October 2018
4 Pulling Away from the Station: The New Face of the Los Angeles Metro Kyra Hudson
10 Tuning into a New Trend Casey Kim
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The Dark Truth About Nursing Homes Kaitlin Musante on the cover
Volume 2, Issue 1
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Take a Stand Sofia Heller
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McCain Pulled It Together for Nonpartisanship Emma Shapiro
20 No Shame in the Thrifting Game
Madison Huggins
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Issue
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Pulling out of the station: The New Face of the Metro
Tuning into a new trend
By Kyra Hudson
By Casey Kim
8 Written in the Stars By Lauren Nehorai
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The Dark Truth about Nursing Homes on the cover
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Take a Stand By Sofia Heller
19 McCain Pulled it Together for Nonpartisanship By Emma Shapiro PANORAMA MAGAZINE
No Shame in the Thrifting Game By Madison Huggins
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By Kaitlin Musante
2
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How “Wellness” Accounts are Bringing Girls Down By Kaitlin Musante
Editors-in-Chief: Sofia Heller Kaitlin Musante Senior Editors: Ryan Albert Kendall Dees Lucas Gelfond Alex Goldstein Sophie Haber Jenny Li
Junior Editors: Caitlin Chung Kyra Hudson Madison Huggins Casey Kim Spencer Klink Lauren Nehorai Emma Shapiro Lindsay Wu
Adviser: Jim Burns Head of Video Production: Kerry Neil
Panorama Magazine is the student magazine of Harvard-Westlake School, and is affiliated with The Chronicle, the student newspaper. It is published four times per year. Letters to the editor may be submitted to chronicle@hw.com or mailed to 3700 Coldwater Canyon, Studio City, CA 91604. Letters must be signed and may be edited for space and to conform to Chronicle style and format.
Letter From the Editors
As frazzled juniors navigating continuous storms of stress, fixated on grades and scores, Panorama Magazine established itself as an anchor in our lives. Serving as our creative refuge, it gave us the opportunity to untangle ourselves from the pressures of everyday life through our passion for design and human interest stories. At its core, Panorama aims to inform the community around it as well as engage readers through dynamic vi-
suals. As this year’s editors-in-chief, we plan to maintain the same level of integrity, impact and innovation that made us eager to show up to layout every day last year, while also expanding our online presence and scope. Through our brandnew website (hwpanorama.com), we are excited to introduce new video segments and continue pushing the boundaries with original design. We are honored to be this year’s editors-in-chiefs.
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Pulling Away fromtheStation:
The New Face of the Los Angeles Metro By Kyra Hudson
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efore this summer, I had only ridden the Metro (Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority) to get to the Women’s March. I never really had a need to ride it before, since I always had car rides or Ubers available to me. This summer, however, I found myself needing to travel to Downtown every day for an internship; so, for six weeks, I rode the Metro. Every morning and every evening, I took the same Red Line Train. The best thing by far was going Downtown during rush hour without having to angrily sit in traffic thinking of how I could better use my time; I would even say it was a luxury. The lack of WiFi on the train, while seen as an issue for many others, gave me 35 minutes every day to read the “Crazy Rich Asian” series and listen to the entirety of my Spotify playlists. In short, I loved my time on the Metro. Despite my pleasant personal experience, I was also upset about my previous lack of knowledge of the Los Angeles transit system. Why had I never used this incredibly useful resource available to me for only $1.75 a ride? The reality is that the Metro’s reputation had proceeded itself: from
friends and family I had heard that it was ineffective, unsafe, and not worth the hassle. In fact, I heard many complaints about the lack of geographical coverage and organization of the system. Metro currently has lines going to areas such as Downtown, Azusa, Santa Monica, and Long Beach. While these lines do cover some of Los Angeles, many riders say it does not cover enough of the city to be a viable option for getting around. Additionally, riders bring up the concern that the delays can be up to 20 minutes without announcement and the number of transfers makes even driving in rush hour more timely. “The delay times are insane,” Jessica*, who rides the metro four to five times a week, said. “I’ve had my trains be delayed more than 20 minutes. Sometimes, it would make more sense to drive in rush hour than wait for the train.” According to the Los Angeles Times, ridership of the Metro dropped to an all-time low in 2017 to 100,000 riders. In comparison, the New York subway had upwards of 1.7 billion riders in 2017. The rise of ride-share alternatives like Uber and Lyft, along with their convenience, is one of the main reasons for this million person decrease, the article said. However, according to the Los Angeles Times, riders bring up another concern: their safety on the Metro. In a 2016 survey, 29 percent of former riders told Metro they stopped taking transit because they felt unsafe. “The low ridership is due to the disparity of wealth,” Noah*, a frequent Metro rider, said. “Most folks who live in the more affluent neighborhoods of Los Angeles will not ride the metro regardless of how practical it may be in terms of cost and efficiency because most law-abiding and working people don’t want to be exposed to potentially dangerous and mentally ill people.” Despite the decrease in riders, Metro has started many projects to transform Los Angeles’ entire transit system to reduce traffic and solve mobility problems. Metro aims to complete 28 transportation projects in time for the 2028 Olympics and Paralympics, which will be held in Los Angeles. These projects have aptly been the titled “Twenty-Eight by ’28”.
