The
PIONEER
All Students for Consent gains national attention
Issue 6 | October 17, 2013 | Whitman news since 1896 | Vol. CXXXI
Spotlight fades from
DIVESTMENT
by sarah cornett News Editor
W
by hannah bartman
hitman’s new All Students for Consent (ASC) club was featured in national news outlets after winning the Consent Revolution Awards, put on by an awareness and anti-rape media outlet called Force, last week. The win was a result of ASC’s recent “Ask For It” campaign, meant to turn an often abused phrase on its head by promoting healthy and consensual sexual relationships. Students in ASC asked to give studiers chocolate “kisses” in the library, and temporary tattoos saying “I ask for it” were handed out freely on campus. Force, a media organization whose mission is “upsetting rape culture,” organized the contest and asked colleges and universities to submit a photo of creative consent promoting activities and campaigns. To win, schools were required to get the most Facebook “likes” on their photo. ASC submitted a picture of the group’s core members standing in front of posters promoting consent that were distributed across campus during events for the “Ask For It” campaign. The photo received over 800 likes, most from Whitman students. ASC won the contest, along with consent advocacy groups from UCLA, Connecticut College, University of Oregon and Arizona State University. As a result, ASC was featured in the Huffington Post, Bitch Magazine and Think Progress, among other news outlets, bringing significant media attention to Whitman and the group. Hundreds of students “liked” the photo, and it got many of them thinking about why the campaign was important to Whitman. “I liked the photo because I appreciate the campaign [ASC] was doing. People’s feelings are very important, and especially in intimate situations, it is crucial to feel like you can and should check in with them,” said sophomore Megan O’Brien. The success of the Ask For It campaign came after months of hard work from founding members juniors Sayda Morales, George Felton, Corinne Vandagriff, Sam Fischer and senior Yana Vasquez.
Staff Reporter
Z
ealous environmentalism and student activism meet head on in the international college campaign of divestment. The peak of this issue was reached at Whitman during environmental activist Bill McKibben’s speech in May of the last school year. Students became impassioned and involved in the campaign for Whitman to divest in its fossil fuel investments as over 200 students marched across campus. But then the school year reached its end. Students left Whitman and divestment similarly diffused, an inevitable difficulty that accompanies student activism. “Right now is a natural period when a good chunk of people who knew about divestment have left and a new chunk of students have come and we have to spread awareness again,” said junior Divestment Media Leader Audrey Vaughan. “It’s a continuing action of informing people.” Divestment is thus still an issue being fought through a passionate minority of dedicated students. It is an issue which they believe has a strong lasting power, and which can be reignited among the student population through education of the issue. And yet the public display of divestment seems to have waned. The posters, the marches and the sit-ins that appeared so prominently last year have diminished with seemingly nothing publicly in its place. “I think it’s no longer at the front and center of campus awareness,” said sophomore Josh Rubenstein. While this may be the majority student opinion, there is still much to be done within the political field of divestment. The student group spearheading the issue believes the next step remains with gaining the backing of the Board of Trustees. “[The trustees have] seen campus issues come and go, and they think that they can ride this one out like they’ve ridden other things out, and so the onus is on us to do our work to get the campus, alumni, faculty and staff behind us so the trustees will listen with an ear towards actually doing something,” said junior Divestment Finance Researcher Collin Smith. Divestment is an international campaign that has been progressively
see DIVESTMENT, page 3
see CONSENT, page 2
Men’s rugby tries for strong season by Mitchell Smith Staff Reporter
A
