SINCE 1891
THE BROWN DAILY HERALD TUESDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2019
VOLUME CLIV, ISSUE 34
UNIVERSITY NEWS
U. files DACA brief
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UNIVERSITY NEWS
Watson director discusses Hong Kong protests, elicits criticism
U. joins 18 other institutions in amicus brief for Supreme Court BY BECKY WOLFSON STAFF WRITER With the U.S. Supreme Court set to hear arguments around the legality of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program in November, Brown filed an amicus brief earlier this month alongside 18 other universities to advocate for DACA’s future. The brief urged the Supreme Court to maintain the program, which allows nearly 800,000 undocumented individuals to legally work and live in the United States. In the brief, Brown and the other universities argued that rescinding DACA would affect the institutions’ ability to advance educational and research goals, and prevent the United States from benefiting from the affected students’ talents. In addition, striking down DACA would “impose direct harm on current students and alumni,” according to the brief. “Students need the ability to work after graduation and the ability to fully participate in their life and society without constant fear of deportation,” said Brian Clark, the Uni-
COURTESY OF ALEXANDER LAFERRIERE
In a forum titled “Making Sense of Hong Kong’s Protests,” Director of the Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs discussed the context and reasoning behind the ongoing events. Some audience members said his lecture was biased in support of China’s Communist Party.
Edward Steinfeld P’20 discusses origins, motivations of Hong Kong protests BY BENJAMIN POLLARD CONTRIBUTING WRITER At a Family Weekend Forum on the ongoing protests in Hong Kong, Director of the Watson Institute for International and
Public Affairs Edward Steinfeld P’20 contextualized and offered his perspective on the events. His lecture, titled “Making Sense of Hong Kong’s Protests,” drew criticism from some audience members, who said his position was biased in favor of the Chinese Communist Party. In June, protesters in Hong Kong took to the streets to challenge a proposed bill that would allow people accused of crimes to be extradited to China. Since the protests began, the interactions be-
tween protesters and police have become increasingly violent. The protesters adopted five demands for the Hong Kong government: withdraw the extradition bill; stop referring to the protests as a “riot”; drop charges against protesters; investigate Hong Kong police for their conduct during the protests; and implement universal suffrage independent from China. Hong Kong is currently a “special administrative region” of China that is governed under a “one country,
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two systems” policy, which allows Hong Kong to maintain its own economic and legal systems. Steinfeld is the director of the University’s China Initiative, an “interdisciplinary hub for the study of modern China,” according to the Watson Institute’s website. He has published three books, his most recent entitled “Playing Our Game: Why China’s Rise Doesn’t Threaten the West.” He is also an aca-
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UNIVERSITY NEWS
SCIENCE & RESEARCH
Wildfire control challenging in warming climate Study shows earth’s climate is primary motivator for burning activity
ACT to allow retakes of individual sections New policy means students can retake individual sections to improve score
BY MARLENE GOETZ CONTRIBUTING WRITER
BY LI GOLDSTEIN SENIOR STAFF WRITER
In the same week that wildfire-prevention blackouts were imposed on hundreds of thousands of Northern Californians, a study on the past 1400 years of wildfire activity in California’s Sierra Nevada region revealed that climate change will bring more burning in California’s future. The study, which was conducted by Richard Vachula GS and co-authors professors James Russell and Yongsong Huang from the Department of Earth, Environmental and Planetary SUMMER ZHANG / HERALD
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Starting September 2020, college applicants will be able to retake individual sections of the ACT exam. The organization will also calculate an official “superscore” — the average of the highest section scores across multiple test dates — that students can send to colleges, said ACT’s Senior Director of Media and Public Relations Ed Colby. Previously, students interested in retaking the ACT had to sit for all four sections — English, math, reading and science. ACT changed this policy in
News
News
Commentary
Commentary
Francisco Cantú discussed his memoir and nuances of immigration discourse Page 3
Public schools in Providence now serve free breakfast, lunch to all students Page 4
Editorial: U. should not suspend Sigma Chi, needs new regulations Page 7
Simshauser ’20: NBA’s commitment to social justice is weakened by corporate greed Page 7
response to feedback from students, parents, teachers, colleges and college counselors, Colby said. Along with the superscore, colleges will continue to receive an ACT score report from at least one full sitting of the test. Dean of Admission Logan Powell expressed uncertainty about whether the change will benefit applicants to the University. “On the one hand, I see this as a benefit to students who may not have had their best day in a particular section and may want to go back and just retake that one section,” he said. “On the other hand, I worry that this may increase test anxiety” by encouraging students to retake single sections more times than they otherwise would in order to achieve a perfect ACT superscore, Powell added. Because the University already sees a high volume of nearly perfect ACT
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ACT FROM PAGE 1 scores, Powell does not expect the new superscore policy to dramatically change the score distribution in future applicant pools. He also emphasized that increasing a score in one particular section may only increase the superscore “marginally,” a difference that will not solely determine a student’s acceptance or denial. Allowing students to retake individual sections is a “very student-friendly move,” said Sara Harberson, an independent college counselor. In the past, students have expressed concern that retaking the full ACT exam may cause some section scores to increase while others may go down, resulting in either no change or a decrease in their score. The changes to the ACT should alleviate such con-
cerns and allow students to focus their study efforts on one subject at a time, Harberson said. Retaking a single section of the ACT will also cost less than retaking the entire exam, but ACT has not specified what the cost of a section retake will be, Colby said. While some institutions already construct their own ACT superscores, the University does not currently superscore the ACT because the company has not provided guidelines on superscoring its exam in the past, Powell said. The Admission Office is working with ACT to “better understand the details of how this will work.” Without a full understanding of their superscoring methodology, the Admission Office cannot yet determine how they will consider such score reports when
reading applications, he said. Through research on the potential advantages of allowing single-section retakes, ACT found that students performed similarly on single section sittings and full exams, indicating that the section retake scores would not disproportionately inflate students’ achievement. Harberson agreed with Powell that ACT “has not been forthcoming” about how colleges can superscore the ACT. The College Board has historically offered clearer guidelines on superscoring the SAT, Harberson said. Many colleges nationwide that previously did not superscore the ACT have been changing their testing policy in favor of superscoring the test, so the change to the ACT follows this trend, Harberson said.
