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FEATURES & ARTS

MISH lends a hand in Turkey and Syria ELLA BLACK Contributing Writer

hen nature takes on humanity; kindness prevails. On Feb. 6, citizens in Turkey and Syria were awoken by a 7.8 magnitude earthquake. Thousands of people were killed and there was destruction across Turkey and Syria. As the Masters community heard about

this devastating event, questions on how the school help arose. Elena Olivieri, the faculty advisor of MISH, heard about the earthquakes and knew that MISH and the Masters community had to get involved; however, she struggled to think about how. She said “We want a culture of being a power for good, and we want everybody involved in service work.” Olivieri first decided to write a newsletter talking about the earthquakes and gave everyone a list of organizations that the community could donate to. An organization highlighted in the newsletter was AFYA. Oliveri recently led a weekend trip to AFYA, an organization that donates critical

medical supplies to underserved health systems globally. Originally, Olivieri was supposed to drive the bus that dropped Masters’ volunteers off at AFYA’s warehouse, but she decided to join the volunteers inside. Olivieri quickly formed a relationship with the founder, Danielle Butin. After word of the earthquake, Olivieri’s relationship with the founder inspired her to rally our community to donate. “If it has to be monetary, at least we know where the money is going. We know it’s a trusted organization” After the second earthquake in Turkey and Syria, Charlie Manzano, the president of the AFYA club, partnered with MISH. They’re working together to get students to volunteer at AFYA. He said, “One goal

this year is to strengthen the connection between the Masters School and the foundations and allow for more engagement on Masters’ part.” A bake sale is planned to raise money for those impacted by the Earthquake. Olivieri said that the easiest way is to volunteer at places like AFYA. One can also lend support to students in our community who may be impacted by this event . Peter Newcomb, head of The Upper School, recently led a moment of silence in solidarity to those impacted at Morning Meeting. Oliveri said, “It doesn’t need to be a $1,000 donation or five hours; it’s just being mindful of what our impacted Masters’ students might be going through.”

Alumni have been carrying the school’s mission statement post graduation. Nil Sera Gungor ‘20, a college senior at Babson College, said, “I don’t think it’s gotten nearly the amount of media attention it should,” She’s passionate about the cause because she has many family members from Turkey. Though her family wasn’t directly affected, she said “If one person feels pain, we all feel it.” Gungor believes that the death toll of the earthquake could’ve been lowered if Turkey had earthquake proof buildings. She believes that the best way our Masters community can help is spreading awareness and donating. Her plea to the community was this. “If you want to be a power for good in the world, think of people above profits.”

Turkish government plays a role in earthquake death toll MAIA BARANTSEVITCH & ELLIE YANG Editors-in-chief

s immediate relief and rescue continue to play a crucial role in the weeks after the devastating earthquake in Syria and Turkey, questions have arisen regarding the long-term recovery of the region. Along with this are concerns about how one can contribute their support and ensure that it is going to the right cause. Turkey is currently under an authoritarian government, with President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan as head. The Turkish government has had strong control over the country’s media and judicial system, enacting many years of oppression and opposition between Turks and Kurdish groups. Series of baseless accusations and investigations ensued among politicians, journalists, and even human right defenders in Turkey. The internal corruption of the Turkish government has caused countless disruption of communities, abuse of power in the parlia-

ment, and lack of safety for many Turkish citizens. This internal corruption has seen an especially deadly result in light of the recent earthquake. Under Erdoğan, a pillar of the Turkish economy was construction and real estate. However, only a small circle of Erdoğan’s acquaintances were granted rights to infrastructure projects, and often built homes and infrastructure without following the proper safety codes. This led to massive damage in the earthquake and the complete collapse of many residential buildings, government buildings, hospitals, and even airports. These ties between the corruption of the Turkish government and the deaths in the recent earthquake has prompted skepticism regarding the government’s rescue and disaster relief efforts. Turkish Philanthropy Funds (TPF) is a community based non profit organization in New York City. They partner with over 70 organizations and have been involved in disaster relief since the earthquake. Seline Green, communication director of the fund, said that it is important to donate to the organizations which are transparent and helping local communities. “It is really important to make sure that people are donating to the right places. We at TPF stand

