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U.S. Women’s Soccer: A Legacy of Athlete Activism

Kaitlyn Vu

Four Women’s World Cup trophies, four Olympic gold medals, nine CONCACAF Championship and Gold Cups, six SheBelieves Cups. The list of accolades goes on and on. Armed with an illustrious trophy cabinet, the U.S. Women’s Soccer National Team has itself as the most dominant dynasty in the world of women’s soccer.  Their accomplishments beyond the soccer pitch are just as worthy of discussion. Although the history books might remember the team for their unprecedented, on-field success, the USWNT’s off-field advocacy cements their place as the most influential women’s soccer team of all time.  The team’s fight for equal pay lies at the forefront of their impressive and influential record of athlete activism. Although the USWNT consistently more successful and popular than the Men’s National Team, the women were significantly less. In March 2019, four months before winning their fourth Women’s World Cup trophy, the USWNT the U.S. Soccer Federation for gender discrimination. The team accused the federation of systematically paying lower salaries to female players — the U.S. Men’s National Team earned 38% more per game than the women despite large disparities in on-field success and viewership revenue. One startling example in the lawsuit revealed that the men’s team earned three times more for their early loss in the 2014 World Cup than what the women’s team received for their 2015 victory. Ultimately, the USWNT in February 2022 that they had reached a $24 million settlement with the federation. The agreement allocated $22 million in compensation to the 28 USWNT players behind the suit and established a $2 million fund for women’s soccer across the nation. It also guaranteed equal pay for male and female soccer players moving forward, especially for participation in the World Cup.   The USWNT’s equal pay victory was truly groundbreaking: The case is to be the first time U.S. women athletes sued their employer for gender discrimination and succeeded.   Likewise, in June 2023, the International Federation of Association Football that it would give $49 million of the $110 million Women’s World Cup prize money directly to individual players, which was the first time such a policy was implemented. As such, the USWNT’s equal pay lawsuit set in motion a wave for greater investment in global women’s soccer.  However, there is still a long way to go in order to fully achieve equal pay for female soccer players across the world. At the 2023 Women’s World Cup, women players on average 25 cents for every dollar earned by the mens’ teams at the 2022 World Cup. And while the numbers are an improvement from 2019 when female athletes were paid less than eight cents per dollar earned by the men, there is still a lot of work left to do.  What the USWNT’s legal achievements have done, nevertheless, is other international teams — including Canada, England, South Africa, Nigeria, Colombia, Spain, and France — to increase the ferocity and urgency of their demands for equal pay. In an interview with the HPR, Henry Bushnell, a senior soccer reporter for Yahoo Sports, commented on the truly global impact of the USWNT’s equal pay lawsuit: “It totally inspires players from other nations to fight for more.” He explained the USWNT’s fight for equal pay provides both motivational and logistical inspiration: The lawsuit pushed other teams to “take a stand” while also providing key insight on the “nuts and bolts” of how collective bargaining agreements and player associations are structured. The USWNT was the first team to truly achieve equal pay, but they will certainly not be the last. Alongside its advocacy for equal pay, the USWNT has long been a supporter of LGBTQ+ rights. With a number of players on the squad identifying as members of the queer community, the USWNT has a tremendous record of LGBTQ+ inclusivity and visibility. For many queer Americans, the women’s soccer team is a source of pride. In a statement to NBC, Matilda Young, a spokeswoman for Human Rights Campaign, , “Young LGBTQ athletes, who all too frequently are made to feel unwelcome, have seen themselves reflected in these history-making champions.” The team’s outspoken support of queer rights has encouraged other women’s athletes to be more comfortable with expressing their sexuality and being who they truly are — on and off the field.  The USWNT has also championed other social justice issues such as speaking out against racial inequities. Following the murder of George Floyd in May 2020, the USWNT players took to the field for an international friendly match against the Netherlands in November training jackets with “Black Lives Matter.” Members of the team, including Alex Morgan and Kelly O’Hara, statements on social media stating that they wore the shirts to protest against systemic racial inequalities that hinder opportunities for people of color.  Most players also kneeled during the national anthem before games in 2020 and 2021. Given their long-standing history of political advocacy, the USWNT is certainly no stranger to controversy. When Megan Rapione took the knee in 2016 in solidarity with Colin Kapernick, U.S. soccer banned players from kneeling during the national anthem. The ban sharp criticism from the USWNT players themselves and other player organizations such as the U.S. Soccer Athlete Council that for an admission of wrongdoing from the federation for failing to support Black players and supporters. In June 2020, the federation the ban and asserted its commitment to supporting their players in any social justice initiatives. Dr. Keating McKeon, who teaches a writing course on sports and politics at Harvard, talked to the HPR about the controversies that arise when athletes are political: “The idea that they can somehow be kept in two sort of airtight compartments just isn’t realistic.” He argues that “the expectation imposed on athletes” is that “they exist as entertainers alone.” From this perspective, athletes who discuss politics deviate from their role as “entertainers” and subsequently receive backlash.  These days, many Americans, particularly conservatives, attack the USWNT for their athlete activism. During the 2023 Women’s World Cup, a majority of the team garnered criticism from conservative figures for not singing the anthem. Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, for instance, the players for disrespecting the flag and the armed forces who serve it. What’s more, their early Round of 16 exit this summer was seized by critics as an opportunity to claim that the USWNT lost because they were too occupied with woke and progressive political issues. Former President Donald Trump strongly the team: “Many of our players were openly hostile to America – No other country behaved in such a manner, or even close. WOKE EQUALS FAILURE. Nice shot Megan, the USA is going to Hell!!!’” Megan Rapinoe has long been for her unapologetic political advocacy and equally staunch opposition to Trump. In addition to championing racial justice, Rapinoe spearheaded the USWNT’s fight for equal pay and also worked tirelessly for the inclusion of the transgender community in sports. In an interview with the HPR, Lindsay Schnell, an award-winning sports reporter at USA TODAY, discussed the long-standing impact of Rapinoe’s activism: “She has not only set a standard for activism, for being unspoken and for being an ally but done so with so much grace.” Schnell further applauds Rapinoe for continuing to push for social justice issues in the face of scalding criticism. To that end, Rapinoe’s lasting impact on the team’s culture is profound. Schnell notes that the USWNT legend has shown younger players that “you can stand up for things, you can fight for yourself, and you can fight for other people” without losing love for either the sport or the platform.  Thus, the underlying intentions of the USWNT’s activism have always been simple: Fight for the causes you believe in and pave the way for other women around the world. Former USWNT captain and longtime defender Becky Sauerbrunn it best, “There’s never going to be a day that we can just show up and focus on soccer.” She added, “We know that we never would have been at this spot had it not been for all the work all these other generations of women have done. And our job is to do all the work and let the next generation stand on our shoulders so that they can see further.” Schnell also expanded upon the long-standing impact of the USWNT: “I think that the USWNT has shown every young girl that they belong in any and every arena that they want to be in … I just hope that all those little things make people understand that they belong.” The USWNT have done just that, propelling themselves from obscurity in the late 1980s to worldwide stardom today, all while fighting for political, social and economic equality in soccer, sports, and the world beyond. And although the continued on-field success of the USWNT is not guaranteed, Bushnell is confident the team’s activism is here to stay: “The ‘what’ of what they’re standing up for and their advocacy will probably evolve over time, but there is just a legacy of the team that they will speak about things beyond soccer … So, maybe it won’t be as fierce and as outspoken as it has been over the past half-decade, but to some extent, it’s always going to be there, for sure.” Put frankly, the team owes their success and fame to no one but themselves — the USWNT’s legacy of athlete activism will continue to evolve long after dust covers their trophy cabinet.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/u-s-womens-soccer/

America’s War on Gender-Affirming Care

Nora Sun

Gender-affirming care is by the Association of American Medical Colleges and the World Health Organization as “a range of social, psychological, behavioral, and medical interventions designed to support and affirm an individual’s gender identity when it conflicts with the gender they were assigned at birth.” This may include a wide range of services, such as counseling and therapy, speech therapy to match the vocal characteristics of gender identity, breast binding and genital tucking, hormone therapies such as puberty blockers, and surgeries such as . 2023 has seen an unprecedented increase in bans on gender-affirming care. According to the Trans Legislation Tracker, 169 bills limiting transgender healthcare so far in 2023, a steep rise from 37 bills in 2022. Many of these bills target gender-affirming care on some level: Some have created stringent guidelines preventing access to gender-affirming care, whereas others have banned it completely for individuals below the age of 18.  Notable bills include Oklahoma Senate Bill 129, which prohibits “gender transition procedures or referral services relating to such procedures to anyone under the age of 26,” and Wyoming Senate Bill 111, which does the same for anyone under 18. These bills refer to gender-affirming services as “mutilation.” In Wyoming, for example, professionals who violate this bill by providing gender-affirming services can be punished with up to ten years of imprisonment — the same sentence as — regardless of parental and child consent to the procedures.    The recent wave of anti-transgender and anti-LGBTQ+ legislation is often partially as a result of increased queer visibility in the media. The 2021-2022 GLAAD report “quick progress made” that year in intersectional television representation of LGBTQ+ characters; Netflix shows like “Heartstopper” and “Young Royals” .  Youth transgender activist and Harvard student Safara Malone ’27, who began socially transitioning during high school and medically transitioning this January, told the Harvard Political Review that the end of COVID-19 may have been a catalyst for the political targeting of transgender youth. For example, during the 2021 legislative session, though visibility of LGBTQ+ individuals had increased, local and state governments did not have the capacity to address the “issue” of LGBTQ+ individuals on top of COVID-19. However, now that the pandemic has subsided, many conservative politicians are taking advantage of transgender youth with vulnerable rights, using slogans of protecting children to further their political power.  On why transgender rights specifically are being targeted, Michael Bronski, the author of “A Queer History of the United States” and a professor of the practice in media and activism at Harvard, explained to the HPR that queer sexuality is easier for the general population to understand and accept than gender queerness: “People, even asexual individuals, understand that sex can give pleasure. The human impulse to have pleasure makes a lot of excuses for people — for example, the two ‘straight’ guys in the fraternity getting drunk and fooling around.”  Citing gender studies scholar Judith Butler, Bronski added that, “Gender is a much firmer binary; we have a far narrower range of what’s acceptable. Among the most powerful ‘speech-acts’ are ‘It’s a boy!’ and ‘It’s a girl!’ No one says, ‘How wonderful, it’s a human!’” Bronski noted that, “Literally seconds after we’re born, we’re given a gender identity, and it’s instilled and instilled and instilled.”  Malone found that conservative legislators have noticed parents, who are oftentimes Christian, becoming infuriated by the existence of transgender people. Politicians capitalize on these parents, as well as society’s general lack of understanding of transgenderism, to gain political power. “These parents are terrified of their child being transgender. Some of these legislators might feel the same way, but most just want to capitalize on the vote of these highly religious parents,” explained Malone.  Harvard student Trinity Dysis ’27, who identifies as Christian and transgender, believes that interpretations of the Bible to oppose gender-affirming care are “a gross misinterpretation of the text that has been found to be profitable,” adding that religious arguments against LGBTQ+ individuals verses targeting pedophilia and rape.  Dysis finds it more productive to follow the values of Christ to be a better person rather than to debate over semantics in the text, as the recorded text itself is imperfect. For example, the overwhelmingly popular edition of King James’ translation of the Bible verses, replacing the word “slave” with “servant.” These alterations could have been done to mislead Christians, since the type of slave trade that flourished in the American South was explicitly condemned in the Old Testament. Dysis explained that the Bible was not written by God, but was instead passed down through oral tradition and translated between many languages, allowing for thousands of years of bias to seep into the project.  Misunderstandings of science likewise play a larger role in fueling this war on gender-affirming care. Conservative parents have formed anti-transgender protest groups, such as , which pathologize transgender identity as an “epidemic” of “rapid-onset gender dysphoria.” The organization describes itself as “a group of parents whose children have suddenly — seemingly out of the blue — decided they identify strongly with the opposite sex and are at various stages in transitioning.” However, the validity of “rapid-onset gender dysphoria” has been : The median time from realization to sharing one’s gender identity with others is typically over a decade and not “rapid” as Parents of ROGD Kids suggests.   Dysis, who was repeatedly denied access to gender-affirming care by her family, found politicians’ and parent groups’ claims that flocks of adolescents are suddenly being externally influenced to transition in an “epidemic” to be baseless. In reality, public access to gender-affirming care is still . While politicians cherry pick vocal detransitioners who may have been rushed into the process without being properly informed and subsequently regret their transition, studies that the vast majority of transgender individuals who have received gender-affirming do not regret their decision. In fact, the regret rate of knee replacement surgery (6-30%) can be more than 100 times that of the regret rate of gender-affirming surgery (0.3%). Ultimately, the political atmosphere has led to other elected officials fearing the loss of support among parents if they do not actively champion transphobic legislation. This dynamic creates a dangerous competition of who can run the most anti-transgender platform. “Elections can no longer be won on the basis of racist commentary,” Dysis said. “That’s widely unacceptable. And gay rights have become less contested. However, transgender people are still a very vulnerable community to this kind of disruption.” While Dysis believes that the rights of transgender individuals should be taken seriously, she believes it has no place being appropriated as conservative politicians’ entire platform. “The ‘anti-woke platform’ — opposing transgender rights — is Desantis’ and Trump’s main running slogan,” Dysis explained. “However, transgender individuals less than 1% of the U.S. population.”  Unfortunately, the momentum of anti-transgender legislation is unlikely to stop at the state level. This spring, Malone at the Texas Capitol against House Bill 1686, the companion bill of Senate Bill 14, which bans gender-affirming care for individuals under the age of 18. Malone witnessed the Capitol legislators providing the opportunity for carefully selected detransitioners who came from out of state to speak before Texas citizens like herself, who was forced to wait 15 hours before being given the platform to testify. She felt sickened by the state’s refusal to hear the voices of transgender youth who would actually be impacted by the bill.  “Having to hear people who were supposed to be representing me in my government deny me as a person and say that all the work I have done is spreading toxic, nasty ideology — it’s just ridiculous,” Malone said. “It made me think, ‘I can’t wait to be out of this state, and I don’t want to come back.’” Malone is not alone in the sentiment of wanting to leave her conservative state. One direct consequence of states banning gender-affirming care is the of families with transgender youth temporarily or permanently to more liberal states. Because this momentum cannot stop on its own, the only political pathway to stopping the momentum of anti-transgender legislation is through cementing transgender healthcare rights and access to gender-affirming care through bills at the national level or through Supreme Court precedents.  The outcomes of the 2024 presidential election may impact gender-affirming care in a variety of ways. Malone believes that the best case scenario would be the re-election of Joe Biden. However, she does not see Biden passing the legislation required to codify gender-affirming care into national rights; she expects that such progress can happen no less than four years from now, if not longer. In Malone’s opinion, the worst case scenario is the election of Donald Trump or a similar politician, which would set back any progress by several years.  Eve Howe, a transgender lawyer who graduated from Harvard Law School, agrees that the worst case scenario is the election of Trump, which she believes may result in a national ban on gender-affirming care. In this case, she predicts a shift towards companies like , which is digitally accessible regardless of physical location. “Transgender individuals may have to go through shady back alleys, fly to another country, or take road trips down to Mexico to get hormones,” Howe explained, likening this potential scenario to the current state of abortion access.  Howe hopes that if Republicans continue to lose on this issue like they have in the past, they’ll move on. “A few years ago, access to transgender care was a non-issue, but Republicans decided to make this an issue for fundraising and get people to vote for them. Eventually, the bully will get tired of attacking one kid and move onto the next kid. And I feel bad for whoever that next kid is.” Ultimately, Bronski has a positive outlook on the long-term future of transgender care, emphasizing that change takes time. “You have to push for change sometimes very quickly, and too quickly for culture to accept it, but culture will ultimately accept it: Women in America began lobbying to have the vote in about 1840 and they didn’t get the vote until 1920,” Bronski said. “If the Republicans lose in 2024, I am optimistic for what will happen after that.”  For Malone, the normalization of transgender individuals is the first step toward turning this political state around. “In order to change the laws, we have to begin having positive and natural conversations about trans existence,” Malone said, “slowly normalizing us in modern society.”  The past two decades have been socially transformative in many ways, from the emergence of #MeToo to the legalization of gay marriage to the Black Lives Matter movement. Through continued intersectionality and allyship, America can likewise achieve tremendous progress in building a more equitable society for transgender individuals. 

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/war-on-gender-affirming-care/

Reckoning with Icons: Frida Kahlo and Cultural Appropriation

Diana Ochoa-Chavez

Most people might not recall when or how they first encountered Frida Kahlo — yet, she is instantly recognizable. Her image appears on objects ranging from the 500 Mexican peso to earrings, clothing, mugs, phone cases, and posters. Often, in these representations, her braided hair is adorned with vibrant flowers, and she is dressed in a huipil — a traditional garment embroidered with colorful patterns belonging to indigenous groups in Mexico and Central America. Frida Kahlo will emerge whenever Mexico is represented.  Kahlo’s image, both in the world of art and popular culture, has served as a source of empowerment for Latinas and a number of other marginalized identities — including the queer, anti-capitalist, and non-able bodied communities. As the daughter of Oaxacan immigrants, wearing huipiles and jewelry crafted by Indigenous Oaxacan artisans have been ways that I remember and honor my indigenous heritage, despite my distance from Mexican citizenship or formal membership in tribal communities. Kahlo’s active choice to embrace her Mexican — over her European — heritage made her a particular figure of interest to me. At first glance, Kahlo’s embrace of her intersecting identities, particularly of her Indigenous heritage, might seem contrary to what most consider offensive. After all, she seems to have amplified Indigenous culture through her art — a culture that continues to experience threats of erasure due to enduring effects of White colonization. However, further investigation into her background and contemporary against Kahlo by Indigenous communities tell a different story.  Recently, Kahlo has become a polarizing figure in the conversation about cultural appropriation. While some express profound admiration and reverence for the artist, others passionately argue that Kahlo profited off an exoticized, calculated self-image at the expense of Indigenous people. To some, this accusation may seem like a wrongful application of the concept of cultural appropriation. After all, Kahlo was a citizen of the country from which her clothes originated, and she was immersed in Indigenous culture. Therefore, some claim that she was justified in wanting to embrace her Indigenous roots as a form of self-expression. Both supporters and critics of Kahlo engage in the wider debate on who can reclaim parts of their heritage and identity — a complex, evolving concept. To better comprehend the grievances of Indigenous Mexican communities, one must examine Kahlo’s genealogy and the way she chose to portray her identity.  Kahlo was the daughter of a German man and a mestiza woman; the term mestiza refers to a person of mixed Spanish and Indigenous descent. Kahlo’s mother tenuous ties to the Indigenous people of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, a region in the state of Oaxaca. in Coyoacan, a municipality in Mexico City, Kahlo remained distant from the rural life most Indigenous groups in Mexico during the 20th century. Given that Kahlo grew up in the city as a mixed White woman, she ultimately benefited from assimilation into colonized, Mexican society. On the other hand, the long standing effects of Spanish colonialism — colorism and racism — continued to unassimilated regions of Mexico, namely its regions with dense Indigenous populations. With regards to race, Kahlo could enjoy the privileges of her White identity and her separation from the quotidian struggles of Indigenous groups in the southern states.  ( , 1940). Furthermore, Kahlo’s image as constructed through her self-portraits may appear to some as too much of an appropriation of Indigenous culture to be considered appreciative. Some may take issue with the mythologized and exoticized portrayal of Indigenous culture in her work — as seen through jungle-like imagery present in the art depicting wild vegetation and animals. The accusations against Kahlo are motivated in part by her construction of an exotic image of “indianness.” Moreover, critics argue she sold her image, portraying an identity that was not entirely hers to claim. The ongoing debates regarding Kahlo and cultural appropriation carry larger implications beyond the Latine community. If Kahlo, a woman of many complex identities, is guilty of cultural appropriation, then those with similar diverse genealogies and upbringings may also be prompted to reexamine the ways they choose to embrace one part of their racial or ethnic identity.  In the case of people like myself — who were born in the United States but come from parents of different national origins — one essential part of keeping one’s heritage from being erased due to assimilation is through its physical form of expression. By wearing one’s traditional cultural clothing, jewelry, or adopting other forms of cultural expression, one is able to give more power to a part of their identity that historically has been suppressed by colonial efforts. In many cases, part of what allows for resistance against White supremacy is one’s ability to embrace and reconnect with historically suppressed parts of their lineage. At the same time, it seems like if we judge who can embrace these parts of their identity based on their existing proximity to it, the effort to revitalize the marginalized aspects of one’s lineage may prove to be more difficult.  While Frida Kahlo’s case appears to be one that is unrelated to the rest of us — for one because we do not share the same level of influence — the debates regarding cultural identity inspire further discussion on the topic of cultural appropriation. Identity is complex and dynamic; part of what makes us human is our ability to express our sense of self and share it with the world. Although the case of Kahlo leaves few concrete answers regarding who can choose to embrace certain parts of their cultural identity, the lesson one should take is a willingness to view their idols through a critical lens. Instead of adopting a dogmatic adoration of Kahlo — and any similar icons — we should be critical and conscious of current discussions. Moreover, we should invite Indigenous people and other marginalized communities into the discourse and comprehensively consider their objections to these powerful figures.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/reckoning-icons-appropriation/

The Freedom-Hero Fallacy

Donald Cruse

Today, many Americans hold misguided views of the Civil War. When polled, 48% of Americans the Civil War was about states’ rights, while only 38% said it was about slavery. We this misguided sentiment echoed by political leaders like Nikki Haley. Over 150 years after the Civil War, Americans still find themselves largely uneducated about the principles that caused it and the factors which resolved it. This should be alarming to anyone who subscribes to the adage that those who disregard history are doomed to repeat it. Tracing this misunderstanding of the past, it is not difficult to find its roots in public education. Everyday, with the warping of education policy that historical books and thorny history, the matter of political influences on youth education is thrust to the forefront of the national scene. It has become clear that statehouse-reliant education policy is failing in some areas to address historical truths, namely, the truth about the Civil War, Reconstruction, and figures of the time. Fortunately, this matter of ingrained ignorance can be mended. With miseducation being the issue, authentic education is the only real solution.  In an interview with the HPR, Harvard professor Dr. Myisha Eatmon stated that the largest misconception Americans hold is “that the Civil War was about states’ rights; it was about more than that. It was about slavery at the core.” Support for this claim is undeniable. Seceding states made this abundantly clear. South Carolina’s 1860 Declaration of Secession from the United States , “An increasing hostility on the part of the non-slaveholding States to the institution of slavery, has led to a disregard of their obligations, and the laws of the General Government have ceased to effect the objects of the Constitution.” From this line alone, the cause for secession is apparent: slavery. Seeing as the cause of the war is apparent, why do a plurality of Americans paint it as a dispute over states’ rights instead of a battle over one of the ugliest stains on America’s historic fabric? The answer, as with so many questions today, can be found in how we educate our youth.  The federal government strict benchmarks for how states must educate on areas like mathematics and reading; there no such country-wide benchmark for social studies or history. As a result, states and localities create their own curriculum requirements in these fields, leading to vastly diverse and contradicting versions of history. In one stark example, while California that slavery was institutionalized and continued to harm Black people after the Civil War, Florida, conversely, that slavery served in some ways to benefit enslaved Black people.  Waylon Massie, a former American history and AP US Government teacher, weighed in on the nature of education as a factor in America’s corrupted view of these historical matters. Massie noted, “Over my 20 years in social studies, we really minimized slavery. You get more into the states’ rights.” Considering Massie’s 20 years in education were spent in southern Ohio, his experience seems representative, as the eighth grade Civil War curriculum — which does not need to be revisited in high school, per Ohio curriculum — , “Disputes over the nature of federalism, complicated by economic developments in the United States, resulted in sectional issues, including slavery, which led to the American Civil War.” While slavery is mentioned, the minimized nature of it and its classification as a mere “sectional issue” confirms Massie’s experience.  Massie found himself frustrated by the constraints of curriculum, and he credits this frustration as a major factor in his decision to leave the classroom. He explained, “I think if you’re not frustrated, you’re probably not a very good teacher.” His story points toward an unfortunate trend: We are facing an extreme educator shortage in this nation. Factors such as pay and working conditions are at the forefront of this struggle, and many educators similar frustration to Massie’s about their constrained ability to teach. Texas, for example, has such low numbers of teachers that the state has lowered its standards to become a licensed teacher. That is terrifying. If the goal is to improve education, historical or otherwise, the answer is not to drive out experienced teachers and replace them with unprepared and underqualified ones. As mentioned, on top of the burden of constrained curricula, teachers are facing all sorts of other constraints. “You could almost write another article on the types of constraints,” Massie said. “We’ve got time constraints, you have financial constraints, you’ve got constraints on the abilities of your learners, and then you have cultural constraints.” As light is shed on the plight of America’s public school teachers, it is no wonder that education on history is failing: The education system is failing teachers.  Eatmon expressed her wish that American youth be taught that “The election of 1876 was only contested because of voter fraud on the part of Southern Democrats.” This point — in the realm of Civil War-era education — is intriguing, as it connects an important theme in American history to modernity; we can to historic voter intimidation today. In another vein, Harvard professor Dr. Walter Johnson said in an interview with HPR, “I would want [American youth] to understand that it was possible to be anti-slavery while still being white supremacist.” Johnson brought up an important point: All too often, historical figures, especially from this era, are portrayed as heroic and unblemished. In reality, the fallacy behind their heroism exists only in their absence of being pro-slavery.  President Abraham Lincoln is likely the most famous example of the reality Johnson laid out. Lincoln is the world over as the “Great Emancipator.” Americans consistently him as the best president in United States history, and tributes to him not only adorn our nation’s capital but can be found across the world — such as his in London’s Parliament Square.  Lincoln is the great American hero, so I’ll his 1858 words to speak for him: “I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists … I have no purpose to introduce political and social equality between the White and the Black races.” I certainly never heard these words in school, and I am confident most others with an American public high school education did not either. Lincoln went on to add, “There is a physical difference between the two [races], which … will probably forever forbid their living together …  [I] am in favor of the race to which I belong having the superior position.”  Abraham Lincoln — the Great Emancipator — uttered those sentiments. What would be the reaction today if President Biden were to utter those words? Surely, he’d be cast as anything but a hero. While some may argue that Lincoln’s words simply echoed his environment and his time, is that a sound excuse when compared to figures like John Brown, who actively against slavery and racism, even though he was a White man? No. Lincoln should not get an excuse; he was not solely a product of his environment.  Why is it that Lincoln is painted a hero on the modern canvas? Massie says it is because “We need heroes. We need things to hang our hats on as Americans.” Especially in poor and rural areas of the country, looking to Lincoln as an example of a poor country boy making it all the way from dirt floors to the White House is nothing short of inspiring. His accomplishments in that sense were absolutely noteworthy, and we must credit him with what he did accomplish. We can no longer credit him, however, with being an anti-racist trailblazer. He was not.   Massie is spot on: We do need heroes. Fortunately, according to Eatmon and Johnson, we have them. Eatmon explains, “I definitely think it’s Black people — whether it was people who self-emancipated during the war, whether it was Black men who fought in the war … whether it was Black people who were at constitutional conventions during Reconstruction … I think Black people are agents in emancipation that we don’t traditionally talk about.” Johnson said the true heroes are, “Enslaved people, themselves, as Du Bois pointed out in Black Reconstruction. John Brown.” These responses demonstrate another great failure in the education some states provide: a lack of discussion of the actual heroes of the Civil War — many of whom were Black. When we take these truths and line them up next to what is widely accepted as true today, the difference is striking. American educators are tired of teaching a version of history that is dependent on state politics and whitewashing. But even more alarming than what they are instructed to teach in public school, is what is absent from the curriculum.  I asked Massie if, in his time as a teacher in these subjects, he was ever instructed by state standards to educate on Black agency during the Civil War and Reconstruction. His response was, “No. I don’t think I have ever seen that … The role of enslaved people is, if not absent completely, minimized.” Indeed, Black people did work to liberate themselves. How could state curricula not make that information front and center in discussions on emancipation? It this matter boils down to the political leanings of those with power over education. After all, the same Republican party that on voter intimidation and gerrymandering would surely not our youth to be educated on from over a century ago. I seem to recall something about learning history so as not to repeat it.  Massie’s words are poignant. Teachers want to teach; it’s as simple as that. So often, however, they find themselves confined to a small scope of history, or fearful of the backlash that would ensue were they to challenge the state’s narrative. Teachers are down every day and used as scapegoats for the miseducation that some state officials feed down the pipe from statehouses to classrooms. This process ultimately results in warped historical and social curriculum, in part, to advance the narratives of those in power.  If we, as a nation, mandate certain requirements for math and reading, why is it that we allow individual states to determine the version of history their youth deserve? Moreover, who benefits from propagating a history that all but removes mentions of slavery, Black agency, and self-emancipation and props up figures like Abraham Lincoln, who, at best, was a temporarily anti-slavery White supremacist? We must focus our efforts on ensuring that children across this nation are learning the truth of American history — the good, the bad, and the ugly. It is only as an educated society that we can ever truly hope to move forward socially and eliminate systemic prejudices and biases.  In the words of George Orwell, “Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.” Right now, state governments control the past through the miseducation of American history. This nation needs to prioritize accurate history, make standardized social studies education national, and, most importantly, show respect for teachers, who should be allowed to serve as deliverers of truth, not used as political pawns.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/freedom-hero-fallacy/

In the Darkness Let There Be Light: The Political Power of Black Hymns

Mikalah Hodge

For many Black children, Sunday mornings are filled with pageantry, hot combs, and gospel. But you will not hear soft melodic instrumental gospel tracks in these mahogany pews — you will hear the upbeat tempo of a people’s survival, you will hear the percussion of politics. These hymns are the physical manifestations of 400 years of history of a people’s struggle. Throughout history, African Americans have used music to communicate biblical devotion, plans of escape, and political protests. The hymns of a people denied literacy don’t just serve a religious experience; they have been used to create a community in the face of a nation that denied them basic humanity, and their legacy is intertwined in the Black experience of so many generational African Americans today. When denied access to the wider society, Black Churches became the epicenter for African American life, including the for political rights. The “Black Church” derives its meaning from what W.E.B Dubois coined the “Negro Church,” in his book by the same title and most commonly to the seven most major Black Protestant denominations. The Bible and Christianity had present in Africa from the 1st century AD and were introduced to Sub-Saharan Africa in the 15th century by Portuguese merchants. However, the vast majority of enslaved peoples were prohibited from being baptized or converting to slavery because slave holders that the Bible might incite rebellion. In fact, in the 1730s, several would-be-Confederate states anti-literacy laws that made it illegal for enslaved peoples to be taught to read. However, as the First Great Awakening and Revivals America from the 1740s through the turn of the century, Black enslaved people began to convert to Christianity. This was in large part because the Evangelicalism and Methodism of the First Great Awakening was imbued with a democratizing force by asserting that all people could be Christianized. In fact, Methodists conversions from enslaved Black people and the White working class. The relationship between enslaved peoples and the Bible was complex and used in a variety of ways, including to legitimize their humanity and subsequent freedom and to criticize their enslavement.  Without being able to widely access and engage with the Bible in its traditional written format, Black Christianity became an oral tradition. As explained in Allen Dwight Callahan’s “The Talking Book,” while there were some literate enslaved preachers, the vast majority relied on sermons taught by White missionaries or passed down from family members.  In the last few decades before the abolishment of slavery, Negro Spirtuals, or religious folksongs often retelling the stories of the Bible or popular motifs, widely popular. Some of the most popular — which are still sung in Black Churches today — include “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot” Wallis Willis and “Go Down Moses,” whose composer unknown. Negro Spirtuals traditional West African musical traditions and Christian motifs. Many enslaved Africans’ native tongue tonal words that weren’t present in English; these tones that had been stripped from them were transformed into the rhythms of spirituals, and they also drew from the traditional communal aspect of singing and dancing in West African tradition.  These spirituals often encompassed stories in the Bible associated with freedom like the story of Exodus, in which the Israelites were enslaved in Egypt for 400 years and subsequently freed by God. In Albert Raboteau’s 1994 “Afro-Americans, Exodus, and the American Israel,” he explains that while most White colonists saw America as Israel or the Promised Land, many enslaved peoples viewed the White colonists as the biblical Egyptians and their forced home as Egypt land. It is important to note that the relationships between enslaved peoples and the Bible is one with complex intricacies and deeply rooted historical meaning, and this article only touches on a small portion of the expansive story. During the 19th century, Negro Spirtuals served a dual purpose: a vessel for religious devotion and a signal for escape. As the Underground Railroad ushered enslaved peoples out of the “peculiar institution” and into Northern freedom, enslaved peoples would plans for escape through the use of spirituals sung throughout their daily tasks. “Map songs” like “Follow the Drinking Gourd” enslaved peoples with the essential instructions for escape. Historians to these songs with double meanings as “coded spirituals.” Negro Spirtuals, however, did not end with the emancipation of enslaved people; they persisted throughout the late 19th century and the 20th century. Although the system of chattel slavery officially on June 19, 1865, systemic forms of abuse and racism did not. With the failure of reconstruction and of Jim Crow, Black people were still under eerily similar conditions of poverty and a lack of opportunities as pre-Civil War times. Despite being denied entrance into “polite” society, the Black religious experience became deeply rooted in the lives of newly freed enslaved peoples. In the decades following the Civil War, many large Black churches in the North thousands of missionaries to the South. As Black Christianity grew, the traditional and comforting spirituals became a center of church service. However, the solemnly slow beats were by fast paced praise dance-inducing rhythms. In fact, the Harlem Renaissance Black music by introducing jazz and blues to the already extensive musical history of Black Americans. With the Great Migration, many Black Southerners music — most specifically, early blues — developed on plantations and the postwar South to the North while in search of better jobs and less discrimination. This new coalition of Black people settled throughout the North, especially in Harlem. With the Harlem Renaissance and jazz making its way into the music collections of White Americans, the irony is that with the of jazz to White people, its Black creators were barred from enjoying the music in parlors and clubs. As the Harlem Renaissance was funded by White dollars, its music expanded beyond the gospel and freedom genre in order to appeal to a wider audience. Although Black music began to explore secular topics, it still stylistic elements of traditional spirituals like rhythmic precision and even used lyrics from spirituals. However, religious spirituals and hymns, the former of which is by its praise aspects, were still widely used throughout the Black community. This cultural touch point would be into the national spotlight during the Civil Rights Movement. The Black Church and Black religious leaders, including Dr. Martin Luther King and Reverend Ralph Abernathy, at the forefront of the movement. Through the use of widely known spirituals and hymns, preachers were able to mobilize and motivate their congregations and White Christians to join in calling for the end of Jim Crow. The emotional songs the struggles of Black Americans and dispersed their message to those who did not readily see the toll of discrimination directly. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr called music the “soul of the movement” in his 1964 book “Why We Can’t Wait ” Black Hymns and the oral traditionality of Black Christianity has long in our community. Music has united a community that has faced injustice and discrimination for 400 years, from negro spirituals to hip-hop. In light of the Black Lives Matter movement in 2013, utilizing Black music as a political message has once again emerged.  Songs like R&B artist H.E.R.’s somber blues song “I Can’t Breathe” of the messaging frequently found in Civil Rights Era songs and even traditional negro spirituals. Artists aren’t just focusing on protest music — some are advocating for the conservation and celebration of traditional Black songs. Recently, a movement to acknowledge what is colloquially known as “The Black National Anthem” has in the media, with Sherly Lee Ralph the song at the 2023 Super Bowl. The Black National Anthem to Lift Every Voice and Sing, originally a poem and hymn composed by James Weldon and Johnson in 1900. The song was later by the NAACP and used in the 1950s and 1960s as a rallying call in Black Churches and Civil Rights demonstrations. The song emerged at the turn of a century, one that many Black Americans hoped would finally be their way out of “Egypt land” and into the “promised land” they had been searching for since their arrivals on the beaches of Virginia.  Black musical politics is far from gone and its history runs parallel and oftentimes intersects with the broader American political history. From spirituals meant to connect enslaved Americans to new found religion to hip-hop and R&B songs that reflect the current lives of Black Americans, music and hymns have always deeply influenced how Black folks interact with the world. Today, however, the anthem is sung as a celebration of overcoming and has been sung by some of the most iconic Black artists of our generation, Beyoncé.  They took our language, they blinded our eyes, but they could not break our spirit. Our resilience is manifested in melodies and remembered in rhythms. What was once enslaved peoples only connection to a home most would never return to has become an anchoring point for generational African Americans who have known no other.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/in-the-darkness-let-there-be-light-the-political-power-of-black-hymns/

Classics Are at a Crossroads

Livingston Zug

The classics — the poems, myths, philosophies, and histories from Ancient Greece and Rome — portray a society struggling with war, disease, climate change, social inequality, unrest, and autocracy. Just like us, but also not like us at all. The classics are at once beautiful paeans to humanity and an inspiration for Mussolini, and this is not justification for their relegation or promotion. Nonetheless, as with many books in recent years, the classics have also politicized. Under the auspices of editor Roger Kimball, the right-wing, high-brow culture magazine The New Criterion has a series of essays since September 2021 collectively titled “Western Civilization at the Crossroads.” In these essays, various authors argue that western civilization has begun to falter as American society changes, with fewer Americans church and communities more racially diverse. To quote the introductory essay of the series: “If one were inclined to sum up the moral of this introductory essay, one might … say that its message is that civilization depends on tradition, that which is handed down, traditum, from the past.” Note that the central idea, “tradition,” is expressed in Latin a few words later, signaling the importance of the Greek and Roman classics to this vision.  Case in point: The “crossroads” in the title of the essay series come from the Greek tragedian Sophocles’ “Oedipus the King.” The authors chose the crossroads — that wooded place where Oedipus kills his father and begins to journey down a swift road to his doom — because they wish to evoke the image of a choice that will decide the fate of this project, “Western Civilization.” They depict the Greek and Roman classics as quintessential vessels of tradition, venerability, and strength. Here is a perspective that conceives of the classics as a set of texts, ideas, and historical events perfect enough to be used as models upon which to base our future practices. Not only is such a stance reflective of a superficial understanding of the material, but it also propagates a dangerous view — that who we were is who we should become.  After all, with some exceptions, those who wrote the poems and inspired the ideas beloved by The New Criterion essayists often owned slaves, enforced the patriarchy, and grew rich off imperial domination. Seneca, the famous stoic philosopher, supported modesty while being one of the richest men in Rome; Ovid’s “Ars Amatoria” comes close to endorsing misogynistic dating strategies; Demosthenes, who provoked Athens to war against Macedon, helped undermine the city’s democracy after it lost. This sounds eerily similar to the world we live in today, where some of the figures most central to the American story, like Thomas Jefferson, owned slaves while advocating for freedom from tyranny. Given this, how can we believe that the world illustrated by classics should by American society’s cynosure going forward?  The left has an alternative viewpoint, and Princeton Classics Professor Dan-el Padilla Peralta is one of the loudest voices behind its critiques. The New Criterion a scathing profile of Peralta in March 2021 in response to an oppositely complimentary in The New York Times just one month earlier. In the article, Kimball viciously objects to Peralta’s assertion that the classics must dramatically grapple with the legacy of oppression and its hand in it. Kimball also lodges cruel insults against Rachel Poser, the author of the piece, and sounds off about preserving the purity of the classics.  In essence, Peralta argues that the historical deemphasis of the dark side of the classics — the slavery, nationalism, xenophobia, classism, sexism, homophobia — has marred the discipline to the point where it has been rendered meaningless. Though he doesn’t exactly clarify how, he claims that that stance has led, in Poser’s paraphrase, to “justifications of slavery, race science, colonialism, [and] Nazism,” among other evils. Thus, the field has to strenuously reevaluate itself, or justly perish for its sins. Like Kimball’s, Peralta’s outlook is fundamentally an extremist perspective on the classics. It also stands in furtherance of an unsavory viewpoint: that the classics, far from being worth everything, as those at The New Criterion would have it, have nothing left to give us. If it’s all dead white men, there’s little reason to bother with it anymore. His burn-it-all-down rhetoric is aggressive. Kimball and his staff are justified in defending the classics as a “fertile source of wisdom and aesthetic delectation.” Yet, for a that’s “on the front lines of the battle for culture” and committed to aesthetics, their March 2021 essay reeks with a most unaesthetic venom: In angrily defending themselves against critiques from the left, they fail to consider that, in their moderate forms, the aggressive aims of the left and the defensive stance of the right have intellectual and societal merit. Besides, using big words, especially those from other languages — like traditum — and gratuitously humiliating one’s fellow scholars does not make one an enlightened person.  The tendency on the right — especially on the erudite right but also, worryingly, on the Proud Boys and extremist side of conservative politics — to idealize the classics elevates them to the pinnacle of morality. It plays out in articles in The New Criterion, yes, but also in banners the Spartans on January 6th, social media influencers touting ancient rape culture as worth emulating by incels (see Donna Zuckerberg’s book “Not All Dead White Men”), and the recent discovery that non-classics-professor men about the Roman Empire rather often. Such misinterpretation and appropriation of the classics, however it manifests, is reprehensible.  As represented by Peralta and company, though, the fringes of the left are equally foolish for their wholesale demolition effort. The New Criterion’s article cites several educators’ diatribes about canceling, or otherwise destroying, the classics as a discipline. Dissolving the field, eliminating its endowments, firing its professors, and removing its texts and topics from curricula are all excessive, unwarranted steps.  There is no doubt that the present moment demands a challenge of the norms of western civilization. One need look no further than to rising authoritarianism in Hungary, violent assaults on the Capitol, or the battlefields of Ukraine to see that the democratic project is under threat. The classics have little to do with this. The solution is not to search two-thousand-year-old texts for suggestions on how to organize society today. The classics cannot explain something so far beyond its bounds, and ought not to be asked to do so.  Western civilization may be at a crossroads, or it might not be. Either way, the left, right, and their academic and social arms have a choice between honestly and appreciatively working with the classics or distorting them to fit a political agenda. As for our larger civilizational questions, we will have to find our way by some other path — one that does not rely solely on traditum nor necessitate its absence.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/classics-are-at-a-crossroads/

