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OPINION
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But for Wales? TALKING BACKWARD | Calling for censorship profits SOUL nothing WEDNESDAY, APRIL 29, 2015 VOL. CXXXI, NO. 54 131st Year of Publication MATT MANTICA President JILL CASTELLANO Editor-in-Chief SHAWN KELLEY Opinion Editor LUKE CHEN Director of Online Projects LAUREN FEINER City News Editor KRISTEN GRABARZ Campus News Editor CLAIRE COHEN Assignments Editor STEVEN TYDINGS Social Media Director PAOLA RUANO Copy Editor RILEY STEELE Senior Sports Editor HOLDEN MCGINNIS Sports Editor
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think it’s safe to assume that most Penn students, in the past few weeks, have seen or heard of at least one of the demonstrations staged by a student activist group which calls itself SOUL, short for Students Organizing for Unity and Liberation. The group, which seems to focus primarily on social issues related to race, has staged a number of high-visibility demonstrations, including placing a member dressed in Ku Klux Klan robes along Locust Walk and, last week, staging a mock slave auction outside the Phi Delta Theta fraternity house. In an article covering that particular demonstration, The Daily Pennsylvanian reported that the group had stated, via its Facebook page, that the demonstration was partially in response to its dissatisfaction with the University’s decision not to pursue disciplinary action against the fraternity for the well-publicized incident late last semester in which members
how such a system would have to operate, it seems fairly clear that any rule which could be invoked to punish Phi Delt for offense caused by the sex doll photo could almost certainly be invoked against SOUL’s protests for the same reason. Under such a policy, a student would theoretically make a complaint to some administrative body, perhaps the Office of Student Conduct, who would then have to determine whether a reasonable person might find the conduct complained about to be offensive, and impose punishment if so. In addition to the laundry list of other problems such a hypothetical “offense rule” would cause on campus, if it was even nominally content-neutral in its application, parading down Locust in Klan robes would, in the face of a complaint, have to face a sanction at least equally severe as the publication of a sex-doll Christmas card. The only alternative, it seems to me, would be for the University to decide specifically what positions, ar-
Want to write for the Summer Pennsylvanian? Submit an application to bit.ly//SPColumnist ALEC WARD last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you — where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country’s planted thick with laws from coast to coast — man’s laws, not God’s — and if you cut them down — and you’re just the man to do it — d’you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I’d give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety’s sake. More’s point is that in our desire to rid the world of those things we believe to be evil, we must take care not do away with those institutions which protect us from evil ourselves and which safeguard our ability to
LAINE HIGGINS Sports Editor COLIN HENDERSON Sports Editor ANALYN DELOS SANTOS Creative Director EMILY CHENG News Design Editor KATE JEON News Design Editor JOYCE VARMA Sports Design Editor HENRY LIN Online Graphics Editor IRINA BIT-BABIK News Photo Editor ILANA WURMAN Sports Photo Editor TIFFANY PHAM Photo Manager CARTER COUDRIET Video Producer CLAIRE HUANG Video Producer MEGAN YAN Business Manager TAYLOR YATES Finance Manager
…[I]t seems fairly clear that any rule which could be invoked to punish Phi Delt for offense caused by the sex doll photo could almost certainly be invoked against SOUL’s protests for the same reason.” of the Fraternity posted a holiday card featuring an inflatable black sex doll online. As a sometime free-speech absolutist, I will defend SOUL’s right to protest whatever they like in whatever manner they like on campus, provided it remains nonviolent. It strikes me as both odd and shortsighted, however, for a group which is clearly fond of using controversial and potentially offensive imagery — Klan robes and slave auctions, for example — in their efforts to make a point to call for the University to impose punishment for the creation of images which they themselves find offensive. When you actually consider
guments and messages it will or will not accept. Aside from that being far from a vision of a just society, it might prove rather dangerous to SOUL’s longevity should current academic fashions someday change. There’s a wonderful moment in Robert Bolt’s play “A Man for All Seasons” where, during a discussion on evil, the following exchange takes place between the cautious Thomas More and his zealous son-inlaw, Will Roper: More: What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil? Roper: I’d cut down every law in England to do that! More: Oh? And when the
pursue those things we believe to be good. It strikes me that, in calling for the punishment of images they find offensive, SOUL is calling for the destruction of the very rights which uphold and protect their ability to strive for the achievement of justice as they understand it. So go ahead, SOUL, protest to your heart’s content. But consider giving Phi Delt benefit of law, for your own safety’s sake if nothing else.