Sciences, also indicated that the earth’s climate has driven burning activity far more than any other factor, including human activity. “Humans are building an ecosystem that is meant to burn,” Vachula said. The Pacific Gas and Electric shutoffs this months are an attempt to protect that ecosystem from the inevitable fires, but no human effort, including this one, will be able to truly counteract the power of climate in the long term.“If we are causing long-term warmer and dryer climates, there are going to be more fires,” Huang said. This research comes alongside an abundance of recent work at the University on climate change. And The Herald’s fall 2019 poll found that 37.8 percent of undergraduate students believe the most important issue facing the country today is the environment and climate change. “When we focus locally, people really strongly influence fire regimes, both now and in the past. If you back out from that and look more broadly, Northern California scale, climate really dominates how frequent and how intense fires are,” Russell said. “Human management is able to mitigate fire at the local level, but the broader regional fire history is driven by climate,” Vachula added. To look into the impact of human fire management systems, the team studied how Native American populations in Yosemite would set low-level fires to clear forests in an effort to control wildlife and food resources. These local burns occurred independent of climate. Other human interventions have included fire suppression efforts by the park’s service — despite the fact that this is not necessarily ideal for the park’s ecology, Russell said. Today, controlled burns are practiced in Yosemite valley, as “it’s now recognized that fires sometimes need to happen in national park systems” since suppression acts have led to a build-up of fuel. But fire can only be controlled locally. In the future, as much as people may hope that human intervention could manage fires, climate is really the overriding impactor. “Warm and dry climates promoted burning, and projections for the future are warm and dry climates, so it’s only going to become more flammable in the future,” Vachula said. Fire management will only become more costly in the future, and climate change should cause an increase in fire intensity and frequency in the coming years. In order to gather these findings,
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2019 Vachula accumulated fire activity data from the past 1400 years by studying charcoal embedded in layers of sediment in Swamp Lake in California. “The only thing that’s unique about the last 50 years or so is how little burning there has been in the context of the 1400 year record that we reconstructed,” Vachula said. The record was constructed using charcoal as a proxy for measuring fire activity in California. During most fires, residual carbon is left behind in the form of charcoal. This charcoal then shoots up into the air in convective plumes and gets dispersed. The scattered charcoal may wash into lakes and form layers. Swamp Lake in Yosemite National Park is unique because it produces distinct layers of charcoal and other materials that settle on the lake floor year after year. “You can then take the sediment apart and count the amount of charcoal in each layer to get a a history of how strong were fires through time, how many were there and how intensely the landscape was burning through the years,” Russell said. In addition, because the lake is in a national park, rangers have been recording fire history very meticulously for over 100 years. “When you actually go back in time further before humans have any records, now you have confidence that what you see is believable … because you have 100 years of records to prove that the proxy (of different charcoal particle size) works,” Huang said. The team was able to compare their charcoal-based estimates with the national park data from the past 100 years, corroborating their estimates. By confirming the accuracy of the last 100 years of charcoal-based estimates against the park records, the researchers were able to feel confident in their estimates going back more than a thousand years before that. The national park records documented area, intensities and temperatures of each burn, among many other details. This made it possible for the team to correlate the size of the charcoal particles in the lake sediment from a certain time period with the geographic radius of the fire as it had been recorded by the park’s rangers, Vachula said. Huang is inspired by Winston Churchill to conduct research that spans a wide range of time. Churchill said: “The farther back you can look, the farther forward you are likely to see.” “That is a good summary of what we do: We are trying to look in the past to find clues for the future, before it affects your life at a time that’s too late to take action,” he added.
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2019
THE BROWN DAILY HERALD | NEWS
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ARTS & CULTURE
Former Border Patrol agent discusses indifference in immigration discourse Francisco Cantú published his memoir, ‘The Line Becomes a River’ last year BY ALEX VALENTI CONTRIBUTING WRITER Mexican-American writer Francisco Cantú spoke of the challenges migrants face at the United States-Mexico border and the importance of hearing and sharing their stories at the Granoff Center for the Creative Arts last Friday night. Cantú, who worked as a Border Patrol agent from 2008 to 2012, discussed the “institutional indifference” of U.S. government agencies like the Border Patrol toward migrants. His experiences working on the border and helping an immigrant friend fight deportation after Cantú’s resignation from the Patrol provided the basis for his memoir, “The Line Becomes a River,” published last year. Cantú’s lecture detailed how migrants who suffer or die while attempting to cross the border often remain anonymous, their lives abstracted in the public discourse about immigration. Cantú said he was moved when he heard the name of a man who died traveling with last year’s migrant caravan from Central America on the radio. He contrasted hearing that name with the first time he witnessed a migrant’s death as a Border Patrol agent. The latter man’s name never made the news, which is almost always the case, Cantú said. “We must first reject the casual dismissal of migrants’ lives, by grieving their deaths, by speaking their names, by choosing to see them, hear them and amplify their voices and stories,” Cantú said. The writer also urged Americans to translate the outrage they may feel about injustices at the border
into action. “To feel empathy is not enough,” he said. “In the end, our feelings and our tears are useless unless they compel us to act in a way that might someday improve (migrants’) situation.” Cantú’s memoir has sparked criticism among immigration activists due to Cantú’s previous employment as a Border Patrol agent.For example, in “The Line Becomes a River,” Cantú recounts various incidents of fellow Border Patrol agents abusing migrants, slashing their water bottles and decorating cacti with women’s underwear. When questioned about his motives for joining the Border Patrol, Cantú acknowledged at Friday’s talk that his decision was “rooted in a lot of naiveté.” He said that he had believed that he could effect positive changes from within the agency, but ultimately realized that this was a “profound underestimation of (its) power.” Elizabeth Rush, visiting lecturer in the Department of English and an organizer of the event, said she considered the controversy around Cantú’s work when inviting him to speak, but believes his voice is an important addition to the conversation about immigration. Criticisms that originate from within institutions that wield power have the potential to move audiences who do not typically find fault in these institutions, she said. “‘The Line Becomes a River’ conceives of an audience beyond the echo chamber,” Rush said. “That is an important thing to consider given the increasingly divisive days we occupy.” Mariajose Rodriguez, a third year Ph.D. student who attended the lecture, said it made her think about the relationship between politics and literature, and where to draw the line between the two when crafting a work like Cantú’s memoir. “It’s a very personal choice — where does politics start and end in art or literature?”
