Fall 2020

The Good Life

Fall 2020

Letter from the Editor Hey! If you've picked up this magazine, first of all, thanks, and I love you for that. You're probably thinking, "The Good Life? Never heard of it. But it looks really, really cool and interesting and fun." Aww, you're too much! I'm blushing! To answer your question, though, TGL is SU's newest general interest magazine. I know Syracuse has, like, 20 magazines already, but we're not like the other magazines. We focus on solutions journalism. That means we report on today's issues and then tell you what organizations or everyday people are doing about it. We also have an art section for you to escape to when Julia's immigration article (pg. 23) gets a little too real.

I started this magazine because I want to get people inspired to make a difference. The protests this summer have shown how important it is to educate ourselves and take action to solve the country's issues. And there are a lot of issues to work on. I hope that TGL gives you some idea of how to get started.

Quick disclaimer: a solid 90% of this issue is about COVID. Sorry. No one wants to think about it, but everyone is talking about it, so we really have no choice but to write about it. Maybe next semester it won't be such a big story… ha ha.

Happy reading,

Profile Syeisha Byrd 󶀳

By Katie Hageman

Arnie & Kate

By Walker Simmons

4

Earth The High Price of Cheap Plastic 󶀵

By Audrey Perry

Beet Boxes

By Katie Hageman

1 | The Good Life Fall 2020

Lifestyle 6

Help Wanted 󶀷

By Ashlyn Umbach

The Good Life Morgaine McIlhargey Editor-in-Chief Katie Hageman Managing Editor

Natalie Muñoz Creative Director

Editorial Fashion Editor Julia Fesser Art Editor Abby Rosenstein Staff Riley Fouts Audrey Perry Walker Simmons Ashlyn Umbach

Photography Dan Lyon Sophie Walter Social Media Isaac Chapin Spencer Seligson Contributors Miranda del Sol Vivica Dennis Daisy Fey Marissa Hong

Harriet Brown Adviser The writing contained within The Good Life expresses the opinions of the individual writers. The opinions expressed herein are not those of the editorial board, Syracuse University, the Office of Student Activities, the Student Association, and the Student Body. The Good Life reserves the right to edit or refuse submissions at the discretion of its editors. The Good Life magazine is published twice during the Syracuse University academic year.

All contents are copyright by their respective creators. No content may be reproduced without the written consent of The Good Life editorial board.

Fashion Supply Chain Reaction

By Riley Fouts

Creativity (Un)masked How do you express yourself without facial expressions?

󶀹

Art Escape

What makes you want to escape? Where do you go?

Feature 󶀱󶀵

Green Future

By Audrey Perry

󶀱󶀹

The Race Game 󶀲󶀱

By Ashlyn Umbach

󶀱󶀰

What Happened to Lady Liberty? 󶀲󶀳

By Julia Fesser

Fall 2020 The Good Life | 2

Profile

Photo by Dan Lyon

Syeisha Byrd

The woman behind the crochet class

By Katie Hageman

A

s she looks up from a burnt orange twisted headband she is crocheting for an interested customer on Facebook, Syeisha Byrd reflects on what she likes most about working with students.

"I've always liked to connect people and work with people," Byrd says. "Especially young people, teenagers, young college students, folks that don't already have their mind made up. Many times, as adults, we have our mind made up, but with students, you're able to help mold them and grow them."

Syeisha Byrd, born and raised in Syracuse, works to introduce students to her city as the director of the Office of Engagement Programs at Syracuse University.

"We have really great, awesome people, caring people, in this city, and I'm sad sometimes because some of our students, faculty, or staff aren't able to meet some of these really great people," Byrd says. "I work towards making that happen."

Her office focuses on student sustainability, student leadership and community service.

Byrd oversees two food pantries and a garden on the Syracuse campus as well as hires, trains, and engages with students to develop strong student leaders. She helps

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students give back to the community and find their passion.

Jack Ramza, a junior, has known Byrd since his first semester freshman year. He's also in a crochet class she teaches outside of the Office of Engagement.

"Syeisha is one of the most selfless, caring, and determined people that I've ever met and worked with," Ramza says.

Byrd's interest in crocheting started as a way to reduce stress when she was eight years old.

She has crocheted ever since and started a circle in Hendricks Chapel four years ago for people to drop by and crochet during their lunch hour. This developed into a class that ended up having a student waitlist the first semester it was offered.

Maria Angiolillo, another student in the crochet class this fall, signed up to learn how to crochet a stuffed animal, but she got more out of the experience than she expected.

"I'm so happy I took the crochet class this semester. It was a lot easier to learn than I expected," Angiolillo says. "I'm also really thankful that I met Syeisha. She's really knowledgeable, and she's a great resource to get involved in the Syracuse community."

The class's success over the semesters pushed Byrd to challenge Syracuse University to make 250 crocheted items to donate this fall, focusing on the homeless population in the community. The idea sparked from both involving students in the community during COVID-19 (when there aren't as many volunteering opportunities as usual) and addressing the cold winters of Syracuse.

