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Friday, February 15, 2019

Ann Arbor, Michigan

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Students, faculty respond to impact of ‘U’ DEI initiatives

ANN ARBOR

Different complaints regard Title IX adherence, lack of community input

ALEX HARRING Daily Staff Reporter

At the University of Michigan and around the country, universities are engaged in ongoing discussions about diversity programs and Title IX adherence. The University has repeatedly stressed its commitment to its Diversity, Equity and Inclusion initiatives. But some people take issue with this type of initiative, claiming certain diversity efforts exclude men. LSA sophomore Saveri Nandigama said themes of

diversity, equity and inclusion have a historical place at the University. Nandigama, a member of South Asian Awareness Network and former Central Student Government chief of staff, said it’s important for the University to include student voices — which has been a problem for the University historically. Nandigama specifically noted the three Black Action Movements and the Trotter Multicultural Center as times students had to make campus-wide calls for change from the University. She said the University has a good DEI presence on campus, but should take student

like they need to speak out and they need to take larger efforts in order to feel seen and heard.” In 2016, the five-year DEI plan, which promised $85 million over five years and included campus climate-related training, the creation of the new Trotter Multicultural Center and new recruitment strategies, was unveiled. According to 2016 Daily reporting, the plan was in part a response to recent student activism, specifically the #BBUM movement on Twitter and 2013 protests started by the Black Student Union. The DEI plan made connections to social movements on campus, including Black Action Movement and debates over affirmative action in the last decade. Students protested Design by Roseanne Chao and Sejal Lal the plan because they felt the student voice was not concerns into consideration before properly accounted for during students feel they must demand the keynote speech at the plan’s action through large-scale actions. launch. The costs of DEI “The quantity of D, E and I Perry has seen what he’s called initiatives is great, but the quality can definitely be greatly improved increased “administrative bloat” if there was more student input in over his 25 years in the University the programming that’s done, and system. He pointed to position looking at the history of diversity, changes related to diversity as equity and inclusion on our part of this issue. Ultimately, he campus, I think that’s very easily said this changing administrative forgotten, but it’s important to go landscape and the costs associated back to our history,” Nandigama with it fall on students, families said. “It’s important to get student and taxpayers. “This is very, very costly, and voice into these D, E and I offices to sort of be proactive about ensuring it’s one of the reasons that college that students feel like they have a gets more expensive,” Perry said. See DIVERSITY, Page 3 space on campus before they feel

The Ronald McDonald House gets 36k grant Michigan Masons B.E.S.T award to charitable organization in Ann Arbor MELANIE TAYLOR Daily Staff Reporter

On Thursday morning, members of the Michigan Masonic Charitable Foundation awarded the Ronald McDonald House Charities of Ann Arbor a $36,000 grant for their notable work. The Ronald McDonald House provides lodging for the families of children being treated at C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital across the street. Mott is a component of the University of Michigan’s medical infrastructure. Julaine LeDuc, director of development for the Ronald McDonald House, said the house aims to provide comfort and convenience to families facing a difficult situation. “The mission of Ronald McDonald House is to provide a home away from home for families whose

children are seriously ill or injured and are hospitalized at the C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital,” LeDuc said. “We provide rooms, meals, each bedroom has a private bath, and families can stay for as long as they need to stay while their child is in the hospital.” The Masons’ donation is a part of their annual B.E.S.T. Grant, an acronym for build, enrich, strengthen and transform. The Masons award $1 million dollars split between seven causes chosen from 88 applicants. Executive Director Walt Wheeler said the Ronald McDonald House stood out in the applicant pool for its truly influential work. “Really, the deciding factor is that we try to look at what’s going to have the most impact — what’s really going to change a person’s life or really make a difference in a person’s life,” See GRANT, Page 3

Ross holds annual Michigan India App offers Ripple to academic Conference, ‘Moving Beyond Emerging’ donate $1 ACADEMICS

CAMPUS LIFE

support for students

Business leaders discuss impact of developing markets in India and China

Free mobile application ‘Skoller’ allows users to access updated class information and tools

On Thursday afternoon, the Ross School of Business hosted the first session of the ninth annual Michigan India Conference in the Robertson Auditorium. The theme of this year’s conference, which was first held in 2011, was “Moving Beyond Emerging,” and was focused at analyzing and comparing emerging markets — countries that have some elements of a fully developed market, but are not quite at that status. The first day’s keynote speakers included D. Shivakumar, president of Aditya Birla Group, and Harry Broadman, former White House

MARIA SOBRINO For The Daily

For Business freshman Aamisha Kini, coordinating class schedules and keeping up with assignment deadlines are difficult tasks. It’s stressful, she said, because many times the primary option for keeping up-to-date in classes is navigating pages and pages of online syllabi. “No one really told me what Canvas was,” Kini said, “I wouldn’t have known that I had assignments due.” This issue inspired the free mobile application Skoller, founded by Carson Ward, Logan Matthews and Jonathan Rankin. The app allows the user to download a syllabus, generate a grade calculator, a course schedule and a to-do list with notifications. Matthews said Skoller is unique from other grade calculators and course planners because it’s “studentpowered,” and doesn’t rely on professors or teachers to update information on official university platforms like Canvas.

JIALIN ZHANG For The Daily

trade advisor. Both discussed growing markets around the globe, especially in India and China. The conference started with M.S. Krishnan, associate dean for executive programs at the Business School, who welcomed all the attendees and explained the idea of educating responsible leaders behind the conference. “At Michigan, our mission is to educate leaders, who believe in business that can change the world,” Krishnan said. “We ask for responsible leaders who can create a positive impact wherever they go, whether it is profit, non-profit or whichever

organization they choose, and whichever part of the world.” The audience then welcomed Shivakumar, who focused his keynote address on the development and growth of markets around the globe, with an emphasis on consumer habits in those markets. “All my life I worked with consumers,” Shivakumar said. “All my life I worked with emerging markets. And all that you see in the next 30 slides are pure, personal experience.” Shivakumar condensed his experiences into some general trends ref lecting the

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million for research

University will create FinTech Collaboratory to build multidisciplinary curricula for innovataion SONIA LEE

Daily Staff Reporter

As part of Ripple’s University Blockchain Research Initiative, the University of Michigan received a $1 million grant for education and research in blockchain and cryptocurrency — types of financial technology, commonly referred to as FinTech. Ripple is a technology company working in the blockchain payments working in the field. Ken Weber, head of social impact at Ripple, said UBRI aims to support students and faculty actively engaged in the blockchain space. The initiative hopes to streamline ongoing partnerships with universities across the world and Ripple will help tailor initiatives to fit each school’s curriculum and goals. “The University Blockchain Research Initiative is a program for partnerships with universities to advance understanding and innovation in blockchain, cryptocurrency and FinTech and related topics,” Weber said. “It is given in the form of a gift and universities are able to utilize that funding in ways that are aligned with students and faculty interests.”

ZACHARY GOLDSMITH/Daily

M. S. Krishnan, associate dean for executive programs at Ross School of Business. speaks at the Michigan India Conference at the Ross School of Business Thursday evening.

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INDEX

NEWS.........................2 OPINION.....................4 CLASSIFIEDS................6

See RIPPLE, Page 3

SUDOKU.....................2 ARTS...................5 SPORTS....................7

News

2 — Friday, February 15, 2019

MONDAY: Looking at the Numbers

TUESDAY: By Design

WEDNESDAY: This Week in History

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LSA sophomore Alyssa McMurtry on her story “Whitmer delivers first State of State address”: “I was in the press room, but from what I could tell it was electric. A lot of people, there were a lot of standing ovations, at one point she got everyone to stand which was impressive. Even though her speech was somber, you could tell everyone was upbeat and pretty hopeful for the future and seemed like they really wanted to get work done. It was definitely nerve-wracking, I was very nervous but everyone was very nice, very polite, and gave some really great answers, really insightful. You could feel the energy off them, that they were really excited about the future. It was scary but i was very happy to do it.”