behind our transparency and we also stand behind our vetted partner organizations,” Green said. This is an issue which will remain persistent, especially as the regions affected by the earthquake continue to recover long-term. “This is going to be a long-term recovery. We are looking at not only addressing the immediate needs right now, but also the long term needs,” Green said. All across Turkey, displaced people are in need of support to rebuild their lost homes. “We also work on building lives or rebuilding homes, and ultimately getting people back on their feet,” she said. The internal corruption of the Turkish government and the role it might play as Turkey slowly rebuilds after the earthquake are both important topics on which students might raise awareness. By addressing the issues these non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are providing relief for, students, and many others, are able to improve the lives of many Turks currently living in

FEATURES & ARTS

TOWER/MARCH 10, 2023

NEWS ANALYSIS

New look at “War and Peace” : why we need to recognize and study Russian imperalism VIKTORIIA SOKOLENKO Staff Writer

hen I come across the “aesthetics” reels on Instagram about Anna Karenina or see my American peers put

a corrupted country.

communist symbols on their laptops, I wonder if they would similarly celebrate the British empire or the US colonists. When I think of the USSR and Russia, I do not see the cute images or political ideals. I think of their imperialistic policies, my family, my people and many other nations, whose history and culture was either stolen or ridiculed and who were subjected to endless poverty and persecutions by Moscow rulers. The challenge of recognizing Russian colonial imperialism is a direct result of the mostly West-centered view on the issue. In the more well-known examples of British or French Empires, colonization was rooted in racism, which was not always the case in Russia. Moreover, the conflict between Russia and the West caused many to

Ninth grade required reading provides context for protest in Iran CHANEL NEAL Contributing Writer

ecent protests that have struck in Iran relating to strict government mandates around restricting women’s dress and activity is contextualized in nineth grade required reading of “Persepolis.” The novel is about a young girl, Marjane, growing up in Iran during the Islamic Revolution, which provides context for the injustices that still persist today. Since the Islamic Revolution in 1978, an authoritarian regime has taken over the Islamic Republic of Iran. More recently, in 2022, an Iranian woman named Mahsa Amini was detained and murdered by officials after going in public improperly observing hijab, some of her hair being visible, a direct violation of one of the regime’s laws.

Her death led to a rise of protests throughout the nation, making Persepolis an even more relevant reading in our community. English teacher, Miriam Emery, said that the reading along with the revolts has been a complete coincidence. This reading has been taught alongside other memoirs such as Trevor Noah’s “Born a Crime”, meant to analyze how political events can shape the course of one’s upbringing. Emery said, “On the surface, someone who hadn’t heard of the graphic memoir, or of the Islamic Revolution in 1979, might think, ‘I don’t think I’m gonna like this. I’m not into politics, and I know nothing about Iran and that part of the world.’ And by the end, almost every student did like the book and would see a lot of connections between themselves and the characters.” Ninth grade have been able to more effectively analyze the recent spark of protests in Iran because of Perspolis’ appeal to teen life as it relates to growing up in political turmoil. Chloe Mackay, freshman, who read the novel, said that it was a relatable story about “finding ourselves and coming to terms with

who we are,” no matter how different those circumstances may seem. Mackay further explained that the novel debunked misconceptions that she and many of her peers may have had about the Islamic Revolution in terms of women’s role, religious implementation, and government regimes in general. She said, “It definitely gave me more context and it was easier to empathize with the character knowing that she was around my age. It could have so easily have been you,” Mackay said. Persepolis is set during and after the Islamic Revolution, but the themes of the novel are present in Iran today. Emery’s neighbor, Nazanin Mahallati, is an Iranian woman now living in Hastings-on-Hudson, who spent 18 years of her life in the midst of post-Islamic Revolution Iran before moving to the United States, speaks to these similarities. When it comes to the recent protests in Iran, Mahallati said that her experiences as a high school student involved being “punished for little things” that she and her peers should not have been, which makes the recent protests