“Winning the 2028 Olympic Games gives us the chance to re-imagine Los Angeles and ask ourselves what legacy we will create for generations to come,” Mayor Eric Garcetti ’88 said in an email. “Twenty-Eight by ’28 will help us frame the progress we’re striving to make in the years leading up to the Games. This initiative is our opportunity to harness the unifying power of the Olympic Movement to transform our transportation future.” The plan consists of major road, transit and bicycle projects. 17 of these projects were already scheduled to be completed, eight are deemed aspirational and have not been started and the last three require obtaining additional resources before breaking ground. For example, I-405 South Bay Curve improvements had been scheduled to be completed in 2047 but were pushed to be completed by 2028. While all of the projects were scheduled to before the plan was introduced, the plan requires them to be completed in a much shorter time frame. These projects aim to provide the necessary expansions to the Metro system in order to make it a highcapacity transit network long after the games conclude, according to the Metro Board Report. Despite these efforts, however, many Los Angeles citizens said that they are still concerned about the lack of safety on the train, not the technological improvements. The polls, however, told a different story. Voters approved both Measure M and Measure R, setting the plan to expand and improve the Metro system in motion. Measure M imposes a retail tax of .5 percent within Los Angeles County in order to raise funds for improving the transit system in Los Angeles. Measure R is a half-cent sales tax for Los Angeles County to finance transportation projects. Senior Transportation Planner in the Office of Extraordinary Innovation at the Los Angeles Metro Nolan Borgman said this project can be split into two categories- projects that were scheduled to be completed before 2028 prior to the announcement of “Twenty-Eight by ’28” and those scheduled to be completed after. While “Twenty-Eight by ’28 has been helpful in pushing along the projects scheduled to finish before
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2028, Borgman said, there has been speculation amongst many Metro employees, including himself, that the others are too ambitious and may be difficult to complete. In order to financially support this project, Metro’s budget was increased to $6.6 billion for the 2018-2019 fiscal year, increasing an additional $281 million from 2017-2018 according to the Metro Board Report. For every dollar that is spent in Los Angeles, 2 cents goes to the Metro budget, making this the Metro’s largest budget ever. Despite these budget increases, the Metro still doesn’t have enough money to fund these projects, Borgman said. “We haven’t identified all the funding for some of these projects yet,” Borgman said. “The funding of projects is very complex, as is the financing.” According to Measure M, Metro is unable to take funding from one project in order to finance another, meaning that they need to have a large amount of money on hand in order to start a project. Due to the large number of projects being funded right now, it is difficult to have such a large amount of money in reserve, and borrowing is not a sustainable option, Borgman said. While the expansion and improvement of the Metro will help solve problems like the prevalent mobility prob-
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lem, other issues arise. For years, the Metro stations have served as a refuge and shelter for the homeless Service Authority. As the homeless population has continued to increase in Los Angeles County, reaching a record high of 58,000 homeless individuals, this use of the Metro as a shelter has quickly become both a safety and sanitation issue, according to the Los Angeles Times. In order to combat this growing crisis, Los Angeles has dedicated $430 million to aid the homeless for the 2018-2019 fiscal year according to the Los Angeles City’s Budget. While this is a seemingly large budget, it is billions less than Metro’s budget for this year alone. Due to a surge of complainants, the Metro Transportation Authority has increased the budget for law enforcement and security by 37 percent, but they do not have any more public plans about increasing the security on the Metro, according to the Los Angeles Times. Furthermore, none of the projects in “Twenty-Eight by ’28” attempt to increase the safety of the Los Angeles Metro users. According to recent surveys facilitated by the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority, these complaints are driving many riders away.
“My family doesn’t like me riding the Metro because they think that it isn’t the safest option,” Sabina Yampolski ’20 said. “There are really large amounts of people clumped together in one location and there is very limited security.” Another way Metro is trying to tackle the homeless crisis is by implementing a new social worker program. This is the first program of its kind in a major public transit system and has a $1.2 million budget for a one-year trial run, according to the Metro Board Report. The outreach workers will spend time trying to help the homeless population throughout the Los Angeles area. While Los Angeles is making an effort to improve the safety of the different people using the transportation system, it is still unclear if it will be enough to raise ridership to a sufficient level after the number of funds, time and energy being spent on “Twenty-Eight by ’28” according to Metro riders. “The closest stop to my house is a mile away, so I would have to drive there in order to actually get on,” Kerry Neil ’19. “So, for me, it’s not about safety, it’s about convenience. Even though they are putting a bunch of funds in, I would only use it if it was easy for me to get to from my house. Twenty Eight by ’28 alone is not enough.”
Photo Illustrations by Kyra Hudson and Spencer Klink
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Virgo: (10/07-10/13) Strap on your seatbelt, you are in for a long ride! Monday will bring a new discovery, Wednesday may hold some speed bumps, but by Friday you will reach your goal as you move into your sixth house of success. Astrology is defined as the study of the movements and relative positions of celestial bodies that influence human affairs and the natural world. It was introduced to the Greeks in the 4th Century BC and became renowned through the studies of Plato and Aristotle. However, the use of astrology has greatly transformed beyond its original purpose of predicting the reoccurrence of seasons, now being used as a tool to predict the course of a week, the future of a relationship, the prosperity of a business deal and more. While some see astrology as a scam filling otherwise blank pages of tabloid magazines, many others use
astrology as a means of exploring their inner selves and find deeper meaning in everyday moments. Astrologist and President of the Los Angeles Council for Geocosmic Research Gaye Nelson has been doing readings for over 30 years and said she believes that astrology has enabled her to have a more peaceful and predictable life. “Most people come to me seeking answers through electional astrology,” Nelson said. “Through this practice, I can assist decision making and date planning for a surgery, wedding, business deal and more. Through my calendar which is synced to the lunar cycles, I can see specific dates and times which I call ‘void periods’ and I urge them to stay away from committing to anything during those periods.” Nelson creates charts based on 14 factors and 30 personality types. An individual’s chart is determined
based on their birth date, place and time, which can provide insight into one’s strengths, weaknesses, and destiny, Nelson said. Charts can also be created to determine compatibility in relationships as well, Nelson said. “Planets are divided into four quadrants, each with a different purpose and importance in one’s life,” Nelson said. “Planets above the horizon are outer-directed and career-oriented, whereas planets below the horizon are based on inner growth and self-development.” Many Harvard-Westlake students implement astrology into their daily lives, looking to their horoscopes as a source of guidance and reassurance. Katie Frazee ’20 has a daily horoscope app and said she resonates with the characteristics of her sign. “I check my horoscope everyday,” Frazee said. “Everything they say about a Capricorn’s personality
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is very applicable to my own [personality]. I usually base my day off of my horoscopes predictions, and if it says I am going to have a good and lucky day, that’s usually what happens.” Frazee has ventured deeper into the world of astrology than the typical horoscope reader, she said. She said she has a collection of astrology books and devotes a lot of time to learning everything she can about her personality. “I believe that astrology is very meaningful, and I now see the effects of small moments that I would typically overlook,” Frazee said. “I recently purchased a few books on astrology, horoscopes and interpreting dreams, and I have been reading them non-stop. I want to know everything I can not only about my own sign, but the signs of my friends and family too.” Not all students buy into the hype, however. Although Kylie Azizzadeh ’21 said she used to love horoscopes and personality quizzes, she said she outgrew the obsession a few years ago when she realized they were not having a visible effect on her life. “It all used to be very exciting,” Azizzadeh said. “You were almost granted psychic powers and given the ability to see your fate for the upcoming week. Although my fortunes were often times accurate, I realized how general horoscopes can be. This makes them easy to resonate with, but when you find some-
thing to resonate with for every astrological sign, it makes you question their reliability.” School Psychologist Tina McGraw said that some people use astrology as a method of validating characteristics and reducing anxiety about the uncertainty of the future. “For some people, their horoscope becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy,” McGraw said. “If you are someone who is prone to believe that astrology has a palpable impact on life then it is possible to conclude that having a negative or positive daily horoscope may set up your expectations one way or another.” Max Valdez ‘20 said he believes that astrology is a scam with no actual effect on people’s lives. “I am very opposed to the idea of horoscopes,” Valdez said. “I don’t think that just because the stars align in a certain way or if the moon is a certain shape, it means that you will ace a math test, or that your crush will send you a message in an unexpected way.” Nelson said she doesn’t deny the opinion that psychics and astrologists can be inaccurate. Despite having a background in therapy and psychology herself, Nelson warns against those who don’t share an equal amount of experience. c ol l e a g u e s “A lot of my they are know what talking about, but never I would let them
do a reading for me,” Nelson said. “Some of them use their knowledge against people, and some are smart but negative. While I try to be honest and warn clients when I see something harmful in their path, there is a proper way to say it that won’t permanently turn someone off from the entire field of astrology.” Nelson also stressed the fact that most horoscope writers are not astrologists and that the horoscopes people find in magazines are often inaccurate. “Horoscope means hour pointer,” Nelson said. “The idea of it is that a horoscope points to the time of your birth. Your chart is based on a snapshot of the sky from the exact time, date, and city of your birth and it gives insight on key personality traits. Not all people born with the same astrological sign have the same chart, which is why horoscopes are very general and imprecise.” Some blame all negative events on the fact that mercury is in retrograde, and others hardly know the name of their astrological signs. Despite potential inaccuracies, Azizzadeh said she believes that following astrology can be fun and, in the end, it only affects people as much as they want it to. “Although I am not a firm believer in astrology, I know I will always be tempted to read information about my sign whenever it is presented to me,” Azizzadeh continued. “It can be fun and reassuring as long as you don’t let it take over your life and attitude.”
