into our day-to-day lives. The majority of this research and advice in our literature is

05

focused on ameliorating our use of technology by interacting with it less frequently. While this idea of creating a balance is well-founded, it is a bit naive to expect that humans reduce their interactions with technology when it is designed to be addictive.

Screens, the primary interface through which we interact with the digital world, are known to affect our brain chemistry, alter our biological clocks, dwindle our attention spans, and deplete our mental reserves—so, of course, we struggle with sleep, mood regulation, and focus as a result of our pervasive digital habits.

The seamless integration of different aspects of our lives into a one-stop-all-features device is distracting. Studies have shown that humans cannot multitask—we can task switch, but this task switching is energetically costly and interrupts our likelihood of inducing the psychological state of flow, the state of highest productivity and creativity. Social media is isolating: Instagram equips us to have thousands of friends virtually and connect with people across borders, but it is also linked with loneliness, suggesting that virtual connections cannot replace the health benefits of physical social interactions. All this data alludes to an incompatibility between the functioning of human biology and behaviors and the development of technological interfaces.

This addictive nature of technology has resulted in what psychologists call “technology dependence” or “technology addiction,” characterized by behaviors that involve obsessive use of and overreliance on digital devices. (A thought-provoking question for readers: Do you use your phone, specifically social media, in the first or last half an hour of your day? An article

by BBC highlighted the significant influence of using social media, half an hour prior to sleeping, on sleep drive and quality). If you’re anything like me though—an optimist who likes to believe that I am the sole controller of how I use my resources—you’d be inclined to think it is up to an individual to mediate their relationship with technology. (Another food for thought: “our relationship” with technology is an absurd phrase that we commonly use because technology is non-sentient; we cannot, or rather, should not be able to have a relationship with it. Yet, studies show that we actually have developed the same kinds of unhealthy attachment styles with our mobiles as we do with real humans!).

One of the most common ways to mediate our relationship with technology is through the use of time management applications. These apps are purposefully made to prevent overuse or distraction by phone applications, especially social media platforms, using a ‘locking’ feature so users cannot open or receive notifications from specific applications for a set period of time. The application Forest, for instance, utilizes behavioral change techniques like reminders (notifications for when we go beyond our set limits of usage), rewards (a small tree that is planted when you successfully meet your

THE COLLEGE HILL INDEPENDENT

( TEXT VR DESIGN TQ ILLUSTRATION RL )

distraction-free goals), and social comparison (comparing productivity amongst friends).

These behavioral change techniques are precisely the ones used by social media apps to make them addictive in the first place. While effective, the use of apps like Forest creates a dependency on them to stay away from technology, thereby simply transposing our reliance on tech from one app to another.

This entangled relationship with technology—one that brings about products that weaponize the very design they supposedly take up arms against—is paradoxical if our goal is to reduce our addiction to personal electronic devices. A reliance on PEDs to curb PED use falls flat. A University of Illinois study found that actively replacing sedentary lifestyle habits brought about by technology with nature-based, outdoor activities grounded in offline community engagement had accentuated health benefits.

However, these activities must be done in the complete absence of digital devices, lest their positive effects be nullified: any positive health effects participants experienced whilst out of doors and with devices out of grasp were completely offset when reintroduced to interaction with their digital devices.

This beckons for an assimilation of human wellness in technology design. One such model to incorporate human needs into the picture is human centered design: a framework for design that is assembled around the human perspective by creating products that resonate with and fulfill human needs. For example, smart displays in cars (like Apple CarPlay) use human centered design to provide humans with convenient navigation and entertainment while driving. However, once again, science shows that engaging with such devices reduces response times to different stimuli on the road by 35-50 percent, which is almost as bad as texting and driving.

It is hard to imagine a world where we do not have screens, or a world where we are free of app notifications, even if blinding blue light and disconcerting buzzing has only been around for two decades. It would require people to imagine a novel type of technology that integrates less harmfully into human behavior.

Enter Hu.ma.ne: founded by ex-Apple executives Bethany Bongiorno and Imran Chaudhri, the goal of Hu.ma.ne is to create technology that is built on the pillars of “truth, trust & joy”—creating technology that is more ‘humane.’ A representative from Hu.ma.ne told me that the company is in “stealth mode” until their first launch on November 9, but their website sheds some light on the pillars and principles that guide their design: “We’ve been creating so long for utilities, speed and ease… designing for everyone means coming to the world not half heartedly but with our full human selves. Hu.ma.ne believes in a future of technology that feels familiar, natural, and human.” Their first product, the Ai Pin, harnesses the power of AI to propose a wearable, “screenless innovative personal computing experience.”

010 110 The notion of eliminating screens is a bold vision; one which, if executed with the right intentions, could be the unimaginable solution to the epidemic of technology fatigue that we are facing today.

Products with adjacent missions of enabling people to “live in the present moment” rather than being distracted by the digital world have been developed before: Google Glass, launched in 2013, were a pair of smart glasses that used augmented reality to make mobile computing more seamlessly integrable in human lives. What this actually looked like was the ability to use social media, make calls, etc. hands free by projecting images on the glasses’ lenses as opposed to presenting them on a hand-held screen.

While the idea behind Google Glass was to help us engage more with the natural world around us, this also makes the digital world even more convenient and accessible.

If we could receive push notifications without even needing to lift a finger, we would be even more distracted by them during the very real life moments the product claims to allow us to engage in. Blippar was a firstof-its-kind app that integrated with Google Glass to lay entertainment and advertisements over real world objects using image recognition—“you can look at a Coke can and see an advertisement for it.” The device has also been critiqued due to concerns for privacy, given the potential for users to record footage of others secretly.

Google Glass was not successful and its production has officially terminated as of March of this year. Contributing to the unpopularity of the technology may have been the prohibitive cost: the most recent retail price was $999.

However, efforts to develop marketable smart glasses are not over: Meta released its brandnew RayBan collaboration smart glasses on October 17, just two days ago, and Apple Vision Pro is set to launch early next year. Similar to Google Glass, these technologies claim to allow people to take pictures and capture special moments, “share unique experiences with social media” by direct live streaming through the glasses, listen to music, and make calls—all without touching their mobile phone, therefore allowing them to “connect with the world around you.” But what world are we really connecting to using devices that foster digital convenience? Taking 50 golden hour selfies for

S+T the perfect Instagram post, being distracted by a work call or EDM music while taking a nature walk, or live streaming a personal moment to your digital circle and beyond only alienate users from the real world that is around them.

What sets Hu.ma.ne apart from the previous attempts at human centered technology is their value proposition of creating personal mobile technology that centers human values and wellness using screenless AI and cloud computing. Because they are in their pre-launch stage, so far there is very little information available publicly about the company—or the technology of the Ai Pin itself. It is clear that the company has identified the current issues with technology interfaces and the need for a product that is more naturally integrated into human life; but what their solution looks like, and whether it will actually address human wellness concerns, is yet to be seen.

While the focus on human centered design is a good start, there is still a big difference between grounding our tech interfaces in problems concerning productivity, efficiency, and specific needs and centering technology around human health and psychological needs. My Google Calendar does a great job helping

me organize my social, academic, and personal life into 30 minute sized blocks, and its reminders help me stick to a schedule that has made me more productive than ever—solving the problem of organizing a multidimensional 21st century lifestyle. What I do not know is if seeing 15 different calendar blocks populate my day and getting reminders from my phone every hour to keep me on track is a particularly healthy and happy way of living.

We should also be cognizant and proactive about addressing the potential risks of integrating digital technology further and further into the functioning of our bodies. It is counterproductive to be living in a world where we develop technology for human advancement and then require interventions to escape it; we must imagine a world that is simply more grounded in the very qualities and needs that make us human. However, within the revenue seeking, profit central technology industry, is it really possible for private companies that innovate the future of our technology interfaces to place human wellness at the center of the design process? How do we balance the profit incentives of addictive technology needed to sustain this very industry with the health implications of them?

Some considerations to serve these imperatives are increasing research in the interdisciplinary field of technology design and wellness; introducing educational programs and experts within large organizations that spearhead the future of technology like Google, Apple, Meta; and, finally, using our extensive research on human evolution, health and happiness as a foundation for design principles. The longest study on human health and happiness conducted by Harvard shows that the number one predictor of a long and satisfied life is good quality relationships.

Making real community and in-person relationships a cornerstone of human centered technology moving forth is not only a critical necessity, but also an exciting possibility.

VR’24.5 hopes for a world that re-emphasizes emotions and human relationships. indyscience@gmail.com

VOLUME 47 ISSUE 05

06

Testimonies for Palestine SPOTLIGHT

Testimony from a friend in Gaza I write these words from the heart of the Gaza Strip, a place where there is no safe place to hide. Anxiety, sadness, pain, and fear overwhelm us. The people here live under constant fear of heavy bombardments, displacement, and the possibility of death at any moment. In these moments, the circle of danger expands to include every home and corner in this besieged enclave, without exception.

All while the world remains silent.

The thousands of innocent people who have been forcibly displaced to UNRWA schools tell an endless tale of sorrow. They are not just statistical numbers; they are displaced souls seeking a touch of humanity in a terrifying world of threats, cruelty, and injustice.

Half of the resilient population of Gaza has fled their homes, escaping the terrifying bombardment that shatters everything. They sought refuge with their relatives, but the occupation forces them once again to seek shelter elsewhere, as if they were mere pawns in the midst of a conflict.

In these critical moments, hospitals become shelters for the displaced who have nowhere else to go. Women don prayer garments, and men carry bags of hope containing only identification documents. These moments cannot be described with words; they are experienced, not explained. They are more horrifying than the scariest horror movies, but they are the harsh reality.

People today are seeking shelter in the homes of relatives, and small rooms that used to accommodate five now bear the weight of dozens of souls.