"I used to ride around Syracuse looking at people at bus stops with bright red ears and red noses with nothing covering their head," Byrd says. "I thought, you know, yarn is pretty cheap, and it's not hard to teach someone how to crochet or knit. What if I provided knit and crochet kits to staff, faculty, students, anyone who is willing to crochet or learn, and challenge them to make something?"

In class, Byrd teaches various crochet stitches and pulls up different free and easy online patterns. Every student tends to gravitate towards something they like making, and she lets them run with it. Byrd encourages her students to recognize the possibilities of crocheting and use her as a resource.

"You can make money with this, you can warm people with this, and you can touch people's hearts with this," Byrd says.

Arnie & Kate

Photo by Sophie Walter

The couple feeding Syracuse

By Walker Simmons

"I

met someone today who is home supporting a family member who just had twins. So, she has fiveday-old twins in her home. She has two other children who were home from school because today is one of those days where they are home studying remotely. Her husband is suffering from cancer and not doing well, and then she told me that today a tree came down in that big storm that happened in her backyard. I went in the backyard to just check her fence and make sure there wasn't greater damage."

This is how Arnie Artessa, a volunteer at the Interreligious Food Consortium (IFC) in Syracuse, describes his normal day. Artessa and his wife Kate, the executive director of IFC, tell the story of being a food consortium during one of America's most historical pandemics.

The IFC serves under-resourced food pantries, mainly smaller ones. They also support other emergency providers, like caseworkers, case managers, social workers, and teachers, who serve people dealing with food insecurity, like immigrants, the refugee population, and the migrant farm

population. While they normally act as a food pantry for food pantries, COVID-19 has pushed the Artessas to take IFC beyond its original mission.

"Although it's not part of our mission to do food deliveries, because we have the wherewithal to do it and because we have a truck, we are able to do some small deliveries," Arnie says. "I just did an emergency food delivery for a small congregational church down on the south side of Syracuse."

The Artessas explained how IFC and the pantries it supports learned a lot from the first months of the pandemic. They had to do a lot of problem-solving, but their biggest challenge was the lack of supplies in the initial scare, when local grocery store shelves were empty.

"There was disruption to the supply chain, and we didn't know where the food would come from for a period of time," Arnie says.

"One of the things from this pandemic was how do you secure your food and your supply chain? For a small pantry, even if they tried to stay open, where were they were going to get food from? How do you maintain service in

a pandemic? I don't think anyone had that in their manual."

The challenges brought by COVID-19 leave many people needing food, especially as the holiday season begins. Kate and Arnie say IFC is doing everything in its power to help.

"We have food. We give away food. We don't ask for any money. We don't ask any questions. We just give it to you," Kate says.

Arnie and Kate know that during COVID-19, more people are dealing with food insecurity. People who have never had financial problems before are needing help.

They say no matter who needs to be served, they will be served with respect.

"If you were in a room with most people, and you asked someone if they have ever been to a food pantry, they might say they have volunteered or donated or something," Arnie says. "I would say no, have you ever gone to one for service? It'd be rare that anyone would raise their hand. There's a stigma associated with going to a pantry and I assume that might apply to students, too. Pantries try to serve with dignity and remove that stigma."

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Earth

The High Price of Cheap Plastic Single-use plastic and COVID-󜀹󜀚

By Audrey Perry

M

ost people wouldn't be caught dead with a plastic straw in their Pink Drink, and no one would walk into Wegman's without their reusable tote. Plastic use has always been at the forefront of the sustainability movement.

Cutting down usage of single-use plastics is one of the easiest ways of reducing your ecological footprint, and in recent years, it's becoming easier and easier to do so. Every day, we were on our way to a more sustainable future. Until the coronavirus.

At first glance, it may seem that the repercussions of COVID-19 have been a good thing for the environment. Greenhouse gas emissions plummeted and air pollution cleared as planes were grounded, cars were parked, and factories were shut down to slow the spread of the virus. However, this was only temporary. As restrictions are lifted and people go back to work and school, greenhouse gas emissions are back on the rise. On top of that, the production of single-use plastic has increased to meet the high demand for sanitary options during COVID-19.

Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) is the most obvious culprit. A rise in the production and use of PPE, although necessary to curb the spread of COVID-19,

5 | The Good Life Fall 2020

has led to mass amounts of masks and gloves being improperly disposed of via burning or littering, according to a study by the Chemical Engineering Journal. Judith Enck, the president of Beyond Plastics and former Environmental Protection Agency regional administrator, reported a marked increase in mask and glove plastic pollution on city streets and suburban parking lots.

Then there are the online orders. With stores shut down and the health risks of going out in public, people have turned to the comfort (and safety) of ordering from their beds.

Amazon's stock increased by more than 60% this year. Those bubble-lined blue and white plastic packages are at every doorstep, and while they're technically recyclable, there's a whole multi-step process to do it effectively.

If the whole package is just tossed into the recycling bin, it will end up in a landfill.

Chris Harvey, an environmental engineering student at Syracuse University, offered his opinion about packaging, as well as reducing ecological footprints as a whole.