Queen of Swords PANORAMA MAGAZINE
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By Casey Kim
Podcasts have become a popular trend among teens and adults alike. Illustrations by Spencer Klink 10
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After a long day at school, Abe Kaye ’20 sat in his car, immediately unlocked his phone and began scrolling through his podcast playlist on Spotify , pondering what he should listen to on his ride home. Ever since he started driving himself this year, Kaye said that he has enjoyed listening to new podcasts, as they serve as a break from his usual music playlists. Although podcasts were once considered a small and mundane media platform, they have recently become a popular trend among teens and adults alike. According to a 2018 Edison Research and Triton Digital survey, 44 percent of Americans ages 12 and older have listened to a podcast, and 26 percent listen to a podcast every month. The wide variety of subjects that various podcasts cover and their accessibility online add to their appeal, Chronicle podcast host Rachel Brown ’20 said. “Podcasts are born and raised on the Internet,” Brown said. “This means that they no longer have to be made for a wide audience, but instead can be made for a specific audience, no matter how small. I don’t see any podcasts that are aiming to please everyone anymore. Instead, I can find podcasts specifically talking about Supreme Court cases or what happened last week on ‘Westworld.’ Since there is such a variety of podcasts, you can find exactly what you want very easily.” For Brown’s new podcast, “HW Goes Back to the Future,” she conducts interviews with Harvard-Westlake alumni about how their high school experience has influenced the rest of their life. Starting her own podcast has allowed her to speak about her topics of interest, Brown said. “I decided to start [a podcast] because I heard that starting one is the modern equivalent of starting a band, and because I can’t play any instruments, I have really been drawn to the idea of a podcast,” Brown said. Podcasts are also unique from other media platforms like television, as they allow people to multitask, Lindsey Kratochwill, a producer at podcast network Panoply Media, said.
“Living in a city, it can be difficult to read a book on the subway when you barely have enough space to stand,” Kratochwill said. “But it is easy to listen to a podcast. For car-commuters, it’s something to do while they are in traffic. I also listen to podcasts while I wash the dishes or clean my apartment. They are good for moments when you can not look at a screen. At the same time, they also feel enriching in a way that watching a TV show on Netflix doesn’t always feel.” Kratochwill produces a variety of podcasts at Panopoly but said she enjoys exploring new podcast genres outside of her work. “In my free time, I like to listen to podcasts that surprise me and tell a compelling story,” Kratochwill said. “Because it’s not as close to the work I do, I really enjoy listening to fiction podcasts. ‘Within the Wires,’ which is made by Night Vale Productions, and ‘Bubble,’ which was made by Maximum Fun, were two I’ve enjoyed recently. They are both simple, but a little strange, and it takes me out of the real world for a while.” Not only do podcasts provide a great source of entertainment, but they also create intimate connections with their audience, which encourages listeners to engage with their content even further, Brown said. “Podcasts are unique in a way that I truly feel that I am friends with the people who I am listening to,” Brown said. “When I am listening to one, I feel like I am listening to my friends talking about a subject I’m also passionate about and interested in. It feels as if I can insert my own opinions in the conversation at any moment, and that the people hundreds of miles away on the podcast would be able to respond.” The ability to learn new things from listening to podcasts also makes them unique from other platforms, Kaye said. “You’re not necessarily there just for entertainment, but also to learn something, which is not always true with TV shows,” Kaye said. “It also allows podcasters to be more honest, and it isn’t set
up, or at least it doesn’t seem that way.” The diversity of guests featured on his favorite podcasts make them even more engaging, Kaye said. “I listen to the A24 podcasts, which is the film company that produced films like Lady Bird, Moonlight and Eighth Grade,” Kaye said. “They have really cool guests like Barry Jenkins and Greta Gerwig, and it’s a great podcast for [people interested in] film.” Although their combination of providing information and entertainment can be intriguing , podcasts have the power to easily sway their listeners’ thoughts, blurring the line between fact and opinion, Kratochwill said. “Since [podcasts] straddle journalism and entertainment, they can often do things a reporter,or traditional journalist can not, like expressing a strong opinion or trying to influence the listener in some way,” Kratochwill said. “I think this is what makes it enticing but also treads a difficult line sometimes. Is a horrific crime really something that should be seen as entertainment? What are the checks and balances to ensure that podcasts handle topics with the right amount of care and accuracy? I think these are things we should think about as listeners, and obviously, as creators, especially given the intimate nature of the medium.” In the workplace, Kratochwill said that she tries to overcome these difficulties by pushing for more variety in perspective in the content she produces for different podcasts. “The work is fun, but it is a little difficult to be in an industry that’s still figuring itself out,” Kratochwill said. “The barrier to entry isn’t very high, so I love that we have the opportunity to broaden whose voices get heard. I want to make sure I’m advocating support for diverse voices, from my place in a company that produces shows. I also love that it’s an industry full of people who want to keep pushing the boundaries and innovating with things listeners haven’t heard before, rather than just creating more of the same.” PANORAMA MAGAZINE
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the dark truth about nursing homes
Photo Illustration by Kaitlin Musante
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By Kaitlin Musante