The situation is not just difficult; it is catastrophic.

People need a safe refuge from missile attacks, and the displaced staying with their relatives need food and water. Electricity and water are absent from their daily lives, making matters even more complicated.

In these trying times, we must unite and stand together. It’s a call for human solidarity and working to provide support and relief to the displaced, ensuring their basic needs are met.

Blame cannot be placed on the residents of the Gaza Strip for their current circumstances. Instead, accusations must be pointed towards the aggressive Israeli occupation and its continuous oppressive policies against Palestinian land and people for decades.

Testimony from a Brown student who grew up in Palestine In times like this, one’s mind cannot help but stray to the past. How easy it is today for the American to condemn his ancestors for the treatment of Native Americans, and to recognize their retaliation not as savagery but the last recourse of a people who had lost all. How easy it is for the Americans to condemn Rhodesia, South Africa, French Algeria, and Pre-Revolutionary Haiti. They are clearly “bad,” and the brave freedom fighters who vanquished them with love and honor were exemplars of nobility. Yet history is never this simple. Both sides are human and both sides commit violence, yet the colonizer monopolizes it. The colonizer’s violence sustains the system which keeps him in place, it affects every facet of society, and most importantly of all it is wrapped up in a pretty little bow tie so that the world, upon inspecting the situation, sees a conflict between order and chaos, civilization and barbarism.

To the colonized, however, violence is a last resort. It is the culmination of all the violence he endures on a constant basis at the hands of his oppressor.

It is a product of the violence of the colonizer. This begs the question then, where would the average person have stood in the past? What would they have said of the bombing campaigns of the ANC (African National Congress) or the FLN (National Liberation Front of Algeria), or slave revolts in Haiti or the U.S.? We do not have to imagine. Iconic figures like Nelson Mandela were considered terrorists by the United States government until 2008. France to this day has refused to issue a formal apology for the crimes against humanity committed in Algeria. The abolitionist John Brown was executed for his role in fighting slavery. Haiti was crippled by the U.S. and France, and now Gazans stand to be erased for rising up against their oppressors.

Testimony from a Palestinian student at Brown with family in Gaza “I am a Palestinian student at Brown. I feel betrayed and abandoned by this university. President Paxson showed up to support a vigil for Israeli victims but showed no support when there was a vigil for Palestinian victims—not now or the countless times before, when Palestinians have been ethnically cleansed, murdered, attacked and have been living in apartheid for the past 75 years. She’s stayed silent. I have family in Gaza, and multiple members of my extended family have died in the past few days. Hearing them talk about it makes me realize how familiar death is to them—they seem so used to it. The ones who are still alive have had their homes destroyed, they have no food and no water, and nowhere to go. It’s incomprehensible. The least that the leaders of Brown University could do as an international university is educate themselves and their students, look at the context and history of what’s happening, and give genuine support to all students—not just some.”

Testimony from a Black Muslim student at Brown The use of rhetoric to characterize Palestinians as terrorists, threats, and barbarians has a direct consequence of legitimizing Islamophobic sentiments and actions. This is evidenced by the tragic case of Wadea Al Fayoume, a six-yearold boy who was brutally stabbed 26 times in Chicago. Repeatedly hearing that an Israeli was killed while a Palestinian “passed away” reinforces the harmful narrative that Palestinians, Arabs, and Muslims are the instigators of violence and that acts of aggression against them are somehow justified.

When baseless rumors emerge, like the horrifying tale of 40 Israeli babies

07

THE COLLEGE HILL INDEPENDENT

being beheaded, there is an immediate clamor for justice. Yet, when more than 1,000 Palestinian children are slaughtered in just 10 days, an unsettling silence ensues. Do our children not deserve compassion and recognition as innocent civilians?

While quietly removing false propagandist fliers about this ongoing tragedy, I found myself confronted by a group of around seven adults. They resorted to physical violence, pushing, hitting, swinging, and pursuing me while yelling that I am a terrorist and a murderer. I have endured the derogatory labels of “terrorist” and “towel head” while walking down Thayer Street before, but never before had someone been so emboldened as to stand directly in my face, shaking their finger while screaming that I am a terrorist.

When Christina Paxson participates in a vigil for Israelis but not Palestinians, and when a support system remains absent for grieving Palestinian students, this university turns a blind eye to the injustices faced by me and countless others within the Palestinian, Arab, and Muslim communities across this nation.

Testimony from a Gazan Refugee in Jordan Palestine is the moral litmus test for every human being. If you want to know someone’s moral principles, find out their stance on the Palestinian cause and Palestinian resistance.”

To you all, I say this: What have you done for Gaza? Reflect on your actions and your beliefs and try to imagine: what if you were in Gaza?

If you claim to support humanity, if you claim to support human rights: then speak out on what is happening in Palestine and the violations committed in Gaza.

We want everyone to take a stand and to scream out against the oppressor through any and all means.

For more than 70 years we have been silent. It is time to speak out. It is time for change.

Testimony from a Palestinian student My words are echoed by millions. My eyes have grown exhausted of the images that litter social media and yet I am unable to pry them off my screen. My mind cannot escape the gruesome images of my people slaughtered in the streets.

And yet, it is the people of Palestine, of Gaza, who are enduring the worst that humanity has to offer. Whole families wiped out, brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers, aunts and uncles.

My time here has altered the meaning of “hope.” A word that once fueled liberation brings me great grief. Our situation is one in which the word is stripped of its power. And yet, the people of Palestine live on. Everyday, beating on, boats against the current, ceaselessly fighting for their God-given rights. Palestinians bring with them to this world an undying thirst for life and its blessings that all should and must appreciate. They are the best of us, and I will never be able to express the gratitude they deserve. My words are echoed by millions.

And they will not be silenced. Free Palestine, we love you, always.

Testimony from an Arab student at Brown The Arab community at Brown and across the United States and Western world is facing an unprecedented amount of hatred, racism, and targeted bullying.

Expressions of our culture and identity are being labeled as supporting terrorism including Palestinian flags, chants for freedom, and even articles of clothing. The inability to recognize or even peacefully mourn Arab lives lost is a testament to the utter hypocrisy and racism of so-called “Western values” towards the Arab world. The ongoing censorship and violent threats against Arab voices and pro-Palestine advocacy is an egregious violation of freedom of speech which is ironically one of those same values the Western world claims to uphold which allegedly makes their lives more worthy than ours.

Currently in Gaza, we are seeing one of the greatest injustices in modern history. Over 2 million innocent civilians, including 1 million children, are being collectively punished under siege in one of the most densely populated places in the world with nowhere to run or hide. The vast majority of the Palestinians in Gaza are refugees that Israel has ethnically cleansed to Gaza against their will and denies their right to return to their homes. Even more concerning is the unconditional Western military, financial, and diplomatic support to Israel’s most right-wing government in history where the military has stated there will be no electricity, food, or water and called Palestinians animals. Despite all this and being one of the most oppressed groups on Earth, Palestinians must be proud of their identity and their people now more than ever. Over the last century, Palestinians have shown an unmatched capacity to resist the greatest imperial powers, first Britain then the United States, as they failed to impose a Zionist settler-colonial reality on Palestine in our postcolonial age. Israel’s occupation is the longest in modern history, but just like how nuclear-armed apartheid South Africa was dismantled, Israeli apartheid will also be dismantled.

This cause to free Palestine…cannot be bought or sold and it cannot be bombed out of existence. Israel’s propaganda knows this so it has resorted to cowardly tactics like systematically hiding the Nakba, spreading fake news, and even weaponizing antisemitism. Palestinians will never leave their land. They would rather die fighting for freedom than surrender their rights or remain caged. Palestinians should raise their kufiya high for they are the bravest people in the world.

Since these testimonies were given, much on the ground in Gaza has changed for the worse. Israel has cut all electricity and water from the Gaza Strip and ordered that over one million Palestinians evacuate the Northern Gaza Strip, a feat which the United Nations has called “impossible.” To make matters more sickening, Israel bombed the designated caravan route they asked civilians to embark on in addition to bombing the Rafah border crossing with Egypt, making evacuation attempts a march towards death.

SPOTLIGHT

“RETURN OF THE REPRESSED” A Deep Dive into Israeli Apartheid and Next Steps for Resistance

( TEXT AA DESIGN SS ILLUSTRATION AYA GHANAMEH )

→ Surrounded by the rubble of the Al-Ahli

hospital, or at least what remains of it, the surviving medical team gave a press release surrounded by their dead loved ones. On October 17th, an Israeli airstrike hit the Al-Ahli hospital in Gaza, killing at least 500 people.

Most of these people were women and children. They were seeking refuge, fleeing at the orders of the Israeli government. They slept on the floors adjacent to the already-filled morgues of their murdered brethren, only to join them the next day.

On October 13, 2023, the Israeli government demanded the expulsion of over one million Palestinian civilians from their homes in the Gaza Strip. This action was widely criticized by the international community, including the United Nations, and sets the stage for the further unprecedented mass slaughter of Palestinian people.

On October 7, Hamas destroyed the “iron” border wall separating Gaza from Israel and entered Israeli-occupied territory. The military branch of Hamas responsible for the attack, the Al-Qassam Brigades, have killed and taken many Israeli citizens hostage. In a statement on the recent violence, President Biden cited a widely-circulated but unconfirmed claim about Hamas “beheading children” among unverified claims regarding sexual assault. In his speech, Biden claims that “there is no justification for terrorism,” but not once mentions the 75-year long genocidal project undertaken by the Israeli state to expel and exterminate the Palestinian people from their native land.

Western media outlets term this ongoing genocide a “war” or a “conflict,” but that is premised on an inherent fallacy—that the Palestinian people have any comparable infrastructure to be considered an adversary to the U.S.-backed billion-dollar war machine that is the Israeli state. What Biden and Western institutions alike fail to acknowledge is that acts of armed resistance do not occur in a vacuum. While the loss of human life is never justifiable, Hamas’ actions were by no means “unprovoked,” and must be understood within the broader historical context of the Israeli apartheid regime.