"Amazon's packaging methods aren't the best," Harvey says. "They send items in a plastic lined envelope and the envelope or box items come in are much bigger than the size of the actual thing you ordered."

In addition to PPE and online orders, food delivery has also become more popular during the pandemic. An Upserve analysis shows that restaurants have seen an 840% increase in online orders, which means more unrecyclable plastic bags, takeout boxes, and cups in the garbage.

"The individual needs food, and there has to be a sanitary way to do it, but businesses should also use biodegradable packaging or use cardboard instead of plastic," Harvey says. "But it's more expensive, so if businesses can't afford it, you can't really blame them."

The plastic pollution problem was already detrimental to the environment before the onset of COVID-19, with over 7 trillion pieces of plastic debris currently estimated to be in our oceans. And Enck of Beyond Plastics estimates that in the next decade, there will be one pound of plastic in the ocean for every three pounds of fish.

Harvey mentioned in one of his classes he learned about the history of the term "carbon footprint". BP, an oil industry company, created a PR campaign where they coined the term "carbon footprint" and focused the term on work, traveling, and buying food. It took the blame of damaging the environment off of BP and other similar corporations and instead placed it on the individual.

"As much as it's the job of each individual to reduce their carbon footprint, the bulk of the responsibility falls on larger corporations that refuse to change their methods because they want to save money," Harvey says.

Although completely stopping single-use plastic waste is a big task that will require the work of individuals, businesses, and large corporations, there are many things consumers can do right now to simply get started in the right direction. To start, wear a reusable mask. Not only are these effective, but they also come in a variety of fun prints and colors. Next, whenever possible, use your own reusable products, whether that be a coffee cup, utensils, or grocery bag. If your supermarket doesn't allow reusable bags yet, keep your groceries in your cart and put them in reusable bags in your car. Rather than buying individually packaged items, consider buying in bulk and storing that item at home in sustainable products. We can choose what to support and what not to support.

Illustration by Natalie MuĂąoz & Sophie Walter

Beet Boxes The need for CSA programs during the pandemic

By Katie Hageman

I

n March, hoarding paper products seemed like the appropriate response to COVID-19. As the months dragged on, everyone became a top chef or expert baker. Some people who didn't want to go to the grocery store, either out of concern for COVID-19 or an unwillingness to wait in a line to get inside, turned to Community Supported Agriculture (CSA).

CSA partners farmers and community members for fair produce prices by eliminating the middleman, the supermarkets. CSA members purchase a share of the farm's harvest and receive fresh produce throughout the growing season.

Shares can be picked up on the farm or, in some cases, delivered.

Common Thread Community Farm, located in Madison, New York, offers CSA boxes for the local Syracuse and Utica community.

Wendy Burkhart-Spiegel, one of the owners, started on this farm eight years ago with her husband, Asher, and has been involved with various CSA programs for 20 years.

"CSA got popular around 2008 or so, and then it grew and grew and grew and you could add and add and grow, but a couple of years ago, we hit some spot where all of the

CSA farmers had trouble filling their CSA orders," Burkhart-Spiegel says.

Suddenly, the pandemic hit and demand grew even more. The farm sold out of CSA shares for the 2020 season. The Common Thread Community Farm is one organization that has played an essential role in keeping local markets well-supplied with affordable and nutritious food. Due to a rise in food insecurity because of the pandemic, agricultural organizations (including CSA programs) are key in giving consumers access and fair prices to food, regardless of movement restrictions and income losses, according to The World Bank. An additional benefit, Burkhart-Spiegel notes, is that more people are supporting locals, something that will always be important.

"That's the way you're going to have vibrant local communities," Burkhart-Spiegel says.

"If we don't do that, all we're going to have is identical shopping malls or Amazon delivering to our door, identical low-quality, low-value goods with no environmental or social values or anything that's going to bring any prosperity to your local economy."

A standard size CSA box contains eight to 11 different vegetables and a smaller box has

four to six. Many CSA members have the opportunity to choose vegetables based on what is in season.

Olivia Templeton, a junior at Syracuse University, shares a CSA box with five people. She commented on the ease of receiving fresh produce without having to leave campus and the ability to cook with vegetables her roommates choose.

"I would never go to the store and buy radishes," Templeton says. "But if [my roommate] has extra, I'll probably use them in something. It allows me to mix things up.

It's also nice because I don't buy as much produce at the grocery store anymore."

CSA membership saves consumers a trip to the grocery store for vegetables, while also saving them from potential exposure to the coronavirus. CSA workers like BurkhartSpiegel are happy with the increased demand and continue to enjoy the non-traditional work environment.

"Nothing ever gets boring because everything is always different every season and every time of year," Burkhart-Spiegel says. "It's very challenging to grow local organic vegetables, so it's always interesting."

Fall 2020 The Good Life | 6

Lifestyle

Help Wanted

SU falls short in counseling services

By Ashlyn Umbach *Source's name changed for privacy

C

ollege is hard. You pull an all-nighter studying for your econ midterm, sleep through your 8 a.m. and miss said midterm, slip in the snow on the Promenade as you run to Whitman — and that's just in the span of a few hours. College students are constantly exhausted, stressed, and overwhelmed. These reasons, coupled with personal and familial problems, make mental health resources on campus especially important, and quite a few students rely heavily on what their university has to offer for counseling and psychiatric services.