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Cantú spoke at length about Border Patrol’s treatment of migrants traveling across the United States’ border with Mexico. she said. Cantú donated a portion of his speaker’s fee to Dorcas Internation-
COURTESY OF BROWN UNIVERSITY
The United States Supreme Court is expected to deliver an opinion weighing the legality of the DACA program early in 2020.
DACA FROM PAGE 1 versity’s director of news and editorial development. The University filed its brief as part of the Department of Homeland Security et al. v. Regents of the University of California et al. case. Since President Donald Trump issued an order to suspend the program in September 2017, several court cases have emerged to
challenge both the legality of Trump’s order and of the program. The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments about the program Nov. 12, and is slated to deliver a decision by early 2020. Pending a decision, qualifying individuals can continue to enroll for and renew their DACA status. DACA guidelines require that participants must be undocumented, under the age of 31 and must have arrived to
the United States before they turned 16. Enrollees must also have continuously resided in the United States since June 15, 2007. “One of the bigger issues in higher ed right now is that newer students in incoming classes won’t have DACA because they don’t meet the requirements for it, it’s a specific age range,” said Julio Reyes, program director of the Undocumented, First-Generation
al Institute of Rhode Island, a Providence-based organization that provides services and representation for
College and Low Income Student Center. But, in the meantime, by issuing a brief the University reaffirmed its “support for immigrant communities, specifically DACA students,” Reyes added. The brief also “validates and affirms our work in looking to support those that fall out of the DACA community,” he said. The University currently has several initiatives geared toward supporting DACA and undocumented students on campus. These include the University’s 2016 commitment to considering undocumented or DACA-status applicants as if they were U.S. citizens or permanent residents, ensuring that they would be considered under the University’s need-blind admission policy. Since spring 2017, the University has also covered students’ legal fees and applications for DACA renewal status. Application fees usually cost $495, according to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. “We fully support our students and want to help them ensure they are able to be successful while here at Brown, so if they are thinking about their DACA status or how they are going to pay for a lawyer, that’s an additional challenge,” said Marisa Quinn, chief of staff to the provost. “We wanted to take away as many obstacles as we could in a supportive, fluid and precarious time.”
immigrants and refugees. The event Friday night was the third in the 2019 Nonfiction@Brown lecture series.
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PROTEST FROM PAGE 1 demic board member of the Center for Industrial Development and Environmental Governance at China’s Tsinghua University. He began the lecture by stating that ever since the May 4 protests in 1919, Hong Kong has been “wedged uncomfortably” between enlightenment and the conflicting tradition of nationalism. During the May 4 protests, students organized against their government’s decision to give up territory to Japan, beginning a rise in nationalist sentiment. “In China, there’s been this juxtaposition between this focus on power and the state and hierarchy and order,” Steinfeld said. “At the same time, there is this different thread of almost wild freedom and liberation and openness and exploration.” Steinfeld then explained Hong Kong’s transfer from British rule to Chinese rule
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in 1997. Hong Kong will be governed under China’s “one country, two systems” policy until 2047, after which its status is unknown. In 1996, a year before the transfer, Steinfeld said “there was an unexpected feeling of hope” for the reintegration of Hong Kong into the larger Chinese nation. The handover “marked a new era,” with hopes that Hong Kong would “pave the way to a cosmopolitanism that the mainland would follow.” According to Steinfeld, this sense of hope faded when mainland China underwent an “economic boom,” with Hong Kong losing some of its relative prominence within the national economy. Steinfeld believes this loss in prominence is one of three factors driving the current Hong Kong protests. The second motivating factor, according to Steinfeld, is the belief held by many in Hong Kong that the Hong Kong government functions only to help the
“local economic elite” who have aligned themselves with the Communist Party of China. Poor and middle-class citizens do not feel that their basic needs — such as public housing — are met. The third motivating factor behind the protests is China’s regression “into a form of authoritarianism” under President Xi Jinping, Steinfeld said. China’s increase in surveillance and extra-judicial actions have worried people residing in Hong Kong. Steinfeld chose to discuss this topic at Family Weekend because he felt the Hong Kong protests are “an important issue in contemporary global affairs” and that “the educational and scholarly work we do here at Brown provides important context for understanding the major societal issues of our time,” he wrote in an email to The Herald. When Steinfeld opened the floor for a question and answer period, two attendees vocalized their issues with Steinfeld’s
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2019
presentation of the motivating factors of the protest. During the period, a Hong Kong-born alum accused Steinfeld of being biased because he felt that Steinfeld’s presentation included talking points of the Chinese Communist Party. For example, the alum said Steinfeld’s focus on economic factors as a reason behind the protests distracts from other motivating factors, such as a potential loss of democratic freedoms — a tactic used by the party. The alum also suggested that Steinfeld might be receiving funding from the United Front, a coalition of political parties led by the Communist Party. Steinfeld denied this allegation, but said that the alum’s criticism “does underscore the fact that there are huge differences of opinion and differences over the facts.” He also urged audience members to “take very seriously these points and read and decide for yourselves.” This interaction was echoed by a
graduate student, who stepped up to the microphone wearing a surgical mask and mirrored sunglasses to hide his identity. The student then said informational posters about the protests that were hung around campus had been taken down, and he asked Steinfeld for his position on their alleged removal. Steinfeld said he was not involved in the removing of the posters, nor does he support this process. “It was important for the audience to see that there are many different views about what is taking place with the demonstration in Hong Kong today, and also about the history of Hong Kong,” Steinfeld wrote in an email to The Herald. “I thought it was equally important for the audience to see that at Brown, people are willing to listen to what a speaker has to say, and then voice their opposing or alternative views. That’s what learning is all about, including for the speaker.”