The West refuses to acknowledge or take responsibility for their role in the creation of the state of Israel. This historical amnesia absolves Western countries of responsibility for colonial violence and contextualizes the propagation of racialized and Islamophobic tropes by Western institutions.

The political project of Zionism, or the creation of a nation-state for the Jewish people, has its roots in the work of 19th century

philosopher Theodore Herzl. Herzl wrote that the only escape from the systemic antisemitic dispossession of the Jewish people in Europe was through the creation of a Jewish state in Palestine, popularly misrepresented as “a land without a people for a people without a land.”

In a statement issued in 1917, The Balfour Declaration, the British imperial state promised to create a “national home” for the Jewish people in the then Ottoman-administered territory of Palestine, offering “civil and religious rights,” but not political rights, to Palestinians. Arthur James Balfour, the foreign secretary who pledged support for the declaration, was a notorious antisemite. He signed into law the 1905 Aliens Act, aimed at preventing Jewish asylum seekers from immigrating into Britain. In fact, his support for Zionism was rooted in this antisemitism; in 1919, he wrote that the Zionist project could “mitigate the age-long miseries created for Western civilization by the presence…of a Body [the Jewish people] which it too long regarded as alien and even hostile, but which it was equally unable to expel or to absorb.”

Both Herzl and Balfour understood the Zionist project as an imperialist one: Herzl wrote about a Jewish state in Palestine as an “outpost of civilization against barbarism.” The British War Office also wrote that “the creation of a Jewish buffer state in Palestine… is strategically desirable for Britain.” This allowed Britain to shore up its control of the Suez Canal in the face of a budding anti-colonial nationalist movement in Egypt, maintain its connections to colonial India and East Africa, and secure access to oil in the Middle East. The Declaration was the basis for the creation of the Mandate System by the League of Nations in the aftermath of the First World War, sanctioning the colonization of Palestine by British forces in 1920.

Nearly thirty years of British rule in Palestine laid the groundwork for the dispossession and ethnic cleansing that remains the living reality for the Palestinian people. Throughout the 1930s and 40s, the Palestinian people faced increasing acts of terrorism by Zionist paramilitary groups like Irgun and systematic and institutional expulsion from their ancestral lands. In 1947, the British government, unable to find a solution to the violent fissures it had created in Palestine, handed their colonial project to the newly established United Nations.

In 1947, the U.N. devised a proposal to partition Palestine into two states. This partition was infused with a political Zionist agenda, allocating 62 percent of land to the Jewish state, even though Palestinians inhabited a majority of the land and were twice the population of the Jews. Though the proposal was rejected by Arab leaders in Palestine and surrounding countries, it sparked a civil war that culminated in the official creation of the state of Israel and the systematic expulsion of over 800,000 Palestinains in what is known as the Nakba (“catastrophe”) of 1948.

The Nakba is not an event relegated to the past. Seven decades later, it remains the daily

reality for the nearly seven million Palestinains who remain in their homeland and for the additional seven million in the diaspora who are systematically denied the right to return. For those Palestinians that remain in the occupied West Bank and besieged Gaza Strip, there lies no justice, no peace, and no dignity.

Palestinians living under military occupation are subjected to the genocidal violence integral to the Israeli nation-state on a daily basis. Any claims of benevolence towards the Palestinian people by the Israeli government are incomprehensible when the material realities of Palestinians are at the whims of a war machine that demands their complete extinction. Israel Defense Forces (IDF) jeeps and Israeli settlers litter the countryside of Palestine, harassing, maiming and murdering Palestinians. Palestinians are strangled by over 1,500 “flying” checkpoints that incessantly police their freedom of mobility.

Since 1967, Palestinians living in the West Bank have been systematically dispossessed from their homes by Israeli settlers and institutions. Israeli military courts convict Palestinians in the West Bank at a rate of 99 percent. Israeli institutions are imbued with a staunch hatred for the Palestinians. There is no semblance of ‘justice’ for Palestinians under this fascist regime.

Within the Israeli legal system, occupation and violence are omnipresent for the Palestinian people. Israel has violated international law by expanding its settlements and demolished Palestinian homes and infrastructure. Zionist settlers have attacked Palestinian villages, and the IDF regularly conducts violent operations in the occupied West Bank against resistance fighters and refugee camps.

Over 200 Palestinians were killed in the months leading up to the recent violence, a death toll over five times larger than Israel’s during that time period.

Such unequal and inhumane treatment has been amounted to apartheid by many human rights organizations like Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and the Israeli non-profit B’Tselem. Nonetheless, the United States has doubled down on its support for the Israeli state, providing $3.8 billion annually in military aid, and Biden is considering sending an additional $10 billion in aid following recent military escalations.

Israeli occupation forces also target humanitarian organizations (such as the Red Crescent) that provide aid to Palestinian victims of Israeli violence. Human rights organizations in Ramallah have been ransacked and looted by the IDF, and Palestinian voices deemed too prominent by Israel are assassinated by IDF soldiers, like Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh in 2022. The State of Palestine cannot even obtain justice from

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SPOTLIGHT

international institutions. Over the past fifty years, the United States has vetoed over 50 UN Security Council inquiries into Israel.

The United States posits itself as a champion for human rights on the global stage and pressures states to comply with its humanitarian interests in order to shape its geopolitical dominance, especially in the Global South.

But the U.S. acts contrary to its humanitarian messaging in Israel, with the United States vetoing almost every resolution condemning the occupation. Thanks to incessant American support for Israel, the aspiration of a Palestinian state has been suffocated by more than half a million settlers in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, fragmenting Palestine to mere bantustans.

The news cameras currently fixated on Israelis hiding in shelters were nowhere to be found over the past 15 years, during which over 6000 Palestinians have been killed. Western media has erected a narrative that justifies Israel’s apartheid where Israelis are recognized as “victims” and “murdered” and Palestinians are “terrorists” who happened to “die.”

Hamas’ attack was by no means a surprise.

Even Israeli sources confirm that their government received a warning from Egypt three days prior to the attack. Beyond this, the new far-right Israeli government led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has inflamed tensions, giving free reign for settlers to terrorize Palestinian villages such as Huwara this past February. The Israeli military even dubbed this violence a “pogrom.” Gideon Levy, a prominent Israeli journalist, writes in light of the recent attacks: “Behind all this lies Israeli arrogance; the idea that we can do whatever we like, that we’ll never pay the price and be punished for it. We’ll carry on undisturbed.”

The armed actions of Palestinians are a final resort, as Israel has met all civil movements with brutal violence. In 2018, during the non-violent Great March of Return, Israeli forces killed over 200 Gazans for demanding to return to the towns and villages from which their families were ethnically cleansed in 1948.

Israel’s policy of containment and endless siege has not produced its desired results of Palestinian capitulation, but rather a casus belli for armed resistance. In an interview with Democracy Now on October 9th, Rashid Khalidi, a Palestinian professor at Columbia University, said that the world is witnessing a “paradigm shift”: War crimes don’t justify other war crimes ...

But I think there are two things that have to be added. This has to be put within the context. [T] he context is not just occupation. The context is settler colonialism and apartheid ... I think that we’re about to see a paradigm shift. The idea

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that you can coop up 5 million people, put them behind walls, tighten the siege on them, use an eyedropper to allow them some food, some water, some electricity, that idea has exploded as a result of the horrific events of the past two-and-a-half days. This cannot continue. It’s not just a matter of occupation. We have to recognize that you cannot treat an entire people the way Israel, not just under this neofascist government, but under all of its previous governments, have treated them. You cannot expel three-quarters of a million people in 1948 and not expect the return of the repressed.

Dehumanization emboldened by Islamophobia is the core of Israeli and Western prejudices toward Palestinians and justifies their continued oppression under an apartheid regime. In “a land without people,” there only exists non-human flora and fauna, and that is exactly what the Palestinians are in the lens of Israel and the West. The British leader Winston Churchill even referred to Palestinians as a “dog in the manger,” stating in a 1937 hearing: “I do not admit that the dog in a manger has the final right to the manger even though he may have lain there for a very long time.” We see this same language being echoed today, with Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant referring to Gazans as “human animals” after announcing a “complete siege” of the Gaza Strip.

This is the same Islamophobia as the post-9/11 rhetoric championed by the United States war machine that paints all Muslims as “terrorists” to justify the invasion and brutal occupation of countries in the Middle East. This ongoing so-called “War on Terror” uses dehumanizing, Islamophobic rhetoric in order to further imperialist U.S. interests, such as access to oil and the construction of new military bases, mirroring how the British state backed the Zionist project in the early 1900s in order to bolster their imperial power in the region. This is the same Islamophobia that the Israeli government capitalizes upon to justify its apartheid of millions of Palestinians living under violent occupation. This is the same Islamophobia that is justifying hate crimes against Muslims in the United States and Europe.

That is why it is no surprise that news reporting agencies were quick to run news headlines on how Hamas committed mass rape and beheaded 40 babies despite it not being confirmed by Israeli officials. These same news outlets helped propel the United States’ invasion of Iraq by incorrectly claiming that Saddam Hussein’s army threw hundreds of Kuwaiti babies out of incubators. Repeating the mistakes of the recent past and believing such propaganda will further fuel the ongoing genocide in Palestine.

Israel’s message is clear: Palestinians in Gaza need to leave their homes or perish.