Progressive Gender Politics Have Become Suffocating: The Case Against Reclamation

Luke O'Brien

I’ve undergone a kind of case study since coming here last August. When I arrived, I had pink hair so bright that the Class of 2027 photo resembles a Where’s Wally game. But I was hit with a disastrous gene: male pattern baldness. Gone went the pink, out of fear that I was damaging the precious hairline that was beginning to recede. Gone, too, it seemed, was the respect for the fact that I might not conform to all male stereotypes. There was a marked difference in the way that people treated me — especially from those in or allied with the queer community. I felt as if I were no longer a member of an in-group, as if I’d now been flung back out into the “normal” public. A part of this change was refreshing — and not just because CVS had been extorting me for pink hair dye. I was faced with fewer stereotypes. Fewer weird looks from people walking through campus. Fewer assumptions about who I was, how I would act, and what political opinions I might hold. No longer was I the worst nightmare of a Fox News anchor. But there has been a more frustrating element. Since donning the forbidden natural hair, people have felt no shame in applying more male stereotypes to me — in assuming that I approach friendship and relationships like most men or that my brain functions in some essentially male way.  What frustrated me most, though, was who made these assumptions. It wasn’t the traditional, masculine men wanting to welcome me back into the fold, so to speak; it was the progressives who were supposedly on my side. And increasingly, it was the queer community. The creation of a strong community has been essential to combating discrimination. It allows queer people not only to form a kind of alliance with others but to learn the appropriate tools to fight prejudice. For some, this may involve scolding the offender as their mother would; you sit them down and tell them that what they said was wrong and ignorant and offensive. Objectively, this seems like the most reasonable response. After all, the offenders should learn why they erred. But such a response can be exhausting. It shouldn’t always be the job of the one facing discrimination to explain why that discrimination is wrong, to soft-parent people into acceptance. And more importantly, it might not even work. In the face of irrational belittlement, a rational explanation is rarely effective. The alternative is not to parent the offender; it is to reclaim what they used against you. If pink hair is socially ridiculous, for example, then maybe I’ll just dye my hair the brightest of the bright pinks available. An act like this weakens the arsenal of prejudice. Beforehand it was something that caused shame; once reclaimed, the tools of discrimination become an element of culture that strengthens your identity. These acts of reclamation are, generally speaking, the foundation of queer norms and trends. In other words, dying your hair pink or following any other trends in the queer community are born not from some common genetic trait, but from reclamation. Often we talk about reclamation only in regards to slurs or offensive terms. But it can apply to any kind of stereotyped behaviors, fashion, or modes of speech. Consider the surge in popularity of the septum piercing. Having one wasn’t imposed on the queer community in the way that slurs were; homophobes weren’t strolling the streets armed with a piercing gun. But when the septum piercing became a target of ridicule, the community responded by embracing it, by owning it. A mere piercing became a marker of one’s identity, a symbol of one’s pride against the discrimination they faced. And this is the sense in which I use “reclamation” — an act that tries to take ownership of something that once invited ridicule so that it becomes central to the queer identity. This, I argue, is the darker side of reclamation. If our main tool against stereotypes is to reclaim them, we risk developing a sense of identity that is just as shallow as the one ascribed to us by others, of repeating the very prejudices we try to fight. My hair conformed well to the norms of the community because it was slightly outrageous and, more importantly, because it was feminine. That’s what signaled to others that I was a member of this in-group. That’s what enabled the mutual recognition with other members that we were alike. But ever since my hair returned to its natural state, it has been expected that I’ll return to mine: namely, my biological sex. And here is where the community has inadvertently committed a kind of biological essentialism. The original script of gender that you must dress, speak, and act in accordance with your assigned sex. If you were born male, you must be manly; if you were born female, you must be womanly. And so, when people had gender identities that erred from the norm, they inevitably dressed and spoke and acted in ways that subverted the original script — namely, those assigned male would present more feminine and those assigned female more masculine. With reclamation, then, this subversion became the norm among trans and nonbinary people. And although this has enabled more fluidity in expression, it has also reduced, in some ways, one’s gender identity to these superficial signals. Adherence to these norms has been conflated with one’s internal experience. To gain respect for your gender identity, you must still act in accordance with your sex but in an unorthodox way; you’re flipping the script while repeating its mistakes.  The natural extension of these norms is that you must conceal your biology — which is a part of the reason why, for a long time, I shaved every shadow of hair left on my body, shaved my face so obsessively that specks of blood would litter my chin. Of course, the other part was gender dysphoria, which isn’t so easily shaped by the norms of a community. My claim here is not that people should stop trying to conceal their sex regardless of dysphoria; it is that our respect for their identity shouldn’t depend on their adherence to these norms. That respect often hinges on our adherence to norms, moreover, can exacerbate those feelings of gender dysphoria. Not only must you grapple with the discomfort of exposing your assigned sex; you must navigate the assumptions that you’re now following the original script of gender. Consider why we’ve tried to move away from the original script — consider, for example, the gender politics of the 1950s. Women were to assume domestic duties, to be a symbol of an infantilising femininity, to serve the men in their lives. Their agency was restricted by their gender, their individuality suffocated by their assigned sex. Albeit less harmfully, the queer community has repeated the prejudiced thinking behind this discrimination. The expectation to subvert the traditional norms attached to your sex is just another form of obedience. Put differently, the principle of your assigned sex consuming your personal identity has persisted. We must soften our reliance on reclamation. Yes, it can be powerful. And yes, it can enable a sense of confidence that was once fragile. But it carries the risk of repeating the prejudice of the stereotypes we reclaim, of committing biological essentialism in a slightly prettier font. One’s individuality must be respected more than it is now. This requires a shift in how everyone, not just the queer community, is treated. One’s presentation doesn’t necessarily reflect their inner thoughts; we cannot dive into their mind and figure out exactly what they mean by their pleated skirt or their winged eyeliner. And if we did believe that the external always reflects the internal, the norms of the queer community would only become more restrictive and oppressive. To respect individuality, we must give everyone the license to have internal experiences that may misalign with their presentation, to be a person before they are a man or woman or non-binary. The liberation movement has been misguided. So focused has it been on reclamation that it seems to have forgotten what the real aim should be: to liberate queer people. Of course, liberation will never be achieved if societal discrimination persists, but we must develop other ways to respond to discrimination than reclamation alone. We must at least try to bolster a respect for individuality — a respect to which everyone is entitled. Instead of flipping the script, let’s just chuck it out.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/progressive-gender-politics-have-become-suffocating/

Ardor et Stabilitas: Latin in U.S. Universities and Secondary Schools

Livingston Zug

The first six months of 2021 were tough for the classics. In April, Howard University its decision to reorganize its Classics department and instead offer its courses as a minor within its Interdisciplinary Humanities and World Languages departments. In late May, Princeton University its degree requirements to no longer require Latin and Greek proficiency as a degree qualification in its Classics department. In February — in an unrelated moment — the New York Times an article about Princeton professor Dan-el Padilla Peralta and his view that the classics might have to be abolished as a discipline because of underlying racism and sexism within the field. According to Times Higher Education later that year, the number of annual graduating classics majors has steadily, as has the number of universities offering classics programs.  Howard’s announcement sparked widespread news coverage, much of it ranging from disappointed to furious, in , , and a host of other publications. The event and subsequent reaction are illustrative of the moment, as classics programs in secondary schools, colleges, and universities are under scrutiny. Nevertheless, as the events of spring 2021 continue to ripple, one thing remains clear: Far from fading, dying, or being reduced to political talking points, the classics are thriving.  In April, I spoke with Howard professor Dr. Molly Levine, who has taught classics, particularly Latin, at Howard since 1984. Our conversation made clear that, contrary to much of the initial, vituperative coverage, Howard did not eliminate the likes of Virgil and Sappho wholesale. The classics are indelible. As long as professors are excited to teach and students are eager to study, the material will flourish.  Dr. Levine stated that, regardless of departmental reorganization, the core elements of the classics remain just as true today as they did long before 2021, and Howard remains staunchly committed to intellectual inquiry. “Students come to the classics for the same reasons they’ve always done,” she told the HPR. “They fell in love with it, and that has not changed and will never change.” Moreover, she says, classics departments are special because of generally small enrollments and associated opportunities for mentorship and the feeling of a home away from home. “Good teaching and small [class] sizes make for a good education.”  Nevertheless, Dr. Levine says enrollment in her Latin courses has risen steadily since 2021, as has the number of other classics-related curricular options. Even though classics courses are dispersed between Howard’s Interdisciplinary Studies and World Languages departments, Dr. Levine is confident that Latin, Greek, and the history, philosophy, and literature of the ancient world will always have a place at Howard. “You can’t kill the classics.” Illustrative of this sentiment is an article in the New York Times from May 2, 2021 that against a written by former philosophy professor Cornel West. West claimed that the loss of classics was a harbinger for the collapse of humanistic inquiry at Howard. In other words, losing the department would cause irreparable harm to the university. The Times authors — who work at Howard — fired back, writing that “there is no spiritual catastrophe unfolding on Howard’s campus … students and faculty are in the midst of a Renaissance replete with all the accompanying spiritual and intellectual affirmations.”  It is worth remembering, as Dr. Levine often says, that Latin and Ancient Greek were among the university’s first curricular offerings when Howard was founded in 1867. The Latin and Ancient Greek departments merged in the 20th century to constitute a unified classics unit. Classics have been a core component of American education since its earliest beginnings, so the decision to dissolve the department and disperse its offerings was understandably challenging.  Funding matters. Enrollment matters. The number of tenured faculty and the academic vitality in a department — how much research is being published — matter. The university administrations making the hard choices are not at fault. As many commentators rightly in 2021, Howard, as a Historically Black College and University (HBCU), has never had access to the same financial luxuries as its much older, historically White, all-male peer institutions. Howard’s endowment is just a billion dollars, while Harvard’s is fifty times . With money comes the ability to attract new professors, pay generously, and retain a sizable teaching faculty, even if the department does not attract massive numbers of students. In this very real sense, the wealth and resources of the university can determine the available classics options for students.  The classics are not uniformly accessible to students, but Dr. Levine is right. Where they do exist, they exist because of the organic passion the professors and students bring to the seminar room. She says, “if you love teaching it, the students will love learning it.” A particularly bright spot in Howard’s Classics landscape is student engagement. Dr. Levine noted that her students are passionate and increasing in number; one of these is Mila Hill, a junior at Howard who double majors in classics and English while pursuing a minor in Latin.  When I spoke to Hill, she was about to walk her dog. She told the HPR that she became interested in the classics after reading the Percy Jackson books, Rick Riordan’s pair of famous book series about Greek and Roman mythology, and though she took Spanish in high school she launched into Latin at Howard.  “I have had the opportunity to get a solid Classics education,” Hill told the HPR. “All our professors are very hands-on in making sure that the Classics we have are as strong as they can be. They know their material and are doing their best to provide as much of a traditional experience as they can for us.” According to Hill, classics at Howard are thriving because of the dedicated efforts of a handful of tenured faculty members, including Dr. Levine, who do their best to enrich students’ academic journeys. “It’s more of a bottom-up effort than it would be if we had more institutional support,” she says, but the indelibility of classics and the faculty’s constant commitment have made her time at Howard positive.  Hill says that Howard’s decentralized model for teaching the Classics might become more common at small institutions. “The Ivies will always have classics departments, but in terms of smaller endowments, classics isn’t the only department at risk … universities might continue to devalue programs like English and the other thought-heavy disciplines that don’t produce things you can see.” She’s completely right. All the intellectual vitality and student engagement in the world cannot help if schools lack the funds and institutional support to maintain a department. The classics are too permanent to disappear, as Dr. Levine and Hill point out, but more schools might find themselves making tough choices. Overall, Hill says, “it’s a privilege to study the classics.” Even without the infrastructure of a typical classics department, students like Hill continue to thrive in an excellent academic program.  The seeds of positive college and university experiences with the classics are sown in secondary schools, where kids first read Rick Riordan and watch Gladiator. When one talks about classics education in universities, one is usually referring to courses in Latin, Ancient Greek, Roman and Greek history, and sometimes even Sanskrit. Classics education in secondary schools, however, almost always means Latin, sometimes with ancient history tacked on. There are a few schools — mostly elite private ones — that teach Ancient Greek, but the reality is that for most students, Latin is their primary exposure to the classics before college. The statistics that secondary school Latin programs are not dying — at least not en masse, but they’re not growing explosively either. Similar to what transpired at Howard, the headline is: Nothing is changing particularly quickly or dramatically. The most recent data, however, is from 2017. Not only is it not up to date, but it’s also not comprehensive, with several states failing to report their numbers. Nevertheless, in 2017 more than 210,000 students were taking Latin, only behind Spanish, French, German, and Mandarin. While 60 schools reported that they were considering discontinuing their Latin programs, 50 said they were considering adding Latin to their curricula. French (of all languages) is losing more ground than Latin.  Even if programs aren’t fading away or growing, they are always evolving. In 2018, the administration at Sidwell Friends School in Washington, D.C. announced it was official AP classes. Although students may still register for the exams, this means their Latin program is no longer beholden to a rigid, externally imposed curriculum. I spoke with Latin teacher Leigh Gilman, who has taught in Sidwell’s Upper School for decades. Gilman told the HPR that besides the Latin AP test not being an adequate estimate of Latin learning, the AP system was disruptive to the school calendar, with half the school leaving to take exams for two weeks in May, and inhibited teacher autonomy. She says that she can better cater to student interests without the shadow of the AP exam. I enjoy being flexible and the opportunity to keep reinventing the material,” she said in an interview with the HPR.  Gilman describes her student constituency as “a small but very excited group of kids.” This sentiment mirrors those of Hill and Dr. Levine, that the excellence of classics programs comes, in part, from student passion and permanence. Part of Gilman’s students’ interest in classics stems, as Hill had also shared, from Rick Riordan and early exposure to fantastical mythology. “The classical retellings [recent books by Natalie Haynes and Madeline Miller] are breathing new life into the discipline” and attracting more students. “I am used to embracing whoever walks in my door,” Gilman says. At Sidwell, Latin class is one of many spaces where students can express themselves. The idea of an inclusive, welcoming Latin classroom is crucial to Gilman. She wants students to know that “Latin and Ancient Rome can be seen as representative … if Latin could shake its ‘dead white men’ reputation, that could do a lot for the field.” She constantly reinforces to students and parents the myriad ways Latin continues to have relevance, particularly since learning Latin can help students learn a separate Romance language in the future.  Sidwell’s Latin program is “small but mighty,” according to Gilman, but the future looks bright. Everyone interviewed for this piece expressed this same sentiment. The classics will thrive as long as students and teachers are emotionally invested in them — and there is no shortage of emotional investment, as the flurry of coverage around Howard demonstrates. Gilman says, “It ebbs and flows, but it will never go away. There will always be a place for Latin.” Sidwell is a well-endowed, prestigious private school, and the experience there is not necessarily representative of the diversity of the classics experience in secondary schools. No article can address every standpoint or find every nuance in the issue, but those who have predicted the unilateral demise of the classics have been soundly proven wrong.  Irrespective of whether knowing Ancient Greek or the date of the Battle of Cannae becomes tangibly relevant to one’s life, the skills that one gains via the rigorous study and appreciation of texts, languages, histories, and cultures will always be relevant. There is humanistic value in any inquiry that exposes students to patterns of thought, learning, and feeling beyond their own. The hexameters of Homer have nearly made me cry, as have the fragments of Sappho and the anguished meditations of Marcus Aurelius. If these subjects have the potential to enrich souls so deeply, it cannot be that they are not worth teaching.  In my recent article for the Harvard Political Review, I that the American left and right, equally, should leave the classics out of their culture wars precisely because they are, like so much art is, “beautiful paeans to humanity.” Putting aside the vituperative rhetoric surrounding Howard, Professor Peralta, and that spring 2021 epoch, the work of the classics continues. In high school classrooms and university seminar rooms across the United States, students continue to learn and love the classics, in ways both new and old.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/ardor-et-stabilitas/

The American Flag: A Symbol for Some or All?

James McAffrey

Last week, I was driving down the highway when I noticed a striking view. The highway had a curve coming up, but at the edge of that curve, straight down the road, there was an enormous American flag blowing mightily in the wind. I could see the stars and stripes clearly waving back and forth. Then I reached the turn and realized that I should probably watch the road. But after that sight, I was struck by another realization: I felt conflicted. The American flag does not seem like a symbol of hope, freedom, and life anymore. Now when I see the flag, it’s typically in an article about another “Make America Great Again” rally or in a bumper sticker on a truck. The American flag has become a symbol of the conservative American, not of shared American values. As I continued driving along the road, I thought to myself: “Does it have to be that way?” The flag is a symbol, and symbols change. The flag — which is meant to represent an entire people — should not simply be the symbol of one party. It should embody the ideas that this country was founded and built on, the ideas that we all share. But recently, most media to associate this American symbol with extremists, as can be seen with pictures of the Jan. 6 riots that feature different permutations of the flag with Trump’s name. Some rioters even down an American flag and replaced it with a Trump flag. This tendency to partner the flag with un-American values is not simply a media problem.  Back in 2007, when Barack Obama was running for president, a reporter noticed that he hadn’t been wearing an American flag pin. Obama by explaining that the flag pin “became a substitute for… true patriotism.” This led him to avoid such false displays. “I decided I won’t wear that pin on my chest; instead I’m gonna try to tell the American people what I believe will make this country great, and hopefully that will be a testimony to my patriotism.” This response provoked a discussion of what Obama’s “true patriotism” meant. Some thought that Obama was his own version of patriotism above that of individuals who wear flag pins or that he wasn’t good patriotism by not wearing it at all. Others found it understandable because they felt that speaking out against war was a form of showing patriotism. But now, the flag has been entirely reduced to a display of fake patriotism instead of a dynamic symbol of what patriotism itself can be. These days, following Obama’s lead, liberal politicians often do not honor or present the flag without occasion. In one story, a graduate student from Harvard an American flag to a protest of the Iraq War. When she arrived, she noticed that many of the protesters couldn’t tell if she was part of the protest or a counter-protester. This just shows the extent of liberal Americans’ negative view of the flag. This distrust of the flag has become a problem for the flag as a symbol. Part of this issue is that the symbol has been taken by conservative politicians and embraced as a true symbol of patriotism while liberal politicians allow their patriotism to shine without an actual symbol. This is problematic because now the American flag does not appear as a symbol of the American dream, but rather of the conservative dream. The American flag should represent the shared identity of its citizens. We may disagree on a thousand things, but in general we share a love of democracy and an appreciation for freedom for all. “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.” This is America’s , and this is what the flag should represent. Some may contest the rigor of our beliefs in practice, pointing to the fact that the Declaration of Independence omitted women from representation and considered some people as three fifths of a person. But the American ideal is far greater than those founding documents.  In 1961, John F. Kennedy gave his great inaugural address in which he the American people to “ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country.” He was emphasizing that America is not simply an inanimate government serving the people. It is the people working hand in hand with the government that help maintain these unalienable rights. We, the people, must help grow and improve our country because without us, the government is nothing. These are just some of the most famous interpretations of the American dream. These help us understand not only our relationship with the government, but also our relationships with each other. When I do well, my neighbor does better, too. When my neighbor does well, I do better, too. This mutual benefit is better understood under the common interest the flag can represent. Liberal politicians and leaders should embrace the American flag as a symbol of all these ideas and more. The American flag can and should represent the ideals of equality and pride that Black Lives Matter and pride flags encourage. We can either make the American flag a symbol of the sins of the present and past. Or it can be a symbol of the hope that Americans have for the future. I know which choice I would want. There are massive problems with this country: The education system isn’t , voting rights are , human rights are , children aren’t , and the list goes on. We cannot solve these problems while at each other’s throats. We have to come together under a shared identity. Through all our differences and experiences, we must cultivate a shared American identity. Notice, I say “we.” Because if one thing is true, it is this: We are not just White Americans, we are not just Black Americans, we are not just Indigenous Americans, we are not just Asian Americans, we are not just LGBTQ+ Americans — we are Americans. It is essential that we realize that, whether we like it or not, our fates are tied together.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/the-american-flag-a-symbol-for-some-or-all/

What Do They Call Me: A Personal Narrative from a Generational African American Student at Harvard College

Gabrielle Greene

It is no secret that the history of a generational African American person is one intrinsically tied to pain, betrayal, and separation. It’s a history that is remembered quite well. However, heavily associated with African American experiences is the concept of fragments, pieces of history that make up our being. And what a beautiful, fragmented history it is — filled with card games, southern gospel, artwork, and dancing. In light of the recent efforts in the U.S. to African American history from school curriculums, it is important that our personal stories are told, now more than ever.  As a young adult, I am slowly coming to terms with my own identity and understanding my place in the world. Although I was ecstatic to become the first member of my family to attend Harvard University and grateful for the opportunities it would bring, I couldn’t help but think about how much had been sacrificed on my behalf in order for me to reach this moment.  The pressure to succeed weighed heavily on me — the pressure to trailblaze on behalf of others in your community, the pressure to be an example, not to fail, and not to waiver in a commitment to education and knowledge-seeking.  Before college, I was fairly secure in my identity as a Black woman. I had a keen interest in politics throughout high school and participated in several initiatives to foster diversity in education and fairness in disciplinary policies. I knew that my ancestors were slaves, which placed its own limits on discovering my heritage. That always unsettled me just a little bit.  Perhaps that is why I gravitated to studying history in college. I am fascinated by the cultures of others, from the wonderful artistic of the Ming Dynasty, to Mayan traditions, to, of course, the oral histories of the Sudanese and Ghanaian regions. However, I hesitated to fully investigate my own history, always approaching it with a certain shyness. Movies like “Twelve Years A Slave” and “The Butler” had shown me the systemic violence against generational African Americans: heartbreak, pain, and abuse inflicted by White individuals. I simply assumed there wouldn’t be much else to explore.  That is until I actually stepped foot on campus. I remember attending an event held by the Generational African American Students Association during Visitas 2023, Harvard’s admitted students weekend. I saw a group of people in full celebration of their heritage as African Americans: a room filled with music, laughter, and dancing.  At first, it was hard to reconcile my previous experiences with a space like this. Coming from a predominantly White high school, I had never seen such an expansive African American community in an academic setting before. And yet, I saw the nation’s brightest, most accomplished minds all joined together in celebration. It was beautiful. And as I sat there, I let my mind transport me back to Fourth of July barbecues, chatter during Thanksgiving dinner, and Saturday all-day block parties. As Beyonce’s “Before I Let Go” reverberated throughout the room, I started to raise my hands and tap my feet. Suddenly, I stood, crossed my feet over each other, and began to clap. Feeling safe in the company of my community, I joined in with the other voices as we screamed at the top of our lungs, “I would never, never, never, never, never, never, never, never, let you go before I go!” I’m so grateful I took part.  I found this experience to be so healing that I kept going back to GAASA events. As a current member of the organization, I’ve learned how to Spades — although I am a work in progress — and other such games as well as discussed issues surrounding my identity. I simply have been able to access a safe space where I can be myself. I feel such pride to be a part of an organization that is dedicated to fostering community on campus. Because of the Generational African American Students Association, I fully embraced the meaning of being African American.  And thus began my quest to learn more. My aunt, Dr. Beverly Greene, aside from being an outstanding university professor, is also an incredibly skilled photographer. She’s been keeping record of my existence through thousands of photographs taken during my childhood. Likewise, she has detailed our family lineage to the best of her ability. I reached out and messaged her, and with one text she became my storyteller.  During our conversation, I learned that I can trace my paternal heritage to the Cumberland Creek and Swift Creek regions of North Carolina, “where many of the earlier slaves were deposited,” she said. They then migrated to Georgia and Claiborne County in Mississippi, where they endured many years of turmoil in the Jim Crow South. Although a house fire destroyed a literal Bible of birth year records — essential information pertaining to my ancestors’ identities — I know for certain that the green fields of Georgia, Mississippi, and North Carolina’s rivers have felt the touch of my ancestors. Embedded within the Earth are their footprints, traveling from South to North during the Great migration.  Similarly, objects carry their experiences as well. I imagine that a wooden hammer, similar to the one resting in my dad’s toolbox in the family garage in Philadelphia, molded itself to fit the grasp of my great-great-grandfather’s hands as he constructed a local turpentine distillery. On the tape measure that my father frequently uses, I can find the markings made by my grandfather. He used this tool to measure the home he built for my father and his siblings, just an hour and a half from where I grew up.  I now see traces of history throughout my family home, in the art, where before they were simply beautiful paintings that complimented my living and dining room furniture —  “The Banjo Lesson” by Henry Ossawa Tanner and “Blessings II” by John Holyfield. Many more were unnamed paintings that told vivid stories —  one of a Black woman cradling her sick child, a painting of an older woman standing in front of cotton fields covered in the pink of the sunset, another of a woman in a beautiful white cape, symbolizing freedom and purity, a canvas depicting a Black bride and groom jumping a wooden broom, and another with three Black soldiers standing back to back, with doves coming out of the barrels of their guns. These paintings portray strong African American stories of struggle and perseverance, as well as intimate, miniscule moments, away from a world of hatred. These paintings tell stories that are uniquely ours. However, it can be difficult to find connections between and chronology through it all — constructing a discernible narrative through the objects, the paintings, the stories. Part of this journey is understanding that all history can be incredibly fragmented. Some historical puzzles are more challenging than others. As a generational African American, I have accepted that my ancestry consists of little fragments of life that tell expansive stories. Although I may never get the full picture, I’ve somehow found a totality within the pieces. I am extremely proud of that.  I made a promise to myself when I committed to Harvard that I intend on keeping: expanding the opportunities of discovery for the generations after me and illuminating the history of the generations before me. By gathering around a circular table and playing spades after the sun has set and the food has settled. By staying connected to my faith as a Christian woman, internalizing the old, southern hymns of the Black church that have made their way hundreds of miles up North. By embracing the Black experience of jazz music — of Nina Simone, Ella Fitzgerald, The Ink Spots, and Nat King Cole. When I open my mouth to sing “Cry Me A River,” I’ll sing it like it means something, because it does.  Although the struggles and pain of my ancestors are remembered quite well, I will choose to honor them with a curious disposition toward a history that is still being uncovered. I have a strong desire to preserve it — the storytelling, the games, the art, and the music. I will do so with an abundance of joy that will remain during my four years at Harvard and beyond.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/what-do-they-call-me-a-personal-narrative-from-a-generational-african-american-student-at-harvard-college/

The Legacy of Critical Whiteness Studies

Diana Ochoa-Chavez

When one learns of the field “Critical Whiteness Studies,” it’s natural to feel confusion and perhaps even discomfort. While this label might prompt one to believe that its field of study centers on White individuals and culture, this would be a mischaracterization. Instead, CWS analyzes the systems that create and uphold White supremacy. In most cases, the core ideas of CWS appear in tandem with conversations about race and ethnicity.  Given the importance of addressing institutional racism in order to achieve social justice, it might seem useful to have academics engage with the topic of White supremacy in a standalone manner. After all, this singular focus could highlight the structures of racism that are often ignored or dismissed in academia. However, the academic institutions’ de-emphasis on CWS in favor of the broader field of ethnic studies is a step toward more inclusive, critical conversations. This shift allows for increased attention toward the historical and current challenges faced by silenced and marginalized ethno-racial groups.  Critical Whiteness Studies gained prominence in the 1990s, emerging as a critical examination of race that beyond traditional frameworks. Whereas earlier approaches, such as primordialism, understand race as a biological category found in nature, CWS argues race is a social construct. On the one hand, the former commits to a view of race as independent of cultural contexts and inherent to humans. The latter is a radical departure from this view. For the constructivist, race is contingent on historical and cultural contexts because it is an artificial categorization. The chief focus of CWS is this construction and the implications of Whiteness as a social category; the field scrutinizes how Whiteness functions as a normative, and often invisible, identity. One aspect of CWS centers on the acknowledgement of White privilege; however, scholars’ approaches vary. Some approaches challenge societal norms and urge for a reevaluation of the role of Whiteness in shaping individual and collective identities. One early work was authored by Berkeley Law professor Ian Haney Lopez, a pioneer in the field, called “White by Law: The Legal Construction of Race.” In the text, Haney Lopez that White individuals should renounce their racial identity in the interest of social justice. While this seems to imply the erasure of personal identity, it’s crucial to dispel this common misinterpretation of Haney Lopez’s work. By advocating for the renunciation of Whiteness, Haney Lopez does not call for individuals to sever ties with their ethnic heritages, such as being Italian or Irish. Instead, his focus is on dismantling the historical and structural foundations upon which Whiteness is viewed as superior to other races. In particular, he argues that individuals should oppose the systemic othering of racial minorities and recognize that the construction of a White race has ties to discriminatory practices.  Such instances of discrimination are prominent in U.S. immigration law: In his work, Haney Lopez discusses a series of cases from 1878 to 1952 that required immigrants to be “free White persons” to naturalize. He writes, “Applicants from Hawaii, China, Japan, Burma, and the Philippines, as well as all mixed-race applicants, failed in their arguments. Conversely, courts ruled that applicants from Mexico and Armenia were ‘white,’ but vacillated over the Whiteness of petitioners from Syria, India, and Arabia.” By deciding who did, and who did not, count as White, courts actively participated in racial construction. At their core, these cases point to the inherent ambiguities and imprecisions that accompany attempts to categorize groups into racial binaries: White or nonwhite. In reviewing cases, courts deliberately applied contradictory rationales to deny the naturalization of most immigrants. Recognizing the origins of such claims to Whiteness among some groups and not others, Haney Lopez argues, is more important than erasing one’s connections to any particular White ethnicity. In an interview with the Harvard Political Review, professor Américo Mendoza–Mori, a lecturer in Latinx studies from Harvard’s Ethnicity, Migration, Rights department, illustrates a similar way of thinking about CWS. She explained to the Harvard Political Review that the field of Critical Whiteness Studies “doesn’t focus specifically on White individuals, but the effects of a narrative-creating a hierarchy and reflecting on the factors that created it … We can think of coloniality, we can think of slavery, we can think of different gaps that foster inequality that are rooted in concrete aspects that didn’t happen just in an instantaneous way. It’s part of this, let’s say, historical legacy.” Rather than centering on the individual, the ultimate aim of CWS is to grapple with the realities of racism and discrimination. It investigates the legacy that privileged White populations in the first place. CWS is a valuable approach because it allows White individuals to understand that discussions of racism are not intended to attack them personally, allowing for more productive antiracist conversations which emphasize the roles of history and institutions. To understand the significance and contemporary relevance of CWS, it’s crucial to situate the field within the broader socio-political landscape of the United States. For one, people of color have increased political visibility since CWS’ peak, as demonstrated by the ascent of high-profile political figures such as Barack Obama, Kamala Harris, and Ketanji Brown Jackson. Some might perceive these milestones, alongside racial justice movements like Black Lives Matter, as indicators of progress — as departures from the deeply entrenched roots of White supremacy. However, this optimism can lead to a dangerous oversight: a form of colorblindness that denies or trivializes the ongoing struggles of various ethno-racial communities. Colorblindness, in this context, refers to the tendency to disregard or deny the existence of racism by asserting that one does not “see” race. While seemingly well-intentioned, this approach inadvertently erases the experiences of racialized individuals and fosters an environment where systemic issues go unaddressed. Therefore, milestones, while undoubtedly historic, should not be misconstrued as marking a definitive end to racial inequality. The danger lies in assuming that the nation has overcome its deeply rooted racial issues, subsequently fostering a narrative that dismisses the experiences of marginalized communities. The connection between CWS and this evolving socio-political landscape is evident. Without proper examinations of privilege and race, colorblind attitudes could offset antiracist efforts. Therefore, one must inquire how the ideas of CWS and its efforts to acknowledge privilege translate to today’s college classrooms. Within the Harvard community, it’s not uncommon to discussions on topics such as privilege, slavery, and colonization. However, we don’t typically consider these to be in service of the resurrection of a dying CWS field. Nonetheless, just because we don’t recognize the technical label anymore doesn’t mean conversations on these topics have also stopped in academia. In reality, the ideas from CWS appear in connection to other disciplines, such as ethnic and decolonial studies, both of which are gaining attention.  In an interview with the HPR, Dr. Jorge Sánchez Cruz, a lecturer in Harvard’s History and Literature department, commented on his work teaching decolonial topics. He first defined decolonial studies as a foreground to how colonial histories have oppressed groups, specifically Indigenous groups. Then he expressed what questions guide his pedagogy, explaining, “When I teach decolonial courses I emphasize: How do we grapple or how do we bring it into conversation with Indigenous philosophies, histories, and theories?”  Moreover, he expressed decolonial study’s role in rethinking “the idea of nation citizenship, geographies, peace, and identity from underrepresented histories.” Sánchez Cruz highlights that instead of seeking to destroy the Western canon and White ideological histories, decolonial studies put diverse thoughts in conversation with each other. In his view, “They have different worldviews and different conceptions of being, humanity, and of man, but they’re in relation.” Sánchez Cruz believes that understanding these canons ultimately allows for the application of a decolonial lens. It’s not meant to destroy European culture. “That would be counterproductive or contradictory because then we’d be implementing the same logic of erasure the other side implements,” he explained to the HPR.  Evidently, the discussions about privilege and power that take root in CWS translate into other disciplines. However, unlike CWS, ethnic studies places marginalized groups at the center of the conversation. This amplifies the voices of underrepresented populations, allowing inclusive, critical conversations about systemic racism and furthering progress for antiracist efforts.  Another scholar, California State University, Monterey Bay Professor Emerita Christine Sleeter, worries about conversations that prioritize White identity and sideline the struggles of other ethno-racial groups. In an interview with the Harvard Political Review, Sleeter reflected on her experiences as an active instructor and her journey grappling with her White privilege. Recalling conversations with previous White students on identity, she noted that “The main concern is that there’s a tendency for White people to want to focus on White people. You can do that, I guess, productively as a part of struggles against racism as long as you know you’re doing it and don’t get too into focusing on yourself … To think of Whiteness studies as being an entity in itself, disconnected from its legacy, makes actual connection with the work of people of color really limited.”  While CWS can be “a way of opening the door for White people who want to engage with ethnic studies,” Sleeter agrees that the focus of conversations should remain on tackling racism and the experiences of underrepresented communities.  By analyzing the systems that oppress racial groups while also exploring the histories of resistance and resilience across different communities, conversations can become more hopeful. To avoid losing sight of the larger issues at hand — such as the increasing gaps in living standards across communities — conversations on privilege, oppression, and coloniality should intersect with diverse fields of thought. Instead of viewing these conversations as assaults on individual identity, one should listen to those who continue hurting. After all, understanding and empathy make way for healing. While CWS offers key frameworks to question the legacies of oppression, the shift in focus from White-centered conversations to marginalized ethnic and racial groups benefits antiracist movements. Recognizing the benefits of having these conversations and teaching ethnic studies in classrooms is one thing; executing this feat in the face of oppressive systems is another. When considering the future of ethnic studies, Sleeter told the HPR that “There’s going to be another wave of attacks because anything that challenges power in the U.S. does get attacked, and ethnic studies is about challenging power.” She also described a mixed vision for the future of ethnic studies. On the one hand, Sleeter doesn’t think that “ethnic studies is going to go away” and she celebrates milestones in its integration across school curricula. At the same time, she thinks that there will be a “push and pull because it does challenge power.” One concern is that, in becoming a requirement in educational systems receiving state funding, the state will “water down or trim out some of the more radical pieces” that might accompany courses. Despite the triumphs, one should remain wary of not becoming content too quickly regarding progress. Certainly, one should be able to admire progress, while not allowing that admiration to blind them from the reality that there is still work to be done.  Sánchez Cruz explains how students and those interested in fighting inequality can approach these challenges: “Everyone regardless of their origin, ethnic identity, or sexual orientation, has experienced some sort of loss …We all have felt that in some way or another, so perhaps that can be a coalition of practice between different populations,” Sánchez Cruz shared.  Indeed, by developing a sense of understanding for a shared experience, communities can find it less difficult to empathize with one another. Similarly, Dr. Mendoza-Mori proposed to the HPR that “keeping that balance of empathy and an active search for new perspectives could be great tools for advancing society with constructive mechanisms.”  When we listen and care about the vibrancy of communities that differ from our own — not just as passing thoughts, but with genuine curiosity and commitments to research — empathy can guide us toward a more loving future. We can allow others to be their authentic selves by appreciating their languages, respecting their culture, and listening to their histories. Through this, a more democratic, just, understanding society will be created — one from which we will all benefit.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/legacy-critical-whiteness-studies/

Shifting Tongues

Author

“Therefore, do not be afraid, be steadfast in love for the land and be united in one thought, to protest forever the annexation of Hawai’i to America until the very last Hawaiian patriot.” Many Native Hawaiians employed their language as a means of active resistance. For example, in the 1897 Ku’e Petitions, 38,000 out of 40,000 total native Hawaiians, signed a petition in opposition to annexation. The petitions, presented in Hawaiian and English, were used in an appeal to the U.S. Congress, but to no avail.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/shifting-tongues/