METRO
Providence Public Schools to provide free meals to all students District expands participation in USDA program, eliminating eligibility requirements BY MAIA ROSENFELD SENIOR STAFF WRITER In a sweeping effort to improve access to nutrition among its students, the Providence Public School District is offering free breakfast and lunch to students at all grade levels, with no eligibility requirements. Providence elementary schools first eliminated eligibility requirements for free breakfast and lunch in 2017, but as of September, this program has been expanded to all middle and high schools across the district. The new policy resulted from the district’s participation in the United States Department of Agriculture’s Community Eligibility Provision, which provides free meals to all students in districts where at least 40 percent of students are eligible for income-based free and reduced-price lunch. While approximately 85 percent of Providence Public School students were eligible for free and reduced-price lunches last school year, only about 72.5 percent actually participated in the free meals program, according to Emily Martineau, PPSD’s director of public affairs. This discrepancy could be attributed to personal preferences or to the stigma attached to identifying oneself as a low-income student, she added. According to Kenneth Wong, director of the University’s Urban Education Policy Program, the stigma around receiving free lunch often increases as students grow older. “In middle school and high school, you actually see a drop in the number of claims in terms of whether they’re eligible for free meals,” Wong said. Meg Geoghegan, communications director for the Rhode Island Department of Education, hopes the new program will help fight “lunch shaming” by implementing a system where“ there’s no exchange of money at the student level.” Wong agreed, adding that by providing free meals to all students, the
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district can ensure that “there is no stigma attached to eating a good meal.” Erasing this stigma and thus improving access to proper nutrition removes an important barrier to students’ ability to learn, according to Geoghegan. “We hear pretty consistently from communities that have robust nutrition programs that it makes a real difference when a student is fed,” she said. “If a student’s hungry, it’s going to be really hard for them to retain (information) and be ready to learn.” The Community Eligibility Provision also reduces administrative challenges and paperwork for the city. While the district used to require parents to complete forms reporting their income each year for the district
to determine students’ eligibility for free and reduced-price meals, there will now be no need for this paperwork given the universal enrollment, Wong said. “By streamlining the process, the district can focus more on food quality and innovative food service options,” Martineau wrote in an email to The Herald. But the streamlined process means that it will be harder for the city to collect the data on household income levels that schools receive from the free and reduced-price lunch form, Geoghegan said. This information is used for a variety of other purposes, such as providing information on how low-income students performed on
assessments, she added. The new program is reflective of efforts to implement a more holistic approach to education in the city, reaching beyond just academic support to nutritional and social-emotional support. According to Patricia Socarras, deputy director of communications for the Office of Mayor Elorza, schools provide more than half of their weekly meals for many Providence students. “Hunger is a daily problem for many Providence households,” she wrote in an email to The Herald. “For students struggling with food security, school meals are their most consistent source of nutrition.” Wong stressed that food quality should be a priority for the district,
and he said it should take into account the USDA’s guidelines set in their “food pyramid” to ensure students receive adequate nutrition. He also hopes that the district takes the opportunity to work with parents and involve them in creating healthier communities. “If you bring the parents in, then some of the school policy in developing healthy kids would be supported and reinforced out there in the community,” he said. The expansion of the Community Eligibility Provision is part of the city’s efforts to address larger issues of food security across Providence. “Providing school meals at no out-of-pocket cost supports the City’s work to address youth food access year-round, in and out of school,” Socarras wrote.
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2019
THE BROWN DAILY HERALD | TODAY
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Teach-in on the Crisis in Ecuador 12:00 P.M. Watson
Brown +1 Programs Information Session 4:00 P.M. Page-Robinson Hall
On Science and Revolution 5:00 P.M. Alumnae Hall
Q U OTE OF TH E DAY
S U D O KU
“We must first reject the casual dismissal of migrants’ lives, by grieving their deaths, by speaking their names, by choosing to see them, hear them and amplify their voices and stories.”