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QUOTE OF THE WEEK

“

Dignity was how John walked. Dignity was how John carried himself. And more than that, it was how he treated everyone — and I mean everyone. ”

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Award-winning poet reflects on themes of Black representation, masculinity Zell Visiting Writer Series welcomed Major Jackson for a reading at the UMMA

the community who could poems which focused of humanity, history and come out and hear writers on broader themes of culture that was passed they wouldn’t otherwise Black representation down.” and the tropes of Black The Zell Visiting Writer have the chance to hear. Series welcomed esteemed She went on to masculinity. After the reading, poet Major Jackson to the discuss poetry’s unique University of Michigan potential to make social Jackson took part in a especially question-and-answer Museum of Art for a poetry commentary, during which reading on Thursday in a society rife with session, Every line that you he ref lected on his own evening. The series political partisanship. invited disting uished “I think, especially experience as a poet. He write is a note you play, now, so much began by explaining the writers each semester to right and it’s a note you play present their work. writing is attempting to moment he discovered he that has to feel right. Zell Fellow Callie grapple with our political wanted to pursue writing Collins, program assistant situation and the way that poetry professionally. The words are there, for the Visiting Writer the world is changing, and “I was writing a lot but the shape is not Series, discussed the so dramatically,” Collins of poems about North there. Jackson program’s goal of giving said. “Poetry is especially Philadelphia,” the University community effective because it can said. “I showed it to my a unique opportunity change so quickly, and it grandfather… He was so to hear from respected can adapt so easily… It’s a proud of that poem. I saw particularly good time to this poem exist outside writers. “These are incredible, listen to people who think of my little apartment, I nationally acclaimed about how to be a human.” saw how it existed among poets and fiction writers,” Jackson, an award- my community at that After the event, LSA Collins said. “We hope winning poet, began his time. That was a feeling that we can bring writers reading with a ref lection that was quite addictive, sophomore Joshua Jordan The Daily how who are at the top of their on poetry’s function as a so much so, that I took told fields and put them in front means of self-discovery. myself serious, and found his passion for poetry Sudoku Syndication stemmed from its being other student writers.” of both current students He then read a series http://sudokusyndication.com/sudoku/generator/print/ Many of Jackson’s poems different from every other and a bigger audience from of deeply personal are location-based, art form. “I enjoy poetry because focused specifically on his hometown, it isn’t so necessary,” Philadelphia. Jackson Jordan said. “Every other explained that he finds art form that we have inspiration in writing seems to be justified by EASY about something so some other medium — deeply personal. He it’s either profitable or ref lected on how his it’s popular. Poetry has writing aims to reveal always been weird and a more humanistic side niche, and it has stayed that way, to some degree.” to his home city. Jackson concluded with “For me, in a lot of ways, it was about a ref lection on how the trying to dignif y lives process of writing poetry in that space, trying to is inherently personal and remember the people based on instincts. “Every line that you I grew up with,” Jackson said. “There’s write is a note you play, something that you and it’s a note you play probably shouldn’t that has to feel right,” bear witness to at such Jackson said. “The words a young age, but, oddly are there, but the shape enough, I’m grateful is not there. That’s a for that childhood kind of restlessness that in Philadelphia… It I think we all should wasn’t a war-torn cultivate inside of us. environment, but That restlessness is really that’s what I am dependent on how much writing against — you are going to lean in GRILLED CH-EASY puzzle by sudokusyndication.com © sudokusolver.com. For personal use only. the perception that on yourself not to do easy there was a lot of pain things.” because there was a lot MADELINE MCLAUGHLIN Daily Staff Reporter

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DIVERSITY From Page 1

ZACHARY GOLDSMITH/Daily Umayyah Cable, associate english professor at Hartwick College, speaks on independent filmmaking at the Critical Conversations: Media Studies at the Intersection of Theory and Practice discussion in Hatcher Graduate Library Thursday afternoon.

GRANT From Page 1 Wheeler said. “And obviously the things the Ronald McDonald House does are just amazing.” The Ronald McDonald House has undergone extensive renovations over the past decade. They launched a new program where volunteers push a hospitality cart around the hospital, complete with hair ties, phone chargers and whatever else families may need. The house has been expanded and re-outfitted from the house originally built in 1985, with new housing in the hospital just steps away from the Newborn and Pediatric Intensive Care Units at Mott.

RIPPLE From Page 1 The University will use the gift to create the FinTech Collaboratory, which will engage students and faculty in educational and research opportunities. The Collaboratory will be an interdisciplinary effort between the Center for Smart Infrastructure Finance (UM-SIF) at the College of Engineering, the Center on Finance, Law and Policy at the School of Public Policy and the FinTech initiative at the Ross School of Business. UM-SIF Director Peter Adriaens, a professor of civil and environmental engineering, highlighted education, case research and applying blockchain knowledge to realworld opportunities as the main components of the Collaboratory. “There’s that student education side to help develop a pipeline that companies like Ripple can hire,” Adriaens said. “To new use cases, that’s really all about market expansion for opportunities for FinTech and blockchain. And then the third one is how do we translate all of this more into the public markets and public finance and public infrastructure systems.” The financial technology space also has a social impact. Adriaens stressed the need to look past the algorithmic side of cryptocurrency to see the business needs and legal implications of financial technologies. “It’s not because you can do it that you should do it, from a business perspective,” he said. “On the social side it’s again, it’s not because you can do it that you should do it. Or if you do it, you’re going to have to put some protections in place, privacy protections in place for people... It might potentially result in destabilization of the markets and that’s why we need financial policy. So, not just public policy but financial policy to be in place. That’s why we’re starting to look at students in all different sides, there are legal students involved both from the Center on Finance, Law and Policy but also in the Business School that look at the legalities.”

Friday, February 15, 2019 — 3

The Alpha Delta Pi sorority pairs with Ronald McDonald House for their primary philanthropy, and the University’s chapter works closely with the Ronald McDonald House of Ann Arbor year after year. LSA junior Sarah Daly is the formerly philanthropy chair of Alpha Delta Pi. She said it’s important for students to be aware of and support the Ronald McDonald House. “Everyone can feel connected because it’s so close to campus and its children are staying at the Mott’s Hospital which is right on campus right next to Markley,” Daly said. “Students have the ability to go in and cook dinner for the families and see the impact they can make and the impact the Ronald

McDonald house is making on the families.” Daly spent time in a Ronald McDonald House when she was younger while her cousin received medical care. She said the organization’s cause still has a place in the hearts of herself and her family. “They don’t ask the families to pay,” Daly said. “That’s another thing that’s so special is that these families are able to stay there, feel warm, feel like they’re at home for free or for a small donation, but those rooms do cost a lot of money. That’s why they need people like us to help take care of them, volunteer but also donate money.” It costs approximately $100 per night to house one family. With 44 rooms and those at capacity nearly all

of the time, LeDuc said it becomes expensive to keep the house up and running. The Michigan Masonic Charitable Foundation’s grant will cover a year’s worth of occupancy for one of the rooms. “We receive a few very large donations a year,” LeDuc said. “This is certainly one of our largest donations, and we’re incredibly grateful to the Masons for providing this wonderful community grant.” LeDuc said that donations like the Masons’ grant or Alpha Delta Pi’s efforts are what sustain the organization. “We rely on the community and appreciate the community support that we receive,” LeDuc said.

Blockchain and cryptocurrency fall under the broader umbrella of financial technology, aiming to improve financial service activities, usually through the use of algorithms. Originally created for Bitcoin, a blockchain is a growing linkage of “blocks” storing transactional information, which can be accessed by anyone and is stored on multiple computers as opposed to in one central location. Because of this, blockchain is seen as a more robust, protected way of making transactions. Cryptocurrency is a medium of assets using cryptography to secure financial data and transactions. Student interest in FinTech has been growing rapidly and surged in popularity in 2017 when cryptocurrencies rapidly rose in price. On Jan. 1, 2018, Bitcoin hit its highest price of $13,412.44. Engineering senior Andy Walner, president of Wolverine Blockchain, sees interest from students in both blockchain and cryptocurrency. “We were founded at the beginning of last school year, and that was a time when blockchain and cryptocurrency, which people often think of as synonymous, was getting a lot of media coverage,” Walner said. “We held our first event and had a turnout of 500 people at Ross in the Robertson Auditorium, and we’re seeing a lot of interest in December.” Business junior Rishi Prasad, co-founder of Wolverine Blockchain and president and founder of Michigan FinTech, a student organization that promotes education and opportunities in the field of financial technology, echoed Walner’s sentiments. He recalled a Michigan FinTech event in 2017, where Andrew Wu, assistant professor of technology and operations and finance, spoke and where the club saw how many students were interested in a FinTech course. The club would go on to develop the course, today taught by Wu and finance professor Robert Dittmar. “That was one of our first events, we had 300 people come out to it,” Prasad said. “And

(Wu) said, ‘If you’re interested in taking a FinTech course, raise your hand.’ And nearly every hand in the room went up, and he literally took a picture of that and sent it to the dean. That was proof right there that there’s insane interest in the space.” According to Wu, meeting high student demand is difficult because already present resources like courses and faculty are being utilized to their full capacity. Resources from the Collaboratory and from Ripple would provide additional learning opportunities for students. “We’re capacity-constrained by faculty, but the demand is there,” Wu said. “We’re going to launch a new MBA section this year. All of our actionbased learning things, as you can imagine these things are very popular. But again, the Collaboratory would give us a lot more resources to develop more of that, maybe getting more faculty involved so that we can better serve student demand. Right now essentially the demand is so high that we’re capped by what we can do.” Weber said one goal of the UBRI is to grow a network of students and faculty who can lead the way in cryptocurrency and blockchain development and application. “Part of the program is to create more connecting tissue and more synergy between students and faculty who are working at these different universities,” Werner said. “There’s a lot of crosspollination, it can happen in collaboration, already we’re seeing subjoined research happening. There are workshops and conferences planned for later this semester and later this year where, you know, Ripple partners will either be hosting, co-hosting or attending.” As one of the 29 universities partnered with Ripple, the University serves as a “node” on a RippleNet blockchain. Wu said this will be particularly helpful as a hands-on approach for student learning. “We’re going to have a Ripple validator here on campus,” Wu said. “That means we’re going to be part of the Ripple blockchain

