INSIDE: Transformative Justice on college campuses, the recriminilization of indoor sex work in Rhode Island, and the suspect side of dietary supplements
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A Brown/RISD Weekly / September 20, 2019 / Volume 39, Issue 02
the
Indy Contents Cover Untitled Eve O’Shea
News 02 Week in Vape Nations Alan Dean & Ricardo Gomez 03 Social Determinants: The DRC Ebola Crisis Jacob Alabab-Moser & Izzi Olive Features 05 Beyond #MeToo Camila Pelsinger
From the Editors To whom it may concern: I’d like to return this issue of the College Hill Independent. How should I address my package? Please advise. I am willing to pay any and all shipping costs, just need it off my hands and out of my house.
12 Cappadocia, and the Places We’ll Go Ella Rosenblatt
Sincerely, EK
Literary 07 The Fourth of July Girl Catherine Habgood 08 Two Poems Alana Baer
Mission Statement
Metro 09 From Decrim to Recrim Victoria Caruso
The College Hill Independent is a Providence-based publication written, illustrated, designed, and edited by students from Brown and RISD. We are committed to publishing politically engaged and accessible work. While the Indy is financed by Brown University, we hold ourselves accountable to our readers across the Providence community. The Indy rejects content that explicitly or implicitly perpetuates racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, xenophobia, ableism and/ or classism.
17 Catering Contract Concerns Noa Machover and Nora Lawrence Ephemera 11 The Croissant Brothers Play a Tune Eve O’Shea and Gabe Simon
Though this list is not exhaustive, the Indy strives to address these systems of oppression by centering the voices, opinions, and efforts of marginalized people in Providence and beyond.
Science + Tech 13 Seeing Through Supplements Jennifer Katz
The Indy is constantly evolving: we are always working to make our staff and content more inclusive. Though our editing process provides an internal structure for accountability, we always welcome letters to the editor.
Arts 15 Disney to Dust Tristan St. Germain X 18 Home/Land Jorge Palacios
Week in Review Gemma Sack News Jacob Alabab-Moser Izzi Olive Metro Victoria Caruso Alina Kulman Sara Van Horn Arts Zach Barnes Sheamus Flynn Features Mara Dolan Mia Pattillo Science & Tech Miles Guggenheim Matt Ishimaru
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Literary Catherine Habgood Isabelle Rea Ephemera Eve O’Shea Sindura Sriram X Jorge Palacios Alex Westfall List Ella Comberg Ella Rosenblatt Tiara Sharma Staff Writers Alan Dean Muskaan Garg Ricardo Gomez Jennifer Katz Sophie Khomtchenko Emma Kofman Dana Kurniawan
VOL 39 ISSUE 02
Deb Marini Bilal Memon Kanha Prasad Nickolas Roblee-Strauss Emily Rust Issra Said Peder Schaefer Star Su Kion You Copy Editors Grace Berg Sarah Goldman Marina Hunt Christine Huynh Cherilyn Tan Design Editors Ella Rosenblatt Christie Zhong Designers Kathryn Li Katherine Sang
Illustration Editor Pia Mileaf-Patel Ilustrators Alana Baer Natasha Brennan Bella Carlos Fatou Diallo Halle Krieger Katya Labowe-Stoll Sophia Meng Sandra Moore Rémy Poisson Owen Rival Charlotte Silverman Mariel Solomon Miranda Villanueva Stephanie Wu Art Director Claire Schlaikjer
Business Somerset Gall Emily Teng Web Ashley Kim Social Media Ben Biesntock Pia Mileaf-Patel
MVP Ella Rosenblatt & Christie Zhong *** The College Hill Independent is printed by TCI Press in Seekonk, Massachusetts.
Alumni+Fundraising Chris Packs Senior Editors Ella Comberg Olivia Kan-Sperling Chris Packs Tiara Sharma Wen Zhuang Managing Editors Ben Bienstock Tara Sharma Cate Turner
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WEEK IN
BY Alan Dean & Ricardo Gomez ILLUSTRATION Pia Mileaf-Patel DESIGN Christie Zhong
VAPE NATIONS
CLOUDLESS SKIES ABOVE SALT LAKE CITY the Church’s policies on prescription drugs and their to be conclusive proof of the non-existence of the Loch
legitimate use. Given this background, the Word of Ness Monster.” BoJo made it a point to let the journalThe emergence of damning new evidence demon- Wisdom starts to appear significantly more coherent ists know that as a child he had longed to believe that strating the danger of vaping and e-cigarettes feels and common-sense in its approach to unhealthy and the mythical creature was real, and that, even now, he like a weekly occurrence in 2019, as scientists issue addictive substances than a good deal of the FDA, at “yearns to believe” in the Loch Ness Monster. ever more frequent warnings of “wet lung,” “popcorn least insofar as it seems to clearly center the questions While Johnson’s explanations of his nostalgia for lung,” and various other lung-related body horror Mad of health and addiction. Though the clarity and consis- the mythic creatures that informed his etiological Libs. While this week’s government ban on flavored tency of the Word of Wisdom is to be appreciated, development may have stirred up renewed hope in e-liquids may be the most widely discussed change several questions remain unanswered. For one, the some like-minded folk, they emerge (unlike Nessie) in of fortune for the vape lobby, Big Vape can now count Indy would like to know what a Latter-day Saint youth the murky midst of a rather concerning lack of progamong their enemies another, far more dangerous foe is to do when prescribed (under the care of a compe- ress on any type of Brexit deal. BoJo’s Brexit plans have than the paper-pushing bureaucrats at the FDA: the tent physician) a strain of medicinal marijuana with a recently hit some increasingly bumpy waters after Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. name like Coffee Haze, Caramel Kona Coffee Kush, or outrage over BoJo's decision to suspend Parliament. As On August 15, in an article published in its youth Cappuccino 420? of right now, British lawmakers are set to come back outreach magazine New Era, the Church clarified together on October 14, just before Brexit’s October 31 its policy on substances deemed “addictive” and —AD deadline. While it might be apt to ask for an extension concretely declared that “vaping is clearly against during a slew of chaos, with giant eel DNA disproving the Word of Wisdom,” a broad category that equally childhood dreams and all, BoJo says that he would forbids cigarettes, alcohol, coffee, and all other TO NESSIE, WITH LOVE rather “die in a ditch” than ask for an extension for manner of habit-forming substances—foods included. Brexit. While a cited study alleged that two-thirds of teen A boy with weak eyes and a tuft of straw blond, muppeThere’s a certain method of mythos in BoJo’s vapers believe themselves to be inhaling nothing tish hair skims a slim stone across the flat water of a belief in Parliament, Brexit, and lake monsters. By but delicious mango flavor “mist,” New Era warns Loch Ness inlet. The stone sputters to an unexpected law, BoJo would be compelled to ask for an extension young Mormons that that’s “way, way far from the halt where an object emerges from the water. The boy if no deal is reached. However, much like he believes truth.” This news follows a general shift in the public’s sees a slender, mesozoic marine reptile and, for the in mythical creatures, he also seems to believe that his attitude toward e-cigarettes, which have gone from briefest moment of bittersweet intensity before the singular power of will can overcome the laws of the futuristic anti-addiction devices to the child-targeting creature retreats back into the gray waters, the boy and state. There’s a certain formula here that posits that if monsters haunting Melania Trump’s nightmares in a the reptile lock eyes, knowing that they have shared one had just enough belief in themselves, they could few short years. Though New Era’s statement is only a something profound and intimate. make whatever they wanted come true. A No-Deal clarification, the fact that it was considered necessary That boy may have been Boris Johnson (aka Brexit would happen without consequence, BoJo might at all reveals the degree to which vaping is becoming BoJo), the United Kingdom’s new prime minister, who befriend a couple members of Parliament, and the ole a normalized part of American teenage life, and how currently has his imagination working overtime as he Nessie of BoJo’s dreams would be alive and well. “Why regulators and officials fail to find the language to tries to conjure up belief in both mythical Brexit deals don’t we? Why don’t we?” BoJo pines. “There is so much properly discuss—let alone solve—this public health and lake monsters. While visiting Scotland, BoJo was more we can do,” he told the Sunday Times. “What issue. While the Independent is skeptical of the applica- recently asked by journalists to comment on the matter grieves me about the current approach to Brexit is that bility of religious purity-based restrictions to FDA poli- of the Loch Ness monster. The fabled creature is we are just in danger of not believing in ourselves, not cymaking, it is clear that the current system’s reliance commonly said to be some type of prehistoric reptilian believing in Britain.” The issue, it seems, is that no one on the moral panics of concerned parents to propel holdover, the last lonely plesiosaur, but new research believes quite like BoJo does. itself into (often haphazard) action is a deeply unsuc- has emerged showing that no traces of reptilian DNA While the existence of the Britain that BoJo cessful model. exist in the water. Indeed, only a high concentra- believes in probably won’t be disproven by giant eel While the vape crisis seems to be keeping the tion of giant eel DNA could be found. BoJo, being the DNA, the Prime Minister might want to rely on more FDA’s hands more than full, it is hardly the only target reputable empiricist that he is, responded with some than just belief to fish out a Brexit deal. in New Era’s scope. As those in danger of straying from insightful analysis, saying, “A high concentration of the Word of Wisdom are not limited to a handful of giant eel DNA in the water, that does not seem to me —RG carefree teens sneakily passing around a Juul during a bathroom break, the article also used the opportunity to clarify the rules for the Latter-day Saint youth surrounding the forbidden “hot drinks”: coffee and tea. As with sweet, sugary, seemingly innocuous flavored vapes, young people should be aware that “the word coffee isn’t always in the name of coffee drinks.” The safest method, as tried and tested in other spheres of adolescent life, is, of course, abstinence, with the Church suggesting that one should “never buy drinks at coffee shops,” or if one must buy a drink, at the very least “always ask if there’s coffee in it.” Similarly, it has been declared that “drinks with names that include café or caffé, mocha, latte, espresso or anything ending in –ccino are coffee and against the Word of Wisdom.” The linguistics of tea are thankfully far less knotty and potentially misleading, but the Church stressed, lest a staple of American drink lead the faithful astray, that “iced tea is still tea.” Lastly, the article in New Era touches upon the subject of “Marijuana, Opioids” (well known to be a single category). While affirming their forbidden nature, the article unexpectedly leaves the door cracked open for medicinal use “under the care of a competent physician, and then used only as prescribed.” This policy may seem contradictory to the unfamiliar observer, but it is quite consistent with
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SOCIAL DETERMINANTS “They were dying slowly—it was very clear. They were not enemies, they were not criminals, they were nothing earthly now—nothing but black shadows of disease and starvation, lying confusedly in the greenish gloom.” Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad (1889)
• • • • • • The DRC Ebola outbreak, explained