— Francisco Cantú SEE BORDER PAGE 3
A T I M E TO REF L ECT RELEASE DATE– Tuesday, March 20, 2012
CR O SDaily SWOCrossword RD Los Angeles Times Puzzle Edited by Rich Norris and Joyce Nichols Lewis
ACROSS 1 Stove fuel 4 Consent (to) 10 Sauna sounds 13 Tiny troublemaker 14 Drink ordered dry or dirty 16 Cheer word 17 *Where some carry keys 19 Pie __ mode 20 New Mexico art colony 21 Volcano output 22 Flavor 24 Author Ferber and actress Best 26 *Behind-thescenes area 29 Reno roller 30 “Now I __ me down ...” 32 One more 33 Two-time N.L. batting champ Lefty 35 The Beatles’ “__ Love You” 36 Physics particle 37 *Peugeot or Renault, e.g. 40 Coppertone letters 42 Remote batteries 43 Krispy __ doughnuts 46 Nonbeliever 48 “This __ ripoff!” 49 Farm worker? 51 *Campaign in rural areas 53 Slow, to Schumann 55 Brazilian writer Jorge 56 Velvet finish? 58 “Gypsys, Tramps & Thieves” singer 59 Grafton’s “__ for Corpse” 60 School entrances, or, in a way, what each answer to a starred clue has 64 One for Monet 65 Evaporated 66 MGM mascot 67 Airline to Stockholm 68 Trattoria desserts 69 Time workers: Abbr. DOWN 1 Like geniuses
2 Medium with a lot of talk 3 Ate, as soup 4 Price to pay: Abbr. 5 Bullfighter’s cloak 6 “Road” film costar 7 __ Sketch: drawing toy 8 Hägar creator Browne 9 Suffix with benz10 Wind River Reservation tribe 11 Kind of lamp with a tungsten filament 12 One who doesn’t hog 15 “__ Easy”: Ronstadt hit 18 Decoding org. 23 Something to wear 25 Sot’s speech problem 27 Money 28 Atlantic Division NBA team 31 Balt. Orioles’ div. 34 Step on someone’s toes, so to speak 35 Mac alternatives
38 Brussels-based defense gp. 39 Shrinking sea 40 Marathoner’s need 41 They may be coined 44 Street opening 45 Became a contestant 46 Gadget you can count on? 47 “This ___”: “How strange”
48 Well-heeled Marcos 50 Sculptors’ subjects 52 Resist authority 54 Earth-friendly prefix 57 Neither an ally nor an enemy: Abbr. 61 Common URL ender 62 Slangy about-face 63 Printer resolution meas.
xwordeditor@aol.com
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ANSWER TO PREVIOUS PUZZLE:
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By Pam Amick Klawitter (c)2012 Tribune Media Services, Inc.
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As students trudge through puddles under some gray skies this midterm season, they can seek solice in the reflective fall foliage.
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THE BROWN DAILY HERALD | COMMENTARY
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2019
The NBA’s hollow commitment to justice BY DEREK SIMSHAUSER ’20 OPINIONS EDITOR
During Adam Silver’s tenure as commissioner, the National Basketball Association has enjoyed the distinction of being the most socially aware major sports league. The NBA was dubbed “the wokest professional sports league” by the New York Times in 2018. Silver, for his part, is aware of the benefits associated with this branding: “I didn’t know we were given that designation,” he said to the Times, “but I understand the sentiment and we’re proud of that.” It’s a designation that the league has earned. Silver’s first major act as commissioner was to bar Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling for life after recordings of him making racist statements surfaced in 2014. Unlike other sports leagues, the NBA encourages its highest-profile players to take stands on social issues. While Colin Kaepernick has been de facto banned from the NFL for protesting police brutality, NBA players and teams are given license to support the Black Lives Matter movement — even as openly as wearing shirts that honor victims of police violence during on-court warmups. To Silver, freedom of expression is woven into the fabric of the league. “It’s part of being an NBA player,” he said in a 2018 interview with CNN — “(that) sense of an obligation, social responsibility, a desire to speak up directly about issues that are important.” But the league’s obeisance to the Chinese government over the past weeks suggests a hard limit to their espoused ideals of social activism. The conflict between the NBA and the Chinese Communist Party began on Oct. 4 when Daryl Morey, General Manager of the Houston Rockets, posted a tweet that said “Fight for Freedom. Stand with Hong Kong.” Outrage in China was swift and unanimous. Morey was lambasted on Chinese Central Television (an organ of the CCP), and Chinese fans called for a boycott of the NBA. Within hours of the since-deleted tweet, the NBA released a statement that distanced itself from Morey and apologized for his tweet. Rockets owner Tilman Fertitta emphasized that “Morey does not speak for the Houston Rockets.” And Morey eventually sent out a series of tweets walking back his original endorsement of the Hong Kong protesters.