To Be Young, Gifted, and Black at Harvard

Jaylen Cocklin

In her 1970 song “Young, Gifted, and Black,” Nina Simone sings:  As I reflect on this song and my experience at Harvard as a Black American, I ask myself — what does it mean to be young, gifted, and Black at Harvard? I find myself wrestling with the significance of my existence within this institution. Let it not be forgotten that Harvard is an institution profoundly shaped by the labor of enslaved people on land stolen from the people. At its roots, Harvard was built on exclusivity and exploitation. This institution was created primarily for affluent White men and has a history of exploiting Indigenous and Black people. According to the Report of the Presidential Committee on Harvard & the Legacy of Slavery, “over nearly 150 years, from the University’s founding in 1636 until the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court found slavery unlawful, Harvard presidents and other leaders, as well as its faculty and staff, more than 70 individuals, some of whom labored on campus.” Harvard, the university in the world with an endowment of $50.9 billion, has financially from the proceeds of chattel slavery.  Knowing that the same institution I attend today made its fortune through the exploitation of my ancestors alarms me. This hard truth sometimes causes me to feel a sense of guilt. Sometimes, I feel guilty for being in a space that has flourished so much from brutality against and oppression of Black people. I feel guilty for the opportunities and privileges that I am afforded at this institution. And I feel guilty knowing that some of these same opportunities are products of the horrid conditions forced upon my ancestors.  I then recall that I live in America, a country literally built by forced Black labor. Being in spaces that flourished off the abuse and subjugation of Black people is almost inescapable in this country. I seek refuge in knowing that those who came before me fought and died for my right to be in these spaces, that my ancestors made sacrifices for my existence today. These sacrifices were actions of love. My faith, something that is really important to me, in the Book of John that the greatest form of love a person can ever show is to lay down their life for the wellbeing of others. I don’t take this lightly. I try to honor the sacrifice of my people by being a practitioner of love and inclusion while being in spaces like Harvard.  While walking to class, I encounter undergraduate dorms, statues, and buildings that honor the legacy of slave owners, those who profited off of slavery, and those who spread racist ideologies. For example, both Winthrop and Mather House, are after enslavers Governor John Winthrop and Increase and Cotton Mather. Eliot and Lowell House are named after Charles William Eliot and Abbott Lawrence Lowell, individuals who racist beliefs and structures like eugenics, the inferiority of Black people, and segregation. The continued commemoration of slave owners, those who profited from slavery, and those who spread racist beliefs at this University pains me.  In the past, students have and called on the University to address this issue, but the University has either performative actions that fall short of student’s wishes or has ignored students’ demands altogether. The University’s continued protection of those who have spread and profited off of racism and hatred is startling. For a university that a diverse student body, one must question the extent to which Harvard cares about its Black student population. Do they see us as the gifted students we are, or as mere diversity tokens?  When Black students are accepted into institutions like Harvard, our merit and giftedness are often questioned. I, along with other Black students, have often been told that the only reason that I am at this prestigious university is because of the color of my skin or programs like affirmative action. People love trying to undermine the accomplishments and talent of minority students. I am tired of having all the hard work of me and my family be diminished and reduced to nothing more than the color of my skin. There are students on campus that think opportunity is just handed to historically oppressed and underrepresented people, suggesting that these people are not worthy of what they rightly achieve. That is one of the reasons why it is so important for Harvard to make sure Black students feel welcomed. Actions speak louder than words, and the University’s actions, or lack thereof, are telling.  While entering a classroom, I often reminisce on the fact that I am learning in the same spaces that were once used by Harvard professors to spread racist ideologies questioning my very own existence. I first learned of and his work during my freshman year at Harvard while taking a class at Harvard’s Museum of Zoology. Agassiz, a professor of zoology and geology at Harvard from 1859 to 1873, was known for being a prominent supporter of White supremacy, Black inferiority, and race science. As part of his research to justify Black inferiority, Agassiz commissioned images of 17 enslaved individuals that are as “haunting and voyeuristic.” These images were at a studio in my hometown of Columbia, South Carolina. After coming across these photographs, my stomach immediately turned. Agassiz had left these images at Harvard and they were in the attic of the Peabody Museum in 1976. These photos, which are owned by Harvard, were mass produced, with the University profiting off of them.  Currently, Harvard finds itself in legal proceedings with Tamara Lanier, a descendant of Renty Taylor and his daughter Delia: two of the enslaved individuals from the group of 17 who were forced to have their picture taken. Lanier is for the University to turn over the ownership of the images of the two Taylors to their descendants. The lawsuit also highlights the fact that Harvard the remains of over 7,000 Indigenous people and the remains of at least 15 people of African descent. Harvard’s refusal to turn over ownership of the images of Renty and Delia to their descendants and its commitment to continuing legal proceedings highlights the University’s continued practice of putting profit over oppressed people like me.  When I think of the horrid images of Renty and Delia, I examine my own ancestry. I am a Generational African American, meaning that I am a descendant of enslaved people. My great-great-great-great grandmother was an enslaved person on one of the many plantations located in the lowcountry of South Carolina. Her name was Middy. I honestly never really understood the importance of a name until I learned of hers. A name plays an important role in acknowledging a person as a person, something Middy would not have been seen as in the eyes of figures like Lowell, Eliot, and Agassiz.  Recently, a petition by the Generational African American Students Association, with the support of the Natives at Harvard College and in partnership with student activists, is calling on Harvard to dename Winthrop House. While I passionately support their efforts, I believe we cannot stop here. Furthermore, while the University has $100 million to “redress” its ties to slavery, that is simply not enough to right the wrongs of Havard’s dark past. This is pocket change for a university like Harvard. Though the University can never truly come to terms with its ties to centuries of slavery, discrimination, and racism, Harvard can do more to show that they care about Black people. I am calling on Harvard to stop the commemoration of slave owners, those who profited from slavery, and those who spread racist beliefs. Rather than performatively renaming houses and buildings and removing statues that memorialize hateful, racist individuals, Harvard should begin to honor the names and legacies of individuals like , Harvard’s first Black graduate in 1870; , the first Black woman to graduate from Radcliffe College in 1898; , a civil rights activist and the first Black person to obtain a PhD from Harvard in 1895; or , a member of the Wampanoag tribe and the first Native American graduate of Harvard in 1665. These individuals serve as representatives of those who accomplished what was deemed unimaginable despite the hate ingrained into this institution. These are the people we ought to celebrate and memorialize. The University must also remains and return artifacts to Indigenous and Black communities. Harvard must commit itself to creating a more diverse faculty and encouraging existing faculty to include more underrepresented authors in their syllabi. Harvard must also invest in more safe spaces dedicated to Black and Brown students so that students can effectively build a community to support one another.  As I suggest that Harvard take these actions, I still want to emphasize that Black people are not monolithic. Black America encompasses a diverse range of cultures, ethnicities, beliefs, perspectives, and backgrounds. That being said, while there is no one way to be Black at Harvard, there is one way Black students exist in America and at institutions within it. Black students are unified by the way our skin is understood and perceived. Because no matter our background, culture, or beliefs, Black people are often viewed as threats — even at Harvard.  I remember my own experience being racially profiled by a White student during my freshman year at the College. I was entering my friend’s freshman dorm one afternoon when I was suddenly stopped by another student who asked to see my identification. The student attempted to act like he had authority over me. When I refused, he then proceeded to ask me questions relating to why I was there. After finally realizing that I was a student, he then attempted to justify his actions by saying that there had been a series of thefts on campus that week and that I had looked “suspicious.”  I remember returning to my dorm room that day confused and immediately contacted my proctor. I then proceeded to rerun the scene in my head. It didn’t feel real. I am not a thief. I have never stolen anything in my life. Questions started rolling through my head. Why would this student ask to see my identification? What about my appearance would cause him to doubt my enrollment as a student? If I was White, would this have happened? This was one of many moments when I did not feel like I belonged at Harvard. This question of belonging at Harvard is one I confront daily. As someone who doesn’t come from a privileged background, navigating a space fueled by entitlement can be a struggle. On the one hand you feel a pressure to fit in, while on the other, you know you never will.  As I reflect on my original question about the significance of being Black at Harvard, I conclude that to be Black at an institution like Harvard is to engage in the practice of resistance. By merely existing at Harvard, I, along with other Black students, am defying the racist origins of the University while pushing it to be more inclusive and benevolent. Black students here have proved that we belong here despite the history and the actions tied to the University that have attempted to keep us out. Black students across this country are making sure that institutions like Harvard realize their full potential and promise. We are young, we are gifted, we are proudly Black, and that is not going to change. We will not be price tagged, ignored, or silenced by this institution. We know Harvard can do more. The only question that remains is whether Harvard is courageous enough to do it.  .

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/young-gifted-black/

President's Note: Literary Supplement

Author

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/presidents-note/

Gender Inequality in Para Hockey

Allaura Osborne

Men, Women, and “Sled.” These are the three options on the USA Hockey . Though sled, or para ice hockey, is supposed to include both men and women, the photo used to represent the sled category contains only men. Unsurprisingly, women are not represented equally in the sport. Para ice hockey is subject to decades of gender inequality, and little has been done to fight this by USA Hockey itself. Moreover, this is just one of many para athletic institutions that are inhibiting women from playing at the international level. In 1948, Dr. Ludwig Guttman started the Stoke Mandeville Games to include injured servicemen and women in athletic events such as . The Paralympics, as it later became known, debuted in Rome in 1960, less than a week after the closing of the . The International Sport Organization for the Disabled was then created and began to offer opportunities to athletes who could not affiliate with the International Stoke Mandeville Games, including those who were visually impaired, amputees, those with cerebral palsy, and people with paraplegia. Other organizations were created to try to fill any remaining gaps, but in 1989 the International Paralympics Committee was founded to all athletes with disabilities. In 1960, Swedish hockey players invented , also known as sledge or sled Hockey, in a rehabilitation center in Stockholm. Their goal was to be able to continue to play ice hockey despite being in wheelchairs. By 1969, Stockholm had a league with five teams that included players with and without physical disabilities. Just a few years later in 1976, Sweden played Norway in an exhibition that is considered to be the first Paralympics para ice hockey game. Over the decade, the two teams continued to go head-to-head. Great Britain and Canada soon created groups in the early 1980s, followed by the U.S., Estonia, and Japan in 1993. After the creation of these five new teams demonstrated to the Paralympic Committee that there was international interest in the sport, para ice hockey became an official Paralympics event in 1994. Today, there are 15 national para ice hockey teams. While perhaps inclusive of disabilities, para ice hockey has had its fair share of gender inequality. Since the introduction of para ice hockey in 1994, the number of players has doubled, yet women remain an extreme minority when teams reach the Paralympic . Only three women have ever played since the official introduction of para ice hockey. In 1994, there were 56 male players at the Paralympics and one female player. Similarly, in 2018 there were 134 male players and only one female, and in 2022, 116 male players and one female player. Erica Mitchell, a sled hockey player of over 20 years, has faced inequality at almost every step of her athletic career. In 2004, at 18, Mitchell was asked to try out for the Men’s National Development Team and was successful. She was the only girl on the team and was the first and only female captain when selected in 2006. Mitchell, encouraged by her success in a male-dominated space, tried out for the U.S. Men’s National Team but was told at the very start she would not be able to make the team due to her .  Even though the International Paralympic Committee officially deemed the sport co-ed in 2010, more must be done to increase female representation. In 2007, the Paralympics created a rule maxing out teams at 17 players, only allowing an 18th player if it is a female. This rule was supposed to help women gain more access to para ice hockey at the highest level but has instead continued to inhibit female representation. According to Peggy Assinck, a Canadian Women’s Team member, the rule women a spot on the team as only a mere checkmark for diversity. For instance, also in 2007, Erica McKee by the U.S. National Team staff that she was unable to make the team due to being a woman. Eleven years later, the U.S. Women’s para ice hockey team was moved under the USA Hockey umbrella and retitled as a “development team.” This effectively means the players have no U.S. Women’s National Team to move up to and get no official recognition. Kelsey DiClaudio, once a member of the U.S. Men’s National Development Sled Hockey Team and one of the best sled hockey players in the world, notes that the label of co-ed inhibits women from getting an officially recognized sport of women’s sled hockey by the International Paralympic Committee. Until this label is and sled hockey is seen for what it is — a male space — women will not be allowed to have an area of their own. DiClaudio played on both the U.S. Women’s National Team (while it existed) and the U.S. Men’s National Development Team, working twice as hard to try and fight for the opportunity to represent her country at the Paralympics. However, after 11 years, she has still not been allowed the chance.  Women in sled hockey fight to bring international attention to gender inequality in their beloved sport. During the summer of 2022, the first-ever Women’s Worlds Challenge in Green Bay, Wisc. The event was used to show the international stage that women’s para ice hockey exists and to encourage disabled women of all ages not to let their physical impairment prevent them from participating in sports. So far, only three nations have women’s para ice teams: the U.S., Canada, and Great Britain. As a result, there are not enough women involved internationally to successfully advocate for a division of gender in the Paralympics. These women recognize that other countries will need to create women’s para ice teams to help ensure the inclusion of a women’s division in the Paralympics.  A lack of gender diversity is not unique to para ice hockey but is seen across the Paralympics. Dr. Andrea Bundon, an assistant professor of kinesiology at the University of British Columbia School of Kinesiology, a 3 to 1 ratio between men and women paralympic competitors. Dr. Bundon, who participated as a guide in the Paralympics for the visually impaired in the 2010 and 2014 games, noted that few initiatives target women with disabilities and encourage their engagement in accessible sports. Similarly, the United Nations found that only one-third of athletes at the international competition level are women and that 93% of women with disabilities are not involved in . Another major challenge is that because many of the events in the Paralympics are listed as co-ed or mixed sports, it leads to unequal funding since women’s teams are not getting funded or developed as much as the “co-ed” teams. Women may be eligible to compete in these sports, but few make national teams and even fewer play at the Paralympics.  So, what can we do to close this gap? We must advocate that para ice hockey organizations, like USA Hockey, pour funding into development and marketing for women’s teams specifically and hold training camps for women para ice hockey players from all over. USA Hockey should also increase the roster size for the sport and hold yearly tryouts for both new and returning members. Finally, they should introduce a women’s division or exhibition for para ice hockey at the next Winter Paralympics. Suppose the number of players is insufficient for particular countries to have a team. In that case, provisions can allow them to group by location or continent for equal access and opportunity.  Women with disabilities deserve an equal opportunity to represent their country at the Paralympics. They also deserve a chance to play sports despite their physical impairments. The future is accessible, but that future must focus more on gender equality. Fighting for women’s space in Paralympics events like para ice hockey would be a significant step towards a fairer world.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/gender-inequality-in-para-hockey/

Demography, Destiny, and Delusion: The Racism of Pandering

Stephanie Wang

It has been a longstanding tradition for political candidates to leverage identity as a tool to win votes, with one of the most popular elements of identity being race. Yet we seem to take for granted the unusual practice of treating racial groups as monolithic voting blocs. In exit polls, we tend to analyze the “Black vote” or the “Hispanic vote” and believe these racial subsets provide us with invaluable voting data. There is no doubt that there are patterns in the way that different races of voters lean, but we must approach these trends in a nuanced fashion. Seeing identity-based divisions as a be-all and end-all encourages political pandering by politicians, whereas neglecting it entirely reinforces systemic racism that needs to be addressed. We must create substantive policy changes based on voting patterns among racial groups, but we must also actively discourage politicians from disingenuously leveraging race as a pandering tool for political campaigns. Policy, after all, is different from politics. There is no denying that racial groups tend to vote in similar patterns. A Pew Research Group poll that Democrats lead by almost eight-to-one among Blacks, lead by close to three-to-one among Asian Americans, and by more than two-to-one among Hispanics. This data suggests that people of color are overwhelmingly attracted to the Democratic Party, while White voters lean more towards the Republican Party. Since the 1960s, Black voters have tended to be the most loyal Democratic voting bloc. Politicians have picked up on these voting patterns and have weaponized race to their advantage with one goal in mind: pandering to get votes on the ballot. Candidates have strategically tapped into the “Black vote” or the “Hispanic vote” by treating racial minorities as a homogeneous voting group — a naive and facetious approach to campaigning. Although there are differences in lived experiences faced by minority groups, their political views are by no means determined solely by their race.  Unfortunately, treating racial minorities homogeneously happens all too often on both sides of the political aisle. A prominent example that hit the airwaves with controversy during Biden’s 2020 presidential campaign was when he a radio host that black voters conflicted between voting for him and Trump “ain’t black.” The phrase “you ain’t black” is a glaring example of the racial prejudice that remains prevalent in politicians’ endeavors for political capital. By viewing all Black voters as a singular voting conglomerate, Biden drew an equivalence between race and voting habits, treating all Black Americans as interchangeable. This perspective is deeply troubling, as it strips Black Americans of their deserved individuality and conforms them into homogeneous groupthink. Even if the phrase was uttered by virtue of a moment of frustration, the pandering message that it sends to the rest of the nation is loud, clear, and dangerous.  Another example was Senator Elizabeth Warren’s (D-MA) to indigenous heritage during her 2020 presidential campaign, which was completely by the results of her DNA test. Her misleading claim of indigenous heritage and subsequent doubling down of that claim with the DNA test were as offensive and stereotypical by many indigenous communities, including by the Cherokee Nation as “inappropriate and wrong.” While it is unclear whether her intentions were to gain Native American votes during her 2020 presidential campaign, it is impossible not to point out the egregious optics of the situation. Throughout American history, Republicans also have not failed to weaponize racial divisions for electoral gain, perhaps most notoriously with their Southern strategy of the mid-1900s. The Southern strategy pre-existing racial grievances among White southerners in order to win the heavily-Democratic South. This historic pandering has extended to the present day, as some political analysts that Trump’s election in 2016 was in part due to racial resentment among working-class White voters — a resentment that Trump did not hesitate to on. While Biden’s “you ain’t black” fiasco and Republicans’ appeal to White voters may be extremely well-publicized, there have also been smaller moments that lend credence to the burgeoning prevalence of racial pandering. For instance, Beto O’Rourke suddenly and awkwardly began Spanish during the 2019 Democratic Primary debates, ostensibly to connect with Spanish-speaking audience members. This prompted Senator Cory Booker to attempt the same later in the debate. Amid his abrupt Spanish-speaking attempt, O’Rourke never actually answered the question soundly, which captures the essence of pandering quite well: superficial political ruses to distract from genuine policy proposals. It is patronizing and offensive, making it seem like votes can be bought without substantive backing or promises. Ultimately, pandering elevates stereotypes to prominence, broadcasting them as the valid representation and characterization of a particular racial group. Once you strip away the flowery language, pandering is thinly veiled racism. Yet, therein lies a predicament — race remains an influential political determinant. Especially amid the racial reckoning in the summer of 2020 with the murder of George Floyd, few topics in public discourse were as prominent as the topic of race. Furthermore, the COVID-19 pandemic disproportionately Black Americans, bringing racial inequities into stark relief. De-emphasizing race in politics — in political campaigns, for instance — would be similarly injurious to these communities, neglecting pressing issues rooted in racism that ought to be readily addressed.  Hence, it is not enough just to identify racial disparities: This identification must be followed by substantive policy proposals that acknowledge minority voting patterns while also recognizing the political heterogeneity within them. Policies like the Affordable Care Act, for instance, have disparities in health outcomes for Black and Hispanic individuals. The American Rescue Plan is another such piece of legislation, Black child poverty by 33.3%. These are examples of substantive policies that assist minority communities in tangible ways and extend beyond the lip service delivered by politicians. These policies recognize that the root causes for racial voting trends lie in concrete issues that affect people’s daily lives, rather than the vote being inherently tied to identity. In this way, racial politics would greatly benefit from added substance to abstract political goals.  On a final note, it is important to note that voting trends stratified by race are not static and fixed; minority votes are shaped by events. Voters are not permanently loyal to a single political party; their vote depends on their concerns. Political scientist Ruy Teixeira and journalist John B. Judis made the mistake of as a decisive political factor in their book “The Emerging Democratic Majority” in which they argued that Democrats were poised to dominate American politics in the foreseeable future due to the growth in underrepresented groups who tend to consistently vote for Democrats. This forecast was proved woefully inaccurate when voters of color, especially Hispanics, by an 8-point margin to the GOP between the 2016 and 2020 elections. Some political scientists attribute this shift to Trump’s and a general with the Democratic cultural platform. The ensuing outcry from communities of color should not be shocking. After all, treating voters of color as a monolithic bloc — the same framework through which politicians pander — is offensive and ineffective. Demography is not destiny. The true litmus test for morally sound, effective political action is whether it addresses the inequalities that persist along racial lines in American society. Awkwardly speaking Spanish to appeal to Hispanic voters or claiming Indigenous ancestry accomplishes nothing except the derision of the very communities pandering politicians seek to appease.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/demography-destiny-delusion/

Race Across Borders: My Reclamation of Indigeneity | PRE X Culture

Sebastián Ramírez Feune

As students sat bubbling in the pre-exam demographic questions on their standardized tests, I shot my hand up. My fifth-grade teacher marched through the aisles, making her way towards me.  “What’s the issue?” she asked.  “The survey is asking me for my race, but I don’t see Latino as an option,” I responded, struggling to conceive how I was supposed to answer this mandatory survey question. “Oh, that’s because Hispanic isn’t a race,” she said. “I’m Latina too, and I would suggest selecting ‘Other.’ I usually just put White.” Her response left me more confused than before. Select White? Not once in my life had I been called White. The names most often attributed to me were “Mexican,” “Latino,” and “Hispanic.”  I went home that day with a minor identity crisis. What was I? I asked my parents, as most kids do, but I ended up right where I’d started: “Mexican,” “Latino,” “Hispanic,”all identities that never appeared on demographic survey questions as races. It was not until high school that I fully gained a better understanding of race in Latin America. Being Latino informs and complicates my understanding of my race. I look at myself and never have a definitive answer. That said, as I have met more Latines on campus, I have heard their stories and found that my experience is not that uncommon. The racialization of my Latinidad shapes one perception of my identity in the United States. Latinidad is seen as a racial category here. However, if and when we Latines return to Latin America, we can find ourselves stripped of the racialized Latinidad and thrust into a society with a completely different perception of race. In Latin American societies, race becomes a more fluid structure informed by histories of colonialism and racial mixing. This variance in racial perspectives is due to the fact that race is a . Different societies have come into frequent contact with specific communities that have influenced how they perceive the idea of race. The United States has often categorized race into broad mega-races, with the U.S. census providing options of “Asian,” “Black,” “Native American,” “White,” “Pacific Islander,” and “Other.” These rigid social structures institutionalize race in an oversimplified, reductive manner.  The rigidity in the of race in the United States can be traced back to the “one-drop rule,” claiming that anyone without 100% Caucasian blood would be considered non-White. As recently as 1924, the Racial Integrity Act, enacted by the Virginia General Assembly, classified a White person as one “who has no trace whatsoever of any blood other than Caucasian.” The one-drop rule generated a racial standard that extended beyond the scope of one’s phenotype, establishing an aversion against any affiliation with Blackness or Indigeneity. On the other hand, the social conception of race in Latin America drastically differs from its North American counterpart. But, before I dive into explaining the racial structures of the region, I must qualify that Latin America is replete with racism. In 2019, eight of ten Brazilians by the police were Black or “pardo,” which means mixed-race. In Bolivia and Peru, hundreds of thousands of Indigenous women have been or . These targeted attacks against the most marginalized communities in Latin America are terribly frequent.  In Latin America, however, these strictly defined racial groups are much more absent, with phenotype-based identity overshadowing genotype, contradicting the North American “one-drop rule.” It is a concept derived from the history of countries south of the U.S. border. While Asian immigrants have become more prominent in recent years, the origins of “Latinidad” — the pan-Latin American identity — are the result of the intersection between African, Indigenous, and European cultures, histories, and traditions. The arrival of the Spanish, French, and Portuguese in what is now Latin America marked the decimation of Indigenous communities and the enslavement and forced migration of African people.  While British settler colonies in the Americas cleared out Indigenous American communities, drawing strict racial lines between racial groups, in Latin American colonies, miscegenation was used to control Indigenous and Afro-descendent groups, resulting in diverse racial hierarchies. Racial mixes between Black, Indigenous, and Caucasian peoples led to different racial categories, something unlike anything in the United States: “Peninsulares” (European-born in the Iberian Peninsula), “Criollos” (European-born in Latin America), “Mestizos” (European and Indigenous), “Mulatos” (African and European), “Indígenas” (Indigenous), “Negros” (African), and “Zambos” (Indigenous and African). In this racial order, enslaved African and Indigenous people were placed at the bottom, with any association with Whiteness associated with social esteem and privilege. Remnants of this “casta” system are still visible in today’s Latin American society, as individuals are referred to based on physical features over general racial categories. So, to Latines like me, it can often be challenging to find a racial group with which to identify. Due to our community’s mixed-race histories, questions of racial percentages become less significant. Rather, we generally identify most with how we look. From this emphasis on physical appearance comes the problem of colorism: the illusion that Whiteness is aspirational. Whiteness is associated with wealth and status, while darker skin tones are affiliated with poverty and ignorance — harmful stereotypes that have been perpetuated since colonial times. If there are two people, one of whom is Black and the other of mixed-racial heritage, the mixed-race person would almost certainly be the recipient of colorist . Colorist treatment isn’t just predicated on skin color; it can also reflect biases associated with facial features and hair texture.  Every Latine person has their own journey to discovering their racial identity. Many make the misinformed — yet understandable — decision of racially identifying as Latino, Latine, or Latinx, without acknowledging that Latinidad in and of itself is an ethnic identity. However, due to mass genocide and racial discrimination, many Latines do not have the resources to truly know and understand their racial identity. Latines of mixed-race, like me, have to engage in historiographical research to uncover their racial ancestry. Fortunately, my grandfather, whom I call Tito, was my primary source of knowledge for all things related to Mexican culture, history, and music. From Tito, I learned that I was a descendant of the Otomí community from Central México. While Tito only knew a few words in Otomí, he was undoubtedly Indigenous. While I had always seen myself as a brown Latino, Tito provided a sense of security in my identity, as both a person of color and Indigenous man. My reclamation of indigeneity, however, was not without conflict. When I referred to my grandfather or myself as Indigenous, some family members would take offense, retorting, “Nosotros no somos indios:” “We are not Indians.” I struggled to understand how this identity could be so contentious. After all, if my family had distinctly Indigenous roots, then we were indubitably Indigenous. Nonetheless, I realized that the aversive reactions to this identity had been formed through colonial-era social constructs of the undesirability of Black and brown identities. My reclamation of Indigeneity has fueled my passion to fight and resist Latin American colorist standards of rejecting African and Indigenous ancestry. Fear of being called Indigenous or Black amongst Latines of mixed-race heritage is a symptom of the plague of colorism. In claiming our Blackness and/or Indigeneity, Latines resist the seeming ubiquity of Eurocentrism. I ask you to embrace your roots.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/race-across-borders-my-reclamation-of-indigeneity-pre-x-culture/

Harmful Representation: Arranged Marriage in Netflix’s “Indian Matchmaking”

Ruhi Nayak

With the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the popularity of streaming services are at an all-time high. However, as viewership grows, so too can the impact of released content. In particular, global shows can have an outsize influence given the impressionability of their Western audience, many of whom have little to no exposure to the cultures depicted. Depictions of unfamiliar cultures can cause audiences to internalize inaccurate information that generalizes entire populations and traditions.  Netflix’s Emmy-nominated show “Indian Matchmaking” constitutes an example of a distorted depiction of foreign customs. At first glance, the series represents a similar genre of reality show to its counterparts “Love is Blind” and “The Bachelor” in that it follows the relationships of individuals as they search for a spouse. However, upon closer examination, the show glosses over the tumultuous history behind arranged marriage and glorifies it as a harmless, entertaining alternative to dating. In its attempt to portray arranged marriages in a palatable way to Western audiences, the Netflix show “Indian Matchmaking” dangerously endorses harmful double standards based on gender, excessive familial influence in romantic relationships, colorism, and casteism. With the show’s second season recently being released by Netflix, it is important to dive into these potential implications. The show follows Sima Taparia, a renowned matchmaker from Mumbai, as she flies across the globe introducing clients to prospective spouses. Marriage constitutes a societal expectation in Indian societies, yet the task of finding a suitable spouse can be time-consuming and troublesome. As such, the numerous challenges posed by dating have created a strong demand for matchmakers like Taparia. A group of psychologists whether it is indeed possible to predict unique romantic desire before two individuals have met and found that though it may be possible, even advanced machine learning algorithms find it challenging to predict the “compatibility elements of human mating.” Thus, in order to craft the best matches, Taparia utilizes “biodatas” — pseudo-dating profiles that include facts ranging from age to family background to height. In this sense, Taparia’s matchmaking methods are comparable to those used by dating apps, which are quite popular in the Western world. Thus, the show normalizes arranged marriages in the eyes of Western viewers by illustrating the matchmaking process as similar to swiping through Tinder or Hinge until finding a match. While “Indian Matchmaking” may have been America’s first exposure to the practice of arranged marriages, in India, the phenomenon is as prevalent as Western dating apps, if not more. In fact, approximately 90 percent of the marriages in India today are to be arranged marriages. “Arranged marriage” refers to a practice in which two individuals are set up by a matchmaker, friends, or family, with the intention of marriage. In this process, families often partner choices and marital decisions on behalf of their children, with the children merely consenting to the decisions of their elders. Consequently, most men and women who enter into such marriages have very limited pre-marital contact with one other. With that being said, as mentioned in the second season of “Indian Matchmaking,” arranged marriages have evolved to provide individuals with increased agency and time to determine whether or not a proposed partner constitutes a good match. However, upon closer analysis, “Indian Matchmaking” normalizes certain practices that are detrimental to achieving satisfaction with relationships and those within arranged marriages. Throughout the series, female clients are advised to “adjust and compromise,” even if such actions consist of radically changing one’s lifestyle following marriage, moving across the country, or abandoning their own career pursuits. Notably, the men in the show are not told to adapt, which exposes the double standards that exist between men and women in relationships derived from arranged marriages. Such double standards suggest that the onus of sustaining a relationship falls solely on women. The several instances in which women are encouraged to change underscore the series’ endorsement of harmful gender roles that are damaging both to individuals and the relationship in general. Contradictorily to advice given in the show, studies have that attempts to alter one’s self-image for others only harms one’s relationships and self-esteem. Thus, in advising women to modify their self-image and personal goals to match those of a potential spouse, Taparia supports a practice that may damage the women’s self-esteem and result in problems within the given romantic relationship. In addition, there are both emotional and relationship when people suppress their emotions, especially when they believe that their sacrifices are not an authentic reflection of their true selves. These costs include worsening personal emotional well-being, as well as anxieties about their own relationships. For this reason, urging women to sacrifice their own desires and goals for the sake of their romantic relationships can result in more harm than good.  Another risk of normalizing arranged marriages is the justification of decreased individual agency in choosing a romantic partner. In the first season of the show, Akshay’s mother Preeti is not shy about voicing the characteristics that she would like to see in her future daughter-in-law. Though the show plays off Preeti’s insistence on her daughter-in-law being able to cook and clean as almost comical, Taparia nonetheless takes Preeti’s demands into consideration. Here lies one of the most important aspects of arranged marriages — family approval. In Indian society, the is a strong agent of socialization, and family unity is often prioritized over individual goals. As a result, the family expects to exercise great influence on an individual’s spouse-selection process, and this influence is manifested in what we know as ‘arranged marriages.” That being said, family involvement in modern matchmaking processes varies widely and the process does not necessitate a complete stripping of individual agency. However, in downplaying the numerous demands made by clients’ families, “Indian Matchmaking” can lead Western viewers to underestimate family influence during arranged marriages and, more importantly, the lack of agency in choosing their own spouse.  Even more alarming than the excessive familial influence is the reinforcement of casteism and colorism imbued within the show’s storylines. The practice of arranged marriage has its roots in enforcing the predominance of upper-caste South Asians and its normalization continues to support exclusionary caste homogeny under the guise of ensuring partners’ “compatibility.” Even today, of South Asian marriages take place within one’s own caste. In “Indian Matchmaking,” each biodata notes a client’s “community background.” Taparia even acknowledges caste’s importance in the matchmaking process by stating in the first episode that “in India, we have to see the caste, we have to see the height, we have to see the age.” Furthermore, Taparia emphasizes how girls ought to be “fair,” which normalizes blatant colorism and the idealization of lighter features. Such idealization from centuries of Whiteness being upheld as the standard for beauty, intelligence, and status across the globe as well as colonization and imperialism. Thus, the show’s casual emphasis of “fairness” and “caste” both upholds these forms of discrimination as well and obscures the violent reality faced by darker-skinned and lower-caste individuals in India. When analyzing “Indian Matchmaking” more critically, it is evident that the show normalizes colorist ideology, caste supremacy, harmful double standards based on gender, and excessive familial influence in arranged marriages. Such normalization is dangerous as it promotes practices that weaken relationships, damage self-esteem, and contribute to the systemic oppression of marginalized populations in South Asia. Given Netflix’s large Western audience, the show’s portrayal of arranged marriage as akin to dating ignores the potential harm caused by arranged marriage and normalizes the practice in the Western world.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/harmful-representation-arranged-marriage-in-netflixs-indian-matchmaking/

From Burqas To Bikinis: Freeing Feminism

Shruthi Kumar

You have most likely never heard of her, and probably never will. She was never written about in historical records nor inducted into Western society’s cultural hall of fame. But Nangeli was a rebel. She was an Ezhava woman who on the coasts of Kerala in British-ruled India during the 19th century, and she was a badass.  As a young adult, Nangeli faced a caste-based “breast-tax” called , which had been imposed by the then State of Travancore, prohibiting lower-caste women from covering their breasts. Failure to comply resulted in heavy taxation.  When I first investigated the story of Nangeli, I viewed the breast tax as primarily a mechanism to satisfy the sexual desires of upper-caste men, and therefore, Nangeli’s story was one of feminism and resistance to patriarchy. It was only after unearthing layers of caste, religion, and colonization that I discovered her story was just that and so much more. Nangeli’s life account alongside a parallel analysis of the contemporary #Freethenipple movement brings to light how centering narratives of male sexual desire have silenced other motivations for resistance. From burquas to bikinis, a woman’s choice of clothing has always been deeply interconnected with concepts of feminism and modesty that respond to the male gaze. But, in order to shift social power dynamics and ensure the public safety of women in our modern patriarchy, feminism must be redefined as an inclusive movement empowered by female autonomy — independent of the eyes of men. During Nangeli’s time, the Mulakaram, or breast tax, served two purposes: first, to maintain India’s deeply-rooted caste system, and second, to appease the male gaze. Indeed, while some say the tax was standardized for all women, others say it was determined based on the size and attractiveness of the woman’s breasts, a clear example of patriarchal and dehumanizing misogyny. Regardless, Nangeli acted against Travancore’s injustice by covering her breasts without paying the tax. Eventually, when a tax collector arrived at her door and demanded she pay, Nangeli cut off her breasts, placed them on his tray, and bled to death in protest. Her sacrifice the famous Channar Revolt, also known as the Breast Cloth Rebellion, in which, from 1813 to 1859, lower-caste women from the district of Travancore fought for the right to wear upper-body coverings. Eventually, the Maharaja (King) of Travancore annulled the repressive law and made a Royal Proclamation in 1859 permitting lower-caste women to cover their breasts. Nangeli’s story has endured from generation to generation as oral history, but only Kerala locals knew of her until the Dalit awakening in the 1990s. Outside of Dalit circles, Nangeli’s story was largely dismissed as a myth or tall tale. Why? For many, the real complexities of anti-caste resistance and colonial conceptions of modesty were too dangerous. Nangeli’s bold actions threatened the power of the powerful, and they still do. To suppress this very threat, the resistance of Dalit women against oppressive law has been purposefully omitted from history: a 2016 decision from the Madras High Court “objectionable content” from school curricula which resulted in the omission of a section titled “Caste, Conflict, and Dress Change” from the Class IX Social Science syllabus, silencing the efforts of Dalit women in early-1880s India. Artist T Murali was interested in Nangeli’s story and visited Mulachhipuram, where Nangeli’s old house remains. He met with her descendants and relatives and was inspired to create artwork to preserve her legacy. Murali explains the importance of sharing Nangeli’s story and ensuring that education portrays the real truth. He said, in an interview with the HPR, “When people write original and truthful history, only then can we have proper culture.” His insights foreshadow the modern patriarchal condition that results from the erasure of stories like Nangeli’s. Given that she sought to protect herself from being sexualized and objectified by the patriarchy’s lustful eyes, on the surface, Nangeli’s story is a feminist one. However, the need for “modesty” in India did not arise solely or even originally from the breast tax, but rather was fueled by the expectations of missionaries and colonizers. At the time in South India, going bare-chested was neither shameful nor noteworthy. Rather, people simply chose to wear minimal clothing to allow for evaporation of sweat and prevent overheating in the hot, humid climate. No one cared to look, and no one was bothered by it. Women’s breasts were not sexualized in India until the arrival of missionaries. Dr. Jayakumari Devika, a Malayali historian from Kerala and professor at the Centre for Development Studies at Thiruvananthapuram explained to the HPR that London missionary societies came to South Travancore and were shocked to see bare-chested women in church. To the pastor, the woman’s bare chest was sinful. Therefore, the women were told that, if they wanted to attend church, they would have to cover up with imported blouses from England. The people needed the support of the missionaries in their anti-caste struggles against the Bhramincal monarchy, and therefore, were willing to do whatever it took to appease them. The patriarchal elements of modesty and caste dignity became intertwined as Colonel John Munro in 1813 an order that granted the Christian-converted women the right to wear an upper garment. As Dr. Devika noted, “The missionaries wanted modesty, and the people wanted caste dignity. So they struck a deal.” Influenced by colonial religious doctrine, women began to view their own bodies as sinful. Consequently, the social sexualization and objectification of women’s breasts became deeply rooted in Indian culture, and ultimately manifested to reinforce an enduring fixture in Indian society: the caste system. Indeed, we must acknowledge that the full purpose of the breast tax was to maintain a caste-based social order. Although popular and historiographical interpretations of her story filter caste defiance and focus more on the role of the male gaze on religious syncretism respectively, Nangeli’s resistance to patriarchal oppression must be viewed in conjunction with her resistance to the caste system. Nangeli was from the Ezhava caste, which was not the Untouchable (Dalit) caste but one above it. The Brahmins were considered the highest caste of people, the order closest to God. Therefore, all actions taken by regional rulers were in the interest of continuing the Brahminical order. Anything unproductive to the Brahmanical order was to be removed. In the extreme case of Kerala, the lowest caste was not just untouchable: it was unseeable. So dire was the injustice that a Dalit person standing in the path of a Brahmin could be legally murdered. In the case of Nangeli, her caste was granted conditional humanity through the payment of taxes. Anything which was not functional for the reproduction of Brahmins was taxed: Thalakaram (hair tax), Meeshakaram (mustache tax), and Mulakaram (breast tax) among others. Regarding the Mulakaram, standing bare-chested was considered a sign of respect towards the “superior” castes for both lower caste men and women. However, the tax was mainly enforced on Avarna (lower caste) women who wanted to cover their breasts. Just like the Brahmanical system at large, the goal of the Mulakaram was to use social and political power to extract any kind of labor (or visual pleasure) from lower-caste populations while keeping them powerless. Dr. Devika told the HPR that Nangeli’s story has nothing to do with covering the breast. Rather, Nangeli was telling the government that she did not want a body nor breasts if she had to pay for her humanity and if the Dalit caste was not granted a socially recognized body at all. Thus, struggles for the upper cloth have less to do with modesty and more to do with taking possession of one’s dignity and self-respect and keeping it away from oppressive societal powers. “By her act of defiance, Nangeli established herself as a bodily being,” Devika said. “In my mind, therefore, she is the mother of all civil rights movements and all kinds of struggles for freedom.” Not only does Nangeli’s story exemplify India’s 19th-century feminist uprising at large, but it also signifies the salience of deconstructing classism in progressive movements. As a member of one of India’s most oppressed castes, Nangeli represents the inclusivity of feminism: freedom cannot only be granted to the privileged. Instead, it must be inspired by those with little to no societal power in the status quo. Centuries ago, Nangeli fought for the right to cover up, to shield herself from the male gaze. Today, that same spirit of resistance manifests differently in the West: here, instead, women are fighting for the right to uncover. in 2012 by New York City filmmaker Lina Esco, who argued that it should be culturally and legally acceptable for women to be topless in public, the now national #Freethenipple (FTN) movement began as a campaign to protest the censorship of female breasts. Nangeli’s motive to resist oppression was clear, but what is the aim of FTN? Contrary to popular understanding, FTN not to display women’s breasts, but rather, to desexualize and demobilize them as instruments for female objectification. Moreover, the movement intends to relocate power to women: a woman should be the only one with the authority to sexualize her own body. However, many, especially men, have misconstrued the #Freethenipple movement’s intended effect, statements like, “#Freethenipple? I wouldn’t complain.” It is clear, then, that the male gaze continuously centers itself in feminist movements, making it all the more difficult to extract feminism from the reigning social narrative dominated by the eyes of men.  The fact is that it is socially acceptable to pay to see women topless in pornography or at strip clubs, often at the request and for the pleasure of men, but if a woman owns her body and wants to be topless of her own volition, it causes social discomfort. Why is that? How can we redefine feminism not as a reaction to the male gaze but as an egalitarian and inclusive movement meant to recognize the autonomy of women and their choices?  Nangeli was an empowered woman, yet she chose to cover up. A woman participating in the #Freethenipple movement is also empowered, yet she chooses to undress. Feminist empowerment, thus, cannot be defined by the quantity of a woman’s clothing.  Unfortunately, though, society’s toxic preoccupation with a woman’s status of dress or undress reinforces and reflects the desires and standards of men. Indeed, while the tale of Nangeli and FTN differ, the history and context of these two phenomena demonstrate a single truth: feminism has always been defined in reaction to the male gaze. In Nangeli’s time, the breast tax was instituted to ensure men could lust over bare-chested women in the streets much in the same way that men seem to enjoy the #Freethenipple trend on social media.  Consider discussions regarding the wage gap as an example. The language society uses, even in progressive circles, to address the subject is always relative to the male experience:  “women need to be paid as much as men.” But why must men be the standard? Feminist objectives and messaging should, instead, be approached from an objective standpoint. Women should seek not to be paid the same as men but rather to be paid the same as others who perform the same quality and quantity of work. Setting a male-influenced standard based on the expectations of an unjust status quo is not as potent as demanding objective and independent empowerment. Our definition of an empowered woman must, thus, be derived from a place that is not reactionary to male expectations. Ideas of modesty and dignity are, more often than not, prescribed to women by society so that women act in accordance with male sexual desire. However, centering the conversation on a woman’s right to choice of clothing rather than the clothing itself, minimizes the importance of the male gaze and redefines feminism as independent of patriarchal priorities. So why does all of this matter? What’s concerning are like this: “India’s tourism minister advises female tourists not to wear skirts to avoid being raped.” Society still asserts that harm against a woman is predicated on her state of dress, so when authorities attempt to mitigate sexual abuse, they tell girls what to wear. But that isn’t the answer. Sexual misconduct and harassment have only one solution: stop placing responsibility on girls, and start educating men. Teach boys that their sexual desire is not the center of every story. Teach boys to respect women in light of any clothing choice. Let the headline read: “India’s tourism minister advises female tourists to be cautious of men’s lack of decency and respect.”  Maybe then we can finally actualize Nangeli’s pursuit of justice, creating a world in which my daughter and her daughters can walk the streets (day or night) freely and fearlessly.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/from-burqas-to-bikinis-freeing-feminism/