Looking at headlines and photos today of Western health workers clad in hazmat suits vaccinating local children for Ebola conjures a trope of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) as a place of disease, instability, and darkness—in contrast to that of the West as the torchbearer of civilization—readily recognizable in Joseph Conrad’s 1899 novella Heart of Darkness. This representation seems to transcend the 120 years of colonial rule and the series of independence movements that distance the modern DRC from the Belgian-ruled Congo Free State that Conrad portrayed in his novella. Today, the DRC is facing the second-largest outbreak of Ebola Virus Disease on record; the DRC Ministry of for Disease Control (CDC) deployed experts on the Health’s latest report puts the total number of cases at disease to North Kivu just days after the outbreak What is Global Health? 3,130, with 2,096 recorded deaths. The virus has also was declared, only to withdraw them a few days later. So how did we get here? Why are decisions affecting spread to parts of Rwanda, Uganda, and, as of last Explaining this reversal in a testimony delivered to the the lives of millions in the DRC being made in bureauweek, Tanzania. Six neighboring countries are also at House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Africa, Global cracies thousands of miles away in DC or Geneva? high risk. Human Rights, and International Organizations, CDC We can roughly trace the beginnings of the internaAs was the case at the time of Conrad’s writing, the Director Robert R. Redfield cited “security concerns.” tional health regime to 1948, when the World Health West still presides over and bears witness to death in The withdrawal applied to other US government Organization (WHO), an agency of the United Nations, the Congo, yet contemporary Western nations’ rela- personnel in the DRC, too: at the same time, the State was formed. The organization is aspirationally intertionship to and responsibility for public health crises Department reduced its staff in Kinshasa, the national national in that its constitution claims “the health of all in the sovereign DRC are far more ambiguous than capital. Redfield attributed this move to escalating peoples is fundamental,” yet its interventions toward they were at the dawn of Western imperialism. A violence between rival political factions in advance of providing global health solutions have been understatus quo of Western patronage and creditorship has the December 2018 DRC presidential election, testi- mined historically by the lack of cooperation from continued the extraction of the country’s resources fying that “several areas of the country experienced a countries that host or donate to the WHO, and its own and stalled sustainable development, problems which deterioration in the overall security situation.” bureaucratic structure, which has been criticized for have resulted in extreme social instability. While many As Redfield’s quote suggests, the global health being overly centralized and slow-acting. of the social ills in the DRC are traceable to internal response was hindered by a climate of incredible Moreover, we should consider that the majority corruption and conflict, in a postcolonial republic violence that has characterized life in North and of funding it receives comes from donors from the no part of the contemporary social situation can be South Kivu provinces for decades. A report published West, with the United States, the Bill & Melinda understood without colonial context. In this article, in August by NYU’s Congo Research Group and the Gates Foundation, and the United Kingdom being the Indy News tries to make sense of the ongoing Ebola Human Rights Watch estimates that around 1,900 top three donors to the 2018 program budget. Even epidemic and the global health response through the civilians have been massacred in North and South Kivu though this should not influence the WHO’s goverlens of postcolonial critique, raising questions about in past 3 years, while 3,300 have been abducted. While nance—its main decision-making body is the World the West’s role in international health interventions, this violence in general has posed a serious obstacle to Health Assembly with delegates from each of its 194 and by extension, in addressing the underlying social curbing the epidemic—it is far easier to treat disease Member States—the majority of funding is earmarked problems that plague former colonies. in safe, stable environments—militia groups have also by donors, or designated for a specific program. This targeted health workers and treatment centers specif- means that as long as the Global North donates the A Word of Caution ically, with a marked impact on disease containment. most money, to a significant extent it dictates the priorWe recognize that by writing about issues in Africa for Attacks on health care infrastructure and workers ities of the global health agenda. a sympathetic Western audience we raise awareness increased around the 2018 DRC presidential elecThis distinction might suggest the reasons behind but at the cost of reinforcing stereotypes of ‘Africa tion after sitting President Joseph Kabila delayed certain policies by the WHO such as why, for example, as victim.’ We write today about this current Ebola voting for 1.2 million people in certain Ebola-affected it often places outsized emphasis on containing infecoutbreak in the DRC because we found it necessary regions known to be oppositional strongholds. The tious diseases, since those pose the risk of traveling to to provide nuanced coverage, but we also recognize disease itself has thus become implicated in mistrust the Global North and infecting people there. In 2018, that there is more to news coming out of Africa and of the government, and treatment efforts have become the organization alloted almost triple the funding to the Global South than complex issues simplified and collateral damage. Just when the DRC Ministry of the prevention of communicable diseases in Africa sensationalized by Western media outlets. Health had Ebola transmission “largely under control” that it did to that of noncommunicable diseases in in February 2019, a series of lethal attacks against the continent (291 million vs. 105 million, 2018-19). The Epidemic treatment centers caused a marked uptick in transmis- This funding disparity stands in stark contrast to the In late July 2018, four fever cases surfaced in North sion. And, as is evident in the CDC’s early withdrawal, fact that 71 percent of deaths worldwide result from Kivu, a northeastern province of the DRC which violence impedes disease containment in a third way: noncommunicable diseases. borders both Rwanda and Burundi. Within five days, by deterring the global health response. In a similar vein, Western donors prefer to fund the DRC Ministry of Health confirmed an outbreak The degree to which the outbreak has been success- emergency response measures, like constructing of Ebola Virus Disease, commonly known as Ebola, fully contained is somewhat remarkable given the outbreak-specific facilities and offering poor counand initiated an emergency response. In the earliest volume of refugees that have fled the DRC since its tries ‘pandemic bonds’ to help them finance future days of the outbreak, before a vaccine had even been onset. According to United Nations Refugee Agency responses, than to invest in a country’s overall healthauthorized for use in preventing further transmission spokesman Andrej Mahecic, Congolese refugees were care infrastructure. Besides the fixation on commuof the disease, efforts focused on containment: Ebola, fleeing to Uganda at a rate of 100-200 per day during nicable diseases, such long-term investments on which often manifests in flu-like symptoms but also the first months of the outbreak, yet it took nearly a healthcare are less economically attractive. In July, interferes with the body’s blood clotting mechanism, year for a case to be reported outside of the DRC. In the Director-General of the WHO Tedros Adhanom is transmitted via direct contact with bodily fluids of June 2019, Uganda confirmed the first incidence of Ghebreyesus tried to pitch them as economically savvy an individual infected with the disease. Ebola. The World Health Organization declared a to a group of African entrepreneurs in Abuja, Nigeria: The United States’ initial involvement in the outbreak Public Health Emergency of International Concern “Health creates jobs. It drives productivity. It stimulates ended nearly as soon as it began. The US Centers less than a week thereafter. inclusive growth. And it protects economies from the
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BY Jacob Alabab-Moser and Izzi Olive ILLUSTRATION Mariel Solomon DESIGN Kathryn Li
impacts of outbreaks and other emergencies.” These facilities, warranting more thought on whom the three times for not posing “a public health risk to other belated remarks, given after the Ebola outbreak had global health regime decides to protect—has only States through the international spread of disease” ballooned beyond the point of containment, demon- caused local communities to vilify health workers before it finally did this July when it spread into strate that the overall health for inhabitants of under- more. Rwanda and Ebola. At the time of the PHEIC declaradeveloped countries is treated as an after-thought, a tion, there were already 2,512 cases of Ebola since the remnant of colonial mentality. And when brought up International involvement: Last time and now outbreak began in August 2018 when in contrast, the at last, health has to be pitched as an investment, a You might be surprised to hear that a lot of progress has more international 2014-2016 West Africa outbreak stimulator of capitalist growth. been made since the last Ebola outbreak in West Africa. had 1,711 cases when it became a PHEIC. This delay in While global health and humanitarianism in general New tools for rapid diagnosis, the new treatment the DRC case suggests that despite the gravity of the are presented as apolitical and international-minded ZMapp, and, most importantly, a new experimental situation, countries in the Global North did not care with ‘health as a right,’ this is impossible given the vaccine have been deployed. In addition, WHO has since there was no immediate threat of the disease imbalance of power that privileges Global North coun- streamlined its processes to rapidly deploy resources spreading outside of the region and into their borders. tries’ ideologies surrounding public health; that is, with the creation of an emergency fund. prioritizing their citizens’ lives over those in the Global Doctors Without Borders International President Conclusions South, as well as their political aims and budgets. Joanne Liu, MD described to STAT the difficulty in For now, the fate of the current DRC Ebola outbreak To clarify, the WHO is not in itself the implementer containing this Ebola outbreak as “ironic,” since remains unclear. While the WHO has reported a of the response to the Ebola outbreak but rather acts as these significant developments have been rendered gradual decrease of transmissions with the lowest an advisory body to the DRC’s Ministry of Health, as useless by the challenges specific to the DRC. Getting weekly incidence on September 12 since March 2019, it well as the unified voice of the response and provider the outbreak ‘under control’ is now about more than cautions against interpreting that the virus’s transmisof technical support and monitoring, among other providing vaccinations and treatments for a viral sion intensity has decreased. Even once the outbreak is functions. It works with implementing partners like disease. Violence, insofar as it breeds uncertainty under control, the communities affected will continue international organizations like the American Red and fear, impedes public health measures of all kinds, to face insecurity, conflict between militias, and a lack Cross and Doctors Without Borders in addition to creating an atmosphere in which disease can flourish. of support by the DRC government, which will only DRC-based NGOs, of which medical staff are deployed In the DRC, violence has posed a more specific threat to make them prone to epidemics and other ills moving to the ‘frontline’ of the response. disease containment efforts, when treatment centers forward. And as we have seen, neocolonialism looms have been caught in the crosshairs or deliberately as the cause behind much of the DRC’s strife. Why the epidemic is unsurprising targeted, in some cases due to mistrust of the containThe DRC Ebola outbreak is lethal and has demanded The cycle of investment capital chiefly in the DRC’s ment efforts. In these ways, the global health response action from the international community, but lucrative mineral export industry echoes the extractive now contends with the symptoms of the DRC’s deeper there needs to be further explanation of the murky system of mercantilism from the colonial era. While historical problems, many of which implicate Western mechanics of aid allocations and the actual response many of the transnational mining companies active imperialism. on the ground for the citizens of both Western, in the eastern DRC today hail from Europe like their It is worth noting that the United States, through aid-giving countries and of the DRC and other counnineteenth century forebears, those from Canada, the CDC and other health agencies, has been less tries affected by the outbreak. Australia, and China have also joined their ranks. involved in the response to current DRC outbreak This is not to mention the role of neighboring coun- than it was in the 2014-2016 West African one. While JACOB ALABAB-MOSER ‘20 and IZZI OLIVE tries like Rwanda and Uganda in looting mines in the US officials have cited greater contributions by other ‘20.5 encourage you to read Rani Chumbak's 2016 Indy eastern DRC through threats and coercion by armed governments in financing the response, other factors piece “Who Cares?: Medicine and Colonial Modernity” rebel groups. Although many Western observers focus include concerns about the safety of personnel and the (https://www.theindy.org/810) for more information their critiques against China’s more recent entrance Trump administration's reduced foreign assistance in on the inherently colonial nature of global health. into mining in the DRC, it remains to be seen how or general, stemming from the president’s isolationist whether Chinese companies have deteriorated the foreign policy. While less aid from the US translates to status quo in terms of work conditions in the mines and less dollars and technical resources for the response, it macroeconomic indicators. precludes the militarization of the US humanitarian In Northern and Southern Kivu Provinces, the response, which occurred during the West African regional economy’s dependence on this system outbreak and could have negative consequences in the of mining has resulted in widespread poverty; the DRC context. majority of unskilled laborers work for as little as $100 The relatively rural character of the current outbreak per month, according to the Nation. In this climate of zone in the DRC’s interior also accounts for why the economic exploitation by foreign transnationals and international community is paying less attention to violence from armed groups, amid other factors, it this outbreak. Though granted a rural, less populated is easy to see why communities are reluctant to let in area puts less people at risk of infection and death, health workers. Moreover, increased security forces this outbreak’s distance from international borders like the Congolese army—sought by partners in the and major cities has limited the response: the WHO response following an uptick attacks on treatment decided against declaring the outbreak as a PHEIC