The NBA’s response to China shows the moral emptiness of corporate displays of “wokeness.” Ultimately, social ideals are subordinated to profits. Over 500 million people watched an NBA game in China last year, and the league’s operations there have been valued at over $4 billion. The Chinese government has a well-documented history of banning corporations for seemingly minute offenses — often coercing apologies from the companies as a re-
humanitarian crises. Such is the hypocrisy of “woke” politics. Are the moral stakes of gender-neutral bathrooms really higher than the internment of over one million Uighurs? This sort of logic rewards corporations for performative gestures of social progressivism and fails to punish them for doing nothing to actually uphold the values that underpin these movements. Even more disappointing than the NBA’s de-
sult — and is fully capable of restricting all NBA broadcasts from entering the country. Given these incentives, it’s hardly surprising that the NBA sought to appease the CCP. But the enduring partnership between the NBA and China should dispel any notions that the league is indeed the rare corporation to also genuinely champion social progress. Silver is often praised, deservedly, for his willingness to leverage the NBA’s power in order to promote social causes. He pulled the NBA All-Star Game from Charlotte in 2017 because of the state’s anti-transgender bathroom bill — allowing the city to play host in 2019 only after the bill had been repealed. But actions like these start to ring hollow when one learns that the NBA still operates a training center in Xinjiang province, site of one of the world’s largest
sertion of Morey was the sight of its best player joining in on the criticism. After playing a preseason exhibition game in Shanghai last week, LeBron James issued a statement upon returning stateside. “I believe (Morey) wasn’t educated on the situation at hand,” James said. “So many people could have been harmed, not only financially, but physically, emotionally, spiritually.” James has been a vanguard for player activism throughout the decade: he has criticized President Trump; he has spoken about racial injustice in America; he stood alongside Gavin Newsom in September when the California governor signed a bill that would allow college athletes to be paid. But James is also a Nike athlete. And while activist athletes are popular, albeit controversial, domestically — Kaepernick starred in a re-
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cent Nike ad campaign, for example — the Chinese government would surely pull Nike products from shelves if one of its athletes spoke in favor of the Hong Kong protestors. Nike brought in over $6.2 billion in revenue from China last year. An athlete like James also risks losing jersey and signature shoe sales by speaking out. And so James gives a statement that would pass Chinese censors. He ensures a placid consumer base in China for his Nike products. He also keeps open the possibility that movies made by his media company, Springhill Entertainment, may pass government censors and be shown in China. James, along with many other players and coaches, will certainly continue to speak out on social injustices throughout the season — gun violence, Trump, racial injustice, etc. He will be right to do so. And Silver will be praised for allowing them to use their platform to advance what are likely to be admirable social causes. But the Morey episode — and the NBA’s involvement with China more broadly — shows the material calculation underpinning supposed “wokeness.” A league that rightly condemns Trump’s travel ban as going “against the fundamental values of (the) NBA” simultaneously does business — and goes to great lengths to ensure that they can continue to do business — with a country that is systematically tracking and detaining Uighur residents in concentration camps. The NBA’s continued courtship of China shows that its espoused social progressivism, like any other corporate branding strategy, is judged by its profitability. The NBA advertises its players’ activism and social awareness for its American viewers, who happen to be the most left-leaning of all the major sports fan bases. The league even voices support for Enes Kanter, who has vocally opposed rising authoritarianism in his native Turkey. But when there are billions of potential NBA fans living under an authoritarian government, the league suddenly falls silent. Derek Simshauser ’20 really hopes he isn’t banned from visiting China. He can be reached at derek_simshauser@brown.edu. Please send responses to this opinion to letters@browndailyherald.com and op-eds to opinions@browndailyherald.com.
Submissions: The Brown Daily Herald publishes submissions in the form of op-eds and letters to the editor. Op-eds are typically between 750 and 1000 words, though we will consider submissions between 500 and 1200 words. Letters to the editor should be around 250 words. While letters to the editor respond to an article or column that has appeared in The Herald, op-eds usually prompt new discussions on campus or frame new arguments about current discourse. All submissions to The Herald cannot have been previously published elsewhere (in print or online — including personal blogs and social media), and they must be exclusive to The Herald. Submissions must include no more than two individual authors. If there are more than two original authors, The Herald can acknowledge the authors in a statement at the end of the letter or op-ed, but the byline can only include up to two names. The Herald will not publish submissions authored by groups. The Herald does not publish anonymous submissions. If you feel your circumstances prevent you from submitting an op-ed or letter with your name, please email herald@browndailyherald.com to explain your situation. You can submit op-eds to opinions@browndailyherald.com and letters to letters@browndailyherald. com. When you email your submission, please include (1) your full name, (2) an evening or mobile phone number in case your submission is chosen for publication and (3) any affiliation with Brown University or any institution or organization relevant to the content of your submission. Please send in submissions at least 24 hours in advance of your desired publication date. The Herald only publishes submissions while it is in print. The Herald reserves the right to edit all submissions. If your piece is considered for publication, an editor will contact you to discuss potential changes to your submission. Commentary: The editorial is the majority opinion of the editorial page board of The Brown Daily Herald. The editorial viewpoint does not necessarily reflect the views of The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. Columns, letters and comics reflect the opinions of their authors only. Corrections: The Brown Daily Herald is committed to providing the Brown University community with the most accurate information possible. Corrections may be submitted up to seven calendar days after publication. Periodicals postage paid at Providence, R.I. Postmaster: Please send corrections to P.O. Box 2538, Providence, RI 02906. Advertising: The Brown Daily Herald, Inc. reserves the right to accept or decline any advertisement at its discretion.
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TUESDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2019
THE BROWN DAILY HERALD | COMMENTARY
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EDITORIAL
Five-year suspension of Sigma Chi is misguided In September, the University suspended the Sigma Chi fraternity for violating hazing and alcohol procedures that endangered students. The five-year suspension came within weeks of a revision to the Code of Student Conduct that targets derecognized group activity. Specifically, the revised code now punishes students who join groups that have had “University recognition suspended or permanently revoked by the University for disciplinary reasons.” In addition, Brown suspended the Buxton International House last semester until Fall 2020 following alcohol-related violations of the Code of Student Conduct. The similar timing of these events points to heightened supervision of Greek life and program housing. Groups that have been suspended in the past, most notably Phi Psi, have been operating underground in off-campus houses for several years — Phi Psi now calls itself Lantern. It is likely that University officials revised the Code of Student Conduct not only in response to the present existence of underground groups but also in fear of the potential for Buxton or Sigma Chi to move underground as well. The code now recognizes participation in derecognized student groups as a prohibited behavior. Given the continued thriving of derecognized groups off campus, the five year suspension of Sigma Chi is misguided and will likely push even more students into underground organizations. It will be harder for the University to maintain oversight, punish inappropriate behavior and ensure the health and safety of Brown community members. The University should instead imple-