Courtney Cargill scribbled her initials and destination (“library, etc”) on the sign-out sheet and checked out of her nursing home. Walking nearly a quarter of a mile to the nearest gas station, she purchased two items: a plastic jug and a gallon of gas. She then removed her clothes, doused her body in gasoline and lit herself on fire, surveillance footage shows. The 57-year-old’s death four years ago sparked a nationwide conversation about the treatment of the elderly. Blaming her suicide on the lack of care at the nursing home where she was staying, South Pasadena Convalescent Hospital, her family took on nursing home mogul Shlomo Rechnitz of Brius Management Co. Inc., in a wrongful death lawsuit. The family accused him of “maximizing profits from the operation of the facility by underfunding, understaffing and undertraining the staff” with “callous indifference to the potential for injury they were inflicting upon the resident population,” according to court documents. “She was basically treating herself,” her sister Cathy Cargill said in an interview with The Sacramento Bee. “I just think her needs hadn’t been met for so long. She just couldn’t handle it anymore I guess.” While Rechnitz was forced to give up ownership of South Pasadena Convalescent Hospital and government regulators decertified the home, the greater problem of understaffing remains. A July report from Kaiser Health News showed that most nursing homes had fewer caretaking staff than they had reported to the government, confirming resident suspicions that staffing levels are often below the state-mandated requirements. Even nursing homes that accurately report their staffing levels and meet these requirements still fall short of the necessary care. A study by the National Consumer Voice for Quality Long-Term Care showed that 97 percent of nursing homes don’t have enough nurses and nursing assistants to provide adequate care to avoid risk to residents. Without at least 4.1 total hours of direct care each day, residents are much more likely to be harmed. California’s minimum PANORAMA MAGAZINE
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requirement is one of the highest in the nation at only 3.2 hours, and many states have no requirements at all. This severe understaffing can lead to issues with food, medication and the quality of care, Executive Director of Long Term Care Ombudsman Services of Ventura County Sylvia Taylor-Stein said. “In nursing homes, there is a very, very small labor force to draw from,” Taylor-Stein said. “That’s what creates all of these problems: there’s not enough staff, there aren’t enough certified nursing assistants, there aren’t enough people taking care of the residents. The people working in the nursing homes can be doing a fabulous job, but there’s just too many people for them to care for.” Taylor-Stein pointed to a general lack of interest as the root of the issue, saying that the low pay and “messy” aspects of the job make it unappealing to Californians specifically. “We have a very transient population,” Taylor-Stein said. “We are a huge but we “Aside from the nurse, state, also don’t that no one is monitoring have many young them. If the nursing people wantassistant can’t be there, ing to go into this field. In they’re going to get poor other parts of the countreatment. ” try, in smaller states that Irvine Gonzalez don’t have as many opFormer nursing assistant portunities and it’s more homegrown, there are more people willing to do this work.” Nursing homes across the nation, however, lose potential nursing assistants to hospitals with more appealing hours and pay, contributing to the overall issue. This can take a toll on both the residents and the caregivers, Taylor-Stein said. Former certified nursing assistant Irvine Gonzalez said he found himself over-worked and unable to effectively care for all patients
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in need due to the severe lack of staffing when he started his job at an Aristacare in New Jersey. He said that patients would sit in pools of their own urine and feces while waiting for a nursing assistant to finish with another patient, leading to severe bed sores and bacterial infections. Nursing assistants would run from room to room to keep up with the constant number of flashing call bells. He recalled instances when some dementia patients would lay in the halls after falling for hours at night, unbeknownst to him and his fellow nursing assistants busy with patients elsewhere. “A lot of these people don’t even have family who come visit them, so aside from the nurse, no one is monitoring them,” Gonzalez said. “If the nursing assistant can’t be there, they’re going to get poor treatment.” Gonzalez blamed this understaffing and low-quality care on the fact that most managements focus on profit rather than the safety of both the residents and staff. “It was definitely more of a business than a caring thing, as much as they would like to make it sound like it wasn’t,” Gonzalez said. “It’s all business. If they could do the job with four instead of six or seven, they’re going to do it with less, as long as they can get by.” However, David Gifford, Senior Vice President at the American Health Care Association, a nursing home trade group, told The New York Times that there are legitimate reasons for lower staffing levels. Weekends, for example, have fewer activities and increased family visitations, requiring less staff members, he said. Nursing home resident Anita Medina, who wished for her location to remain undisclosed, disagreed with Gifford, saying that a lack of staffing even on weekends has led to dangerous situations in her home. She recalled a time where her roommate fell from her bed, knocking her head hard enough to require a hospital vis-
it and a number of stitches. Yet, even when she tugged on the call rope hanging in her room, which was supposed to send a staff member running in their direction, no one came. Medina, who said she can’t afford to leave the home due to the high costs of living elsewhere, also said that the lack of staff training at her facility has fostered an unwelcoming and hostile environment. “[The staff are] like bullies in a school and nobody can reprimand them because they have good reasons or good excuses,” Medina said. “They talk to you like ‘stop that’ or ‘go sit down’ or ‘sit over there.’” According to a study by the National Center for Biotechnology Information, patients in understaffed nursing homes are at a higher risk of suffering from elder abuse and a lack of personalized care, leading to a variety of health risks. Marin County native Tracey Ayres discovered this when she checked her mother into Flagship Healthcare Center after her mother broke her femur while making the bed. Ayres said she expected that her mother would spend about six weeks in physical therapy, healing and learning to walk again, before she was released. Instead, her condition only worsened. As days passed by without improvement, nurses and the physician’s assistant told Ayres that her mother may never recover, Ayres said. “In one moment, she went from being a pretty active, independent senior to someone who we were told that basically would spend the rest of their life in bed dying,” Ayres said. “We just didn’t believe that was the only alternative.” And it wasn’t––Ayres discovered weeks later that the pins holding together her mother’s femur had come undone. Despite daily physical therapy and checkups from medical professionals, the issue went unnoticed by Flagship’s staff, Ayres said.
