CHRONICLE

Vol. XXV, Issue 4 April 15, 2014

THE VASSAR

Controversial Class Trip Promotes Critical Discussion: Students Reflect on Their Time in Israel, pg. 8
VASSAR DISCOURSE

Irene Tait

OFFICE HoURS WITh JoShUA SChREIER LIlY SloSS oN MENToR VIolENCE PREvENTIoN PRoGRAm

4-5 14

NATIOnAL & FOREIGn PAGE 7

STUDENT PROTEsT DOEs NOT REQUIRE ADMINIsTRaTIVE PERMIssION

CHRONIcLE, APRIL 2014

ThE VASSAR ChRoNIClE

TABLE OF CONtENtS
Staff Editorial Vassar & Local National & Foreign Affairs Debate & Discourse Humour The Last Page 2 3 8 13 15 16

EDITOR-IN-CHIeF MANAGING EDITOR

CHRIsTa GUILD JOsHUa SHERMaN
PUBLISHeR-IN-EXILe Will Serio EDITORS Hannah Matsunaga Marya Pasciuto Gregory Perry Nathan Tauger COpY & STYLe EDITOR Jenna Amlani COpY & STYLe ASSISTANTS Tatiana Esposito von Mueffling Logan Hill Adam Ninyo Charles Perkins Hailey Steichen ILLUSTRATORS Madeleine Morris Advertising Policy: All advertisements will be clearly demarcated as such. Contact chronicle@ vassar.edu for rates. All material is subject to editors discretion. Nota bene: The opinions published in The Vassar Chronicle do not necessarily represent those of the editors, except for the Staff Editorial, which is supported by at least 70 percent of the Editorial Board.

ZaCK STRUVER

TReASUReR

SubChat

We're Loopy for the LOOP Bus

he founder of Vassars History Department, Lucy Maynard Salmon, was fond of teaching her students how to go to the source while engaging in the study of history. Salmons admonition remains a guiding principle for students pursuing not only history, but all fields of study, at Vassar. To go to the source implies not merely that Vassar students should read primary sources in the library, but that they should visit communities in the Hudson Valley and explore the potentiality for intellectual stimulation in even the least significant historical sites. To that end, Vassar should continue to support opportunities for students to explore and appreciate the sources of the Hudson Valley. Since we, as the Editorial Board of The Vassar Chronicle, love not only the insulated Vassar bubble in which we spend most of our time, but all of Dutchess County, we urge Vassar to subsidize transportation for Vassar students on the Dutchess County LOOP Bus System. We believe that such support will enable more Vassar students to access enriching academic resources and recreational activities that will allow active support of business in the Hudson Valley. In the status quo, Vassar promotes greater access to the Poughkeepsie community by subsidizing use of the citys bus service. Expanding service to the Dutchess LOOP would not only open

more doors in and around the Hudson Valley, but support Vassars ongoing subsidy with the city bus service. Currently, Poughkeepsie Transit System ends bus service at 6:10 P.M. on weekdays, 3:30 P.M. on Saturday, and does not run on Sundays. This greatly limits student accessibility to the city in the evening, or even late afternoon on weekends. The Dutchess LOOP bus service runs as late as 10 P.M. and provides access to all of Dutchess County. The LOOP would connect Vassar students to a number of cities and communities, such as Hyde Park to the north, Beacon to the south, and Lagrangeville to the east. The Dutchess LOOP would provide Vassar students with a hybrid-electric, bike-friendly way to take advantage of Dutchess Countys many facilities and resources. Public transit is by far the most sustainable way for students to travel, compared to a Zipcar or private taxi, and is also a far cheaper way for students to reach locations such as the Galleria, especially when the Saturday Shuttle, sponsored by the VSA, is not in operation. Every trip on board a Dutchess LOOP bus would also support the county and its efforts to improve public transit. We believe that such infrastructure projects deserve greater support in a region dominated by private car usage. Financially, this is hardly a high cost

for Vassar. According to reports released by the Presidents office, Vassar students took a total of 3,600 rides in the nine-month test run that Vassar began in 2012 for the Poughkeepsie bus service. While it is fair to expect that this roughly $6,000 cost has risen in the two years since, its also fair to say that six grand is a minor cost for an institution like Vassar. The LOOP would therefore offer Vassar a low-cost means to promote an active Vassar presence outside of the Vassar bubble. Should Vassar see enough of a benefit from access to Dutchess County, it could negotiate for the placement of Vassar on the LOOP route. Such a connection would grant even more accessibility, as it would allow direct campus access all day and night to Poughkeepsie as well as the Hudson Valley from Monday through Saturday. Alternatively, Vassar could operate a shuttle between the campus and the nearest Dutchess Loop stop, enabling similar accessibility without negotiating the Dutchess LOOPs access to campus. We at The Vassar Chronicle firmly believe that the College should, at the very least, consider a trial run of subsidized Dutchess LOOP service, measuring how far students travel and how often they choose to take advantage of this service.

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Indian Point Closure May Increase Energy Costs
Joshua Sherman Treasurer

or the past few years, the fossil fuel divestment movement has inundated our campus through various forms of media. It is an issue about which many students remain passionate, given what perils may lay ahead should climate change continue to affect the globe. However, there is an ecological issue that I have rarely heard spoken about on our campus that is located rather close to home. The issue surrounds a facility that many of you have probably seen while taking a train from New York City to Poughkeepsie. This facility, The Indian Point Nuclear Energy Center, is just 28 miles from campus; while it provides an immense amount of power to the Hudson Valley, the 40-year-old facility sits in an ongoing debate over what future it and nuclear power in general will have in the Hudson Valley. Let me first note how much Indian Point contributes to the power infrastructure of the New York metropolitan area. Right now, Indian Point generates a little over 2,000 megawatts of power. For New York City and Westchester, this makes up about 25% of all power used for the millions of people who live there. Indian Point contributes 40% of all power used in Dutchess County. For some perspective, the largest wind power plant in the world

the Alta Wind Energy Center in California generates just over 1,300 megawatts of power. The Topaz Solar Farm, the largest solar farm in the United States, produces just 550 megawatts of power. Indian Point, however, is not the largest energy facility of its kind. The largest nuclear facility in the United States The Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Facility contributes 3,875 megawatts of power and also happens to be the largest power plant in the United States. Despite the significance of Indian Point in terms of power consumption, the future of this facility continues to sit in limbo. In 2007, Entergy the company that runs the Indian Point facility filed with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) for a 20-year renewal on the two active nuclear sites within Indian Point. The two sites were both issued 40-year licenses back in 1973 and 1975, respectively. By next year, both of the sites will be operating under expired licenses an action permitted by the NRC while they consider the application. Governor Cuomo has, so far, expressed support for decommissioning Indian Point. The biggest reason most critics of Indian Point want the plant decommissioned is due to the 50 mile evacuation radius, which encompasses the Hudson Valley and most of the New York metropolitan area. If Indian Point is deactivated, it is not yet clear where exactly the 2,000 megawatts we would lose will come from.

In the immediate months following its deactivation, it will likely be that our power will have to come from sources outside of the immediate New York area. Right now, the electric bill at Vassar hovers between 11-12 cents per kilowatt hour. In the New York Metropolitan area, that number is even higher. Its fair to assume that electricity prices will rise sharply from an added demand of 2,000 megawatts, which equates roughly to two million homes worth of electricity. So far, there hasnt been much discussion regarding a new nuclear facility farther north and away from New York City to keep up with longterm electricity demand. There is, however, a proposal for a 1,000 megawatt gas power plant in Dover, NY, which is about 25 miles east of Vassar. Its likely that fossil fuels will replace the majority of power should Indian Point be deactivated. The issue of old power plants is not a unique one for nuclear facilities. The vast majority of power plants in the United States were built between the late 1940s and late 1970s as a ravenous hunger for electricity grew with the baby boomer generation. The issue that nuclear facilities do have is that their licenses to operate expire. Its logical to want to replace aging power facilities with newer ones. The question, however, is what we want to replace our aging nuclear facilities with. So far, solar energy production remains about 40% more costly than nuclear energy, according to the Department of Energy.

I am not a member of the Vassar Greens, so I am not aware of their official opinion on the future of the Indian Point Nuclear Facility. Indian Point, like many industrial facilities, has an environmental impact, even if it lacks much of a carbon footprint. The effect of Indian Point on the Hudson River is immense a report in 2010 by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation deemed the nuclear facility in violation of the Clean Water Act and claimed that the hightemperature water released back into the Hudson kills over one billion organisms each year. This is, of course, not including the environmental impact of Indian Point with the nuclear waste it produces, as well. That said, this impact exists for all facilities that use steam turbines; all known forms of energy generation, much like all industrial spaces, have some significant ecological impact. Nuclear power is not green power. Nuclear power does, however, lack a carbon footprint. It also remains the safest form of power generation in the world and is more than 300 times safer than coal power in the United States, according to the World Health Organization. I dont necessarily think that Indian Point is the right or best choice in the status quo, but I do think that we should have an active discussion about the impact of this facility in the present and future of energy here at Vassar and in the greater New York area.

CHESS PUZZLE
by Max Baumbach '15

One time in Moore Oklahoma, They noticed a heinous aroma, Their patience was shattered, The supremacists scattered, And left before left in a coma.

by Gregory Perry

White to move.
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Israeli Policy and Culture Oppresses Palestinians and Arabs
OFFIcE HOURS WItH PROFRESSOR JOSHUA ScHREIER

he Boycott, Divest, Sanction (BDS) Movement has gained widespread traction and drawn serious, often vitriolic, opposition at Vassar. So, for this installment of Office Hours, we visited Professor Joshua Schreier, who teaches courses in the history department on the history of the Middle East, as well as in the Jewish studies and international studies programs. We spoke with Professor Schreier about protests against Israel on American campuses, the history of Israeli policy towards Palestine, and the role of public intellectuals in supporting activist causes. Zack Struver 15: The first question we have is in reference to people using the word apartheid to describe whats going on in Israel what do you think theyre referring to when they use that word? It seems like the notion of apartheid when people think about South Africa is fairly different from the contemporary international law definition. Professor Joshua Schreier: Well, its unclear. Ill admit that I dont know the specifics of the international law definition. The word apartheid obviously comes from a very specific case. Apartheid isnt originally an English word it comes from Afrikaans so its from a very specific context. The international law definition being as it may, I think people use it as a way of describing a situation that has been evolving over the last, lets say, 20 years or so maybe a little bit more where there has been more and more effort by the Israeli state to contain populations by building walls and restricting movement. Of course, theyre not classifying people by race or color, as they did in South Africa, but by nationality, which overlaps generally, but not exclusively, with religion. Theyre not the same, obviously, and there are also people with liminal statuses. For example, the situation of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza is different from the status of Palestinians with Israeli citizenship. That being said, there is so much control, even on Israeli Arabs, in terms of where they can live and where they can buy homes control on, not technically their movement, but on how they integrate into society. Clearly, a lot of people have seen it applicable to use apartheid. Again, theyre not the same things. Im sure there are people who are out there saying that its exactly the same there are always going to be people saying anything. Im saying the utility of it is to see how people are characterized. The utility of the comparison, if youre going to give it some utility, is to say: heres a situation where people are being categorized by nationality, by race, by something, and strict rules of their behavior and where they can work and where they can live are being determined based on that. Nathan Tauger 14: So, when people use that definition, how much of that issue, do you think, is the direct consequence of Israeli government action and how much of it is just part of the practices within civil society? JS: I think thats a great question. Arabs in Israel frequently would recognize the