ment alternative measures to reign in fraternities and other organizations that have violated the Code of Student Conduct, based upon a review of social life on campus and an analysis of how peer institutions have solved similar problems. Though the revision to the Code of Conduct is theoretically an increased deterrent from joining a derecognized group, there is virtually no enforcement mechanism in place. As Yolanda Castillo-Appollonio, senior associate dean of students and director of student conduct and community standards, admitted in The Herald’s Oct. 10 article “University policy targets derecognized group activity,” “We know about the Lantern. We’ve known since the beginning, but we haven’t been able to address it since we don’t know who’s in it.” The new policy does not overcome the difficulty identifying involved students, and there is little reason to believe that this will change as more groups potentially go underground. Clearly, students are seeking a social outlet that enables them to make friends and attend parties. That demand will not go away, and with even fewer outlets on campus to turn to, organizations only stand to grow. Pushing fraternities and other groups off campus is not the solution. “When an organization is derecognized and is continuing to perpetuate some of their behaviors off campus and without any oversight,” there could be a heightened risk to the health and safety of students, Castillo-Appollonio said. Instead of suspending these groups, the University should place more stringent regulations on fraternities and other
organizations, keeping them within sight of the administration on campus. There is no silver bullet approach to stopping hazing and other alcohol-related violations, but the University can implement several measures in conjunction to further address the problem. Among a litany of other options, the University should impose harsher punishments on specific students responsible for violations and make the punishment for these behaviors clearer. While the Student Code of Conduct explicitly prohibits hazing and sexual assault and claims to apply to individual members within a fraternity, the code does not specify what the ramifications would be and how they would be enforced. In addition, the University ought to expand hazing-related training and mandate non-undergraduate residential advisors within fraternities. More frequent short-term suspensions in response to varying degrees of inappropriate behavior would also be a more constructive mechanism. Any of these options would be more effective than the current fiveyear ban, as these other options would create incentive to change behavior instead of moving underground. Brown is not the only school to face this dilemma. Dozens of schools have dealt with hazing and other alcohol-related issues in recent years. At Pennsylvania State University, the death of Tim Piazza during a hazing incident led to the permanent ban of Beta Theta Pi on that campus. At the University of Michigan, a rash of hazing incidents across several organizations led to a temporary ban on all fraternities in 2017. Regardless
of whether their solutions were effective in curbing dangerous behavior — and our experience at Brown indicates a permanent ban may not do the trick — these examples illustrate a nationwide trend that Brown needs to consider in crafting its own solutions. The University should learn from the way that other similar schools have handled hazing and misconduct. In particular, Brown could turn to Tufts University’s overhaul of Greek life on campus as a model. Tufts is similar to Brown in many ways, including its student body size and makeup, academic standards and location. Though a larger percentage of students participate in Greek life at Tufts than at Brown , similar hazing incidents and other violations led to the temporary suspension of multiple Greek life organizations in 2016 and 2017 at Tufts . During the suspension period, Tufts took a number of steps to work toward a healthier Greek life on campus. The university now publicly publishes the organizational status of each Greek organization on its website, clearly outlining which organizations are under suspension and the specific incidents that led to the suspension. Tufts joined the Hazing Prevention Consortium, a multi-year attempt to stop hazing across eight universities, and also undertook its own study of all social life on campus. These efforts indicate that Tufts, when compared to Brown, has made a public point of investing time and resources in holding these organizations accountable. Since this overhaul, Greek life has restarted on Tufts’ campus with much stricter regulations. Brown would benefit from
a similar process. A deep analysis of Greek life and program housing, conducted by both within the University and an external organization, would allow Brown to learn more about the underlying motivations of students who join these organizations. In addition, a review of other schools would allow Brown to understand and potentially learn from creative regulations in place elsewhere. Publicly naming suspended organizations would provide new members with proper warnings about their organization’s history, and it would create a level of transparency into the disciplinary process that does not currently exist. While Brown could certainly learn from Tufts’ overhaul, the University should adapt mechanisms and review processes that best fit Brown’s administrative capacity and student body. No single solution will solve the issues around Greek life, and violations are bound to reoccur in the future. But the current five-year ban on Sigma Chi will only serve to make hazing and alcohol-related incidents worse. The University should reconsider its decision and work toward a more productive solution, incorporating successful strategies from other universities and imposing heightened regulations on Greek life and program housing on campus. Editorials are written by The Herald’s editorial page board: its editor, Krista Stapleford ’21, and its members, Dylan Tian ’21, Eduard Muñoz-Suñé ’20, Jonathan Douglas ’20 and Riley Pestorius ’21. Send comments to editorials@browndailyherald.com.
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THE BROWN DAILY HERALD | NEWS
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2019
Brown students are over-committed BY ANNA B. KRAMER ’20 STAFF COLUMNIST Brown students try to do it all, and maybe they should be doing less. Upon entering Brown, it is easy to get pulled into the hegemonic standard of student involvement on campus. One has to merely step foot in the club fair during the first weeks of the semester to get a sense of how involved Brown students really are. The Main Green is packed with rows of tables with various club members shouting over each other, hoping to draw in eager first-years. The daunting environment conveys a clear message to new students — that we can and should be signing up for everything. This reflex toward over-commitment is unhealthy. Certainly, the near unanimity of student extracurricular involvement on this campus makes Brown special by cultivating an enterprising and interdisciplinary mindset. But students should be more selective in choosing what clubs to join, what research positions and campus jobs to apply for or even how many classes to take. It is impossible to do it all and do it well — all too often, students spread themselves thin by over-involving themselves to the point where they are not able to complete their assignments or attend meetings for their extracurricular clubs and organizations. Ultimately, the quality of our involvement is far more important than the quantity of organizations we are involved in during our time at Brown. Not only will students have far more meaningful
experiences and personal connections if they channel their energy and time to fewer activities, but the campus organizations themselves will see better development if students are able to be more dedicated with their time.
“Over-commitment results not only in diminished productivity, but in unnecessary levels of stress that bleeds into the larger campus culture.”