“The bone was as broken as the day she had hurt it,” Ayres said. “She basically lost her mind. She was out of her mind with pain, constantly, 24 hours a day. I blame Flagship for all of that. They should have gotten her in to see a doctor, they weren’t giving her proper level of care, and there weren’t enough people to adequately care for her.” Ayres said that in order to get a nurses’ attention, she would need to stand around the computer station and interrupt, only to be told that someone else, who often never showed up, would help. “Nobody would even look at me,” Ayres said. “I could never find anybody to answer my questions or to help with anything. If I did, it took a very long time. It seemed like nobody wanted to help or talk with me. They were way too sparsely staffed and they might be meeting requirements for state mandates, but they aren’t meeting requirements for optimal patient care.” While Ayres was eventually able to hospitalize her mother for another surgery, improving her physical condition, she said the emotional effects of the lack of care at Flagship have stayed with her mother. “By the time she left, she was no longer the same person,” Ayres said. “She had lived with this pain for ten weeks. When she returned to her house, the house she had lived in since 1964, it took her four months to even believe it was her house. She did not know where she was. That’s how much damage she sustained during her time at Flagship.” While the ombudsmen, who work as advocates for the elderly attempt to nip issues like these in the bud, it becomes more and more difficult the less frequently they visit, Taylor-Stein said. Due to Ventura County mandates, volunteer ombudsmen in the area visit each nursing home at least twice a week, and problems still arise almost every time, Taylor-Stein said. In Los Angeles, the ombudsmen are only re-
quired to visit facilities once a quarter. This is not nearly enough time to effectively eliminate all potential problems, Taylor-Stein said. “If you were in a nursing home and you saw an ombudsman only once every three months, you probably wouldn’t even know what they do and you certainly wouldn’t feel comfortable talking to them,” Taylor-Stein said. “I think a lot of our success and complaint reduction has been because our volunteers get to know the residents really well and the residents trust them and are willing to talk to them.” In Ventura County alone, residents issued over 900 official complaints last year. Before the county issued the requirements, complaints could total over 4,000. These numbers are even higher across the state, Taylor-Stein said. But the solution isn’t as easy as simply sending out more volunteers. While the Ventura County program is privately funded, most ombudsmen programs are run through the government and are given an extremely low budget, Taylor-Stein said.
“In the state of California, seniors are not a priority and this program is not a priority, so it makes it hard for these programs to exist and do an adequate job across the state,” Taylor-Stein said. “Without our private funding, we couldn’t do it. Our state needs to start caring.” As far as the issue of understaffing itself, Taylor-Stein said she doesn’t see the problem resolving anytime soon unless serious changes are made to staff salaries and management systems. In the meantime, while elders continue to suffer, Taylor-Stein stressed the importance of uniting to help. “They don’t have a voice,” Taylor-Stein said. “When you think about someone who is 90 years old, they are bedridden, they may have debilitating arthritis, they may have heart failure, and no one in that position feels strong. So much of their power has been stripped away by their age and by their debilitating diseases, so it’s really crucial that they are able to have someone who looks out for them. We need to be their voice. ”
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bortion is healthcare.” Like many teenagers, I was scrolling through Instagram on my phone after school. Sitting with my backpack unopened at my feet, unceasing thoughts racing through my mind about the stresses in my world that day, I scrolled through Instagram when I came across a Planned Parenthood graphic that read, “Abortion is healthcare.” The post stopped me dead in my tracks, or rather in my mindless scrolling through my “feed.” I was immediately empowered. The purpose of the post, as I would learn in the caption, was to ask people to take action to stop the confirmation of Supreme Court Nominee Brett Kavanaugh, who threatens abortion rights. I followed the steps in the caption that detailed Planned Parenthood’s guide to advocating, but I closed the app feeling like it wasn’t enough. I was scared of everything I had read about Kavanaugh. About the direction the Trump administration was heading. About women losing their right to choose, losing Roe v. Wade. I felt an immediate threat heading my way, and all my natural instincts were telling me to do everything I could to stop it. I didn’t know how to, though. And I had tests to study for and essays to write, so I put down my phone and opened my backpack.
I feel ashamed as I write this and admit that despite a visceral reaction to take action, I did nothing more than click a button. I feel even more shame knowing what was to come. About a week after seeing that post, Christine Blasey Ford came forward and accused Kavanaugh of sexually assaulting her. Ford said in an interview with The Washington Post that Kavanaugh pinned her to a bed, groped her and put her hand over her mouth when she tried to scream at a party as teenagers in the early 1980s. My previously abstract fear of Kavanaugh became all too concrete as I read that article. A flood of #MeToo emotions came over me, as did feelings of guilt. Ford’s decision to come forward with her story and testify before the Senate shows immense courage and activism. Ford stood up in front of a national, even international audience, and boldly stated her truth. It took all the courage I had just to post a Change.org petition on Facebook. There is no excuse for not participating in our democracy. We must use our voices to advocate for ourselves, our beliefs and for others. Go to the marches. Call your senator, your congressperson, your local repre-
sentative. Sign petitions. Vote. I am not sure what’s going to happen with Kavanaugh. I don’t know if he will still be confirmed like Clarence Thomas was in spite of Anita Hill’s testimony. I hope not. I hope that the #MeToo movement really has changed things, and the Senate understands that a man who sexually assaulted a woman is not deserving of a seat on the Supreme Court. And he is certainly not fit to rule on what a woman can do with her body. I don’t know what’s going to happen with Kavanaugh, but I do know that I am going to do everything that I can to stop his confirmation. Individuals can make a difference, just look at Ford. Today, I opened Instagram to find another Planned Parenthood post. It read, “Join us in a national walkout and moment of solidarity. Wear black, and show solidarity with Dr. Blasey Ford. Stop Kavanaugh. Believe survivors.” This time, I’m not turning away to focus on my own inner stresses, to open my backpack and shut out a desire to stop Kavanaugh. I’m going to show solidarity, and I’m going to take a stand. *Up to date as of press deadline
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Illustrations by Sam Ko
McCain Pulled it Together for Nonpartisanship By Emma Shapiro
Before John McCain was
laid to rest, he requested former President Barack Obama to speak at his funeral service but banned current President Donald Trump. The simple request led to massive media coverage, not only because of the denial of his attendance, but because the death of McCain symbolized an end to respectful politicians and the current divide within the Republican party. Throughout his 21 years as a senator, McCain developed a reputable name for himself. He is most notable in my mind for winning the 2008 Republican primary and going head-to-head against former President Barack Obama in the 2008 election. This past year, McCain publicly spoke about his discontent with the current president by discrediting President Trump’s bills. Trump tweeted negatively regarding the highly respected politician, and after McCain’s passing, the president hesitated to
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put the symbolic flag at half mast, according to CNN . McCain consistently cared more for the individual and the country as a whole rather than his own party and its sometimes outlandish beliefs, which made him a truly inspiring politician for both Democrats and Republicans. My definition of a respectful politician is someone focused on the betterment of the country instead of the betterment of his own political party. John McCain exemplified these characteristics by repeatedly dismissing rumors made by members of his party and instead crediting other politicians for their work. By judging the work of Democrats or Republicans as the quality of the work opposed to the work being deemed a “Democratic/ Republican” bill, McCain was able to separate his party’s beliefs from his own logical judgment calls. Additionally, during the 2008 election, the former Arizona