year ago, the Whitman rugby Reapers suffered an 88-0 loss on their trip to Klamath Falls at the hands of the Oregon Institute of Technology. On Sunday, Oct. 5, the club rugby team of Whitman College had a chance to avenge that season defining loss. The Reapers did not disappoint, outscoring OIT 19-15 on Ankeny Field for their first win of the season. “That felt really good,” said sophomore Nate Dorlac of his team’s redeeming win. It looks like many more of such wins are in store for the team this year, which has been infused with young talent. “It’s a completely different animal,” he said. “We’ve had a lot of people from the freshman class that have showed interest and played really well.” In fact, of the 25 players on the team, eight had never played before coming to Whitman. Second-year Head Coach Clive Kaiser pointed to the youth movement as vital to the future of the team. “This team has incredible potential ... They have the desire, they have the ability and I think they’ll go a long way,” said Kaiser. That youth movement has paid off so far for the Reapers, who also won last Saturday, Oct. 12 in an away game over Willamette University by a score of 15-5. Those away games are tough, explained Kaiser. Because rugby is a club sport, traveling to away games is not mandatory. “The big snag we have is traveling long distances to play teams,” said Kaiser. “The numbers drop off as you go to the away games.” This makes road wins such as the victory against Willamette all the more satisfying for the Reapers. The talent of the younger players sometimes takes a little while to blossom, as Kaiser and some of the more experienced players have to teach technique, strategy and rules to those players with
less experience. This inexperience was a big part of the team’s loss in its first game to Gonzaga University, explained first-year Logan Miller. “That was our first game of the year and we had four or five guys that had never played a game before, so [the difficulty] was to be expected,” he said. Miller has played rugby since he was just six years old, which is actually quite common where he grew up, just outside of London. Miller said that the quality of play here is not quite at the level that it was in England, but that there are parts of the game that are more intense than across the pond. “The guys here are very intense ... It’s very oriented around contact here,” said Miller. That should change soon, though. As the less experienced players gain the basics of the sport, more tactics will be introduced. Miller believes the more advanced tactics will come with time. “You need to know the basics of the game before they can be implemented. I’m sure we’ll bring those [tactics] in soon,” he said. In addition to the rugby players who attend Whitman, the Reapers include several members of the Walla Walla community. This year the number of community players is down compared to years past. Of the 25 on the roster, just four do not attend Whitman. The talent from outside the Whitman sphere has benefits outside of helping the team, explained first-year Edward Ferguson. “I think it’s really great because when you go to a school like Whitman you can sort of get into a bubble. You can be in an environment where you don’t get a lot of contact with the local community unless you get yourself out there. Playing with the guys from town is a great way to get to know some of the people from Walla Walla and engage in a more organic way. Because we’re playing out here, it’s not a forced sort of thing,” said Ferguson. Miller has also enjoyed his teammates, whether or not they are Whitman students. see RUGBY, page 5
Photo by Clay
Humane Society celebrates 46 years of service to local animals by ISABEL MILLS Staff Reporter
T
he Blue Mountain Humane Society in Walla Walla is about to celebrate its 46th anniversary. According to its website, its mission for almost 46 years has been to encourage kindness toward all animals in the community. Sarah Archer, the executive director of the Humane Society, has worked there for eight years now. Since she joined the team, adoption numbers have nearly doubled. “Being an executive director is a pretty multifaceted role. It requires wearing a lot of hats,” she said. “I try to be an inspirational leader for the staff, a fundraiser, a cheerleader, an advocate for animal welfare, a bookkeeper, a counselor and a poop scooper. It’s pretty
much whatever needs to be done.” Despite the heavy work load, Archer truly loves her job. “One of the fun things about being in a leadership role in a nonprofit is that every day is different,” she said. The Humane Society puts no limit on how long they keep animals. Sometimes when animals are there for a long time, staff members take them home, but most of the animals are waiting to be adopted by community members. The adoption process is fairly simple. An application must be filled out, but the Humane Society is quite reasonable when it comes to trusting the citizens of Walla Walla. “Our adoption process honors the belief that people are basically good. More often than
not, people come through our doors because they genuinely have a passion for the human-animal bond,” said Archer. The bond that Whitman students in particular have with the animals is very helpful for both the shelter and the students themselves. “In the summer, you can’t know how much we miss that energy and that enthusiasm. It really makes a difference. I love how on any given Friday afternoon there’s a whole flock of people who come in and it’s so win-win. It’s great for us, it’s great for the animals and it’s great for the students,” said Archer. First-year Spencer Thomas is one of the frequent visitors to the Humane Society that has been going about twice a week since she arrived. see HUMANE SOCIETY, page 6