fact that they werent part of this large Zionist project that they have a certain pride in being Arab, being Christian or Muslim, and that their aspirations in life are not to become Jewish. Thats not the goal of many peoples to become Jewish and integrate into society that way. That being said, there are so many limits and so many differences in the experiences of Arab Israelis and Jewish Israelis in terms of the rights they have. Im not even talking about the Palestinians without Israeli citizenship yet, but I think that if you look at the fact that all these areas that were largely Arab in the triangle in the Galilee post-1940 there was Martial Law over them for several decades after the independence of the state. Even now, over 80% of Israel they cant live in, technically, because its an inheritor of this JNF statute whereby these lands became the inheritance of the Jewish people exclusively. So, there are rules, even now, on where Arabs can buy land to say nothing about the fact that because of different army regulations and because the army is such an important institution in Israeli life, and is so important in terms of preparing people for developing connections for later jobs, there are real limits on how much Arabs could reasonably integrate into Israeli society. Especially with the dominant narratives not that Im saying that theres only one the multiple dominant narratives within Israeli society that generally see it as, if not officially a Jewish state, then basically a Jewish state. Thats not a kind of national ideology thats accessible to everyone whos actually living there. So, I would say that, obviously, theres Arab pride and concern in supporting what is understood as Arab culture among the Arab Israeli community, but that shouldnt be seen as a particularly profound stumbling block towards integration into a society. There are plenty of Arabs who come to the United States, for example, from Palestine and from throughout the Arab world who are very happy to be Arabs and very proud to be Arabs, but that doesnt put the same stumbling block in their way in terms of integrating into American society. So, to say that theres something kind of magic, or special, or unique about Arab culture that would make it impossible to integrate into a non-Arab state is borderline racist. NT: This is difficult to answer, I know,

but how much of this is de facto and how much of it is de jure? JS: Let me just put it this way its both. There are definitely laws and provisions that prevent Arabs in Israel as well as Palestinians from living where they want and integrating into society. There are laws. Palestinians dont have citizenship. There are walls around where they live. They have different ID cards. They have different license plates. Arab Israelis also have limits on what we just discussed on where they can live and what they can do. Beyond that, there are no laws saying that Arab Israelis should be deprived of water for weeks on end, but they are. There are also certain places where Arabs can legally rent apartments, but local neighbors and various pressures prevent them from doing so. So, its both. ZS: You said that being Arab Israeli shouldnt be a stumbling block to integrating into Israeli society. So, what do you think is the stumbling block that prevents them from being integrated into Israeli society? JS: a) The laws. There are specific laws that prevent them from integrating and therefore act as stumbling blocks. Also, theres a general mood in Israel that this is a Jewish state and that [Arab Israelis] are essentially either foreigners or only there at the pleasure of the Israelis. [Former Prime Minister of Israel] Ariel Sharon famously called them foreigners when he talked about whats happening in the Galilee; We have this many foreigners living with us. To say nothing about the fact that, in day-to-day conversation and in day-to-day reality, this is seen, for very real reasons, as an Us vs. Them Israeli Jews vs. the Arab world. There is also this, kind of, subcategory the ones who are occupying or the ones who have citizenship who are essentially representatives of this larger Arab threat who happen to live behind our borders and its up to Us, the Jews, to decide what to do about Them. So, even though they can vote and even though there are and have been Arab representatives in [Israels national legislature] the Knesset, that does not prevent a general mood and sense that theyre foreigners, that they dont really belong, and that theyre subject to different standards, both legally and socially. ZS: How do you think things like the academic boycott, which youre participating in, might help to push away from this sort of otherization thats occurring in Israel? JS: First of all, I think the academic boycott is largely symbolic. Universities dont go under because someone refuses to attend a conference. If some academic institution in Israel were to offer to someone at Vassar me, or someone else, Wed like to have you come to this conference and give a paper on whatever biology project youre doing whatever history project youre doing, and you say no, they just invite someone else. Thats not necessarily going to make a big difference economically. That is largely, I would say, a symbolic effort to denormalize a horrific situation and therefore bring attention to it. As one of my colleagues very smartly

pointed out at a recent conversation just by bringing up the academic boycott at Vassar, all of these conversations multiplied, both in the Miscellany News and now in The Chronicle, but now also on campus at the various forums and town halls, and so on. Just by bringing it up, you have a whole new conversation, for better and for worse, going on oncampus about whats happening in Israel/ Palestine. So, I see the academic boycott keep in mind that thats just one corner of this larger movement to put pressure on the Israeli regime as one economically small corner, but perhaps symbolically, discursively a larger component of an effort to put pressure on the Israeli regime to change laws and to change the direction theyre going in. ZS: What do you think this pressure thats being applied is doing right now? Do you think that the Israeli government is listening, at this point? What do you think needs to happen for them to respond to this pressure? JS: If you go to Israeli-sponsored or Zionist institutions websites right now, you will be hard-pressed not to find some conversation about [Boycott, Divest, Sanction] BDS and how to combat this movement on American campuses. I just noticed that recently. Its all over the place. What that means, in terms of a direct response to your question, is that its certainly getting attention. Probably, the real pressure is going to come when major corporations and banks start not wanting to do business with them. But, for the time being, its certainly getting attention. Its certainly raising awareness. Also, we have to remember that the mood is really different in Europe and in other parts of the world with regards to the Israeli occupation. The United States, at one level, is one of the few holdouts where the population and, lets say the press, remains sympathetic with the official Israeli position. That has, kind of, evaporated in much of the world. When campuses and students start being more critical of it in the United States, anything could happen. Im not predicting anything I stay away from that but it strikes me as a potentially positive sign in terms of the Israeli government changing its direction. NT: It seems to me that theres a lot of confusion over what is meant by an academic boycott and what is meant by academic freedom. Could you give us your take on what this means? JS: Academic freedom, from my knowledge, emerged in the early part of the 20th century and specifically had to do with whether students, but especially professors, could freely share, publish, and discuss their opinions, their findings, their arguments, and their theses, without fear of retribution. This became much more of a heated issue in the late 1950s-1960s, where there was, especially after the 50s, pressure [as to what could be published] and tenured professors were being fired for being suspected of communism. So, in the 1960s, from my understanding, [the concept of academic freedom] emerged largely as a question of whether or not academics have the freedom to share their findings,
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Academic Boycott Promotes Academic Freedom
Continued from Page 4

to share their opinions, to freely discuss; it was in relation to the administration and whatever pressures were being put on it. So, freedom is within the university. Now, recent discussions have brought up all of these other questions relating to what academic freedom means when you have an academic boycott. People are now saying, Well, theres a limit on academic freedom if you are not going to allow, lets say, Vassar College, to partner with an Israeli university in order to have a conference. I have a colleague here who has very intelligently argued against me by saying, Look, youre splitting hairs if youre saying that youll invite an Israeli scholar theres no problem because the academic boycott is not about individual Israelis, so individual Israelis could come and speak at Vassar, etc. and we, American scholars, could go to do research in Israel. That would not be a boycott of the academic boycott. Other people say, Look, theres still an issue of academic freedom if youre not having an institutional collaboration because youre splitting hairs in an individual vs. institution. I understand that argument, but I happen to disagree with it because I think that, ultimately, by saying, I am not going to collaborate with an Israeli institution because of the larger ways in which these Israeli institutions are implicated in the occupation essentially collaborating with the occupation, that doesnt prevent anyone from saying anything. No American, no Israeli, is prevented from saying something. Thats not retribution, I would argue. So, thats one way in which you could say that I dont so much see that as a compromise of academic freedom, but I would also say, How could you even talk about academic freedom if it doesnt exist. It doesnt exist in many ways in Israel because there are so many limits on whether Arabs, either Israelis or Palestinians, in the occupied territories have access to universities in Israel. Universities are closed for years on end the separation wall goes right through the campus of one of them. There are all kinds of limits placed on Arab student groups and Arab expression on Israeli universities, so if you could talk about academic freedom, you could say that some of it exists only for a specific class of people who live in Israel/ Palestine. You cant say it exists right now. If, for example, there was a university somewhere in the United States that somehow managed to get around the Civil Rights Act and said, Were going to admit blacks, but only 1%, even though the black population of our state is 10%, and AfricanAmerican students can only do this and can only say that and at any given time may be denied entrance to the university campus in the first place. Can you say that theres academic freedom there? ZS: No. JS: Okay. So, when people get up in arms about academic freedom, theyre focusing theyre imagining that what Israeli Jews experience is absolutely the norm. Theyre forgetting the fact that theyre denying academic freedom to a huge portion of the people who actually live in the area currently governed by Israel. So, a

response may be, Theres a problem in that academic is one small component of a vast number of freedoms that people in the part of the world under Israeli governance dont enjoy. So, we are not going to say, Oh my god, weve got to preserve the academic freedom that exists for one component of that population God knows who else deserves it too but thats only one component of the population, and then say, Oh well, we cant do anything because one component seems to be able to talk somewhat freely. Do you see what I mean? So, I think that academic freedom as much as I think its absolutely worthwhile talking about also risks derailing the conversation and allowing us to normalize the situation of occupation. NT: I know that discussion about Israel has never been this prominent on campus. Can you talk a little about what the academic landscape on Israel has been like for the last 15 years, since youve been active as a scholar? JS: By the time I was in graduate school in the mid-to-late 1990s, the attitude in Middle Eastern Studies and Middle Eastern History had become much more diverse and, in many cases, critical of any sort of non-critical nationalist historiography. There was definitely criticism of traditional Zionist historiography and a triumphalist narrative of Zionism. This was emerging, of course, at the same time that people were doing new work complicating Arab nationalist historiographies too. That is, it came out of the post-colonial thinking of the late 80s and early 90s, but also out of various new interventions about the imaginings of nationhood in different contexts, where criticism of these kind of histories of peoples or nations were seeming to go all the way back into history. The Arabs were always wanting independence, even under the Turks, you know. They always wanted independence. Or, the Jews were always yearning for a free nation-state in Zion [certain historians] go back to the middle ages in various forms of liturgy to say that weve always been trying to do this. This is not new. Well, that kind of attitude was subject to a whole new critique, especially in the 80s and 90s, but really in the 90s. So, the idea that any nation could possess some sort of clean, easily-traceable history going way back into history before the 19th century was already very problematic in academic circles; this isnt specific to Israel. Of course, this is also a time where you have many different voices entering the academic landscape. The 60s had happened. There was an all-new focus on history from below that history isnt just made by important men deciding when or when not to have a war. How do we trace womens voices? How do find workingclass voices? Peasant voices? Colonized voices? So, coming out of this period, there was much more of an effort to say, Well, what about the Palestinians? What about other colonized peoples in the Middle East? Other people who have been dispossessed who have been pushed to the side in standard histories, or not given their due in standard histories. So, various things came together, I guess, starting really in

the 80s but coming more alive in the 90s, which is going to make a lot of people who are interested in critical histories interested in coming up with a new perspective on the Palestinian situation. So, I would say that a lot of people who have come into the academy teaching the Middle East over the last 15 years are influenced by these different trends, but this is by no means universal youre still going to find much more conservative attitudes in other parts of the history department and, certainly, Hebrew and Judaic Studies departments. Not to say that everyone there is Im just talking very broadly here. But, I think that this is all going to influence the way various people coming out of the academy are going to be looking for alternative histories that end up being far more sympathetic to poor people Palestinians among others. NT: What do you think about the role of public intellectuals in discourse about Israel, the Middle East, and Palestine? JS: I could answer that in any different number of ways. I speak to a lot of people who agree with, lets say, 80%-95% of what I say, and youve never heard of them. Well, you may have heard of them, but youve heard of them for other reasons. Academics and intellectuals are very nervous about talking about Israel/Palestine, especially if theyre hired by or work in partnership with Jewish Studies departments, because theres so much anxiety over particularly this issue. I, ultimately, think that public intellectuals, historians, political scientists, anthropologists, and any other number of people have a very important role to play in getting us new ways to think about things. Just in my experience, Ive seen so many people who come into contact with, lets say, new kinds of scholarship on the Israel/ Palestine conflict or anything else and say, God, I have never thought about it in that way. This is so different from how I was brought up and the assumptions [I made]. They say, I consider myself a critical thinker. I see myself as an educated person, and yet, one good essay, one good article, one good book can make people think about things really differently. Obviously, I think that it is the purview of informed, criticallythinking people to talk about this, to give us new things to consider, to perhaps change the ways in which we regard the region, and, ultimately, expand our notion of who merits humane treatment. I think that its so easy to dehumanize in the course of a short newspaper article, or to ignore something pertinent. Its all about framing; informed public intellectuals coming in and saying, Can we reframe this? Can we think about this a little bit differently? That, I think, is a very important part toward mobilization towards increased humanity NT: In terms of activist thinking, or just in terms of being a more global citizen, or however you want to phrase it what was it like when you were in college? I dont want to minimize whats going in Israel/ Palestine, but there are injustices all over the place. JS: Including right here; that has been a comment of some faculty members here. Its very true, I think, because if you want to fight injustice, you know, open