senator spoke out against false claims towards the Democratic candidate Barack Obama, and tried to put any false sense of discomfort to bed, which was covered by many news outlets. Despite being confronted with questions by voters about Obama’s religion, McCain was able to eloquently and effectively deter the conversation and persuade his voters to vote for him because of his ideas, not because the other candidate is Muslim. Politicians who automatically agree with their political party’s bills and decisions ultimately lose their voices and opinions on issues that they can differ from their own party. The divide in the Republican party is most evident during the presidency of Trump. Despite McCain and Trump’s unity through their party, their positions were very dissimilar because of their differing political backgrounds and views on the future of America. Throughout his presidency, Trump has been unable to see eye-to-eye with many politicians, primarily Democrats. McCain voiced his concern with Trump’s authority, and there was animosity between the two, especially when McCain voted against Trump’s bill to repeal ObamaCare. Moreover, McCain’s funeral showcased a divide within the Republican party due to his request to not have the Trump family in attendance. Denying his invitation continued to prove the
political differences between the two and the widespread beliefs within the Republican party. A sense of the new republicanism beliefs towards the current president and his followers differs from the more uniformed republicanism of more experienced politicians. The feud between Trump and McCain is well known by the public and led to backlashes from the president directed at the former Arizona senator. Despite being put under a microscope by the supporters of Trump’s presidency, McCain remained firm in his beliefs. During the most recent election, McCain endorsed Trump’s campaign initially, but in my opinion, that was due to him winning the Republican primary, not because of the similarities in their viewpoints . More importantly, following the allegations against Trump, he withdrew his support. By withdrawing his support, it shows that although the issue wasn’t politically related, McCain would never align himself with the scandals surrounding the Trump campaign and the type of politician Trump is. McCain’s views on policies proposed by other members of his party didn’t deter him from remaining firm in his personal beliefs and what he perceived to benefit the country as a whole by voting against it. He wasn’t bullied into submission. The entire world would be remiss to not thank McCain for his years of public service and his devotion to making the country a better place.
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PHOTO ILLUSTRATIONS BY CAITLIN CHUNG, SOFIA HELLER AND MADISON HUGGINS
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The morning trek through the suffocating masses of the quad, teeming with kids to whom the accumulation of clothing is both as natural and as necessary an act as breathing, has become a familiar scene in the picture many paint of the daily HarvardWestlake experience. However, few are familiar to the straining sensation in my throat in having to both swallow the fear and cough up the courage to come up with a less embarrassing answer to the inevitable question when someone compliments the contents of my outfit that could pass for UNIF, but I know very well came from Goodwill. However, the shackles of judgement have been lifted thanks to the second-hand sensation that is sweeping the nation, commonly known as “thrifting.” Over the past few years, an act that was once often followed by a silence only shattered by the echo of awkward sighs has exploded into our popular culture. The second-hand lifestyle has
seeped into our Instagram explore pages, Buzzfeed articles and YouTube subscription boxes. It has even successfully infused the strictly fast-fashionoriented content that courses through the veins of every beauty vlogger on the face of the earth with the musky scent of history sewn into the patch of five dollar vintage Tommy Hilfiger mom jeans hiding somewhere in the depths of Savers clothing racks. Not only has thrifting wiggled its way into the millennial vernacular, but it has done so with verb status. “I haven’t always second hand shopped,” now avid thrifter Sarah Bagley ’20 said. “I started probably when I was a freshman because it was a fun thing that me and my friends liked to do when we hung out. I saw that it was something that my friends were doing, so I thought that I would try it out.” The subtly stuffy, fluorescently lit, graffitied thrift store dressing room, whose corner is accented
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“What appeals to me most about thrifting I think is finding gems: mom jeans, vintage-y things that look cool.”
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stores. “With thrifting for me, I have to clear my mindset,” University of California, San Diego freshman Natalie Hun said. “I don’t even hope or anything because I probably won’t even find anything good. What appeals to me most about thrifting I think is finding gems: mom jeans, vintage-y things that look cool and kind of just finding my style.” Bagley said that after investigating more in depth about how terrible the concept of fast fashion is, she’s turned to second hand shopping as a more ethical as well as enjoyable alternative. “I definitely still have fast fashion in my wardrobe and occasionally buy fast fashion from the clothing store I work at, but luckily at this point most of the fast fashion in my wardrobe is from years ago,” Bagley said. Although second hand shopping as recreation appears to have been embraced in our popular culture, there is no denying the once phobic attitude towards the idea of purchasing used clothing perpetuated a certain shame and self consciousness that has, and continues to be woven into second hand garments along with their price tags. “I started in 9th grade because my grandma loves coming to thrift stores, and she would drag me in,” Jessica Gonzalez said. “At some point I was like, ‘you know what,’ I’m already here might as well look around and I liked a lot of things. I like it because it’s different. You’re not wearing what everybody else is wearing.” However, before its explosion into pop culture, not everyone was willing to give thrifting the same chance Gonzalez was. While at this period I am spared
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only by discolored smudges you don’t want to get close enough to be able identify, is now the place to be. Because it came from the mouth of Emma Chamberlain herself it must be gospel. Eager social media influencers will stop at nothing until the thrifting golden rule that no aisles go left behind permeates your conscience with such violence you start to believe that just because race car pajamas typically don’t fit into your daily aesthetic the little boy’s section shouldn’t be knocked until it is tried. In my attempt to allow Hank Green’s oddly soothing Crash Course European History videos to take a crack at untangling the three stages of the French Revolution, the thrill of thrifting is often not only tickling the upper lefthand corner of my conscience, but of my computer screen as “Come Thrift with Me,” “Collective Thrift Haul” and “Thrift Swap” videos galore swallow the “UP NEXT” bar of my YouTube screen. “Secondhand clothing and vintage items are showing up in couture, street wear, even everyday office wear,” Yasmin Amer and Michaela Vincent, the writers of CNN News article “Thrifty Shoppers Rediscover Secondhand Fashion” said. “Besides the incentive of saving money, thrifting has also become trendy.” According to the National Association of Resale and Thrift Shops, the industry is growing at a rate of five percent a year, a number whose significance is evident considering that the growth rate in retail stores from 2013 to 2014 was less than four percent and the growth rate of discount department stores decreased two percent over the same time period, according to the United States Department of Commerce. “I find myself here more than the mall,” Celeste Plascencia, a seasoned thrifting professional, said. “The mall just frustrates me, I’m not gonna lie. I just feel I’m there for one specific item and then I’m out. I’d rather just go thrifting.” This shift toward thrifting has therefore transformed the places once solely understood as wastelands of the remnants of people’s spring cleaning into an unlikely rival for fast fashion