Kritika Nagappa

A 12-year-old girl rides in the backseat of a van to a remote location. She is unaware of where she is going, how much further is left, and when she will arrive. She sits quietly next to her mother. There aren’t enough tears left within to cry any longer. The girl , “What does he think about this marriage? How does he feel about marrying a child?” Her father nonchalantly replies from the front seat, “Oh, he’s done it before.” This is a very real tale of the Fundamentalist Church of Latter-Day Saints community in the United States. The experiences of FLDS children, including but not limited to brainwashing, coercion, and most notably, child marriages, resulted in harrowing effects on their childhoods. Issues such as child marriage are not only the reality for FLDS children but also tens of thousands of children around the nation. Today, under specific conditions, child marriage is legal in 44 U.S. states, due to extensive loopholes that put children in danger of predators, assault, and trauma. The FLDS is one example of what can occur when legislation doesn’t prioritize the rights and safety of young people. To better understand the larger conversation on national child marriage, it is imperative to look into such groups and observe how the law enables such a heinous crime. The Fundamentalist Church of Latter-Day Saints, initially founded in 1856, branched off from the Mormon faith to ensure its followers could practice polygamy. Today, however, the Southern Poverty Law Center FLDS a “white-supremacist, homophobic, anti-government, totalitarian cult.” Young boys are raised to believe that it is their right to have multiple wives, and young girls are taught that their life’s purpose is to obey their husbands. The church’s modern leaders, the late Rulon Jeffs, and his son, convicted predator Warren Jeffs, are for normalizing this thought process. Both Rulon and Warren Jeffs have held the position of Prophet — the man believed to have been called on by God to lead the FLDS community away from eternal damnation. With this power over the community, both created a culture of fear, especially among the women he dominated. To Warren Jeffs and other FLDS men, young women were simply seen as methods to produce a lineage and attain salvation. One of the most appalling FLDS traditions is forced child marriages to older male predators. Parents would present their daughters to Warren as soon as God deemed them ready for marriage — a heavily plagued meter controlled by FLDS men and Warren himself. Devout mothers and fathers allowed their middle-school-aged daughters into nonconsensual unities. The FLDS violated these girls and their rights, stripped them of their innocence, and forced upon their lives they did not wish to live. The most well-known instance in 2006 to 12-year-old Merrianne Jessop, Warren Jeffs’ youngest wife. When investigators took over the Yearning for Zion Ranch in El Dorado, Texas, they found the temple bed Warren used to consummate his marriage with Merrianne. Warren, who was 50 years old at the time, raped Merriane, a 12-year-old, and allowed a number of his other wives to watch this “ .”  While Merriane’s story is jarring, it is not the only one within the FLDS or even within the greater United States. Countless young girls fall victim to marriages with significantly older, oftentimes abusive, men. Though child marriage has been declared a human rights abuse by the U.S. State Department, it is under certain circumstances in 44 U.S. states. Among these states, 20 have no minimum age for marriage if conducted with a parental or judicial waiver, and over 300,000 child marriages taken place since 2000. In some of these states, children can be pressured into marriage by their families, abusers, and even religious leaders — as seen in the FLDS community.  For instance, in California, children can be at any age as long as one parent and one judge approve, even if the marriage is to an adult several years older. Judges rarely have enough information to determine if parental approval is actually parental coercion. This issue is often worsened when a teen becomes pregnant. Adults can be driven to support child marriages out of social fears and pressures like the stigma surrounding pregnancies out of wedlock. Not to mention, the financial strain of supporting a teen parent may dramatically impact family savings. Together, these influencing factors coerce parents into supporting child marriages that they otherwise would not, which overworked, unconcerned judges find convincing enough to approve. What’s more egregious — in many states, child marriage waivers for legal statutory rape, where one of the parties involved in sexual activity is younger than the age of consent. What should be considered a heinous crime is sanctioned by law if the people engaging in sexual activity are married to each other? Despite the fact that child marriage exists in law books and practice, most Americans have no idea about its prevalence. A recent survey that nearly half of the Americans polled believed that child marriage was already illegal throughout the U.S., suggesting a false understanding that child marriages don’t occur within the United States. However, this is a matter with a long history in this country — the supposed global champion of human rights. How can the United States hold other countries accountable for their human rights violations when it overlooks its own?  The FLDS community and its leaders provide a small but important look into the many legal atrocities that occur every day within the “freest country” in the world. While it is easy to blame FLDS predators for the atrocities they’ve committed toward minors, and rightfully so, it is equally the fault of the legislators enabling these actions. To protect our children and their rights, we must support legislators who have the best interest of all Americans at heart.  .

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/crimes-by-flds/

Alejandro Escobar

At the close of each Olympic cycle, it’s easy to guess which nations brought home the most medals, and last year’s Tokyo 2021 Summer Olympic Games were no exception. The United States, Russia, China, and the United Kingdom undoubtedly topped the charts, while others, such as Panama, Mozambique, and Laos trailed the pack. This is surprising to no one. The talent some athletes from the higher-performing nations have is impossible to deny. American swimmer Katie Ledecky’s speed is jaw-dropping; Argentinian soccer player Lionel Messi’s prowess on the pitch is inspiring and responsible for his most recent World Cup victory. Nonetheless, these people aren’t once-in-a-lifetime prodigies; before Ledecky, the Americans had Phelps, and before Messi, the Argentines had Maradonna. The star power in these nations’ rosters is ever-present, helping them excel generation after generation. Meanwhile, dozens of countries struggle to raise a single virtuoso or snag their first gold medal.  With fewer than ten countries almost 50% of all Olympic medals, there is a clear systemic anomaly in the distribution of Olympic achievement. Based on such jarring numbers, the public consensus has normalized that only a few nations are athletically successful. Yet, while many have attempted to resolve the question of why this strange and recurrent phenomenon even exists — often attributing athletic mediocrity to low national incomes or instability —  the true answer may not be so simple. Contrary to general trends already discussed, there are some sports in which developing nations manage to squeeze their way onto the podium. Sports like volleyball and water polo are not only dominated by the usual champions but also by underdogs such as and , respectively.  Although varied, most of the sports in which less-medaled nations thrive are group sports. This makes sense: On a tighter budget, when it’s time for developing nations to invest in sports, they logically choose to favor whatever will benefit the most people. When deciding between building a tennis court or a soccer field, the soccer field would be the wiser choice, as dozens could play at a time, whereas a tennis court would only serve four or fewer. Therefore, team sports are the usual beneficiaries of government support. Conversely, athletes from developing nations who compete in individual rather than team sports are left unattended, and their chances of gold are far slimmer. Having little governmental support, they face systemic barriers at times too high for them to surmount, including lack of access to equipment or infrastructure, coaches with enough expertise, and a community that will support their pursuit. As a result, most individual sports remain led by traditionally successful countries.  However, there are solo sports in which poorer nations surprisingly thrive. In track and field at the 2016 Olympic games, for instance, the charts detailing the countries with the most medals were by Kenya, Jamaica, and Ethiopia. Yet, this exception is surprisingly easy to explain. Needing little to no infrastructure, running opens its doors for everyone to train regardless of a country’s wealth or resources. Although all professional athletes eventually train with expensive machinery and skilled trainers, the sport’s simplicity allows all interested participants a foot in the door and makes earning a gold medal boil down to hard work and raw talent. On the other hand, sports that heavy infrastructure or equipment such as gymnastics, horseback riding, and swimming the podium from both countries and individual athletes who are unable to afford it. In an interview with the HPR, former Harvard baseball player Matt Thomas mentioned that this was an obstacle for many athletes, saying, “The wealthier you are, the more opportunities you have. Think of sports like golf or baseball, where you need to buy a lot of equipment to be able to perform and play the sport.”  From a macroscopic view, national low-income status also exacerbates this shortage. Since many countries can’t afford to build several gymnasiums or pools for aspiring Olympians, athletes are sadly denied proper training, leaving their talent unrealized. Therefore, results in such sports continue to reflect a positive correlation between GDP and success, with wealthier countries like the United Kingdom, the United States, and Germany monopolizing victory.  Colombia’s Minister of Sport Ernesto Lucena concurred in an interview with the HPR, saying, “Great nations, the ones with big budgets, who additionally have great infrastructure to help all areas of their country, where not a single person lacks the budget to explore their talent, are definitely the ones you see secure top spots.” Aware of the scarce opportunities in their home countries, especially for those playing solo, many athletes choose to emigrate and seek a professional career elsewhere, where their talent can be fully nurtured. This phenomenon can be clearly seen in soccer leagues; regardless of where they come from, all of the world’s soccer stars end up in Europe, where the highest level of the sport is. Everybody wants to further their career and acquire the, often monetary, resources to do so, many sacrifice their homeland.  Not only do athletes find better and more numerous coaches, equipment, teammates, and infrastructure when they leave, but also, perhaps most importantly, a better quality of life. For many, sport is the ticket out of problem-ridden nations that being drafted or hired somewhere else allows them to leave behind Coming from Venezuela at 16 to play baseball, Gold Glove recipient Ozzie Guillen lived this reality, telling the HPR that it was common for people to “want to leave your neighborhood and your poverty behind, and provide for your family.” After all, when leaving for countries that can afford to invest in sports, athletes’ salaries can from hundreds to millions of dollars. The offer is simply too good to pass up.  As such, athletes end up building better lives elsewhere and seldom return to their home countries. This has massive implications for the development of sports. When retired, most athletes into managerial roles or use their expertise and resources to expand the specific sport they’re interested in. Slowly but surely, these athletes build the backbone of a country’s sports program. When athletes stay in already well-resourced countries around the world, those nations ultimately continue receiving the best training while underfunded sports in often developing countries continue to struggle. Even though social mobility and better quality of life are incredible news for the athletes, it’s a pattern that feeds the system which upholds traditional winners and subdues the rest, contributing to a lack of role models, experts in the fields, and future coaches.  Demonstratively, when asked what opportunities athletes in countries such as Venezuela have to succeed, Guillen’s answer was simple: “None.” Those unable to leave their home country and find better opportunities in a foreign land often face an obstacle too difficult to overcome: Athletes interested in pursuing both an academic and athletic career, only have access to undernourished collegiate programs that don’t allow them to go professional. On the other hand, affluent countries, particularly the United States, have created a system for their athletes to succeed both academically and athletically. College sports have become incredibly popular, and schools constantly invest in bettering their programs. Associations and conferences such as the NCAA and the Ivy League have been built to support this booming culture, proving collegiate sports are not a hobby but rather a training ground for professionals. University funding also helps the strain on the government to finance sports and produce world-class athletes. The cultural and athletic salience of the college-to-professional pipeline is most observable in U.S. men’s basketball. For instance, nicknamed March Madness for its popularity, college basketball’s annual tournament an average of more than 15 million viewers per game. For those wanting to go professional, playing at this collegiate level is the right step to take: Almost 85% of all NBA players college, confirming that university athletics feed into professional leagues in wealthy nations with high athletic performance. Naturally, this benefits such countries in international competitions, like the Olympics. For Lucena, “Countries who have bet on a good university system for sports have also become dominant.” In other countries, though, that potential is lost: The lack of a sports culture in college makes funding for young athletes rest entirely on the government’s shoulders, leading to underfunded and incompetent sports programs. As so much of international athletic success is dependent on investment, it’s important to look at why successful countries spend so much on sports in the first place. The answer is exceedingly simple: Sports are a profitable investment, so the greater the input, the greater the output. Sports move people, elicit strong emotions, and create die-hard fans; they’re a central part of the entire world’s culture. Soccer star Cristiano Ronaldo and Leo Messi’s positions as the first- and second-most followed people on Instagram, boasting over 520 million and 400 million followers respectively, the magnitude of this phenomenon. Considering their exceedingly large following, the athletic industry is incredibly lucrative and moves colossal sums of money. Tickets, merchandise, advertisements, meet and greets, among many others are a constant, heavy stream of revenue. What’s more, by creating millions of jobs, requiring infrastructure, and transporting so much capital, the industry has become an economy in and of itself, a market size of 83 billion dollars in North America alone. Thus, it’s no surprise that, when able, countries invest so heavily in this area, as it’s almost a given the investment will be returned. Unfortunately, however, this profitability cements the power dynamics in sports and upholds the current system of winners and losers. Whenever a country earns money through sports, it can then invest it back and grow its athletics programs quickly. In Thomas’ eye, this also happens at the collegiate level, where “at certain schools, [sports] are part of the economics. They depend on the money they make from football season, for example.” Consequently, they continue winning. A positive feedback loop is generated in which some countries continue to dominate generation after generation. Meanwhile, the rest valiantly, yet unrealistically try to break a cycle that works against them. In Guillen’s words “we’re swimming against the current.” At first glance, this issue might seem easy to solve. Since it’s such a profitable investment, developing nations with tighter budgets should try and spare some change for their athletics department; after all, this will benefit them in the long run. However, it’s important to note that this is a long-term investment, and many of these countries can’t afford to spend on projects that will only come to fruition ten or twenty years later. Instead, they operate on a more day-to-day basis and must solve immediate problems faced by their populations. Hence, sports are not a priority, and the decades-old pattern remains intact. Wealth distribution and inequality play a major role in all areas of life, including sports. Without a doubt, all athletes work hard and train strenuously to achieve success; yet, systemic barriers place additional obstacles in the way of many. The disproportionate number of wins wealthier countries have relative to worse-off others is a clear demonstration of this unbalanced structure. It’s disheartening to think that there might be incredible athletes out there who are waiting to set a new world record or discover new techniques but just lack the opportunity to do so. There are, however, glimmers of light that progress is approaching: For instance, Morocco blew the world away with its top-four finish in the 2022 World Cup, declaring to the globe that African players playing for African countries have a place among the best in the world.  One can only hope that the world of sports will, however gradually, continue this transition toward equity and justice and that the race for number one becomes a nail-biter that includes all nations — even those who have yet to clinch their first gold model.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/tit-for-tat-gold-for-gold/

Appreciation, Resistance, and Intentional Action: A Review of “How to Do Nothing”

Naomi Corlette

In the world of politics, it’s rarely a good idea to do nothing. How could you when there are such pressing issues to address? But Jenny Odell’s book, “ ,” contrary to the title, is neither a how-to guide nor a suggestion that we do nothing. Instead, she offers a compelling case that resisting the urge to act rashly or constantly make progress can actually be the greatest catalyst for change.  “How to Do Nothing” reflects on how the modern economy, which capitalizes on our attention, has conditioned us to prioritize sometimes needless productivity over introspection. It inspires a call to action for individuals hoping to reclaim their autonomy and reimagine their relationship with the world around them. “I would be surprised,” Odell says, “if anyone who bought this book actually wants to do nothing. Only the most nihilist and coldhearted of us feels that there is nothing to be done.”  The book itself acts as a case study of what Odell means by doing nothing — “to hold yourself still so that you can perceive what is actually there.” Odell explains that she finds “existing things infinitely more interesting than anything I could possibly make,” and she stays true to her word. By drawing from a wide variety of sources, including indigenous philosophy, contemporary art, and numerous books and essays, she pieces together the collage that is “How to Do Nothing.” Each section brings something new, and there is something for a wide variety of audiences to connect with, ranging from activists and artists to those in the tech and business world. For those of us who feel the urgency of social action, calling for less productivity may seem confusing. Odell provides an example: In 2015, San Clemente decided to that had stood for over 100 years and restore the natural habitat. This demolition did not provide instant gratification but was rather a slow and arduous process of dismantling the dam and putting the environment back together piece by piece. Odell argues that perceptions of this decision as regressive destruction have it all wrong. What if, instead, the construction of the dam was seen as destruction of the ecosystem? Viewing land as a blank slate for development is often blocking the way for the more careful remediation that should really be happening. In approaching such a project with intention and forethought, the city was able to restore a lost habitat. Similarly, Odell lauds intentional civil disobedience. To explain this, she tells the story of Diogenes, a fourth-century Greek philosopher who aimed to shock people out of their mindless habits through public displays of refusal. He claimed that, although many of his actions may have seemed insane to a passerby, any “sane” person is insane for continuing to uphold systems and standards that perpetuate the world’s wrongs. Following politics can lead to despair, and it can be tempting to leave it all behind. But Diogenes demonstrates that there are ways to participate in the world that challenge the systems in power. Although sometimes difficult, he shows that we must continue to invest ourselves in working towards a more just world. Jumping forward to the 1934 West Coast Waterfront Strike, Odell provides a more modern example of refusing injustice. Subject to the whims of their bosses and the economy at large, longshoremen created the International Longshoremen’s Association and began to build up workers’ power. Their determination ultimately inspired 150,000 people to walk off the job. This refusal to assimilate and belief in the power of community is still applicable to today’s politics, with ongoing and . We must learn from the activists of the past in order to be successful in the modern-day fight for labor rights. Odell sees social media as an important aspect of this modern collective action. She explains that social media platforms are a way for people to communally share what they believe is important without regulation. So why has it so difficult to focus and connect with others? Odell argues that “context collapse,” the need to appeal to a wide-ranging audience without background information, is what has ruined these platforms, particularly for political discussion. Further, the of our attention has made these platforms incredibly addictive. She recommends that we work on returning to the one-on-one conversations, closed group chats and meetings, and slow speed communication that political activists have continually found to be the most effective throughout history. Despite her argument, Odell admits that this way of doing nothing is not accessible to everyone. She acknowledges that it is a privilege to be able to sit still, listen to the birds, and spend hours admiring contemporary art. Many of us have to act without much time for contemplation, and this isn’t always a bad thing. But at the end of the day, the book is not one about retreat from the world, which is what makes it so accessible.  Odell asserts that we must approach today’s most pressing issues, from technological advancement to climate change, with purpose. Yet in order to do this, the book teaches that we must learn to appreciate indigenous environmental wisdom, philosophical and artistic models of civil disobedience, organizing strategies of historical movements, and the power of our community. Ultimately, “How to Do Nothing” is a call to stop doing something just to do something and, instead, to understand what has already been done and where we can go from there. Odell concludes, “if we have only so much attention to give, and only so much time on this earth, we might want to think about reinfusing our attention and our communication with the intention that both deserve.”

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/how-to-do-nothing/

Just How Feminist is Your “Girl Power” T-Shirt?

Zoe Yu

No matter where my friends and I started shopping, middle school retail therapy always ended the same way — at the mall, in a clothing store, competing to see who could find the most ridiculous graphic tee. With a Spongebob shirt in one hand and an “I vote pizza” hoodie slung over a shoulder, I was sifting through the racks when I spotted a top with chunky lettering: “Smash the Patriarchy.” Then another — “Wild feminist” — and a third — “Empowered women empower women.” Unlike the silly tees that we’d been searching for, these shirts were ones that we’d actually buy. It probably had something to do with how they weren’t just shirts to us but polyester proof that we were gutsy enough to wear our hearts (literally) on our sleeves — and, in the spirit of “ ” and “ ,” broadcast our very fashionable politics out to the world. Or maybe it was the star-studded lineup that made it cool: Emma Watson a “Girls Just Wanna Have Fundamental Human Rights” jacket on Instagram, Bella Hadid down the runway with “The Future is Female” on her chest, and we wanted to be just like them. Whatever it was, empowerment or trendiness, we swiped our cards and walked out of the store feeling like feminists with a capital F. With a chic “GRL PWR” crewneck, we were taking a stand — and dressing the part. At least, that’s how it’s sold. Because tangled up in the shopping tags and glossy receipts was the real, unmarketable truth: Most feminist shirts are made in a way that’s entirely at odds with what the movement stands for. And it’s a truth that’s slowly coming out in the wash. In 2020, the fashion titan Boohoo, which owns brands like Pretty Little Thing, MissPap, and Nasty Gal, was for paying workers as little as $4.40 an hour — less than half of the national in Britain. (Nevermind that Nasty Gal was by the original “#girlboss” Sophia Amoruso, who a bestselling memoir of the same name pitched to publishers as scripture for women “seeking ownership of their careers and futures.”) And Forever 21, which launches collections to celebrate International Women’s Day nearly every year, was for using factories that grossly underpaid its workers by a margin of $1.1 million in lost wages. It isn’t just one chain or one line, Sam Maher of workers’ rights campaign Labour Behind the Label to The Guardian. “It’s an entire system of exploitation.” But this tragic system is also a very profitable one. For every candy brand that cashes in during Halloween and florist who makes most of their sales on Valentine’s Day, there’s a company that off of Women’s History Month and the trillion dollars of . It’s gotten to a point where terms like “ ” and “ ” have been added to the corporate dictionary to describe businesses that invest in women as a cheap advertising gimmick, just to make a quick buck. There are Women’s March activists who sell and shop for manufactured by Gildan, a company with a long history of . There’s a founder and CEO of a huge feminist brand who is an . Consumers, too, don’t have a free pass from the outward grandstanding. Like my middle school friends and I, some buy into this twisted progressive branding either to make a publicly feminist statement or to jump onto the feminist fashion bandwagon (or both, or neither). And when we buy into it, we also buy into the wave of feminism that places optics above all else. “Were you even at the rally if you didn’t post in a pink shirt? Do you even support reproductive rights if you don’t have a hoodie with a uterus on it?” What we need to understand is this: What you wear as a consumer, and what you sell as a company, doesn’t make you more or less of a feminist. Not when are women. Not when earn a living wage. Not when every study, report, article, testimony, and investigation that the nauseating abuse garment workers face behind the sewing machine all thread the same message: There are more ways, and better ways, to be a feminist than to wear a shirt that says you are one. Who are we “empow-her”-ing when we buy a feminist shirt? And how can the future be female when the women making these shirts can’t even afford to buy them? To retailers, who will slap on money-making slogans without a second thought about what they represent, it’s enough to look like a feminist. It’s up to us to actually be one.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/feminism-and-fast-fashion/

Imperiled Careers and Forged Prose: A Nascent Rivalry Between An Author and Her AI Foes

Helena Baruch

Her prose so incisive as to trap one in the jaws of awestruck envy and her thoughts so idiosyncratic as to tickle all the right parts of the brain, Joan Didion was an incomparable talent. Her lyricism was unrivaled — her punchy syntax so organic and her intentions so dogged and sharp. Didion had been one of few contemporary writers to explore the unplumbed depths of style and composition, uncovering roots of literature never touched before; thus, Didion’s writing is inimitable.  Or is it? After reading my first Didion novel, “Slouching Towards Bethlehem,” I was convinced that there was, nor will ever be, a writer quite like her. There have been the Virginia Woolfs, Ernest Hemmingways, and Jack Orwells of literature, but I have not seen an authentically whip-smart voice like that of Didion’s. But it turns out that there is one person, or shall I say one thing, that can recreate Didion’s unique voice and regurgitate her style onto a new, unwritten page: artificial intelligence.  When ChatGPT made its infamous debut in late 2022, I fearfully began researching, googling the literary aptitude, accuracy, and humanness of AI technology. When comedian Sara Silverman and two other authors Meta and OpenAI for using their work to train their algorithms, I knew the death knell for the very vocation of writing had already been rung. In no time, AI would be sullying the careers and livelihoods of writers and entertainers worldwide, suddenly making the inimitable (my beloved Joan Didion) imitable.  Like many others, I unapologetically myself an “AI limitationist.” AI is derailing the careers of creative minds across the U.S. This kind of technology, and the inequity that trails in its wake, warrants government intervention and regulation and should be regarded with skepticism. I remember over an article in the New York Times from 2018 titled “Computer Stories: AI is Beginning to Assist Novelists.” The author, David Streitfield, a science and technology journalist, wrote about novelist Robin Sloan’s use of machine learning technology. Sloan is quoted as saying, “The lovely language just pops out and I go, ‘Yes.’” The output from his machine reads “bare sky,” and Sloan, optimistic, ponders, “would I have written ‘bare sky’ myself? Maybe, maybe not.” If AI can assist an author, could it not become one as well?  I’ve always wanted to be a writer. But, alas, my future is looking pretty grim. Soon, an AI machine will be writing a novel in a minute when it would have taken me years; it will be crafting a style of prose that would have demanded a college degree and a library read through and through. It will be forging stories in the crucible of literature that dwells within its labyrinth of knowledge, stories that would typically take hours of brainstorming and a superb aptitude for world-building; it will co-opt the brilliance of Didion, Morrision, and Atwood in just the blink of an eye. In a February 2023 article titled “In the Age of AI, Major in Being Human,” David Brooks, an American political commentator, idealistically that the “humanistic core” of true literature would invariably outperform the lukewarm, inexpressive word-vomiting machinery of AI technology. AI, Brooks confidently , “often churns out the kind of impersonal bureaucratic prose that is found in corporate communications or academic journals.”  However, as of July 13, Brooks seems to have had a startling change of heart: He an article titled “Human Beings Are Soon Going to Be Eclipsed,” in which he acknowledges the profound abilities of AI. While AI doesn’t possess emotions, authenticity, sentience, or self-awareness, Brooks , it’s lack of sentimentality does not preclude it from cogently mimicking the very essence and nature of what it means to be human; it seamlessly synthesizes its repository of knowledge into intelligible, coherent thought. We must give credit where credit is due: AI does, in fact, possess “some degree of consciousness,” as Brooks concludes.  And before I’m dubbed a luddite or scolded as a traditionalist, I hope to make a few things clear. I understand that technology is mutable; it is constantly evolving, progressively becoming more equipped to better suit the needs of its human beneficiaries. Not to mention, the “plagiarism” brought about by AI is nothing new. For centuries, writers have been borrowing the style and prose of their contemporaries. But I suppose the convenience is what concerns me the most.  The phrase “bare sky” was not written by Sloan, but it could have been. In fact, it seems like no challenging feat to simply brainstorm a phrase comparable to “bare sky”: prosaic sky, ashen blue above, a veil of celestial desolation. The nature of literature demands its writers to be composers, to conduct an orchestra of creativity, prose, syntax, plot, dialogue, characters, and a welter of other more nuanced instruments. But AI technology strips writers of that responsibility, making them mere spectators of an orchestration they had little to no part in.  This is, in part, why so many actors and writers unions are on strike. A salvo of counter-defenses have been launched against media companies by the literary world. This is because AI poses two disastrous risks for writers and actors alike. Foremost, it is far cheaper than actual writers, prompting many television companies to underpay writers and replace their work with AI-generated material. Second, AI is using the work of writers, unsolicited and uncompensated. Seeing as AI culls through the entire internet to accumulate data, it is essentially availing itself of the words and content of writers.  You see, I’m not some malcontent adversary of AI technology. I understand the profound potential of AI work in medicine and research. But when it comes to an industry that has long thrived off of the creativity and innovation of talented, dedicated, and seasoned writers, AI takes on a more insidious identity.  Given that AI sits in the willful hands of private companies, regulation is of the utmost importance, and it is incumbent upon the Biden-Harris administration to spearhead this intervention. As a matter of fact, the White House is currently on a legal crusade to regulate AI technology; the administration has already seven leading AI companies to voluntarily commit to safer, more secure AI policies. These moves by the administration have put the pressure on private companies to help safeguard American rights and employment.  Perhaps I’m stuck in the antiquated and muddy waters of yesteryear, pinned as the hapless advocate of classicalism and a captious critic of modernism. Or, perhaps I’m more frightened of my own future as it seems that my long-held vision of my career is becoming ever more blurred and elusive. Or, maybe I’m wrong about all of this. Just as there are sought-after craftspeople for handmade jewelry, furniture, appliances, and whatnot, perhaps human writers will be deemed “higher-quality” and carry more currency in the future.  But, then again, perhaps my fears are warranted, and perhaps the very artistry and talent unique to human authorship is on the brink of extinction.  I suppose only time — and Joan Didion — will tell. 

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/imperiled-careers/

Introducing the 2015 Literary Supplement: "Language and Power"

Author

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/editor/

Jon Stewart Isn't Going Anywhere

Author

Jon Stewart was born in New York City and raised in suburban New Jersey. I was born in New York City and raised in suburban New Jersey. Maybe that’s why I have forgiven Stewart’s over the years for its many at the Garden State (and for the record, there is fresh air and water in Bayonne, thank you very much). Now, Jon Stewart, the face of American political satire, is vacating the desk, perhaps to pursue a career in filmmaking, but definitely to spend more time at home. Although Stewart he is not “going anywhere tomorrow,” he will step down sometime this year. I would despair, but as much as Jon Stewart would like to leave, he can’t. Stewart’s reach has extended far beyond his own show. The list of comedians who owe their success to him is just that— . Former and future host Stephen Colbert and current host John Oliver both began as correspondents. Stewart’s production company Busboy Productions produced , and HBO only considered offering Oliver his own show after he filled in as host during Stewart’s summer 2013 leave of absence. Some other notable alumni include, but are not limited to: Academy Award nominee Steve Carrell, current Weekend Update co-anchor Michael Che, star of and Ed Helms, host Larry Wilmore, and star Kristen Schaal, contributor and star Rob Riggle, and stand-up comedian Wyatt Cenac. This list does not include current correspondents like married couple Samantha Bee and Jason Jones, Aasif Mandvi, Al Madrigal, and the increasingly popular Jessica Williams. Jon Stewart has elicited your laugh more times than you have realized. And his influence transcends international borders. Early on in his satirical news program a , host Bassem Youssef was dubbed “ ”. In fact, Youssef admitted Stewart influenced his show’s format, and both hosts have been guests on each other’s shows. Youssef, inspired by Stewart, evolved into an icon for free speech. Though Youssef decided to in 2014 amidst crackdowns by the Sisi government, he has maintained rapport with Stewart, on to rant about U.S. involvement in the Middle East. What’s next for Jon Stewart? And what’s next for ? Stewart’s departure will not sink the institution of , and Stewart’s legacy will remain permanently tied to that institution. When Jay Leno left ( ), Jimmy Fallon was able to adapt the show to his own talents. Fallon brought in creator Lorne Michaels’s production company Broadway Video to produce as it had produced and continues to produce . And when David Letterman leaves the this year, Stephen Colbert will follow a similar path. Letterman’s production company, Worldwide Pants, Inc., will cede control of to CBS, and Colbert will take over the creative reins. Stewart’s situation is different. Comedy Central might ask Stewart’s Busboy Productions—which produced and produces —to fill the vacant 11 o’clock timeslot. Even if Comedy Central holds on to (since Stewart does not actually produce his own show), Stewart’s company will still produce at 11:30. No matter what happens, Stewart’s legacy will continue to shape his replacement. Comedy Central could keep the current set and install one of the show’s correspondents as the new host, guaranteeing direct continuity of Stewart’s legacy. But even if receives a complete makeover, the new host will certainly base his or her show on the Stewart model—rant, correspondent remote piece, and interview, repeated Monday through Friday. “Seventeen years is the longest I have ever in my life held a job by 16 years and five months,” said Stewart during his on-air retirement announcement. “But in my heart I know it is time for someone else to have that opportunity.” Who will that someone else be? Ignore the clamor for John Oliver’s triumphant return to Comedy Central and calls for comedians outside the realm of political comedy. Inevitably, whenever a late-night spot opens up someone suggests as possible hosts, but I doubt any of the three would abandon personal projects to host a late night talk show. Among the current crop of correspondents there appears to be no clear successor. Samantha Bee is the longest-tenured correspondent, but she lacks popularity. And it’s hard to judge the hosting merits of long-time correspondent Jason Jones based on a single episode, but . Correspondents Jordan Klepper and Jessica Williams are popular and talented but too inexperienced to run the show. Look out for the titular star of Comedy Central’s , as the network prefers to build from within and Schumer’s Judd Apatow collaboration will hit theatres this summer. There is not much else to say about Stewart’s legacy that won’t be said in the coming weeks and months. But viewers must remember one epithet above all others: Stewart is a comedian. In October I proclaimed that John Oliver had “ ” the genre of television news and political satire, and I stand by that claim. But Stewart cultivated the genre, and there is no denying that Colbert (until his departure), Oliver, and Wilmore have borrowed from Stewart to mold unique shows. Jon Stewart, a one time stand-up comedian, turned a late night talk show into a political institution. Presidents, secretaries of state, senators, congresspeople, businesspeople all flock to Stewart’s desk to seriously discuss politics with a . And that’s why Jon Stewart isn’t going anywhere. As long as television news and political satire exists, so will his legacy. So, sorry Jon, looks like you’re stuck.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/jon-stewart-isnt-going-anywhere/

Too Burnt to Function

Author

A Lamont Café barista prepares the last chai tea latte, the pop hit blaring from her laptop fades to a weak bass, and swarms of students—eyes weary but triumphant— trickle towards the bag inspection line. It is 2:00 AM. Tomorrow’s p-sets have been solved. But though others’ nights have ended, mine is only halfway done. I adjust my legs on a gray couch facing the window and try not to fixate on the suspicious stain that adorns its right arm. My forehead throbs, so I silence it with a long, bitter swig of dark roast. The moon, my lone faithful companion at this hour, sends slivers of light to pierce through the hazy shadows and it is under this meager radiance that I type away, fingers flying frantically, to complete yet another essay that is due frighteningly soon. The above scene occurs more often than I’d care to admit. I’ve stayed late enough at Lamont to see the moon fade and sun rise, the vending machines restock, the guard-on-duty doze at his desk. As a second semester freshman, I think I’ve become a Lamonster. My academic-extracurricular workload isn’t quite as balanced as I’d thought, I’ve lost the youthful naiveté that motivated me to finish all required optional readings, and shouldn’t I be saving sleepless nights for thesis season senior year? I used to think that beneath the evaporated piss on John Harvard’s left foot there’d still be a speck of gold. But now I fear that I’m doing it all wrong. And with Spring Break nearly ending, I find this fear resurfacing. But I also find that I’ve gotten the necessary physical and metaphorical space to reflect on my confusion and exhaustion. Kate Chopin, I hadn’t seen Paul in more than a month, even though he lived in my entryway. So when I was exiting Mower on an afternoon in November just as he was entering, I stopped to chat. The exchange was polite: lots of “You’re not dead!” on his part but, as I searched for words to assure him that I was very much alive, it became clear—to me and I’m sure him— that my exclamations of “How are you?” and “Let’s grab a meal soon!” were placeholders for conversation. With three office hour appointments to attend, four classes that required I be coherent enough to contribute in section, and five organizations to comp, people had become, well, . Because of this mentality, I’ve accumulated a list of strained encounters. I’ve doled the rushed inquiry and responded with an equally rushed “I’m fine!” I’ve worn a strained smile and raised my hand in farewell to expedite the brisk walk to the next appointment, section, meeting. I’ve forged a fictitious self. It’s mechanical, no doubt, but also functional, and sometimes I’m tempted to wrap the garment around more tightly because to unwrap risks vulnerability and as is. There are moments, however, when I get a bit audacious. A professor will compare the compactness of gumballs to poetry or a HUDS worker will cook me a chicken though the grill closed fifteen minutes before and I think—no I know—that it’d be more than fine for me to embrace the touch of bare authenticity. These moments appear in short bursts and disappear just as quickly. But they come, no less, and encourage me to pause from routine, reach out to acquaintances-who-could-be-friends like Paul, maybe eat un-plugged: emails and half-written responses left, if only briefly, to the side. John Steinbeck,  I first understood the disease, I think, on the treadmill. It was a Sunday morning, and the MAC was abuzz with clinks from lifted barbells, thuds from swinging punches, deep sighs from that petite, pixie-haired woman leg pressing three times her weight: a cacophony composed by those guilty from engaging in calorie-rich revelries the night before. My own feet pounded in furious repetition to a Beyoncé playlist. I had one eye on the “Calories Burned” count—so damn close to 600!—and another on page 45 of John Stuart Mill’s , which I delicately balanced in my right hand. In my left, I clutched a pink highlighter that I used, not so sparingly, to mark page 45 because I needed citations for a seven page paper due by midnight. I groaned in self-reproach and remembered, not too fondly, that Saturday was busy with comp socials that were dissatisfying to say the least and awkward at best, filled with paltry supplies of stale multigrain crackers and aging cheddar cheese. Wiping beads of sweat mixed with fresh tears, I determined that the paper needed to be done by 7:00 PM, realistically, because that’s when HPR would begin. Perfect hurts. Or, more precisely, to be perfect does. I should have left the MAC right then, showered, and napped: what better method was there to have maximized my happiness and minimized my pain? I had succumbed to an ill-formed urge, rather, to do everything and do everything perfectly and, in doing so, I was at once stationary and running: running after crackers and cheese because I thought they signified inclusion, running after a meticulously highlighted book, running after an arbitrary 600. It’s hard but attainable and just-lofty-enough, I’ve come to believe, to instead aspire for less breadth in what I do, to accept that I will, inevitably, fuck up in what I do—and that’s alright. It’s actually quite good. —Jonathan Safran Foer, Before he declared that the Vice Presidency was , Joe Biden quoted William Butler Yeats. “All’s changed, changed utterly,” he at the Kennedy School in early October. “A terrible beauty has been born.” Biden was referring to Russian coercion and the rise of China’s economy: in short, world affairs. I gasped, in awe and shock, at this application of poetry to politics and remembered, for a minute, what I’d been missing. I love literature. In other worlds, I find lessons that help me in this real, sometimes disappointing, one. The White Queen’s conviction in imagination inspires me to believe in six impossible things before breakfast; Elphaba’s past as an animal rights activist reminds me that the witch was not always wicked; Prufrock’s paralysis prods me to eat the peach. Upon entering Harvard in the fall, I felt a painful distance from literature begin to form. Immediately, I had found large and conspicuous and relatively open groups that fulfilled my other passion—politics—and so I quickly became an IOPerson, a Dems aficionado, an IWRC board member. The people I came to associate with, naturally, were more inclined to discuss President Obama’s immigration policy or grassroots organizing than they were to discuss Haruki Murakami’s latest story in The New Yorker or narrative journalism. I ached for a community devoted to the arts. And, to be sure, these communities exist. But like all student-formed communities at Harvard, they have barriers to entry and . Or so I consoled myself. Though, I’ll admit: I was convinced, at first, that my estranged relationship with literature could be repaired if I lived a second simultaneous life—or better yet, eight more. Invigorated by newfound time and energy, I’d fill these lives comping The Advocate and The Lampoon and Tuesday Magazine—hell, maybe even The Crimson. Then, perhaps, I’d find the community—an officially branded one, too!—that I craved. But adding more dissatisfying and awkward comp socials to my to-do list, as the MAC incident demonstrated, would do more harm than good. And to interpret increased membership in branded communities as the solution was, well, emblematic of the actual problem at hand. Every extracurricular in which I was involved, I’d mistakenly come to believe, reflected facet of my identity. Lacking an activity explicitly associated with the arts, I perceived that a void had swallowed my former self, that I was now a fraud who needed a label—I’m on the blank board of blank publication—to validate my love of literature. And since extracurricular activities and the people in them consumed so much of my free time, the delusion became a self-reinforcing one: I hadn’t considered that I could find fulfillment —to use that annoyingly vague term—“the establishment.” This lack of consideration points to a larger trend, I now realize, that permeates Harvard: exhibitionism. If all the world’s a stage, then all lives are certainly on display. And there’s no greater stage—or audience to impress—than here. A self-induced pressure arose, for this reason, to institutionalize my passions and talents in order to acquire external validation: to remind classmates and entryway-mates that these passions and talents existed, but more so to remind myself. Because while acting on this stage, draped in ivy and filled with the best and brightest, I’d lost any sense of self. Yet Biden’s allusion suggests all is not lost. I can find art anywhere if only I search hard enough and in the right places: individuals like the poetry professor extolling the virtues of gumdrops; conversations with that kid wearing a Vonnegut sweatshirt near the panini grill in Annenberg; even myself. After all, I don’t need to make every aspect of my being “official” to wholly exist.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/burnt-function-literature/