This is something I have found is a common sentiment for people in leadership positions across the board at Brown. In speaking to Sara Kutscher ’20, president of Spoon University, she expressed frustration that her club members have continuously neglected to treat their commitments as priorities. “I always find it very frustrating that every year we get a slew of applications for our club, all of which seem super engaged and ready to be a committed member that year,” she said. “But the same trend frequently occurs in which these new members are so over-committed with activities that someone always has a conflict with a meeting time or helping with an event.”
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Herald coverage of Kanders must improve To the Editor: As an ex-managing editor of the Brown Daily Herald, it is with great sadness and embarrassment that I read the Sept. 12 op-ed “Warren Kanders still must go” and the validating Editorial Page Board follow-up comment Sept. 23, “University should further clarify its ethical gifts policies,” on the topic of Mr. Warren Kanders. There was a time when opinions of the Editorial Page Board were thoroughly researched and vetted. We have always had alumni who were involved in all sorts of endeavors — I recall that at one time Brown was considered a breeding ground for CIA recruitment. We did not possess the arrogance nor the stridency to opine upon matters that we had not researched, that we knew very little about as students. What I find appalling is the weak line of argument in both pieces that suggests that since Mr. Kanders stepped down from the Whitney that we at Brown must therefore completely expunge the man from all connection to Brown. The extreme political forces and the guerilla tactics employed by the group who attacked Mr. Kanders at the Whitney bullied a morally weak board of trustees into submission. Why would we at Brown assume that the actions of one group were valid and act upon the judgements of people we do not know with motives unknown? As an ex-journalist of this paper, I find the extreme bias inherent in the op-ed and its validation by the Editorial Page Board a violation of the trust conferred upon journalists by the community. Not surprisingly, the University recently decided, for the first time ever, not to renew its
Students usually have the best intentions when they first sign up for these obligations. Perhaps it from Brown’s pure liberal arts backbone, which encourages undergrads to touch and explore every facet of academia and cre-
subscription to The Herald, forcing it into a questionable financial position. Perhaps outreach to alumni, such as myself, who had such an excellent experience at The Herald, could have easily relieved the newspaper of its funding problem. However, the paper has clearly gone awry and is no longer representative of the community at large and has become some sort of mouthpiece for extremist external groups. The Brown community has always been a place where fair, balanced, thoughtful and researched ideas were welcome, from whatever side. As I recall, intelligence, hard work, fairness and most of all respect were key values of the Brown community. These attacks, which place Mr. Kanders at its center as a symbol, are destructive to and certainly not representative of the community’s core values. Most disturbingly, Mr. Kanders, as a personal friend of almost 20 years, has been dehumanized and forced into the spotlight with no regard by the attackers for the well-being of his family and associates, without regard to the positive endeavors that have marked the 40 years since his graduation. For those of us who have lived this life, we realize that there is a complete picture of a human being that is complex. Before one violently attacks a person of substance in a public forum, one needs to be in possession of the facts. Unfortunately, not knowing the facts has now relegated The Herald to a place of irrelevance. Dan Tapiero BA ’90, MA ‘91 The Herald’s Associate Managing Editor, 1989
ative pursuit. But this sentiment also cultivates a culture in which students individually feel the need to commit to as much as they can, perhaps to be an example for the impressive diversity of student involvement and interests on Brown’s campus. Ultimately, there is a difference between engaging and exploring a diverse array of activities and committing to as much as possible. Exploration, particularly during the first half of college, helps us figure out what we are most interested in and what we may ultimately want to do with our lives post-graduation. But over-commitment results not only in diminished productivity, but in unnecessary levels of stress that bleeds into the larger campus cul-
ture. Further, this “do it all — and more” ethic can alienate students who have truly steadfast commitments to on-campus jobs. For those who have to spend a fixed number of hours working for pay, added pressure to join a long list of extracurricular clubs can make them feel like they are unable to fully participate in Brown’s culture. To that end, I think we must re-examine what it means to be successful at Brown. Not only is it impossible to do it all and do it well, but it is also impossible to do it all without unhealthy levels of stress. Brown may be known as one of the happiest colleges, but it has also been ranked in the top ten most stressful universities in the United States. We have an ability at Brown to truly craft our college experiences — both in academics and extracurriculars — that is uncommon to many universities. In choosing how to get the most out of our time here, be that how we contribute to ourselves or to the University, we need to be more thoughtful and selective in what we choose to do. We can’t do it all, and coming to terms as individuals with this will hopefully alleviate the pressure we all feel to commit to everything. Anna B. Kramer ’20 can be reached at anna_ kramer@brown.edu. Please send responses to this opinion to letters@browndailyherald. com and op-eds to opinions@browndailyherald.com.
C ORRECTI ON A previous version of the Oct. 20 article “‘Poet of the Body’ exhibit celebrates Walt Whitman” stated that Walt Whitman was born and raised in New York City. In fact, he was raised in West Hill, New York. The article has been updated to reflect that change. The Herald regrets the error. A previous version of the Oct. 20 op-ed, “Who we talk about when we talk about astrology,” stated that astrologer Randon Rosenbohm identifies as a lesbian. In fact, Rosenbohm does not identify as a lesbian. The Herald regrets the error.
ERICA HUNT KARAN MAHAJAN Join us in welcoming two new members of the Literary Arts community: Erica Hunt, Assistant Professor of the Practice in Poetry and Karan Mahajan, Assistant Professor in Fiction, by coming to hear them read from their work.
Tuesday, 22 October 2019 at 7:30 pm McCormack Family Theater 70 Brown Street, Providence [use Fones Alley entrance]
Erica Hunt is a poet, essayist and author of Local History, Arcade, Piece Logic, Time Flies Right Before the Eyes and other publications. Her latest title is Veronica: A Suite in X Parts. Karan Mahajan is the author of Family Planning andThe Association of Small Bombs, which was shortlisted for the 2016 National Book Awards.