In addition to the usual college anxieties, COVID-19 has major effects on students' mental health. A study by Active Minds found that 80% of college students have reported that the pandemic negatively impacts their mental health, and one in five students said the pandemic even severely worsens their mental health. These students attributed their feelings to stress and anxiety, loneliness, financial setback, and relocation.

With more students struggling, there needs to be an outstanding support system set in place by their university.

Syracuse University touts their mental health services offered through Hendricks Chapel programs and counseling at the $50 million Barnes Center at The Arch.

However, SU has 15 staff therapists listed on their website, among 30 members of the

7 | The Good Life Fall 2020

counseling department, making the ratio of students (including graduate students) to therapists about 1,523:1. Mental health experts recommend a ratio of 1,500:1 at the very least. Many students attest that these services fall short of their needs for psychological assistance.

Junior Hanna Martin felt the Barnes Center could not offer her the support she needed last spring. She had stopped taking Sertraline, a psychiatric medication used to treat a number of disorders, including anxiety and depression, and she wanted professional help.

"I had felt like a shell of myself," Martin says.

Martin sought help through the university's mental health resources. After a counseling appointment at the Barnes Center, she still felt discouraged and alone. While Martin thought the counselor she saw was kind, he had made it very clear that the Barnes Center was not able to facilitate services for longterm patients and steered her away.

"I was hoping to get help from the Barnes Center, but they basically refused treatment for me," Martin says. "They don't have enough resources to cater to all of their students."

Martin had trouble finding a mental health service near the school that would take her

insurance and that was conveniently located.

Eventually, though, she was able to get a referral to an off-campus counseling center and is doing much better now.

Ella*, a junior studying data analytics at Syracuse, had a similar experience with SU's mental health services.

"I was having a really tough time," Ella says.

"I wanted to go to the Barnes Center for help last fall, but the walk-in counseling services get filled very fast, and they wouldn't see me."

The Barnes Center frequently promotes their walk-in mental health counseling services to Syracuse University students. Unfortunately, Ella was unable to get in after repeatedly trying. The Barnes Center did not respond for comment on this article.

Universities should provide more accessible and quality mental health resources for their students, especially in a time of unforeseeable events such as COVID-19. Many students rely heavily on what their school has to offer for mental health resources, as they may not have a car for transportation, may not have insurance, or may be in an imminent mental health crisis. It is important to hold universities accountable and call on them to reform their mental health services to better the campus environment and overall experience of their students.

Illustration by Natalie MuĂąoz

Fall 2020 The Good Life | 8

Fashion

Supply Chain Reaction How COVID-󶀱󶀹 disrupted clothing supply chains

By Riley Fouts

N

ew York City is known for its life, bustling with tourists, crowded with buildings, and jammed with taxis.

But a few months ago, the city looked asleep.

Eerie photos showed flickering billboards with no audience and empty streets with no traffic. Months into the pandemic, the city is slowly waking up, but it is still suffering from the effects of COVID-19, partly due to closures of both small and big businesses.

When consumers abruptly stopped shopping in March, retail businesses were left with excess inventory, some even demanding refunds or discounts from their suppliers.

It's a game suppliers can't win — to offer the refund and lose money or to refuse the refund and lose business. On top of overproduction, suppliers are hit with cancellation of large orders, decreased trust with buyers, lower wages, firings and furloughs, and factory closures.

According to the Worker Rights Consortium COVID-19 tracker, retailers like T.J. Maxx, Balmain, Urban Outfitters, Topshop, and Walmart have not committed to paying suppliers. When retailers cancel orders, this means less revenue for suppliers, which means lower employee salaries or the elimination of

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employees in general. These employees are then left with little to no money for basic needs like food, shelter, and medical care.

For factories in developing countries, like Bangladesh, India, and Ethiopia, where most low-cost labor occurs, McKinsey analysts say long periods of unemployment lead to hunger and disease.

Fortunately, other companies, like H&M, Nike, Target, and FLAX Designs, a lightweight clothing company that also serves as a supplier to storefronts, have been more understanding of suppliers' struggles.

Kate Ducey, president of FLAX Designs, attributes this to the relationships they've built with their suppliers.

"One of the many benefits to working with the same vendors and suppliers for over 25 years is that we have truly symbiotic relationships with our factories in Europe," Ducey says. "We give more time to complete orders to accommodate changes to their workforce. Several employees came back at their own pace based on what their personal lives, i.e., childcare, allowed."

Large retailers aren't the only ones facing issues. Chelsea Leveille, owner and designer

of Sugarfoot Apparel, a small loungewear business out of Skaneateles, New York, confronts inventory hurdles of her own. She had planned a pop-up event for late March, but she had to cancel it because of the pandemic, leaving her with more inventory than she was prepared to sell. Luckily, Leveille was able to rely on her online store to sell most of it.