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BEYOND
METOO content warning: sexual violence sexual assault. Between one in four and one in five healing involves directly confronting the person who women are sexually assaulted while in college, while harmed them about their experience or knowing they the National Institute of Justice estimates around one won’t ever have to see them at a social event. For others in seven men. One in four trans and gender-non-con- still, only the knowledge that the person who caused forming students experience sexual assault according them harm will no longer remain on campus gives to a 2015 study. However, research from the National them a sense of safety. Sexual Violence Resource Center suggests as few as The barriers preventing survivors from seeking 10% of incidents of sexual assault on college campuses institutional accountability veil the harm happening Two years ago, a friend asked me to confront someone are reported. It is strikingly clear that the existing in all communities. With no other mechanisms for in their community who had perpetrated violence and avenues for accountability are neither accessible nor accountability, many survivors are left feeling guilty, continued to display what they described as predatory desirable for survivors of sexual violence. The Title as if choosing not to report makes them responsible behavior. Unsure of how to address the harm without IX process can re-traumatize those who have expe- for failing to stop violent behavior and leaving others prompting defensiveness or anger, they asked me to rienced violence and forces people to prove they are vulnerable to harm. As Dr. Julie Shackford-Bradley work with the individual to help them understand telling the truth, often while facing the victim-blaming describes in her article for the Daily Californian on the impact of their actions and change their behavior. embedded in our society and institutions. Moreover, sexual violence on college campuses, “the fact is that Over the next two years, I would be approached the legal representatives of perpetrators of violence most cases don’t get reported or sufficiently addressed by many others who sought similar interventions. rely on these sexist tropes to discount survivors’ credi- through formal reporting structures, limiting people’s Some of these requests came from survivors them- bility and defend their clients. options for taking accountability or making amends. selves, others came from close friends of individuals One of the most common desires of those who The stress of unresolved harm and conflict that results who caused harm, others from people who observed have experienced gender-based violence is for the can fracture communities, further exacerbating harmful behavior from afar. Unequipped to undertake person who harmed them to understand the impact trauma.” The existing resources on college campuses these tasks, I searched for a resource on my college of their actions and never harm anyone else. But on are failing. In order to begin protecting the safety and campus that could help. There were none. college campuses, there are only two ways to deal with needs of those who have experienced violence and violence when it occurs: file a complaint and undergo seek true accountability and change from those who +++ an investigation and trial, or remain silent about the have caused harm, college campuses are in dire need experience with no way to ensure that the individual of a new framework. In my experiences in sexual violence prevention work, who caused harm will not continue to violate other what has surprised me more than the sheer number people. The unrivaled insularity on college campuses +++ of instances of sexual violence has been the silence, make the latter option a harrowing and often shame, and guilt that surrounds it. The power of the dangerous default that forces survivors to share class- We often think of perpetrators of violence as hooded #MeToo movement was that it started to address rooms, dining halls, extra-curriculars, and even social men waiting behind bushes to snatch young women, that silence. However, the movement relied on the groups with the individuals who harmed them. For most often white, thin, and rich, from dark alleys. We emotional labor of survivors to educate the world on many survivors, this means sacrificing participation in have been taught that they are evil and we are good. how they had been harmed. Likewise, institutional activities that risk these stressful run-ins, forcing them What happens when those who perpetrate violence live systems for dealing with interpersonal violence rely on out of collegiate activities, whether social, academic, within our own circles? What happens when the list of survivors to come forward and commit to reliving their or extracurricular. those who have caused harm is filled with our friends, experience in order to convince the world they should For some, healing from an experience of sexual family members, teachers, mentors? be believed. violence requires ensuring that the individual will The #MeToo movement has shown that violence College campuses have incredibly high rates of never violate anyone else again. For others, a road to happens in all communities and spaces, obscured by
This week, the Features editors invited Camila Pelsinger B’20, Transformative Justice Student Coordinator, to author a piece on transformative justice on college campuses. As a student and activist, Pelsinger worked to help bring the nation’s first university Transformative Justice program and Transformative Justice practitioner Dara Bayer to Brown University this year.
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Transformative Justice on College Campuses
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Transformative Justice processes are uniquely equipped to address harm in a way that prioritizes the needs of survivors and transfers the labor of holding perpetrators accountable for changing their behavior onto the community. Both the high incidence rate and communal nature of college campuses make them ideal spaces for Transformative Justice to shape culture and ensure accountability. As institutions rooted in slavery and colonial violence, universities must begin to grapple with the assaulted or harmed, a Transformative Justice process ways that their spaces are sites of both interpersonal would invite the survivor and their network of friends and institutional violence, structured around the very and community members to come together and, hierarchies that breed harm. As a community-based depending on how much the survivor wants to be framework that operates outside of institutions, involved in the process, invite them to design a plan Transformative Justice on an elite college campus to address the harm. One component of TJ involves is both a paradox and an opportunity for commudeveloping a plan of safety for someone who has expe- nity-based radical change. As Robin D. G. Kelley, a rienced harm, while the second involves mapping the Professor of History at UCLA, writes in the Boston BY Camila Pelsinger relationships of the person who has caused harm and Review, “Universities will never be engines of social DESIGN Christie Zhong working with them to stop ongoing violence, recognize transformation. Such a task is the work of political the impact of their actions, and hopefully repair the education and activism.” Redistributing university harm in whatever way would be appropriate." However, resources to the work of Transformative Justice presas Bayer also notes, “that [process] could take months; ents the opportunity to build community capacity for that could take years. There is no clear one-size-fits-all greater self-determination that will inevitably ripple way to do that work, but it is rooted in coming together far beyond the confines of college campuses. cultural norms that have long normalized violations in community with shared values and developing The persistence of gender-based violence in the of consent. Dialogues about gender-based violence action plans that ensure safety.” wake of the expansion of penal and carceral responses are difficult precisely because they force us to examine To make these TJ processes a reality, Bayer has to harm suggest that existing responses to violence the ways that our consent has been violated in the begun developing an apprenticeship program to equip are failing. It has become apparent that isolating past, or perhaps how we have violated the consent and students embedded in different communities across people from their communities does little to repair or autonomy of others. campus with the skill sets and relational resources to prevent harm. The overwhelming prevalence of sexual Many sexual violence prevention programs on run TJ processes. “These processes must be grounded violence on college campuses and the underused college campuses empower communities to dismantle in the communities where the harm has happened, nature of Title IX processes make clear that existing the behaviors and cultural norms that normalize which means that this work cannot be held by one punitive systems are insufficient. Both addressing the and allow for harm. These frameworks acknowledge person. By its very nature, TJ is a decentralized non-co- violence that has occurred within our communities that the power to prevent violence lies in communi- ercive framework that cannot be scaled up or enforced and preventing future violence requires changing the ties and networks of support. We have yet to mobilize in a top-down manner,” Bayer said. culture of silence that has allowed for harm to persist these same networks to address the harm that has In 2000, the Color of Violence Conference brought without interruption. Colleges are insulated commualready occurred within our spaces, to take the plight together 1,200 people, most of whom were women nities of shared space and overlapping social circles of #MeToo and transform listening and believing into of color, to discuss the role of sexual violence in long- that make cultural change not only possible, but action. standing institutions of US state violence, “demanding necessary. Dismantling a culture of violence that has a more nuanced and expanded understanding of the persisted for so long requires an approach grounded in +++ category of ‘violence against women’ that integrated the notion that humans are constantly changing and the violence of medical and reproductive control, evolving, replicating the systems and structures that Brown University recently became the first and only criminality, poverty, colonization, imperialism, and are projected onto them. Transformative Justice revocollege campus to pilot a Transformative Justice war,” as Alisa Bierria, Mimi Kim, and Clasissa Rojas lutionizes the very ways in which we build community program after hiring Dara Bayer B’08 to serve as the later described in their journal on community account- with each other in a manner that honors our humanity Transformative Justice Program Coordinator. ability. INCITE! Women of Color Against Violence, and keeps us accountable. Transformative Justice (TJ) is a penal abolitionist the network of collectives that emerged from the political framework and set of practices for responding conference, “opened a portal for critique, analysis, CAMILA PELSINGER B’20 encourages anyone to interpersonal and structural violence that relies and new visions for change, while contributing energy interested in joining the Transformative Justice on community relationships to protect the safety and and resources to building on-the-ground alterna- Practitioner Program to email camila_pelsinger@ needs of survivors, while building systems of support tive responses to violence.” Many community-based brown.edu. and accountability for those who have caused and organizations have emerged from these networks that enabled harm. This framework links individual justice use Transformative Justice and community accountand collective liberation as mutually supportive and ability frameworks to address both interpersonal and fundamentally intertwined, creating structures for structural violence, including Communities Against communities to address harm in innovative and gener- Rape and Abuse (CARA), Sista II Sisita, Creative ative ways that prevent future violence, rather than Interventions, and others. inflicting it. The Transformative Justice model presents us TJ has emerged from political movements and with an opportunity to heal the trauma of past violence, marginalized communities, including indigenous, prevent violence from occurring in the future, and Black, queer and trans, low-income, undocumented, transform the toxic conditions that beget harm. disabled, and sex worker communities, that have built networks of mutual support as a way to survive and transform state and interpersonal violence. In the US, Black women in particular have been at the forefront of developing Transformative Justice and community accountability frameworks for ending genderbased violence outside of a penal system that has long exacted violence on Black and brown communities. Describing a situation in which this model could be used to address an instance of gender-based violence on a college campus, Dara Bayer told the Independent, “In response to a situation where someone was
THE COLLEGE HILL INDEPENDENT
FEATURES
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THE FOURTH OF JULY GIRL
BY Catherine Habgood ILLUSTRATION Eve O'Shea DESIGN Christie Zhong