network, actually processing the Ripple transactions. As part of that, we’re also going to build what’s called stock servers for the students, our students, to get involved. So they can see the transactions, that’ll give them a better understanding of how this blockchain actually works. They can see that in real time, live.” Since FinTech, cryptocurrency and blockchain are new topics, Wu said there are no textbooks and no cases for students to study. Instead, he said, students will engage through action-based learning. “We already launched a bunch of projects which we are going to do more with the FinTech Collaboratory,” Wu said. “We’re going to build essentially actionbased learning projects for students to actually work in these FinTech companies. Be it Ripple, be it startups, across different markets. In the U.S., we have one here this spring in the U.K., we’re going to build new markets in China and Israel … just to give these guys firsthand experience in actually working with the companies. And in doing so they can learn what FinTech is and how it works.” Prasad believes the Collaboratory can help solve challenges on campus, including a lack of recruiting events for those interested in a FinTech career, as well as increasing student engagement and education across the University. “I think it’s tremendous that the University is doing this, I think it’s definitely a step in the right direction,” Prasad said. “I’d say the blockchain space can definitely be crowded and the legitimacy of companies in that space can definitely, to put it bluntly, be called into question. But I’d say Ripple is definitely one of the industry leaders, one of the most legitimate companies in the space, with their leadership team, the type of investments they’ve attracted and the partnerships that they’ve garnered with some of the biggest financial industries and companies in the world. I think it’s great and in terms of research and connections it should help a lot.”

“In addition to all the administrative bloat and administrative growth that’s been driving up the cost of tuition, this is now a whole new part of subset of the bigger picture of more and more administrators making higher and higher salaries, and then burdening students and their parents with higher and higher levels of student loan debt to be able to afford this rising tuition that’s blowing up not because instructional costs are necessarily increasing or their hiring full-time professors, they’re hiring more and more bureaucrats.” Perry published a list of diversity officers at the University on his Twitter account. He said over 70 positions have been added and the money spent would be equivalent to giving in-state full tuition scholarships to over 700 students. In response to a Detroit News editorial critical of DEI spending, University President Mark Schlissel wrote in a letter to the editor over 80 percent of the positions were created before 2016 and have had diversity duties added since their creation. “In many cases, staff with the term ‘diversity’ in their job descriptions have added these specific duties to jobs they already had,” Schlissel wrote. “Everyone benefits from their work.” University spokeswoman Kim Broekhuizen reiterated the message of Schlissel’s letter in an email interview with The Daily. She added there is also a DEI Implementation Leads Group, which is a group helping with department-level DEI work, but these are University employees doing this in addition to their other work. “They help carry out unit and department level DEI goals and meet on a monthly basis to share best practices, engage in professional development activities and receive updates, information, tools, templates and other resources from central administration,” Broekhuizen wrote. “Many of these employees are not solely dedicated to DEI efforts but do so in addition to their roles and responsibilities within their department.” National discourse on diversity and Title IX compliance Perry filed a complaint in May with the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights challenging 11 University programs, initiatives, organizations and scholarships. An OCR letter to Perry dated Jan. 24 said the department is opening an investigation into the claims. Perry said his claims stemmed from males being overlooked and the University not taking action. He said the roles of employees who have diversity-related duties should be to ensure programs and policies work against discrimination against all groups equally. He specifically noted the case of men. “From a legal standpoint it’s very clear and yet it seems like it’s never tolerated to discriminate against women or minorities, but discriminating against men is either overlooked or encouraged or even advocated,” Perry said. “That’s where this double-standard, I think, in the diversity industry, the Title IX enforcement and compliance is, so that’s where I think if they’re really doing their job, then they have to look at discrimination against men as a violation of Title IX — which it is — and they have to take that as seriously as they take discrimination against women.” Perry is known for challenging a women-only lounge at Michigan State University in 2016. His complaint prompted a petition in favor of the lounge garnering over 6,500 signatures and the school converting the lounge into a study space for all students. Additionally, he has filed complaints with OCR against Wayne State University, the University of Virginia and the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. However, Perry is not the only person vocalizing his opinions on diversity programs and Title IX policy compliance on college campuses. Margaret Valois, a Virginia-based lawyer, filed a complaint with OCR against Tulane University for “financial discrimination” against men in awards and internship grants. Ultimately, Tulane reached an agreement requiring administrative training to prevent discrimination in funding and on-campus opportunities in the future. Perry held up the Tulane University agreement as an example of the outcome of OCR investigations into diversity programs. He said there are parallels between his complaints

and those made against Tulane. “Tulane University was just challenged on a bunch of similar programs,” Perry said. “They were found to be in violation of Title IX, so they’re now under sanctions from the Office for Civil Rights in Dallas for programs that are very similar to the ones that I challenged at the University of Michigan, and so they’re now under orders from the Office of Civil Rights to open up all these programs that previously discriminated based on gender… The outcome at Tulane, I think, should be a precedent for what happens at Michigan.” Similarly, Harvard University has recently faced a flurry of lawsuits related to Title IX, diversity and discrimination. One pair of lawsuits, known unofficially as #StandUpToHavard, was filed by Greek groups and three anonymous students. The lawsuits claim a school policy barring students involved in single-sex finals clubs — a select group of fraternity-like student organizations recognized by the school — and Greek organizations from holding campus leadership positions, varsity team athletic captaincies and school endorsement for fellowships violates the U.S. Title IX policy and the Constitution, as well as the Massachusetts state constitution and Civil Rights Act. In another case, a transgender woman is suing Harvard and one of its Office for Dispute Resolution investigators for alleged discrimination and retaliation against the plaintiff after she reported an admissions officer for sexual harassment. All three lawsuits are ongoing. Broekhuizen said because Title IX decisions are made on an institution-by-institution basis, rulings made on programs at other campuses like the decision at Tulane University, do not influence University decisions. “A ruling at Tulane University — which is specific to the programs/ policies at Tulane University — does not impact our policies and programming here at the University of Michigan,” Broekhuizen wrote. “The University of Michigan, as an equal opportunity/affirmative action employer, complies with all applicable federal and state laws regarding nondiscrimination and affirmative action. The University of Michigan is committed to a policy of equal opportunity for all persons and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, age, marital status, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, disability, religion, height, weight, or veteran status in employment, educational programs and activities, and admissions.” Student opinions, involvement Kinesiology junior Jackson Schleuning, secretary of the University’s chapter of College Republicans, said he doesn’t take issue with the intentions of DEI, but feels University resources should be placed directly into the classroom. “I believe the intentions are good behind the efforts,” Schleuning said. “The resources could better be used if those are funneled directly back into the classroom. What strengthens us as a University and community is being one of the most high-level institutions in the nation and I believe that comes with having highly funded classrooms.” Broekhuizen recognizes any program will garner differing opinions from students. She referenced the first and secondyear progress reports for the fiveyear plan to show the impact of the program on campus. As of today, she said 92 percent of the 2,177 individual action items are already implemented or in progress. In regards to student input, Broekhuizen said there are many avenues for students to share their thoughts. For instance, one 2018 DEI Summit Week event, hosted by the Office of Student Life, was a student-designed event that gave students the opportunity to discuss possible approaches to campus climate-related issues, as well as give input on the proposed Trotter Multicultural Center interior finishes and programming. Additionally, Broekhuizen also said many individual schools and departments have diversity committees comprised of students and faculty. She said all students are welcome to contact the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion to share their thoughts. Broekhuizen also noted a new student advisory planning group in the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, which students can join if interested.

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Opinion

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JONATHAN R. MORRIS | OP-ED

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DYLAN BERGER | COLUMN

We must come back to our roots on activism

he University of Michigan has a rich and storied history of student activism. One vivid example is student activism against the horrors of South African apartheid. But today, students have lost sight of that history, instead now organizing against the only stable democracy in the Middle East and resorting to anti-Semitism to do it. Going forward, we must organize against hate-filled movements, such as Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions, in order to honor our rich history of fighting for what’s right. In his “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. wrote, “Injustice any where is a threat to justice every where.” King wrote this letter while detained in the Birmingham City Jail for organizing nonviolent resistance against racial segregation in Alabama. The letter served as a rebuke to critics who spoke out against King as an “outsider” and derided his popular campaign against segregation in the state. King ’s words remind us all that it is our duty to stand against injustice, wherever it may exist. King so profoundly articulated that none of us can sit idly by while our fellow members of humankind are denied their God-given rights. Despite his life being cut short by hate, his words live on. Inspired by King, countless Americans have picked up his mission to spread the light of freedom wherever darkness may exist. Students right here at the University of Michigan have an especially storied history of carrying on King ’s eternal struggle against injustice. When confronted with the menace of apartheid in South Africa, University students led the movement to tear down such an unjust system. In 1977, students launched a divestment campaign against apartheid South Africa with the formation of the South Africa Liberation Committee. Through these organizations, students pressed University leadership to divest all corporate investments in South Africa and cut ties with any segregated academic institutions in South Africa. At first, progress was slow. While opposed to apartheid, University leadership was reluctant to fully divest from South Africa. However, students were not deterred. A new generation of student activists kept the movement humming on campus throughout the 1980s as the rest of the world woke up to the horrors of apartheid. Thanks in large part to the work of students, the University

Board of Regents voted in 1983 to divest 90 percent of University holdings in companies with ties to South Africa. By 1985, the board voted to divest a further $4.5 million of holdings connected to apartheid South Africa. Students continued their quest for justice with an intense push to bestow an honorary degree on Nelson Mandela, the imprisoned leader of the South African anti-apartheid movement. After weeks of intense demonstrations, the board finally voted in favor of awarding Mandela with said honorary degree. After his release from prison, Mandela visited Michigan in 1990, holding a rally at Tiger Stadium and receiving his honorary degree. With two decades of hard work and determination, University students honored King ’s legacy by doing their part in bringing an evil system to an end.