your door. Theres plenty of things going on. Why Israel/Palestine? When I was on campus, Israel/Palestine was an issue, but it wasnt quite as loud. Keep in mind that this is just coming after a period where there had been a huge amount of activism around apartheid. There had been activism around the United States involvement in Central America in El Salvador and Nicaragua. These were all issues. Why Israel/Palestine has emerged as such a hot issue now? I think it really has to do with both America and American campuses meaning whos on them. Keep in mind that many of the people who have brought Israel to the public attention are people who are very much supportive of Israel. I think a lot of people are complaining that Israel gets so much attention, but it sung from the same groups that have insisted that it get attention theres always been a very pro-Israel sentiment among certain student groups and political action committees. They have succeeded, in part, on making Israel the largest recipient of U.S. aid. Not only have you got one of the two largest Jewish populations in the world in the United States the United States and Israel are the countries with the largest Jewish populations in the world but now you also have especially since Christian-right organizations have really taken on Israel as an issue huge numbers of non-Jewish Americans who have taken on defence of Israel and even colonization of the West Bank as a religious interest. Im not talking about the Jews here. Ultimately, Jews are what? 2% of the population? Its not a big group of people; when you talk about born-again Christians, youre talking about more like 40%-45% of voters, right? Well, now you have this voice. You have many more Muslims, many more Arabs, many more people who have been exposed to different kinds of scholarship, regardless of their ethnic background, looking at these issues and responding to what has been a dominant narrative in support of Israel. So, I think that when we say, Why Israel, out of all of the horrors that have happened in Sri Lanka and even in other parts of the Middle East in Syria and other countries? Youve got a situation in the United States where youve got a huge number of people who are supporting Israel and a huge amount of money U.S. tax dollars going to support Israel more than any other country. So, of course, this is going to become a big issue. People arent talking about sanctioning Syria, which is obviously a more horrific violator of human rights, because we already are. You want to talk about Iran? Is there a really strong voice in the United States to support Iran? No. We agree many people agree on that. Its an issue because, with Israel, people are disagreeing about it, so I think thats part of the reason the amount of the support it gets, financially, but also the amount of moral support it gets from communities here, combined with the changing attitudes and a changing population in the United States, it seems to me, is combining to give Israel/Palestine a huge amount of attention these days.

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VSA Must Advocate for Student Concerns
Zack Struver Editor-in-Chief

round one year ago, in a moment of moral weakness and immense boredom, I applied for the position of Co-Chair of the Board of Elections for the Vassar Student Association (VSA). Even then, I had no real interest in administering fair elections or, rather, popularity contests governed by arcane, and often quite pointless, policies and procedures. (The VSA Bylaws stipulate, for example, that the Board of Elections must provide email, phone, and written notice of any decisions made after an appeal). Indeed, I did something that most college students with integrity frown upon I joined student government solely to pad my resume. Since my responsibilities are minimal (i.e., bullshit), I generally, however, dont include this position on my resume. Though as Im guessing youve already gathered Im generally apathetic about executing the duties of my VSA position, Ive come to enjoy all of the quirks that come with being the Board of Elections Co-Chair the dysfunctional VSA Operations Committee meetings, the vacuous questions from candidates who dont know how to read, and the brain space that Ive wasted thinking about VSA bylaws. My experience on the Board of Elections points towards an ideological problem with the political culture of the VSA. The principles that guide Vassars system of student governance prioritize perceptual problems the VSA needs to be seen as accessible, transparent, and helpful over maintaining and fostering a structure that operates as a tool that can be employed to advocate for student interests in an institution in which it shares governance with administration and faculty. Student government ought to function in a few ways. First, it should support students in their extracurricular endeavors by providing funding, access to spaces on campus, and event-planning resources to student organizations. Promoting the role of student organizations on campus is essential if the VSA wishes to leverage its ability to engage in dialogue with administrators, as student organizations often provide a means for students to engage with and promote their interests and passions. Without a student

government that maintains a direct interest in the welfare of organizations on campus, advocacy on behalf of students would fail, as the VSA would have nothing to advocate for. In my assessment, the VSA generally does a pretty good job of helping out student organizations. The VSA Activities Committee regularly assists organizations that have trouble navigating the confusing bureaucratic structure of the Office of Campus Activities and the confusing confusion of the Student Activity Resource Center (SARC). Likewise, the Finance Committee ensures the equitable distribution of limited funds towards worthy projects undertaken by a diversity of student organizations. Even preliminary organizations on campus have access to the pertinent groups in the VSA. Since theres no general crisis in the management of student organizations, the VSA certainly has the ability to focus its attention on the broader issue of advocacy. Like any form of government, the VSA works according to a complex political culture. Members of the VSA must rally support for their policy proposals, listen to the concerns of their constituents, and deal with contention on the Council floor. Additionally, members of the Executive Board, as well as individuals who sit on Joint Committees made up of students, faculty, and administrators, must vie for the favor of administrators who ultimately decide upon and implement policies that will affect the Vassar community. Those individuals elected by the students to work directly with administrators, especially members of the Committee on College Life (CCL) which makes direct policy recommendations that affect vast swaths of the Vassar community and the VSA Executive Board which represents all students at Vassar have a special responsibility to reach out to students, listen to their concerns, and advocate for their voices to be heard when administrators seek to make controversial changes to Vassars governance. Vassar College claims to operate under a system of Shared Governance. The governing documents promulgate a set of principles that are supposed to guide this system. Vassar administrators, students, and faculty should work under the assumption that they hold each other to standards of mutual acknowledgment,

Zack Struver

trust, cooperation, and accountability, as well as respect for diversity of opinion and perspective. I interpret these principles to mean a few things. The first and obvious reading is that administrators, faculty, and students should respect, debate, and account for a diversity of viewpoints when making decisions. However, before one can respect an opinion, such an opinion must be vocalized. Moreover, though accountability certainly implies that those directly involved in the decisionmaking process should hold each other accountable, it also means that the various committees and groups that meet on campus should make their discussions public and transparent to students and faculty members who do not participate in College governance. According to the principles of shared governance, then, members of the VSA should publicize their discussions with administrators, be clear about which policies they disagree with, and solicit opinions from a diversity of students and campus organizations. In the status quo, this rarely happens. Though members of the VSA may meet with administrators, and even disagree with them, rarely do they communicate these issues to their constituents. Rather, in discussions that weve had this year in the VSA Operations Committee which is largely composed of elected VSA officials the concern has often been how students feel about and perceive the VSA. While I dont think its a bad thing that members of the VSA care about how students feel about the structure of the VSA, any changes made based on perceptual issues will be utterly ineffective unless the VSA functions as a sort of union

for students. Proposed solutions to the VSAs image problem include making the VSA more transparent and open to student input, but if students arent well informed of the conversations that are occurring within the VSA and with administrators, they wont have much to say. Being transparent is important, but only if Joint Committee and Executive Board members communicate directly to the student body. Communication is the first step in advocacy. For the VSA to be true advocates for the student body, they cannot rely on merely holding closed-door meetings with administrators. To be sure, closeddoor meetings are certainly valuable in that they let people speak their minds without worrying that information will be communicated outside of those meetings. Upholding confidentiality is also a principle of shared governance; I would not ask that VSA members violate that principle. Members of the VSA and joint committees must, however, be public about certain issues if they wish to retain the trust of the student body. Had student CCL members provided a rationale for why they voted in favor of a smoking ban in the face of student disapproval, perhaps they would not have incurred the ire of so many students. Publicity about decision-making is a valuable check on any government. The VSA and student Joint Committee members are ultimately responsible for representing student voices to administrators on campus. Members of the VSA Executive Board are elected into office by over 2,500 students. When meeting with administrators and planning for Vassars future, that is their bargaining chip, and they should use it more often.

Do YoU WANT To mAKE YoUR voICE hEARD? THE VASSAR CHRONIcLE ENCoURAGES YoU To SUBmIT ColUmNS AND lETTERS To ThE EDIToR.
CoNTACT ChRoNIClE@VASSAR.EDU SpEECh IS CIvIlIZATIoN ITSElF. - ThomAS MANN
PAGE 6 CHRONIcLE, APRIL 2014

Responses to Protest Convey Sterilized Notion of Activism

Christa Guild, Managing Editor Jesse Mills, Contributor

VASSAR & LoCAl

n February of 2013, Vassar was thrown into action by the presence of the Westboro Baptist Church (WBC) on campus. Student groups formed specifically to protect the rights of Vassar students who felt threatened by the presence of the WBC namely, those belonging to the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans*, and Queer (LGBTQ) community. Huge numbers of students engaged in a counter-protest and the administration publicly commended students for their efforts. Nearly a year later, a number of students from Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) protested outside of the classroom of an International Studies (IS) travel class that would be going to Israel over Spring Break. Far from the laudatory reaction received a year prior, numerous figures, including many members of the administration, have spoken out against the actions of the protestors. The marked difference between the reactions to these two incidents reflects a greater problem at Vassar that of the expectation of conformity to hegemonic beliefs. Protesting against the WBC confirmed acceptance of a certain type of diversity on Vassars campus there is little contention throughout the community about whether or not its okay to be gay. But, when the activism of certain students pushes the boundaries of political expression beyond the sanitized brand of the privileged faux-progressivism that Vassar upholds, there are immediately cries of discomfort and events like, The Ethics of Student Activism and Protest at Vassar are arranged. This notion of discomfort forms the heart of the argument for those condemning the protest. Numerous students have expressed concern with the tactics involved in activism, citing their discomfort when confronted with the Apartheid wall in the College Center or posters in dorm bathrooms on the same subject. Some have stated that they felt as if they were being personally attacked and their privacy indeed, their place at Vassar was being questioned. Such statements do not come only from students. At, The Ethics of Student Activism and Protest at Vassar, Professor Rachel Friedman of the IS travel class claimed, Were in a dangerous place if, suddenly, classrooms are being picketed and students [are] made to feel harassed when they are going to a class that theyve chosen. Such a claim is nothing but inflamed rhetoric. Students standing outside a classroom prior to the class with non-violent intentions is hardly even disruptive. Handing out flyers and attempting to engage with other students in a public space are those the types of activities we want to declare, Dangerous? The ubiquity of discomfort as a legitimate argument is disheartening. Such discomfort should not be feared or repressed it must be embraced. This type of discomfort arises from the disruption of privilege. Such privilege is defined by the ability to forget about or ignore an issue in this case, the state of the Israel-Palestine conflict and its true that most of us on this campus have that opportunity. This is the epitome of the Vassar Bubble, where discomfort is viewed as a feeling to avoid rather than as a necessary

precursor to reevaluation of ones beliefs. The apparent conclusion to be drawn from this contrast between recent events and those of February, 2013 is that activism is acceptable only when it doesnt challenge the beliefs or opinions of anyone in the Vassar community. In other words, activism is okay only when it cant achieve (i.e. change) anything. In conjunction with this neutered concept of activism, we are presented with an incredibly disturbing perception of what constitutes protest, not just from administrators, but from faculty and even fellow students. Professors Jill Schneiderman and Rachel Friedman of the previously-mentioned IS

thing more deeply worrying about the administration. They indicate a desire to disempower and control students. This fact was made clear by the Committee for Inclusion and Excellence (CIE) event, The Ethics of Student Activism and Protest at Vassar. In an email from Luis Inoa, we were all invited to participate in an open conversation on the ethics and possibilities of student activism and the rights of students to protest on campus. These phrases may appear benign, but they are incredibly problematic. To have a conversation on the rights of students to protest insinuates that that right is open for discussion. What constitutes ethical student activism is not for the