She emerges from the port-a-potty dripping wet. The feet, saw that his toenails extended at least three quar- faceless from her angle, knees and denimmed legs blue plastic door swings a full one hundred and eighty ters of an inch past each toe. They were sallow and had busy keeping each other busy. The game is to slide a degrees, shuddering the entire structure. The hinges visible craquelure spidering outward, clumping in odd hotdog from the top of the table without being noticed shake; she takes off running at a furious clip, bare places like old grits, and as he made for the door, the underfoot and undertable. She pulls a string of beads feet on the earth, applying pressure at the ball of the nurse grabbed his sleeve, “It happens when you die! over her head, swinging it upward, cascading a platter foot and springing—sudden and small—forward. The Your toes, they shri— ” but before the nurse had the of hotdogs to the grass. grass bends back and forth at her beckoning. The port- opportunity to finish, he’d turned through the door a-potty sits, still quivering slightly on its designated and made it halfway down the hall. “Sir, you have to The woman in bright, wallpaper-printed kaftan is plot. She rushes through the field and droplets of water sign—!” the nurse called after him. bragging about “the cousins,” as she calls them, and from her drenched bathing suit fly like marbles from his listening is interrupted by explosions in the sky. her torso. Streaming, she is jeweled, imprecise, and Now, the Fourth of July girl moves swiftly through She seems not to notice, talking and pausing with pathways made by hanging skewers and tableclothed regular rhythm. She leans toward him as if about to watering the diamond of green. folding tables, short-haired waggers and chopsticked spill juicy gossip from her bosom. “The youngest one paper flags. They are creating a roaring and fuchsia was working on his college apps when he was at our He had been asked to identify his grandfather at the buzz, and the kelly green grass, wet with dew and house, so you know, he let me read one of his responses, morgue a few weeks ago. His grandfather had had a ocean humidity, is sodden and mud-stained in places. and, oh, it was divine!” He’s stopped listening, really, heart attack and died at the supermarket in the toilet She crawls through darkening and moist palaces, red watching the lightning bugs flash over her shoulder paper aisle. The man was 91 years old. His grandand white-checked picnic blanket palaces where she and wondering how long they live for and whether they mother had died some time earlier, and his parents, can pretend she lives. both botanists, were conducting field research in the die with their lights on. Mayan Biosphere Reserve in Guatemala and couldn’t be reached. After a painstakingly awkward and slow Two centenarian magnolia trees frame the going-in. A She notices that he keeps his toenails cut quite short, as elevator ride into the basement of the hospital, he was trickle of cars beep softly toward the water, corralled short as she’s ever seen them, and they make his toes shown into a room. As he entered, his senses were by the human edges of things. He anticipates well- look disproportional and off, sort of stubby and weird. overstimulated by fluorescence and immaculate- meaning but inquisitive talk of his grandfather from It looks like it might even hurt, having nails that short. ness, the sterilizing agents in the air, but at the same his parents’ friends and decides he’ll tell the anecdote Blades of grass stick up between his toes like hairs or time, underwhelmed: despite being saturated with of the last time he saw Grizzly. He had gone over to his carpet until the feet start walking and move away. She death, the room was disappointingly bland. It had house to make spaghetti, but Grizzly, self-proclaimed is doggedly following heels. Someone says, “Whose is office ceiling tiles and a cup with pencils in the corner. pro-chopper, had cried so much over the onions—his this?” He felt heavy and human, as if, by breathing, he was Achilles’ heel, he said—that his vision became blurry. adding too much carbon dioxide to the air. There, on He sliced his finger, now just a chopper, releasing A shirtless boy is saying to a girl with overenthusiastic the table, lay his grandfather, wearing blue boxer scarlet blood over the cutting board. And, without even gesturing, “Yeah, I want to be an activist to stand up—” shorts and a yellowing white undershirt, with his eyes batting an eye, he taped a bit of paper towel around the and the sky erupts. The colors rain. She asks, “Do you shut and his tufted white hair less clean than usual. In wound, announced that they were going out for pizza. know how I get home from here?” life, he’d been a regular kook of the mannerly, affable The onions, now pink, sat on the counter. sort, with hyper-expressive blue eyes, wildly unkempt The reply: “Why? Are you scared?” white eyebrows, and a distinctive cackle that carried She crawls between legs and, because she is plasdown city blocks. He nodded. Could he leave now? He tic-beaded, collects dirt in rings around her neck. turned to go and, faced with his grandfather’s wilting She imagines the people as a ceremony of aliens,
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Cathy I hate missing sock mistake I hate rat raisin fluorescent forget and death and a plastic clothing hanger wet paper crowded flip flops with heels carbohydrated turquoise trip I hate Jimmy Fallon and jeggings and sporks messy messy hurt humid handshake hurt I hate dumb and sticky smell arts crafts promised plaster in wifi I hate sand in food the number three Cathy I hate you knot never loathing loading liquorice I hate math moth meth broken zipper wait and laminate a lie I hate lost
kumquat I love button billow baby banana bad water luck in lavender and kumquat in footsteps pretty like corduroy cuffed calling out I love half I love celadon spoonful of sigh only in the winter click clack sail stomp leather luck lust — I love wait I love throb I love nail beds I love nails and beds wrinkles in beds books butters ballets in beds and almost in half and half dim light dim I love whatever comes to mind the fucking smell of ugly ugly things cannot I love I love and
TWO POEMS BY Alana Baer ILLUSTRATION Alana Baer DESIGN Christie Zhong
THE COLLEGE HILL INDEPENDENT
LITERARY
08
BY Victoria Caruso ILLUSTRATION Katya Labowe-
Stoll DESIGN Christie Zhong
FROM DECRIM TO RECRIM Ten years of recriminalized indoor sex work in Rhode Island
Every Wednesday night, Bella Robinson parks her Robinson herself is no stranger to sex work; it’s been parlors and to the sex buyers. There’s very little tangerine Nissan Rogue inside the faded lines of the her livelihood on and off for thirty-five years. Now freedom for the women.” lot by the McDonalds and Dunkin Donuts on Broad fifty-four years old, she says it's how she can afford her There had not been a federally prosecuted human Street, a spot she says the “working girls” often visit home, purchase a brand-new truck, and support her trafficking case reported in Rhode Island for nearly a between shifts. It was 18 degrees the night the College cat, Bobby Two. decade, but the critics of decriminalization won. On Hill Independent spoke to Robinson, and her SUV was Her path to sex work started at 18, after she left the November 3, 2009, Governor Donald Carcieri signed one of the few stragglers in the glazed parking lot. It 41-year-old man she had married only a year before. a bill into law, just six months after Robinson set foot could have snowed at any minute, but still, she decided After the marriage ended, she decided to live out of her in Rhode Island, that closed the loophole and took her to stand next to the trunk of her car. With her glasses car, eventually making friends that would become her taste of freedom away from her. pushed back in her auburn-dyed hair and a scarlet pea survival guides and teach her how to work the streets. “When I found out, I got pissed,” says Robinson. “I coat to match, she shivered in the cold, waiting for her “I learned that if I turned two tricks, it paid for my didn’t know anything about being an activist. I didn’t guests to arrive. “Hey honey, what do you need?” she hotel, cigarettes, food, and I would never have to kiss know anything about sex workers’ rights.” said to a heavy-set man approaching her. a man’s ass again. I was the master of my own castle,” About a year after the loophole was closed, “Anything you can spare,” he replied. Robinson told the Independent. Robinson read about the Gilgo beach murders, a series Trunk opened wide, she reached inside and In 2009, Robinson was working in New Jersey of killings of women on Long Island—many of whom pulled out four floral-patterned bins filled with the using online sites like Backpage.com when one of her were associated with prostitution—committed by an essentials for her outreach work: water, hygiene clients told her that sex work was decriminalized in unknown murderer. supplies, naloxone kits, condoms, gloves, hats, and Rhode Island. She initially dismissed the comment, “I started becoming an activist after that. Ritz-crackers. assuming the man was trying to impress her, but a Something in me just broke, and I told myself, this isn’t As the executive director of COYOTE RI (Call Off quick Google search verified her hopes. It was all she okay,” says Robinson. Your Old Tired Ethics Rhode Island), a sex workers’ needed to pack up her home and move to Rhode Island. rights organization, Robinson offers supplies to sex “Oh my god, girl, it was like freedom for the first +++ workers and anyone else who is in need, no questions time,” Robinson said. asked. Outside of outreach, Robinson volunteers For the first time in her life, she could call the cops Criminalization puts sex workers in a vulnerable state her time educating high school students, university on customers who threatened her, work from home where the fear of being arrested may prevent workers students, and local organizations about sex work and without the fear of being evicted, and raise her child from reporting acts of violence. is a leading advocate for the decriminalization of sex without any fear of losing her. The current laws render it almost impossible for work in Rhode Island. But her freedom was an accident, a mere legisla- sex workers to do their work safely and to seek help This year marks the 10th anniversary of the crimi- tive error. In 2009, there was an eruption of opinions from other sex workers. For instance, according to nalization of indoor sex work in Rhode Island. ‘Indoor’ that criticized the legality of indoor sex work. Donnie Robinson, if sex workers work together, they risk being sex work refers to offering of sexual services through Anderson, executive minister of Rhode Island State charged with a felony for promoting. This happened websites, escort agencies, and massage parlors. From Council of Churches, wrote in a statewide email to Robinson, who, at 44, was working with another 1980 to 2009, the practice had been legal due to a saying, “There can be no doubt [sex work] is twen- woman off Craigslist when a SWAT team kicked down legislative loophole that strengthened laws against ty-first century slavery and we have placed ourselves in her door and arrested them. outdoor, street-based sex work and accidentally legal- the eye of the storm.” Under this system, many sex workers also refuse ized indoor sex work in the process. The mistake went Donna Hughes, a sociologist at the University of to share information about clients with each other for unnoticed until 2003, when eight women could not be Rhode Island who spoke against decriminalization in fear of getting charged with a felony. convicted after police arrested them in a sting opera- 2009, feared the loophole would enable sex trafficking. “If sex work is decriminalized, I can say, ‘Yeah, I tion on massage parlors. Sex workers from all over the “I felt it was very important to stop the movement know Tom, he's a nice guy’,” says Robinson. “Or I can country started flocking to the new safe haven state to decriminalize prostitution in the United States,” say, ‘Uh, no, he’s on a blacklist for choking some girl when they discovered the loophole. she stated in a podcast created by WHYY, a public FM out...’ and I'm supposed to go to jail for promoting prosradio station that serves Philadelphia. “The ones who titution because I want to help keep others safe?” +++ get freedom are the pimps, the sex buyers, the busiThe inability to organize under criminalization nessmen who then can rent properties to the massage also creates a lack of solidarity. According to Robinson,