"Moving forward, instead of always having a "stash of inventory," Leveille says, "Now, I'm only ordering a specific number of each item so that I'm not stuck with bills that I may not be able to handle in the future, because at that time — and still, really — I just feel like no one's completely sure of what's going to happen next."

Ordering exact amounts of inventory might not work for every retailer, but the minimalist approach can give suppliers a chance to adapt to the current economy, rather than throwing them to the wolves.

"Communicating these needs and inviting [suppliers] to be part of the solution-finding throughout this entire process was key," Ducey says. "Our partnerships with everyone involved have grown stronger because [of it]."

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Tie-dye provided by Kyra Kouture (IG: @kyra_kouture) Models: Massimo Marchese & Kyra Surgent

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Illustration by Natalie MuĂąoz; Photos by Dan Lyon & Sophie Walter

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Illustration by Natalie Muñoz; Photos by Dan Lyon & Sophie Walter

Earrings provided by Don't Grow Up Yet (IG: @shopdontgrowupyet) Models: Julia Fesser, Erin McCarthy & Natalie Muñoz

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Art

By Daisy Fey

By Vivica Denis

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By Daisy Fey

By Marissa Hong

By Abby Rosenstein

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By Abby Rosenstein

17 | The Good Life Fall 2020

Illustration by Natalie MuĂąoz

Pacing in places I've never been to Patience is fading Got all these expectations of you And what we're turning into I hate the waiting But there's nothing left to do Haven't hit your line up Cause last time that I did I acted like a kid Haven't hit your line up But baby if I did Would it even make a difference?

Can you make this easy for me I just wanna know Are you really simping for me Answer yes or no Answer yes or no Do you really want me Or the feeling that you got when you were on me Are you only on a power trip Or are you really into this I'm just curious If it weren't for the circumstances Would I be getting all of your romantics Is that ever gonna happen do you think?

You haven't hit my line up The last time that you did You treated me just like a friend Was that the end, then?

You haven't hit my line up I'm genuinely frustrated Like I'm so frustrated Ugh, I'm such a fucking SIMP Can you make this easy for me I just wanna know Are you really simping for me Answer yes or no Answer yes or no

Listen on Spotify:

Do you even remember how it felt when we were close Cause I've been thinking 'bout it way more than I would disclose Yeah, I've been going crazy waiting to see where this goes Where's this gonna go?

Fall 2020 The Good Life | 18

Feature

How the Green New Deal could save the economy and the planet

By Audrey Perry

W

hen America was at one of its lowest points during the Great Depression, with unemployment at an all-time high and the economy failing, Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal was able to breathe some life back into the economy and bring the country out of economic turmoil. Today, it's hard not to wonder what it will take to repair the damage caused by the pandemic. Just as the New Deal was the solution then, the Green New Deal (GND) is the answer now.

The GND is a controversial topic in today's politics. It's goal is for the federal government to reduce the United States' usage of nonrenewable fossil fuels and slow the emittance of greenhouse gases, while also seeking to address growing income inequality. While the coronavirus affects the economy and unemployment, the climate crisis continues to grow, pushing a need for new policies that focus not only on economic health, but our nation's environmental health.

By far the most controversial aspect of the GND is its cost, and consequently, its effects on the economy. On its latest proposal the GND was budgeted at $16.3 trillion over 15 years or about $1.1 trillion a year.

Ethan Gormley, a project coordinator at The New York Public Interest Research Group (NYPIRG), spoke about the need for the cost. NYPIRG is a student-led non-profit that works to protect the environment, public health, and other important student issues. While the organization has not taken

19 | The Good Life Fall 2020

a stance for or against the GND, Gormley pointed out that people may be opposed to green infrastructure policy because it has an intimidating price tag attached. However, the country will have to pay for climate change at some point in the future anyway.

"For decades we have been ignoring the cost of climate change and have been deepening our reliance on fossil fuels," Gormley says. "We need to stop making the future generations pay for our environmental impacts now, and begin to seriously invest in green energy."

Although coming in at around 5.4% of the United States' annual GDP, those backing the GND have proposed many ways to offset the cost. With the use of litigation, fees, taxes, and eliminating federal subsidies on the fossil fuel industry, an estimated $3 trillion could be raised. An additional $6.4 trillion can come from the wholesale of energy produced by the regional Power Marketing Administrations.

Plus, increasing the annual tax on the top 0.1% is estimated to create $2 trillion, on top of the additional $2.3 trillion from income tax on the new jobs created by the GND. This increase in spending will not be inflationary, as more goods and services will become available because of the switch to renewable energy (solar panels, sustainable batteries, and wind turbines). By switching to clean energy before it's too late, it is estimated that the U.S. will save $2.9 trillion over 10 years, $21 trillion over 30 years, and $70.4 trillion over 80 years.

Sarah Pralle, a political science professor at Syracuse University, offered insight about the GND. "It is best to think of these things as investments rather than as costs," Pralle says.

"We can avoid billions of dollars of damages due to climate change if we invest in green technologies, green jobs, and other actions that will reduce emissions."