Dylan Finley

class, in a letter to the editor from The Miscellany News, indicate their support for the right of SJP students to protest in any number of ways, including ongoing tabling in the College Center, but not inside an academic building at our classroom door. What does it say about us as an institution and, perhaps, as individuals when an act as passive as sitting at a table and watching people walk by in the hopes that perhaps one in 20 will stop to talk to you is considered protesting? That passivity is what makes tabling an acceptable form of protest to these individuals. Activism is only respectable when it is passive and can be easily ignored, which is inherently oxymoronic. The recent analysis of proper, respectable activism on campus has involved even our president, Catharine Bond Hill. While she may feel as if sending numerous lengthy emails delving into the state of activism on campus is sufficient for addressing the issue, it honestly just gives credence to our belief that unobtrusive forms of discourse are not as effective. They can, and they will, be ignored. President Hill preaches the superiority of discourse over action, imploring us to start there when difficult issues arise. Unfortunately, she does not consider the fact that discourse is often the result of political action. The actions of those SJP protesters are the reason that a campus-wide conversation is occurring; if they had just been tabling and hadnt participated in that protest, there would be much less, if any, vocal discussion on campus regarding this issue. Despite the shortcomings of these emails, its too bad that they will receive so little attention, if only because they reveal some-

administration to decide. The political activism and action of students is not and cannot be subject to the sympathies of the institution. If we ignore this fact, we perceive and, in fact, create a relationship in which students are subjugated completely to the administration and are objects to be directed rather than subjects who act of their own free will. This perception becomes especially problematic when the institution itself is the target of such action. Take the example of a protest at The University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario, Canada. During the schools freshman orientation week, a small number of students congregated near the festivities in order to raise awareness about the increasing burden of student debt, the increasingly exorbitant cost of tuition, and the presence of corporate interests on campus issues that the university chose not to discuss. The activists attempted to engage with freshmen, most of whom were very receptive to their message. Campus authorities had a very different response. Executives from the Student Life department as well as orientation week organizers told the students that this was not the time nor the place for such action and that they should have asked permission before staging their demonstration. They called the Campus Police, who took the students ID cards and names before removing the students from their own campus (Openwide Online, April 9, 2013). A response of such an extreme nature has not yet taken place at Vassar, but our administration holds a similar view toward student actions. In her Apr. 11, 2014 email, President Hill states her belief that protest can be ac-

ceptable at a particular moment in time at a particular place a time and place she wishes to have control over. Activist organizations at Vassar are required to ask permission before they hold an event they must submit speakers to the administration for approval and request a space in which to gather. In many cases, this system is sensible, but it becomes problematic in cases such as the one at Western where the administration is able to silence voices that challenge it. The repeated calls we hear for civility are themselves an attempt to silence voices. They present a sterilizing notion of civility which requires shared respect to such an extent that each side is, in effect, denied the right to believe their own opinions are correct. It seems to us that if we follow this definition of civility, discourse itself becomes impossible. Participating in civil discourse does not preclude us from challenging those around us. You can create intellectual discomfort while being civil. You can tell someone theyre wrong while being civil. Such a sterilized view of civility is in direct opposition to the actual point of activism, which is meant to be disruptive. It is meant to challenge those whom it is protesting against; if it does not create discomfort, it does not achieve anything. We are consistently told that protest and action are only to be undertaken when discussion has failed, but those telling us this do not consider the preconditions necessary for discussion equality of power, equal opportunity to be heard, equal accountability from all involved to all involved. When these conditions are not met, discussion is a farce; these conditions are not met when the discussion in question finds itself to be between administrators and students. Discussion is meaningless when one participant in the discussion has the power to disregard all of the others and make decisions on ones own. It is not discussion. It is a trial a trial in which administrators serve as judge, jury, and executioner while students are compelled to accept the decisions made. Discussion accepts this highly unequal relationship. It acts within the existing power structure. But what if it is the power structure itself that we seek to change? Discussion becomes nothing more than the hope that we can change the minds of those with the power to act. Indeed, recent endeavors to place more power among the student voices on campus, specifically the creation of a Student Bill of Rights, falls right into this very trap. This movement, while more active than tabling at the College Center, is still a suitable form of activism to the administration because they have the ability to stifle it. For the Bill of Rights to succeed, the administration must accept it. Protest takes that power to act away from those who might oppose it and gives it to us. Protest does not need to meet the same preconditions as discussion because it does not work within the accepted power structure. Protest levels the playing field. So, to those who would seek to control, subdue, or eliminate student protest on campus, we say the following we are Vassar students and the public spaces of Vassar belong to each and every one of us. We will protest when we believe it is necessary, where we believe it is appropriate. We welcome your approval, but we do not need it.

CHRONIcLE, APRIL 2014

PAGE 7

FoREIGN AFFAIRS
Students Reflect on Controversial Class Trip to Israel

rom March 8th to March 23rd, 28 Vassar students traveled to Israel for International Studies 110: The Jordan River Watershed. Many students, faculty, and alumnae/i criticized the trip from a variety of political vantage points. Outspoken alumnae/i claimed that the class was potentially anti-Semitic and unfairly critical of Americas closest ally in the Middle East. Other students and faculty on campus urged the class not to go because they wanted to protest the Israeli governments human rights violations and discrimination against Palestinians. The debate took place online, in campus newspapers, and in on-campus forums. Students in the class went forward with the trip, though many were sympathetic to the on-campus criticism of their decision. For them, the trip was an opportunity to learn more. What follows are a handful of memories from a handful of students from the first three days of the trip. There is only enough room for these first few days, but more memories, whether in the form of blog posts, journal entries, essays, or other forms of reflections may emerge from individual students later. In the meantime, if you know someone that went on the trip and youre curious about it, ask. Everyone will have something different and important to tell you. -Nathan Tauger, Editor

Our first day was technically at the airport. I think the rest of the group was just as ready I was to get past the controversy and get into the learning we wanted to do. As ready as I was to go, in the back of my mind, I was still a bit unsure of getting through customs. I was importing an Arab heritage, and sure enough, Israel had a problem with my baggage. I was questioned, and the qualia began to take hold. What is your name? Andrew Ibrahim Jdaydani Where are you from? America. Where are your parents from? Lebanon Hebrew Hebrew Hebrew Please wait at the security booth. I was a member of a 28 student class, several of whom had entered without a problem before me. I would not have been as suspicious as a lone traveler. But a violent past haunts Israel; to them, I was just another Arab threat. I stayed calm and collected. Both because I knew this might happen, and because my professors were getting too concerned, too excited. But after 30 minutes of waiting with the same dismissive response from security personnel, I started to make allusions to the blatant discrimination. What is your great grandfathers name? Why is that important? Its just protocol. Why did you choose me? This <pointing to passport> says United States. <Pause, then, in an annoyed yell> Please step back sir. Did your family tell you anything about Israel? They told me not to give my name. They said people might treat me unfairly. The harassment and tension soon gave way to my American passport, allowing me to enter the country. Finally, I was there, in Palel (Palestine/Israel).

Ben Gurion Airport (March 9) Andrew Jdaydani 14

As the young men guided us through the narrow streets and alleys and onto a high point above the roofs of the camp so that we could see it all, I knew that even though our lives are different, I didnt feel much different from them. - Alicia Robinson-Welch soft hum of conversation and morning prayer enveloped the Dome of the Rock and al-Aqsa Mosque, the Western Wall formed a space for contemplation and reflection, and awe permeated the Church of the Holy Sepulcher like a sacred museum. Standing by the Western Wall, one can look up and see the Dome of Rock, as if it is literally sitting on top of the Wall. And walking from the Western Wall to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher takes no time at all. These holy sites are incredibly close together, and in a city of 0.35 square miles, tight quarters create palpable tension between the different religious groups. While the sites share sacrality and peacefulness, their differences overshadow the harmony that can be found within them. at, and said Those are settlements (Beitar Illit). I could not believe it. I always knew settlements were wrong, they were in someone elses land, taking others resources, breaking international law. However, I had thought of them as rudimentary and small. It was a shock for me to realize that they could look like Californian condos, literally casting shadows over the nearby village (Wadi Fuqeen). Later on that same hike, Tova Weitzman, one of the professors on the trip and a nature buff, pointed out a small purple flower growing out of the crack of a rock. She compared it to the Palestinian village, small and peaceful, growing naturally out of the land. The settlements are like ivy; they extend their tendrils as far as they can, too focused on their search for light that they do not realize they are taking it away from the beautiful flowers below them.

As a religion major, I try to understand cultures through their religious rituals and symbols. On our first morning in Israel, we saw the familiar religious sites of Jerusalem the Dome of the Rock, the Western Wall, the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, and al-Aqsa Mosque. These sites, holy to Muslims, Jews, and Christians, are peaceful in their own unique ways. The

Holy Sites in Jerusalem (March 10) Elana Fruchtman 14

On our third day in the region, we went on a hike through an area on the outskirts of Jerusalem. As we turned a bend a few minutes into the hike, I noticed a large, sprawling condominium-like complex on a hill not far in the distance, with a small village in the valley beneath it. My first reaction was Wow, those are really nice houses. Another person on the trip pointed out that they were settlements, and I refused to believe him. Within a few seconds our guide came up behind us and pointed to the place we were looking

Wadi Fuqeen and Beitar Illit (March 11) Matthew Kolbert 17

Driving in and out of the West Bank today from Tsaur Hadassa to Battir, Battir to Dheisheh in Bethlehem, we saw the separation wall from the bus many times. Dheisheh is a neighborhood in Bethlehem that started as a tent camp for refugees in 1949, but is now made of multi-storied makeshift buildings, which at first disguised it to many of us, who werent expecting the refugee camp to be a neighborhood. An NGO located in

Dheisheh (March 11) Alicia Robinson-Welch 15

Dheisheh called Shoruq hosted us. Some male students, about our age, showed us around the camp. Dheisheh started out as a tent camp, but its residents built houses when it became clear that they wouldnt be able to move back to the homes they left or were forced out of in 1948. It is supported entirely by UN aid. 13,000 refugees live there now, within one square kilometer of Bethlehem. Our guides told us that the first level of houses is the first generation of refugees. The second level built on top of the first is their kids, and the third story was built by their grandkids. It felt very bizarre walking around the camp. In some ways I felt unaffected. As the young men guided us through the narrow streets and alleys and onto a high point above the roofs of the camp so that we could see it all, I knew that even though our lives are different, I didnt feel much different from them. I spoke with one of the students, Muhammed, on the walk back through the streets to the Shoruq office. He told me a little bit about how it was, about how the neighboring settlement, which we could see very close on the next hill, was firing weapons at them five years ago, when the fighting was more intense. His younger brother died during one of those attacks. He was eager to tell me stories. Did you hear about the five martyrs today? he asked me. Five people died today. One in Ramallah, one in Nablus, and one here in Bethlehem (I dont remember about the other two). Killed by Israeli soldiers. Did you hear the ambulance going by earlier? It was very nearby. Along the way he kept pointing out the stenciled faces of the different martyrs on the walls of the street around us and telling me their names. I didnt feel as out of place as Id anticipated. I was worried before going that I would feel like privileged Americans are supposed to feel in third world places, where people have so much less, where life is different. But I didnt feel out of place. I felt welcomed. And I think my feeling came from both the hospitality of the people from Shoruq, as well as my own state of being. Its not about the differences between us and them, me and Muhammed or Saad or any of the others; its about why Im there, its about witnessing what life is like in the camp and why its like that I would even say its not even about understanding, although one can start to understand more about what life is like by going there. I didnt feel depressed and hopeless. I felt sad and angry, but they are beautiful and inspiring people who Im happy to have met. I wish I could go back tomorrow and stay for a while.

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CHRONIcLE, APRIL 2014

FoREIGN AFFAIRS
Reality TV: Effective Contraception, Entertainment, or Both?