Palestinians remain resilient in their resistance, remaining loyal to their culture of Summud (“steadfastness”). The world can either stay

THE COLLEGE HILL INDEPENDENT

quiet and permit for this genocide to unfold or it can take the side of justice and humanity. In a brief moment of ecstasy during the Unity Intifada of May 2021, people around the world marched calling for an end to Israel’s displacement of Palestinians in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood. The same calls for global solidarity need to happen now, but at an even larger scale. Israel and the United States must be condemned for their egregious actions. Students at U.S. colleges and universities must call out their administrations and faculty members for supporting the apartheid. Brown University President Christina Paxson is complicit in the ongoing genocide in Gaza and she must be called out for allowing Brown University to profit from the plight of Palestinians. Now is the time for action.

We, as students on Brown’s campus, are directly implicated in Israeli apartheid and the mass murder of Palestinians. We must join Brown University’s Palestine Solidarity Caucus and Brown Students for Justice in Palestine in demanding the following: Stop Brown’s Complicity in the Ongoing Genocide in Gaza!

1. CEASEFIRE NOW! Brown University must use its power and privilege to publicly condemn the genocide and demand that Senators Reed and Whitehouse support legislation calling for a ceasefire in Gaza and an end to US military aid to Israel.

2. PROTECT STUDENTS! Palestinian students, faculty, workers, and their co-strugglers face urgent threats to their safety, academic freedom, and futures.

President Paxson must immediately and unequivocally condemn the doxxing, Islamophobic and racist harassment, censorship, and political persecution of the Brown University community.

3. DIVEST! Until Brown heeds the multiple democratic demands to divest the endowment from Israel and the military-industrial complex, the university remains complicit in the ethnic cleansing of Palestine. Maria Zuber—a board director at Textron, a weapons manufacturer—must also resign from her position as a Brown University board member.

Read the full demands on Palestinian Solidarity Caucus’ Instagram @brown.psc From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.

This article was written by an anonymous Palestinian student at Brown. theindy@gmail.com

SPOTLIGHT

Brown Students for Justice in Palestine’s Statement on the Recent Events in Palestine.

We, the undersigned, hold the Israeli regime and its allies unequivocally responsible for all suffering and loss of life, Palestinian or Israeli. While all loss of life deserves to be mourned, we cannot stand by as the root cause of this violence is not only ignored but strengthened: Israel’s settler colonial regime of apartheid and military occupation and its brutal 16 year blockade of Gaza.

We stand in solidarity with Palestinian resistance against Israeli occupation.

Decades of the Israeli state killing and ethnically cleansing Palestinians have continued while the world watches. No people in history subjected to oppression of this scope have not responded. This is not a conflict; it is settler colonialism that has yielded a brutal apartheid regime. In response, the Palestinian right to return and the right to resist their elimination is not only just, but enshrined under international law.

Brown’s endowment is invested in military arms and weapons companies profiting from Israel’s apartheid regime including: Textron, Raytheon, Northrop Grumman and more. As Israel promises unprecedented mass killing of Palestinians in Gaza, it will use weapons and equipment Brown’s endowment has helped pay for and profited from.

We reject President Christina Paxson’s claims of neutrality, open dialogue, and community support for all, while we know she has unequivocally privileged Israeli interests and initiatives. She has pledged unconditional support for maintaining these relations against the collective demands of this campus, its Palestinian students, and those in solidarity with them.

We reiterate our calls on Brown and President Paxson to heed to the multiple democratic demands of the students, faculty, and workers of this campus to end Brown’s complicity in the Israeli apartheid regime.

Peace can only come when Palestinians can live freely with equal rights in their homeland.

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CHINESE & LESBIAN FEATS

( TEXT AL DESIGN ES ILLUSTRATION AL )

→ “Why couldn’t I raise a normal child?”

We were standing in the kitchen at 6:47 a.m. on my last first day of high school. At 16 years old, I had just begun to let my guard down. That was a mistake. My mother’s words were barbed, and the blood that spilled was hers just as much as it was my own.

I wasn’t surprised that my mom was homophobic. I had known this for years. My family’s one and only previous conversation about queerness was short, and my sisters and I hardly spoke—it ended with my father declaring at the dinner table, “We don’t care about what those people do, as long as it’s not my children.” I was ten and blissfully ignorant. I took comfort in the fact that it would never be me; I would never disappoint my parents.

Far too many years later, I came to realize that the exact opposite was true. There was no ignoring it now. Without family to turn to for support and guidance, I searched for people like me and came up empty-handed; from where I stood, I could see no prominent media, no discourse, no community.

Where are the Chinese lesbians? +++ The first time I encountered the Mandarin

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phrase for “gay” was while watching 《谁先爱 上他的》(2018) just this past summer: “同性恋.”

Even though Mandarin was my first language, I had never heard or seen this phrase before. It makes sense: when would my conservative parents or grandparents have introduced me to it? 同性恋 is a literal translation of “same-sex love,” derived from the English “homosexuality.” However, it is only used in reference to gay men—there is no real word for lesbian in Mandarin. Instead, the character representing women is tacked on as a prefix, a mere modifier, to make 女同性恋. There’s the slightly less formal 女同志, which is also the product of 女 (woman) + 同志 (male homosexual). 蕾 丝边 (pronounced lěi sī biān) is also used, but it is only a transliteration of the English word lesbian, just as 酷儿 (kù er) is a transliteration of queer. In this process of translation, whether semantic or phonetic, something is lost along the way. The result is an idea borrowed from the West and a void where the lesbian should exist in the collective Chinese imagination.

Today, there’s also slang—slang that I could not have learned from my family or my Chinese American friends (who also could not have learned from their families) and instead had to scour the Internet in search of. It was a strangely impersonal way to learn something that I could have—should have—grown up with; I found myself up late, reading strangers’ comments on public forums in a desperate attempt to learn the language of my community as if I could make up for 18 years of lost time

THE COLLEGE HILL INDEPENDENT

in one sleepless night. On Reddit, u/Comprehensive-Lab-41 explained that “lesbian is 女同 or 拉拉, gay is 同志,” while a deleted user added: “拉拉 is lesbian in Chinese. 跨性别 is Trans in Chinese. Then we also use the [English] words gay and LGBT in our lives. There is no corresponding vocabulary in Chinese.” 拉拉, pronounced lālā, is twice displaced: an abbreviation of the transliteration of lesbian. I learned from Tumblr user audreydoeskaren that 百合, meaning lilies, is another common term for lesbians, and Quora user Yiya Weng taught me what felt like a secret code: P = pretty girl (signifying a femme lesbian), T = tomboy (butch), and H = half. “XX恋” (恋, as in 同性恋, meaning “love”) indicates interest, with “tt 恋” meaning “butch for butch” and so on.

Even as the slang has expanded my world, it is also limiting: these terms are modern, only originating within the last several decades and having been cultivated by online communities, and still rooted in Western words and ideas. We can self-identify all we want with both old and new transpositions of the English language, but an authentically Chinese lesbianism remains elusive while queerness itself is already elusive and indeterminate as a Western concept. Placing the unarticulated “Chinese lesbian” atop the fluid foundation of queerness makes it, in a sense, doubly queer; we search for language to not only express identity but also to interrogate it. But we are hermeneutically limited: there is an epistemological gap in not being able to fully and authentically vocalize one’s identities and experiences. Community is that much harder to build without the linguistic framework to support it.

Still, at least now I can come out to my extended family. Not that I would. +++ When I accused my mother of being homophobic, she denied it. “You can’t blame me. This is just my Chinese background; it’s how we were raised.”

She placed the responsibility on an untraceable past, the ghostly hands of our ancestors guiding her beliefs. The bigotry is not hers, it is our inescapably Chinese blood, our mothers and fathers before us, a tradition strengthened by the steel of a thousand years—or is it?

The idea that Chinese culture is, and has always been, uniformly sexually conservative and homophobic is pervasive. I, along with everyone I know, believed it readily without really questioning where this traditional ‘culture’ came from. There are the obvious reasons, the easy reasons: in line with Confucianism, parents want grandchildren, and it is their child’s filial duty to make that happen. Confucianism itself, along with Buddhism and Taoism, does not condemn homosexuality, but instead places emphasis on family, lineage, and ancestral worship (which is not possible without continuing the family line). Among conservative Chinese people, the belief that queerness is a Western

FEATS

idea that was neo-colonially brought to China is also popular, perhaps influenced by the fact that Mandarin queer terms are originally Western.

The result of this is best expressed by my mother when she told me: “你千万不能跟别人说这个事儿. If our friends or relatives find out, it will bring so much shame on us. 太丢脸了.” 丢脸 means, literally, to “lose face,” and to prevent this would be, of course, to save face. Chinese communities are tightly knit, and word travels fast. Having an openly queer child is an (unjustified) indication that the parents did something wrong in raising them, and that’s why they turned out like that; family relations become a matter of saving face over supporting one’s own child.

However, Chinese literature indicates that the homophobic attitude may not have always been the dominant one. Some ancient sexual handbooks contain illustrations depicting sexual activity between women; such activity was tolerated and even encouraged as a way to draw out women’s ‘yin’ essences, since sexual energy and activity were seen as ways to cultivate the feminine ‘yin’ energy and balance it with the masculine ‘yang.’ 怜香伴 (The Fragrant Companion), a Ming dynasty (1368 to 1644) play by renowned author Li Yu, tells of a newlywed woman, Cui Jianyun, who meets an unmarried woman, Cao Yuhua, at the temple.

They fall in love, promise to become husband and wife in the next life, and arrange for Yuhua to become Jianyun’s husband’s second wife so they can be together. Feng Menglong’s Ming dynasty anthology 醒世 恒言 (Stories to Awaken the World) includes a story set in the Jin dynasty about one of the fictional King Hailing’s concubines, Hu Ali, who begins to have sex with Shenge, one of her ladies-in-waiting who also dressed like a man. The king was told that Ali was having sex with another man and had her killed, causing Shenge to commit suicide. The famous 18th-century Chinese classic, 紅樓夢 (The Dream of the Red Chamber) by Cao Xueqin, openly explores same-sex romance between both men and women.