Going forward, we must organize against hate-filled movements Currently, however, similar forms of activism are employed by students on campus to smear a beacon of freedom and democracy while looking the other way on real evil. This is painfully apparent in the rise of the BDS movement on campus. In a sea of Middle Eastern illiberal theocracies and failed states, Israel has developed as a paragon of liberal democracy. The country’s diverse population of Jews, Muslims and Christians live in relative peace, with equal rights for all. In fact, next month marks the 20th anniversary of Abdel Rahman Zuabi, the first Arab-Israeli Supreme Court Justice, taking his seat on the court. Arab-Israelis also contribute to Israeli government, business and academia as equal citizens. In opposition to the facts, BDS supporters on campus have forged ahead with their crusade against Israel. Since 2002, student activists tried and failed 10 times to pass a resolution in support of the BDS movement against Israel. Exemplif ying the frightening rise of anti-Semitism worldwide as of late, Central Student Government ultimately passed a motion in support of BDS in 2017. Thankfully, the University Board of Regents have stood against this unjust effort to

wage economic war against the world’s only Jewish state. While speaking out against Israel, a beacon of freedom and a key pillar of American security in the Middle East, student activists have been mum on the rising tide of antiSemitism associated with their movement. Just this month, newly-elected U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., accused supporters of Israel in Congress of being bought off with Jewish (specifically from AIPAC) money. While some came to her defense, her comments provoked significant backlash on both sides of the aisle. In a rare show of bipartisanship, both President Donald Trump and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., condemned Omar’s comment. While Omar represents a fresh face for liberal Democrats, her ideas are anything but. Instead, Omar has reverted to age-old anti-Semitic tropes to make her case against Israel. As a Jewish-American, those comments hit close to home for me. My loyalties are with one countr y and one countr y alone: the United States of America. That being said, I’m a strong believer in Israeli sovereig nt y and securit y. My opposition to the BDS movement should in no way be construed as opposition to Palestinian sovereig nt y or the Palestinian people. Quite the contrar y. I believe wholeheartedly in the Palestinian right to self-determination and am a strong supporter of a t wo-state solution. Having said that, I oppose BDS’s antagonization of a liberal democracy that is key to advancing U.S. securit y interests in the reg ion. With public f ig ures such as Omar increasingly comfortable with calling the loyalties of patriotic Americans into question because of their relig ion, now is the time for action on campus. As Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. said, “Injustice any where is a threat to justice every where.” In the past, students at the University of Michigan have stood on the side of justice, tirelessly working to extend the f lame of freedom into the next generation. Now, however, a movement built on antiSemitic hate has taken root on campus and in our country as a whole. University of Michigan students must again honor our legacy of leading the fight against hatred, no matter how long it takes.

Dylan Berger can be reached at dylberge@umich.edu

CONTRIBUTE TO THE CONVERSATION Readers are encouraged to submit letters to the editor and op-eds. Letters should be fewer than 300 words while op-eds should be 550 to 850 words. Send the writer’s full name and University affiliation to tothedaily@michigandaily.com.

Fossil fuel is not the path to carbon neutrality

he scientific consensus is unequivocal: To curb climate change, humanity must act with existential urgency or face devastating impacts. The recent 2018 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report recommends cutting global greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2030. Other research, like the alarming recent findings on sea level rise and Greenland’s rapidly melting ice sheet, implies that we need to act even more swiftly to avoid potentially catastrophic tipping points. Fortunately, University of Michigan President Mark Schlissel has pledged to make the University of Michigan carbon neutral. His administration just announced the formation of a committee to make recommendations towards this goal. Unfortunately, we are way behind the curve. Other universities are taking the challenge seriously, like Stanford University, which is switching to 100 percent solar energy by 2021. Closer to home, our Big Ten rival Michigan State University has installed a system of solar carports that produce 15,000 megawatts of power annually, while Ohio State University now generates 26 percent of campus electricity with wind power. Others are already implementing aggressive carbon neutrality plans, like the University of California system, which set an ambitious target of cutting emissions by 2025. Disappointingly, our primary strategy at the University for confronting the climate crisis has been to double down on fossil fuel infrastructure. This past summer, the University finalized an $80 million plan to upgrade the U-M Central Power Plant and to expand our capacity to burn natural gas. According to University estimates, the project will improve efficiency and partially help us to meet our previous GHG reduction goals. But from a climate standpoint, this move is deeply troubling. First, this decision ignores the emerging science that demonstrates that methane leaks

from natural gas infrastructure are much worse than previous estimates and may erode the potential transitional benefits of this fuel source. Second, and most importantly, investing in yesterday’s infrastructure locks our university into continued fossil fuel reliance for decades to come — a move that is diametrically opposed to the rapid decarbonization timeframe established by the IPCC. We can learn from others who have already made this same mistake, such as the UC system, which is struggling to meet their carbon neutrality goals because of the dead weight of their extensive natural gas infrastructure that was expanded decades ago. Fortunately, they have already done most of the research necessary to guide us away from this same quagmire, while still meeting campus heat and electricity needs. Not surprisingly, the first recommendation is to stop expanding natural gas infrastructure. This is, in fact, doable at the University and there are many innovative examples around the world, starting in our own backyard with MSU and OSU — both of which are saving money to keep tuition costs down by switching to renewable energy. At the University, the experts that actually run our central power plant say that we can make the transition, but what they need are the directive and the resources. That means leadership from University administration, not just the formation of another committee. In fact, in 2015, Schlissel’s previous Greenhouse Gas Reduction Committee made the recommendation that any upgrades to our central power plant should come in tandem with an aggressive plan to transition our infrastructure away from fossil fuels. This was four years ago and yet there is still no plan in place. Their report even admits that the central power plant plans are “... unlikely to be viewed as the action of a climate leader or

to engage the campus community in the vision and implementation of GHG reduction.” And yet, embarrassingly, the University Office of Campus Sustainability continues to brag about this misguided plan, seemingly taking pride in our increased reliance on natural gas. While we must give Schlissel credit for aspiring towards the right goal, it is crucial that we press the University to do it the right way. On that, there are two important perspectives. First, if we aspire to actually reduce the climate impact of our campus, we must have scientifically sound and transparent accounting. The only emissions metric that matters is the total impact of our actions on the atmosphere, which requires a holistic approach — incorporating methane leaks and all. Second, echoing Schlissel’s own vision, our impact must be much broader than the individual footprint of our campus. As one of the world’s largest and most prestigious public universities, we are in a unique position to lead on this issue and to set an example to inspire other institutions to also take this challenge seriously. Our tremendous capacity for research and our ample resources, including the impressive $5 billion we recently raised, can be mobilized to partner with communities and inspire climate solutions around the world. In fact, other universities — like, you guessed it, OSU — have already been doing this by collaborating with local governments and municipalities to develop extensive plans for decarbonization, in turn making their efforts replicable on a broader scale. To do the same here in Michigan, we must be a good community partner and set an example by actually committing to ambitious climate action, not just questionable baby steps.

Jonathan R. Morris is a doctoral student at the School for Enviroment and Sustainability

ANIK JOSHI | COLUMN

The sorry state of conservatism on campus

olitical commentator Ben Shapiro is coming to campus. He has been invited to come down to the University of Michigan at the behest of Young America’s Foundation and there will surely be fireworks at his event (as there tend to be at all of them). I’m not going to say he should be disinvited, because I do not believe in deplatforming, but I will ask, what does his rhetoric do? Is there an expectation that the incoming circus will actually make anything better? Or is he being invited solely to — if you’ll pardon the phrase — own the libs? A quick look at YouTube videos of his previous on-campus experiences typically features the same thing — a clueless student who makes the mistake of asking a question only to get shot down by Shapiro talking faster than the speed of light. The videos all tend to be titled something to the effect of, “Ben Shapiro OWNS/DESTROYS/ OBLITERATES/etc.” This certainly helps fundraising and it no doubt raises Shapiro’s name recognition, but does this convert students to a belief in freer markets and freer people? I would argue that it doesn’t and, if it does anything, it pushes students away from anything resembling conservatism. There are those who say that the young lean left and, as they grow, they’ll grow into conservatives — but this might not happen. The young people who put President Obama in office in 2008 and 2012 are settling down and having kids — they’re not college students any longer. However, their liberal politics have stayed with them along with their resistance to voting Republican. This isn’t a problem solely with millennials — Gen Z is just as, if not more liberal than millennials, and I