With the current recession caused by COVID-19, unemployment has gone through the roof and was estimated to be as high as 16% in May. One of the biggest goals of the GND is creating new jobs with anti-inequality at the forefront. A goal that, in these circumstances, could not be more timely. The GND has promised to create 20 million strong union jobs. It plans on replacing the fossil fuel jobs lost in the transition with new, higher paying jobs in the clean energy field, particularly solar energy and energy development. Other jobs will be created in steel and auto manufacturing, construction, energy efficiency retrofitting, coding and server farms, and renewable power plants.

"It is incredibly important that New York engages in a just transition for workers in the fossil fuel industry to engage in the new renewable energy jobs that will fuel the green energy economy," Gormley says.

"A just transition into the renewable energy economy is absolutely essential."

The GND's goal of lessening the income

Illustration by Sophie Walter

inequality present in America today is more important now than ever before. In light of the current recession, low income populations, specifically those of racial and ethnic minorities, have been disproportionately affected by the pandemic and the economic downfall that came with it. 61% of Hispanic Americans and 44% of Black Americans reported that they, or someone in their household, had experienced a job or wage loss due to the coronavirus outbreak, compared to 38% of white Americans.

Low income and marginalized communities are also disproportionately affected by the effects of climate change, even though a study from the World Inequality Lab (WIL) showed that the personal carbon dioxide emissions of the wealthiest 1% are up to 20 times as large as the average person in the U.S. A detailed investigation by the WIL of UK carbon dioxide emissions from consumption concluded that increasing the tax rate on the highest incomes and redistributing the proceeds to the poorest households would significantly reduce carbon dioxide emissions, while also decreasing income inequality. Many of the other advances called for in the GND would be beneficial to low income communities, such as insulating houses, providing adequate family and medical leave, and creating work for women in new green industries.

"The architects of the GND are very concerned about social justice and equality and therefore, promote policies that will also help the most vulnerable and shift costs to those who are better off and can afford to pay," Pralle says.

With the current effects of climate change sweeping the nation, along with the devastating effects of COVID-19, we have never had such a strong need for legislative intervention. The GND would pay for itself, bring an increase of jobs when they are most needed, and help in creating an even playing field for everyone with reduced income inequality. The environment is everyone's problem, but young people especially have a lot on the line.

"Future generations will feel the worst effects of climate change unless we act now," Gormley says. "Young people know this, and that's why students are organizing not just across the state or country but around the world to combat the climate crisis."

Fall 2020 The Good Life | 20

How civil rights movements affect elections

By Ashlyn Umbach

T

his summer, an estimated 26 million Americans took to the streets to demand justice after the murder of George Floyd, making it the largest civil rights movement in American history. You'd think, then, that this unified protest against systemic racism and injustice would force the two presidential candidates in an already highly contentious election to appeal to the widespread will of the people. (Of course, we are talking about Donald Trump, who is the definition of highly contentious.) So, the parties were split by racial ideology: pro-Black Lives Matter and anti-Black Lives Matter. This is not new.

Civil rights movements bring race to the forefront of the election. In the mid-50s and '60s, the Civil Rights Movement affected elections in the same way the BLM

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movement affected the election this year.

Timothy Hoffman, who studied the relationship between race and elections at Seton Hall University, says that race has always been a part of the conversation when election season rolls around, and there are usually at least two different opinions when it comes to policy.

"We have seen where if one party makes the move in one direction, there's a reaction among the public, and then the other party tries to capitalize on that," Hoffman says. "So unfortunately, you don't really see the two parties come together often and speak with one voice on these issues of race."

Once the parties divide into their two camps, they then focus simultaneously on appealing

to voters in that camp and trying to get other voters to join them. So, in typical politician fashion, the candidates start virtue-signaling.

In 1960, Republican candidate Richard Nixon tried to appeal to Black Southern voters and initially gained the support of Martin Luther King, Sr., though he and his party were less vocal about civil rights than his Democratic opponent, John F. Kennedy.

Steven White, an assistant political science professor at Syracuse University, notices that there was a similar dissonance in Joe Biden's 2020 campaign.

"Biden had the support of the vast majority of Black Americans but distanced himself from many of the specific policy goals of the BLM movement," White says. "Ultimately, they're calling for a more radical rethinking of American society, and Biden is very much

In 1968, President Nixon dropped his act and ran on a "law and order" campaign, which was due in part to a distaste toward civil rights protests, much like Trump's campaign strategy when the Black Lives Matter movement sparked.

"Nixon's narrow victory over Hubert Humphrey in 1968 might well have been due to white voters growing more negative in their assessments of civil rights protests," White says.

Despite the similarities, there is a key difference between the elections in the 1960s and the 2020. In the '60s, Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson ran on civil rights platforms that actually opposed a large part of the Democratic establishment, which was largely white at the time. Today, that probably wouldn't happen because there is a more stark divide between Republicans and Democrats.

"It's easy to see that we're polarized by party, and everything is really viewed through that lens," Hoffman says. "Back in the '60s, the polarization was harder to see because you had liberal Republicans and conservative Democrats, especially on the issue of race.