I Never Stopped Believin’: An Ode to Glee and Its Legacy of Trailblazing

Author

In the fall of 2009, my dad asked me if I wanted to watch the pilot of a new show that he had just heard about: , Fox’s original dramedy about a ragtag group of high school outsiders who band together to make beautiful music. As a 13-year-old belter who spent her afternoons in middle school musicals, I was ’s target demographic. As a 49-year-old lawyer without a musical bone in his body, my dad was far from it—he just liked good television. We plopped down in front of his computer and watched the first episode, a cheery extravaganza that introduced the characters who seemed like mere stereotypes at the time: the Jewish diva, the catty cheerleader, the flamboyant gay guy, the soft-hearted quarterback, the brassy African-American girl, the wheelchair-bound nerd, the shy Asian, and the rebellious stud. When the episode ended, I offered my analysis. “That was fun, but it was cheesy,” I said. “I don’t feel like I need to see it again.” But later that week, in one of those sudden epiphanies that happen so often on as an emotional song like begins to swell in the background, I realized that I had to see that show again. Six seasons, 121 episodes, and 728 songs later, I have remained an utterly devoted Gleek to the very end: I have dressed up as Rachel Berry for Halloween. I have traveled up and down the East Coast to watch Jane Lynch wow on Broadway, Darren Criss jam on the 4th of July, and the  cast rock out at the season one concert. I have scrolled through endless news articles and downloaded CDs filled with  tracks. I have tuned in every week, sometimes ’s harshest critic but always its biggest fan, eager to follow the triumphs and tragedies of the multilayered, very un-stereotypical characters whom I grew to love. became an international sensation back in 2009 and persisted as the cultural phenomenon of the moment during seasons one and two. It started to lose momentum after graduating its primary cast in season three, suffered a severe blow with the tragic death of leading man Cory Monteith after season four, and endured a ratings decline until its cancellation in season six. But to me—even when new characters were forgettable, even when storylines seemed contrived, even when characters’ personalities felt inconsistent—the magic of continued to glow, episode after episode and season after season. At root, the magic of came from its entertainment value. The linchpin of ’s success was its mega-talented original cast, an endearing group of Hollywood newbies like Chris Colfer, Broadway veterans like Lea Michele and Matthew Morrison, and comedic heavyweights like Lynch. They had meaty material to work with; creators Ryan Murphy, Ian Brennan, and Brad Falchuk cooked up unfailingly clever soap-operatic plots and an ever-expanding web of relationships that remained at the center of the action. The drama of the show was lightened by ’s whip-smart brand of humor: a mix of obscure pop-cultural nods, self-referential jabs, and hysterical one-line zingers. But the magic of came from more than just strong actors and well-written scripts. The magic of came from the dignity and the relevance that the show lent to the arts. In a day and age in which the STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) are trumpeted as society’s game-changers, brought attention to the arts as a vital source of creativity and self-expression that needs to remain in our schools and communities. made the art form of musicals cool again: I firmly believe that shows like , movies like , and television specials like would never have emerged had not paved the way. One of the most unique ways in which supported the arts was by pulling together a spectacular variety of music. The show did the ordinary by including contemporary hits like Lady Gaga’s and Meghan Trainor’s It did the extraordinary by weaving in ’80s rock ballads, ’40s jazz standards, Broadway classics, ‘60s grooves, and everything in between. What other show could have 15-year-old fans singing Tom Jones’ and 70-year-old viewers humming Bastille’s ? What other show could land the 1937 showtune on the 2010 charts? What other show could intertwine the Beatles’ and Barbra Streisand’s into the same tear-jerking storyline? The magic of came from its unabashed desire to shed light on important political issues. Although at times the episodes could feel more like public service announcements than narratives, never shied away from topics worth talking about, like eating disorders, teen pregnancy, texting while driving, suicide, obsessive-compulsive disorder, Down syndrome, gun control, underage drinking, and domestic abuse. did its most groundbreaking political work as an unparalleled leader in the fight for LGBTQ rights. Ever since the fourth episode of season one, when Kurt (Colfer) so touchingly to his father (Mike O’Malley), made a difference in countless lives as a juggernaut at the forefront of equality. brought a tremendous number of LGBTQ stories to the small screen and bestowed upon those stories the same respect that it gave to the rest of its plotlines. Kurt began a fan-favorite relationship with Blaine (Criss), and together they lost their virginities, confronted intolerance, broke each other’s hearts, and found each other again. Santana (Naya Rivera) struggled to come out to her school and her family and then embarked on a popular relationship with fellow cheerleader Brittany (Heather Morris). Superstar Rachel (Michele) was raised by two fathers (Jeff Goldblum and Brian Stokes Mitchell) who used a surrogate (Idina Menzel) to become parents. Dave (Max Adler) started as a closeted bully, tried to commit suicide after coming out, and ended as a confident, out-and-proud man. Coach Beiste (Dot Marie Jones) transitioned from female to male. Unique (Alex Newell) insisted on equal treatment as a transgender student. Spencer (Marshall Williams) labeled himself a “postmodern gay teen,” a person who does not consider his sexuality to be one of his defining characteristics. In season six, capped its history of progressiveness with a dual wedding in which Kurt and Blaine tied the knot alongside Santana and Brittany. ’s commitment to advancing the fight for LGBTQ rights coincided with a profound shift in the public’s opinion of marriage equality. In 2009, when debuted, the Pew Research Center reported that 35% of Americans supported gay marriage. In 2015, the year of ’s last season, CNN proclaimed that 63% of Americans support gay marriage. While several factors are responsible for this increase, shows like deserve credit for changing the minds of many of the folks who make up the 27% jump. led the pack of television shows that dared to present LGBTQ individuals as people just as worthy of love, just as deserving of joy, and just as full of music as any straight character. In the final shot of the final episode of the series, spelled out its own legacy. As ’s swan song, One Republic’s drew to a close, the camera focused in on a plaque in the Finn Hudson Auditorium (one last tribute to Monteith and the character he brought to life). Ending the series on a didactic note, the plaque advised, “See the world not as it is, but as it be.” presented the world as it should be: a musical place where the arts are important and what is right is worth fighting for. How meaningful that used its concluding moments to ask all of us to see the world that way, too. So consider this my love letter, my thank-you, and my farewell to an incredible source of happiness and music in my life for the past six years. I hope that goes down in the history books not as a flash-in-the-pan hit that lost its audience after a brilliant beginning but rather as a fountain of talent, a savior of the arts, and a pioneer of noteworthy political statements. If taught us anything, it’s that we could all use a little more friendship, a little more music, and a lot more glee in our lives. ,

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/ode-to-glee/

A Language of Their Own: Swahili and Its Influences

Author

“Africa will write its own history, and it will be, to the north and to the south of the Sahara, a history of glory and dignity.” So Patrice Lumumba, the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s first prime minister, in 1960. Though his leadership was unconnected to Swahili particularly, the words spoke to a new, proud pan-Africanism to which Swahili was inextricably linked. When the Kenyan government Swahili as its official language in 1970, it lauded the language for being more African than was English, the previous choice for the government and people’s affairs. As reported then, “the governing council of the Kenya African National Union, the ruling party, decided that the widespread use of English language smacked of neo-colonialism, or at least was un-African.” Or so it was said. But Swahili itself appears to be, at least somewhat, “un-African.” Jomo Kenyatta, president at the time, seemingly chose to overlook Swahili’s foreign influences. The language was born from the between dwellers of the East African coast and traders from the Middle East. Those traders spread its vocabulary as they rode their ivory and slave caravans farther inland, reaching the Democratic Republic of the Congo in the west and Uganda in the north. Indeed, the very name “Swahili” from the Arabic for “of the coast,” . The language also incorporates pieces of English, German, Portuguese, and other tongues belonging to the merchants and colonizers who permeated the region. Yet, curiously, Swahili has come to represent pride in post-colonial identity. This is true nowhere more than in Tanzania. English or French could serve practical purposes as well as Swahili, offering a common tongue for governmental and economic affairs. In fact, both do serve such purposes in various African regions, English still filling that role alongside Swahili in Tanzania and Kenya. But Tanzanians’ is primarily to Swahili—a language they can more easily consider African. Recent linguistic studies have supported this identification, establishing Swahili’s foreign influences as only to its development as a language with deeply African roots. More importantly, the very act of identifying with the language legitimizes it. Swahili has African. Tanzanians the language’s significance more completely than Kenyans and cherish it more ardently. Their relationship with their chosen tongue began at the birth of the country itself, in 1964. From the start, Julius Nyerere, Tanzania’s first president, promoted Ujamaa, a nationalist and pan-Africanist ideology that around reliance on Swahili instead of on European languages. Though Tanzanian citizens possess tribal affiliations and typically speak a tribal language in addition to Swahili, they their allegiance to their country. This priority is rare in Africa, a continent of people whose first loyalty more commonly to their tribe. That general preference is unsurprising: many country borders by European colonial powers, rulers who disregarded or intentionally opposed grouping Africans according to tribal and linguistic affiliations. Tanzanians, though, feel unified—a to the strength of Nyerere’s vision. Even the Hadza, Tanzania’s only remaining hunter-gatherer tribe, identify with this bond. They have chosen Swahili as their second language—after Hadzane, their tribal language—in the years after Tanzania’s independence. (They formerly Isanzu, a Bantu language, instead, in order to communicate with a tribe living south of them.) The switch testifies to Swahili’s utility, capable of being greater than that of any single tribal language while, significantly, maintaining Tanzanian pride. Similarly, some African-Americans have praised the language’s authentic value, an affiliation that Dr. Maulana Karenga, the American founder of the holiday Kwanzaa and a leader of US Organization, supports wholeheartedly. “We wanted to escape Western tradition and tribalism, both. Swahili is not a tribal language—it represents a collective effort and our group does too,” he a magazine reporter in 1968. As the Black Power movement gained strength in the late 1960s, the language became for the movement’s members a of meaningful black identity. The timing was excellently coordinated: just as East Africans themselves were accepting Swahili as both tool and emblem of nationalism, US was offering it a place in America—extending the significance to the swelling Black nationalism in which the organization was engaged. This approach possessed real issues, as some of Karenga’s colleagues within the Africana studies field in the States . When the William Howard Taft High School in New York City joined the trend by to offer Swahili classes, a vibrant debate ensued. A questioned Swahili’s importance in an American curriculum. At least two doubted its legitimacy as an African language. Even beyond the tradition of Arab slave traders’ using Swahili, it was true the link between the language and African-American heritage was tenuous. Most African Americans’ ancestors the west coast of Africa, where Swahili is not spoken. John McWhorter, linguist and associate professor at Columbia University, has for the Ghanaian language Twi as a more suitable option. But Swahili to Karenga like an appropriate language for pan-African unity. It became Kwanzaa’s language, providing the holiday with the roots of its name and the words for its . Karenga’s preference fit well with Nyerere’s. Swahili political literature offers more complexity than Nyerere and Karenga’s happy faith in unity, however. Fortunatus Kawegere, a Tanzanian author and translator dissatisfied with President Nyerere, his views known subtly through language, such as the vocabulary he chose for a translation of George Orwell’s , as the Swahili version is called, the book’s decidedly English features—the English names, the descriptions of British farm implements—in favor of Tanzanian equivalents. Kawegere turns the book into an East African tale, situating it in Ibura, a neighborhood of a Tanzanian town, and labeling the animals’ socialism in the same precise terms by which Nyerere defined his own. To clarify even further his frustration with the president, Kawegere the animals’ references to the farmer’s whips as intentionally as republican Romans might have eradicated from a text the loathsome word “king.” Because whips so effectively evoke colonial rule, Kawegere is careful not to risk allowing their presence to justify the animals’—i.e., Nyerere’s—policies. While other Swahili translators have confined themselves more faithfully to their source texts, the choice each has made to contribute to a significantly multi-ethnic literature is intentional. And Kawegere’s case is proof that the choice asserts power, not concession: the language has developed an identity entirely its own. East African culture has even the Middle Eastern and Western influences indelibly wound up in it. Swahili literature comfortably works written in the language originally and works translated into it, often with an East African twist. Nyerere himself translated both Shakespeare’s and his into Swahili. Even the very earliest Swahili literature, to roughly 1652, retained foreign origins: it was a of the Arabic poem known as the , telling of the Prophet Muhammad. Since then, numerous Swahili authors have composed that draw both from Muslim prayers to Allah and from Bantu odes to political leaders or courageous animals. Some scholars have Islam, centuries back, with unifying the region ideologically as Swahili has linguistically. East Africans’ Swahili literature, then, reflects their culture. Swahili identity emerged from the melding of its oddly disparate influences, and even Nyerere recognized its inability to exist in isolation. As he to the sixth Pan-African Congress in 1974, “Humanity is indivisible.”

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/swahili-language-influence/

Women, the Unspoken Heroes of War

Michelle Stern

I was by this shocking headline: “Kyiv Train Station Mayhem as Thousands Rush to Flee.”  I couldn’t believe how familiar it felt. Growing up, my mother would always tell me stories of my grandmother and her grandmother before her, boarding trains to escape occupation. “They were heroes,” she’d say. “Women are the unspoken heroes of war. They are brave, humble, and resilient protectors — a force to be reckoned with.”  It was 1940, a year after the German invasion of Poland kickstarted World War II. My grandmother Maya, a baby at the time, was taken in by her grandmother Chaya-Sura. They resided in the Jewish community of Kremenchuk, a quiet town in central Ukraine. Although for months, the city remained undisturbed by the war, on September 15th of 1941, everything changed: the German army invaded.  Prepared for the worst, Chaya draped as many belongings as she could about her body, one hand clinging to her son’s and the other arm cradling my grandmother. She ran for the trains with her elderly husband.  Journalist Asami Terajima the situation in Ukraine now as one in which “thousands of people spen[d] hours … each day, hanging onto a slim hope of boarding a train to flee.” The article reads in tandem with my mother’s stories of the past. Chaya had caught the last train leaving Kremenchuk, unaware of where it would end up — if anywhere at all. Many days later, it eventually stopped in Urala Russian city in which her husband, a deeply religious Orthodox Jew, was promptly detained and sent to the Ural labor camps for speaking out against the government.  While she had succeeded in her escape, Chaya’s parents and relatives hadn’t. They had stayed behind in Kremenchuk and were executed soon after when their neighbors exposed their Jewish identity to the Nazis. Having lost nearly everyone, Chaya single-handedly managed to survive while protecting a baby and a young child from the looming German threat. Chaya and the children stayed in the city of Molotov (Perm), located on the banks of the Kama River near the Ural Mountains along the Trans-Siberian Railway. It was an industrial city known for its metallurgical industry and notorious for its incredibly harsh and unwelcoming weather. It was no place for an infant. Chaya begged an orphanage to take in my grandmother but proceeded to volunteer in their kitchen to continue to care for her. After lengthy shifts, she would carry heavy bags of coal on her back and load and unload barges in order to put scraps of food on the table for her son, who the orphanage had refused to accept. She continued to work from dusk to dawn until the German surrender in May of 1945. Without her, my grandmother would never have lived to see freedom. I would not exist.  The whereabouts of Chaya’s daughter Ellie-Mordtko, my great-grandmother, remained unknown until after the war. It was later revealed that she had remained in Leningrad and had only barely survived because she had contracted Typhoid and was transported to Kazakhstan. Ellie, like many of today’s Ukrainian citizens, refused to abandon her home in the face of an invasion. She was beyond the brink of starvation and had lost her husband in the in 1942. Even when reunited with my grandmother, who was already a teenager at the time, she was far too traumatized to be a mother, and the two maintained a formal relationship.  However, my family’s journey was far from over. It wasn’t long after the close of WWII that the Cold War reached its peak in the Soviet Union. My mother was only a young child when her mother decided to leave the USSR. In 1977, however, both her and my grandfather’s requests to leave the country were denied. For a long and arduous 11 years, they “Refuseniks,” Jews who were denied permission to emigrate from the Soviet Union. For their continued practice of the Jewish faith, activism, and the desire to leave their country, my family became social pariahs, coming under the constant scrutiny and torment of the local authorities. Still, my grandparents persisted and continued to demand permission to leave. After Freedom Sunday for Soviet Jews 1987, they finally succeeded. History soon repeated itself as my mother and her family abandoned everything they owned and boarded the busy trains of the “Vienna-Rome Pipeline,” which was to eventually connect them to American access routes.  Not unlike my family’s refugee , “recent estimates indicate that 54 percent of people in need of assistance from the ongoing crisis [in Ukraine] are women. More than 2.3 million refugees from Ukraine–the vast majority women and children–have fled to neighboring countries, and others displaced within the country.”   The detailed coverage of the war on Ukraine makes the events that transpire deeply personal — my family and I, like many others, recall a terrifying past. I’ve Tatiana Perbeinis and her children lose their lives in , a maternity ward that was bombed. I’ve seen the scorched bodies of soldiers on the streets, but I’ve also seen Marina Ovsyannikova live on Russia’s Channel One; I’ve seen the of Russia demonstrating in St. Petersburg and Moscow; I’ve seen the women of Ukraine’s Parliament the geopolitics and taking up arms to defend their country; and I’ve seen the women volunteers at refugee centers, aiding Ukrainian people who share in the experiences of so many families like my own.  They are brave, humble, and resilient protectors — a force to be reckoned with. The original artwork for this article was created by Harvard College student Duncan Glew for the exclusive use of the HPR.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/unspoken-heroes-of-war/

Antihero-by-Default

Author

House of Cards Breaking Bad “Some people say there’s too much pork in this town. I could not agree more.” So says Frank Underwolf, of Frank Underwood from Netflix’s wildly popular political drama Frank Underwolf wants to live in the White Brick House, but first he must huff, puff, and blow down two houses made of straw and sticks. He succeeds, and the three little pigs of this common fable willingly let Underwolf overtake their brick house. The pigs, however, have a plan. They work together to dismantle the brick house, and Underwolf concedes, “Well, sometimes you win and sometimes you lose. And this time, the cards were stacked against me.” But in the real , there are no pigs. There is only Frank Underwood. Underwood weaves a complex of allies and enemies as he climbs Washington’s political power structure from House Majority Whip, to Vice President, and finally to President of the United States. Through blackmail and deception he manipulates an education reform bill, sabotages a trade deal between the United States and China, and uses FEMA money to fund his entitlement reform plan. But some moments are less political, less complex. In the season three opening scene of , now-President Frank Underwood urinates on his father’s gravestone. And three episodes later, Underwood spits in the face of a statue of Jesus that hangs on a church cross. Although has spent three seasons unfolding a complicated plot dotted with corrupt, unrelenting characters, these two instances tell us all we need to know about the series and its protagonist: they are vile. Underwood’s house rests upon a tenuous foundation: the cards, it increasingly seems, will topple. Absent of nuance, creator and showrunner Beau Willimon routinely slaps us across the face with heavy-handed symbolism and manufactured melodrama. The show seeks respite in Kevin Spacey’s and Robin Wright’s Emmy- and Golden Globe-nominated portrayals of Frank and Claire Underwood, but they cannot redeem characters steeped in self-indulgence. A character as ridiculous as Frank Underwood can only exist in such a ridiculous world of mindless treachery—a world Underwood has come to rule. Congressman Frank Underwood’s slow march to the Oval Office has left some bloody footprints. He murdered innocent Congressman Peter Russo. He pushed reporter—and one of the show’s most developed characters—Zoe Barnes in front of a train. Executive Producer , but surely he must believe in consequence. Instead of experiencing negative repercussions for his villainy, Underwood receives not one but promotions. And even in Willimon’s twisted conception of Washington, Underwood’s antics amount to just that—villainy. But for some reason, Netflix viewers and political junkies obsess over Underwood. Eric Deggans of NPR rightly proclaims Underwood a villain. “But the scariest revelation of all,” Deggans, “is that we’re so excited by this antihero turned villain in the first place.” This revelation is less scary than it is telling of the show’s contrived antihero. Walter White, the antihero of AMC’s drama , might clue us in to the antihero’s appeal. In Vince Gilligan’s popular series, Walter White is the antiheroic protagonist, and we clearly understand why. At first, the high school chemistry teacher turns to cooking meth in order to pay for his cancer treatment. Although his motives evolve, Walter White’s antiheroic nature is never contrived because he gradually breaks bad and faces genuinely evil protagonists. We have no reason to consider meth distributor Gus Fring or drug kingpin Tuco Salamanca, for example, in sympathetic lights; both torture Walt and threaten his and his family’s lives. Although Walt’s DEA agent brother-in-law Hank acts as a primary antagonist to Walt throughout the series, by the time Hank faces his reckoning, we are expected to know that Walt has descended into abject villainy. But in , we have no choice but to root for Frank Underwood because he always wins. Although Walter White kills for his family, Underwood kills for himself. The only reason we want to see Underwood climb Washington’s power structure is because repeated viewing drives our enjoyment. There is no reason for us to root for Underwood besides our familiarity him. That’s what makes Walter White an antihero with an impetus, but Underwood an antihero-by-default. Antiheroes with impetus warrant sympathy due to the nature of television viewership. Entertainment scholars often cite affective disposition theory (ADT) to explain why audiences identify with a character. According to ADT, we enjoy narratives based on characters’ likeability, their successes or failures, and our reconciliation of the narrative outcome with our own sense of morality. Communication scholars Daniel Shafer and Arthur Raney we must have a righteous and defensible reason to root for a character, or else we will experience cognitive dissonance. We are relieved when we watch morality unfold before us; we want the bad to be punished and the good rewarded. But like Walter White and Frank Underwood, not all characters are moral. Some protagonists do not conform to the traditional idea of the morally righteous hero, and these characters are called antiheroes. We know Walter White cooks meth to protect his family, and even though an element of selfishness motivates his drive for money and power, we have seen life trample all over Walt in his early characterization. He is, by all means, a pathetic man at the show’s start. But Underwood is never pathetic. He always lies, cheats, and murders from a position of power and for purely selfish reasons, yet we return to without reservation to binge watch the latest batch of episodes because we adapt to the antihero narrative over time. Moral disengagement allows us to disregard moral standards in light of our own imperfect morality, according to psychologist Albert Bandura. This, in combination with continual viewing, develops an antihero narrative schema. We desperately want to like Frank Underwood because he dominates screen time, so for the duration of the program we discard our unwarranted moral righteousness and delve into an hour or so of delightful but devilish affairs. Here’s the problem: although moral disengagement explains why we root for antiheroes, both theories presuppose the antihero is one of impetus. However, the seemingly antiheroic Frank Underwood plays protagonist only by default, and an antihero-by-default can only be a villain. Antagonists in the series exist only relatively to Underwood, and they are often more complex, compelling characters. Consider Congressman Peter Russo. Underwood orchestrates Russo’s campaign for Pennsylvania Governor, and then he topples the campaign by exploiting Russo’s alcoholism and relationship with a prostitute. Underwood convinces Vice President Jim Matthews to run in Russo’s stead, opening a Frank-sized hole in the Office of the Vice President. Perceiving Russo as too much of a liability to his merciless quest for power, Underwood accordingly kills Russo. From any first-time viewer’s perspective, a villain has killed an innocent man. In another context, Russo, Barnes, and, in season three, Heather Dunbar and Jackie Sharp could each be the show’s protagonist. But through the warped reality, the opposite has happened. Underwood’s character creates a blurred line between antagonist and protagonist that does not offer the show sophistication; rather, it is evidence of a show—and a character—without clear direction. With this in mind, Underwood seems to wander instead of walk, and his deviousness allows Willimon to drive the narrative continuously forward to no particular destination. Underwood’s motive—a search for power—is vague enough for Willimon to lead us on a march to nowhere. Our fascination with is the result of a bait-and-switch. Willimon familiarizes us with Underwood, and Underwood often acknowledges us with one of his signature asides. We must either tolerate Underwood’s crimes or abandon the show altogether. We are taken with the conniving Frank Underwood, but this does not reveal some great truth about morality in the 21st century. Antiheroes are different, and we like them—just ask any college freshman who hangs an “I Am The Danger” quote in their dorm. Antiheroes like Walter White can challenge and have challenged television convention. The serial nature of television is prone to reliance on tropes, and antiheroes have helped the medium mature and overcome this reliance. But Frank Underwood serves only to parody these complex characters, and ultimately we will reject this antihero-by-default. Underwood’s show has dictated its own demise. “Sometimes you win and sometimes you lose,” says Frank Underwolf, imparting a basic life lesson to child viewers. If the real Frank Underwood wins at the series’ end, will collapse in on its glorification of an antihero-by-default—a villain. And its ending will suffer from the same contrived nature as Underwood’s antihero status because, throughout the series, no amount of power could satiate him. It would then end because it had to end, just as it continued because it had to continue. If Frank Underwood loses, will struggle to explain how a villain so powerful could collapse. If an even greater act of debauchery than his previous two murders brings him down, then Underwood’s invincibility was always a shadow, and this would contradict the show’s premise. Underwood always outsmarts his enemies— . Finally, if Underwood simply loses to something greater than him, then what is greater than him? Frank Underwood is God—or so he believes. Who could humble the man who pisses on his father’s grave and spits in the face of Providence? manufactures drama for its own sake: it is like a desperate soap opera that continues, but does not develop.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/antihero-default/

Distorted Reflections: Examining Asian Fetishization as an Adoptee

Liana McGhee

I am a child of a country that I have visited once, a language that I do not speak, and a culture from which I feel divorced in every way except one.  I was adopted from China at 10 months old, brought to America, and raised by two White parents in a predominantly White town. Growing up, I was bombarded with ignorant remarks about my identity: “You don’t seem Asian at all,” or “you’re practically White.” The words were hurtful enough, but most damaging of all was the tone of approval with which they were spoken. With each comment, my desperation to maintain my proximity to Whiteness grew. I was a miniature-sized terror during Chinese calligraphy lessons and expressed more interest in the massive Forever21 store than the Terracotta Army during my 3rd grade heritage trip to China. I fled from any meaningful engagement with Chinese culture. Instead, I chose to bury myself in the perceived security of my Americanization.  My teenage years marked my entrance into one of the largest public schools in the country, brimming with students who resembled me. Conformity transformed into curiosity as I began to wonder about the culture on which I had turned my back. As I observed the richness and depth of my friends’ and peers’ relationships with their cultures, I began to believe that the passing years had rendered my own heritage inaccessible. I approached Mandarin with trepidation, utterly resentful of the American accent that tainted my tongue, and eventually abandoned the learning process all together. I shied away from conversations with friends about Chinese traditions or home-cooked meals, humiliated that I could not relate and ashamed that I had not substantively tried.  It is uniquely painful, the realization that you are a guest in your own culture.  All that remained was my physical likeness: This indelibly linked me to my cultural heritage. I could identify with Asian actresses that I saw on the screen, delight in beauty tips suited for the features of my ancestors, and exuberantly rejoice with each stride our country took toward increased Asian representation. In this respect, I did not need a perfect accent or wealth of childhood experiences to validate my Asianness. I had realized ownership of a tie to my background for the first time. It was a small, but powerful, reclamation of my identity.  Then, 6 women of Asian descent were in Atlanta. As details regarding the perpetrator’s alleged sex addiction, and the victims’ faces circulated the internet, I came to the terrifying realization that my physicality — my unimpeded, cherished connection to my heritage — was the target of fetishization and violence.  The Atlanta spa shootings gave shape to the disparate observations I had scatteredly realized throughout my upbringing, but never quite understood. I was flooded with recollections of being described as exotic by adult women, individuals pulling their eyelids in an attempt to replicate my own, and warnings to investigate the dating histories of potential partners (“they might have yellow fever!”); memories of the commodification and objectification of Asian, female bodies. My body.  My experience with the often painful intersection of femininity and Asianness is simply a microcosm of a greater lived-reality. In her paper “White Sexual Imperalism: A Theory of Asian Feminist Jurisprudence,” Sunny Woan, a graduate of Santa Clara Law School, how imperalism, media, and sexism have resulted in Asian women functioning as “objects for western consumption and the satisfaction of western desires.” Subsequent to their objectification is the overarching conception of Asian women as submissive, subservient, and inherently hypersexual.  The experiences of Asian women are indelibly linked with 19th and 20th century imperialism. Perceptions of Asian societies as unsophisticated and inferior imperialist countries relegated the already dehumanized Asian women to the status of sexual objects. As prostitution centers around military bases, sexual encounters between US troops and local women were informed by these colonial legacies, which contributed to “sexually denigrating stereotypes” about Asian women becoming prevalent in America. Asian women were thus perceived as salvation from the ambitious, independent feminists of the 20th century. Rather than fighting for sexual liberation and freedom, the Asian woman actualized the male fantasy; her demureness augmented the man’s masculinity, while her implicit sexuality satiated his desire.  This phenomenon manifests itself in the lived realities of Asian women. In the 1970s, the mail-order bride industry prominence because American men considered the supposedly docile brides to be alternatives to second-wave feminists. The Asian woman’s assumed perpetual willingness for sex in her overrepresentation in violent pornography, which scholars have noted contributes to racial violence. Today, 55% of Asian women in the US intimate physical and/or sexual violence during their lifetime, and Asian women hate incidents 2.3 times more often than Asian men. I grieve each day for their collective suffering.  How excruciating, for anguish to infuse the only avenue through which I can resonate with my culture. How heartbreaking, for the physical evidence of where I come from to function as the source of my dehumanization.  I have not reconciled the duality of my Asian femininity, and perhaps I never will. However, I refuse to consider my body, gifted by my birth parents and nurtured by my mother and father, a weakness. When I look in the mirror, reflecting back is a mosaic of conversations with my sister about adoption, dreamscapes of my orphanage in Fuling, compassionate whispers from friends who affirm my identity, Chinese New Year potlucks in Canaday, and my mother’s musings about female empowerment.  My Asianness and femininity are defined by everything that the world attempts to claim that they are not. In this divergence, I not only recover my heritage — I find myself.  The original artwork for this article was created by Harvard College student Duncan Glew for the exclusive use of the HPR.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/asian-fetishization-adoptee/

A Comedy of Errors: Trevor Noah and the Late-Night Talk Show

Author

For 16 years, has been at the helm of cutting-edge political criticism with a progressive slant. Mercilessly calling out racism, sexism, and hypocrisy in the government and in the media, has inspired a generation to advocate for equality. Stewart and his team of correspondents have covered significant social and political issues such as pay discrimination, police brutality, and marriage equality through in-depth investigations that, though humorous, ultimately informed its audience. After the beloved host and fearless leader of this show announced he would be , Comedy Central had the opportunity to act on the principles it had championed for so many years. But it didn’t. Late-night talk shows are—and always have been—an almost exclusively men’s club. It seems as if, for the foreseeable future, it will stay that way. On , Comedy Central announced Trevor Noah as the future host of after the departure of Jon Stewart. Noah is a 31-year-old from South Africa who has only been on the show three times after joining as a correspondent in December. Though Noah has proven himself to be an excellent stand-up comic, telling stories of his childhood during apartheid with a sardonic twist, he has not yet successfully transitioned into satirical news. His appearances were vaguely funny, but not particularly memorable. In his most recent appearance—just two weeks ago—Noah reported on the United States’ purchase of skilled foreign chess players. What should have been a single joke became an unnecessary five minute long segment that only served to remind the audience that Noah is a correspondent on the show. This prompts the question: why would Comedy Central take a chance on a comedian with such little experience in satirical news when it had the opportunity to choose from a range of well-known and beloved female comedians? Jessica Williams, Kristen Schaal and Samantha Bee are all accomplished correspondents on . In 2012, Bee became the longest serving correspondent in the history of the show, but she was still passed over for the job. Noah’s appointment is even more problematic if we examine his previous comedic style. Recently, he came under fire for a series of old that many have called anti-Semitic and sexist. As recently as May 2014, Noah wrote, “Behind every successful rap billionaire is a double as rich Jewish man,” playing into a tired Jewish stereotype. In October 2011, Noah tweeted, “‘Oh yeah the weekend. People everywhere are gonna get drunk and think I’m sexy’ –fat chicks everywhere.” Now that Noah’s offensive attitudes towards women have become public, his appointment is incredibly ironic given the fact that there was strong public for a female host. Some have that as a half-black, half-white, quarter-Jewish man from South Africa Noah will bring the diversity late night television so desperately needs. But diversity is more than just skin deep. In order to properly represent those who have been historically underrepresented, Noah must be capable of handling sensitive issues with tasteful humor. This is something that comes from an implicit understanding of today’s social hierarchies and how, as the future host of he will have the capacity to affect public opinion. Noah hasn’t even made his debut as the host of and he has already drawn significant criticism—and for a good reason. Noah is inexperienced in ’s style of comedy and has a sense of humor that seems incompatible with the show’s egalitarian stance. Nonetheless, Comedy Central stands by its decision and has come to Noah’s defense. “He’s everything that a host should be,” Comedy Central chief, Michelle Ganeless . “This is a very specific job with a very specific set of talents, and Trevor checks off all those boxes.” Unfortunately, it seems that none of those boxes are “tasteful humor” or “respect for women and minorities.”

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/trevor-noah-late-night/

Overcoming my Fear of Dresses

Nellie Ide

I used to be terrified of dresses. Pretty much anything that could be classified as “girly” was off the table, so I stayed far away from anything pink or glittery. Apparently, basic hygiene practices fit into this category as well, so I refused to wash my dreadlocked hair or change out of my oversized soccer jerseys unless absolutely necessary.  I would follow my older brother everywhere, assuming that I could do everything that he did. When he got obsessed with BB guns, I happily dressed myself up in pads and ran around in the yard as target practice. When he started to enjoy sports, I joined his all-boys teams. Suddenly, I was spending hours each day surrounded by boys at soccer, baseball, and hockey practice — and I was . I loved that I could fit in with the boys and be respected for my athletic ability. Male professional athletes receive significantly more attention and funding at every level of the sports industry. This has fostered an environment in which little girls think that their identity as a woman and their desire to excel in sports are mutually exclusive. This led me to reject any aspects of femininity that could have undercut my athletic abilities. I took the word “tomboy” to the extreme. I wore boxers under my baggy zip-off pants and donned boys swim trunks for the beach. Even when I later joined girls’ teams, I could not alter my tomboy persona. I was the “sporty girl,” and that meant that I wouldn’t be caught dead in a dress. My identity as a woman felt incompatible with my identity as an athlete. My older sister, imbued with the wisdom of a sixteen-year-old, thought otherwise. When I transferred schools in the sixth grade, she decided that it was time for me to start dressing like a girl. Before my first day of school, she took me shopping and filled my wardrobe with items that I barely recognized. I started off slow with jeans and gradually transitioned to include Uggs (a middle school staple), tank tops, and the occasional dress. I washed my hair at least once a week and tried to brush it even more frequently. To my absolute shock, incorporating these “girly” items and practices in my life did not negatively impact my athletic performance or credibility, and I actually liked getting dressed up! I gradually learned that I could embrace my identity as both a woman and an athlete. Sports are still a crucial part of my identity as I am a member of the alpine ski team at Harvard, but that no longer precludes me from getting excited about a pretty pink dress. It is a slow road that I continue to travel, and I still hesitate to put too much effort into my appearance or let go of my “sporty girl” persona. However, I am grateful that I feel much more comfortable in my joint identities.  Despite my personal progress, I remain frustrated by the persistent male-domination of the athletic sphere. A few years ago, I coached co-ed youth T-ball with only one girl on the team named Susanna. Susanna was the opposite of me as a child, consistently covering herself in pink sparkles and donning dresses to practice. She remained quiet at all times. Instead of getting involved in the dirt-throwing and ball-whacking adventure that is eight-year-old T ball, Susanna chose to sit on the sidelines and watch the boys play. When I convinced her to join, she would have a great time playing! While I loved and respected Susanna’s confidence to wear her pink sparkles, I longed for her to not have to choose between being “girly” or athletic.  It is my hope that every girl can realize that these two identities are not incompatible. If you genuinely don’t like dresses or traditionally feminine items, there is certainly no problem in wearing baggy soccer jerseys. And if you don’t like sports, there is no need to swing a bat at a baseball. But if you feel drawn to both and find yourself afraid that one conflicts with the other, then throw on a dress and whack that ball out of the park. The original artwork for this article was created by Harvard College student Duncan Glew for the exclusive use of the HPR.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/fear-of-dresses/

First Ladies: America’s Most Ambiguous Office

Alejandro Escobar

Every four years, the citizens of the United States elect a new president to lead the government and country into what they hope is a brighter future. Given that this is one of the most influential occupations in the world, those who aspire to the White House usually need lifelong preparation and an illustrious career to even get their foot in the door. Thus, when assuming office, the elected president is ready to take on the role and put a lifetime of hard work to the test. However, although the president and vice president are the only officials formally elected on those November nights, the vote indirectly involves more than those two. As the president occupies the Oval Office, his entire family moves into the White House. Among them is his wife, who is now the first lady of the United States.  Unlike the president, most first ladies did not devote their lives to politics, nor did they dream of calling 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue home. Melania Trump, former model; Michelle Obama, former attorney; and Laura Bush, former librarian, are all stark examples of women who led lives separate from politics and public office. They never threw their hat into the ring but were rather roped into the spotlight by the election of their husbands. Consequently, some were unprepared and overwhelmed when taking on the task, some to fare better than others.  As the highest-ranking unelected officials in U.S. politics, these women assume an important but unclear role. With no specified or legally attributed responsibilities for them, the position has always been up for interpretation — and each first lady has made it her own. As such, it has evolved throughout the centuries, culminating in the contemporary, at times mismatched, standard of what these women can and ought to be: a housewife, a changemaker, and a public figure. Due to these broad, ambiguous, and misogynistic expectations, this position has become an unconquerable task for women with disparate backgrounds who are often unacquainted with public service. The public’s fixation on their lifestyle further exacerbates this pressure to achieve and represents the lopsided scrutiny on women in positions of power. Initially, the job comprised nothing more than supporting the president. First ladies did not embark on self-directed projects but rather augmented their husbands’ efforts by taking on more traditional, gendered roles, such as hosting dinner parties, entertaining guests, and taking care of the house. However, when Eleanor Roosevelt took on the mantle in 1933, she redefined what it meant to be the first lady of the United States. Realizing the tremendous amount of power, influence, and connections she had as first lady, Roosevelt herself to major projects and initiatives, one of which included her significant contributions to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Outspoken, passionate, and at times controversial, she was a trailblazer. Though revolutionary at the time, this new standard was to become the norm. With other remarkable women following in Roosevelt’s footsteps, this zest for service and ability to achieve is now expected of whoever stands next to the president on Inauguration Day. Throughout the years, this work has manifested in different ways, each woman pursuing her own interests. Michelle Obama’s initiative, Melania Trump’s and Barbara Bush’s are all examples of movements that first ladies have . Accustomed to such robust engagement, the public has now deemed a lack of involvement from the first lady as unacceptable. That being said, the public’s standard for what a first lady should be extends far beyond their undertaking of initiatives, as evidenced by the scrutiny that they’re subjected to in all areas of life. From fashion choices to parenting decisions, the media often latches onto private, somewhat trivial minutiae. Oftentimes, coverage of these powerful women perversely reads more like celebrity tabloids than actual news. For instance, a first lady’s wardrobe has become of the utmost importance at every event. After Jackie Kennedy herself as a fashion icon, first ladies were expected to dress to the nines and make a statement every time they went out. Even after ending their tenure as first lady, they remain under scrutiny, as demonstrated by the of Michelle Obama’s fashion choices at President Joe Biden’s inauguration. Although this phenomenon has paved the way for political statements, the featuring of POC and underrepresented designers, and overall great fashion, it has focused heaps of energy, conversations, and articles on the way that first ladies look. Meanwhile, their male counterparts are ignored in their unproblematic navy suits. Additionally, a first lady’s personality is consistently cross-examined. Partaking in a myriad of interviews, press conferences, and other public events, their charisma and way around people is put to the test daily. Seldom having experience with public relations prior to the role, first ladies are — once again —  held to an unfair standard. Furthermore, this emphasis on a first lady’s warmth and politeness is akin to traditional motherly characteristics such as tenderness, care, and demureness when taking care of children. Whereas no one flinches when senators or presidents raise their voices in frustration, women grab national attention if they’re anything but docile. Michelle Obama, for instance, often the “angry black woman” trope whenever she spoke her mind. These trends are expectations that are deeply entrenched in misogyny and outdated gender roles. Although decorum, self-presentation, and propriety are important in such visible and high-ranking positions, it is impossible to deny that these criteria are not reflected equally when discussing men in public office. It’s interesting to think about what would have happened had former President Bill Clinton assumed the inaugural role of first gentleman in 2016. Despite expectations for him to spearhead initiatives and participate in public service, he probably wouldn’t have been held to sky-high standards of decorum, personality, charisma, fashion, and housekeeping. This then begs the question of what it is the public wants and expects from a first lady. If Americans want someone who mobilizes resources to affect positive change, then none of the aforementioned categories are relevant criteria on which one can judge their successes and failures. After all, fashion and grace are not what will terminate child illiteracy. However, if decorum is what should be prioritized, it’s time to expand this benchmark to all public officials and reevaluate the sexist undertones of such expectations. At this time, however, public scrutiny forces first ladies to be jacks of all trades, leveling an unfair standard that is rooted in their gender identity. Despite them not being fashion connoisseurs, interior designers, or motivational speakers, first ladies are expected to stun in their outfits on state visits, dazzle with their White House Christmas decorations, and inspire millions on the daily through their flagship initiatives. Without undervaluing the significance of these moments, it’s important to recognize the often overlooked and unsolicited weight placed on these women’s shoulders. Nonetheless, it is important to note that although some of these women have no prior background in community organizing and project management, they do have significant influence, budget, and institutional resources as first ladies. So, although the expectations are high, so are the opportunities to fulfill them. A paucity of programming is likely indicative of a lack of interest or initiative. With a sizable budget, a large team of advisors at her disposal, and an international platform, there’s no excuse for inaction. However, a degree of indifference and lethargy might be forgiven considering that, as aforementioned, this is a job for which most are unprepared. As an unpaid, unelected position, how much can the public justifiably expect from them? In this way, the role of a first lady has become an insurmountable task. They’re expected to be political, initiative-driven, and inspiring, but at the same time nurturing, stylish, and affectionate. While these are all ideal and desirable characteristics, setting them as standards and expectations, rather than hopes and prospects, has become toxic. Not only are these expectations unachievable at times, but they are often rooted in misogyny. As such, these women should be commended for what they do achieve rather than criticized for what they don’t; expectations should be minimal and consistent across gender. Doing otherwise would be to unfairly rebuke these women for failing to reach the unreasonably high standards of a role that they did not choose for themselves.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/first-ladies/