fail to see how large numbers of either of these groups will vote for people who have made militant resistance to gay marriage and transgender rights a prerequisite for involvement (one need only look to the 2016 Republican platform to see things to this effect and beyond). Not all hope is lost, but much work must be done to regain the trust — and, eventually, the votes — of younger people, and there are promising starts. Shoshana Weissmann, digital media manager of the right-leaning think tank R Street Institute, has become a passionate advocate for occupational licensing reform and groups like the Association of Corporate Counsel have popped up to give the environmentalist capitalists a place to call home. If people like this were the face of the young right, it would demonstrate that not only are there serious solutions on the right but that they are being pursued by serious people as opposed to what there is today. The main issue with this important work is that it tends to be outshone by charlatans like Charlie Kirk who came to campus to screech about capitalism in 2018. They’re the visible ones and the ones who will end up forming the backbone of the future of activist conservatism. To be clear, Ben Shapiro is leaps and bounds ahead of Charlie Kirk, but that would, ideally, not be the baseline. This is because when one consciously chooses to make Charlie Kirk the baseline, this lowers the bar for everyone else to the point that an infant could crawl over it. Conservatism can offer a compelling vision to young people — lower taxes on the businesses they start, a strong national defense to keep them safe and fewer regulations to make day-to-day life less onerous. However, as long

as it comes with the antiimmigrant, anti-LGBTQ and anti-Muslim rhetoric of U.S. Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, the anti-intellectualism of Charlie Kirk and the hostility to basic governance embodied by President Donald Trump, none of them will sign up — and you can’t blame them. These problems have been written about before and will be written about again. But until the right decides that they’re done vying for the youth vote, nothing is going to change and that is a tragedy. Younger voters could help make the Republican Party more appealing to broader swathes of the electorate and could help divorce the GOP from its current dalliance with bigotry. It’s a bit of a chicken and egg problem, because the party won’t change without young voters — but young voters aren’t getting involved with the party without changes. This is especially evident given that under one-third of millennials and under one-third of Gen Z approve of President Trump. The more the institutional right ties itself to Trump, the less young voters will approve of the institutional right. This problem has bled down to the campus level and as a result, the on-campus iteration of the institutional right seems to have decided that given the choice between “owning the libs” and achieving meaningful policy victories, they would go with the former. Those who involve themselves in groups like Turning Point USA and put on these kinds of circuses might do well to remember that if they want to see any public policy that they agree with later in their lifetimes, they’ll need the votes of their peers.

Anik Joshi can be reached at anikj@umich.edu

Arts

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BOOKS DIALOGUE

Dialogue, digitized: A look at ‘Crudo,’ back and forth VERITY STURM

Daily Book Review Editor

JOHN DECKER Daily Arts Wrtier

After working with John Decker for a semester, I began to realize he likes to read weird stuff (according to my roommate, he also likes to write it! Ooh la la). He has sung the praises of Anna Burns’s “Milkman” three times in print (and counting), wrote a fullon piece in support of uncomfortable fiction and was 300 percent into Kristen Roupenian’s latest collection of squirm-worthy horror stories. He is also on Goodreads, and I happened to notice that he had marked Olivia Laing’s “Crudo,” an aggressively contemporary experimental novel with a dried, crushed fly on the cover, as “want to read.” This was convenient for me, because I had been looking for a reason to buy the book (it’s hardcover, a greater investment than I usually squander my impulses on). A couple texts and transactions later, we both had books in our hands and updated statuses on our Goodreads. As a contemporary novel, “Crudo” does that risky thing where it pulls present-day behavior into the revered realm of published literature. The book moves at the rapid speed and with the passive attitude of technology, so we decided to write our review in a compatible medium: email. It worked pretty well for “Paradise Rot,” another stylish and slim work of fiction marketed to millennials. The form felt right for Laing’s tweet-infested, Trump-obsessed prose, too. For what it’s worth, I gave “Crudo” three stars and John gave it four. Watch us duke it out below. — Verity

something just in the very act of reading; that is, to be struck while in the process of encountering the images Laing flashes, but not to be affected by them afterwards. I’m not sure if you felt the same, of course. I will say, this belligerent line will sit with me for a while after finishing the book, though: “The hammer, smashing the crab’s back. She wanted to be cracked open, that was the thing, only on her own terms and within preordained limits. There were rules, she changed them.” At this crab-smashing point in the book, I’ll say, my interaction with “Crudo” changed. What I said before still stands, but I found that the images started throwing punches a little more violently (right into my gut, sometimes, because I think I related a bit too much to some of Kathy’s sentiments). But maybe it was all just me getting used to the structure of the book —

‘Crudo’ Olivia Laing W. W. Norton & Company Jun. 28, 2018 image after image with dialogue claustrophobically in between. Somewhat hoping that your feelings on the almost-experimental aspect of the book’s structure are similar. Still absorbing. John P.S. Wondering what you think of the development of the Laing’s characters. Especially “husband” and Kathy. *** John Decker!

*** Verity, I’ve just finished reading “Crudo” and I think there is something to be said about a reader’s evolving proximity to a book. As in, not just how someone quantifiably judges a book (for its writing style, its lovely intrigue), but how they interact with it. I’ll say that “Crudo” began as something distant for me. I worked through the first quarter of the book with a slight attraction around Kathy’s story. But the brevity of the images that Laing had written meant that when I stopped reading, any of the emotional velocity I’d felt while reading was gone. It was like I had to start over with emotive involvement when I picked up the book again. I’m thinking, then, that the depth of the book was really meant to spark

You put words to “Crudo”’s peculiarity so effortlessly. “A reader’s evolving proximity to a book … ” yeah, I’d say. “Crudo” is low-key slippery, one of those books that looks digestibly edgy but ends up eluding you just a little more than you wanted it to. Flirting with disaster. I thought it was going to be a talkative high and it was more like a funky microdose. Which isn’t bad, it just wasn’t as easy as I had anticipated. In fact, I’d be a hypocrite if I said that wasn’t a good thing for a book to do. But yes, I kept changing my mind about my relationship with “Crudo” chapter to chapter, exactly the way you’re describing. It’s much easier to put down than pick up. And it gave me an identity crisis as a reader because, as much as I despise this term, “Crudo” is my brand — pissed

off women trying to figure out how to emote in the now, complete with art and snark and a Chris Kraus endorsement (“Paradise Rot” is also endorsed by Kraus, a funny little throughline I just realized). I usually devour that shit, but I found myself making excuses to not pick up “Crudo.” When I did, it would take me 5-10 pages to stop resisting and warm up to each chapter (my east coast brain says “WASTED INTERPRETIVE TIME”). I wish I had forced myself to read it all in one go. Omg, I just realized that this warming up/cooling down inertia cycle I’ve been describing is the narrative structure we’ve been discussing in Joyce class the past few weeks. “A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man” is also separated into five chapters, COINCIDENTALLY ENOUGH, each of which seems to frustratingly end exactly where it had begun. Although Stephen Dedalus (angsty hetero womanfearing intellectual whiteboi protag) is doing stuff — going to school, fucking prostitutes, almost becoming a priest, comparing women to birds, mansplaining philosophy, writing bad poetry, you know — he never seems to evolve from it. There’s dramatic irony to this: through pattern, we learn that Stephen is forever doomed to stagnancy. The character development is paralyzed, and every chapter starts in the same introspective funk, unresponsive to the plot that continues to strike it. Visually, the book is like five identical circles in a row. Ask Ethan for more about this, it’s really interesting. Anywho, I think “Crudo” is very much like five identical circles in a row. That’s the best answer I have for your question about character development. I just got massive deja vu while writing that sentence and I can’t place it. Weird. I mentioned this briefly in person, but I’m very certain that much of the pause “Crudo” gives me is due to how personally attacked I felt while reading it. This sort of identification is always such a double-edged sword. There’s definite relief in seeing something kind of knotty about yourself in popular art, the solidarity of representation, yada yada. But it also gives you the unique distance to see exactly how difficult those qualities can be, like the age-old fantasy of getting to watch yourself go through a day from afar or as an onlooker (it also makes you feel less special, like is my internal struggle that basic? Sad).