There it was: Chinese lesbians, or at least queer Chinese people, written onto pages and into minds. But that wasn’t enough. I wanted three-dimensional reality, people who had lived and loved, proof that we’ve existed throughout history—and not just as figments.

During the Zhou dynasty, heterosexual marriage and homosexual romance often coexisted for upper-class men, and in the Han dynasty, emperors had male as well as female concubines. The phrases “断 袖”—“cut sleeve,” referring to the story of a Han emperor who cut his sleeve because his male lover was sleeping atop it) and “分桃” (“divided peach,” from the story of two male lovers sharing a peach) became popular during the Ming dynasty. At the same time, complex marriage ceremonies in Fujian province valorized male same-sex relationships.

These ceremonies involved animal sacrifice, blood oaths, and sworn loyalty; however, the homosexual aspect was not explicit, as the men were then called “契兄” and “契弟”—essentially, “contracted older/younger brother.” As early as the second century, there were also marriages between women in a practice called 对食, meaning paired eating, or eating facing one another. This involved palace women becoming “husband and wife,” and sometimes, one of the two women would also dress as a man. The heterosexual framing makes it clear that these marriages were not just about companionship but rather were explicitly romantic and sexual, and women dressing as men implies that there was room for, and tolerance of, a degree of gender fluidity. At the same time, female same-sex relationships were perhaps only accepted in heteronormative and patriarchal contexts, in which women were forced to play husband and wife instead of simply existing, and loving, as themselves.

The 金兰会 (Golden Orchid Society), although not exclusively lesbian, is perhaps the most well-recorded instance of a nonheteronormative female community in China. It existed in Guangdong for over 300 years, beginning in the mid-17th century Qing Dynasty. Women in the Golden Orchid Society took oaths to never marry men or never have sexual relations with the men they were formally married to. Breaking the oath had severe consequences involving public humiliation and even beating.

Some members of the Golden Orchid Society were 自 梳女—self-combing women.

These women, who were single or in relationships with other women, would style their hair in a certain hairdo that was typically worn by married women

to indicate their unavailability to men. Many women in the society entered into marriages with one another, both as a queer practice and as a rebellion against often oppressive and abusive heterosexual marriage practices. The growing silk industry expanded employment for women, allowing them to be financially independent and making a two-woman household feasible. The courtship rituals for such marriages were similar to heterosexual ones, and despite typically being seen as rebellious, the marriages were sometimes accepted and even supported by the women’s communities and families. Families were especially accepting in the case where the daughter refused her (unwanted) husband on their wedding night, violating the conditions of the marriage contract and becoming ‘unweddable’ to men. Marrying another woman was perceived as at least being better than remaining an unmarried financial burden to one’s parents.

A smaller and shorter-lived group existed in Shanghai from the end of the Qing Dynasty into the beginning of the Republic of China.

They were called 磨镜党—a name derived from the phrase 摩镜子 (polishing or rubbing mirrors), which was a euphemism for lesbian behavior. The anthology 《清稗类钞》, a collection of historiographical essays from the Qing, talks about the society in detail in its 38th volume, 《洪奶奶与妇女昵》(“Grandma Hong flirts with, or is intimate with, women”). “两女相爱，较男女之狎昵为甚；因妒而争之事时 有之，且或以性命相博... 自是而即视男子为厌物矣” roughly translated, means that, for members of 磨镜党, “the love between women was deeper than the love between man and woman; fighting due to jealousy was common, and some even risked their lives… naturally, men were seen as disgusting.” In fact, the Baidu Baike encyclopedia page about 磨镜 claims that, while the 磨镜党 was active, lesbians seemed to have considerable power and numbers in Shanghai.

Early Western travelers in China found the acceptance of samesex romantic and sexual relations to be a great flaw of Chinese society; Westerners saw this as proof of their own moral superiority. For instance, in his 1569 account of China, Portuguese Dominican friar Gaspar da Cruz depicted China as the New Sodom and criticized Chinese tolerance of that “filthy abomination, which is that they are so given to the accursed sin of unnatural vice” (the vice being sodomy).

Today, there seems to be a complete reversal; a 1992 Washington Post article articulates the modern Western viewpoint succinctly, accusing China of being “one of the world’s most repressive countries” for queer people.

So what happened in between?

The “Self-Strengthening Movement” in the post-Opium War Qing dynasty saw the importation of not only Western science and technology but also of Western moral and cultural values—including homophobia. Historian Bret Hinsch argues that during this time, the Chinese began to absorb Christian missionaries’ ideas about sexual morality, even though very few followed the religion. Not only were perceptions of homosexuality Westernized, but so was the discourse surrounding it. Terms like 断袖 (cut sleeve), 分桃 (divided peach), and 摩镜子 (rubbing mirrors) were native conceptions about individual behaviors—rather than asserting an essential identity, these terms built upon the actions that constructed a fluid, performative identity. Today’s 同性恋 (same-sex love, used to denote homosexuality) asserts the essential in the way that English words ‘homosexual’ and ‘heterosexual’ do. Discourse has also shifted toward delineating sexuality as either normal or abnormal, rational or irrational. Homosexuality’s deviance from imported 20th-century Western beliefs about normality and rationality ultimately led to widespread homophobia in China.

Perhaps more crucially, this aspect of Westernization also means that queer Chinese communities now look to Western models of being queer, such as prominent populations in cities like New York City, instead of turning to native traditions—not because they choose not to, but because these traditions aren’t widely known.

Following both Western-influenced suppression and intolerance of queerness as well as major evolutions in China such as the Cultural Revolution, the extensive Chinese history of queer and specifically lesbian activity and community has been lost not only on critics of homosexuality but also on the homosexuals themselves. The lives and experiences of Chinese

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FEATS

lesbians past and present are already woven into the tapestry of our culture, waiting to be discovered, waiting for us to realize that we are part of an enduring narrative about resistance, freedom, and love. +++ In 1997, China decriminalized homosexuality, and as of 2001, homosexuality is no longer officially considered a psychiatric disorder— but homophobia remains. Homosexuality was specifically associated with violence—an association with no factual or logical basis aside from the idea that homosexuality was considered psychologically and morally aberrant. Without the religious basis of Christianity, China developed its own justification for this intolerance, primarily that homosexuality disrupts the generational cycles and familial structures that are so central to Chinese society. In this way, lesbianism is doubly harmful to the Chinese social order in that it threatens both heterosexual and patriarchal hegemonies, along with the traditional family structure.

Nevertheless, in recent decades, lesbian communities in China have only become stronger. The late 1990s saw the first lesbian bars open in major cities like Beijing. Filmmaker and activist He Xiaopei says of the importance of the gay bar as a site of organization: “As long as everyone comes out together, we will all be able to become visible living beings in our community. We must work together to become a group with a goal. ” Following China’s 1997 Gay and Lesbian National Conference, lesbians, feeling dissatisfied with the focus on gay men, started both a lesbian national conference and a queer women’s organization called 北京姐妹小组 (Beijing Sisters Group). In 2004, activists started 北京拉拉沙龙, “La La Salon Beijing,” which was a weekly discussion event allowing lesbians to come together as a community, encouraging self-acceptance, mutual support, and social visibility. Starting in the early 2000s, there have been multiple active lesbian organizations and networks in cities like Beijing and Chengdu, as well as online. The rise of social media and online platforms has allowed lesbians in China to connect, share experiences, and organize in ways that were previously difficult. Online hotlines like 兰妹 热线 (Lánmèi hotline), and dating apps like

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the L (formerly Rèlā, 热拉) have played a crucial role in bringing together Chinese lesbians, providing a safe space to explore their identities and find support. Today, Douban group 天空组 (Les Sky) is a space for over 370,000 Chinese lesbian members to commiserate and celebrate, sharing with and supporting each other in their journeys of self-discovery and self-acceptance. In this online refuge, the cultural detachments that once isolated many have given way to a thriving, inclusive, and liberating space where individuals can be their authentic selves and find the support they need to flourish. +++ As it stands, Chinese American lesbians experience a detachment from what would otherwise have been communities we belong to. I learned Chinese values and practiced Chinese culture only through my parents; I have been closed off from a world of my own. I spent years believing that what were perhaps the two most pivotal facets of my identity—my heart and my blood— existed in direct opposition to each other. And we are twice removed: once from mainland Chinese lesbians who themselves are removed from historical traditions of Chinese lesbianism.

The very language we would use in conversations about Chinese queerness and lesbianism is taken from the West, and even that imported language, especially slang, is not quite within reach for the diaspora.

So, in place of community, I found a pathway for self-understanding on the screen.

Movies like Saving Face (2004) and Everything Everywhere All At Once (2022) depict the Chinese American lesbian in the context of familial, and especially maternal, relations. Saving Face in particular explores the marginalization of Wil, a lesbian within her already marginalized ethnic community in Flushing, New York. Wil came out by saying “I love you… and I’m gay,” two phrases that her mother, Hwei-Lan, immediately deemed mutually exclusive. Hwei-Lan’s response reflected my mother’s: “My daughter is not gay. I am not a bad mother.” But Hwei-Lan

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is also ostracized by the Flushing community for being pregnant out of wedlock; while her father (Wil’s grandpa) pressures her to marry a man she does not love, she pressures Wil to date a man. Months later, Wil and her love interest reunite at a Chinese party, where they kiss. Most of the partygoers leave, disgusted, but some stay—including Hwei-Lan. Saving Face illustrates explicitly the possibility of Chinese and lesbian coexistence, and perhaps more personally, the possibility of familial reconciliation.

The implications of the theories, histories, and stories I unearthed reach beyond just Chinese lesbians; these discussions hold meaning for all Chinese people, the diaspora, queer people, immigrants, and children of immigrants.