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if sex workers try to unionize, they may be charged work, stating, “I oppose decriminalization because majority of society starts to stand up for sex workers, with criminal enterprise. I don’t believe it does anything to promote family they’re not going to be able to take our rights away from As a sex worker who has lived through both values.” us.” decriminalization and criminalization, Robinson is Robinson argues that human-trafficking has little determined to demonstrate the positive impacts of to do with the majority of sex work. “Immediately VICTORIA CARUSO B‘21 thinks everyone who is legalized sex work. Part of this effort is lobbying for when legislators come hear about the resolution, the able to should support COYOTE RI at https://www. H5354, a resolution introduced by Representative response comes from anti-trafficking people and gofundme.com/f/soliciting-for-change. Anastasia Williams this past February, which would people who've never worked in the sex industry,” she create a commission to formally study the health and says. safety effects of decriminalization in Rhode Island. It In a 2017 study performed by COYOTE RI, 1,494 would also guarantee COYOTE RI a seat at the table, sex workers were interviewed, and of this population, which would give the organization, and Robinson, a only four percent considered themselves victims of voice at the state level. trafficking. 51 percent of the sex workers, on the other On April 4, 2019, after a hearing in the House, it hand, reported being victims of a crime while working, was decided that the resolution would be held for and almost seventy percent of them said they would further study. Robinson plans on “going for it again” not report it to the police. next year, but the real win, she says, was that COYOTE Robinson argues that a majority of the news about was able to testify and spread its message. sex trafficking has been inflated by anti-sex work “Our testimony was well-planned, where people groups in order to get funding from sponsors. She talked on different points to call out the narrative and claims the “rescue lobby,” as she calls them, tries to tell some stories, and now it’s on public record,” says make victims out of sex workers who are caught, promRobinson. ising them benefits in return. “The police will threaten The ACLU, RI NOW, and The Womxn Project HQ you,” she says. “They'll say, ‘We're going to put your are some of the supporters of the resolution. name in the paper and everyone is going to know that In an interview with the Independent, Steven you're a whore, but if you say that you were forced, you Brown, Executive Director of the ACLU, said that can become a victim. ’ Then they'll parade you around H5354 is a “good and timely bill that will revisit the a fundraiser so you can tell your struggles on the state's prostitution laws.” microphone...” “The ACLU long supports decriminalization. We A better solution to combating sex trafficking, think it's a victimless crime and think the state has Robinson argues, would be to have “knock and talks,” nothing to do with it,” Brown told the Independent. where, rather than arresting sex workers, undercover “We recognize the disproportionate discrimination on police would book an appointment with sex workers to women that this law creates, as [women] are the ones check in on them to make sure they're safe. to most likely be charged with the crime.” Robinson made a point to mention that supporting Still, there are others similar to Hughes, who are sex work doesn't neccesarily mean you approve of more skeptical of the resolution and the decriminal- it, it just means you understand that criminalization ization of sex work. Some opponents shared Hughes' contributes to the abuse of this population. sex-trafficking concerns, like Rhode Island House In the end, Robinson thinks she is working Representative Sherry Roberts. The representative torwards a larger, more complicated goal than the refused to comment on the resolution itself, but wrote decriminalization of sex work. in an email to the Independent, “I believe it could “Yes, we want decriminalization,” she explains, potentially become an enticement for increased crim- “but if we win it tomorrow, they’re only going to try and inal activity into the state, like human-trafficking, for take it away, like abortion. I feel like my job has to be example.” Roberts also had other concerns about sex about shifting social perception. Because when the
THE COLLEGE HILL INDEPENDENT
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EPHEMERA
20 SEP 2019
BY Ella Rosenblatt ILLUSTRATION & DESIGN
COLLECTING SEDIMENTS Cappadocia and carving out homes
Ella Rosenblatt
The houses do not default to box shapes. I can appear surprisingly stable despite their thin trunks. imagine that the people who lived there through the Tourists flock to the valley to see this sculpted world centuries took for granted these geological forma- and its strangely intentional rocks. Advertisements tions around them, while, to me, they’re unlike any online show skies full of hot-air balloons. They float house I’ve seen. My mom took her home with her in above the peaks, cheekily hinting that they might touch broken-off pieces, collected sediments. For the ancient down to lightly tap each apex. A guide website called Cappadocians, rock was also home, just here and now “Captivating Cappadocia lists a categorization of fairy chimneys: “The Traditional Phallic,” “Elf Houses,” around them. “Pyramid-ish,” “Dunce Caps.” I’m impressed with the imagination people bring to simple peaks, what people +++ can see. I wonder if it is possible to get over the places I first heard about Cappadocia from a podcast interview with one of my favorite writers, Elif Batuman, a we aspire to visit. I don’t know when the image of year after I received the stone necklace from my mom. Cappadocia’s peaks will leave my mind, if ever, and I Batuman mentioned the place in passing, and I could don’t know if my mom will ever say that she’s happy have easily let the detail go unexplored. But I had been exactly where she is. She never expected to stay in the thinking around that time about how often I let people U.S. She dreamed of visiting, and when she finally did, mention unfamiliar details and avoid interrupting the she happened to meet a friendly young architect on the conversation to fill myself in. It occurred to me that plane (my dad). There is a difference between wanting +++ this could cause me to miss out on a richness in these to visit a place and wanting to live there permanently, exchanges. I decided to Google this unfamiliar place and there is a difference between hoping to visit a place When I was in elementary school, we made cave she mentioned, and the images of natural rock spires and having the privilege to actually access it. I asked diagrams with Bugles. I glued them in rows like a stuck in my head long after I closed the tab. I kept my mom about this recently and she said, “When I shark’s teeth to the mouth of my paper cave. We spent mentally returning to this magical place, and it made studied film I wanted to go to America ’cause it is the more time capping our fingers with the salty snacks me think of the thousands of other places like it that land of movies—wanted to make a road trip. Even at 25 when I went to the States I never expected to live here.” and popping them in our mouths than we did talking might exist. about geological formations, but I’ll also never forget My mom is an immigrant from the Netherlands, She was lucky to have the choice to stay, unlike many what stalactites and stalagmites are. and our conversations have always been punctuated by other immigrants, but it wasn’t necessarily a conscious In Cappadocia, people used to live in giant stalag- idealistic statements about elsewheres. She often says, decision, and it wasn’t based on how she had romanmites. It’s now a landscape of impossibly skinny moun- assertively, “someday I will live in a house by the sea.” ticized the United States before. She never actually tains or impossibly tall buttes. A thousand years ago, She makes textile art about the tulip fields and horizon experienced a moment of transition from desiring to humans slashed into the rocks to carve out their homes, lines where she grew up: geometric expanses of hand- be in America to desiring to stay; rather, it was someand many of the dwellings remain. There are tunnels dyed fabric broken by vibrant stripes and calligraphy. thing that happened to her in a series of events. Like the and engineered, arched rooms. Full underground city She collects postcards depicting the flat Dutch land- layers of Kızılkaya ignimbrite and Cemilköy ignimbrite, complexes hide beneath the rock. The tunnels, which scape situated precariously below sea level and tacks choices and moments had piled up—moving to I've only seen in photos, alternately look like inflated them up for inspiration. “We are moving. We’re going Pittsburgh when my dad got a job there, deciding to go insect hives and castle bedrooms. It’s a world of wobbly to live here,” she would say about every place we visited to grad school at Carnegie Mellon University, getting a structures and shapes nestled in modern-day Turkey. on family trips, always with the same striking convic- job in a gallery there, eventually having kids, a dog, a house. The people who originally burrowed into those tion. She is serially in love at first sight. My mom was born on certain rocks and then giant stalactites eventually ended up moving past the When my mom immigrated to the United States, region, leaving it open to others settling in or passing I imagine she might have seen movement as a solu- moved to stand on others. I visited her Dutch stones, through. Its first occupants to leave written historical tion. There must have been something missing in her picked them up, and she and I carried them away, as documents were the Hittite, when Cappadocia was a life in Holland, or at least something she sought. I water and wind and gravity did the same. Rocks can location along the Silk Road. Then the Persian empire always thought she would not have made a change be solid enough to be mountains and Cappadocian invaded in the sixth century, to be overthrown by the as drastic as moving across the ocean without some homes. But they, like people, are also piecemeal and Roman empire around 200 years later. Each saw new dissatisfaction with her previous home. I wonder now scattered. Sometimes we hold rocks so close that they tenants settling into the burrows. Even more conquests if the United States struck her as more of a home than rest above our hearts on lengths of string, and somefollowed: a Christian influx, the Seljuk Turks, and the Amsterdam or Leiden or the rocky North Sea beaches. times we leave the largest ones behind. Ottomans. All the while, the peaks of rock remained At the time, I doubt she thought about how her home +++ surrounding and sheltering people. might become fractured or multiplied. Now her collecLater, in 1923, the Greek and Turkish governments tion of rocks includes Appalachian pebbles and rubble imposed an official population exchange that displaced from the Maine beaches where my dad spent his child- When I was little, I believed in God. I imagined a huge many Cappadocians to Greece and produced a remote hood summers. She has accumulated a conglomerate figure who cast the world in shadow, and his tears were new language: Cappadocian Greek. Situated in a region of places she’s visited or lived in, and, at the same rain. Now, when I look at Cappadocia, I can’t help but dominated by Turkish, the language took on Turkish time, these new places have created fault lines in her see an image of a god-artist shaping the world. I love to imagine this sculptor, molding the hills. The landcharacteristics, but originally was related to Ancient formerly singular home. scape seems so intentional, so constructed by a mind, Greek. It was thought to have died as people in the that this creation story is the most plausible to me. I region adopted Turkish instead, but recently some who +++ see enormous hands squeezing the volcanic rock as if still speak Cappadocian Greek today were discovered. The language descends from both Western European In a geology course, I learned that all striped rocks it were clay and forming lumpy, oversized stalagmites languages and ones spoken farther toward East Asia, were at one point horizontal to the earth’s crust. I like drippy candlesticks. Thumbs smooth over the rock a linguistic midpoint in a region that has hosted many immediately thought of my mom’s collection, of lining and pull it into tall peaks as the earth spins like an enorgroups over time, accumulating influences. up all the slender white stripes. Of course, it’s unlikely mous ceramics wheel. When it’s done, the figure whisThe rocks that these groups inhabited are layered, they all came from the same place, but I was interested pers to the the little humans, Go ahead, carve out your Kızılkaya ignimbrite above Cemilköy ignimbrite. The in the idea that they had some origin aligned with world. I imagine the same enormous fingers painting first is reddish and harder to wear down, while the the earth. There they could have been, horizontally latter is gray and more easily weathered; this combi- stacked and attached, and then, ever so gradually, they vibrant-hued tulip fields. They dip in wells of color and pull out globs of pasty paint. Fingers smear, making nation creates the Cappadocian cones. There are broke off and apart, drifting and scattering. “fairy chimneys” or “hoodoos”—naturally-occurThere is a valley in Cappadocia comically called the patterns, making geometry. It all blurs into the ring obelisks with almost spherical pinpoints at their “Love Valley” where the fairy chimneys are distinctly abstract: hands, cones, rectangles, red rock, gray rock, tops. Less precarious peaks are smooth like enormous phallic. The stronger red rock has worn less than calluses, old hands, pink tulips, blue sky. river rocks, a pure whitish-gray. Many are dotted with the grey to form towers that fill a grassy landscape. windows from the burrows within. Asparagus-like columns shoot up from the ground and ELLA ROSENBLATT B’21 just got a pet rock. My mom’s name is Petra. Short for Petronella, it shares the Greek root “petros” with petrified, Peter, and petrol. Petros means “stone,” and my mom likes to say, as clichéd and cheesy as it is, that she is “my rock.” The name does feel unusually appropriate for her in my eyes. She has collected striped rocks for as long as I can remember. Her favorites are usually smooth and grey and small enough to fit in an enclosed fist, with a distinct white streak. When I was little, I would scour the Dutch beaches where she grew up looking for stones to add to her collection. She amassed so many of them that they fill glass jars in her bathroom today. (I think she had to start secretly discarding rocks that I retrieved because there simply got to be too many.) When I turned twenty, she gifted me a striped rock necklaceof which she has a matching pair. These stones and stripes link us to each other and her to her home.