ALEC WARD is a College sophomore from Washington, D.C., studying history. His email address is alecward@sas. upenn.edu. “Talking Backward” appears every Wednesday.
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THIS ISSUE ANNA GARSON Associate Copy Editor JULIA FINE Associate Copy Editor EVAN CERNEA Associate Copy Editor LUCIEN WANG Associate Copy Editor ALLISON RESNICK Associate Copy Editor TOMMY ROTHMAN Associate Sports Editor CONNIE CHEN Social Media Producer COSETTE GASTELU Social Media Producer
SEAN MCGEEHAN is a College junior from Philadelphia. His email is seanmcgeehan@verizon. net.
CORRECTION In yesterday’s issue on page 9, an individual under the pseudonym Ginika was incorrectly identified in one quote by an alternative name. The DP regrets the error.
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GUEST COLUMN BY EMMANUEL CORDOVA
iving as an undocumented immigrant, deportation is a daunting political consequence of my reality, but it pales in comparison to not having access to health insurance and health care. By the time I was 10 years old, I was forced to come to terms with my immigration status under a dysfunctional health care system. Through this realization, I grew motivated to become a physician that delivers culturally appropriate and effective care to underserved and immigrant families like my own. I remember vividly the moment I decided to become a physician. It wasn’t because I had an early fascination with the human body or sciences — it was because of my mother’s near death experience. We rushed to an emergency room at a local, public hospital will-
colleagues in the Journal of Academic Medicine examines the Latino physician workforce between 1980 and 2010. While the Latino population increased in the United States from 15 million to more than 51 million in the last 30 years, this growth has not been proportionately represented in the physician workforce. Between 1980 and 2010, the number of Latino physicians for every 100,000 Latinos in the U.S. dropped from 135 to 105. The number of non-Hispanic, white physicians, on the other hand, increased from 211 to 315 in the same period. Granting medical school admission to undocumented students with Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals like myself has the potential to alleviate the declining Latino physician workforce. In this spirit, the Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine be-
In 2012, the Medical School closed the Office of Diversity and Community Outreach, led by two long-serving administrators that were subsequently terminated. Students were outraged. The decision was made without transparency or student involvement, the main reason the office was created in the first place. As an institution that accredits itself for creating a diverse medical workforce, this recent action calls into question whether the institution continues to embody these values. As the nation’s first medical school and as one of the first in the nation to open a minority office, the Medical School has created a trailblazing legacy of influential decision m aking. Unfortunately, its current policies concerning undocumentedDACA and minority students do not meet expectations. The number of
I felt helpless and scared at the thought of losing my mom. My feelings were exacerbated by the lack of Spanish speaking physicians in the hospital.” ing to provide medical care to uninsured patients. But due to the high volume of patients, my mother withstood hours of pain before receiving care. I felt helpless and scared at the thought of losing my mom. My feelings were exacerbated by the lack of Spanishspeaking physicians in the hospital. In the middle of all this chaos, I was forced to act as the cultural and linguistic liaison between the physicians and my mother. My family’s experiences are not singular. Undocumented Latinos continue to be alienated in the medical system, which aggravates the disproportionate rise of chronic diseases among this population. Unfortunately, the medical profession has fallen behind in addressing these health disparities. Using census data, a study published by Sánchez and
came the first medical school in the nation to publicly accept undocumented students. They recognize that undocumented students often come from bicultural and bilingual backgrounds that can meet the diverse needs of underserved populations. Additionally, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges, prestigious universities, such as Harvard, Stanford and Yale, now consider undocumented applicants for admission. Still, many medical institutions have not embraced progressive admission policies for undocumented applicants. As a senior at the University of Pennsylvania, I have been privileged to receive a worldclass education. However, when I apply to medical school, I will not be considered for admission at my school’s medical program, the Perelman School of Medicine.
medical institutions of similar caliber and endowment that admit and finance undocumented DACA students will continue to rise. The Medical School has the opportunity to enact policy that will, once again, build much n eeded diversity in the medical profession that will readily address the growing health disparities among underserved communities.