A radically supportive, cross-cultural community can flourish further when we step out of the shadows of hegemonic cultural imperialism and Western misconceptions about China and its people, culture, and history. I am realistic at best and cynical at worst, but I can learn to hope.

👩

AL B’26 ‍❤️‍👩 indyfeatures@gmail.com

METRO

MOTOR CITY, MASSACHUSETTS Mansfield autoworkers’ road to solidarity

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On September 14, the President of the United Automobile Workers (UAW) Shawn Fain made an unprecedented announcement: when the UAW’s contract expired at midnight, workers would strike at one plant of each of the Big Three automakers—General Motors, Ford, and Stellantis (formerly Chrysler). It would be the first time in history that workers at all three companies walked off the job at once. The next day, a sunny one at the Stellantis-subsidiary parts distribution center in Mansfield, Massachusetts, the UAW Local 422 union held a “practice picket.” Even though its members were not yet among the 13,000 Big Three workers already on strike, the entrance to the distribution center at 550 Forbes Boulevard was blocked by about 40 Stellantis employees and other supporters demonstrating their readiness if called upon. They wore bright red UAW-branded T-shirts, held signs with messages like “FAIR PAY NOW” and walked in a circle chanting “we are the union, the mighty, mighty union” to the tune of the Frosted Flakes song.

A week later, the call came. On September 22, the UAW asked the Stellantis employees in Mansfield, a town about 20 miles north of Providence, to go on strike. By early October, they were approaching two weeks off the job.

Along with a familiar chanting circle, a 20-foot tall “Scabby the Rat” inflatable now stood over cars passing on Forbes Boulevard. Pearl Jam’s “Even Flow” played from portable speakers under tents, where picketers took relief from the sun. Police officers leaned against their Dodge Charger police cruisers—manufactured by Stellantis—surveilling the scene in fluorescent yellow vests from across the street. Days before, a member of the Local had been arrested for blocking a truck from entering the facility.

Like the rest of the UAW, Local 422 is fighting for a significant raise, a return of regular cost-of-living pay increases which were eliminated during the Great Recession, and the end of so-called “tiers,” which lead to different levels of pay and benefits for workers based on when they were hired. But members of Local 422 in Mansfield, occupying a peripheral role in the national union, have a different perspective than the one visible in most coverage of the UAW strike. While the vast majority of Big Three employees work in manufacturing plants, UAW members in Mansfield exclusively distribute parts to local dealerships. Additionally, while the bulk of Big Three manufacturing employees work in midwestern states like Michigan and Ohio, Mansfield is one of 38 distribu-

tion centers that are on strike in other locations across the country. This can pose challenges when it comes to communicating problems specific to the parts division to the national union’s bargaining team, said Patrick Lozeau, the Local’s financial secretary, in an interview with the College Hill Independent. Citing the fact that of the nearly 40,000 Stellantis workers in the UAW, only 1,200 are in the parts division, Lozeau said, “it’s tough, because a lot of things end up getting pushed through in the contract and we don’t have much of a say in it.” For instance, according to Lozeau, the “ancient,” inefficient equipment Local 422 members use on the job have not yet received the updates promised in the previous contract negotiated in 2019, and newly hired workers in the parts division have a top pay $7 less than older workers, which is not the case in other divisions.

For Local 422, then, there are benefits and drawbacks of belonging to a union with a broad membership.Members of the Local can combine their leverage—i.e., the ability to decrease the profits of their employer if they don’t get their demands—with that of tens of thousands of manufacturing workers across the country.

Striking would be significantly less effective if the union only represented workers in a certain division. On the other hand, conflicts can arise when manufacturing workers’ interests differ from those of workers in other divisions. There is hope, though, that the disappointments Local 422 has seen in the past will be made up for in the new contract.

A priority for Local 422 is equality between workers within the Mansfield facility. People at the distribution center hired after 2011, socalled “Tier-2 workers,” do not have guaranteed pensions. And those hired after 2015, referred to as “Tier-2-and-a-half,” earn about 75 percent as much as other workers. Finally, those hired as “temporary workers”—even though some have worked at the plant for years—do not receive healthcare benefits like others. Even though Tier-1 workers would not personally benefit from the hierarchy’s elimination, workers of all tiers who spoke with the Indy repeatedly criticized the tier system. “We want it so everybody, once they retire, can live comfortably and have a pension…It’s not fair that we’re paying into their retirement, but no one’s paying into ours,” said Paul Gado in an interview with the Indy, a “Tier-2-and-a-half ” employee who grew up in Mansfield and has worked at the center for five years.

Stellantis instituted tiers back in 2008

( TEXT BBK DESIGN SS ILLUSTRATION LS PHOTOGRAPHY WS ) amid the economic consequences of the Great Recession, a decision that has caused some inter-union strife that threatened to weaken solidarity within the Local. As Lozeau told the Indy, “What’s a union supposed to stand for? Unity.

We don’t have that right now with the two-plus tiers that we have.” Justin Blanchard, shop chair for Local 422, said in an interview with the Indy that tiers are “the single biggest thing that has hindered our union and any progress…there’s always been that animosity. The younger guys kind of blame the older guys for why they’re at a lower tier.” But rather than play into the corporation’s hands and continue to foster animosity between tiers, Local 422 has united behind their goal of putting every worker on a level playing field. “I’m so happy because it’s the first time in years that the newer guys have really started to embrace the union,” Blanchard said.

Workers of all tiers face the same risks in the workplace. Some Local 422 members had disturbing stories of the dangers of working at the distribution center. Carter Shaw fractured his knee loading a trailer mere months after he started working at the Mansfield distribution center. But the injury itself was only the first in a series of damages, bodily and financial.

Because he had not yet worked for a 90 day probationary period, his compensation claim was originally denied. The knee injury kept him from being able to work and earn a paycheck for a year and a half. Being unable to work also meant that he missed out on some of the benefits workers receive as a percentage of the company’s profits: “If you get hurt on the job, you don’t get those profit-sharing checks that they always brag about,” Shaw said. In light of how vulnerable all Big Three employees are, the capacity to work together, to rally around similar issues, and to demonstrate solidarity becomes all the more important.

Solidarity and Disruption: The History of the UAW Local 422’s involvement as a New England distribution plant in the national strike, as well

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METRO as its emphasis on solidarity between long-tenured and newer employees, is in keeping with the reason the UAW was first created. Before the UAW’s founding in the 1930s, the American Federation of Labor (AFL) dominated the labor movement in the U.S, but exclusively organized “skilled workers” in craft-specific unions and ignored workers who were put on factory assembly lines. After pressure from this growing contingent of less-specialized workers, the AFL chartered the UAW to represent all workers that produced automobiles, regardless of speciality. The UAW’s trademark was the “sitdown” strike—in which workers, often against the wishes of their own union presidents, would sit on the job and refuse to work, while also taking “physical possession”of machinery and thus preventing the hiring of replacement workers or “scabs.” Often holding secret meetings to keep members from being fired for participating, the UAW overcame company-sponsored spying, intimidation, and violence to organize GM, Chrysler, and eventually Ford. In the process, the UAW increased auto workers’ wages by as much as 300 percent, along with other benefits. By 1944, the UAW claimed over 1 million members.

For much of the rest of the 20th century and up to now, though, the UAW was significantly less confrontational against the Big Three. Several transformations had weakened the union’s leverage: as labor historian Jeremy Brecher argues, a “class compromise” between workers’ unions and management caused labor leaders to suppress strikes. In 1981, President Ronald Reagan tacitly declared open season on labor when his administration fired more than 11,000 striking air traffic controllers. Additionally, free trade policies and the opening of China to foreign corporations made it possible for the Big Three to outsource labor abroad where wages were lower. In Mansfield, the facility that once employed over a hundred people now only employs about 45.

Under these new constraints, the UAW had significantly less leverage. Furthermore, foreign competitors like Honda and Toyota caused American manufacturers’ profits to plummet, and before long the Big Three turned towards its payroll to make up the difference. Fearing the loss of their jobs during the Great Recession, the UAW made a series of concessions— including the implementation of the tiered hiring system and the removal of cost-of-living adjustments—whose effects are being seen most dramatically now after a period of high inflation.

While it is hard to know whether these concessions could have been avoided without UAW members losing their jobs, they have not aged well: several Local 422 members saw it as a case of the UAW leadership “selling out” its future members and emphasized that they had voted against that contract.

This March, though, Shawn Fain was elected UAW President after campaigning to stamp out corruption and to stop making concessions to automakers, marking a profound shift in rhetoric and vision after decades of UAW lead-

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ers trying to work cordially with employers. The current “Stand Up Strike” led by Fain consciously aims to reject the UAW’s recent practices and explicitly invokes the UAW’s historical trait of disobedience, which seems not to have disappeared but merely skipped a generation.

This “break the rules” attitude is first evident in charismatic and incendiary social media posts and a frank approach in interviews and livestreams, in which Fain has accused Big Three CEOs of lying and tossed paper copies of their contract offers in trash cans.

While replicating old strategies of solidarity and disruption, today’s UAW is also employing unprecedented tactics: rather than have everyone strike at once, leadership has been intentional and sparing, announcing which plants are to strike the day of: “The strategy is to create as much chaos as possible for the company so they won’t see where things are coming,” said Brandon Mancilla, director of UAW Region 9A— comprising New England, New York, and Puerto Rico, in a conversation with the Indy. The union has thus far refrained from striking at some of the Big Three’s most important plants, such as those that produce lucrative vehicles like the Ford F-150, instead strategically choosing particular plants like Mansfield’s. Keeping critical factories open means that the UAW keeps the threat to close them in play. Last week, for instance, 8,700 UAW members were told to strike at Ford’s most profitable plant, Kentucky Truck Plant in Louisville, immediately after Ford had opened a bargaining meeting with an unimproved offer.