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Whenever I have a problem, my parents believe vitamins are the solution: “Feeling tired from classwork? “There must be an iron deficiency acting there, plus you haven’t been consistent with B12 since you’ve quit eating meat. “A sniffle when the weather starts to cool down? “You better double up on vitamin C lozenges, start your day with echinacea, and add in a vitamin D pill. “Strep throat, sinus infections, headache, or the flu? “You must have not been taking your vitamins.” I spent most of my life rolling my eyes at their nagging, feeling apathetic to their habitual plastic measuring cup full of colorful pills of different sizes and shapes. Only after a considerable amount of pressure did I hesitantly negotiate with them and buy a pack of multivitamin gummies, a biotin pill, and a B-complex pill. For the most part, these bottles of vitamins have since become another forgotten relic collecting dust in my cabinet. The idea of having a daily ritual is appealing, but I’m still just working on making sure I find time to eat a meal before 3 pm. My vitamins have only been revisited on unique occasions: a momentary health craze, an anemia self-diagnosis spiral, or a laziness-hunger combination that made it hard to distinguish between the multivitamin gummies and fruit snacks. But when I saw an ad for the vitamin company Ritual on my Instagram feed, I suddenly wanted my own daily supplement regimen. Without a doubt, Ritual does stand out with their visually compelling design—clear capsules filled with tiny white beads is more definitive of being on top of your life than was crucial to the brand. But as their name suggests, suspended in a yellow oil. Moreover, they’ve built a having the time and self-discipline to stick to a vitamin the end goal was not a lab coat product but one that powerful brand identity with their site’s yellow and routine? Along the same lines, their feed endorses enriches a daily ritual of wellness. It was crucial for white colors, the repetition of the words clear, clean, and applauds extreme self-care as the formulaic sum us to embody the feeling of taking ownership over simple, and their women-run revolution messaging: of drinking enough water, sleeping eight hours, inbox one's health without skimping on hard science and “Created for and by women who wouldn’t settle for zero-ing, applying a facemask, wearing sunscreen, and education.” less than the truth.” With such compelling marketing, putting your phone on airplane mode. Full of women But a closer look at Ritual’s marketing tells a within minutes of perusing their page I was debating glowing with all-natural beauty, sipping matcha from different story. While they preach openness as a not only purchasing their $30 monthly vitamin metal straws and making their 7 AM yoga class, their quality of their brand, their advertisements falsely use subscription, but also potentially buying a honey- brand radiates wellness without much focus on their positive quotes from paid advertisements for articles yellow sweatshirt with “RITUAL” plastered across the actual product. on websites such as Well & Good and PureWow. In the front. Aside from Instagram ads, Ritual also sponsors New York Times article, "Tricky Ads from a Vitamin A 2013 Gallup poll showed that there is a significant YouTube influencers to endorse them. One such video Company that Talks up Openness," business reporter generation gap between those who take vitamins and by the plant-based, sustainable fashion and lifestyle Sapna Maheshwari writes, “In an industry built on those who don’t. Only about one third of Americans influencer WearIlive is entitled “Wellness plans products that do not require reviews for safety or effecbetween the ages of 18 to 29 years old said that they and getting my life together.” In it, a recent Fashion tiveness from the Food and Drug Administration, regularly take vitamins or mineral supplements, Institute of Technology graduate, Jenny Welbourn, companies can easily get away with making dubious compared to more than half of individuals in the 50-64 shares her goals for taking care of herself, including claims.” With the ability to sponsor advertisements, age range and 68% of those who are over 65 years old. her “honest” feedback on Ritual’s multivitamin, like the one that Welbourn presented on her channel, Despite a lack of evidence to show that vitamins are which she noted was sponsoring her video. Welbourn it is difficult to determine what is true or merely an beneficial, the concept of having a daily regimen that says, “Especially when I was in school and really busy I advertisement. Ritual paid these platforms to review gives the sense of longevity, well-being, and overall would not plan my days around food. I think it’s really their product, and then used quotes from their articontrol over your health has promoted vitamins' popu- important to fill those gaps with a vitamin.” As to why cles as evidence that their product is successful and larity for people of older generations, like my parents. she chooses Ritual over other vitamins, she points out well-liked. In response to the Times, Schneider said In recent years, however, the multivitamin industry that it’s a women-owned and run company, vegan- that she did not believe that it was misleading to use has begun targeting a new demographic—primarily friendly, and you can tell where everything is coming those quotations in their ads, even though they were middle-class and affluent women. Business Insider from. taken from sponsored posts. She said in an email, “If cites these trends, stating, “These formulas ooze with Transparency, down to the see-through design of it were a statement of more substance, about the prodthe lifestyle trends of 2017: minimalism (‘Everything the capsules, is what drove Ritual’s founder and CEO, uct’s efficacy or something mirroring a structure-funcyou need and nothing you don't!’), bright colors, ‘clean Katerina Schneider, to build her own multivitamin tion claim, we would treat it differently.” Additionally, eating,’ and personalization.” That’s where brands like brand. In their promotional video “Why we rein- she claimed that the “links included in the ads that Ritual have found their niche in the online market- vented the vitamin?” Schneider shares what inspired quote from the sponsored Well & Good pieces are place, turning a product that was once a stale necessity her to launch the company. She was pregnant, purging enough to give consumers an idea of Ritual’s finaninto a fashionable commodity. her house of all the products with ingredients that cial relationship with the site.” The brand is superBrit & Co, a lifestyle blog for women asks “Are she distrusted, from polyethylene glycol to titanium seding the product here—like Schneider says, these cool girl vitamins really a thing?” and affirmatively dioxide. But her attempts to swap out her prenatal ads aren’t about the substance of the product, they’re answers that yes, yes they are. The article states,“With vitamin for one without any of the same questionable about everything that taking this multivitamin every typography and graphics cute enough to copy onto ingredients she was noticing in the products around day represents: aesthetics of control, stability, and a tote bag, it’s immediately clear who Ritual wants her house left her at a dead-end. Four months into her empowerment. to reach: millennial women. If you still find your- pregnancy, obsessed with her search for the perfect Another troubling aspect of their product lies in self looking for an added wellness boost even after prenatal vitamin, she quit her job and decided to create their claim to have all-natural ingredients with tracebathing in Glossier’s brand new serums, this is for you.” her own brand. She says in an interview with Forbes, able sources. Laid out in a schema on their website are Ritual, and several other similar brands like Care/of “We became so obsessed about our ingredients that splatters and smears of the nine essential ingredients or Gwyneth Paltrow’s “Goop” use Instagram ads and we decided to share every scientist and source on our contained in the capsule that Ritual determined to be carefully curated marketing designs to compel this site. That is how the idea of ‘traceability’ was born.” missing from a woman’s diet; methylated folate from demographic of women to buy their product. In the Schneider partnered with biomedical scientist Dr. Italy, omega-3 from the same microalgae that NASA same way that the concept of conquering a healthy Luke Bocci to put together a website that makes their uses in space, and D3 from wild-harvested lichen in the lifestyle through a daily vitamin regimen is attrac- ingredient selection and sourcing comprehensive and United Kingdom are some of the attractive ingredients tive to older people, brands like Ritual introduce their trackable. that fill their capsules. Their pictures present the idea product, and the idea of a self-care routine, as an essenSchneider told Forbes that she invested their seed that these all-natural, vegan ingredients are coming tial element to reaching stable adulthood. money heavily into two areas: R&D and evidently, directly from their natural sources. Upon clicking on They motivate working women to conquer their brand identity. One of their brand strategy directors, each ingredient an article appears discussing their busy schedule and realize the ultimate badge of Jessica Yan, describes her takeaway from working with provider, where it’s manufactured, why they chose success and stability—room for “me time.” What Ritual on her website. “Ritual's science-led approach it, and what it does in your body backed by scientific
SEEING THROUGH SUPPLEMENTS
13
SCIENCE + TECH
20 SEP 2019
BY Jennifer Katz ILLUSTRATION Natasha Brennan DESIGN Ella Rosenblatt
How the vitamin industry sells health
innocence that the DSHEA has introduced is that often he claimed to take them every day. The relationship times the proof of guilt looks like severe side effects between Hatch and Utah’s vitamin industry, often for users, or even more commonly, death. In 2013, for called the Silicon Valley of nutritional supplements, instance, Dr. Kenneth Spaeth noticed that many of his has always been symbiotic. Hatch collected an enorpatients were reporting strange symptoms: one woman mous amount of campaign contributions from supplehad bleeding scales on her head, another lost her posi- ment manufacturers, and then facilitated the lax tion in a choir because her voice had changed, men regulation of their products. On top of that Hatch’s reported the formation of male breasts, and others son is a longtime supplement industry lobbyist in noted increased aggression. He discovered a common Washington. Though Hatch retired at the end of last year, his law link between each of these patients—they had all been regularly taking a vitamin B-50 supplement by the lives on even when studies show that there is not clear brand Purity First. Candace Tripp started this vitamin evidence that they’re beneficial. Better regulation is company in the 1980s, making the pills by hand in her the answer; the FDA must ensure that dietary supplekitchen using scientific knowledge she taught herself ments are safe and reliably marketed. They should be from trips to the medical library. When the FDA was subject to the same regulations as drugs—considered notified of users’ side effects they told Tripp she didn’t unsafe until proven safe rather than safe until proven have to stop selling the product because nobody had unsafe. As it is now, vitamin companies are fundadied. They were only taken off the market after the mentally deceptive and free to use strategic marketing results came back from a product that Dr. Spaeth even- to sell their brand and the promise of a healthier lifetually arranged. The vitamin capsules were evidently style without any objective evidence that their product benefits one’s health. laced with two anabolic steroids. Without a doubt, Ritual has made steps in the right Despite the dangers and the many consumers that studies. But looking further at their supplement facts, have been endangered, the industry is still booming. direction by providing more accessible information they are listed as chemically synthesized vitamins. Back in 1994, about 600 U.S. supplement compa- about their vitamins. But their ability to use marketing That means that these products—like those of many of nies were producing about 4,000 products for a total to manipulate women into incorporating their product its competitors—are manufactured synthetically with revenue of about $4 billion. According to one estimate as a daily self-care ritual is symptomatic of a flawed chemicals and do not come directly from their natural at the end of last year, the size of the global supple- vitamin industry. Consumers of all ages, my parents sources. ment industry is now roughly $128 billion, with the included, must proceed with caution when dealing And further, beside each of their vitamins’ claims United States representing the largest single country/ with dietary supplements. And with this new leg of contains an asterisk. At the very bottom of their page, region at 31.4 percent market share—more than $40 aestheticized vitamins hitting the market, or at least beside their privacy policy and terms of service are billion and over 90,000 products on the market. And our social media feeds, it’s easy to be taken in by their the small letters that say, “These statements have not it’s only projected to grow, a new report by Grand ads. They tell us that the ritual of a vitamin regimen been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. View Research, Inc forecasts the dietary supplements empowers us and gives us control over our bodies. But This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or