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Arts

DAILY GENDER & MEDIA COLUMN

FILM REVIEW

Bait in the online ocean

AMAZON STUDIOS

A ‘Cold War’ moratorium on romance for your cold post-Valentine’s Day feels in front of Wiktor, his lovestruck look slices through the Daily Arts Wrtier otherwise ordinary atmosphere of the scene, wonderfully I was looking for an antidote. capturing the disarming effect With Valentine’s Day a week some people have on us. This out, I tried not to get my hopes gaze cannot become a crutch. up. But I was searching for It’s only charming a few times. a romance film that tasted It cannot support the weight of better: not the syrupy spoonful a budding romance, or justify of infeasibility, not the stale a sharp cut into a sex-scene, or sensation of overused formula, make us believe Wiktor loves not the acrid aftertaste of leftover Zula. I inadvertently put a friend chauvinism. I’ve only collected a few over the years — “Eternal through this film, hoping it Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,” would convince him to see “Blue Valentine” and “Up” come “Ida” (actually, it just became to mind. (Fatalistic? I call them more difficult to convince him to watch a dark movie about a frank. But I digress.) When I encountered Paweł nun — thank you, “Cold War”). He compared Pawlikowski’s one of the “Cold War,” most egregious my hopes got instances of this away from me. gaze (across a Pawlikowski’s crowded room — 2015 film I’m not kidding) “Ida” was to a Dos Equis an antidote ‘Cold War’ commercial of another and called nature that I Amazon Studios Wiktor “the desperately most interesting needed at the State Theatre man in Poland.” end of my first There is no year of college. better way to It came at a convey this time when I unconvincing, felt ashamed contrived of the Catholic device. Church to the Exhibit B: The point where aggressive kiss I was on the Once Zula and Wiktor are an verge of leaving but hesitated, fearful of what would be left of item, they spend much less of me if I abdicated that part of my their time staring at each other identity. “Ida” soothed me, told and much more of it making me I could live with opposing out. Neither tactic should be forces and curate takeaways used as a wholesale substitute from both the secular and for character development or religious influences in my life. If dialogue. Yet both tactics are anyone was going to convince me used as such. Exhibit C: High-Impact with a romance, it would be the Screenwriting/Low-Impact man who convinced me of that. Sadly, though, the romance in Reception In other words, schmaltz. “Cold War” leaves much to be desired. The movie places it in Lines alluding to staggering love mid-twentieth century Poland (“she is the woman of my life”) and France, between an aspiring without substance to prop up singer Zula (Johanna Kulig, “The these words. They fall flat. Exhibit D: Wait, so what Innocents”) and music director Wiktor (Tomasz Kot, “Gods”). happened to her husband? Otherwise known as the In strictly practical terms, they writers’ selective probably shouldn’t be together, romance and, by the end of the film, they amnesia, the main symptom of definitely shouldn’t. That leaves which includes giving the loveran hour and a half to … what? protagonists an interloping lover Bide our time? What happens or spouse to mention to one in the prodigal journey from another in passing. Causes vary; point A back to point A? A host in “Cold War,” they range from of heteronormative romance the need to justify a character’s tropes, that’s what happens. ability to leave communist Poland for France to the more Let’s identify some. Exhibit A: Propelling the common desire to provoke envy. No matter the cause, the loss of romance through the male gaze The first time Zula auditions the romance writer’s integrity is

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JULIANNA MORANO

What happens in the prodigal journey from point A back to point A? A host of heteronormative romance tropes, that’s what happens. Let’s identify some.

the universal result. I lost track of the non-character casualties of this endemic in “Cold War.” Exhibit E: He slaps her, and I guess we’re supposed to chalk it up to the historical period I don’t want to brush over violence against women. I don’t want the setting to silently justify it. It was never justified. The list of other tropes that sap the emotional impact of this film go on, but I want to talk about one of the few scenes in “Cold War” that made me feel something. Zula and Wiktor venture to a club. “Rock around the Clock” comes on and a drunk Zula dances her heart out, from partner to partner, even mounting a countertop (while Wiktor fixes her with a very different gaze, tinged with disgust). You’re probably supposed to feel apprehensive about the increasing turbulence of their romance. I was smiling, tapping my foot. The only feeling I got from watching this movie was accidental. What I’m asking for, this Valentine’s Day, is that we close these exhibits. Until then, I hope you’re lucky, unlike me, and that you find one of those rare romance films that does.

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A few weeks ago, my friends and I were hanging out and the conversation devolved into a wilderness survival scenario. We all agreed; one of them would survive for a few weeks and one would end up splitting from the group to join another. My own fate was unanimously decided in less than five minutes: As soon as my feet touched dirt, I would just cease to exist. Although I am Michigan born-and-raised, the nature streak that many girls have growing up around this many lakes skipped me almost completely. I credit this to my parents, especially my father (who needs a hair dryer to survive). I have never been camping, am very allergic to mosquitoes and would probably light myself on fire if I tried to cook outside. Needless to say, I never dreamed of having an outdoor life. I have made some strides in embracing the natural beauty of my state, but it ends at a lack of indoor plumbing or the inability to plug in a microwave. Sure, I love the dunes, but the thought of returning to a warm shower is just as sweet as the sand between my toes in the moment. I assumed many girls were like this, or that it was at least a 50/50 split between the population of young women who loved being outside and those who despised it. However, according to the men of Tinder, I was wrong. The first time I downloaded Tinder as a freshly-minted student here at the University of Michigan, I was shocked to immediately find a peculiar species of male Ann Arborite running amok: the fish man. I didn’t know this was such a major demographic in the online dating sphere, but boy, was I in for a surprise. These men are typically white, stocky, tall and absolutely LOVE to fish (or at least their online presence would say so). Their names are things like Brent, Logan, Trenton. Their first profile photo is characteristically an image of them on a dock, holding

the prize of their time on the water limply in one hand. Each time I come across one

CLARA SCOTT of these profiles, all I can ask myself is whether these fish know what they’ve gotten themselves into. I look into their dead, slimy eyes do they know that their demise has become a ploy to get some 20-year-old laid? The fish do not respond, only hang in the photos like def lated props of masculinity. It is a sad, if confusing end for our scaly friends. Beyond the fish themselves, the mystery of the men behind them has perplexed me since that first foray into online dating a year ago. They still come up every time I lazily swipe when I’m bored in class, or trying to fall asleep after watching a romcom. This phenomenon alone has cemented my suspicions that

Beyond the fish themselves, the mystery of the men behind them has perplexed me since that first foray into online dating a year ago.

love is dead, but leave it to Netf lix to change my mind, if only for an hour. Whatever the fish men’s deal is, it’s clear to me that I am decidedly not their target audience. But who really is? What I imagine is a girl dressed in all-pink hunting fatig ues, bearing a hatchet in one hand and another fish in her second. Their respective fish eye each other, and romance is reborn. But that can’t be right. The phenomenon requires deeper thinking. In my hypothetical musings on the fish men, I realized what they could truly be playing to: The primitive need to be taken care of. See, I have no interest in building a life out in the wilderness (or the suburbs, for that matter), but I can understand that many young women do. And what a better consolation for that dream than knowing that your Tinder match can literally provide food for a family? Hell, he could probably build you a cabin too. In this understanding, I finally came to comprehend the core of the fish men. They must believe that displaying their catch, however disg usting in theory, shows more than the fact that they are willing to sit for hours on top of an algae-ridden lake. It is more than a display of machismo; rather, a concrete example of the traditional male calling to build a home, fish and all. Now, as previously established, this is not something I personally aspire to. I’d rather live in a shoebox apartment and subsist solely on bodega chips than deal with a home in the woods and everything that comes with it. However, my initial confusion around the fish men has slowly turned into a muted reverence for their cause. All they want is a nice blonde lady to eat their fish, to turn hot dogs over a campfire and attend country music festivals wearing matching bandanas with them. I know that I am not this girl. But for now, I’ll let the fish men live. Even if the fish can’t.

Sports

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

Friday, February 15, 2019 — 7

Different mindsets define Michigan, ‘M’ set to take on ACC opponents Binghamton ahead of Opening Day UNC, Louisville over weekend AIDAN WOUTAS Daily Sports Writer

Erik Bakich sees a lot of benefits to practicing outside in the wintertime. Even in Michigan. “We’re trying to get as many reps outside as we possibly can,” the Michigan baseball coach said after another practice in 33-degree weather last Thursday. “So even on nights like tonight where it’s probably too cold to scrimmage, it’s still great weather to get out and do some team defense, get some swings, things like that.” That said, the Wolverines will be more than happy to exchange Ann Arbor’s erratic, often-freezing weather for the sunny warmth of Port St. Lucie, Fla. when they play their opening series of the season against Binghamton this weekend. Expectations are high for Michigan. The Wolverines had a promising 2018 season and advanced to their sixth straight Big Ten Conference tournament. On Wednesday, the team was selected second in the 2019 Big Ten Preseason Coaches Poll, behind Minnesota. Furthermore, they are the only team in the conference to be featured in every national top-25 ranking, coming as high as No. 17 according to D1Baseball.com. This fact is by no means lost on the Bearcats. “(Michigan) seems to be very deep in a lot of different areas,” said Binghamton coach Tim Sinicki in a phone interview. “And I think the country is recognizing that with very nice early season rankings for them. “We expect to see as good of a team as we’ve ever opened up with.” Sinicki’s evaluation is

probably correct. Michigan will arrive confidently in the Sunshine State with much of last year’s high-performing offense returning to the diamond, now with another year under their belts. “I see a group of kids who’ve had another birthday, who’ve gotten stronger, who’ve become more physical,” Bakich said. “I would like to think we’re capable of hitting for more power this year.” This, paired with improvements on the mound, has the Wolverines poised for a successful opening weekend. But the Bearcats have made their own improvements in the offseason. In Binghamton, Michigan will find a determined opponent with an appetite for a comeback. The Bearcats’ 2018 season was more than disappointing. After backto-back seasons winning the regular season conference title and a No. 1 ranking in America East in the preseason, they posted a lackluster 18-30-1 record and sat out the postseason. “Last year we struggled offensively,” Sinicki said. “We had a great group of seniors who had won some championships in their time

here, but for one reason or another we couldn’t get things going and we struggled to score runs.” Burned by that experience, Binghamton is now approaching things with a different mindset. “This year we’re hoping to have a bit of a different philosophy,” Sinicki said. “We’ve moved some guys and are looking to play a bit more aggressive baseball.” Michigan will have to contend with a reinvigorated Bearcat defense and a deep pitching staff. In addition to reliable pitchers Nick Gallagher and Reid VanScoter, Binghamton sophomore Ben Anderson — who posted an impressive 1.60 ERA in 2018 — will move into the starting rotation on Saturday. This weekend will be the first-ever matchup between the Wolverines and the Bearcats. They approach their inaugural meeting with different states of mind. But with everyone accustomed to the bitter cold of the Midwest and Northeast, both teams will be sure to enjoy the Florida sunshine. “Just like Michigan,” Sinicki said, “we’ve got more than our fair share of weather issues in Binghamton.”