So far, this unorthodox strategy seems to be working. Victories touted by Fain include GM offering to add electric-battery-plant workers to the UAW contract and GM and Ford offering to reinstate cost-of-living-adjustments.

The success of the UAW strike in Mansfield and beyond is part of a labor resurgence nationwide, the most promising a majority of U.S. residents have seen in their lifetimes. After other recent labor wins—like the International Brotherhood of Teamsters securing significant gains in their contract negotiations with UPS this August—it seems clear that the unions can and will gain ground in the 21st century and that labor struggles, once seen as mostly a thing of the past, are alive and well.

one thing: fairness. This July, Stellantis reported that it made a record $12.1 billion in profit in just the first six months of 2023. CEO Carlos Tavares earned $24.8 million in salary in 2022, 365 times more than his average Stellantis employee. These vast profits come off the back of concessions made by UAW members in 2008 to try to keep Chrysler (now Stellantis) and others from going bankrupt. Since then, employees haven’t gotten the cost-of-living raises they had before, and Local 422 members say that the 6.54 percent average raises they have received haven’t nearly protected against a 20 percent increase in the cost of living since 2019. According to Gado, “a lot of people look at us and they say, ‘Oh, they’re union. They just want to make more money and have a four-day work week.’

It has nothing to do with that at all. It’s about being fair.”

The unity being fostered in Local 422, between long-tenured Stellantis employees and newer ones, between those that grew up in Mansfield watching their fathers and uncles go to work for the same company and those that have transferred from Texas and Illinois, and between those in parts distribution in Mansfield and their fellow UAW members across the nation, comes from something more than the desire to earn better wages or get a guaranteed pension. This is not to say that these material demands are unimportant. But the demand to unite and support workers of all stripes that led to the founding of the UAW in 1936—and spurred the union to pay for buses to take people to the March on Washington in 1963—demonstrates the same commitment that members of Local 422 have to build far-reaching solidarity. As Gado told the Indy, “I feel we’re out here for a reason, not just to fight for us, but for future employees that want to come in here and earn a livable wage.” Time will tell whether they get all their demands. But whether or not they get the raise they deserve, it seems Local 422 in Mansfield will be better off having joined the UAW Stand Up Strike, if only because they are part of the most powerful labor movement in decades.

BBK B’23.5 mostly rides his bike anyway. theindymetro@gmail.com

Justice as Fairness At 550 Forbes Boulevard in Mansfield, the message on the picket line kept coming back to

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EPHEMERA

CU B’25 Hot and Spicy Plotting collage on fabric Materials source from Golden Pot, Quick Wok, and Chef Ho’s. indyephemera@gmail.com

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$

“I’M A BOSS, YOU A WORKER BITCH”

ARTS

Black femme rap under the pressures of racial capitalism. → At the peak of Black femme rapper Lil

Kim’s 90s success, civil rights activist C. Delores Tucker condemned Lil Kim’s label, Warner Bros. Records, “for producing this filth,” this “gangsta porno rap.” Almost thirty years later, Congresswoman Maxine Waters argued that Megan Thee Stallion and Cardi B’s “WAP” exemplifies “the ability for women to take charge of what they want to say.” In the last 20 years, what was once considered degrading has now become empowering, at least on the outside.

“WAP” is a hypersexual hymn. Backgrounded by a sample from Frank Ski’s 1992 “Whores in This House,” Megan and Cardi B rap about their “wet-ass puss[ies]” and “[fire] head game.” In the music video, Megan and Cardi engage in an exaggerated, neon-colored spectacle of ass shaking and tongue splaying, supported by a clan of conventionally attractive, high-profile women. The video was directed by a white man named Colin Tilley.

For feminist online magazine Bitch Media, “WAP” “honors women’s pleasure” and is “a feminist anthem” in which Cardi and Megan “don’t care if it’s too much for some folks to handle.” But when we examine the artists’ careers, lyricism, and public personas in the context of a hypermasculine and often misogynistic hip-hop landscape, this narrative of empowerment becomes complicated. While it may seem these rappers are taking back a once-clandestine sexuality, these supposed acts of reclamation are still delimited and reified by hegemonic views of women, through a process known as selfobjectification. The question remains for whether or not self-objectification can be an instrument of social change, or whether it is simply part and parcel of a normalizing, exclusionary femme sexuality. +++ Self-objectification is not a completely victimized state of oppression—it is a consequence of a system that requires us to labor for our basic needs. While the forms of production for sex workers and rappers are tangibly different, the premise of monetizing one’s sexuality still binds the two professions.

Mainstream performing artists of all mediums are bound by the preferences of the public eye. However, considering the historical and contemporary hypersexualization and fetishization of Black women, lucrative options that ensure popular reception are limited. Within psychologist Ann Cahill’s framework, which suggests that women who commodify their sexuality are “full agents,” Megan and Cardi are actively choosing this presentation. But this understanding of sexual labor can only take us so far. We still must interrogate the extent to which one can be an agent in a capitalist system. Cardi B and Megan are not total victims in their own work, but navigating the production of an image and body that can get them what they desire in the face of impossible standards.

Cardi and Megan’s careers began with hit singles that exalted their bodies and demoted other women. The act of these femmes performing such braggadocio—performing a deviant form of their gender—is implicitly radical.

Megan’s 2018 “Cocky AF” highlights what

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she has to offer to another: “Got face, I got body / you name it, I got it.” However, the repeated “yo ho’ wanna be me, yo n***a wanna eat it,” empowers Megan only by placing her within the hierarchy of male desire, and thus places certain women beneath her. Similarly in Cardi’s 2017 “Bodak Yellow,” she repeatedly raps “I don’t gotta dance/I make money moves,” referencing her history as a stripper. The cavalier tone of this line tells an individualist success story, intrinsically claiming that her ascendence and social mobility out of sex work is universally aspirational. She not only abandons women who may currently be in that position but uses an exceptionalist framework to glorify her acceptance and success within the white space of mainstream music. Empowerment here is framed as one woman’s economic success rather than a disruption of a capitalist system that offers the female body as a commodity. +++ Although hypersexualization like Cardi’s and Megan’s is marketed as a choice, it’s really a method of survival. Self-objectification is one of the only paths to female success in a competitive music industry that promotes radical expression solely within the narrow frame of patriarchal legibility and profitability. As Cornel West writes, hip-hop is a “paradoxical cry of desperation and celebration,” caught inevitably between liberation and oppression. Considering Kimberlé Crenshaw’s famous theory of intersectionality, it is misguided to say that Cardi and Megan are expressing their female sexual and bodily autonomy through their performances with a de-racialized free will. We must situate Megan and Cardi’s turn to self-objectification through the lens of both race and gender, not only in the music industry, but in the stratified social sphere.

This large-scale hypersexualization of Black women is reflected in the expectations of those in power: primarily white label owners and audiences. Gail Hilson Woldu writes that “the business of hip hop is built on mythic and fantasized depictions of reality,” advancing the idea that the inflated braggadocio adopted by Megan and Cardi is a means of accruing status and capital in the industry. Furthermore, this “mythic” image of many rappers, not just femme ones, distances Blackness from whiteness and normative expectations. It turns Blackness into something consumable, alienated, and fetishized.

Ultimately, Megan and Cardi are catering to an audience that expects them to align with historically destructive portrayals of Black women.

Those very expectations are rooted in Jim Crow-era tropes, which trouble popular perceptions of Megan and Cardi–specifically the Jezebel and the Sapphire. The Jezebel is “seductive, alluring, worldly, beguiling, tempting, and lewd.” Jezebel’s Black female sexuality is fierce, perilous for those who interact with it. These adjectives are in accordance with photographic portrayals of Megan and Cardi, many of which balance a Marilyn Monroe-reminiscent seductive glamor with an enticing exposure of skin. Their shimmering, cat-like eyes and juicy, rouged lips visually hearken to Jezebel. Very rarely are the rappers depicted visually or lyrically without an armor of sexual appeal. The Sapphire, moreover, is “rude, loud, malicious, stubborn, and overbearing.” Lyrically, one might describe Cardi and Megan’s verses as bold, brash, and, in some cases, mean. Thus, the self-objectification, hyper-confidence, and assertive lyrical behaviors of Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion are concurrently a satisfaction of deeply racist archetypes and, technically, an exercise of Black femme freedom. White audiences (sub)consciously

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( TEXT DdF DESIGN GK ILLUSTRATION IRD ) project these stereotypes onto these rappers, fostering an acute white comfort that calls for nothing to change.

The interplay between Megan and Cardi’s self-objectification and their disturbing reduction to the Jezebel and Sapphire tropes results in their diminishment from the categories of both rapper and artist. In fact, when Megan Thee Stallion was shot by Tory Lanez in July 2020, her pain was immediately minimized and invalidated. In a New York Times op-ed, Megan wrote, “the way people have publicly questioned and debated whether I played a role in my own violent assault proves that my fears about discussing what happened were, unfortunately, warranted.” The “excessive” Black female body is commercialized and fetishized to such an extent that her pain struggles for basic recognition. The consequences of a white audience’s demands for caricatures of Black femme artists results in a concurrent self-invalidation and self-objectification. Most mainstream femme rap engages with content akin to the core subjects of braggadocio rap—sex and the female body as a thing to be consumed. If this is the case, what change are female rappers truly making, continuing to set a precedent for the body’s constriction to a sexual commodity? +++ The contrasting material success and moral ambiguity of Megan, Cardi, Lil Kim, and other female rappers pose an ethical quagmire. Their liberated sexuality is in tension with the racist stereotypes and misogynistic desires their physical and lyrical presentations fulfill. Femme rappers are situated in this double bind: both gatekeeping male desire and stylizing their desire for men.