EMMANUEL CORDOVA is a College senior studying health & societies and Hispanic studies. His email address is ecordova@ sas.upenn.edu. He is a member of Penn for Immigration Rights and PreHealth Dreamers, a national community of undocumented pre-health students.
Seeking engagement not divisiveness
JENNIFER WRIGHT Deputy News Editor
Unsigned editorials appearing on this page represent the opinion of The Daily Pennsylvanian as determined by the majority of the Editorial Board. All other columns, letters and artwork represent the opinion of their authors and are not necessarily representative of the DP’s position.
Undocumented medical students: Opening the doors and addressing health disparities
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hen Students Organizing for Unity and Liberation first formed on campus toward the end of the last school year, we were intrigued by its stated mission to “elevate the political and social consciousness of the student body at Penn” while “educat[ing] the masses on how to take action.” We hoped that SOUL’s aim would be to contribute to an expansion of intellectual diversity and meaningful exchange regarding issues of race and power structures on campus and in the world around us. With the benefit of hindsight, however, we can unfortunately observe that this hope has been dashed. Rather, SOUL has at every turn sought to in-
GUEST COLUMN BY DILLON WEBER AND AIDAN MCCONNELL voke controversy and division in order to distinguish themselves on campus. Their mission of division was more evident than ever this past Friday when SOUL demonstrated outside the Phi Delta Theta fraternity house on Locust Walk, equating the purchase of a blow-up sex doll by a college student to the purchasing of human life by slave owners in the pre-war South. A slave auction? Really? We would like to ask SOUL what exactly it aimed to achieve with this demonstration beyond the stoking of social and racial tensions. Tactics such as these, which are so openly hostile toward large groups of the student population, add little value to
the discussion of race, gender and power, and serve only to drive wedges between people who should instead be coming together. Take the further example of the white robe-adorned student, meant to represent a Ku Klux Klan member, holding hands with another student dressed as a police officer, which occurred not long before the protest Friday and was also put together by SOUL. The irony, of course, is that police protection allows this University to exist, and it is those same police who ensure SOUL can hold such demonstrations without being chased off campus by an angry mob. So what should SOUL do? One clear step is to tone down the rhetoric and the extremism.
Whether you feel the Christmas photo was offensive or not, all reasonable people can agree it was not tantamount to slavery or the purchasing of slaves. The next step might be holding open discussions and forums rather than inflammatory demonstrations. A crucial step might be inviting conservative leaning groups to these discussions and ensuring the conversation remains civil and fact-based — perhaps by inviting a professor or administrator to moderate. As conservatives on campus, we know how incredibly intimidating it can be to go to an “open discussion” that will be anything but for someone on our side of the political spectrum. For those who disagree with SOUL, the responsibility
then falls to us to attend such forums and state our views intelligently. Overall, SOUL has not been a boon to constructive dialogue on this campus. It has alienated many, who would otherwise be willing to engage in meaningful discourse, through its aggressive and extreme tactics. Instead of catalyzing exploration of racial issues and struggles, SOUL has damaged the environment for debate, unfairly portraying many on the other side of the debate. Its members have consistently shown that they are unwilling to even listen to an opposing viewpoint, most recently by rejecting those who approached them on Friday to calmly discuss the supposed grievance. When SOUL
is ready to sit down and have productive discourse rather than see who can shout the loudest or make the most talked about demonstration, they will have lived up to their mission. Until then, it betrays the spirit of true progressive discourse and resolution of conflict at every turn, hurting the causes it seeks to advance.
DILLON WEBER is an Engineering junior studying chemical & biomolecular engineering and economics. His email address is dillonw@seas.upenn.edu. AIDAN MCCONNELL is a College junior studying political science. His email address is aidanm@sas. upenn.edu.