associate the former with being an anti-West and, thus, anticolonial power. While the first assumption is not false, the second one is far from being true. In the early 20th century, when colonialism finally started to lose support in the West, Moscow began to broadcast an image of itself as an anti-colonial champion to international audiences. Lenin even famously named colonialism the final stage of capitalism. Putin in his recent speech about the illegal annexation of several Ukrainian regions called Russia’s actions “decolonization” and in 15 minutes mentioned the word “colonialism” 11 times. Despite such rhetoric, the Russian empire, the USSR and now Russia have continued to build typical colonial structures inside their borders. The prominent feature of imperialism is the economical and social divide between the center (Russia/Moscow) and the periphery (Eastern Europe, Baltic States, Caucasus, and Central Asia). Such inequality is usually achieved through the centralized control and disregard for the needs of the colonized regions, economic and social oppression, and forcible assimilation, which leads to identity loss and cultural erasure. For example, both the USSR and Russian Empire, have long imposed “the great” Russian language and culture on many indigenous and subjugated peoples forcing them to lose their cultural identity. The execution of a whole generation of Ukrainian writers known as “The Executed Renaissance,” the massive deportation of Ukrainians to isolated parts of the USSR, and the Ems Ukaz (edict) that prohibited publishing of literature in Ukrainian are just a few examples of Russia’s colonial policies against Ukraine. Similar examples can be found for any other nation subjugated by Moscow. Colonial imperialism would have been impossible to sustain without the belief system it promoted. To justify the oppression of other countries, the empires such as the USSR or Russian Empire often reinforce the

idea that their people are superior to other nations and, thus, have some inherent right to rule and oppress them. The propaganda of such ideas often elevates the colonizers’ culture and ridicules and simplifies to cliches the culture of the colonized people. For example, in Soviet and Russian media, the language of the oppressed countries has often been portrayed as stupid, aimed for the village or at most for the family dinners, while Russian language has been depicted as intelligent, the language of science and education. Such propaganda becomes so deeply ingrained in the minds of people who live in the empire that it is impossible to point out the media produced by the empire’s center that does not somehow support those stereotypes. Russian literature is no exception. While recognizing the imperialist ideas in the works of many Western writers, most American and European readers prefer to ignore similarly dangerous ideas in the Russian literature. For example, many Western audience do not know that their beloved Dostoyevsky in his “Diary of a Writer,” celebrates Russia’s victory in Turkmenistan (another Russian colony) and expresses his hope for people “all the way to India” to “become convinced of the invincibility of the white tsar.” Tolstoy in his novel “War and Peace” disregards the perspective of Polish people and modifies the actual history of Vilnius meeting Tsar Alexander I to further elevate the Russian army. Lermontov in his novel “A Hero of Our Time” repeatedly describes the indigenous people of Caucasus as uncivilized and tries to construct a sympathetic character out of the Russian officer Pechorin, who kidnaps and abuses a Circassian woman. Virtually all famous Russian writers helped to justify Russia’s imperialist policies, promoted Russian exceptionalism or excluded the voices of oppressed nations. For many years, this literature has shaped how the West viewed Eastern Europe, Central Asia, and Baltic Countries and led many to neglect the actual history and culture of those regions. Unlike in other known empires, in the USSR and the Russian empire, and now in Russia, no work has been done to recognize their imperialist past and present and counteract it. From the incredibly popular comedy TV series “My Fair Nanny” that ridicules Ukrainian culture to constantly using ethnic

slurs for almost every single ethnicity, the imperialist mindset is alive and well in Russian culture. Such ideas are reflected in Russians’ attitude to their former colonies that they consider worthy of respect only if they cooperate with Russia. Russia’s imperial ambitions towards its former colonies have already resulted in Russia’s wars in Chechnya and occupation of Ukrainian (in 2014) and Georgian territories (in the 1990s and 2008) and eventually has led to the full-scale invasion of Ukraine that started in 2022. The overwhelming support of Russians for the invasion comes from the prevalence of imperialist ideas such as that Ukrainian people (being “less educated”) need the help of Moscow to succeed. Being used to the caricatured image of stupid Ukrainians or the idea of “brotherly” relationship between Ukraine and Russia, Russians struggle to comprehend that their former colony can actually exercise its right of self-determination and not accept Russian “help” with open arms. The West has turned a blind eye to Russian imperialist policies for centuries and now has to deal with the consequences. Without recognizing and counteracting the Russian imperialist mindset, we can not hope for the cultural revival of the subjugated nations within Russian borders or for political independence of Russia’s former colonies. If the Slavic departments of American universities keep centering Russia at their course offerings and research, the culture and history of former Russian colonies will continue to be disregarded. If high school World History curriculum or college courses about colonialism continue avoiding the topic of imperialism in the Russian empire, the USSR, and modern Russia, Americans will keep falling to Russian propaganda and being “surprised” at Russian chauvinistic views. Instead of idolizing Pushkin or Tolstoy, obsessing over Russian culture or praising Soviet leaders, Americans should educate themselves on Russian imperialism, critically analyze what they think they know about Russian history or culture, and amplify the voices of formerly subjugated nations. Only this way can they counteract imperialism around the world and help create the platform for all the nations colonized by Russia.