Ultimately, as Woldu puts it, these artists are “shapeshifters,” straddling racialized, gendered, and sexualized paradigms. They challenge preconceived tropes by unapologetically fulfilling them with something approaching free will. Yet, everything is complicated by these artists’ relation to production. Sexualization and self-objectification generates revenue, profit that primarily goes to the (mostly) men running record labels. This cycle is doomed to repeat as women, specifically Black women, are simultaneously empowered and oppressed. If we must “shapeshift” into preset paradigms, we forfeit actual empowerment for a false version constrained by hegemony.

Upsetting this ideal would garner an integration of corporeality and femme desire located outside the patriarchy into music and cultural production. Rather than celebrating the body’s sexual acts solely in service of men, this music would have to celebrate the erotic body in all forms. Separating corporate motivations and celebrating the artist of color as an expansive force allows sexually-centered music to serve everyone: divorcing itself from the grasp of whiteness, masculinity, and industry.

DdF B’26 wishes Megan and Cardi got 100% of the royalties. indyarts@gmail.com

DEAR INDY

SMS SOS

g after, in rn o m e th , e tt e u q Texting eti uch into it m o to s d a re ie d In and

When my phone wouldn’t turn on one sweaty morning in the summer of 2022, I breathed a sigh of relief. Actually, that’s not quite accurate. Take two: when I’d completed a small bout of hysteria about the loss of Apple Pay, a freshly curated Tinder, and the organized home screen of a self-identified anal-retentive, I breathed a sigh of relief. I felt that I had finally encountered a socially acceptable escape from the web of hyper-communication. It was then with relish that I texted my closest interlocutors from my laptop: ack! phone broken, might be afk for a bit. bit. Afk, for those of you who haven’t dated gamers (remain (remain grateful) grateful) means “away from keyboard.”

And away from the keyboard I was! Released from my iMessage obligations, I was free to browse Instagram on Safari, experience the sublimity of nature, and email my friends about how life-changing it was not to have a phone. The month, dear reader, was wonderful. But September’s arrival, with its onslaught of social responsibilities, coordination about where the fuck in the Rock I was, and, quite frankly, the primal need to take a selfie, prompted me to get my phone fixed.

With my Walden experience officially over, I’m now writing from the same texting purgatory that the rest of our generation exists in, trapped in a Sisyphean cycle wherein each hour seems to undo the replying work of the previous one. Even as I type, shielded in theory

by Do Not Disturb, the red number on my messages app rises higher. Sometimes, however, a text of interest appears, whether it be from lover or op. My close-reading skills go into overdrive, and I feel allowed to indulge my worst qualities: a prolific attention to grammatical detail, and an ability to overthink that Deleuze and Guattari would be proud of. Is this healthy? Definitely not. But imagine a college without these textual micro-dramas—without the anticipated “u up?”, the subsequent lack of response, and the dreaded screenshot of the aforementioned exchange. C’est…sad and boring! If loving Dear Indy, the little dramas of texting is wrong, I don’t want to be right.

I hooked up with someon e a few nights really well, b ago. I though ut neither on t it went e of us has te mean someth xted since. D ing, or should o es that I stop overth inking it?

Sincerely, Morning(s) A fter

) After,

Dear Morning(s

Dear Indy,

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r men? xting etiquette fo te er op pr is t ha W meone’s that I text like so I always get told sister… dad, or like their Sincerely, t Family Group Cha

Dear Famil

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( TEXT SA DESIGN SS ILLUSTRATION SS ) Questions edited for clarity.

VOLUME 47 ISSUE 04

18

n i t e l l u B The BULLETIN

10/20/2023

( TEXT QC & ARC DESIGN AM )

Upcoming Actions & Community Events Saturday 10/21 @1PM: All Out for Palestine Rhode Island Rally and March Join community organizers this weekend for a rally and march at the RI State House Steps for Palestine. Call for an end to U.S. complicity in Israel’s bombing of Gaza and an end to occupation. If attending, wear a mask and wear plain clothing.

Location: RI State House, 82 Smith St, Providence, RI 02903 Saturday 10/21 @4PM-9PM: 18th Annual Iron Pour and Sims Ave Festival Join The Steel Yard as a trained crew melts over 2,000 pounds of iron in their custom-built furnace, creating life sculptures with fire and molten metal. The theme for this year is BUGGIN’ OUT! AT THE YARD. More than twenty artists will also take over the center of Sims Ave with demonstrations of glass blowing, blacksmithing, and more.

Free admission.

Location: The Steel Yard, 27 Sims Avenue Providence, RI 02909 Monday 10/23 @6:30PM - 7:30PM: Is Beekeeping for Me? Join Calvin Alexander, owner of Bailey Beattie Apiaries LLC, Chair of the Presentation Committee of the Rhode Island Beekeepers Association, and avid beekeeper, in an introduction to beekeeping as a hobby.

The event will go over the time commitment, beekeeping equipment, and bee biology.

Location: Rochambeau Library, 708 Hope Street, Providence, RI 02906 Friday 10/27 @7PM-9:30PM: Queer Open Mic Night Small Format is hosting a Queer Open Mic Night dedicated to the queer community by celebrating their music, stories, drag, comedy, and poetry. Sign-ups to perform begin at 7PM, and the show begins at 7:30PM. Enjoy a free drink when you sign up! Costumed accessories encouraged.

Location: Small Format, 335 Wickenden St, Providence, RI 02903

Mutual aid* & community fundraisers *Mutual aid is “survival pending revolution,” as described by the Black Panthers. Join in redistributing wealth to create an ecosystem of care in response to institutions that have failed or harmed our communities. + Saturday 10/21 @10AM-12PM: Fall Volunteer Orientation The Roger Williams Park (RWP) Botanical Center invites you to their fall orientation this Saturday, joining other new and returning volunteers to learn about what volunteering for RWP Botanical Center entails. Swing by if interested!

Location: RWP Botanical Center, Floral Ave, Providence, RI 02905 + Buy Nothing Day Preparation: Coat Exchange Drop off some winter clothes for RI Coat Exchange as the weather gets chillier! RI Coat Exchange redistributes donated winter wear for community members in need. In preparation for Buy Nothing Day, RI Coat Exchange is currently looking for winter coats, gloves/mittens, scarves, and winter hats, especially in sizes for kids and 3XL+. Visit one of their collection sites across Cranston, East Greenwich, Middletown, or Providence during their business hours!

Location: The Hot Club, 25 Bridge St, Providence, RI 02903 + JBL Mutual Aid Wishlist: Call for KN95s!

Instagram: @jblmutualaid Check out the JBL Mutual Aid wishlist to fulfill some community needs as COVID-19 and flu surges in the fall! Requests include high-quality KN95s, blankets, winter socks, gloves, and more. Follow the links in their Instagram bio to locate the wishlist!

Do you have an event, action, or other information for the Providence community that you’d like to see shared on this page?

Email us at indybulletinboard@gmail.com!

Arts Saturday 10/21 @2PM-5PM: Rising Waters Climate Art Installation This weekend, come make a Rising Waters Fish Flag Installation! Pick your climate actions and your message, make a rising fish, and then plant them. Come to learn from Susan Israel from Climate Creatives to learn about how art can be used to communicate climate data.

Location: 195 District Park, Downtown Providence, Providence, RI 02903 Wednesday 10/25 @7:20PM: Pecha Kucha Night “Taboo” Pecha Kucha PVD is hosting a Pecha Kucha night, mysteriously titled “Taboo.” Pecha Kucha is a presentation method that uses a format of twenty slides maximum, with 20 seconds allotted per slide, capping off the talks for 6 minutes and 40 seconds. There will be a special presentation from Grupo Ondas. Doors open at 7:20PM, and presentations begin at 8:20PM. Location: TBD. Check @pechakuchapvd on Instagram for updates.

Thursday 10/26 @5:30PM-7PM: Café Recuerdos This month’s Café Recuerdos from RI Latino Arts aims to reflect on authenticity, asking the question “What words make up your self-portrait?” Join for an evening of discussion and art-making.

Location: The Broad Street Gateway Center, 1197 Broad St, Providence, RI 02905 Thursday 10/26 @6PM-8PM: NaNoWriMo Kickoff LitArts RI is opening their space to RI writers tackling the 50,000word NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) challenge! Join Kate Lane, facilitator of the SciFi/Fantasy Writing Group, for a presentation on preparing, producing, and sharing work. Register at the link @litartsri.

Location: 400 Harris Ave Unit E, Providence, RI 02909

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THE COLLEGE HILL INDEPENDENT

FEATURE:

All Out for Palestine 10/21 As atrocity in the Gaza Strip breaks news at the culmination of nearly a century of Israeli apartheid, many of the world’s leaders have continued to turn a blind eye to the suffering of the Palestinian people.

Between the United States’ delivery of American defense equipment to Israel and inflammatory news coverage, discourse in the U.S. has overlooked the history of oppression that has coalesced into the landscape of cruelty today.

The struggle for Palestinian liberation is not a movement that stands alone. Calls for a free Palestine are situated alongside calls to stop police brutality, dissolution of the capitalist system, demilitarization, and abolition of imperial power everywhere. Around the world, tens of thousands of people have rallied in support of Palestine in an international demand for an end to Israeli apartheid and the relentless bombing of Gaza. Cities across the United States have erupted in protest against the U.S. government’s economic and military endorsement of the ongoing genocide.

This Saturday, Rhode Islanders are going “ALL OUT FOR PALESTINE” with a march and rally at the steps of the state house. Organized by groups Direct Action for Rights and Equity (DARE), Party for Socialism & Liberation (PSL), Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), Communist Party USA Rhode Island (CPUSA-RI), ANSWER Coalition, and Brown Students for Justice in Palestine, the Ocean State community is calling for hands off Palestine, an end to collective punishment, and the cessation of the supply of US arms to the Israeli regime.