Camilla Pfeiffer Contributor

ince the premiere of 16 and Pregnant on MTV in 2009, the televisionconsuming population of the United States has been fascinated with teen pregnancy. Many people argue that shows such as 16 and Pregnant, and its successor Teen Mom, have glamorized a major social issue, proving detrimental to the fight to curb teen pregnancy. If we cast our eyes over to the United Kingdom, however, we see a fascinating phenomenon that may mark a potential link between the American glamorization of teen pregnancy and a drop in such rates across the pond. Teen pregnancy is a major problem in the UK the country has some of the highest rates of pregnancy in the age category of 1519 years old in the whole of Europe, topping out at 30.8 pregnancies per 1,000 women. To put these statistics in perspective, France had 9.3 births per 1,000 women; Germany had 13.1, and Italy 6.6. Scarily enough, these incredibly high values actually represent a significant drop in such rates. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the only countries in Europe with comparable pregnancy rates in this age group are countries in Eastern

Europe such as Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria. People started to take notice of this issue when the Social Exclusion Unit published a report in 1998 that indicated pregnancy rates in the UK were at their highest level in the past 50 years, at 46.6 births per 1,000 women. After the release of this damning report by the Social Exclusion Unit, the British government set about addressing this issue through a number of social policy changes. It released a report in 1999 that presented a multi-departmental government approach to curbing pregnancy. The incredibly comprehensive 139-page report states that, Ignorance about sex is a risk factor for teenage pregnancy and that good sex education helps to delay rather than accelerate when young people start sex. But parents are given little help to talk to their children about sex, and school-based sex education is patchy and often under-developed. In order to combat these issues, the government has developed strategies including making Sex and Relationships Education (SRE) more widely available, centering the focus of free sexual health clinics on young people, and making abortions more easily accessible. In many ways, education has been the most significant factor in this drop as it

has allowed young girls in the UK to make informed decisions about their bodies standing against cultural norms associated with sex-negativity in order to talk about sexual health and thereby advocate for themselves. But what does American TV have to do with this statistical drop? The National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) published an article recently establishing a causal link. The airing of 16 and Pregnant led to more searches and tweets regarding birth control and abortion, and ultimately led to a 5.7 percent reduction in teen births in the 18 months following its introduction. This accounts for around one-third of the overall decline in teen births in the United States during that period. The notion that reality television may affect public health trends has implications for the US, which consistently tops the UK as the Western country with the highest rates of teen pregnancy at 68 births per 1,000 women. The British media, including major newspapers like The Daily Telegraph and The Guardian, have reported on the statistical link unocvered in the NBER research. The question that this fascination begs is whether this link between television shows that place such premium on shock

value are having an effect outside of the US. American media has most definitely saturated the British cultural landscape, whether or not the British public likes it. MTV UK is consistently relevant to British teens, discussing and airing television shows that incorporate both British and American popular culture. Over the years, MTV UK has even created shows that seek to emulate popular American programs. After the success of Jersey Shore, MTV UK began airing Geordie Shore, documenting the lives of young people in Newcastle who ascribed to a similar hard-partying, deeply-tanned lifestyle like that of their American counterparts. Similarly, both 16 and Pregnant and Teen Mom are very popular in the UK. No equivalent British show exists yet, though one can argue that by viewing such programs, British teens are internalizing an awareness of the socioeconomic struggles involved with teen pregnancy, childbirth, and young parenthood. The British government, in its 1999 report, cited inaccurate media representations of teen pregnancy and young parenthood as a major factor rising pregnancy. Though moderated by reality television producers, perhaps shows like 16 and Pregnant have been so successful because they entertain as they education.

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CHRONIcLE, APRIL 2014

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NATIoNAl & FoREIGN AFFAIRS

Amnesty for Religious Homeschoolers Misguided, Harmful
J. David Nichols Contributor

hrough wind and wave, they persevered dreaming of a new life in the New World. They fled persecution, and desired a home where they could worship God as they saw fit, and a world where a secular government wouldnt disrupt their lives. At least, thats the way the media has presented the story of the Romeike family as 21st century pilgrims. In reality, their persecution consisted of their being required to comply with the German governments education policy, which mandates that education, you know, ought to actually happen. It is a very reasonable requirement, that every child attend either a public school or a licensed heavily subsidized and therefore decently affordable private school. Uwe and Hannelore Romeike, however, felt that such a requirement constituted sufficient persecution for them to seek and gain asylum in the United States with their six children. Their claim was that Germany had discriminated against them by denying them the right to homeschool their children as they felt they had a right, as Christians, to do. This issue raises a number of questions, and I believe that I am qualified to discuss them. I attended a private, religious school that accepted no funds from the government and therefore was not restricted by any government oversight whatsoever until halfway through my senior year, after which I was homeschooled. By homeschooled, I mean that I meandered my way through the remainder of the year by reading history chapters through three times straight and then administering myself the test before I forgot anything. The English curriculum that my school used the school let me use its curriculum and tests until I graduated had a strong emphasis on grammar, so the first thing I did as a homeschooler was to take all of the remaining English tests. They didnt contain anything that I hadnt learned in the tenth grade. The school was also very, very religious. Conservative Christianity was present in every aspect of the teaching. The first chapter of every textbook addressed the question How can this material be used to glorify Christ? The extent of the science textbooks coverage of evolution was the story of how the Piltdown Man was fake and the Nebraska Man was created from the discovery of only a tooth that later turned out to belong to a pig. Essentially, I grew up in the environment that the Romeikes

wanted to create for their children; they asked the U.S. government for asylum so they could actually put it into place. The obvious question that arises after hearing the claim of persecution is, Is it essential to the Christian faith that children be homeschooled? I have read the Bible in its entirety multiple times and cannot recall a single verse that links the practice of Christianity with the practice of homeschooling. Millions of German Christians practice their religion in accordance with the countrys education laws and their rights are in no way infringed upon. This makes the Romeikes request for amnesty incredibly weak. An adherent to a religion that requires human sacrifice would have a better freedom-ofreligion complaint about their countrys murder laws than the Romeikes do about Germanys education law. Being that homeschooling isnt in itself a tenet of the Christian faith, their complaint is simply that Germany isnt giving them full discretion to do whatever they want because theyre Christians. The oftenrepeated claims of parents rights and indoctrination fill the statements made by the Romeike family and their legal representative, the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) claims I heard countless times growing up. What can be so horrible about the state curriculum or school environment that makes it such a threat to Conservative Christians? This is broken down into two other questions: What rights does it take away from parents?, and What kind of indoctrination does the state supply in its schools? I will attempt here to answer these questions. The rights taken away by an education mandate are shaky at best. The HSLDA Director of International Affairs, Michael Donnelly, claims that the right of parents to decide how their children should be educated is a fundamental human right (Breitbart, March 4, 2014). I do understand where he is coming from; no parent wants their child taken away from them and raised in a manner contrary to their desires. In this situation, however, the children would not be taken away. They would not be educated in secret indoctrination camps. They would simply be ensured a solid education administered by those certified and qualified to teach. If were talking about rights of parents and rights of children in philosophical terms, I would say that a child has more of a fundamental right to be free from indoctrination than a parent has to indoctrinate someone who is only subordinate to them by virtue of the accident of birth. This brings us to an

answer to the second question, which is a study in Orwellian doublespeak. The truth is, the state does not indoctrinate its students it provides 35 hours/week in which parents cannot indoctrinate their children. To the conservative Christian mindset, a lack of Christian indoctrination means the presence of anti-Christian indoctrination. To be clear, the German law does not require reeducation or indoctrination. It requires that children be educated and that their education meets certain standards. It is not at all outrageous that a country would have an education mandate. Such a requirement is essential for continued technological, cultural, and intellectual progress. Though the United States has education laws, they are largely rendered toothless by provisions allowing for nonaccredited education in private or home schools; people like my parents and the Romeikes rely on those provisions to maintain a continued monopoly on their childrens intellectual development. A federal immigration court judge granted the Romeikes political asylum in 2010, and that ruling was subsequently appealed by the Department of Justice. The

Roberto Maiocco Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the decision of the immigration court, and ordered the deportation of the Romeikes. The Supreme Court declined to review the case in March of 2014. After public backlash in the United States, however, the Department of Homeland Security quickly announced that the Romeike family would not be deported. Germanys education law has been described by the countrys highest court as guarding against the creation of a parallel society within the German state people who were raised completely secluded and disconnected from mainstream society as well as, sometimes, reality. Unfortunately, that parallel society is thriving in the United States people like the Romeikes around the world can see that. That parallel society speaks the language of privilege and condemnatory morality and wields disproportionate power in the government through its assertions of rights. Its latest victory, gaining indefinite residency for the Romeike family, has just shown the world yet again that the United States will respect and reward the violation of any law, so long as it is done to advance the cause of Christianity.

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CHRONIcLE, APRIL 2014

NATIoNAl AFFAIRS
Gun Control in America, Part III: The Second Amendment
Spencer Virtue Contributor

his is the third installment of my series of articles on gun control. The first framed the debate by discussing both sides of the argument, the second described the ideological foundations for private gun ownership, and now, I would like to turn to constitutional law and the effectiveness of assault weapons bans. I would like to begin with the relevance of constitutional law. In the aftermath of the Sandy Hook shooting, I was involved in several discussions with Vassar students about what we could do to curb gun violence. Students offered various solutions, from simple background check legislation, to bans on all assault rifles, to the outright confiscation and prohibition of private firearm ownership. Never, however, in any of these discussions were issues of constitutional law brought up. Students presented solutions without acknowledging the fact that private gun ownership is a constitutionally-protected right that is enforced by the judicial system with a standard nearly as strict as free speech protections. We cannot compare gun control in the United States with gun control in other countries because, in other countries, gun control is not a protected individual right. Gun confiscation in the United States would be wildly unconstitutional the courts would immediately halt any attempt to do so. For some, this is an inconvenient truth, but it is, however, the truth. The Second Amendment sits beside the freedom of speech, the freedom of religion, the right to a speedy and public trial, the right to not be forced to testify against oneself, and others, as a fundamental individual right protected by the courts from legislative infringement. Simply disliking firearms or believing that the Second Amendment should not exist does not remove the amendment from the Constitution, nor does it permit any or all restrictions on gun ownership. In addition, it is not possible for the Second Amendment to be repealed; in a nation with more guns than people, such an amendment to repeal would never garner the public support necessary to pass it. It is, therefore, necessary to frame any debate about gun measures with a sufficient understanding of the constitutional law behind the Second Amendment. How do the courts interpret the Second Amendment? How do the courts determine which gun control measures are constitutional? Without answering these questions, it is impossible to have an informed discussion about gun control. First and foremost, arguments that the Second Amendment refers only to state militias have been shot down by the courts. The Supreme Court has ruled that the Second Amendment gives the common citizen the right to own firearms. This is no longer a question. This precedent is now etched in jurisprudential stone and the courts from this point on will interpret the

Second Amendment in such a way. This decision was brought about as a result of two landmark Supreme Court decisions District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) and McDonald v. Chicago (2010). The District of Columbia v. Heller decision challenged, among other things, the de facto ban of handguns in Washington D.C. The Court decided that it was unconstitutional to prevent individuals from owning and using handguns for selfdefense in the home. Alongside striking down the handgun ban, the Court made crucial rulings on the Second Amendment in general, deciding that it undoubtedly protects an individual citizens right to keep and bear arms. The Court made this decision in line with substantial scholarship that proved that the founders of this country intended gun ownership to be an individual right. The McDonald v. Chicago decision reinforced the Heller decision, arguing that the Heller decision applied not only to federal restrictions on gun ownership, but to state restrictions as well. Our discussion of gun control must now be framed by the understanding that the courts recognize the right to bear arms as fundamental. Very often, the fine line between an unconstitutional and a constitutional measure makes them hard to distinguish. However, I can provide you with a few proposals that are clearly unconstitutional and, therefore, should be thrown out of the realm of possibility because they are, frankly, illegal. First, Heller made it clear that handgun bans are unconstitutional because they present a burden on the common citizens ability to defend themself. This does not mean that all gun bans are unconstitutional, however. Second, it is unconstitutional to ban all forms of gun-carry; there must be some way for citizens to both keep and bear arms. Third, of course, gun confiscation is unconstitutional any attempts by the government to seize private arms would undoubtedly be halted by the judiciary. In my opinion, assault weapons bans, magazine limits, and many restrictions on concealed carry are unconstitutional. The unconstitutional nature of handgun bans as ruled in Heller should logically include assault weapons bans, as both types of weapons are commonly used in traditionally-lawful purposes, such as target shooting and self-defense in the home. I also believe that current court precedent requires states to allow citizens to carry firearms in some fashion, whether concealed upon the person or carried openly. For example, in my home state of California, the de facto ban on handgun carry was ruled unconstitutional. There is no space here to go through all of my legal arguments, but the important point is simply that private gun ownership is here to stay and, therefore, gun control measures must remain in the bounds of this understanding. With all of this in mind, I would like to go through and briefly evaluate the effectiveness of assault weapons bans and magazine restrictions in preventing mass shootings.