market to reach $194.63 billion by 2025. instead, the ads hide the complicated truth about vitaprevent any disease.” Many view Orrin Hatch, the former senator from mins behind a veil of clear capsules. As with drugs and medications, vitamins and Utah, as the chief author of this federal law. Hatch supplements are regulated by the U.S. Food and Drug loves the supplement industry. Early in his career, he JENNIFER KATZ B’20 no longer wants to see Ritual Administration (FDA). But unlike drugs, they are only sold vitamins and supplements, and later, as a senator, ads all over her feeds. regulated to the point of preventing “significant harm.” The FDA defines dietary supplements supplements as products “taken by mouth that contain a ‘dietary ingredient.’” The umbrella term of dietary supplements, encapsulates not only vitamins and mineral formulas, but also those derived from herbs, glands, botanicals, amino acids, hormonal extracts, probiotics, or enzymes packaged in varying forms of tablets, capsules, gel caps, powders, or liquids. In 1994, Congress enacted the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA). The act served to eliminate government regulation of dietary and herbal supplements industry, barring the Food and Drug Administration from blocking a supplement from reaching market. The agency could only take action if they become aware of health and safety problems with the product after the fact. Under the DSHEA, companies can make general health claims about many kinds of supplements without being checked by federal reviews of their safety and effectiveness before hitting the market. With such lax regulation, vitamin companies thrive on unrestricted branding power. Supplement sites like Ritual are sprinkled with asterisks referring to disclaimers in small font that essentially remove the authority from many of their statements. The law states that the manufacturer is responsible for ensuring the accuracy or truthfulness of these claims—not the FDA—and it must state in a disclaimer that the FDA has not evaluated such a claim. The disclaimer must also state that the product is not intended to “diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease,” because only a drug can legally make such a claim. Los Angeles Times business columnist Michael Hiltzik compares this process to a twisted version of the presumption of innocence. “In other words, supplements were assumed to be innocent until proven guilty.” The glaring issue with the presumption of
THE COLLEGE HILL INDEPENDENT
SCIENCE + TECH
14
DISNEY TO
DUST
BY Tristan St. Germain ILLUSTRATION Sandra Moore DESIGN Kathryn Li
In 2019, the Walt Disney Company became the very So how does the recent string of Disney remakes—a CGI to produce a sense of realism that their animated first studio to release five films that each grossed over list that comprises hits like The Lion King, Alice in counterparts did not try to accomplish, and second, one billion dollars in a single year. As a projectionist Wonderland, Christopher Robin, and Jungle Book, crafting complicated plots and grimmer characters to at an independent movie theater in Massachusetts, among others—go about adapting animated films to ostensibly elevate classic titles beyond their status as I couldn’t help but see the writing on the wall. As the live-action format? And how does this change of children’s cartoons. a one-screen theater, our cinema was consistently medium affect the logic guiding these films, as well as Compared to the wonky, proto-psychedelic atmostrong-armed by the Mouse into only playing their their thematic coherence? Such an investigation must sphere of the 1951 original, Burton’s Alice eschews most recent blockbuster for up to four weeks worth start with the progenitor of this fairly recent genre of lighthearted caricatures in favor of CGI creatures of showings—an agreement that shoves out other blockbuster, 2010’s Alice in Wonderland, directed by whose hyperrealistic designs border the uncanny big-name releases and potential indie underdogs. Burbank’s most commercially successful misfit, Tim valley. In the version that Walt himself produced, the While bad for business, the alternative is also financial Burton. Deliberately or not, the master of mall-goth Mad Hatter and March Hare, among other residents of suicide: choose to not screen the most recent Disney perfected a technique of revising children’s animated Wonderland, are drawn with wacky proportions that flicks and watch audiences flock to adjacent venues classics to fit a more ‘mature’ aesthetic palate, thereby children can comprehend and relate to quite easily; while revenue dips even more dramatically. Needless appealing to an adult audience on top of the franchise’s take the famous tea party sequence, where Hatter and to say, I saw the smash hit remake of The Lion King core tween viewership. Alice highlights two essen- Hare celebrate their “un-Birthday” by performing more times than I could count over the course of the tial ways in which subsequent Disney remakes would bizarre feats of dubious logic, such as causing a chorus summer. Though I came to appreciate the film’s visual diverge from and ultimately contrast with their tradi- of pots to sing in harmony, or filling cups that have excellence, I couldn’t rid myself of the feeling that tionally-animated originals: first, using live-action and been sawed in half with tea. Despite the scene’s ridicthere was something lacking in its attempt at engaging ulous presentation, every action works within the a more mature demographic. Disney remakes tend to bizarre logic and impossible physics familiar to animaimprove positively upon problematic legacies left by tion. The magical elements present mainly express the their originals, but leave out the silliness and fantasemotional contours of Alice’s reality. Not much of the tical elements for which many audiences are nostalgic. same can be said for Burton’s version, which retains the original’s quirks and exaggerations, but varnishes
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ARTS
20 SEP 2019
Cultural nostalgia and cynicism in live action remakes
of animals akin to ones you would find in the Museum of Natural History. By constructing a more precise approximation of a reality in which animals can speak (and vaguely reenact the plot of Hamlet), director Jon Favreau offers little room for the audience to invest the characters with their own imaginative capacity. For the purpose of The Lion King, Favreau’s special effects team even invented a new form of VR ‘motion capture’ that aimed to create convincing CGI with “the shaky-cam look of a handheld camera.” Shaky-cam, a form of cinematography meant to replicate the atmosphere of home-movies, tends to privilege the realism of the event being depicted over formal dramatic conventhem in a dourness that tries to convince the viewer of tions. It suggests a sense of distrust toward spectac- hunts Mowgli for pleasure to a brooding and injured the film’s dramatic integrity. Though Johnny Depp’s ular presentation, even when the subject matter (such outcast of the jungle seeking vengeance on the boy Mad Hatter still speaks with a lisp and lobs tea in as talking lions) obviously falls under the umbrella of as a representative of the human species. Favreau stacked cups, his gaunt and ghostly features diminish the spectacular. The conversation between Simba and forfeits the villain’s wit and playfulness to authorize the character’s playful nature. Similarly, March Hare’s Scar over the former’s future inheritance comes off what amounts to a condescending moral message, frantic twitching, now rendered with convincing as vacuous, without the conspiratorial intrigue that which manifests most clearly in the 2016 version’s detail, reminds one of a diseased animal. The remake the original’s expressive animation may have engen- revised ending. While the original presents Mowgli constantly declares its resistance to the whimsical dered. When the film tries so hard to convince us of fighting Shreva out of hubris, and thus emphasizes reality of the source material, and only occupies its its ludicrous anthropomorphisms, the fantasy which character development over an explicit message, the framework in a detached and vacant manner. As a made such ludicrousness compelling in the first place 2016 Mowgli performs the exact opposite gesture result, all of Wonderland’s emotional connectivity is vanishes. by refusing to fight Shreva in order to overcome the short-circuited: One sees the characters as ironic paroDespite all of their visual posturing, on a narrative longstanding enmity between animals and humans. dies of naively illustrated Disney creations. and thematic level Disney remakes still behave as chil- Though it is well-intended, the film paints Mowgli as Facing similar complications is 2018’s Christopher dren’s movies would—sometimes, even more child- a messiah, and thereby indulges in a simple resolution Robin, in which the Walt Disney Company resurrects ishly so. It should not be ignored that traditional Disney that glides over any complexities the original conflict Winnie the Pooh and his woodland friends as CGI dolls. ‘classics’ explicitly advocate for a code of moral conduct may have posed. When the herds of animals take This goes against the way in which Winnie has always and behavior that does not hold up by today’s measure- Mowgli’s side to defeat Shreva, a gesture that shallowly been presented: an anthropomorphic bear whose ments. At the same time, these films do not forcefully reconciles the real issue of human and animal coexisplush animal status is never placed under scrutiny. handhold the viewer through the statements they are tence, one can’t help but feel patronized. This isn’t to Partly as a result of this unbroken principle, genera- trying to make, but tend to present the conflicts in say anything about the film’s historically oppressive tions of children have invested the character with trust perspective as farcical. In comparison, the remakes subject matter (echoes of Rudyard Kipling’s imperiand admiration. Yet the 2018 version goes out of its authorize their moral judgements through dramatic alist legacy still resound through Favreau’s seemingly way to emphasize Pooh’s inanimate existence by high- stakes and sympathies that appear shallow, as though sanitized adaptation), but to point out how Disney lighting every thread, stitch, and matting of fur; even they are coddling the audience. A conspicuous sacrifices character-centered drama for cheap soluhis beady eyes are more akin to buttons than actual instance of this can be traced back to Burton’s Alice in tions to global problems. The convenient formula peep-holes. The film’s use of CGI and saccharine Wonderland, when a bobble-headed Helena Bonham amounts to escapist entertainment rather than a legitivisuals do not better immerse us in a child’s fantasy, Carter orders one of her frog servants to be executed mate call to action, despite vigorously presenting itself but reduce the experience of such to a nostalgic relic for stealing her tart. The low angles, slowed editing, as otherwise. that is forever lost. For instance, during (yet another) dramatic drop in music, and punchy acting all compel As these films continue to be churned out on a seemtea party sequence, Pooh and Tigger appear caked in the viewer to fear the Red Queen and sympathize with ingly monthly basis, I’m reminded of David Mitchell’s layers of dust, the environment is drenched in a sludge the frog who had been unjustly indicted. In compar- 2004 sci-fi epic Cloud Atlas, in which he envisions of sepia, and a melancholy orchestra saps the scene of ison, the original film’s analog to this scene depicts a future where every film is referred to as a Disney. its joyf. This impression of loss would be fine if it corre- the declaration of execution as rather quotidian: it is Mitchell’s satirical riff on corporate familism rings sponded to the film’s message; instead, Christopher performed with an upbeat musical number, as though with surprising relevance, as cultural nostalgia for a Robin insists that adults can, in fact, retrieve their to suggest the Red Queen’s behaviors are no more regime of cartoons that can only be replicated cynichildhoods. Though it gestures toward a compel- outrageous than those of the Hare and Hatter. The film cally, without the animated magic they once possessed, ling statement on the disappearance of that naiveté levels the playing field between both parties, leaving wears thinner. Regardless of critics’ remake fatigue, perhaps crucial to children’s movies, the film lacks the it up to the viewer to navigate the moral landscape on Disney’s remake-train does not show any indication conviction to successfully carry out this theme, and, as their own accord, rather than directing them at every of stopping: Browsing Wikipedia, one sees at least 12 a result, dawdles in its own indecision. moment. future remakes already in production. When I return If films like Christopher Robin and Alice retain some The manipulation of audience sympathies to vali- to work at the theater next year, I will not be surprised of the exaggerated designs of their traditionally date a film’s dramatic integrity runs though another to find Disney once again plastering our marquee, and animated forebears even as they coat their characters recent Disney remake, The Jungle Book, also directed original titles more conspicuously absent than ever. in a veneer of hyperrealism, then The Lion King pres- by Favreau. Here, the antagonist, Shreva Khan—a ents the logical step forward: It substitutes the iconic tiger seeking to kill a young human living in the jungle, TRISTAN ST. GERMAIN B’21 is still watching chilmodels of the 1994 original with generic renderings Mowgli—is transformed from a bumbling foe that dren's cartoons.