- Natalie Hun
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comes from knowing they have the ability to close their minds to it at their leisure. However, while the fact that my personal motivation for thrift shopping migrated from more of a need-based to a want-based territory, the flame of love for thrifting that had long since been ignited only burned more ferociously, in others it was just being kindled. “As I get more interested in fashion, going to second hand stores is more fun because it’s like you’re traveling through the past,” Bagley said. “All the old styles are so cool and interesting.” The polarizing trends that sprinkle our Instagram feeds are so called because they can be torn out of our interest just as easily as we are pulled into them. Because of this, daunting prices give customers the excuse to not dip their toes into their latex two-piece sets, clear raincoats, or dare-I-say cheetah print fantasies. However, the flexibility of thrift store prices loosens the restriction of price tags from around the creative muscle, especially for those with limited resources who are rarely able to seize the opportunity to stretch it. “I definitely think that my style has evolved as a result of my exposure to thrift stores,” Bagley said. “Whether it’s what my friends are wearing or people I follow on apps like Depop, my style has changed a lot in the past few years. I get a lot of pieces now that I would never buy a few years ago and my general openness to fashion has expanded.” One can now be unafraid of taking a scissors to the jeans whose conformity to the waist is straight out of our dreams but fit along the legs is torn straight from our nightmares. The one instance in which we are allowed to run with scissors also decreases the probability of
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-eb sgniht raew dluohs I taht dezilaer I taht kniht I“ -yreve esuaceb ton dna looc er’yeht kniht I esuac
the view of the underside of people’s noses when they do that pretentious head bob after learning the purchase location of the pair of boots they were just drooling over a few minutes ago, it wasn’t always this way. “To overcome prejudice against used items, thrift stores emulated department stores displays,” said Erin Blackmore, author of the JSTOR Daily article “How Thrift Stores Were Born.” The wall of stigma between the prospect of that darling blouse having touched the back of a stranger before it touched the back they were just praising has been evident to both me and thrift stores themselves, and has in turn sacrificed an unbiased appreciation of clothing itself for disapproval of where it came from. There was a time in my life where money was a bit tighter for my family. In such a period when the word frugality had a special spot in the back of my conscience, both the array of options and flexibility of prices found at thrift stores was more of an practical option. The thing is, I didn’t mind. There was just something about the sensation of delicately tracing the curvature of engraved chrysanthemum outlines on the brass buttons of a corduroy jacket I could have sworn I saw Rachel from “Friends” sporting in one of her no-less-thanflawless season three ensembles that was irreplaceable. If I could walk through the melodically creaking thrift store doors with a receipt for 12 items whose total would match that of one item at Urban Outfitters, why wouldn’t I? However, while I had no difficulty in reckoning with the idea that someone else’s trash could become my treasure, I couldn’t seem shake the self-consciousness I felt brush past me in the halls along with the Yeezys and Gucci slides. The sudden, and frankly suspicious, gravitation toward an activity that had to endure such a phobic perception in society for so long brings to attention the possibility that maybe those who have only recently decided to open up their hearts to idea of secondhand shopping have only done so because of the security that
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walking past someone perhaps many have not moved as far in the diin the hall with an outfit rection of acceptance of thrifting as I’d hoped. that looks horrifyingly faAs anyone in search of answers to pressing miliar. questions about the quality in content and serThis appeal has al- vice of any type of establishment, I took to Yelp lowed the definition of to confirm my potent suspicions. The comment “second hand” to take section of upscale, Studio City, secondhand on all new form. Beyond shop Wasteland was riddled with complaints of just going to thrift stores, people, who were unpleasantly surprised with more and more people are H&M rejects that ranged from $30-50, purnow going to vintage shops. chased clothing customers were enraged to find “I go to the more high end second hand originally just $2 more on the store’s website shops like Buffalo Exchange and and customers to whom sales asTattered,” Hun said, who finds sociates’ cold glares felt penetraherself frequenting the cool cous- “I like it because it’s tive and lacked “human decency” in of the humble thrift store more different. You’re not was more than what I needed to often than traditional stores. “I rm the disdain I proudly harwearing what every- affi have been to Goodwill. It’s just bored for these thrift store imposthat it’s harder to find things that body else is wearing.” tors. are cuter and actually fit me.” I decided that it was necessary Although Hun said she has to feel the frost of these cashiers’ Jessica Gonzalez found upscale second-hand stares before writing my concluHigh School Junior shops more compatible with her sion in stone. than traditional consignment While slightly incriminating, I stores, such as Goodwill, I find must admit that before the indiemyself especially wary of the shops whose egos rock melodies of Buffalo Exchange filled my are just as inflated as their price tags that have ears, I had nothing but the desire to report the been sprinkled down Melrose, masquerading most nightmarish experience possible. Howunder the very characteristic that once repelled ever, from the striking yet comforting contrast shoppers by dangling the word “trendy” out the between the industrial water pipe in place of a window. clothing hook in the store’s dressing rooms and What is particularly unsettling to me about the mismatched bohemian curtains that covthe creation and subsequent success of these ered them, to the smiling buzz-cut girl workstores is that they are only made profitable by ing the try-on counter, there was nothing that the fact that the concept of used clothing has would make me hesitate to visit again. been deemed socially acceptable by the people The building, wedged cozily in the pathto whom it is not even necessary. ways of yoga moms from the Proactive Health The sacrifice of the primary allure for tradi- clinic and pedestrians lazily floating in on the tional consignment stores––affordability––and intoxicating aroma of Indian Cuisine on either the mere few steps from the door of Buffalo side of it, proved to be a wonderland sprinkled Exchange to Urban Outfitters has proven that with prices significantly higher than your typi-
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cal Goodwill, but were excusable when I realized they were attached to a pair of Doc Martens whose worn leather skin dusted with use I wouldn’t even allow myself the hope of finding in a traditional thrift store. Although I expected, and maybe hoped, to walk out of the store even more appalled by prices than I had predicted, the empty arm that swung open the door to this new land closed it with an arm of two adorable pieces that have done pretty well for themselves on that once exhausting morning trek across the quad. While I am happy that thrifting has found its way into our hearts along pathways of variety of motivations, Gonzalez reiterates that the relief from financial hardship plays a significant role in shaping how and why thrifting fits into people’s lives. “I don’t have the most money, and before, I would shop, and my money would go by after three pairs of jeans,” Gonzalez said. “It went by fast, and at some point, I needed more clothes. I found myself buying more at the thrift stores, liking more stuff and having more variety.” Like Gonzalez, many have found that while it may not be the only thing holding together pieces of their lives, the reasonableness of thrift store prices has provided relief in one form or another. Because a large percentage of the population whose lives fill the statistics of the pie charts that prove thrifting’s upsurge in popularity have done so not out of necessity, they will be left bruise-free when it eventually falls out of society’s favor.