First and foremost, I would like to propose a question to all of you. What is an assault weapon? When most people say they support a ban on assault weapons, they are referring to an abstract class of weapons that share certain aesthetic, not mechanical, characteristics. For example, Dianne Feinsteins proposed assault weapons ban had a list of criteria used to evaluate whether or not a firearm was to be classified as an assault weapon. Quoted from Dianne Feinsteins website, assault weapons are classified as all semiautomatic rifles that can accept a detachable magazine and have at least one military feature: pistol grip; forward grip; folding, telescoping, or detachable stock; grenade launcher or rocket launcher; barrel shroud; or threaded barrel. Apart from the grenade launcher and rocket launcher attachment which is a ridiculous addition to the list, given that such devices are illegal already none of the above military features make the firearm any more or less dangerous. They are aesthetic characteristics, not mechanical ones. A pistol grip simply allows the shooter to hold the firearm differently. This, in no way, makes the firearm more dangerous. Folding, telescoping, or detachable stocks simply allow the firearm to be 1) stored in a smaller space or 2) maneuvered more easily in a tactical situation because the firearm will not be as long. This does not make the firearm any more or less dangerous. One can simply purchase the rifle with a shorter stock to begin with. Having a foldable or collapsing stock simply allows the shooter to transition from close quarters to longrange combat, which doesnt play a role in a mass shooting situation. A barrel shroud simply prevents the user from burning himself on a hot barrel; a threaded barrel allows the attachment of a flash suppressor or silencer. Silencers are already illegal, while flash suppressors do nothing but make the gun less bright when fired at nighttime. None of these characteristics that define an assault weapon are actual mechanical characteristics that make such a firearm more deadly than any other. So, then, what on earth is an assault weapon? Nobody really knows. It is a catch phrase a name that sounds scary but means very little. So, when you say that you want to ban assault weapons, what do you mean? How are you distinguishing an assault rifle from the everyday run-of-the-mill rifle that one uses for lawful hunting? The gun that is the poster-child for assault weapons is the AR-15 a civilian version of the military M16, but without the automatic firing function. This firearm uses a .223 bullet, which the media has falsely portrayed as somehow being extraordinarily dangerous. In reality, the .223 bullet is fairly weak. It is an intermediate-sized bullet, somewhere in between handgun ammunition and fullfledged rifle ammunition for hunting. One would not be able to hunt any large game with a round like this; indeed, this round is used primarily for hunting coyotes. The military uses it because it is versatile on the battlefield, meaning that it works

sufficiently in all types of engagements from close quarters to medium-long range. The media has also falsely portrayed this round as being particularly dangerous in close quarters. This is not the case. While it works in close quarters, it is not more dangerous than handgun ammunition. In some select cases, it is less effective than handgun ammunition in close quarters because the round travels so quickly that it ends up passing through the human body without doing much damage. Handgun ammunition is heavier and slower and therefore does more damage in close quarters. Therefore, in a close-quarters massshooting situation, the ammunition of the AR-15 will not increase the effectiveness of the shooter as opposed to pistol ammunition. The one advantage of the AR-15 in a mass-shooting situation is the 30-round magazine. However, many legal pistols come standard with magazines upwards of 20 rounds, with optional extended magazines that can go above 30. In addition, a shooter could use two pistols at once, making his capability for sustained rapid-fire even higher than with the assault weapon. With this in mind, I wonder why people who support assault weapons bans do not also support the banning of equally-dangerous standard pistols. In fact, according to a July, 2012 article in Mother Jones, of the 143 weapons used in mass shootings since 1982, nearly half (71) were legal handguns, 23 out of 143 were revolvers, and 21 out of 143 were shotguns. Only 28 were carried out with rifles. Of all 143, only 43 would have been outlawed by Feinsteins ban 20 because they were assault weapons and the rest because they had magazines above 10 rounds. Does this mean that all shotguns, handguns, revolvers, and rifles should be outlawed? If so, all guns in the United States would be outlawed, because all guns fall within these categories. And, of course, such a prohibition would be impossible without an amendment to the Constitution. For some, the answer to this is magazinecapacity restrictions. However, banning magazines over 10 rounds presents many problems. First and foremost, there are millions upon millions of AR-15 30-round magazines in circulation in the country banning them will do little to prevent easy access to them. Furthermore, magazines are so mechanically simple that anybody with sheet metal and some tools can create one that could feed into an AR-15. Therefore, mass shooters will still have access to them. Furthermore, even if one could somehow remove all magazines from circulation, mass shootings would be just as deadly; even an unskilled shooter can reload in under one second. While there is much more that could be said on assault weapons and high-capacity magazine bans, this is all that I have room for. I hope the information that I have given has illuminated some of the issues with popular support for assault weapons bans and magazine restrictions.

CHRONIcLE, APRIL 2014

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NATIoNAl AFFAIRS
SCOTUS
Stacey Nieves Contributor

Increases

'Price

Tag'

on

Democarcy
are restricting voting hours and days in the interest of establishing uniform voting procedures throughout the states. But these restrictions are a naked attempt to repress the ability of blacks and Latinos who are more likely to vote Democratic to vote. The Supreme Court has enabled these clear violations of the Fifteenth Amendment. The Court hasnt always favored voting restrictions when given the chance. Last June, the justices ruled against an attempt by Arizona to demand proof of citizenship from persons attempting to vote in federal elections. The measure has since been approved by a lower court, which mandated that the federal government must aid both Arizona and Kansas in requiring proof of citizenship. But the overall trend of the Courts decisions in the past few years has increased the political power of the elite while suppressing input from already oppressed groups. In its Shelby County v. Holder decision, the Court suggested that the states and regions governed by the Voting Rights Act could no longer be judged by their history of racial oppression. However, the flood of restrictive voting laws enacted since the decision proves that the Court was wrong the Voting Rights Act wasnt outdated and the rights guaranteed by the Fifteenth Amendment still need protecting. It is unjustifiable that the Court continues to privilege the First Amendment rights of a tiny minority over the Fifteenth Amendment rights of a significant portion of the American populace. As the Court puts an ever-increasing price tag on participation in our democracy, its clear whose speech the conservative justices are most interested in protecting.

ith its latest campaign finance ruling McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission the Supreme Court has further empowered a small group of deep-pocketed donors when it comes to their ability to influence elections. In a 5-4 decision, the conservative-led court ruled that the federal government cannot impose an overall cap on political donations within a two-year election cycle. The decision left in place a cap of $2,600 on contributions to a single campaign. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. framed the decision as a victory for the First Amendment rights of the plaintiffs Shaun McCutcheon, who wanted to donate more money to Republican candidates than the law allowed, and the Republican National Committee, which was eager to accept. But in his dissent, Justice Stephen G. Breyer wrote that the decision eviscerates our nations campaign finance laws, leaving a remnant incapable of dealing with the grave problems of democratic legitimacy that those laws were intended to resolve. As Breyer clearly realizes, the McCutcheon decision cripples the governments ability to restrict the influence of money in politics. Billionaires are perfectly free to express their political views in speech and writing, as they should be. But the money that trades hands during election season isnt speech, its a down payment wealthy donors are going to expect a return on their investment. The Courts latest ruling ensures that the wealthy are going to be making many more investments and expecting more returns in the future. This decision also further tips the

balance of political power toward the small fraction of the American populace capable of writing big checks and further away from those who can hardly afford to take a Tuesday off to cast their ballots. The Courts recent decisions have revealed an expansive view of the First Amendment coupled with a very narrow conception of the promises made in the Fifteenth, which is meant to prohibit the government from preventing citizens from voting. In June, the court settled the case of Shelby County v. Holder by invalidating the formula used to determine which areas were governed by the Voting Rights Act, effectively barring the federal government from controlling elections in those places, despite their histories of exclusion on the basis of race. When considered alongside the Courts latest ruling, the Voting Rights decision reveals the skewed view of democracy held by the conservative justices. Unwilling to rein in the influence of a privileged elite or protect the minimal leverage held by the underpowered, the Court is eschewing a democracy of the many in favor of a democracy of the few the rich. In the United States created by the Roberts Court the Supreme Court under the leadership of Chief Justice John G. Roberts that has existed since 2005 politicians will only fight for the interests of those capable of shelling out the cash to cover their next campaign ad, meaning the voices of the poor and the vast majority of people of color will go unheeded. The McCutcheon decision is only the latest step in the Roberts Courts campaign to expand the definition of speech to include spending and to limit the definition of corruption to exclude any influence that doesnt scream bribery. In Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission a 2010

decision that was also split 5-4 along ideological lines the Court found that the First Amendment protected the right of corporations to donate limitless amounts of money to independent political groups. The newer decision has already sent leaders of both parties scrambling back to wealthy donors who had already made the maximum contribution allowed under the law. Parties are hoping to regain the control they lost when Citizens United pushed politically-minded billionaires to donate their money to Super Political Actions Committees (PACs) rather than directly to parties or candidates. Some proponents of the McCutcheon ruling argue that guiding campaign contributions to parties rather than PACs will increase transparency because PACs arent obligated to disclose their donors. But the latest decision only grants a wealthy minority yet another technique to exert undue influence on the American government. As Justice Breyer wrote in the McCutcheon dissent, If the court in Citizens United opened a door, todays decision we fear will open a floodgate. As the Roberts Court abolishes limits on the political influence of a wealthy elite, it represses the voices of racial minorities and the poor. By gutting the Voting Rights Act, the Court cleared the way for state governments to enact voter ID and proof-of-citizenship requirements, restrict early and absentee voting, and disallow same-day registration. These measures disproportionately affect minority voters, who often lack drivers licenses and passports, and prefer early and absentee voting to avoid missing work. False cries of voter fraud cant explain all of these measures, so Republicans have recently begun claiming that they

Sex Ed in U.S. Public Schools Can be Misguided, Harmful

Hannah Matsunaga Editor

should probably start with a disclaimer the private school I attended in Honolulu, Hawaii, provided good sex education. Really good sex education. We covered anatomy and puberty in fourth grade, sex and contraception in eighth grade, and the basics of gender identity, sexuality, consent, and healthy relationships in the ninth grade, with refreshers every year. Most of this was wasted on me. As a precocious little pervert with like-minded friends, I grew up hearing stories about sex, pornography, and masturbation; the endless bounty of debauchery that is the internet had opened my horizons to fetishes, erogenous zones, and the ups and downs of different materials for sex toys by the time I turned fifteen. I remember smirking with pride in my eighth grade science class when I won a pen from a Planned Parenthood guest speaker because I could name the four fluids that transmit HIV (blood, semen, vaginal fluids, and breast milk, in case you were wondering). All of this knowledge-gathering happened well in advance of my first sexual experience well, well in advance so when it finally happened, I was able to make informed deci-

sions because of the educational opportunities afforded to me by my school and my own research. Given this background, I was shocked no, horrified when I found out that only 19 states in the U.S. require that sex education in public schools be medically, factually, or technically accurate. Accompanying statistics are just as frightening. Only 22 states and the District of Columbia even require public schools teach sex education, and only 33 states and the District of Columbia require instruction about HIV/ AIDS. Granted, Im sure many schools across the country go above and beyond what is legally required of them, but in the majority of states, there is no accountability to ensure that the information being given to kids and young people is even correct. Take Alabama, for example. Section 1640A-2 of the Alabama Code, passed in 1992 and titled Minimum Contents to be Included in Sex Education Program or Curriculum, mandates that, Any program or curriculum in the public schools in Alabama that includes sex education or the human reproductive process shall, as a minimum, include and emphasize the following: Abstinence from sexual intercourse outside of lawful marriage is the

expected social standard for unmarried school-age person An emphasis on sexual abstinence as the only completely reliable method of avoiding unwanted teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases An emphasis on the importance of self-control and ethical conduct pertaining to sexual behavior An emphasis, in a factual manner and from a public health perspective, that homosexuality is not a lifestyle acceptable to the general public and that homosexual conduct is a criminal offense under the laws of the state. Nowhere in the law does it say that medically accurate information is required. What is required, however, is that homosexuality be taught as both unacceptable and as a lifestyle choice. The state also requires that schools teach shaming people for sexual activity under the guise of self-control and ethical conduct. Im not a Womens Studies major, but I dont think its very difficult to guess the gender of those who are shamed by teachers and students. If sexual education is not required to be medically or factually accurate, a Mean Girls-esque teaching style If you have sex, you will get pregnant and die is something that could legally be a reality for the more than 700,000 students enrolled in Alabama public schools.