“Made in China” China’s economy as its borders open dropped as a result of decreased output from its factory in China under Covid-19 restrictions. “Made in China.” This is the phrase we see on our clothes, computers, toys, jewelry and the list goes on. However, what is the economic market that is behind these three words? How has the pandemic and the recent reopening of Chinese borders influenced its production? Since the start of the pandemic in 2019, many Chinese factories have stopped production, causing a decrease in China’s manufacturing output. In 2020, China’s annual GDP growth rate dropped to 2.2% compared to the previous six percent in 2019. This number increased in 2021 to 8.1% when the pandemic in China stabilized, and is predicted to drop back down to 3.3% in the upcoming 2022 data. Now, with the recent reopening of Chinese borders and an increase in international trade, R

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(while at a larger scale) familiar. According to Mahallati, the required reading of Persepolis is a step in the right direction. She went on to say that spreading awareness on this issue can be done effectively through literature. Mahallati said, “Through introducing books that are written by Iranian young immigrant writers who have been in the country and experienced it, they can voice their experience through their literature and through their writings. Personal experience, either verbally or written, speaks better than other people talking about it who haven’t experienced that themselves.”

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MAIA BARANTSEVITCH & ELLIE YANG Editors-in-chief

student walks into the Apple store in hopes of obtaining a new charger for their computer, but to their surprise, Apple is out of stock. This might have been the case for you last year, when Apple’s stock

the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has predicted a GDP growth of 5.9% for 2023. These predictions correlate with the increase in Chinese products in the international market as factories return to full capacity. For example, metal processing companies around the world are seeing the reopening of the Chinese economy and borders in a positive light. China’s non manufacturing PMI has increased from 41% in 2022, to most recently 54%, showing an increase in employment, inventories, and production. Senior Youri Lee, head of the economics club, said, “Iin terms of opening trades, it is definitely a positive for both China and the world. Especially in the United States, as China opens up the exports, it will decrease the price of the goods in America, which will help America’s objective to decrease its inflation rate.” However, behind this positive trend of the moment, many western companies have begun to, and are shifting their factories

to be located in southeast Asian countries such as Vietnam and Indonesia. This could be a result of many factors: including the pandemic, Chinese foreign policies, and the price of labor. Lee said, “Contrary to common knowledge, Chinese labor price is actually rapidly increasing at a point that the Vietnamese market is becoming more attractive.” Politically, China’s international policies and stances have also prompted some companies to move out as fear of tense foreign relations arise. Sam Scheinbach, senior and student in the economics course, said, “China’s economy is likely to grow in the near future, but if they keep making the wrong moves with Taiwan and other foreign policies, then it will probably go downhill in the future.” While the “Made in China”’ tags seem to push the prominent role the country plays in the global supply chain, the country’s high population and demand might also be

an important factor upon its reopening. There have been concerns surrounding the pent-up demand in China after three years of pandemic restrictions. Many fear that global inflation might worsen as demand, in particular for energy and gasoline, rises since China holds the second largest consumer population in the world. From water bottles to keyboard circuits, China’s manufacturing power has continued to hold power over our country’s consistent consumerism. Looking forward, there are positive, negative, and mixed predictions for the future as China reopened its economy. But one thing is for certain, after the ups and downs of pandemic policies, “Made in China’’ stickers are coming back. Lee said, “As China opens their borders and increases manufacturing, it is almost certain that it can help the global economy in the near future.”