THE COLLEGE HILL INDEPENDENT
ARTS
16
BY Noa Machover & Nora Lawrence DESIGN Christie Zhong
CATERING CONTRACT CONCERNS An open letter on catering workers’ contract negotiations Since September 2018, Brown University catering Still, the University has remained obstinate on inappropriate conduct on the part of Bon Appétit’s service employees have been negotiating their this issue. Rather than supporting catering workers managers, as well as disregarding the experiences contract with the University in an attempt to unionize. by acknowledging the importance of flexibility and and talents of dining service workers in favor of The catering banquet captains are seeking to be repre- autonomy on the job, dining managers have proposed generic policies implemented by frequently rotating sented by the United Service and Allied Workers of convoluted alternatives that ignore the workers’ main managers. As generic policies and shifting manageRhode Island, according to Karen McAninch, the concerns. Management has suggested installing time rial practices emerge, certain workers fear that Bon union’s business agent. USAW is the same union that clocks in all satellite locations and providing Zipcar Appétit’s practices at Brown will be no exception. Peter represents Brown University library and facilities accounts so that employees aren’t using their own vehi- Rossi, managing director of Dining Services, has left workers, as well as the rest of Dining. cles, a solution which would add time and complica- his current position at the University. Additionally, The department has been stymied in its attempt tion to the tasks of catering staff. Rather than trusting several mid-level employees in Brown’s Main Dining to come to an agreement with the University, with employees to show up for their jobs, the University is Room have either left or accepted a job demotion. As catering negotiators citing an inability to square the insisting on increased monitoring and surveillance. these relatively swift changes occur, there is concern demands of the contract with the reality of their job. These measures have not historically been necessary throughout the department that Brown University Without an agreed-upon, signed contract, the catering for adequate functioning of the department and will management is slowly being replaced by Bon Appétit. workers remain in a temporary holding pattern, neither only make abiding by catering operations protocols These managerial changes are affecting the current in the Union nor out of it. In order to address unre- more expensive, complicated and arduous — without unionization negotiations. While the company is solved matters, federal mediation has been requested. adding any perceptible benefit. not directly involved in negotiations, their presence Moreover, Brown’s partnership with the Bon These increased expectations for catering services informs what the future of dining will look like. Rather Appétit Management company has coincided with coincide with inadequate funding for the department, than preferencing top-down managerial measures, shifting management structures, increased moni- resulting in fewer people and less access to equip- Brown needs to be more sensitive to the unique way toring, and arbitrary policy changes. These trends ment than ever. Dining employees in Catering and that catering operates within the University. suggests an underlying disinterest on Brown’s part in throughout the Dining department are being asked In the past couple of years, the University’s partmeaningfully factoring workers’ day-to-day realities to do more with fewer resources. While catering nership with Bon Appétit has made it harder for into management and negotiations. When negotiating continues to grow each year, the department struggles workers to do their jobs. Yet the current catering negowith catering workers, Brown needs to be more sensi- with growing pains due to a lack of resources, such as tiation standstill has gone largely unnoticed by the tive to the unique way that catering operates within the insufficient full-time staffing and outdated or broken majority of the Brown community. Despite the fact University. equipment. Labor shortages during busier events are that catering services are present at events throughout One issue forms the crux of the disagreement: the addressed by outsourcing labor to temp agencies. campus and play an essential role in the day-to-day University wants catering workers to clock in and out The strains faced by catering workers have coin- functioning of the university, the 10-person departat the beginning and end of their shifts. As reasoning, cided with significant shifts of management in Dining ment has historically been invisible to students and the University cites consistency and fairness with the Services. In September 2016, Brown Dining Services the broader university community. Students should protocols of other dining units. However, according to launched a partnership with Bon Appétit Management be aware of these ongoing struggles for justice in McAninch, other dining stewards—dining employees Company, an on-site restaurant company. Although our community. As students who rely on the labor of who act as union officials representing and defending catering workers are negotiating with the University, Brown’s employees, we urge the University to meanthe interests of fellow employees—have provided and not directly with Bon Appétit, the consulting ingfully include workers in the decisions that affect signed letters of support to catering services in their company’s presence brought on immediate and drastic their daily operations. negotiations. These letters acknowledge that the role changes in working conditions for dining workers. of catering workers is distinctly different from that According to a 2017 Brown Daily Herald article, dining This letter was originally published online at Uprise RI. of the other dining services workers who currently service workers say that Bon Appétit’s presence in BDS clock in and out, and that schedule flexibility is neces- middle management has increasingly “brought on NOA MACHOVER B’19.5 and NORA LAWRENCE sary for catering operations. Ultimately, what other new responsibilities — with little change in compen- B’19, two members of Brown Student Labor Alliance, dining stewards recognize, as well as catering banquet sation.” Workers are manning more stations than ever, want you to support local workers’ struggles. captains, is that the irregular nature of catering is at and those whose roles were once limited to serving odds with Brown’s contract expectations. food are now expected to prepare food from scratch as The highly variable nature of catering makes well. clocking in and out a major inconvenience for workers. Bon Appétit has a history of asking the same Events routinely end early or go late, and often take number of employees to do more work with fewer place at locations far from the Ratty (where they resources, as evidenced by previous labor campaigns at would have to clock in), such as campus’ north end or Lafayette and UPenn in 2013, WashU in 2017, Oberlin off-campus satellite locations such as the School of in 2018, and several other universities. At Oberlin, Public Health and the Medical School. for example, patterns emerged of undertraining and
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METRO
20 SEP 2019
home / land
ancestors looking down
murmuring potential futures in the earth in our bodies
a prophecy of nopal cactus forests
my abuelita revealed to me in a summer Texas daydream THE COLLEGE HILL INDEPENDENT
X
18
Friday 9.20
RI #ClimateStrike - Burnside Park - 10AM - 6PM
Make like our resident climate baddie Greta Thunberg and demand immediate action in response to the climate crisis! Hundreds of fellow Providence residents will be meeting at Burnside park at 10am to march to the state house—and, that too, just three days before the Emergency UN Climate Summit in New York. If you’d rather not march, come directly to the State House at 12:45 to strike. Work refusal has never been more urgent…
Sat 9.21
Mon 9.23
Business & Entrepreneurship for the Creative Professional - Nelson Center for Entrepreneurship - 5-6:30PM
We can all take a deep breath knowing that with the introduction of the Nelson Center for Entrepreneurship at Brown, residents of 257 Thayer—the Center’s immediate neighbor—will truly be able to work, live, and play all on one of Providence’s most dynamic street corners. Come to the East Side’s newest innovation district to hear Jonathan Wolffe, the composer of none other than Seinfeld’s “Bum ba dum bum bup dum da dada” speak about uh, entrepreneurship?
Ocean State Oyster Fest - Waterplace Park - 1-7PM
Farm Machinery & Tractor Safety - Southside Community Land Trust - 4-6:30PM
Were y’all ever traumatized by the walrus in Alice in Wonderland? Well, now’s your chance to perform some role reversal. Imbibe in his ruthless gluttony and pry open some oysters, peruse the food trucks, and take a swing at the infamous shucking contest. Callooh, callay, we’ll eat today, like cabbages and kings.
Wed 9.25
This event’s promotional literature offers a terse and ominous message: Farming is one of the most dangerous occupations in the world because of tractor accidents. Need we say more?
Sun 9.22
Moor Mother at Columbus Theatre https://www.facebook.com/events/375086199815059/
Ah, Providence Flea, Brooklyn Flea’s tragic younger sister, both of them the bastard child of Paris’ original Les Puces (how we long!). Here, you’ll find all of RI’s artisanal staples (soap, jewelry, macrame plants, that sort of thing...). Try your luck rooting around—this listwriter got an original Benny’s sign here. RIP.
Camae Ayewa (a.ka. Moor Mother) is poet, community organizer, performer, philosopher, experimental music maker—the list goes on. Her music moves from cataloguing historical trauma to dwelling on the present-day carceral state to weaving her own speculative futures. Listening to Moor Mother is maybe like listening to time itself: absolutely sublime. Tickets are $17.
PVD flea - South Water St. by the pedestrian bridge - 10AM-4PM
Thurs 9.26
Hannibal Buress at Strand Theatre 8-11PM https://www.facebook.com/events/915248098833595/
Hannibal Buress is maybe the last funny cis dude left— and he’s coming to pvd. If you can nab a ticket, do. This is… the next best thing since moving to Philly and starting a noise band.
ARE YOU AN EMMA, CLEO, OR RIKKI? TWEET @THEINDY_TWEETS