CAMERON HUNT/Daily

Michigan coach Erik Bakich will take his team to Florida this weekend.

Wolverines look to right penalties RIAN RATNAVALE Daily Sports Writer

Mel Pearson sat at the back of Yost Ice Arena after an October win again St. Lawrence, content with the Michigan hockey team’s victory. But beyond that, he still had a goal in mind. “We want to be the least (penalized) team in the country,” Pearson said. “ ... If we can do that, we continue to keep it three or under power plays a game, we’re going to be in good shape.” But since Dec. 30, the Wolverines have only had less than three penalties in a game once. Though that hasn’t always stopped Michigan from picking up wins, frustration penalties are an easy — and completely avoidable — way to tilt the balance of a game right into another team’s favor. In the Wolverines’ 5-2 loss at Notre Dame on Tuesday, senior defenseman Joseph Cecconi helplessly watched

a third-period shot from the blue line come to a halt in an empty crease, with no teammates there to clean it up. But shortly after watching that wasted opportunity, he got called for interference. Only a minute after that penalty ended, Cecconi sulked back to the box after hitting a Notre Dame player. And 36 seconds after Cecconi got out of the box for a second time, sophomore defenseman Quinn Hughes kept the seat warm with a slashing penalty of his own. “You can get angry because they don’t give up much, and when they do give up much, you don’t score and you get a little angrier,” Cecconi said. “And it can slide out the wrong, but I felt like yesterday was one of the one times this season that it happened, usually we don’t take those.” Frustration — and a feeling of unfairness — on both a micro and a macro-level isn’t anything new for the Wolverines. In games against Michigan State

They let their emotions get the best of them in that situation.

and Minnesota, they saw 45-plus shot attempts yield to nothing but a loss. And though Michigan has yet to replicate their 17-penalty weekend from Lake Superior State, 13 in two games against Minnesota recently and six against the Fighting Irish point to more than an abundance of necessary, commonplace fouls. “When I mean selfish I mean — I don’t say that outward about the team, but they let their emotions get the best of them in that situation,” Pearson said. “When I say a selfish penalty I don’t mean protecting a goal or helping a teammate in some situation. It’s just a bad penalty. “... We were playing a pretty good game. I think there were some non-calls against us on penalties. I think their guys were going down easy, we were playing strong, and I think that’s part of it. You get frustrated like Quinn at the end there. You can get slashed three times and they don’t call it, and then he says ‘OK, I’ll slash him back’ and they call it.” If Michigan can tighten that up it may well stay alive longer than conventional logic might dictate. But if it doesn’t? It might find itself in a tight box come March.

ALEC COHEN/Daily

Senior defenseman Joseph Cecconi took two penalties in Michigan’s 5-2 loss at Notre Dame on Tuesday.

MILES MACKLIN/Daily

Sophomore left-hander Meghan Beaubien has mentored freshman Alex Storako, Michigan’s No. 2 starter.

DANIEL DASH

Daily Sports Writer

When the No. 17 Michigan softball team takes the field this weekend, it will see a pair of unfamiliar foes on the other side of the diamond. The Wolverines (3-2) will travel to Chapel Hill, N.C. to participate in their fourth straight ACC/Big Ten Challenge. This year, they’ll take on Louisville (3-2) and North Carolina (2-2), who they haven’t faced since 2014 and 2016, respectively. Since those meetings, each program has evolved. At Louisville, longtime head coach Sandy Pearsall retired in 2018 after an 18-year stint. Despite the loss of its icon, the program hasn’t lost a step under the tutelage of first-year head coach Holly Aprile, who compiled a 271-234 record in ten seasons as Pittsburgh’s head coach. History will be on the Wolverines’ side when the teams clash on Friday and Saturday, as they have won 18 of the 21 all-time meetings. Meanwhile, two softball coaching legends — Michigan’s Carol Hutchins and North Carolina’s Donna Papa — will put 71 combined years of experience to the test when the Wolverines square off against the Tar Heels on Friday and Sunday. Hutchins has established the upperhand thus far and will look to improve upon her 9-1 all-time record against North Carolina. The Tar Heels received four votes in this week’s USA Today/NFCA Coaches Poll

after last weekend’s impressive showing in Mexico, where they captured a 4-0 victory against No. 9 South Carolina at the Puerto Vallarta Challenge. The Wolverines have posted a 9-3 record in the ACC/ Big Ten Challenge over the last three years — a stretch highlighted by last season’s thrilling triumph over Florida State, the eventual national champion. In that game, thenfreshman pitcher Meghan Beaubien’s two-hit shutout propelled Michigan to a 1-0 victory. If the Wolverines are to see similar success against this season’s ACC opponents, Hutchins will need solid innings from freshman pitcher Alex Storako — who recorded a 2.33 earned run average while amassing 18 strikeouts over 15 innings in Tampa last weekend. Because Beaubien faced the same pressure early in her freshman year, Storako has looked to her for guidance. “(Beaubien) is a great mentor,” Storako said. “It’s so exciting to have her. She has

(Beaubien) is such a great mentor. It’s so exciting.

base. Last weekend, senior Alex Sobczak and sophomore Taylor Bump split the first base duties, recording seven and eight at-bats, respectively. Before last weekend, Sobczak — who started 22 of the Wolverines’ 57 games last season — had started 41 games at catcher and two at third base, but none at first base. On the other hand, Bump’s natural positions are third base and shortstop, meaning she is accustomed to playing defense on the other side of the infield. But with junior Madison Uden and sophomore Natalia Rodriguez in the fold, the lineup already has a pair of standouts opposite first base. Though Hutchins has decided to give Bump a shot at the first base job, only her performance can dictate whether or not she secures a full-time job. The ACC/Big Ten Challenge will live up to its name by posing just that — a challenge, at least for Hutchins’ first base candidates. Despite roughly equal opportunity, neither player recorded more than two hits and each struck out at least twice. If Sobczak and Bump don’t make the most of the next few games, Hutchins could start turning to other options as soon as the end of the weekend. “First base is a hitting position, we all know, but you’ve got to be able to take care of the defense,” Hutchins said. “We’ve got to find a place for our best hitters. And first of all, I’ve got to figure out who the best hitters are.”

First of all, I’ve got to figure out who our best hitters are.

such great poise and is someone that anyone would love to look up to. She’s really pointed me in the right direction at times and I love having her on the pitching staff with me.” As the weekend goes on, Hutchins hopes to find a resolution to her lineup’s biggest question mark: first

Sports

8 — Friday, February 15, 2019

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As the Big Ten race tightens, the Wolverines keep their eyes ahead JACOB SHAMES Daily Sports Editor

This was supposed to be straightforward. The Big Ten was supposed to run through the mitten this year. Michigan and Michigan State were the two highest-ranked teams in the conference before the season and the disparity between them and everyone else only seemed to grow as the season progressed — at the end of January, the Wolverines were 20-1, the Spartans 18-3. It was all supposed to come to a head on Mar. 9 in East Lansing in the second meeting between the teams. It couldn’t have been scripted any better: on the last day of the regular season, two juggernauts with no love lost between them would walk into the Breslin Center, and one would emerge as Big Ten champion. Turns out, nothing’s that simple. Not in a conference where 10 of 14 teams currently harbor reasonable NCAA Tournament hopes. For starters, other legitimate challengers have emerged. Purdue, which Michigan blasted by 19 in December, rattled off eight straight wins, including a defeat of Michigan State, before falling to Maryland on Tuesday. The Boilermakers and Terrapins sit at third and fourth, both within a game of the Wolverines and Spartans. Wisconsin and Iowa, at 9-5 and 8-5 respectively, lurk just beyond, and both teams have also beaten Michigan. Meanwhile, the cannibalism that has pervaded the Big Ten’s middle and lower tiers has finally caught up to the top. The Spartans’ recent three-game losing streak included a home defeat to 11th-place Indiana and a loss at Illinois, which has won four straight after a 2-8 conference start. Penn State, just 2-11 in conference play, chased the Wolverines out of State College with a 75-69 win on

MILES MACKLIN/Daily

Michigan coach John Beilein credited Penn State as better than its 9-15 record after the Nittany Lions beat Michigan 75-69 in State College on Tuesday for just their second win in the conference.