Democracy in Egypt: A Paradigm of Western Imperialism

Menat Bahnasy

Just over a decade after the Arab Spring protests in 2011, questions about the future of Arab nations continue to span the globe — as do misunderstandings and assumptions that stem from the West’s imperial projects and distorted media portrayals of Arab nations. I decided to explore this further by writing my senior thesis about democracy in the Arab world. In particular, I focused on how Egyptians’ public opinion on democracy has evolved since the Egyptian Revolution of 2011. As an Egyptian myself, I have a stake in the future of Egypt’s democratic governance. I care deeply about the voices of Egyptians being heard within the political system. However, over the last three decades, democratization efforts by the United States in Egypt have ignored what many Egyptians hope and envision for their nation. Therefore, we cannot advocate for democracy in Egypt without critically examining what democracy means, its history in Egypt, and the approach that the West (the United States in particular) has taken to promote democracy in Egypt. Through conducting this thorough examination, we can actualize the democratic future that Egyptians envision for themselves.  “الشعب يريد إسقاط النظام” The protests began on Jan. 25, 2011. For 18 days, numerous sectors of Egyptian society called for a regime change, chanting — “the people want to bring down the regime.” Protests erupted across all Egyptian sectors, in direct response to the issues that Egyptians faced: police brutality, high inflation, unemployment, corruption, media censorship, and more. The protests were further galvanized by the death of Khaled Said, an Egyptian civilian by the police after criticizing them online. The photos of his death were released by authorities after unrelenting pressure, and a Facebook page entitled was created, sparking a widespread social media movement. This quickly translated into mass mobilization and, eventually, the Egyptian Revolution of 2011 that took place in Tahrir Square in Cairo. After days of demonstrations, the Egyptian army announced that it would not use force against protestors, leaving President Hosni Mubarak without any support from his military. He was on Feb. 11, 2011, after being in power for 30 years. More than one year later, on June 30, 2012, Egypt’s first democratically elected president, Mohamed Morsi, was sworn into office.  This was a significant turning point for the Egyptians — Egypt was finally a democracy for the people. But for a nation like Egypt, where most of the population was familiar only with Mubarak’s dictatorship, it is important to ask ourselves the following questions: What is democracy, and what has democracy looked like in Egypt’s history? And how do Western ideas about democracy impact democratization in Egypt? Alongside this, it is also important to examine Egyptian conceptions of democracy in Egypt because they form the foundation of the nation’s democratic prospects. They elucidate what Egyptians want to see in their nation’s future — not just what Western nations, such as the U.S., might presume.  Democratization is the demand for empowerment and choice in government and politics. Movements for democratization stem from a growing awareness and criticism of repressive and “out of touch” governing bodies across the globe. More and more people living under authoritarian regimes are demanding political participation and empowerment through protests and alternative forms of civic engagement and disobedience. Although democracy manifests differently in different societies, democratic ideals — such as secular governments — are based on the political traditions of the U.S. and Western Europe. The U.S. has been a proponent of a secular style of democracy in recent decades and rejects alternative styles of democracy. But in many nations across the globe, religion plays a largely hegemonic role in the public and political sphere. For instance, Muslim-majority nations such as Egypt strive to reconcile Islam and democracy. Not only must they ensure that the regime meets the demand for increased political participation, they must also consider how to maintain an authentic Islamic republic. Within our increasingly globalized sociopolitical context, it is parochial to view a key concept such as democracy through the limited Western lens, as it only serves to set back the global movement towards democracy. But the West has been far from amenable toward Egyptians and their ideas about democracy in recent decades. By way of background, during the Clinton administration, American leaders that one of the three main pillars of American foreign policy was the promotion of democracy in other nations. This crystallized the U.S. mandate to promote democracy in Egypt, which led to the establishment of the United States Agency for International Development, an organization designed to support democratization efforts in addition to the traditional development aid. In the first few years of the 1990s, the aid sent to Egypt was to support the rule of law and civil society; in the latter half of the decade, the aid expanded to support governance and media. The U.S. was nearly $2 billion annually to Egypt for a myriad of projects and specifically earmarked aid for democratic efforts comprising approximately $20 million of the total. Although aid for democratic efforts was a step in the right direction, tensions between the U.S. and Egypt began to fester after multiple acts of U.S. aggression. After the 1979 peace treaty between Egypt and Israel, the U.S. substantial economic and military assistance packages to both countries to celebrate their newly developed diplomatic relationship. However, the assistance packages for the two countries were asymmetric. Israel received approximately $3 billion in aid per year as direct cash transfers to the government while Egypt received approximately $2 billion with extensive stipulations on how the funding would be allocated. This inequitable agreement led to Egyptian ambivalence toward democratic reform, and the USAID programs lost their legitimacy to promote democracy in an equitable way. Around two decades later in 2002, Bush the Mubarak regime for the unjust prosecution of activist Saad Eddin Ibrahim, who had been convicted and sentenced to prison on what many believed were false charges. In addition to publicly criticizing the Egyptian government, members of the U.S. Congress later an amendment that gave USAID full oversight and discretion over democracy aid sent to Egypt, ultimately removing any oversight and power of the Egyptian government to allocate the funds.  The U.S. government’s misguided efforts to support democracy only exacerbated tensions between the two nations and limited progress toward the ultimate mission of a democratic future in Egypt. Although a segment of Egyptian activists believed that the aggression of the Bush administration aforementioned was an effective means to reform the regime, many also viewed this approach as an extension of imperialism and the relationship between the U.S. and Egypt as extractive. And I would agree — the contentious approach that the U.S. has taken in its promotion of democracy in Egypt has been nothing short of flawed and rooted in imperialism. Although there has been enthusiasm for the future of Egypt as a democratic nation by Egyptians and Americans alike, not only has the approach been inequitable, but the country’s political context has been completely neglected. For instance, it is abundantly clear that many Egyptians continue to believe that religion plays a significant role in political life and that Islam and democracy are not mutually exclusive. So much so that when Hosni Mubarak was ousted after three decades in power after the protests during the revolution, the Freedom and Justice Party affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood won the 2011-2012 free parliamentary elections in a landslide. Religiosity in Egypt, however, is just one facet of the nation’s context that has been ignored. The West must work with Egyptians and within the Egyptian context to design a framework for an Islamic democracy that may eventually lead to a democratic future for the nation.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/democracy-in-egypt/

The Black-Arab Paradox

Dinan Elsyad

What comes to mind when you think “Arab?” Do you think of falafel? Do you imagine two Middle Eastern men arguing over the check at a restaurant? Do countries like Egypt cross your thoughts?  Well, falafel happens to be my favorite food, I prefer to pay for my own food at restaurants, and although I’m not from Egypt, my country, Sudan, borders it.  Still, despite my culturally Arab background, my claim to Arabness has always been questioned. In the Arab world, to be both Black and Arab is a contradiction.  When I was younger, I reconciled this debate in my mind by rejecting my Black identity. I clung to my Arab identity like a lifeline, using it to deny the Black parts of me that I had been taught to hate. As I grew older, however, I slowly found myself less insecure — in both my Arab and Black identities. By my senior year of high school, I had even learned to take pride in my two contradicting backgrounds. Going into college, I was ready to embrace both sides of my identity. Unfortunately, I would soon learn that those around me weren’t ready to do the same.  The first week, I remember walking with a group of Arab girls to the first Harvard Arab event. In what I considered to be a harmless act, I joined in on their conversation, speaking Arabic. One of the girl’s heads snapped around to look at me in shock. “ speak Arabic?” Her shock felt like a slap in the face. For a brief moment, I thought her reaction was my fault because of how I looked. In particular, I blamed my box-braids. I had debated wearing them to college, because, while they were good for my hair, I knew that it would detract from the little claim to “Arabness” that I had — my looser hair curl pattern, a perceived characteristic of those of Arab heritage. Ultimately, I decided to prioritize the health of my hair over the microaggressions that I would face. However, at that moment, I wished that I hadn’t worn my hair in braids — as if I was the problem. As if her ignorance regarding Black Arabs from Sudan — a country with a population of 44 million people — was somehow a burden that I should have to bear.  This would be the first of many isolating interactions with Arabs that I would have on campus. Despite these interactions, I still held onto hope that I’d find my place among the Arabs, and that I would learn how to say the words “I am Arab” self-assuredly.  This optimism would soon be deflated. A few months ago, I attended a non-Harvard Arab event. I felt uneasy about attending at first, but I eventually drew hope from the idea that maybe the Harvard Arab community was the issue; maybe this event would finally be the place where I’d feel welcome.  I hadn’t even walked into the event before I was met with my first microaggression: I thanked someone in Arabic and was met with laughter. Evidently, it was shocking that I knew any Arabic at all. After I made it clear that I was from Sudan, she apologized, but the damage was already done — I already felt like an imposter. I continued to face microaggressions throughout the event — more than I can count and more than I feel like thinking about. Two things became clear to me that night. Firstly, the Harvard Arab community was a small part of a bigger issue. Second, nothing was ever going to change. The root of my struggles wasn’t others’ malintention. The kindest Arab, with only the best intentions at heart, will still make me feel like an outsider.  In so many ways, the Arab events that I attend still feel like home. They smell like the food that my mom makes at home; they sound like the music that my siblings and I listen to in the car. And yet, oftentimes I find myself bitter. I think of my lighter-skinned friends that I often bring with me — from Turkey, India, and so many other places — with their wavy dark hair, and how they have more of a claim to Arabness than my cultural background ever will. It has become clear that there is no home for me in the Arab world. Your identity is supposed to be your home, and so how can I continue to label myself with an identity that has, time and time again, made me feel like a foreigner? Reflecting on my experiences as I write this article has brought my lifelong debate about my identity to a close: I relinquish my claim to Arabness.  It’s not easy for me to let go of an identity that I’ve held close to my heart for so long. All I’ve wanted, my whole life, is to feel like I belong. I wanted so badly to believe that I would find that comfort in the Arab community. However, my interactions on campus have stranded me on the outskirts. Once upon a time, the mere thought would have been unbearable. Now, I recognize that my relentless self-vilification of my dark skin and curly hair — all in pursuit of belonging — was far more heartbreaking.  To be Arab is to strip myself of my Blackness, and I am no longer willing to reduce myself for the acceptance of others. I am not Arab, and I am not just Black. I am Sudani — a descendant from the land of the Blacks. My experiences in Arab spaces have demonstrated that the two identities cannot co-exist for me. I’m finally learning to be okay with that.  When I was asked to write this article, I was wary. I wasn’t even sure that I identified as Arab, so who was I to write about being a Black Arab? In the end, I agreed to write this and put my experiences out there in the hopes that a future Black Arab at Harvard is met with the love and compassion for which I’ve always yearned. Even though my journey with Arabness has ended, I will gladly take incoming Sudani first-years under my wing and nurture their dreams of finding solidarity among the non-Black Arabs. Maybe someday, the Arab community will be a place that Sudani students, and other Black Arabs, can call home.  

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/black-arab-paradox/

The Halakhic Argument for Reproductive Justice

Lauren Perl

As the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade and the Senate the Women’s Healthcare Protection Act, the future of American reproductive justice looks bleak. Today, many legislators who promote restrictive abortion laws often cite Christian theology as the underpinning for their political beliefs. For instance, anti-choice Congresswoman Vicky Hartzler that aborted fetuses “were human beings with a purpose from our Creator.” She proceeded to religiously justify a restrictive abortion law in Mississippi by saying that “laws like Mississippi’s demonstrate that the American people still believe in the God-given dignity of every person, born or unborn.” However, such statements are not fully representative of abortion discussions within Judeo-Christian texts. In fact, Judaism is an inherently pro-choice religion, and Jewish women have historically lead the battle for reproductive justice. I come from a long line of Jewish human rights activists. My grandpa 40,000 Jews during the Holocaust and was a leader of the Jewish Defense League. My father was pursued by the FBI for protesting the persecution of Soviet Jewry. In response to rising hostility toward inter-faith marriages in our neighborhood’s existing Jewish community, our family joined with other Jewish families to an inclusive synagogue. Similarly to those in my family, I am guided by the Jewish belief of “ ,” which states that all people have equal dignity and value because we are all made in God’s image. My Jewish values not only inspire but “command me to fight for reproductive justice. A post-Roe world would have deadly consequences for individuals who can get pregnant. Significantly, abortion restrictions disproportionately people of color. We, as Jews, cannot accept this discriminatory, dangerous future.  Judaism champions egalitarian values. In fact, reproductive justice is written into Jewish scriptures, particularly within the Torah and Mishnah. The Torah in Exodus:  “When men fight, and a pregnant woman is pushed, and a miscarriage results but no other damage ensues, the one responsible shall pay a fine, according to what the woman’s husband deems appropriate [to compensate for the loss of the pregnancy].But if other damage ensues, the penalty shall be life for life, eye for eye…”  The life of a fetus and the life of a mother are prioritized differently within Judaism. If the mother is killed, the murderer is charged with homicide and thereby sentenced to death. However, if the mother survives an attack but miscarries as a result of the assault, the attacker is charged with a financial penalty. Accordingly, acclaimed 11th-century writer Rashi, author of a comprehensive commentary on the Talmud and Hebrew Bible, that the Torah does not view abortion as murder or a capital crime. This is consistent with the Jewish definition of life: the Talmud that a fetus is merely water until the fortieth day after conception. The fetus is not considered a living being until it is fully delivered.  Such ancient Jewish laws continue to be relevant. The Rabbinical Assembly has codified the value of a mother’s wellbeing into Jewish law with the Assembly’s Resolution on Reproductive Freedom. The resolution affirms that abortion can be an act of mercy and compassion, and clarifies that a fetus does not have the legal status of a human until birth. Similarly, the Mishnah that:  “If a woman suffers hard labor in travail, the child must be cut up in her womb and brought out piece-meal, for her life takes precedence over its life; if it’s greater part has (already] come forth, it must not be touched, for the [claim of one] life can not supersede [that of another] life.”  In these texts, the Torah acknowledges that the fetus has the potential to become a living creature. Judaism places an infinite value on every human life; therefore, Judaism understands the harm that a pregnancy may have on someone’s body and orders them to protect and prioritize their health and wellbeing over a potential life.  Within this framework, it is also critical to consider that abortion bans disproportionately harm marginalized communities — specifically Black and Latino communities. The University of Colorado that a federal abortion ban would increase pregnancy-related deaths by 21% overall and cause a 33% increase in pregnancy-related deaths among Black women. In the 21st century, we recognize that abortion bans have deadly consequences for Black, Indigenous and people of color communities. Therefore, Judaism commands me — and other Jews — to stand in solidarity with the reproductive justice movement. Given these Jewish values, it should be no surprise that Jewish people have always at the forefront of the battle for abortion access — from Bella Abzug to Heather Booth to Elizabeth Holtzman. While these women are the faces of reproductive justice advocacy, they represent a much larger movement of angry, progressive Jewish activists. Nearly four in five American Jews staunchly support abortion rights. We, as Jewish people, support abortion rights, because we value the lives of our BIPOC siblings and recognize that they are most vulnerable to physical harm as a result of abortion bans. It is our religious and cultural commandment to carry the torch of those before us, to continue fighting for our Jewish values and demanding reproductive justice — in the streets, in the courts, and in Congress. 

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/the-halakhic-argument-for-reproductive-justice/

Cultivation

Tarina Ahuja

Every day between August 2020 and December 2021, I opened up my Instagram application to find images of my Sikh and Punjabi elders being run over by tractors and their ribs caving into the blunt points of police batons. I saw young women, who look like me, arrested and assaulted for daring to raise their voices against oppressive structures. I saw delicate bodies dragged by the beautiful strands of their uncut gray hair and sleeping on brutally cold pavements, kept warm by nothing but one other’s company and their thin “chunnies” or scarves. These images document the sacrifice and resilience of one of many untelevised revolutions that my people have led. Throughout 2020 in India, farmers the largest protest in human history — 250 million people strong. While these protests were not a referendum on religion, they were largely by Sikh-Punjabi farmers. The reason for this is two-fold: first, Punjab has historically served as India’s proverbial . Second, the Sikh tradition is deeply with agricultural practices. These protests about human rights and worker’s rights are fueled by the pride in Punjab’s five rivers, farmers, and soul. In September 2020, three ordinances were seeking to privatize Indian agriculture, essentially pushing the small and marginal farmers — who have cultivated the land for centuries — into unemployment. These ordinances opened the door for corporate players to strongarm smaller family farms, which 70% of all Indian farmers, and ultimately get rid of the Minimum Support Price, which is similar to a minimum wage for agricultural laborers. This action, which permitted private actors to pay whatever compensation they chose no matter how little, only exacerbated farmer debt. Even before the protests, farmers were on the brink of collapse, demonstrated by the 12-fold in Punjabi farmer suicides between 2015 to 2020. During the protests, farmers demanded: “Why are you biting the hand that feeds you?” As protestors and their allies schools, , and at every leg of their march to New Delhi, the Sikh/Punjabi diaspora all around the globe, and people from every walk of life joined in the struggle, I rest assured knowing that the oppressors never went unchallenged. In fact, after about a year and 4 months, the farmers celebrated a major victory — Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the repeal of the controversial farm laws, marking the protests’ official end date. However, the struggle as farmers, especially those in Punjab, demand more expansive government support of agricultural laborers through financial safety nets and healthcare for farmers experiencing adverse health effects from the dangers of their occupation. For instance, mental health resources are necessary to rectify and mitigate the soaring suicide rates among Punjabi farmers, as aforementioned.  Experiencing the protests as a diasporic Punjabi-Sikh is beautiful yet disorienting. The cognitive dissonance can sometimes feel unnerving when realizing that someone with our exact same identity, yet living in a different country, can result in lives that are figuratively and literally worlds apart. However, the thread that blends the Punjabi and Sikh diasporas is that of cultivation. While the Punjabi experience in South Asia entails cultivating roots of culture and faith for generations to come, Punjabi-American cultivation manifests differently. Being Sikh in America means having to explain that Sikh is a religion, not an illness and that Punjab is a state located at India’s northern tip. With each explanation of my faith and ethnicity, a seed of understanding is planted. It is for this reason that I never mind the burden of explaining my identity. In fact, I appreciate the opportunity to talk about the religion and homeland that I am so proud to call my own. As news of the farmer protests broke out, or stories emerged about the pattern of hate crimes against Sikh individuals in , this burden of explanation has transformed into a burden of action. Every person who cares, posts, and donates helps amplify the struggle taking place in India and in our very own backyards. I am asking you to share in this burden of action and help us cultivate healing and justice.  It is up to us all to do our own cultivation: of our understanding, of our potential for action, and of our amplification of movements that do not directly pertain to us. To my peers at Harvard: I ask you to use your shovel and soil — even if it is simply reposting on your Instagram story about the recent rise of hate crimes against Sikhs or reading an article about the myriad challenges that Punjab currently faces. Cultivate your knowledge. Nourish through action. Grow in solidarity.  Just like the farmers in India.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/cultivation/

Don’t Sit Next to Her; She’s Jewish!

Shira Hoffer

In first grade, a little boy called John announced to the class that no one was to sit next to me during the morning meeting. “She’s Jewish,” he offered as an explanation. Like the Sea of Reeds parting at the staff of Moses, my peers parted from my right and left at the word of John, leaving me sitting as though I was looking into a horseshoe. Awkward, to say the least. This little incident was my first foray into a world where, over 75 years after the liberation of Auschwitz, anti-Semitism remains so prevalent that even a first-grader succumbs to its influences. Three years after the deadly at the Tree of Life synagogue, the American Jewish Committee a report called The State of Anti-Semitism in America, which contained four key findings: These statistics reveal something that I feel to be very true and very resonant. Jews experience anti-Semitism and non-Jews largely don’t notice. For example, did you know that a swastika was carved into a corkboard at Currier House this month? I did not until last week. Statements to the entire campus community? None, though the Currier House Faculty Deans responded appropriately by reaching out to the Currier students. Campus-wide outrage? Non-existent. President Lawrence Bacow was about growing anti-Semitism on campus on a May 3rd faculty meeting — more than a week after the swastika was drawn — and he did not mention it. Meanwhile, in 2019, a faculty member arrived at her office to find hateful messages about her ethnicity and immigration status taped to her door. Appropriately, FAS Dean Claudine Gay and University President Lawrence S. Bacow signed a of condemnation, and The Crimson the incident almost immediately.  To be clear, I do not mean to set up a competitive sentiment between marginalized groups, and there are obvious differences between these two cases: The former was a broad symbol of hate, and the latter specifically targeted a faculty member. Rather, I am emphasizing that the Harvard community as a whole must demonstrate equitable concern and support for all marginalized groups on campus, including Jews. This is not the first swastika in an undergraduate house, in the law school, at the school of public health, nor on campus. It is frustrating that The Crimson did not write an article specifically about the swastika in Currier House. While I know the administration is doing their best to navigate situations such as these, silence across the board on issues affecting the Jewish community is deeply felt. Recall Jan. 15, 2022, Congregation Beth Israel synagogue in Texas: an 11-hour standoff during which a British national three congregants and their rabbi hostage during Shabbat morning services. My reaction was of shock and incredulity: “A hostage situation? Doesn’t that only happen in movies?” In a very Jewish fashion, I thought, “hearing slurs or getting graffitied, or even a shooting, these we know how to handle. But a hostage situation? Now that’s a new one.” Part of my own Jewish practice is not to use technology during Shabbat, so I wouldn’t have known. I’m pretty sure I asked my dad once every 30 minutes for the rest of the day for an update on the situation. After Shabbat, scrolling numbly through Instagram and Facebook seemed to be the only activity I could emotionally handle. As more and more of my Jewish friends came online after Shabbat, my feed became increasingly populated with posts about the situation: “ at my sweet children’s faces today and hugging them, I wonder about what it means not just for my life but for their future to be Jews. I tell them it’s safe… but it’s a prayer for something I dream may yet be.” These posts reminded me of the strength and power of the Jewish community, filling me with a sense of pride I didn’t realize was dwindling. However, as the evening went on, I started to realize that I had only seen posts about this situation from my Jewish friends. My non-Jewish friends were eerily silent. Social media activism is not really my thing, but in 2020, the Pew Research Center that around a third of social media users have used various platforms to promote a cause. Harvard students do so as well, arguably to a greater degree. My friends are constantly alerting me to a civil or human rights violation worthy of our attention, or circulating a fundraising opportunity which merits our support. Notably, there is not always an obvious connection between their identities and the causes they champion. There is some incredible activism going on, but to my dismay, after this hostage situation, I counted exactly zero non-Jews posting in support of my people, and I felt like the story fell out of the news cycle as quickly as it arrived. Why doesn’t this activism extend to us? I almost didn’t write this piece; you might be wondering why you’re seeing this months after the situation. There are two reasons. First, honestly, I was afraid to seem like a whiny liberal lamenting a lack of hashtags about some random issue. But anti-Semitism isn’t just “some random issue,” and hashtags aren’t really the point. These past few weeks have been troubling for me as a Jewish person on campus committed both to my identity and to the ideas of free speech and the right to protest. While I did not — and do not — intend to address Israel Apartheid Week, the carving of a swastika at Currier House this month needs coverage. It is shameful that The Crimson did not find this newsworthy enough to cover, and that this incident did not inspire campus-wide outrage. I decided to write this piece because my experience in both the aftermath of the hostage situation, and the campus swastika, highlight what I see as a broader issue facing Jews today. As Jews, we have this complicated minority status because our privilege has often been the source of our persecution. I can only hypothesize on the effects of this, but I have a few ideas. While Jews comprise many racial identities, our most common racial association is White, so many of us benefit from White privilege, despite our minority status as Jews. Perhaps when prioritizing advocacy work, this privilege exempts many of my people — myself included — from support. Perhaps the between Judaism and Zionism — a topic which deserves its own article — is a barrier for anti-Zionists to speak out on anti-Semitism. Perhaps the Holocaust feels like old news; to the great concern of many, the last survivors of the Holocaust are . But Jewish first-graders are still sitting alone in the morning meeting, and synagogues still don’t feel safe. Anti-Semitism is rising; it is not old news. Ancient Jewish folklore that Abraham and Sarah’s tent was open on all sides, demonstrating their wholehearted hospitality and setting an example for our people. When the to-be hostage-taker knocked on the doors of Congregation Beth Israel asking for shelter, Rabbi Cytron-Walker — a modern-day Abraham — let him in, pouring him a cup of tea. The Rabbi’s compassion was followed by an act of heroism as he finally threw a chair at the hostage-taker, enabling himself and the congregants to safely escape 11 hours after the ordeal began. Rabbi Cytron-Walker’s bravery sets an example for young Jews everywhere; I wish I could have stood up to John in first grade with the conviction and pride which Rabbi Cytron-Walker displayed throughout that horrific Shabbat.  My pride in my identity remains strong, and the spirit of the Jewish people has not — and will not — be broken by anti-Semitism, whether the rest of the world sees it, posts about it, or ignores it.  is licensed under the

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/dont-sit-next-to-her-shes-jewish/

Man of Iron

Author

Superheroes have long been the tried and true beacons of justice that save the world from imminent peril. In the late 1930s, at the time of the “ ” of comics, Superman swooped in to rescue the fictional city of Metropolis from corrupt governors and ruthless murderers alike. In 2012, Iron Man and his fellow Avengers saved New York City from alien attack in Marvel’s film . And this year, Tony Stark once again leads his Avengers teammates into battle against the robot Ultron in . Despite his role as co-founder and co-leader of “ ,” however, Iron Man is one of the most human members of his extraordinary team. From his first appearance in Marvel’s comics in 1968 to his current appearances in (MCU) movies, Iron Man has been one of the least traditional superheroes. Tony Stark, who dons a self-made super suit to become Iron Man, is not as supernaturally gifted as his comrades. He has no genetic enhancements or physical modifications—no super strength, super speed, or super healing. Without his suit, Tony Stark is just a regular (albeit extremely wealthy and intelligent) human Yet thousands of people have flocked to see this not-so-super hero in action on the big screen. He currently twelfth on IGN’s Top 100 Comic Book Heroes. He is the star of Marvel’s $2 billion-grossing and movie franchises. Yet Iron Man owes part of his creation and his appeal through the years to human rather than superhuman qualities—aspects in which modern audiences in particular can find entertainment, strength, and inspiration. The resulting superhero comic book industry offered what cartoonist Jules Feiffer “fantasy with a cynically realistic base”—a fictional universe whose superhuman protagonists addressed issues that affected readers in the real world. This realistic base provides “an of historical moment and entertainment” and has held true throughout the years. No matter how many superheroes had been added to comic book lore—Batman, Wonder Woman, the Human Torch, the Spectre, Captain America, the list goes on—and no matter how many storylines or universes or alternate universes had been introduced, the identity of “The Superhero” always held a ring of truth and justice to it. , teams like the Justice Society of America were banding together to exterminate crime on the home front while the Allied forces were fighting the Nazis during World War II. When the Cold War broke out, comic books paralleled its development with eerie precision—Captain America faced off against his Nazi-turned-Communist arch-nemesis Red Skull ; the Fantastic Four, all of whom gained their powers in space, to the Space Race in the 60s; Bruce Banner also crashed into the scene as the Hulk after being caught in a gamma bomb blast reminiscent of the Soviet nuclear . And it was during this Cold War period that Iron Man joined the fight, bringing along his own unique caliber of “super” to the battlefield. Iron Man is not unique in his representation of yet another aspect of the Cold War: the role American industry and technology. Tony Stark is, initially, a wealthy weapon and defense technology manufacturer, the brains behind Stark Enterprises. To become Iron Man, Stark eventually transitions in his duties from developing weapons and armor for others to to fight Cold War-esque enemies. This concept of the wartime superhero, especially one affiliated with the Cold War, is nothing novel given the slew of other superheroes conceived during that era. The concept of the Iron Man character, however, gave birth to a more relatable superhero. At first glace, this genius, billionaire, playboy, and philanthropist may seem like a flashier rip-off of Batman—someone who lacks natural-born superpowers but uses his financial and intellectual resources to save the day. There are some undeniable surface parallels: Bruce Wayne and Stark are both wealthy industrialists and playboys-turned-superhero. Bruce Wayne has his Batmobile, Tony Stark his Iron Man suit. Both are similar even down to their trusty sidekicks and meticulous butlers. But unlike Batman, Tony Stark did not choose to become a superhero out of a self-righteous and noble desire to save his city. On the contrary, Tony Stark becomes Iron Man in order to save himself. While attending a field test for his military product abroad, Stark is attacked and captured by terrorists and triggers a landmine during the struggle; he is critically injured, with shrapnel lodged near his heart. Desperation and sheer determination to survive push Tony Stark to create the arc reactor chest plate that keeps his heart beating and to manufacture the armor to go with it. Self-survival, rather than self-righteousness, leads Tony Stark to become Iron Man. Rather than detract from Iron Man’s legitimacy as a superhero, this ignoble beginning forms the basis of his appeal. He is the superhero who rescued himself before rescuing the world, and he did not require superpowers in order to do it. Tony Stark instead relies upon human intelligence and resourcefulness to build the chest plate and prototype suit under the guise of developing weaponry for his captors. He uses his personal fortune to develop the Iron Man armor, fight villains, and help found the counter-terrorism organization S.H.I.E.L.D. So while DC Comics that Batman may be “proof you don’t need superpowers to be a superhero,” Iron Man is proof that you don’t need to be a superhero in order to be “super.” a situation where many would have prayed for the Dark Knight to come to the rescue—like during a hostage situation involving international terrorists—Tony Stark instead became his own knight in shining red and gold armor, and in the process he became his better . As Stan Lee, the co-creator of Iron Man, about the hero’s conception: “what if a guy had a suit of armor, but it was a modern suit of armor … and what if that suit of armor made him as strong as any Super Hero?” The armor that allows Iron Man to be a superhero is just the product of very human efforts. So, what if a human could be Super? It is this display of human potential, this aura of possibility and success, that attracts fans. As Stan Lee it: [Tony Stark] was a weapons manufacturer, he was providing weapons for the Army, he was rich, he was an industrialist … I thought it would be fun to take the kind of character that nobody would like, none of our readers would like, and shove him down their throats and make them like him … And he became very popular. Lee took a character who was so overtly flawed in his ambitions, his morals, and outlook—a wealthy industrialist that nobody would like—and created a role model for readers—a wholly self-made superhero. Outside the suit, Stark is prone to “humanness” like everybody else. He cracks frequently inappropriate jokes for his own amusement. He lives up to his playboy status and throws lavish parties filled with beautiful women, to the ire of his love interest, Pepper. He even quarrels with teammates; in fact, the premise of the third installment of the movie franchise around a rift between Iron Man and Captain America. But inside the suit, he is Iron Man. While fans can idolize a character like Batman who improves his city, they can doubly relate with a character like Iron Man who improves himself. The story of Iron Man offers commentary on the reader’s own potential: Tony Stark suggests that perhaps everyone can each build their super suits, can achieve the previously unachievable, and can become their own iron men and women. In an essay in , George Dunn that “the enduring appeal of Iron Man owes a great deal to how Tony Stark personifies the spectacular promise of technology to turn our dreams into reality, a promise that has stoked a fire in the bellies of countless men and women in the modern era.” What was initially a reason to dislike a brilliant industrialist is now a main selling point in Stark’s character. Technologically savvy and determined to save the world, Iron Man leads his superhero comrades into the modern era. It is no surprise that thousands of children and adults alike have bought and continue to this appeal, even after Iron Man transitioned from comic books to movies. While in the films he is no longer a Cold War-era hero, the movie rendition of Tony Stark/Iron Man is every bit as flawed and fabulous as his comic book counterpart. The first installment of the franchise in 2008 begins with Tony Stark’s shrapnel-in-the-heart incident (this time while inspecting his weapons in Afghanistan), and develops into the familiar story of the creation of the arc reactor and super suit, of Iron Man’s battles, and of Tony Stark taking on the role of one of the world’s least “super,” but fortunately most human, superheroes.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/man-iron/

One Hundred Years of Remembrance

Author

On December 6 , 1928, banana plantation workers from the town of Macondo, Colombia, who are in the midst of a general strike over their abhorrent working conditions, gather in the city square to await the arrival of the province’s civil and military leader. In the crowd are three thousand men, women, and children. Thus far, their foreign employer has dodged their demands with the skilled maneuvering of lawyers who argue that their complaints are invalid because they do not legally exist. On this day, however, the crowd expects acknowledgment. They have strength in numbers; their existence cannot be ignored. They wait by the train tracks for the military leader’s promised arrival. The train arrives as promised, but no general steps out. Instead, an official reads from a decree that narrowly defines the existence of the crowd: “a bunch of hoodlums.” He gives the crowd five minutes to disperse. No one moves. When the time has expired, a volley of gunfire erupts from all corners of the square, and all but one of the three thousand men, women, and children are gunned down. In the eerie silence that follows the massacre, their bodies are piled onto trains and dumped into the sea. Any trace of their existence is wiped clean. Or, at least, so writes Gabriel Garcia Marquez in his novel, In reality, some semblance of this massacre did occur in the very real town of Cienega, Colombia, at the hands of the Colombian army and the United Fruit Company. Marquez’s retelling takes many liberties with the official versions of the event. Most notably, he imagines a literal amnesia descending over the town and wiping the event from everyone’s memory, leaving the ranting of the sole survivor, strike leader José Arcadio Segundo, to go blissfully unnoticed. Of course, no such magical disease could ever have afflicted the town of Cienaga. But, like all parts of the narratives surrounding this massacre, the amnesia described by Gabriel Garcia Marquez treads a thin line between fiction and reality. We know that, on December 6th, 1928, banana plantation workers from the town of Cienaga, Colombia—in the midst of a general strike against: the United Fruit Company’s bans on small agriculture, failure to comply with social insurance legislation, and payment in the form of vouchers valid solely in company stores—did indeed gather in a square to await that arrival of the province’s civil and military leader. We know that the company did indeed refuse to listen to its workers on the grounds that their temporal status meant they were not actual employees. We know that General Cortes Vargas did indeed arrive, only to read a directive accusing the strikers of various infractions, labeling them a “cuadrilla de malhechores,” proclaiming the right for public forces to use arms against them, and giving them five minutes to disperse before opening fire. But we do not know how many of those workers died; the numbers range from nine, as official José Gregorio Guerrero reported, to as many as two thousand, as liberal politician Jorge Eliécer Gaitán reported. And we cannot know exactly why General Vargas gave the order to fire: interpretations range from a spontaneous defense of Colombian sovereignty to premeditated collusion with the United Fruit Company. It is not due to any form of amnesia that the historical narratives about the banana massacre are riddled with these inconsistencies. Instead, such discrepancies are an inevitable result of the uproar that followed the massacre, which propagated a number of different versions of the event. The facts and figures of the massacre came to be thoroughly obscured, it seems, by politics. After the massacre, the Colombian government, under President Miguel Abadía Mendez, attempted to minimize potential backlash by blaming the strike on foreign agitators. General Vargas penned his own interpretation of the incident, which he presents in a tone that feels jarringly impartial when compared to the evocative prose wielded by Marquez. Vargas excuses his own actions by emphasizing the radical ideology of the strikers; for example, he points to an anarchist pamphlet that supposedly threatened the lives of North Americans living in the region. “We have proceeded in each and every one of our actions, during this time of danger to the peace and tranquility of the Republic, with all of the wisdom, prudence and energy of which we are able and which the circumstances require,” he asserts. Most importantly, Vargas claims that there were two North American ships stationed nearby, prepared to dispatch troops into the region if the situation were to be perceived as dangerous for the interests of the United States. The order to shoot was a defense of Colombian sovereignty. And the true enemy, by extension, was the United States. Although President Mendez was decidedly conservative, his government was not particularly repressive; as a result, a significant volume of press coverage slipped through its limited attempts at censorship. Several competing narratives emerged, which contradicted that of General Vargas. National newspapers actively reported on the situation, and many gave their overt support to the labor movement. Survivors were also able to share their stories and the definitively non-amnesic public responded to their accounts by adopting a generally grave perception on the situation. Most prominently, strike leader Raúl Mahecha spoke at a communist convention in Montevideo, where he directly implicated the government for the tragedy and accused it of pandering to foreign influence: “This is how the reactionary government of Colombia, to meet the interests of a foreign company, has murdered native workers demanding better living conditions and more humane working conditions in the hell that is the banana plantations.” Arguably, the most influential narrative that emerged to explain the tragedy was that of Jorge Eliécer Gaitán. Gaitán was a young and relatively inexperienced parliamentarian at the time of the massacre, but he quickly rose to prominence within Colombian politics by adopting a firm stance against the government and pressing for official enquiries into the event. Gaitán’s narrative was nearly as dramatic as the one advanced by . He delivered fiery speeches marked by moral righteousness and a sense of urgency to congressional debates and before public crowds, accusing the government of collusion with the United Fruit Company: “ So premeditated was this monstrous crime, that the workers were maliciously concentrated in the city of Cienaga…because the city had signed an agreement with United, which had accepted certain points…” He punctuated his own points by bringing out the skull of a child supposedly killed during the massacre and imbued his story with sensationalism by referencing a report of the rape of a mentally retarded girl by the soldiers who had perpetuated the massacre. The effect of Gaitán’s pointed narrative was not immediate. Ultimately, President Mendez was exonerated by a senate committee for his suppression of the strike. By the time of the election of 1930, however, Gaitán’s retelling of the “Matanza de las bananeras” had contributed to a perceptible shift in Colombian politics. The conservative party lost public support and faced continuous strikes and demonstrations, while the liberal party gained the strong backing of the labor movement and all of the corresponding economic and political force it had come to wield thanks to popular outrage over the banana massacre. The reform-minded liberal Olaya Herrera assumed the presidency in 1930, while Gaitán continued to rise to prominence until his assassination immediately before the 1950 election, for which he had been a favorite. The period of relative stability sustained between 1930 and 1950 came to a tragic end with Gaitán’s assassination, which launched the beginning of popular uprisings by the liberal lower classes, infamously known as the “Bogatazo,” and the subsequent era of violence known as “La Violencia.” Today, the story of the banana massacre continues to inhabit popular consciousness far beyond Colombia, thanks to Marquez’s version. Yet this literary narrative is one informed by politics; after all, Marquez himself identifies with the politics of Gaitán, which are echoed throughout his own retelling. But does not simply add yet another political spin to a vague series of events whose resonances can still be felt in Colombian politics to this day—it adds another, higher dimension to the massacre by immortalizing it in a work of literature. And, as it does so, it brings its readers’ attention to the role of memory. Returning to the amnesia that affected the inhabitants of Macondo—it’s clear that it stands in sharp contrast to the actual outrage that followed the heavily reported events in Cienaga. We know that Marquez’s account of the massacre is fictionalized because we know that it is impossible for an entire town to experience event-specific amnesia—but does this make Marquez’s version of events any less powerful than those that purported to tell the truth? At the same time, Marquez’s choice to invoke a plague of amnesia that allows an oppressive system to perpetuate its abuses gives his narrative another clear point: history can be manipulated, and this manipulation can be powerful. The characters that appear throughout must grapple with a multitude of difficult circumstances that they cannot control, but, along the way, Marquez provides them with the powerful weapon of memory. For generations, the Buendía family endures on the foundation of its memories. In more ways than one, memory defines the characters of . All of them craft their own personalities based on their outstanding capacity to remember and synthesize the experiences of past generations. The entire town of Macondo similarly constructs a cohesive sense of identity by cultivating its memories of the triumphs and travails of the past. But the novel itself, as a work of literature, reminds us that memories can be distorted. Through the experience of reading , we are able to observe the complexity of memory by watching it reconstruct or wreak havoc on the lives of others. Although many other novels stop there, providing us with characters who seem to dwell safely in the realm of fiction, the narrative of bumps up against that of history and pushes us to recognize that this realm is not so safe after all.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/one-hundred-years-remembrance/