The parties have really sorted to be much more homogenous today, ideologically speaking, than they were in the '60s. So, when there's an issue and there's two sides to that issue, it basically depends on where the base is at that moment. The parties then have to respond to their bases."

This change might determine the futures of the Republican and Democratic parties.

If the country continues on its path of division, candidates will become further stuck on drastically different sides instead of being able to go against their party and win like Kennedy and Johnson did, giving Democrats the potential to have ascendancy over elections for years to come.

"I predicted the 2016 election was going to be an opportunity for Republicans to really change their relationship with race in politics," Hoffman says. "I still think the premise is right where they won an election in 2016 by really not catering to Black voters or any minority group. It worked, but at some point, your average white male voter is not going to be the average voter. That could create decades of dominance for a Democratic party."

Whether that idea is exciting to you or not, there is a problem with the parties dividing over civil rights movements. The fact of the

matter is that the Black Lives Matter ideology is not necessarily designed to be debatable.

The core values of the movement are to end racially motivated actions and crimes against Black Americans and to hold police accountable for brutality involving these minorities. Politicians using this movement in order to grow their political platform and create a divide between the political parties is not only wrong but selfish in nature.

Using the Black Lives Matter Movement as a fear mongering tactic or as a way to gather support from white supremacist groups is not a way to use a presidential platform for good. Neither is virtue-signaling to activists and not taking a firm stance on a movement's proposed policy change. Politicizing a social justice movement and using it as political warfare should be the last thing on the president's mind when they are trying to eradicate racism in America. Obviously, though, one stance is worse than the other.

Illustration by Natalie MuĂąoz

within the tradition of more establishmentoriented center-left politicians."

"If you're tacitly endorsing white supremacy and being okay with that being part of the overall electoral process, there's a long-term danger there as well," Hoffman says. "I think we've got candidates who were being very shortsighted and just trying to win an election rather than thinking about the longterm health of their parties and also, certainly, the long-term health of the country."

Fall 2020 The Good Life | 22

country is too unsafe to live in. Immigrants are facing an unprecedented humanitarian crisis in the U.S., and their testimonies recount abuse, mistreatment, and fear.

The reality of immigration to the U.S.

By Julia Fesser *Source's name changed for protection

S

he didn't know if it was day or night.

All she knew was that she was hungry, cold, and scared. Miriam* and her four-year-old son were kept in the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center referred to as the "icebox," an overcrowded, cold, windowless room with no food and only some water for four days and four nights. They were only given an aluminum emergency blanket to keep warm at night.

At only 23 years old, Miriam gave up everything she had in Honduras — her house, her family, her livelihood — and decided to make the journey across the border to avoid a gang that threatened to kill her family. She traveled for days across the border in a van packed with hundreds of people, with the windows locked shut and nowhere to go to the bathroom. Upon arriving at the detention center anything she had left was taken from her — all clothing, bags, her son's blankie. Miriam and her son were packed into a cage so crowded that people had to take turns sitting down.

"They put me in a perrera, a cage where they put dogs in," Miriam says in Spanish. "I was there for two days with only water and no food. I was starving."

23 | The Good Life Fall 2020

From the cage, Miriam was sent to the icebox. The U.S. government maintains that the detainees' stay does not exceed 72 hours and that temperatures must be kept "in a reasonable and comfortable range for both detainees and officials," according to a standards manual by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

"It was freezing. My son was convulsing from a terrible fever. They didn't give him any medications. Why did that happen?" Miriam says. "A woman from El Salvador's daughter fainted in the icebox. She begged to have them give her daughter food because she was on the brink of death, but nothing was done."

After the icebox, she was taken to another location where she was given some clothing and food. She then left the border and flew to her final destination in the U.S., where she was forced to wear a monitoring device to track her location at all times for about three months.

"I would look at the device and cry every day," Miriam says. "They were treating me like I was a criminal or something."

Her story is similar to the thousands who try to seek asylum in the U.S. because their

Border Patrol station in Welasco, TX

There is a commonly upheld narrative perpetuating the idea that immigrants coming into this country are violent criminals. However, a study by the Cato Institute showed that overall, immigrants do not commit crimes at a higher rate than nonimmigrants, and that higher concentrations of immigrants do not lead to higher rates of violent crime. They have to leave their country, community, family, and rich culture behind for their own safety, a decision most people wouldn't voluntarily make.

"I just came to this country to give my kids a better life," Miriam says. "In my country, there's nothing but violence. I couldn't be there anymore."

In order to understand why immigrants come to the U.S., it's important to recognize the direct impact the U.S. has had on its neighboring countries that has led to increased violence and crime. Take Guatemala, for example: In 1954, the U.S. government orchestrated a coup that led to a series of militant, authoritarian governments that created ethnic, economic, political, and social divisions in the country.