The popularity in thrifting among people that would characterize $2.99 t-shirts as something more convenient than life saving has its repercussions. “I have absolutely seen consequences of us partaking in thrifting when some families need it for survival,” Bagley said “For example, I’ve noticed at big thrift stores like Goodwill, prices have been steadily going up for a while now. They are also constantly crowded and picked out by people who thrift for the trend.” It’s incredibly convenient that something so easy on the wallet is in style, but when $5 mom jeans soon cease to be nearly as revered as they are now, those whose thrifting motivation is strictly recreational have the wiggle room to shift back their perspective. We as a community must be sensitive to the fact that those who view the act of second hand shopping solely through the lens of necessity do not have that luxury. For them, thrifting is a constant, not a trend. For the future, the fact that every single person who provided the thrifting chapter of their story promised that, like the Grinch whose perspective changed to see good in Christmas, their hearts would maintain the size necessary to hold a love for thrift shopping when everyone else around them shrinks back keeps me hopeful.
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How wellness accounts are bringing girls down By Kaitlin Musante
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Joanna Kuang traced the lines of her rib cage with her finger, admiring the way the dressing room light further contoured her protruding bones. Her mother, standing in the shadowed corner of the stall, reached out to her daughter’s bare back and ran her fingers down the knobs of her spinal cord. Kuang froze. In the mirror, she said she could see tears streaming down her mom’s cheeks. “At that point, I finally realized that I didn’t exist in a vacuum,” Kuang said. “My anorexia was hurting other people, too.” The New York teen’s eating disorder had begun around six months earlier when she started counting calories for a nutrition experiment in her freshman biology class. Soon she was severely restricting her food intake, turning to social media for diet tips from young girls “skinnier” than her. “I would see these accounts and think that pictures can’t lie,” Kuang, now 19, said. “I thought that that is what I could do if I just ate how they ate and I worked out how they worked out. Then, I thought I would look just like them. I could be just like them.” A new crop of wellness accounts, run by teens and young adults with no nutrition background, is on the rise on platforms such as YouTube and Instagram. Some have amassed tens of thousands of followers. Despite purportedly health-focused motives, these accounts often promote unhealthy eating behaviors, leading to the development of disordered eating and body dysmorphia, nutritional therapist Lauren Cash said, who specializes in eating disorders. “Eating disorders don’t happen because of these accounts, but they feed off of them,” Cash said. “Young girls prone to eating disorders and disordered eating will cling to anything that is restrictive or promising a certain body type through tips and tricks.” For Natalie Rabe, 22, the allure of a toned, lean body pushed her to follow a meal plan from a popular model and wellness blogger, who advocates a low-calorie, low-carb diet, she said. Although she said she felt hungry and malnourished for the majority of the plan, the college student saw results fast, losing 10 pounds in just two weeks. Soon into her “transformation,” Rabe said she reached out to the model to share her results. To her surprise, the social media star not only responded but sent even more tips, telling her to cut out snacks, stop
eating around 6 p.m., work out twice a day and reduce her portion sizes to get leaner even quicker. “It made me feel great that someone who is so influential in the world, as she has a decent amount of Instagram followers, actually took the time to care about what I was doing and care about how I was doing,” Rabe, who still follows the account, said. The sense of community promoted by these girls adds an appeal that accounts run by older influencers lack, registered dietitian Samantha Giertych said. The downside is that, most of the time, the advice is not substantiated by fact, Giertych said. “These accounts are like a false sense of social connection,” Giertych said. “Girls feel like they are participating in a movement to better themselves and be healthier and more fit. However, it is all based on the amount of exercise they are doing and what they are eating.” Such get-fit-quick ideas can be psychologically damaging for young girls, Giertych said. According to a study by the National Institute of Health, 44 percent of young girls believe they are overweight due to social media and 60 percent are trying to lose weight. The constant flow of photos from these online accounts praising the “thin ideal” quickly loops teens into a cycle of restriction, therapist Doug Skelly-Brown, who specializes in eating disorders, said. “They see these accounts and have this goal weight in mind, but once they reach it, they don’t look or feel the way they thought they were going to because of the distortions that are happening in their brain,” Skelly-Brown said. “There isn’t ever a place where magically they get to and get happy.” Buying into these ideals can also be dangerous physically, as the diets often don’t provide enough nutrients to satisfy, Cash said. In one video on a popular YouTube channel, between clips of a thin blond model and her sister wearing customized sports bras, the influencer recommends her followers eat a restrictive diet of just few slices of turkey breast, an egg white scramble and a dozen pieces of sashimi to be “runway ready” in just five days. Consuming such a small amount of food can lead to bone density issues, muscle atrophy, neurochemistry imbalances, osteoporosis and energy deficiencies, Giertych said. Beyond promoting unhealthy eating
habits, the wave of social media influencers can also lead young girls to associate feelings of guilt with certain foods. In a video posted by a wellness blogger on her YouTube, a model stares longingly at a cookie, begging “I swear to God, I need one... just let me hear it crisp.” Popping a piece of cookie into her mouth, the model slinks back over her sister’s sighs. Skelly-Brown said viewing such behavior on-screen can spark food-associated anxiety and low self-esteem in young girls. “If we feel like we are a bad person or that there is something wrong with us for following a biological, physiological, natural inclination, we can start to develop all sorts of identity issues and self-esteem issues,” Skelly-Brown said. “These are the things that really self-perpetuate this sense of feeling like our identity, our importance, our lovability, is going to be based on what we look like and what we put into our body.” Understanding this, however, has allowed some girls to buck the trend, Skelly-Brown said. Jordan “These accounts are Medina, 21, who followed like a false sense of a restrictive social connection. detox plan for a month Girls feel like they earlier this are participating in a year, said she began movement to better to unfollow these acthemselves.” counts after realizing their motiSamantha Giertych vation often revolved around appearances. “Sometimes when they post YouTube videos, it is all about losing weight,” Medina said. “I think that health isn’t about losing weight all the time; it’s about feeling good overall.” Arming young women like Medina with enough information to see through the ploys of sham wellness accounts is a crucial step in combating disordered eating and body image issues, Los Angeles-based author and pediatrician Cara Natterson said. “When these kids see someone in a white coat giving a lecture, the facts won’t resonate,” Natterson said. “We have to find a way to meet their generation where they are and send our message, and we need to send it over and over again, so that we can teach them how to take care of their bodies.” PANORAMA MAGAZINE
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October 2018
Volume 2, Issue 1