The World’s Newest Republic: Barbados’s Journey Towards Independence | PRE x Culture

Trey Sullivan

Last December, the world watched as Barbados, a Caribbean country of roughly 300,000 inhabitants, itself as a republic and removed Queen Elizabeth II as its head of state. Many celebrated what was perceived as Barbados breaking free from the last vestige of British colonialism. Barbados’ newly elected president, Sandra Mason, even in her inaugural address that “the time has come to fully leave our colonial past behind.” While I am not Bajan, I am always inspired — as a Black man — to witness Black nations like Barbados break the yolks of European exploitation.The removal of a British monarch as head of state cannot be overemphasized. Nearly 400 years after King James I established the island as a British colony, the Royal Family has been replaced by a Black woman –– a descendant of the very African slaves brought to the island to process sugar and enrich the Crown. However, as I scrolled through Twitter, reading an unending and homogenous stream of praise for the new Bajan Republic, I couldn’t help but ask: “Has Barbados truly left their colonial past behind?” My skepticism with what many saw as a wholly emancipatory event stems from my academic background. I am a History & Literature concentrator studying anti-colonial literature and neocolonial relations, which renders me familiar with modern Euro-African/Caribbean interactions and their complexities. Using my studies as a framework to understand the Bajan context, I analyzed Barbados’s transition from a realm of the Crown to a republic within the broader history of the latent — but equally as insidious — relations between former metropoles and their territories. This analysis led me to revisit the work of the prolific anti-colonial writer Frantz Fanon. His seminal work, “The Wretched of the Earth,” the nuances of decolonization and the many pitfalls that can ensnare a nominally independent nation into neocolonial tendencies. Fanon cites a 1961 address delivered by the president of a newly decolonized Gabon, Léon M’ba, who declared: “Gabon is an independent country, but nothing has changed between Gabon and France, the status quo continues.” This bolsters Fanon’s overarching argument: All too often, independence for former colonies is only titular.  Although the context in which Fanon wrote “Wretched of the Earth” is much different from our own, I believe that his logic still applies today. The fanfare of “independence” continues to hide its nefarious undercurrents. For example, more than 60 years after its independence, Gabon is still inextricably linked to France. Gabonese presidents have been by French military forces against popular uprisings, and France still a military presence at Camp de Gaulle in Gabon’s capital city. From an economic standpoint, France continues to rely on and from extensive oil and uranium reserves in Gabon. Observing this troubling historical trend, I wondered if it applied to the 21 century Caribbean context as well. What has tangibly changed now that Barbados is a Republic with a Bajan as its head of state? Is this more than a symbolic removal of a figurehead, or will “the status quo continue?” An important addendum that was lost in the brouhaha of independence and Rihanna’s at the republic ceremony is that while Barbados may have removed Queen Elizabeth as its head of state, it remains a member of the Commonwealth of Nations. The Commonwealth, which against the backdrop of the British Empire’s decline, is a conglomeration of former British territories and presents itself as a promoter of economic prosperity, democratic values, and international peace. Although members of the Commonwealth are purportedly equal and no longer considered “dominions” of the Crown, they continue to swear allegiance to it. Since the era of decolonization, many former African, Asian, and Caribbean colonies have integrated themselves into this new Commonwealth of Nations. So, what is the relevance of this condensed history lesson? It is important to map this history to understand the colonial roots of this modern institution. However, while history informs the present, it does not define it. One should be careful in characterizing an institution as neocolonial simply because of its colonial past. Therefore, we must dig a little deeper into the nature of the Commonwealth. As colonialism was largely an economic project, the economics of the Commonwealth are extremely relevant. While all nations in the Commonwealth are technically equal, this equality is called into question when you consider the fact that British companies roughly $1 trillion worth of African gold, diamonds, oil, and other natural resources. And while one of the Commonwealth’s official economic goals is to “boost trade,” Afro-British writer Afua Hirsch argues that Britain has used the Commonwealth to “extractor friendly regimes, low corporate tax rates, and tax havens.” Essentially, Hirsch argues that Britain uses this historic institution to legally plunder Africa. And the data bears out Hirsch’s assertion: a 2017 study by a coalition of UK and African equality and development campaigners that even with international charity, Africa loses an average of $40 billion a year due to predatory debt policies and tax avoidance by multinational European-owned companies. Due to these objectively unequal monetary practices, it is not difficult to understand why Hirsch refers to the Commonwealth as “nothing but the British Empire 2.0.” While the African and Caribbean nations in the Commonwealth are no longer under direct rule, many argue that they are still being exploited by rapacious economic practices. How does this history and understanding of the Commonwealth’s economic imbalances inform the recent events in Barbados? Simply put: we should be critical. This is not to say that there shouldn’t be celebration. While removing Queen Elizabeth may have been a largely symbolic gesture, symbols are important. A symbolic event like the removal of a foreign monarch as head of state sends a powerful message. I firmly believe that seeing a Black woman as head of state will inspire the younger generation of Bajans. However, we should not allow symbols to cloud our judgment or analysis because this can all too easily lead to complacency and acceptance of an inequitable status quo. Former empires like Britain and France have built their wealth at the expense of these territories, and they continue to profit off of their economic dependency. Yes, Queen Elizabeth may no longer be its head of state, but Barbados has yet to fully escape the grasp of its former colonizer. Thus, it is imperative that we hold a nuanced view. We can simultaneously laud Barbados for taking a huge step forward while also acknowledging that there is still much work to be done.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/the-newest-republic/

Summer 2015 Postcard

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“All our final decisions are made in a state of mind that is not going to last.” –Marcel Proust, Last night, I decided to go to law school. This morning, I resolved to pursue a career in diplomacy. And all of this afternoon, I have been agonizing over whether I should eventually settle down in Paris or New York. While I have been fastidiously planning out the rest of my life, I have been battling inconvenient mood swings and overly dramatic emotions that threaten to derail my carefully cultivated focus on the future. I fight to quiet daydreams that spring naturally from people-watching the crowds streaming past café windows, because I really should be finishing an assignment. After a run, I don’t allow myself to linger by the river and watch until the last traces of sunset fade away, because I really should be preparing for bed. And, as I finally lie down far later than I had intended to, I try not to wallow in the miseries of a bedroom that makes up for its lack of cool air with an abundance of outside noise, because I really should be getting some rest. It is much easier to resist the pull of idle contemplation, rapturous enjoyment, and all-consuming wretchedness when the Boston winter is equally numbing to your fingers and your senses. But in the summer, the slow pace and steady warmth of the world outside calls for meandering and melodramatic thinking. It seems most natural to languish in a lit patch of grass and let thoughts travel with clouds, sometimes in a gentle stream and sometimes in a desperate, wind-whipped escape. It is the time in which I can best relate to the tortuously slow growing pains of Marcel Proust’s unnamed narrator of Proust’s narrator can be frustratingly petty, self-pitying, and sensitive. Especially in , in which he is sixteen and confused and in love with every girl around him, he is especially hard to bear. But, as my own summers become more about working and planning and worrying and less about thinking and sulking and wondering at beautiful things, Proust’s earnest exploration of adolescent angst becomes a reminder of what I am missing. Proust’s narrator is sixteen and I am twenty, and I would like to think that I have moved past much of the childish selfishness that makes him so indolent and insufferable to read about. But I have not moved past the constant confusion and contemplation and the occasional off-putting candidness that redeems him. I fall in love with a lot of ill-advised sights and ideas and feelings in a state of mind that cannot last. In the winter, these ideas freeze over with some semblance of permanence. But in the summer, it’s easier to let them melt away. Pexels

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/summer-2015-postcard/

In Horton Hears a Who, the Dr. Seuss You Never Knew!

Author

Dr. Seuss has achieved what few artists have: his sixty-one children’s books, from   (1938) to   (1990) have captivated millions of children’s hearts and their parents’ too. Dr. Seuss’s characters are charismatic, entertaining, and imaginative. Who doesn’t recognize the Grinch, the elephant Horton, or the Cat in the Hat? Their names evoke fond memories of some of our favorite childhood two-dimensional friends and cozy reading time with family. In these children’s picture books, Dr. Seuss’s world is bizarrely fun and yet outlandishly harmonious. It’s the  place where Whos, elephants, tigers, kangaroos, monkeys, and eagles can cavort together, all within the span of a few pages. The fact that his picture books are imaginative and fun, however, does not ensure that Dr. Seuss’ books lack serious substance. On the contrary, they carry important messages for their young readers. His picture books accomplish a two-fold purpose: teaching words to beginning readers and moral lessons to young citizens. In  , for instance, after the Grinch has successfully made away with all the Whos’ Christmas gifts and decorations, he does not succeed in actually stopping Christmas. Instead, “every Who down in Who-ville, the tall and the small, was singing! Without any presents at all!” Their joy cured his “two sizes too small” heart, and he returned all the stolen goods and joined the Whos’ merry party. Beneath the otherworldly plot, then, are accessible messages of communal joy and forgiveness. Among these positive messages, though, embracing diversity is perhaps the single most salient one embedded in many of Dr. Seuss’s books. In  , Dr. Seuss lists all kinds of feet, including “red feet, black feet…slow feet, quick feet, trick feet, [and] sick feet.” This may be a convenient way to introduce some basic descriptive adjectives, but it’s also a means to show children that feet are feet no matter how they look—a lesson easily extrapolated to people. As Seuss observes in  , “a person’s a person, no matter how small.” In this case, even if a person is invisible to everyone but Horton, with effort they can make their voices heard by all. However, Dr. Seuss had more than one audience: he also drew cartoons intended for adults. Before becoming a world-famous children’s book writer and illustrator, Dr. Seuss landed his first jobs as a magazine cartoonist and ad illustrator in the late ‘20s to ‘30s. During World War II, as the chief editorial cartoonist for the New York newspaper  , and a writer and illustrator at the humor magazine  , he drew over 400 cartoons promoting America’s political interests. He even joined the Army in 1943 and led the Animation Department of the First Motion Picture Unit for the Army Air Forces. Recently, I visited the   of Dr. Seuss’s war-time cartoons. Clicking through hundreds of his political cartoons, I was outraged, saddened, and confused. Many of his drawings depicted the Japanese people in a way that, most people today would agree, is extremely offensive. In a cartoon published on August 4, 1941 in  , for instance, the Japanese are depicted as silk worms under the direction of an evil looking, pig-faced then Japanese Prime Minister Hideki Tojo. In another cartoon that appeared in   three days after the Japanese Navy attacked the US naval base at Pearl Harbor, the Japanese were depicted as vicious alley cats poised to attack. It’s true that these images of the Japanese were only intended to be of the soldiers who participated in the war with the U.S. But in his February 13, 1942 cartoon titled “Waiting for the signal from home…”, the generic image of the Japanese was extended to all the people of Japan. All of them wore the same slanted eye sneer, an identical caricature of Tojo, as they lined up to receive explosives. This implied a direct threat to America by all who looked Japanese, even those within the U.S.’ borders. Art, it’s clear, can prompt moral panics, especially during wartime. In wartime cartoons like those drawn by Dr. Seuss, the Japanese people were deprived of their individual identities. They were instead assigned a collective, stereotyped identity that reflected the fear and hatred many Americans directed against the Japanese after Pearl Harbor. They were guilty by ethnicity. When we recall the Holocaust, the unspeakably hateful actions enacted by many ordinary people, we can also look back to the anti-Jewish propaganda art created by the Nazis in the ‘30s and ‘40s. The dehumanization and stereotypical depictions of Jewish people sensitized people to a mindset that would allow systematic killing by the millions years later. Art aided in the war effort against innocent people even more effectively than bullets. What’s most disheartening, perhaps, is that Dr. Seuss’s depictions were   Even though Germany was allied with Japan against the U.S., Dr. Seuss’s portrayals of Germany were, to be sure, comparatively  subdued: the evil Hitler was portrayed as acting alone, with no other German clones assembled near him in the drawings. There was no indication of German Americans’ being lined up in order to blow up American cities. The alienation of an entire country’s people was not present in the cartoons. The care Dr. Seuss took to distinguish Hitler from German Americans was absent in his treatment of Japanese Americans. Moreover, Dr. Seuss included racially discriminatory slurs and harmful stereotypical terms toward Asian Americans in his many such cartoons. A cartoon printed in December 1941 depicts a sinking cat labeled JAPAN holding onto a sign that reads, in all caps, “Beware! I can be velly dangerous when aroused!” Another depicts French politician Pierre Laval saying, “Doc, give my eyes a bit of a slant, I’ve joined the Japanese Navy.” Throughout these cartoons, Japanese people were consistently referred to as “Japs”, and their words written in broken English. Cartoons like those created during the war helped garner popular support for policies such as the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. Seeing these cartoons was like stepping into a nightmarish perversion of Seussville. I wanted to look away and never think about them again. That was what many people did, even scholars of Dr. Seuss’ work. Many books on Dr. Seuss’s works devote all of their pages to his children’s books and other paintings without any mention of his racial cartoons. But we should not look away just because what we might see is ugly. In fact, even a sideway glimpse is simply not enough. In  , Charles D. Cohen explains Dr. Seuss’ rationale for these cartoons as a reflection of what “the populace” was doing at the time. This explanation is unconvincing to say the least. In Richard H. Minear’s 1999 book about Dr. Seuss’s WWII editorial cartoons,  , we are reminded of Dr. Seuss’s anti-Fascist   cartoons in 1941 and 1942, of which it has been said, “if they have a flaw, it’s an absolutely endearing one: they’re funny.” But we know today that the racial cartoons Dr. Seuss drew are not so funny after all. The fact that Dr. Seuss never publicly apologized to the Japanese people only adds insult to injury. It is said that in 1954, Dr. Seuss did make an indirect attempt to apologize to the Japanese through his book  . Like many of his children’s books,  championed tolerance and sticking up for those whose rights are not recognized. However, his only reference to the Japanese people was a scrawled dedication to his “Great Friend, Mitsugi Nakamura of Kyoto, Japan”. Examining these racially charged cartoons is important. They are emblematic of the types of portrayals of Asian Americans that lent credibility to harmful, problematic stereotypes that persist today. Dr. Seuss’s powerful penciled lines and brushstrokes lent his cartoons even more clout in the political sphere, and to harmful effect. They remind us, in short, of the interplay between art and politics. Yet something fundamentally changed in Dr. Seuss’s artistic works after the war. His wartime political views did not seep into his children’s books. The reason for this paradigmatic shift is unknown. However, questionable racial expressions can be spotted here or there, e.g. in  , Seuss writes the line, “with helpers who all wear their eyes at a slant,” and in  , “a Chinese man who eats with sticks.” The accompanying image similarly depicts a generic Asian man in some version of what is supposed to be traditional garb, with slants for eyes. Can drawings for children serve to purify what an artist chooses to portray? For Dr. Seuss,  the answer is yes. In a 1949 writer’s conference at the University of Utah, Dr. Seuss elaborated on his creative process: A man with two heads is not a story. It is a situation to be built upon logically. He must have two hats and two toothbrushes. Don’t go wild with hair made of purple seaweed, or live fireflies for eyeballs…Children analyze fantasy. They know you’re kidding them. There’s got to be logic in the way you kid them. Their fun is pretending…making believe they believe it. Dr. Seuss nominally aimed to create a fantasy world that was different from the one in which he lived. That world was supposed to be a far better one, a world for children’s eyes, but still, a world that made sense. We do not know whether Dr. Seuss approached his later work with the intention of absolving himself for his wartime propaganda, yet there is one certainty: racially tinged remarks could find their way into that world, but they belonged on the sidelines, if at all. Now, when I open my favorite Dr. Seuss books, I will myself to imagine a more conscientious Dr. Seuss, pencil and brush in hand, staring at the canvas with resolution—a Dr. Seuss who would be committed to purging racial prejudice from his art at all costs. That Dr. Seuss would draw a line and never cross it.  

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/oh-dr-seuss-didnt-know/

The Diverse Femininity of Disney Princesses

Sophia Weng

I am not ashamed to say that I love Disney princesses.  When I was growing up on the Internet in the mid-2010s, social media sites like Tumblr and Youtube saw a concentrated backlash toward everything feminine. It was a status symbol not to be like the “other girls,” and young women of my generation frequently felt the need to reject femininity to assure themselves of their value. During this time, I also rejected my femininity. I decided that I hated the color pink and everything associated with it. I wore cargo shorts to class every day in 6th grade. I scoffed at anyone who loved boy bands. I internalized the idea that the culture of adolescent femininity was inherently shameful, and that I could be better than other women if I rejected it. Disney princesses were branded anti-feminist. The Disney princess is a girl who talks to animals, has a terrible relationship with her stepmother, and waits for a man to save her. She is seen as having no agency, no ambition, and, most of all, she is unwaveringly feminine. Part of growing up as a woman is learning to love the color pink. For me, it was learning to love the Disney princesses, despite the cultural shame associated with a young womanhood. Over the course of my life, I’ve identified with many different princesses, and as new princesses enter the Disney canon, I’ve come to appreciate them too. I love Disney princesses for what they represent: an expansive definition of femininity. Femininity is the set of qualities and attributes associated with being a woman. It is not a stretch to say that we learn how to be part of society through the media that we consume. Since we learn femininity from the media, and the media is ever-changing, femininity is an expansive construct. Disney princesses showcase a diverse range of traits and ambitions through every generation of “Princess.” Disney princesses subvert the notion that there is one kind of strength, and that strength and femininity are mutually exclusive. Ultimately, Disney princesses taught me that there are many ways to become a woman. The best way to understand how Disney princesses showcase feminine diversity is to compare them with fictional role models for young boys. In his TED Talk “How Movies teach Manhood,” Colin Stokes movies directed at young men as “war movies,” in which young men are told that problems can be overcome by hitting them really hard. “Hitting things really hard” is the ideal of masculine strength, and male characters are assumed to be strong. Media role models for young boys are almost always technically skilled and physically competent and good leaders. In contrast to masculine strength, each Disney princess demonstrates different kinds of strength beyond the physical or technical, including strengths like empathy, fortitude, perseverance, curiosity, creativity, flexibility, and kindness. Disney princesses are most frequently critiqued for their supposed “passivity,” especially early princesses like Snow White and Cinderella. And yet, these princesses demonstrate strength, but their strengths are not traditionally masculine. Snow White is compassionate and caring, which draws others to help her. She may wait around for a prince to appear, but she also survives on her own, fleeing from an abusive stepmother. Cinderella, in contrast, does not actively break out of her situation because, like many victims of abuse, it’s not as simple for her as just leaving. Despite her step-family’s abuse, Cinderella maintains her kindness to those around her. It is easy to be angry in the face of adversity. It is difficult to be kind. Even in a film like “Mulan” that takes place against the backdrop of war, in which its titular character quite literally punches her problems, the creativity and leadership that Mulan show subvert traditional ideas of masculine strength. At the end of the movie, she leads her male compatriots to defeat the villain of the story by dressing up as women and using the skills she’s learned to embrace her feminine strength within the context of the army.  Princess Tiana is hard working and ambitious. Ariel is explorative and curious. Belle isn’t afraid to be her true self. Princess Jasmine defies her objectification. Moana is insightful and chooses her own path. Raya is relentless and learns to lead. In contrast to the role models for young boys, the Disney princesses are unique and display different kinds of strengths and weaknesses, demonstrating through the media that there are many ways to be a woman.  Disney still has so much work to do to accommodate different cultures, races, body types, sexualities, and abilities into their canon of femininity to demonstrate how many different types of people can be women. Disney princess films are also notorious for centralizing heterosexual relationships and avoiding queer representation.  We must condemn these failures on behalf of the Disney company and keep demanding new stories that reflect the individuals in society.  The new shift in Disney movies is to critique the previous princesses. Movies like Moana, Raya, and even Wreck-It Ralph get rid of the love interests and stereotype previous generations of princesses as women simply waiting around for a man to save them. This criticism, however, ignores the kinds of feminine strength that the early princesses possess and how many types of femininity can be strong. Love interests themselves are also not a bad thing, as long as they respect and support the women of their stories, which the Disney princes absolutely do. At almost 20 years old, I’m now older than most of the Disney princesses. Watching the Disney princesses growing up became key in understanding myself as a young woman, since it was such an important part of my media diet growing up. Since almost all of the princesses are in their teens, which is when women are predominantly being socialized as women, it was particularly informative to have these role models. I haven’t unified a kingdom, napped for 100 years, or found my prince or princess charming, but I did become a woman, as Simone de Beauvoir might say. As a queer woman who rejected femininity for points in my life because I did not identify with traditional ideas of womanhood, I needed both Cinderella’s kindness and Mulan’s bravery to show me that I can be both strong and feminine. Women deserve to have role models who can be many different things, because we are not meant to fit into boxes. We need to have a diversity of conceptions of femininity to look toward in the media. Although they have a long way to go before achieving true diversity, Disney princesses represent many varieties of femininity and make for outstanding role models. The original artwork for this article was created by Harvard College student Duncan Glew for the exclusive use of the HPR.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/femininity-disney-princesses/

If I Wanted Your Opinion, I Would’ve Asked

Liz Benecchi

“You’d be prettier if you smiled.”  I might have expected this comment from an older man back in my Southern hometown. However, I was taken aback hearing it at Harvard, arguably one of the most liberal institutions in the country. In that moment, I’m not sure what I was particularly thinking about — maybe my family, maybe schoolwork, or maybe I was just daydreaming. But one thing was for certain: I was not thinking about how my appearance might be perceived by other people. As I walk down the street on my day-to-day, I don’t think about my image. My goal isn’t to look pretty — it’s to get from Point A to Point B.  Still, don’t get me wrong. I want others to feel comfortable when they’re around me, and I definitely believe in the positive power of a smile to transform someone’s day for the better. Although, I’d argue that the perception of my beauty has nothing to do with anyone else’s comfortability. It got me thinking — what inspired him to say this? Was he just trying to cheer me up? Regardless of his intentions, it rubbed me the wrong way. I imagine this man was not trying to be malicious or disrespectful, but I also don’t think that he knew just how much his words would affect me.  Scientifically speaking, smiling has a positive impact on mental health, even if you it. Smiles spur the release of dopamine and serotonin within the brain, chemical reactions that levels of stress and increase feelings of happiness. However, his comment still wasn’t appropriate, even if it was intended to make me feel happier. Comments of this nature are rooted in a sexist power dynamic, and asking women to smile discreetly reinforces the patriarchy. Patriarchy is as a “social system in which power is held by men.” American history is highly representative of this phenomenon. For centuries, men have tried to control women. At first, it was prohibiting women from owning land, followed by barring women from voting, and now, the patriarchy manifests itself through limiting access to reproductive healthcare.  In the context of these more significant issues, this arguably insignificant comment struck a nerve. Just because men have historically been awarded power doesn’t mean that they have the authority to criticize our appearances and actions. Unsurprisingly, that man’s comment wasn’t the first time I was told to smile, and my experiences are not isolated instances. After Hillary Clinton’s primary victories in 2016, Joe Scarborough at her, “Smile. You just had a big night.” In the political sphere, men often comment on female appearances. Tucker Carlson Nancy Pelosi to Michael Jackson in a low-blow regarding her physical image. Donald Trump insulted Carly Fiorina, a 2016 Presidential candidate, , “look at that face. Would anybody vote for that?” Comparatively, mens’ physical characteristics are critiqued substantially less. My male peers aren’t frequently told, “you’d be more handsome if you smiled.” Although it’s clear that, regardless of gender, public officials are lightning rods for judgment and criticism, compared to their male counterparts, female figures have to unfairly deal with the additional scrutiny of their physical appearances. Oftentimes, digs made toward female politicians are directed at their physical appearances rather than toward the quality of their policies or decision-making abilities. The degradation of female officials, and women more generally, is harmful, not only on an individual level, but on a societal one as well. If we don’t universally establish the understanding that men shouldn’t vocally criticize women’s bodies, the devaluation of women within our society will persist. When gender-based discrimination is embedded into culture, it becomes a more difficult obstacle for women to tackle. While technically under Title VII, discrimination in the workplace is still a reality for many women, and it disproportionately women of color and those within the LGBTQ+ community. 48% of women that they have experienced unwelcome sexual advances or verbal harassment at work, and that more than two-thirds of Americans that sexual harassment occurs in most workplaces. These experiences and remarks are nothing short of traumatizing. In terms of productivity, the perception of female beauty is simply a waste of time. Over a lifetime, women, on average, will individually 3,276 hours to grooming, while men only devote 1,092 hours. This means that women spend three times as long as men on their physical appearance. While many women, including myself, mostly dress for personal satisfaction, I’m sure I’d waste significantly less time on my appearance if it wasn’t getting overanalyzed and critiqued regularly. Ultimately, with all this lost time, I’m led to wonder what discoveries could have been made, but weren’t, and what could have been done, but wasn’t. Commenting on female attractiveness is inherently demeaning, especially when unsolicited. Whether it’s expressing unnecessary concern someone’s body or what’s someone’s body, needless remarks can be unsettling, even without malintent. So please, don’t ask me to smile — I’m not going to change myself for your satisfaction. This Women’s History Month, and from here on out, if anyone tells me that a smile would make me prettier, I’ll promptly tell them to mind their own business. If I wanted your opinion, I would’ve asked. The original artwork for this article was created by Harvard College student Duncan Glew for the exclusive use of the HPR.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/i-wouldve-asked/

The Role of Thought in the Fight For Gender Equality

Elise Hawkins

Last year, my seventy-eight-year-old grandmother started a salon. Twice a month, she would invite eight of her closest female friends to her house in northern Maine to discuss politics and ideas over tea. The salon was specifically dedicated to talking through issues of gender inequity, exploring it through the lens of more manageable topics like “wokeness” and feminism. There were only two rules. First, to buffer the friction of the wide range of political ideologies present, every perspective had to be taken seriously. Second, and most importantly, men were never to be admitted. From the get-go, the second rule struck me as odd. If the very purpose of these meetings was to appreciate alternative ideas, why should half of the population be barred from joining? If anything, their inclusion would invite a more diverse set of perspectives and consequently push the conversation further. When I asked her about this rule over dinner one night, with my grandfather bobbing his head in agreement, my grandmother firmly responded: “Because we can.”   First, it was Betty Friedan. In her 1963 book “The Feminine Mystique,” Freidan identified the “problem that had no name:” There is no blueprint for what constitutes femininity. The idealized image of a happy housewife is neither the only manifestation of womanhood nor a fixed mechanism by which a woman achieves fulfillment. Rather, Friedan demanded that women be freed from the mental and physical confines of their house. Friedan capitalized upon the anger generated by World War II — and the transient freedom granted to women —  to catalyze the Women’s Liberation Movement into relevancy.  The rejection of conventionality that she popularized in her book, however, was neither a groundbreaking nor revolutionary idea. When I first read “The Feminine Mystique,” I couldn’t understand the outsized impact of her writing given the rudimentary nature of her claim. If you consider yourself to be grounded in the ideal of freedom of opportunity, a central tenet to American political ideology, shouldn’t all people agree that women must be free to aspire to more than housework? Why, then, was her book so revolutionary?  In the 50s and 60s, an era that needed a unified and cogent message, Friedan dared to offer her own. Growing dissent regarding gender inequity was intellectually repressed. Any isolated woman’s expression of discontent with life as a housewife invited public disapproval. The man would cry: “How you not appreciate your children?” and “how can you be not to appreciate the luxuries that I provide?” Betty Friedan validated the thoughts of the majority by turning to one of the only methods through which women could have unimpeded access to the public: writing. She ignited an intellectual revolution, coalescing and consolidating the thoughts of many around the words of one. Women had been conditioned to obey rather than think for so long that when a single banal book invited them to challenge the nature of their inequality, the push towards equality was kickstarted. Friedan fomented the Women’s Liberation Movement by carving out a space devoted to understanding marginalization and consequently articulated the thoughts of the movement. While powerful, Friedman’s book would never be enough. She focused myopically on the privileged: the White, wealthy, and heterosexual. The crux of her argument itself, that women should be liberated to join the workforce, is a gross misunderstanding of reality: One-third of the female population was working, in largely appalling conditions, out of necessity. Her model may speak for the privileged, but not the majority. Homophobic undertones and racist and classist assumptions meant the feminist movement needed far more to catalyze the world into equality.   Luckily, more critical perspectives came. In 2014, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie published “We Should All Be Feminists.” Her essay explores gender inequality through the lens of the seemingly negligible: being overlooked by the waiter when you eat at a restaurant, or the suffocating pressure of picking an outfit that balances professionalism with beauty. She picks up where leaders like Betty Friedan and Gloria Steinem left off and pushes the fight for gender equity into the 21st century by dismantling deeply embedded social constructs.  Adichie heralded a decisive shift in the fight for gender equality by focusing not on the exclusionary byproducts of inequality that fluctuate in accordance with class, race, or sexuality, but identified the universal root of the problem itself: Inequality, prejudice, and gendered power is a product of inveterate sociocultural constructs weaved into the fabric of society. The beauty of her analysis lies in its universality. The core of her argument can be extrapolated beyond a binary interpretation of gender to address the inequalities associated with sexuality in a gender-diverse world: Regardless of the specific prejudice’s manifestations, gender constructs need to be extracted, one-by-one, from the fabric of our society. Each time I revisit Adichie’s words, I feel like the key to our oppression is unlocked. The elusive nature of our oppression, the prejudices that permeate our lives, and the assumptions we internalize are finally synthesized into its raw, rudimentary truth.  To engage in this expansive culture shift, Adichie places the burden of activism on the individual by reclaiming and refocusing feminism to include us all. In the early 2000s, a sort of collective memory disorder fell upon the word “feminism,” rendering it synonymous with radical, disruptive change that aimed to reverse the gender hierarchy. As a result, the world was needlessly ruptured into its supporters and opponents. Even those in favor of the ideals that undergird the feminist movement believed themselves to be anti-feminist not because they were against its values, but rather against its stigma. Adichie mends the cleavages of the movement by by uniting the word with its simple roots: A feminist is anyone who acknowledges the problems associated with gender inequality today and resolves to address them. Feminism can be masculine; it can be mainstream; it can be kind; and it is inclusive. In reuniting feminism with its inclusionary origins, Adichie implores us to be the vehicle of change because we are part of the movement.  If there is one thing that has pushed the fight for gender equity forward in the ways that Friedan and Adichie articulated, it’s the existence of spaces dedicated to thinking through the nature of marginalization. I now understand that this is the purpose of my grandmother’s salon. Without understanding one’s oppression, liberation is not a goal; it is merely a dream. Her decision to bar men was not borne from spite or bitterness, but was rather an attempt to free women from the stereotypes perpetuated and reinforced by men: The polite woman, the deferential wife, the submissive daughter. For women, a history of intellectual repression weighs upon their shoulders, whispering in their ears that the man commands while the woman obeys. The woman is told: “Cross your legs,” “cover-up,”, “be quiet.” We were commanded for so long that the power of thought slipped through our fingers. The language of the repressed is silence. But, slowly, we are breaking free. The end has not yet arrived. On the most fundamental level, the conversation about gender inequality needs to be expanded to explicitly confront the prejudices associated with a more gender fluid society. Gendered power will never end if the conversation isn’t representative of the people it tries to help. The stats about gender inequality today are all too well known: The gender pay gap still hovers around 77 cents per dollar, transgendered people are four times more likely to live under the poverty line, and women constitute less than 25% of all national parliaments. Of course, change will not come without action. But, articulating the goals of the movement is the first step in translating ideas into action. We must carry on the legacy forged by activists like Friedan and Adichie by continuing to think, write, and analyze the state of our current inequalities. In doing so, we are reclaiming the very thing once stripped of us: the confidence and freedom to think. My grandmother started her salon so that women could have a sacred place dedicated to thought. She is engaging in the same principled behavior as Friedan and Adichie that catalyzed equality into a not-so-far-off reality. If my grandmother can do it, we all can; and we all must. The original artwork for this article was created by Harvard College student Duncan Glew for the exclusive use of the HPR.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/thought-gender-equality/

Girlboss, Gaslight, Gatekeep: Feminism in a Capitalistic World

Muskaan Arshad

“I want to be a billionaire.” My friend demanded an answer. “How?”  “Maybe I’ll go to Trump University,” I responded with a laugh. Though this conversation took place years ago during junior high school, I can still recite it from memory. Maybe because it still stands to date as one of the funniest jokes I’ve ever made. I recall it now because it so perfectly my neoliberal belief system at the time. “Liberal,” because I disliked the conservative extremism of Trump and his followers. However, I still trusted in a capitalistic system and looked at most political issues, such as feminism, through this economic lens.  I was quite infatuated with choice feminism. I wanted to be a “#girlboss.” The term is as “the melding of professional self, identity, and capitalist aspiration.” I wanted to become a billionaire CEO of a company, not because I knew what such a job would entail, but because that was what I was told I should become; the money didn’t hurt. CEO was the pinnacle of success within a capitalistic system. Why wouldn’t I want to reach the apex of society? Even though the upper echelon of corporate spaces are exclusively designed for White men, I wanted to carve out a spot for myself. My parents would often share with me speeches by corporate leaders such as Indra Nooyi, the CEO of the PepsiCo corporation. Success, for a brown woman like her and myself, was to occupy a space that had been historically reserved for White men. In my mind, feminism was about breaking the glass ceiling. Although, at first glance, this sounds empowering, I grappled with the following question: Would my personal, corporate success benefit any other woman’s well-being? Capitalism is defined by its reliance on individuality. Choice feminism an unmistakable parallel to capitalism with its investment in individuality by “encouraging women to embrace the opportunities they have in life and to see the choices they make as justified and always politically acceptable.” “Girl-bossing” is an extension of choice feminism within the corporate world, mutating feminism into a personal rather than a collective, liberatory issue for women of all stripes. Indra Nooyi, my parents’ favorite role model, is a perfect example of this phenomenon. Although she girl-bossed her way to the top, her success hasn’t had a positive impact on women or people in general. In fact, under her leadership, Pepsico has multiple allegations of human rights violations within the production process and was to be lobbying against crucial public health measures across the country. Neither of these instances can be branded as a positive contribution to women or society in general. Is it inherently feminist to become a CEO of a large multinational corporation? Should personal success within an oppressive capitalistic system be the final goal of feminism? Indra Nooyi’s example makes the answer clear: No. One may argue that these female CEOs are empowered to make the choices that they do, which could be perceived as “feminist.” But the reality is that their choices aren’t made in a vacuum. The ethical value of their choices are defined by their impact on the collective rather than the individual. choice feminism through the lens of utilitarianism, it becomes clear that choice feminism is morally reprehensible because of its selfish nature. This example elucidates the importance of assessing a choice’s collective impact on the majority when determining its feministic qualities. The collective impact of choice feminism and — by extension — girlboss feminism is highly problematic. Natalie Jovanovski, a sociologist at Swinburne University of Technology in Australia, that choice feminism “doesn’t demand significant social change, and [it] effectively undermines calls for collective action. Basically, it asks nothing of you and delivers nothing in return.”  Since choice feminism is rooted in individualism, it’s also intrisically tied to capitalism and lacks a deep analysis of how class and race intersect with gender. We continue the status quo, an inherently unjust capitalistic society, under the guise of gender equality. Although girl-bossing is perceived positively due to the replacement of White men as corporate leaders, womanhood should not be defined in opposition to masculinity. As the late Prime Minister of India Indira Gandhi , “to be liberated, woman must feel free to be herself, not in rivalry to man but in the context of her own capacity and her personality.”  Equality with men, within a problematic capitalistic system, isn’t something we should aspire to. Aeon reporter Livia Gershon that “​​for many working-class women today, full equality with their male peers would still mean stagnant wages and unstable jobs with erratic hours.” Gender equality in the context of significant socioeconomic disparities is inadequate.  Furthermore, choice and girlboss feminism don’t adequately address racialized misogyny. Much of the discrimination Black and brown women face stems from their intersectional identities as women of color. As the United Nations (UN) entity “UN Women” so aptly it, “long histories of violence and systematic discrimination have created deep inequities that disadvantage some from the outset.” Choice feminism’s roots in capitalism does not address any of the unique oppressions women of color face, and instead benefits and upholds the very systems that perpetuate these inequalities in the first place.  Through promoting a single woman’s choice and autonomy, we undercut efforts to act collectively and undermine the systems that actively oppress us. Choice feminism and its weaponization won’t mitigate violence against women or counter unequal access to contraception and abortion. Instead, choice feminism in the form of “Girlbossification” prioritizes individual success at the extreme detriment of other women. It maintains oppressive policies that negatively impact communities of color and low-income individuals.  Simply put, equality and individual success aren’t enough. I want collective liberation. The original artwork for this article was created by Harvard College student Duncan Glew for the exclusive use of the HPR.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/girlboss-gaslight-gatekeep/