The turmoil eventually ruptured into a civil war and a rise in guerilla warfare. A similar coup occurred in Chile in 1973 due to U.S. intervention, which had a disastrous effect on the Chilean economy and made violence a daily occurrence. Due to U.S. implemented policy, crime in Latin America has become a social pandemic, forcing people to flee their countries in order to survive. Veronica Walther, an immigration attorney originally from Barranquilla, Colombia, volunteers to help these immigrants at the border.

In Matamoros, Mexico, Walther and her team have created refugee camps through donations of tents, sleeping bags, and food in an effort to give thousands of people shelter and safety. Despite their efforts, the refugees are still at risk. People are kidnapped, robbed, and violated. Volunteers help immigrants with their asylum process and provide any resources they might need to survive in the camps for an extended period of time. Court hearings can take up to five years, and being granted asylum is an overly bureaucratic process. Immigrants have to present their case to an immigration judge and often need extra witnesses and lots of documentation.

Even then, according to the New York Times, only around 40% of immigrants are granted asylum.

Refugee camp in Matamoros, MX

"One of the hardest situations I encountered was when I had to tell a woman she had lost her case," Walther says. "Her and her little daughter feared that they would starve to death if they had to go back. They were both sobbing because they knew they had nothing in their country. It unfortunately wasn't a reason enough for asylum."

Immigrants risk their lives and experience horrific conditions in detention centers, knowing that they could inevitably be sent back to the violence they so desperately fled.

The question therein lies, what can be done to improve these conditions?

There's a more humane process of having immigrants in the United States that goes through the same legal process but would actually cost our country a lot less," Walther says.

The Canadian refugee system for example, pays for refugees in the first three years to have housing, take English lessons, and prepare for their job search, so they're set up to become productive members of society.

If immigrants in the U.S. weren't detained, they could apply for asylum and, at the same time, apply for work permits which would allow them to earn their own money and contribute to taxes. Working immigrants fuel the U.S. economy by adding an estimated $72 billion dollars, according to the George W. Bush Institute. Providing immigrants with a better path to citizenship and giving them the opportunity to work would allow them to produce and earn significantly more.

In addition to granting immigrants with work visas, providing basic health care could prevent them from waiting until they were very sick to seek treatment and the costs would pay off over time.

Susanne Callahan began working with immigrants some 30 years ago in New York City as a public health professional in a federally qualified health center that provides healthcare to both documented and undocumented immigrants. As a safety net program, the center is required to provide comprehensive primary care, as well as mental health services, dental services, and other services that help medically underserved communities. They are able to cover primary care and check-ups, but what becomes a real issue is when immigrants need specialty care, like seeing a cardiologist, a rheumatologist, or need to be hospitalized.

"We serve about 115,000 patients a year," Callahan says. "In the community, there are lots of providers that won't accept Medicaid or people who are uninsured. There are about 1,100 organizations like this one across the United States, but there still aren't enough to cover all the people that need it."

The Institute for Public Health, where Callahan works, has an immigrant health outreach initiative in Harlem and the South Bronx that tries to identify immigrants in need of health care and alerts them that there are resources available. Still, some immigrants don't seek out health care out of

fear of being sent back to their war-torn or impoverished country.

"When the ICE raids occurred two years ago, there was a tremendous amount of fear," Callahan says. "People panicked and stopped coming in for healthcare. That was a big concern, especially for pregnant women, children who needed vaccines, and people who were sick."

Callahan's work ensures immigrants stay healthy and safe as they adjust to their new life in the U.S. "The most important thing to do is to listen to people," Callahan says. "Ask immigrants themselves what their biggest challenges are, what they need, how can you support them.

Becoming informed and not thinking of immigrants as one mass group is also really important. They're all unique individuals.

They have some things in common, but within immigrant groups there are huge differences in their culture, in their education, and in their experience as immigrants. I refuse to use the word illegal because no human is illegal."

There are many ways to help the immigrant populations in our own communities and country, either on a larger scale politically or on a more personal level. Voting, writing letters, sending emails, and calling local officials and representatives around issues that impact immigrants can make a difference.

Identify an issue that impacts immigrants in your community and get involved to support them, whether it's tutoring, health care, translating, etc. The Immigrant Refugee Youth Association of Onondaga County in Syracuse offers volunteer positions that help out with health care and education advocacy for immigrants, and the Literacy Central New York supports adult immigrant literacy through English tutoring.

Photos provided by Veronica Walther, Source: OIG; Illustration by Natalie MuĂąoz.

"Many immigrants come from various different countries, but they must be at the southern border in order to seek asylum, due to the 'Remain in Mexico' policy created under the Trump presidency" Walther says.

"They are put through the horrible iceboxes and then are sent back to the other side of the border in Mexico to wait until their hearing can be heard in the United States.

Often times, they are sent back to the border with no support, no work permit in Mexico, no food, no housing, no money, nothing."

Miriam is now reunited with her husband and all of her children in the U.S. and has found help through a volunteer in her area. Her husband works as a busboy and construction worker, and her children attend the local elementary school.

"I hope things get better with immigration," Miriam says. "I will never forget what I went through. It's so sad. I wouldn't wish it upon anybody. But I am so grateful for the people who have helped me get to where I am."

Fall 2020 The Good Life | 24

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