All of this misinformation and shaming is terrifying because, despite the best efforts of abstinence-only education programs, high school students are still having sex. According to the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 47% of all high school students say theyve had sex, and 15% of high school students have had sex with four or more partners during their lifetime. Three in 10 girls in the United States will be pregnant at least once before their 20th birthday, and teen mothers are more likely than their peers to drop out of high school, live in poverty, depend on public assistance, and suffer from poor health. People ages 15 to 24 make up 25% of the sexually-active population but acquire half of all newly-contracted sexually-transmitted infections. Although I dont believe sex education should focus entirely on pregnancy and STI prevention, the harms of ignoring either issue are widespread and serious. Young people in the U.S. deserve better. They deserve sex education that discusses gender identity, sexual orientations including asexuality pleasure, sexual violence, healthy relationships, body hair, choice, and anything else they have questions about. At the very least, they deserve medically accurate information.

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CHRONIcLE, APRIL 2014

DEBATE & DISCoURSE

MVP Training Increases Awareness of Sexual Assault
Lily Sloss Contributor

kinny! Yeah, but not too skinny! You have to be sexy But you cant have had sex with too many other people. Exactly! The women in the Mentor Violence Prevention (MVP) training program I recently completed kept finishing each others sentences. When asked the question, What does society expect of women? the answers were fast and furious. For the follow-up question, What are women called if they dont conform? the answers were just as immediate. Slut. Bitch. Cunt. Bossy. Conceited. Ugly. Fat. Stupid. Worthless. The list went on and on. The faces of my fellow Vassar females went from enthusiastic to morose. When you are repeatedly called names, it is difficult to remember that you in no way deserve them. The male students taking the training program had starkly different responses to the same questions. Men are expected to be brave, athletic, strong, a caretaker, sexually active, and triumphant. When they dont fulfill these expectations, the most derogatory terms are insults to their sexuality, or worse, they are called a pussy. If you want to make a man feel really bad about his self-worth, compare him to a girl. At this moment, I certainly felt poor about my self-worth. Why had I signed up for this class? The first day of MVP had felt full of promise. The room was crowded with students of different academic backgrounds and class years. The group was primarily female but about one quarter of the class was male not a terrible ratio. Students of different socioeconomic statuses and ethnicities were represented, although we never did discuss how ones race or background might affect the sexual harassment, assault, or victimization one might witness or experience. The defining characteristic of the group, however, was hope. Students had come to learn bystander strategies how to intervene when we witnessed sexual harassment or assault. Everyone shared why they were taking MVP. The responses were surprisingly varied. Experience working at Planned Parenthood or domestic violence shelters, a legal or medical interest, and personal encounters with sexual violence were referenced as reasons. I found my heart pounding when my turn came to explain my rationale for joining; I nearly started

crying. As someone proudly unemotional, tears were an unwelcome surprise. When I was eight years old, I attended self-defense seminars that my mother and sister taught. Being black belts in karate, my female family members taught ways to avoid and fight off attackers. Throughout the classes, conversations circled nearly identical topics a sweet, caring boyfriend who turned abusive; the dangers of looking unsure of yourself in a public setting; not making yourself a target; always having a buddy and keeping track of your friends if you go to a party. Although women often found the seminar empowering, the program altered my perception of the sexual landscape ahead. In my eightyear-old mind, if I walked home alone, or if I had a boyfriend, or if I was drunk and didnt have a friend around, I was bait for sexual assault. The potential danger was clear. I had methods for fighting men off I knew how to swipe keys to blind someone, how to drag my shoe as hard as I could down someones shin to make them fall, and other methods to put off potential assailants. The lessons I learned, primarily, were how to take care of myself. So, I believed I was well educated and prepared to prevent sexual assault.

Although a difficult situation to handle, the event is easy to read in that there is obvious bad behavior, an aggressor, and a victim one individual clearly harming another. You need to act.

When I joined MVP and reflected on my four years at Vassar, I realized how wrong I was. I have had close friends with mean boyfriends who I was never able to help or, quite frankly, support. I witnessed drunk girls incapable of consenting to sex leaving parties with guys. I listened to male friends discussing women as if they were objects without uttering a word in protest. I have listened to and taken part in ugly, derogatory conversations about fellow female students. Am I a feminist? How can I confidently proclaim my allegiance to women when I have never, ever, intervened in situations of domestic abuse, potential sexual assault, and rampant sexism? I may have imagined previously that I had no need to take a course in prevention, but I was foolish and, more dangerously, just plain wrong. None of us are too clever

or too educated to hear how we can help one another. My sensitivity arose when the MVP participants began sharing their reasons for joining the course, not because I had personally experienced sexual assault, but because I knew that my peers and I were all guilty for witnessing and participating in events and conversations which had laid the groundwork for sexism, assault, and violence to occur on our beloved campus. In MVP, our discussions ranged from futile to upsetting. In one class, we watched images of sexual assault victims paired with lyrics from Blurred Lines. The conversation that followed was not productive. It failed to illustrate new topics, but rehashed a common theme rap songs are often derogatory to women and encourage sexual assault. The discussion, familiar to most students, felt like wasted time and effort. In another class, we learned how few rehabilitation centers are available for men with histories of abuse. If an assailant is arrested for domestic violence, he will be forced into rehab, but if a perpetrator seeks help prior to arrest, there often is not help available. Most states offer limited services to victims, but do nothing to stop the source of abuse. It was shocking to learn how one-sided the response to sexual assault is. By dealing with the symptom rather than the source of the problem, domestic abuse and sexual assault will continue to run rampant. This discussion was heated and eye opening. One major failing of the class something coordinators promised to correct in upcoming semesters was its adherence to an antiquated training booklet. The hypothetical situations were so explicit as to be obvious, such as, What would you do if you saw a boy hit his girlfriend? The entire class responded that you would intervene. You separate the couple. You talk to the girlfriend. You try and distance the boyfriend. You follow up on the situation, maybe the next day, offering victim services available on campus. Although a difficult situation to handle, the event is easy to read in that there is obvious bad behavior, an aggressor, and a victim one individual clearly harming another. You need to act. The class became interesting, however, when we introduced Vassar-specific situations and realized the range in responses. What if, while at a party, you saw your friend Bill open a Snapchat of your friend Clarissa? She is depicted in an eroticized manner and doesnt realize the photo is being taken. What would you do? The responses varied. Some felt the victim should be told; others wondered how many people had received the photo. Many

wondered about the specific content of the photo was it that sexual? As was so often the case during MVP, I was reminded of an incident during my time at Vassar. In either my sophomore or junior year, a group of students were discussing the sexual behavior of a friend, Jessica, in a derogatory manner. One of the students present, Claire, told Jessica what had happened. She probably felt she was being a good friend, but Jessica was devastated. The students discussing her were neither friends of hers nor people with whom she felt close. It was unlikely anyone would have spoken poorly about her in her presence and it was embarrassing and inappropriate that people she was not close to would feel comfortable discussing her sexuality. But did she really need to be informed? Furthermore, the incident prompted another friend of Jessicas to discuss her sexual habits with her, recommending that maybe Jessica should tone it down. Both friends who approached Jessica were trying to do the right thing. They wanted her to be self-aware and not to feel foolish. Contrary to their intentions, their actions resulted in Jessica feeling hyper-aware of her appearance, constantly concerned that other students were talking about her, and socially anxious. There must have been another way to help Jessica. In MVP, most students agreed that in the Snapchat circumstance, there is no single correct response. Situations have contexts and are person-dependent. Consider your options. However, the most valuable thing I gained in MVP was the impetus to intervene. As I mentioned, I have watched a ton of wasted students leave parties together, probably to hook up, and never stepped in or checked to see if they were okay. Instead, I thought, I dont know them, or, Its probably what they both want, or, It would be weird to intervene. Well, think of it the other way. What if your little sister or brother was coerced into leaving a party with someone? They are drunk, having fun, dont know what theyre getting into, and they are scared to speak up. People watch them leave, feel concerned, but dont say anything. How would you feel if you knew someone could have prevented your siblings worst night ever? We all need to recognize that every incapacitated student, slurring their words, leaving a party unable to consent, is someones sister, brother, daughter, son, or friend. The next time I see a drunken pair, Ill ask, Hey, your friends were looking for you. Did you tell them you were leaving? Its not much, but it could make the difference.

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CHRONIcLE, APRIL 2014

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DEBATE & DISCoURSE

Debate of the Month: Is Hacktivism Morally Acceptable?
Joshua Sherman, Treasurer Tati Esposito von Mueffling, Copy Editor

acktivism, a portmanteau of hacking and activism, is defined as the usage of computers or computer networks to demonstrate a political ideal to communities, nations, or even the entire world. Depending on how broadly one defines activism, any number of illegal internet activities could constitute hacktivism in our evergrowing digital world. In this Debate of the Month, Joshua Sherman 16 and Tati Esposito von Mueffling 17 discuss the advantages and disadvantages behind such a form of protest, and whether its ends justify the means. Joshua Sherman 16: The emergence of the internet connected the world and empowered individuals to communicate on a global scale. This empowerment brought with it, like any new form of communication, legal and illegal methods to utilize it to help further social, political, and economic causes. Just as pamphleteering with the invention of the printing press and pirate stations with the advent of radio allowed free expression to take place by rejecting the accepted laws, the Internet, through hacktivism, has facilitated powerful demonstrations in our modern era that otherwise would have not earned the attention they received or the response they intended. Whether it is through decentralized hacking groups such as Anonymous or coordinated political groups, hacktivism facilitates more free speech and better discourse on important issues despite its illicit process.

The Internet, through hacktivism, has facilitated powerful demonstrations in our modern era that otherwise would have not earned the attention they received or the response they intended.