Tuesday. All of a sudden, the MichiganMichigan State prize fight is no longer a foregone conclusion. “It’s great for our league to have a team who’s in the bottom of the league beat a team that’s going for the championship,” said Wolverines coach John Beilein on Tuesday. “It means there’s great parity.” Beilein was as positive as one could be about a game in which his first-place team was, in the words of redshirt junior guard Charles Matthews, “punked” by the conference’s cellar dweller. “It just shows who they are. They’re a top-100 team,” Beilein said of Penn State. “All you will make a whole lot about their Big

Ten record, just look at their scores. They’re a basket or two away from being a team in the middle of our league with all those games they’ve played. We lose to a top-100 team on the road, it’s not the end of the world.” Coachspeak or not, Beilein has a point — the Nittany Lions are ranked 347th in KenPom.com’s “luck” rating, factoring in the number of close losses they’ve suffered. Penn State might be just 9-15, but its KenPom rating of 58th is the highest of any team with less than 10 wins, by a wide margin. It was always capable of beating Michigan if enough swung in its favor. Matthews, however, was far

more critical in his evaluation. “(No) sense of urgency, lack of focus right there,” he said. “Simple as that.” But underlying these contrasting postgame sentiments is a point of agreement between coach and player. Beilein indirectly noted it when he extolled the Big Ten’s depth. Matthews was more explicit. The Wolverines aren’t flying above the conference’s pressure cooker anymore — they’ve been dragged back in, and their mentality must be adjusted accordingly. “You got to respect each and every game,” Matthews said. “Lack of discipline, lack of effort, not having a sense of urgency. I tell my guys, all of our losses

came to teams who at the time weren’t ranked. … Clearly (that) has to do something with our focus.” The problems that were on display in Happy Valley didn’t start there, but the loss might serve a benefit as a muchneeded wake-up call. To take advantage of it, Michigan needs to learn from what went wrong Tuesday and, if Matthews is representative of anything, it has the sense of urgency needed to do so. “I’m not gonna hang my head and quit before the end of the season,” Matthews said. “We gotta go out fighting, nothing to lose. Get my teammates to rally on with me. We gotta be better.”

That starts as soon as Saturday, when Maryland comes to Crisler Center with a much stronger team than Penn State. The Terrapins represent a new reality for the Wolverines: if they want to achieve their ultimate goals — celebrating a conference title in their rivals’ arena, a third straight Big Ten Tournament championship or a deep run in March — there’s no margin for error. Not in arguably the toughest conference in America. The path to achieving those goals isn’t as straightforward as it once was. But on Tuesday, Matthews couldn’t have been more clear: “Don’t get punked. It’s simple. Don’t get punked.”

Charging to victory

Michigan comes from behind to beat Indiana, 67-58, moving to 8-6 in the Big Ten and boosting NCAA Tournament hopes BENNETT BRAMSON

TEDDY GUTKIN

Daily Sports Writer

With 30 seconds on the clock and Indiana pushing the ball, the Hoosiers looked poised to cut into the Michigan women’s basketball team’s 63-58 lead. But then Nicole Munger stepped in. Literally. With four fouls to her name, the senior guard planted her feet and took a charge right near the basket to give the Wolverines the ball back, effectively icing the game. “It’s Munger,” said junior guard Akienreh Johnson said. “Everybody else was probably like, ‘Wow that’s amazing.’ But she does that every day.” Thanks to Munger’s hustle play and strong performances from Thome, who had a double-double with 14 points and 11 rebounds and Johnson — who stepped up in the absence of injured freshman guard Amy Dilk, going for 16 points and seven rebounds — Michigan (8-6 Big Ten, 17-9 overall) got a come-from-behind 67-58 victory on Thursday night against Indiana, its fifth-straight win. The Wolverines started off the game strong, jumping out to an 8-2 lead in the first three minutes, thanks in part to a pair of 3-pointers from Johnson and sophomore forward Hailey Brown. A few minutes later — following freshman forward Naz Hillmon’s layup, a pair of free throws from sophomore guard Deja Church and a Johnson jumper — Michigan extended its lead to 18-10. Then things started to change. Quickly. From the final 2:22 in the first period until nearly two minutes into the second quarter, the Wolverines failed to score. The Hoosiers (6-8, 17-9), meanwhile, put together an eight-point run during that same stretch to tie the game. Johnson finally ended the scoring drought for Michigan with a layup in the low post to go up, 20-18. But things didn’t change much for the Wolverines after that. During the final eight minutes of

Daily Sports Writer

ALEXANDRIA POMPEI/Daily

Akienreh Johnson went for 16 points and seven rebounds against Indiana.

the first half, Michigan could only muster six points. “We (talked) about (how) we kind of went away from what was working,” Johnson said. “So we had a lot of transition and we went away from that. I think it might have been a little bit of fatigue and a little bit of like we didn’t think that we could keep getting the shots that we were getting.” Indiana, meanwhile, got everything it wanted. Following the Johnson layup, the Hoosiers and Wolverines traded a pair of baskets each before Indiana went on its second run of the game, registering nine straight points during a four-minute run at the end of the second period. Thome rescued the Wolverines with an up-and-under layup with 21 seconds remaining, cutting the deficit to five going into the half. A big reason for Michigan’s struggles late in the first and throughout the second quarter was turnovers. After committing just three turnovers in the first eight minutes of the game, the Wolverines committed another three in the last two minutes of the quarter. Then, in the second quarter, Michigan recorded four more turnovers in the first 4:20 of the period. The Hoosiers totaled 12 first-half points off turnovers. Michigan coach Kim Barnes Arico attributed much of the turnover issues to the team missing Dilk. “Amy was probably averaging about 35 minutes a game and she had the ball in her hands, especially under pressure,” Barnes Arico said. “A lot of decision

making came through her and now we’re putting Deja there, we’re putting Akienreh there, putting Nicole there, (freshman guard) Danielle Rauch a little bit at times in that spot. … And now teams are pressuring us.” Coming into the second half, it looked like not much had changed for the Wolverines. After allowing an Indiana layup, Michigan then proceeded to turn it over on its first possession after the break. But, as quickly as things changed for the worse in the first half, they changed for the better in the second. Highlighted by Brown’s second 3-pointer of the night, the Wolverines put together a 7-0 run of their own to tie the game at 35. The rest of the quarter was a back-and-forth affair, with the two squads trading basket after basket. Then, with seconds remaining, Munger caught the ball in the corner and knocked down a three as time expired to give Michigan a 51-48 lead heading into the fourth. In what continued to be a tense battle, the Hoosiers and Wolverines exchanged blows in the final period. With Michigan clinging to a 58-57 lead, Thome converted a spinning layup while getting fouled to extend the lead to four with just under two minutes remaining. “In the fourth quarter we brought a huddle in,” Thome said, “and it was pretty close and we said, ‘We’ve been here every game and we know what to do,’ ” Then, the Wolverines went out and did it.

With just under 30 seconds remaining in Michigan’s 67-58 win over Indiana, Kim Barnes Arico pulled senior center Hallie Thome out of the game. As Thome took a seat on the bench, her coach approached her. “Did you get it?” Barnes Arico asked. “No coach, I needed one (more),” Thome said. Despite finishing one point shy of the 2,000 point milestone, Thome was fine getting the only stat that mattered to her on the night: a fifth-straight victory. After scoring one point against Penn State, Thome bounced back in a big way in Thursday’s win. Thome — who was masterful all night long with a 14-point, 11-rebound performance that also included three assists, two steals, and three blocked shots — netted seven points in the first half. Michigan, however, found themselves in a five-point hole heading into the locker room. To try and spark a run, Barnes Arico started the second half with freshman Naz

Hillmon coming in at power forward — pairing Thome with her heir and sparking a 9-0 run to seize the game’s momentum and bring the Crisler Center crowd to its feet. “I think it’s a tremendous thing,” Thome said. “To have me, Hailey and Naz, three bigs, some guard has to guard one of us.” While Thome scored just two points in the third quarter, she dominated on the glass and helped to create transition opportunities by forcing steals down low and registering a blocked shot. On the offensive end, her lone bucket came on a play that saw her strip a Hoosier defender to regain possession of a loose ball before banking in a tough layup to tie the score at 39. In the fourth quarter, Thome came up with two of the team’s most important baskets. With just under 4:30 remaining, Thome hit a right-handed hook shot to give Michigan a 56-55 lead.

Two-and-a-half minutes later, Thome once again converted a hook shot, this time with her left while earning a trip to the line for a three-point play in the process. Thome’s ability to muscle through the contact to finish the tough shot reminded her of a certain teammate. “I felt like Naz on that one!” she laughed. As the final buzzer sounded, the Wolverines locked up another huge conference win to push their conference record to 8-6 and, most importantly, improve their resume for the NCAA Tournament. The team’s next game will be on the road against Illinois on Sunday, meaning that Thome will be unable to secure her scoring milestone in front of her home fans. Thome, however, reiterated that she got exactly what she wanted: “At the end of the day, I’m not worried about the points,” she said. “As long as we win, I’m a happy camper.”

At the end of the day, I’m not worried about the points.

ALEXANDRIA POMPEI/Daily

Senior center Hallie Thome left Thursday’s win over Indiana just one point short of 2,000 on her career.