Tati Esposito von Mueffling 17: Upworthy and Change.org exemplify Internet altruism. Hacktivism has been lauded by some as the newest such empowering form, but unlike its lawabiding counterparts, hacking groups like Anonymous exist in a legal grey area of vigilantism. But, the law does not have to be broken to achieve free speech; in fact, the First Amendment of our Constitution explicitly articulates free speech as a fundamental right. In August of 2013, a 16-year-old girl in Ohio was raped while incapacitated by alcohol in what became known as the Steubenville Rape Case. Some of the football players that comprised the rape crew documented their disgusting actions with photos and video that were shared on various social media platforms, sparking a national

debate about rape culture. KnightSec, a group related to Anonymous, hacked a website on which they demanded that officials involved in covering up the assault apologize. While these hackers were clearly on the morally-correct side of the Steubenville case, they offered an ultimatum, not a discourse, which would have been far more beneficial for all parties than a potentially empty expression of contrition. JS: Sure, hacktivism inherently cannot be controlled because it does not abide by the laws and policies we have set as a society. By no means am I justifying actions like these; however, lets consider the Steubenville case. In the case of the individuals the hackers exposed, we have authority figures in the community who committed criminal negligence and, quite frankly, failed to uphold their end of a social contract. These individuals accepted their positions in the community with the expectation that they would respect and uphold all of their social, political, and ethical obligations. I am more concerned with the violations committed by these individuals than those committed by groups like KnightSec. That said, I will say that I believe that hacktivists should operate in a framework of civil disobedience that they should be prosecuted and accept the punishment that society sees fit for their actions. Hacktivism can be a powerful tool of expression, but in the status quo, we have laws and we arrest those who break those laws. Often, however, this only helps intensify the strength of the voice and the message, which furthers the value of such free speech. TEvM: The concern with hacktivism is not one of control free speech is what I am advocating for. However, I take issue with doing so outside of the law. Saying that actions taken by groups like Anonymous against negligent community members will likely be illegal and thus prosecuted accordingly suggests that the only effective way to deal with crime is to fight back with crime. Certainly, rape and civil disobedience are crimes of completely different natures, but they are still both illegal. What is the importance of legality in the face of such clear moral wrongheadedness as seen in a case like Steubenville? Hacktivism, when done as an act of civil disobedience, only pushes issues further into a realm of anarchy. Trial by jury is a cornerstone of the American justice system and, though this system has failed many people again and again, we should focus on ameliorating the existing courts rather than creating new, lawless ones in a space as volatile and unregulated as anonymous websites. Furthermore, courts of law only function when faces and names can be put to both sides of a case. As long as Anonymous remains just that, members cannot speak for themselves, let alone speak for others. JS: I dont think our justice system is in peril as a result of hacktivism. In fact, Id go as far as to say that acts of nonviolent protest or demonstration that bring issues to light, much like groups like KnightSec

have been doing, is an excellent example of our justice system being supported by hacktivism. This example goes further, with anonymous hacker groups often reporting child pornography, acts of domestic violence, and other serious felonies to proper authorities when they discover it. Accusations that hackers make for their causes, including individual

Trial by jury is a cornerstone of the American justice system and, though this system has failed many people again and again, we should focus on ameliorating the existing courts rather than creating new, lawless ones in a space as volatile and unregulated as anonymous websites.

accusations, are acts of free speech, as are claims of an investigative journalist or whistleblower, except the means by which they make them, in many scenarios, are illegal. This does not impede justice; if the legal authorities care enough to act against these hacktivists, they are entitled to do so under the laws we have set. That being said, their actions are not inherently immoral and can offer social and political benefits. Arguing that free speech is only beneficial when it follows all proper laws and policies has been proven to be, in some cases, an inherent fallacy. Theres legislation already passed by Congress that denies journalists the opportunity to investigate and report on factory farms in the Midwest, not because of the inherent immorality of this action, but because farm lobbyists exert great influence on lawmaking. The law is not always just; hacktivism is simply a means to allow discourse where it otherwise would not be possible. TEvM: I certainly agree that the law and its enforcement are not always just a point I made earlier. However, hacktivists work outside of the law, instead of working to reform it, albeit while fighting for good causes. One of the most dangerous aspects of hacktivism is doxxing the procurement and dissemination of private information about an individual. Some of this information is public and thus legal to post, but some like a social security number is private information that cannot be posted without that individuals consent. Doxxing also becomes illegal when it is used to threaten someone, gain access to private emails, or when information is used to impersonate an individual. On the one hand, doxxing can be used to make the public aware of the identities of perpetrators of such heinous crimes as the Steubenville rape.

Hacktivists demand total transparency and believe that the public has a right to complete information before making an informed decision, yet any person could be targeted by doxxing if a hacktivist deems that individual sufficiently bad. The biggest issue with the lack of rules and regulations on groups like Anonymous is the arbitrary nature of who is targeted. Typically, they go after people that the public agrees need to be reprimanded, such as rapists, negligent officials, and people who promote rape culture. What makes it ethical to condemn some people to public scrutiny and not others? Where is the line? There is not a universal moral code by which Hacktivists can measure such actions, so outside of the law, anyone is fair game. JS: Yes, there is no global rule or line that is drawn, but the law does not necessarily imply a guarantee that your privacy will not be infringed upon, whether or not a legal amount of disclosure is maintained. If an individual is identified in the media by name, it doesnt stop the public from then going and harassing this person. This is not about people using knowledge they discover to attack or threaten. This is, rather, about making information accessible to bring attention to issues that otherwise would not be known. In the end, the act of doxxing makes information available, but it doesnt imply how you should use that information once you have it. Hacktivism is about offering tools for the public to decide how to act and, as I stated in my original point, to facilitate free speech. Its an entirely different story once you consider the actions some may take once they receive this information. Its the same activism investigative reporters do, though the methodology differs and is, in this case, against the law. TEvM: The ultimate hypocrisy of hacktivism is that it claims transparency as a public right and a necessity, yet those who engage in doxxing hide behind the anonymity of a computer, or their favorite symbol, a Guy Fawkes mask. Furthermore, though hacktivists do not instruct the public to act in certain ways, they give people information they ought not necessarily have. You skew this release of information as merely objective and factual, but hacktivists have very clear intentions when they release certain information. The do not passively inform they themselves take action. I do see your points about sparking discourse and creating an informed public, but I believe you ignore the significance of hacktivisms frequent illegality and the dangers of a form of vigilantism that borders on anarchy. Furthermore, if we accept such civil disobedience as a necessary evil, it means we have resigned ourselves to the ineffectiveness of our justice system. As long as our government and the law are at odds with online activists, they will be fighting each other rather than fighting those who have committed far greater crimes.

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CHRONIcLE, APRIL 2014

Fred Phelps, Champion of Gay Rights, Dies at 84

Marya Pasciuto Editor

HUmoUR

TOPEKA, KS Fred Waldron Phelps, Sr., who led the Westboro Baptist Church (WBC) from 1955-2013 and achieved international notoriety for his anti-gay activism and penchant for picketing the funerals of gay people and soldiers, died of natural causes in a Topeka hospital on Mar. 19, 2014. He was 84 years old. Phelps, after decades of leading anti-gay protests that catalyzed a shift in the social landscape which led to policy changes that advanced gay rights in the United States, was under hospice care in the weeks leading up to his death last month. The exact cause of death is unclear, as his church announced merely that the pastor had gone the way of all flesh. Phelps leaves an impressive legacy which proves that bigotry and universal scorn go hand in hand; from his absurdly inappropriate courtroom behavior to his remarkable career as a professional crusader against LGBTQ rights, the late minister proudly demonstrated to all but the most fiercely socially-conservative voters that bigotry is a cause for ridicule. Thanks to Phelps, Americans have become increasingly aware of the stupidity of active homophobia since 1991. Protesting wasnt Phelpss first vehicle for helping the American public to associate anti-gay attitudes with batshit insanity Phelps began his illustrious career as a bigoted laughingstock when he practiced

as a civil rights lawyer. The late reverend later explained his initial appearance as a decent human being via the Westboro Baptist Church website, which states that, The Scripture doesnt support racism, and that, The only true Nazis in this world are fags. After a few years of directing his demented zeal towards overturning racial segregation laws and discovering his now-infamous proclivity for lawsuits Phelps found his calling after filing an unnecessary lawsuit which eventually got him disbarred from practicing law in the state of Kansas. Perhaps it was this particular suit, in which he relentlessly harassed and defamed the defendant by insinuating that she was a sexual deviant, that ignited Phelps passion for rabidly attacking other people for their sexuality. This despicable behavior elicited mass public disdain a reaction that Phelps continued to evoke outside of the courtroom. His disbarment certainly did not put an end to his religious mission; in fact, his forced removal from the courtroom enabled him to focus all of his energy on winning the scorn of decent human beings everywhere and showing the United States the absurdity of treating gay people as if they were Satans spawn. The Fred Phelps that America has come to know and love to hate emerged in 1991, during his first prominent attack on the gay community with the Westboro Baptist Church. Although the church had picketed regularly for about a decade prior, their 1991 protest against Gage Park in Topeka

kicked off more than 20 years of anti-gay picketing and nationwide disapproval. It makes sense that Phelps and his gang of frothy-mouthed homophobes started with Gage Park; local and apparently crawling with homosexuals, Gage was the ideal stage for Phelps to launch his career in looking foolish while railing against gay people. Since then, the Westboro Baptist Church has been widely labeled as a hate group and has prompted counter-protests across the country. Phelps even managed to get himself and his church banned from Canada and the United Kingdom, demonstrating to Americans that his particular brand of nastiness is unwelcome among our nations peers and hinting at the ever-mounting shift away from statesanctioned bigotry. Vassar College owes particular gratitude to the late reverend and his church. In February of 2013, the Westboro Baptist Church provided both our campus community and those surrounding us with a wonderful opportunity to join together for a day of counter-protest, examination of privilege in our bubble of general LGBTQ acceptance, and lots of public homosexual kissing. The general feeling on campus leading up to and following the Westboro Baptist Block Party was of pride and security in our knowledge of right and wrong; we owe it to Phelps and his almost cartoonish hatred for serving as an impetus to action. Vassars response to the Westboro Baptist Churchs protest is but a small-scale version of the United States

reaction to Phelps and his churchs overall existence; while Americans may fail to see eye to eye on countless issues, everyone can agree that Phelpss actions are wrong and that our duty is to put up a united front as supporters of, The Fag Agenda, as his church so lovingly puts it. Phelps passing prompts reflection upon his influence on the gay rights movement. His relentless picketing and unforgettable slogans among them, countless variations on God Hates Fags have forever changed the public perception of anti-gay politicians and other prominent figures; while opposition to gay marriage and gay rights in general once dominated American politics, more and more public figures have changed their positions in the past couple of decades to distance themselves from radicals like Phelps. While it would be ludicrous to say that Phelps was the sole contributor to this shift, his life of infamy and near-universal ridicule will forever be associated with a backward movement that the American public is increasingly eager to leave behind. No funeral service was held for Phelps because, according to his daughter Shirley Phelps-Roper, [The Westboro Baptist Church] do not worship the dead. Those who wish to posthumously thank the man who catalyzed progress for gay rights by picketing funerals and condemning Mr. Rogers are welcome to send an unsolicited message to the Contact page at the Westboro Baptist Churchs website, GodHatesFags.com.

What Vassar Administrators Really Do on Sabattical

Coachella Ding-dong-ditch Cappy's house

Practice layups for the student-faculty basketball game

Attend lecture classes and troll professors

Crash TH parties to relive their college days

CHRONIcLE, APRIL 2014 PAGE 15

THE LASt PAGE

A VOtE IS LIKE A RIFLE: ItS USEFULLNESS DEpENDS UpON tHE cHARActER OF tHE USER. THEODORE ROOSEVELt

WOMPY WANTS YOU

to abstain from voting!
But if you must, follow the

Vassar Chronicle Guide to Student Elections

Step One: Ensure none of your friends are running in the election. If they are, get new friends. Step Two: Submit Strom Thurmond as a write-in candidate. It worked in 1954. Step Three: Rank every candidate as a 1 to guarantee a fair election. Step Four: Thoroughly punch a hole in your computer screen to avoid hanging chads. Step Five: Log on to the online voting system at exactly 11:59 AM on Thursday, April 17th. Step Six: Demand an immediate recount on the grounds that students did not present photo identification to vote. Step Seven: Get drunk at the results party. Hook up with the entire new VSA Executive Board. Step Eight: Comfort yourself with the knowledge that, excluding the students going on JYA or writing a thesis, youve elected the best that Vassar has to offer.

CHRONIcLE, APRIL 2014