Girls, Gender Equity, and Global Affairs

Shriya Yarlagadda

Sitting in a dark auditorium packed with thousands of other nervous middle schoolers, I clutched my teammate’s arm in excitement. I was at the 2016 VEX Robotics World Championship alongside my all-girls robotics team called “Major Trouble,” which was created to provide a supportive community for girls at my middle school.  Suddenly, the auditorium spotlights turned on, shining brightly on the stage. They revealed Debbie Sterling, the TIME “Person of the Moment,” Presidential Ambassador for Global Entrepreneurship, and founder and CEO of GoldieBlox, a company dedicated to making toys geared towards girls that teach basic science and engineering concepts. While standing in front of a screen reading “Girls ♡ Robots,” she urged the audience to “encourage more girls to come into this community.” After facing a year of taunts from male classmates, who often attributed my team’s successes to “brownie points” from judges for being girls, this was exactly what my younger self needed. I recognized that I belonged in a space dominated by men, and that this affirmation was backed by significant time and investment by major companies in the field. At the same time, however, it highlighted the paucity of institutional support and resources for young women in another space in which I grew up and have decided to pursue a career: global affairs. Long before my brief stint in STEM, I became enamored by geography. First exposed to the subject as a toddler while playing with our family globe, my curiosity about the world seemed never-ending. Between the ages of eight and 11, I invested copious hours into studying the discipline and went on to compete in numerous geography bees. Yet at nearly every competition I attended, I stood out due to my gender. Although National Geographic commissioned a study in 1996 to investigate this gap,  I was still only one of six girls (out of 54 state and territorial finalists) competing in the National Geographic Bee’s National Finals in 2015, nearly 20 years later. When the Bee coordinators informed me that this was the most girls at Nationals in recent memory, I was disturbed. Even after I stopped competing, I sought to understand the roots of this phenomenon.  The results of the 1996 National Geographic study that although girls and boys entered the National Geographic Bee in equal numbers, fewer girls qualified for the later stages of the competition. Scholars have largely this variation to males’ inherently greater spatial awareness skills, which is vital to the study of geography, suggesting that such a difference is a foregone conclusion. However, the notion of insurmountability neglects the fact that it’s entirely possible to one’s spatial abilities. Personally, I have tried to address this by mentoring young girls I know and sharing resources and tips that I learned. Yet, I have often been disheartened by how our societal paradigms fail to promote equity, with parents I’ve spoken to being more likely to see their sons than their daughters as geographers.  Although gender differences in childhood academic competitions may at first seem harmless, it should be seen as a pressing issue due to the broader implications of exposure to global affairs at a young age. In general, I firmly believe that exposure to geography provides a greater appreciation of the world, something that is beneficial for and should be accessible to all. However, encouraging girls to study geography could also possibly translate into increased gender equality within the field of global affairs. Personally, I’ve found that my passion for foreign policy stems from my early exposure to the study of geography. However, I am also consistently one of the only women participating in college policy discussion forums. And beyond college, this disparity is demonstrated in major foreign policy bodies. For example, in 2016, only 32.4% of Foreign Service officers affiliated with the Department of State were female. Yet, policymaking groups have that women often play a significant role in successfully executing policy. Especially given the Department of State’s recent of the First National Strategy on Gender Equality and Equity, which sees global gender equality as a “strategic imperative,” it is a travesty that more women are not involved in the policy creation process as well. However, I believe that this gap can and should be addressed in the same way it is being addressed in STEM fields — through working with young girls.  Of course, this does not mean that we should make toddlers dive head-first into the intricacies of geopolitics. Instead, we should be taking steps to ensure that young girls are exposed to the subject’s fundamentals. For instance, we could begin by dismantling societal phenomena that limit girls’ access to spatial awareness-building resources, such as the stereotypical association and of toys like building blocks and puzzles towards boys. Additionally, we could advocate for the increased inclusion of geography curricula into elementary schools, democratizing access to the subject instead of restricting it to those who are fortunate enough to gain exposure on their own.  Beyond this, however, girls would also benefit from recognizing that there is institutional support for the value of their presence in the global affairs community. As I sat in that stadium in 2016, I felt appreciated and empowered by the extensive support of VEX Corporation in my robotics enterprises. I’ve witnessed a welcome shift in the world of global affairs, including via Harvard student organizations like Harvard Undergraduate Foreign Policy Initiative (which recently hosted a Women in Foreign Policy Conference) and Harvard Undergraduate Women in Foreign Policy. Yet if National Geographic had enacted a similar counterpart to VEX’s Girl Powered initiative during my time competing in geography bees, it may have had a tangible impact on our societal conception of who belongs in global affairs. In the future, I hope to see such moves being made, as they are vital in actualizing the following now common adage: Women belong in all places where decisions are made. The original artwork for this article was created by Harvard College student Duncan Glew for the exclusive use of the HPR.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/gender-equity-global-affairs/

The Politics of Beauty: Yielding Beauty as a Woman of Color in STEM at Harvard

Shania Hurtado

My first computer science class at Harvard was a culture shock. Walking into CS20: Discrete Math in Computer Science, a class with 200+ people, I immediately felt alienated as a woman of color. The computer science department faculty didn’t look like me, and the students were mostly White and male. As a Latina woman in my 4-inch heeled boots, gold hoops, slicked ponytail, and dress, I felt completely out of place.  Many students in class had years of coding experience and had attended STEM-focused, well-resourced high schools. They navigated the CS20 course content with ease. Coming from a Texas public school of almost 4,000 students that was more than half Hispanic/Latino, I felt isolated and unsupported in classes with little diversity. I was confronting impostor syndrome like never before.  As an activist for gender equality, I was familiar with the exclusive nature of STEM, but I never experienced it like this. However, I soon realized that beauty and `confidence — core values for Venezuelan women — could be used to overcome obstacles in my STEM classes and at Harvard.  My mother’s red lipstick, gold hoops, and 4-inch heels demand respect. Her ability to command a room, even as she radiates kindness and love, always inspires me. Her internal sense of self worth and self love is impermeable. She channels this in every room she enters. As an immigrant woman in Texas, her power moves mountains. And for me, it means everything.  On a Thursday evening phone call, my mother told me, “Eres una guerrera, una guerrera Venezolana. Eres intocable y poderosa. Nunca lo olvides.” This translates to: “You are a warrior, a Venezuelan warrior. You are powerful and untouchable. Never forget that.”  In male-dominated spaces in Venezuelan culture, confidence and strength are tools through which women can empower themselves to become leaders. Beauty refers to inner determination and ambition, a high sense of self-worth and self-respect, and love and kindness toward others, which all serve as tools with which one can lead, inspire, and succeed. Beauty becomes political as women demand reverence in spaces historically led and dominated by men. Many Venezuelan women pursue careers in engineering and mathematics, leading in both the STEM world and in the communities to which they belong.  I realized the confidence and self-love of my mother – and of other women of color in my life – were unstoppable forces in each room that they entered. They utilized beauty as a form of garnering respect, believing in themselves, and showing up as their most authentic selves, regardless of what others believed.  I showed up as her. I showed up as the Latina from Texas – hoops, makeup, everything, confident in who she is, unstoppable in pursuing her dreams, and unapologetic in making mistakes, learning, and growing.  Head held high, I remembered my mother’s words and where I came from.  Channeling the Venezuelan women who came before me, and who continue to carve spaces for themselves in STEM and in the world, I enter my classes with a new perspective, leading conversations on class content, and unapologetically asking questions. My expressions of femininity, culture, and identity as a Latina are not mutually exclusive with studying STEM. I can wear hoops, pink eyeshadow, and high heels, while latex-ing psets, discussing proofs by strong induction, and dissecting Cantor’s diagonal argument.  After speaking with other Latina and BIPOC women in STEM, it’s clear that my feelings of isolation, frustration over lack of support, and impostor syndrome were universal, extending beyond the walls of Harvard. We are not alone. Women utilize STEM to change the communities to which they belong. We are multifaceted and multidimensional. Our unique perspectives better the STEM fields with which we engage, challenging and inspiring those around us. Holding on to the pieces of our identity that empower and move us is critical in assuaging impostor syndrome and other obstacles.  As my mother says: You are a warrior, never forget that.  The original artwork for this article was created by Harvard College student Duncan Glew for the exclusive use of the HPR.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/politics-of-beauty/

Punch Drunk: The Ban on Tackling in Ivy League Football and its Repercussions

Donovan Keene

In late February, the eight Ivy League football coaches unanimously chose to eliminate all full contact hitting in practices. The move I considered the to address brain injuries and trauma in football. After being formally affirmed by the Ivy League’s policy committee, athletic directors, and university presidents, this new rule will supplement existing limitations on full-contact practice frequency during the offseason and spring, which are among the most rigorous in collegiate football. Although the research on concussion prevention is relatively new, studies have explicitly shown that limits on full contact practice can . In the National Football League, concussions have declined during practices in both the preseason and regular season since 2012, when limits concerning the quantity of full contact practices were imposed. Medical director of the Concussion Legacy Foundation and co-director of the Center for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy at the Boston University School of Medicine that current research clearly “shows that you not only have fewer subconcussive hits, but also concussions.” While the evidence surrounding the benefits of limits on full contact is clear, the next step towards improving players’ safety is not. The elimination of full contact in practices for high school and collegiate athletes is an important measure; however, the introduction of more robust, controversial methods of injury reduction has complicated matters. Ivy League coaches’ decision to ban full contact in practices was largely inspired by Dartmouth head coach Buddy Teevens. Teevens eliminated full contact practices in 2010 in an attempt to reduce injuries, especially concussions, which atrophied players over the duration of the season and prevented them from playing in games. Currently, the Dartmouth football team hits tackling dummies and pads, including the “mobile virtual player,” or , which was strategically designed by former Big Green football and Dartmouth Rugby Football Club alumni at the Thayer School of Engineering. Coach Teevens told the HPR that the introduction of the mobile virtual player has simultaneously reduced head injuries and improved the team’s tackling, as the simulated player movement has enabled Dartmouth players to train at the same or an increased volume with less danger. “People look at it and say we’re nuts,” Teevens said, “but it’s kept my guys healthy. It hasn’t hurt our level of play. It’s actually .” Thus, changes like this can make it possible for players’ safety and health to improve without negatively affecting a team’s performance. Since Coach John Gagliardi of Division III St. John’s University in Minnesota opted to eliminate hitting in practice altogether, the team has won four national titles and 489 games. This is by far the . His “ ” philosophy includes players’ prohibition from tackling in practice, no whistles or yelling, no playbook, no roster cuts, and no required strength and conditioning workouts. Following in Gagliardi’s footsteps, a majority of coaches across the United States have eradicated the Oklahoma Drill—a drill testing players in confined full contact situations—as well as other drills requiring players to hit heads. Coaches’ measures to reduce contact in instances like these have alleviated repetitive subconcussive trauma. In an interview with Malcolm Gladwell in the , Dr. Cantu indicated that this trauma was especially evident among linemen and that “[weren’t] necessarily people with a high, recognized concussion history,” but “individuals who collided heads on every play repetitively doing this, year after year, under levels that were tolerable for them to continue to play.” Efforts at improving player safety in football are not exclusive to the professional and collegiate levels, as many youth leagues and high school football programs are undergoing similar adaptations. Started in 2013, the program actively promotes less contact in football practices. Supported by multiple NFL Hall of Famers and progressive-minded individuals from both medicine and football, Practice Like Pros has assisted efforts like those at Dartmouth, playing a critical role in mitigating the between professional, collegiate, and high school football. In high school, 60 to 75 percent of concussions occur on the practice field compared to only three percent in the NFL. Presently, Practice Like Pros is working towards change in high school football by focusing on . This strategy emphasizes converting all youth leagues to flag football before the ninth grade level, eliminating full contact in the off season, reporting symptoms of concussions to prevent second impacts, ensuring full-time trainers are on every team and EMS at each game, and studying catastrophic injury and maintaining a national brain tissue bank. Subsequent to the development of this program, dozens of states that control public school athletics have significantly reduced or eliminated contact in practice. Many Boys & Girls Clubs throughout America have taken additional measures to reduce the incidence of head trauma among children and young adults, shifting their emphasis from tackle football to flag football. In alignment with the mission of Practice Like Pros, Somerville Recreation programs from tackle to flag football for children in first through eighth grades after an increase in injuries and decline in enrollment. Somerville director of recreation and youth Jill Lathan stated in a press release that “the rise in injuries among young people playing contact football, both in game situations and during regular practices, demonstrates a need for us to reevaluate the programs we offer to our youngest residents.” A by the University of Wisconsin corroborates the effectiveness of contact limits on sports related concussions, claiming “the rate of SRC sustained in high school football practice was more than twice as high in the two seasons prior to a rule change limiting the amount and duration of full contact activities.” This , which removes full contact the first week of the season and limits it to 75 minutes the second week and 60 minutes in the following weeks, has witnessed the rate of concussions among football players drop by approximately half. Although this change received initial pushback by those directly involved in the game in fear of reduced preparation, improvements in player health and reports of increased team-wide success have abated concerns. Executive director of the Ivy League Robin Harris that these changes would alter the nature of the game in a late February statement: “We’re not trying to change the nature of the game, we’re just trying to make it safer.” One of the most recent suggestions to reduce brain trauma and concussions in competitive football is the “ ,” which “calls for the tackler to keep his head to the side while driving his shoulder into the thigh or chest of the runner.” This technique is derived from tackles made by rugby players. Assistant head coach of the Seattle Seahawks Rocky Seto, has noted that “It is safer and more effective than traditional methods while still packing a wallop.” After introducing the Seahawks’ Hawk Tackle to his players, 55-year-old Georgia Southern coach Willie Fritz’s team recorded their in 2014. These examples suggest that there are indeed methods to make the game safer without sacrificing performance. Furthermore, rules against hitting opponents in a defenseless position in the head have reduced concussions at all levels of play, according to NFL Competition Committee co-chair Rich McKay. Since this , there have been significant reductions in concussions and fines for illegal hits, evidenced by the 25 percent drop in total concussions from 2013 to 2014 and a 36 percent decline since 2012 in the NFL. Aside from the Hawk Tackle and measures to remove head-hits to defenseless players, one thought to prevent concussions and chronic traumatic encephalopathy is the . The idea has been suggested by students, parents, and medical professionals alike. While the elimination of football may remove the incidence of any football-related injury, especially in high school and collegiate athletics, it leaves a serious void—physically, emotionally, culturally, and socially. Universities and public education systems should indeed have the ability to regulate athletics in order to promote safety of participants. However, it should not be at the cost of a physical outlet, source of entertainment, and tradition of community for many. According to Michael Baumann of , while football has its cons, it can “ for players and fans alike, and serve as a welcome escape from the pressures of ordinary life.” Baumann adds that, “The sport cuts across distinctions of race, class, geography, and religion in a way few other U.S. institutions do, and everyone who participates reaps the benefits.” By respecting both players and the game, teams can ban tackling in practice and disprove the “that if you’re not working on these techniques and skills in practice, but asking the athlete to do it on Saturday in a game, then they are potentially predisposed to injury,” as Gagliardi of St. John’s has. The Ivy League’s elimination of full contact practices is certainly a step towards creating a safer environment for players. Admittedly, this rule change may affect how the game is played, as well as shape future safety reform, which could even bring about football’s demise. Nonetheless, the consideration of shutting down competitive football has immeasurable repercussions far beyond those directly involved in the sport, as football serves as a unifying force on college campuses throughout the United States, fostering community and pride in a population otherwise marked by its differences. Consequently, Harvard, the Ivy League, and football teams across the country should exercise cautious consideration in navigating the pathway to make football safer.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/tackling_ban/

The Strength of Street Knowledge

Author

The story of rap group N.W.A. begins with a pounding beat and a promise. “You are now about to witness the strength of street knowledge,” growls rapper Dr. Dre as the group’s debut 1988 album roars into anarchic life. The group’s five members—Dre, Ice Cube, Eazy-E, MC Ren, and DJ Yella—knew all about such “street knowledge.” They were only a few years removed from their former lives as dropouts and drug dealers in one of L.A.’s poorest suburbs. From the beginning, N.W.A.’s success has revolved around this appeal to authenticity. Within the genre of gangsta rap, which focuses on unsparing accounts of urban crime and violence, artists succeed or fail based upon background. Commonly regarded as the group that took gangsta rap mainstream, thus changing the course of hip-hop for over a decade, N.W.A. was unrivalled in its ability to narrate from experience. The group’s story was Hollywood-scale, from dealing drugs to dropping multiplatinum records in the span of two years. It was only natural that such a cinema-ready story would make its way to theatres. This summer saw the release of whose name references the aforementioned album. The film is in many ways a straightforward rags-to-riches biopic, hitting all the standard beats as it charts the group’s journey to stardom. Most biopics, though, maintain a certain distance from their subjects. makes no such claim—two of its protagonists, Dr. Dre and Ice Cube, also served as its executive producers, and the fictional Ice Cube is played by his real-life son, O’Shea Jackson. The film thus illustrates a curious trend: biopics that blur the line between fact and fiction through their proximity to their subjects. which openly dramatizes the events of Facebook’s founding only six years after these events occurred, is a relevant comparison. So is the flood of Steve Jobs biopics that have been released in the years following the Apple CEO’s death. If these films had been made a decade later, they might have been seen as more objective—but without such removal, they shape the narrative surrounding the people they portray in real time. Rather than commenting on, or even altering, their subjects’ legacies, these films play a role in creating them, trading point-for-point accuracy for narrative effect in the process. In the hands of the filmmakers, Mark Zuckerberg becomes an insecure, conniving nerd, and Jobs’ mythic qualities are taken to absurd extremes. Yet even these films were not produced by their own subjects. is singular: a work of self-created mythology by Dre and Ice Cube. And while they take pains not to depict their fictional selves as perfect—in one memorable scene, O’Shea as Ice Cube demolishes a music exec’s office with a baseball bat and his father’s signature scowl—they cannot help but emerge as heroes. Relying on their own credibility as witnesses, they continue to tell their own story just the way they want it to be told. For many, however, that story remains inadequate. Jerry Heller, the group’s former manager, is presented in the film as manipulative, divisive, and ultimately responsible for N.W.A.’s eventual breakup. The real-life Heller, when interviewed by the refused to comment on his role in the film other than state that “… I think sooner or later it may be part of an ongoing litigation.” More serious are the film’s omissions of past misogyny, a frequent criticism in the wake of its release. In August, Gawker published an editorial by female rapper Dee Barnes, titled “Here’s What’s Missing From Straight Outta Compton: Me and the Other Women Dr. Dre Beat Up.” Barnes describes Dre violently assaulting her at a record release party in 1991. Dre allegedly grabbed her and slammed her head into a wall over and over, resulting in chronic migraines from which she claims to still suffer. gives no indication that this incident ever occurred “Like many of the women that knew and worked with N.W.A.,” Barnes writes, “I found myself a casualty of ’s revisionist history.” Her account mirrors those of others, from Dre’s former girlfriend Michel’e to musician Tairrie B. All recall incidents of physical violence at Dre’s hands—violence that references only in passing. In the film, the fictional Dre shrugs off a criticism about his assault charges, and the subject is never mentioned again. It’s hard not to see this as a knowing deflection on the filmmakers’ part, an act of lip service that preempts criticism. Unfortunately for Dre, this omission has had precisely the opposite effect. Barnes’s article prompted an online frenzy, forcing him to publicly apologize in : “I apologize to the women I’ve hurt. I deeply regret what I did and know that it has forever impacted all of our lives.” The film, in its attempt to sweep Dre’s mistakes under the rug, instead caused them to blow up in his face. So emerges the double bind: Should Dre and Ice Cube have included the darker aspects of N.W.A.’s rise to fame, at the potential expense of their public images? Doing so would certainly have resulted in a more balanced film. Yet it also seems unrealistic to demand this degree of candor from them. after all, is the story of their own lives—and no one is the villain in their own narrative. The film cannot have it both ways. Some events are too ugly to be reconciled with heroism. Given the producers’ self-promotional goals, we are left to wonder: Should they have been given this responsibility to begin with? The grand scale of the N.W.A. story makes its Hollywood adaptation inevitable—and just like its namesake album, draws much of its appeal from Dre’s and Ice Cube’s “street knowledge ” After all, they were there as witnesses. Yet in this case, N.W.A.’s proximity has been as much a curse as a blessing. Had its producers recognized the dangers of this proximity, they might have adopted a more hands-off approach to the movie’s production, or even excused themselves all together. For over twenty years, N.W.A’s members have leaned on the strength of their own “street knowledge.” Perhaps this time, they should have stepped back, recognizing that that their story deserved something more than just strength: the truth.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/the-strength-of-street-knowledge/

Fleabag: An Unlikely Bible for a Brown Girl

Annika Inampudi

I’m scrunched up in a fetal position on the floor of my childhood bedroom, tufts of carpet imprinting in my face. On the dusty, fingerprint-stained screen of my laptop: Fleabag is staring at me in one of her trademarked fourth wall breaks. And I am looking right back. Eye to eye. In a few minutes, I will be crying. My lungs will fill with the kind of air that only lives between close friends. In a few minutes, the series will end, the screen will fade to black. But I don’t know that yet. Instead: I am following the life of Fleabag, a thirty-something White woman played by Phoebe Waller-Bridge as she navigates life after the death of her best friend. And though I, a sixteen-year-old Brown girl from Jersey, am worlds apart from its British protagonist, “Fleabag” has become a comfort show for me. I watch it whenever I feel lost, whenever I’m looking for reassurance and guidance in my life. The character has so many qualities that resonate: The expansiveness of her grief, her feelings of alienation in a modern world, her tongue-in-cheek humor.  And I’m in good company. Since its conception as a stage play, “Fleabag” has captured the minds and hearts of millions, has won more Emmys than Phoebe Waller-Bridge can hold, and has found a place on Barack Obama’s year-end favorites list. Fleabag’s relatability has garnered widespread acclaim for the show. Yet I’m wary of making my love for “Fleabag” public; whenever I mention it as one of my favorite shows, I get this sinking feeling in my chest. Because, while it is a technical masterpiece, Fleabag has also been the subject of an onslaught of criticism. There’s this one scene that I used to like a lot. Fleabag is sitting with an older business woman, Belinda, at a bar. Martini in hand, Belinda confesses: “Women are born with pain built in, it’s our physical destiny — period pain, sore boobs, childbirth, you know. We carry it with ourselves throughout our lives. Men don’t. They have to invent things like gods and demons… they create wars so they can feel things and touch each other… and we have it all going on in here. Inside, we have pain on a cycle for years.” At the time (sixteen and forever cursing my period and forever scorned by boys), it felt like Belinda was talking straight to me. But now, the entire monologue makes me cringe. It’s imbued with the sort of biological essentialist rhetoric of trans-exclusionary radical feminists. To a lesser extent, it ignores the swathes of suffering that men of color experience at the hands of oppressive systems. In short: It’s a scene that hasn’t aged well. Despite all its claims to capture the “universal female experience,” “Fleabag” falls short. “Fleabag” is, at its core, a TV show about a White woman. There are few characters of color in the entire six hour run of the show, and Fleabag almost never confronts class or racial dynamics during her exploits. The misogyny in “Fleabag,” though it resonates, is often devoid of the nuances of intersectionality. When Fleabag says that she “wouldn’t be such a feminist if [she] had bigger tits,” I think about what a privilege it is for the size of your tits to be the deciding factor of whether to be a feminist or not. As a Brown woman, being a feminist was never a choice for me. If I’m not a feminist, I’m campaigning against my right to exist.  White is the default. Due to a whole load of systemic oppression related supply chain reasons, we end up with a lot of shows written, directed, and acted in by White people. White women in TV and movies and all sorts of popular culture are given the privilege of experiencing uncomfortable emotions. They are allowed to be loud or quiet, sexual or prudish, they are allowed to grieve, they are allowed to have people for whom they can grieve. They are a literal blank slate for us to project our emotions onto. When women of color are on TV, they are relegated to plot lines about racism. So, when it comes to finding sisterhood in emotions outside of Feeling Oppressed, I do turn to “Fleabag,” even as I cringe at its titular character’s outdated thinking. Nobody else has that perfect mix of intense desperation and horrible decision making skills as our lovely protagonist. And yes, while shows like “The Mindy Project” or “Never Have I Ever” fit all of the demographic categories that I should theoretically like, I still find myself revisiting Fleabag every couple of months. I take a free Sunday, grab a soft blanket I don’t mind getting tears on, and binge the whole show. What can I say? It’s Fleabag. 

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/bible-brown-girl/

It Was Never About the Emails

Akshaya Annapragada

What’s HRC looking at? Oh….got it. ☕️☕️ Via — Yashar (@yashar) might just be the greatest irony of today’s extraordinarily strange political scene—Hillary Clinton, whose historic presidential campaign was often eclipsed by controversy surrounding her private email server use, reading about how the current vice president did This is certainly a meme-worthy, cosmic irony. It might even provide a bit of dark comic relief in an increasingly tumultuous political climate; but more than anything, it’s a heartbreaking photograph. It’s sad, poignant, and all too representative of the double standards that plagued Clinton throughout her campaign and continue to harm the women attempting to “that highest, hardest glass ceiling”. In October 2015, Bernie Sanders famously that “the American people are sick and tired of hearing about [Clinton’s] damn emails.” Nevertheless, the email saga continued for over a year. In fact, Google Trends data that the search terms “Hillary emails” and “Clinton emails” reached their peak popularity in the week between October 30 and November 5 2016. Yes, three days before the election, Americans were still talking about the purported email scandal. Remarkably, Clinton’s use of a private server was not unique among politicians. Even before the Democratic primaries began, the public knew that many others had used private servers in similar fashion,  some of Clinton’s harshest critics: Senator Marco Rubio (R – Ill.) and governors Chris Christie(R – N.J.) and Rick Perry (R – Tex.). Interestingly, President George W. Bush also a private email server from inside the White House. Yet it was Clinton who took the fall and was crucified for the same actions committed by numerous others, in positions just like hers. One conspicuous difference, however, is that Clinton is female. And, like women everywhere, Clinton has had to fight harder than her opponents to make her actual, substantive policy positions heard. This is the same tragedy that dogged Clinton on the campaign trail, and obscured her detailed policy discussions. Remember when President Trump attempted to from his  “locker room talk” by calling attention to sexual assault allegations levied against President Bill Clinton? The surrounding media circus put the Hillary For America campaign on the defensive, and shifted the public’s attention towards infidelity in the Clintons’ marriage and whether Bill Clinton was a sexual predator. The strange part—every one of the events in question concerned Bill Clinton, yet it was Hillary running for president. While then-candidate Trump hand-waved his way past taped records of him bragging about sexual assault, Clinton was judged according to the record of her husband, and left wading in a quagmire of scandals that only peripherally concerned her. Unfortunately, these anecdotes are representative of a broader playing field where women must be more qualified and surmount higher barriers than their male counterparts in order to be taken seriously.  after  after has found that women in professional settings are perceived as harsh and controlling when exhibiting behaviors deemed assertive in their male colleagues, while also facing judgement for their physical appearance, and given less credit than their male colleagues for their work. Ultimately, there is no better example of this institutional undervaluing of women’s professional skills than the new Trump administration, which the most male-dominated cabinet since that of Ronald Reagan. Earlier this week, the story broke that Trump’s attorney general, , lied to Congress when he claimed to have had no contact with the Russians; in fact, he took multiple meetings with the Russian ambassador. While Sessions will be to provide written statements on his involvement with Russia, there has been no large-scale outrage, and certainly no public calls for Sessions’ incarceration. When Clinton made mistakes, she them in a forthright manner, and has since been repeatedly cleared of any wrongdoing. Despite this, she faced more persecution than it appears Sessions ever will, for actions he committed and then lied about. While it may be tempting to dismiss this double standard along partisan lines, the contested confirmation of Trump’s secretary of education, Betsy DeVos, shows the same misogyny. During DeVos’ hearings, a major sticking point was her with public education. This is undeniable, and she absolutely lacks the experience needed to be secretary of education. However, this same lack of qualifications was evidently not of concern in the case of , Trump’s secretary of state, who has neither government nor diplomatic experience. While both neophytes were eventually confirmed, DeVos, as a female,  faced an uphill battle requiring Vice President Pence to the first tie-breaking vote in the history of cabinet confirmations. In contrast, Tillerson the requisite votes by a safe margin, even managing to attract a few Democrats to break with party affiliation and vote for his confirmation. Perhaps the most damning example of this phenomenon in the Trump administration is the Commander-in-Chief himself. Trump has never a public or military office, yet he managed to ascend to the presidency over the head of Clinton—a former U.S. senator, secretary of state and First Lady of both the state of Arkansas and the United States. As the rise of Trump makes clear, whether a woman is qualified or not, she will be judged more harshly than her male counterparts and her competence will be more severely scrutinized. These double standards must be of huge concern for anyone concerned about women’s rights, which, , are human rights. Laugh at these newest Clinton memes if you like, but don’t forget what we’re really looking at: the most qualified presidential candidate in U.S. history, who publicly chants of “Lock Her Up” due to her questionable email practices, reading about how the vice president did exactly the same thing and still became the second most powerful man in the United States.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/not-really-emails/

Replacing Newsfeeds for Newspapers: The Detriments of Using Facebook for News

Jessica Boutchie

When Facebook began as an online   for Harvard students in 2004, no one—not even founder Mark Zuckerberg—anticipated its use beyond forging college connections. Facebook,   Zuckerberg, was intended to help college students “understand what was going on in their world a little better.” Yet Facebook has since blossomed into a full-fledged social media site, and as of January 2017,   81 percent of Americans have at least one social media profile—a 57 percent increase from 2008. Beyond growth as a social media site, Facebook has seen another change: according to a Pew Research   from May 2016, the general public increasingly considers social media sites such as Facebook to be a source of news. Of the   two billion active monthly users on Facebook, nearly 66 percent—and thus 44 percent of the general population of the United States—obtain news from the site. More striking, however, is what this social media giant replaces; of users who receive news from Facebook, only 15 percent also consult newspapers for news. If Facebook is replacing the most traditional form of news dissemination, one would hope that its quality is comparable. But, overwhelmed by an abundance of information, selective exposure, and ‘filter bubbles’, this new avenue for news may estrange or even polarize Americans long before it aids them. The abundance of information available to Americans online constitutes a   known as “infobesity.” As Carlos Watson, founder and CEO of Ozy Media, told the HPR, the reality that “there’s just too much information online” and not all of it is helpful or even relevant. On social media sites such as Facebook, a single political article may be lost among the less news-oriented posts from family and friends—while much information is present, only a small facet of it may be political. The average news feed, in fact, consists of   300 stories—a result reached only after the Facebook algorithm consults   1,500 and 15,000 stories in total. The sheer number of stories encountered by every user is not the only problem, however—there is also the variety among users’ feeds. As Harvard Kennedy School professor Matthew Baum cautioned the HPR, “people have different constellations of ideologies amongst their friends and their social network,” and thus, those people control what content they see. While one set of users could present “a pretty diverse, thoughtful, and informative array of information” for their friends, explained Baum, another may present content that is “completely narrowcast and extremely limited in breadth.” Or, as Watson highlighted, a large proportion of that which one might see in the newsfeed is “the big story of the day,” repeated “ad infinitum.” While Facebook may therefore trim the stories encountered by any one user to a manageable number, they, as a social media site, do little to control the content beyond consulting user preferences, reinforcing inconsistent exposure to a variety of political information. Even with droves of information available, Americans are incentivized to limit what they consume—yet they often choose incorrectly. According to a 2005   from Princeton professor Markus Prior, in a “high-choice media environment,” “dramatic increases in available political information” do not coincide with noticeable changes in political engagement. While greater choice allows “politically interested” individuals greater access to more political knowledge, Prior wrote, those uninterested in politics “can more easily escape the news.” This paper, though written over a decade ago, continues to be relevant. In an interview with the HPR, Prior confirmed that the media environment in the United States is still high-choice. In fact, “there’s indisputably more choice,” as a result of the emergence of social media. What began as a problem with cable television and the early Internet has thus been exacerbated by the rise of social media as a news source—users unwilling to view news can simply keep scrolling. An additional detriment of such plentiful choice, according to Prior, is that in a high-choice environment, chance encounters with any political content also declines. Americans no longer have to endure “a few minutes of cable news” before “something entertaining comes on,” Prior lamented to the HPR. As he wrote in the 2005 paper, a “lack of motivation, not lack of skills or resources, poses the main obstacle to a widely informed electorate.” A lack of political knowledge among the electorate is only one problem: when media choice increases,   results—individuals seek out information that confirms their own biases and avoid contradictory information. On Facebook, users may—intentionally or unintentionally—limit their political awareness to only those ideologies and opinions held by their close friends. In choosing not to pursue political knowledge on social media, users may also choose not to encounter any opinions that may be contrary to their own. Social media thus represents, as Baum puts it, “a double-edged sword.” Moreover, “if people are motivated to engage in selective exposure—meaning seeking out information sources that reinforce what they already believe or tell them what they believe is true—social media probably makes that easier,” Baum claims. Americans’ tendencies toward polarization “are likely to be reflected in their online social network.” Still, political exposure in any form   the likelihood of voting among the American electorate. For the approximately 44 percent of Americans who choose to receive some version of news on Facebook, then, it becomes a question of whether this exposure has positively impacted their voting preferences. Beyond human choices, Facebook’s algorithms may also be to blame for increased partisanship and polarization. While Mark Zuckerberg   in 2013 that Facebook’s goal is to “build the perfect personalized newspaper for every person in the world,” Baum warned that Facebook and its algorithm’s main goal remains “trying to figure out what [will] keep users looking at their site.” To do that, Facebook attempts to “figure out what people like and only give them that,” explains Baum. It is what Eli Pariser, chief executive of Upworthy, refers to in his   as “filter bubbles”—small communities of individuals with like ideas isolated from the opposition thanks to the algorithms of their respective social media site. Through such bubbles, “the internet is showing us what it thinks we want to see, but not necessarily what we need to see,” critiques Parisier. Similarly, Watson argues that “if we are all in our own tribes or all in our own bubbles,” it may be more difficult for them to debate difficult issues. While such algorithms therefore increase Americans’ fondness for the site, they do little to increase one’s exposure to diverse political opinions, and in fact, they may even reinforce the aforementioned problems of selective exposure and polarization. Ultimately, the newsfeed performs many functions that the newspaper could not—enhancing mobilization, fostering connectedness among geographically distant people, and allowing greater freedom of choice in the political information individual Americans receive. Yet the newsfeed also restricts American political awareness in ways that the newspaper never did. The newspaper refused to shield Americans from opinions contrary to their own, and prevented the politically uninterested from remaining that way. Unfortunately for Americans, this trend toward the newsfeed remains, as Prior revealed, “so different than everything we have seen until very recently,” to the point that Prior himself is “not quite sure what to make of it.” In the United States and abroad, both the benefits and the detriments of utilizing social media as a news source have yet to be specifically measured. The forecast, however, is ominous.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/replacing-newsfeeds-for-newspapers-the-detriments-of-using-facebook-for-news/

The Hatred of Comedy

Catherine Zhang

When I inevitably quit comedy, I’ll tell people the truest version of the story: that I started writing it to feel like myself again until it came at the expense of that very thing, and I’d rather be human and occasionally funny than funny and occasionally human. No one will really care. Thanks to the democratizing force of the internet, everyone is funny: the 13-year-old former Vine star living with his parents in Milwaukee, a City of Toronto councillor named “Norm,” or whichever minorly famous Twitter account first called Mariah Carey “skinty.” Online, millions of people are parading their sly commentary on the latest Trump alerts, dispensing sardonic one-liners like human gumball machines. “You’re a comedy writer?” some boy is probably asking his Tinder match, a 25-year-old freelancer for  . “So tell me a joke.” This constant influx of wisecracks and memes would be innocuous if it didn’t constantly remind me of my own disposability — that at any moment, someone is churning out faster and better jokes, rendering the rest of us obsolete. The problem is that laughter, like writing or speaking, is viewed as an integral part of being human. In  , author and poet Ben Lerner   the profound disappointment of failing at a craft so intricately wound with our humanity. “If I have no interest in poetry or if I feel repelled by actual poems, either I am failing the social or the social is failing me,” Lerner explains. I think a stronger claim could be made for comedy as a form of collectivity: Our ability to incite and respond to laughter orients our relationship to others and, to some extent, constitutes our identity. No one is advised to seek partners who are excellent poets ( ), but delete all of the starry-eyed blog posts advising you to “fall in love a boy who makes you laugh” and you might drive   into bankruptcy. On the feedback survey the former editor-in-chief of my satire publication sent out last year, someone anonymously recommended we get rid of pre-pitch icebreakers. The exercise is designed to lubricate the mind for writing jokes and quickly induce the feeling of camaraderie among writers, but for some it was the subject of intense anxiety, a fraught competition to see who can split ribs with elaborate tales about their quirky dream jobs or middle school mishaps. You could argue that we all need to develop tougher egos; it’s just college comedy. But to be fair, it’s hard when your pre-professional worth and personal likability is bound up in one short performance to a group of relative strangers. Imagine bombing in front of your friends at an open-mic. No one wants to console you when you’re not funny. Two years ago, I fell out of love, and writing jokes in Google Docs became a mechanism for staving off grief. Too anxious to go home after work, I’d ride the train from Metro Center to DuPont Station and walk to a gentrifying coffee shop called Emissary, which had natural sunlight and fragrant heirloom tomato toasts sprinkled with tiny violet flowers. I drained their cold brew slowly as I wrote various attempts at comedy, plays and satirical articles and sketches. For a second they’d incite a moment of giddiness, make me feel lighter, at least temporarily. The afternoons I filled agonizing over syntax and obsessing over the cadence of a joke were ones I didn’t waste ruminating over what was so fundamentally wrong with me that someone would want to leave. When it happened, my roommate was still at happy hour with her friends. I stripped down to my underwear and blasted Robyn’s “Dancing On My Own,” thrashing my body to sparkling synths like a mopey, self-loathing protagonist in a Lena Dunham series, so that the campiness of it all would be too perfect — I could pretend to be a parody, an imitation of the real thing instead of the thing itself. That summer was a slow movement through grief, the days disorienting, existentially anxious, emotionally unstable. In my apartment, I was a bad roommate: absent, with a tendency to avoid saying “hello” by pretending I wasn’t home, even when my roommates called out to me. They pulled me into the bedroom and said “oh,” when I told them flatly that I was now single, sympathetic but still moving at a time when I needed stasis, and so I hid from them quietly. If I could have removed myself from the terror of it all, I could have seen how excruciatingly funny the summer was: the hot pink children’s underwear lying next to us in the sand as my friend D* tried to console me on a beach in Williamsburg, the imploring wooden sign in the park we walked to, speaking on behalf of the humble grass: “PLEASE DON’T PEE ON ME.” The weekend my partner had intended to visit me I shared a yurt in Shenandoah National Park with six other women, buoyed temporarily by the ludicrousness of living some second-wave eco-feminist dream. Before we broke up, I thought funny was a useless thing, the bread displayed before a meatier course or the sugary thing you eat afterward, which is fun but cannot sustain you. When we first began flirting I had a grand, larger than life Facebook presence — “Submitted My Resume to Someone the Same Age as Me,” I’d post, in the same self-congratulatory format that acquaintances announce premature weddings or decisions from colleges they’re not even that into — and he thought I was  , I think. Later, I’d joke to minimize the parts of myself he’d find ugly, to derail philosophical inquiries before I was required to have an opinion and obscure all of the intellectual references I didn’t know. We’d sprawl out on my futon and I’d practice being inane — striving to glide past our friction, to  . But across the dinner table from my friends I worried that’s all I would ever be. “Don’t let him make you feel small,” my high school teacher insisted, when I panicked over hot pot about my inability to recite Cicero. That semester I made it onto the satire publication, but not before I succumbed to personal anxiety. Five months after we broke up, I rearranged the lyrics to Taylor Swift’s “You Belong With Me” at a stand-up comedy show:   If I play up facets of his personality, shift things to the right light, I can reduce him to a trope. Parodying the thing you fear is wrenching it from someone else’s control. If I repeat something enough times, it ossifies into the final version of the story. My freshman roommate, who took a leave of absence during the year of our relationship, put that story bluntly: “He seemed like kind of a dick.” In 2017, the serial   winner Ken Jennings   in the   that Twitter was turning everything into a joke. “For most of human history, laughter and comedy were scarce resources in bleak times,” he wrote, “but that’s not remotely true anymore.” Twitter turned the whole world into an   writers room. Late night hosts, quirky corporate accounts, and online personalities battled in all-consuming chase to metabolize the news and churn out timely laughter. Funny became a “brand,” and brands never sleep. At first, Jennings participated in this constant joke-making, addicted to the dopamine rush of being told that he said something funny. Suddenly, he saw jokes everywhere: in airline demonstration videos, Superbowl ads, and of course, political comedy shows. “This crazy overabundance,” Jennings said, “has not been a net good for me.” The term “irony poisoning” refers to what happens when you cease to take anything seriously: your worldview is so clouded by nihilism and detached irony that you lose your grasp on reality. Jennings’ “hedonic treadmill” of punchlines dulled him to genuine earnestness and empathy. “My snarky repartee is smoother than ever, but in situations when a more heartfelt connection is required, I find that I’m a little out of my element,” he wrote. Around a quarter into my term running the satire magazine, I started to become desensitized to puns, the inside of greeting cards, one-liners on popsicle sticks or Laffy Taffy. The only thing I liked were screenshots of nonsensical Tinder conversations that began with “send nudes” and ended with commentary about the inexorable death of the sun. Even then, “laughing” meant briefly exhaling through my nose before scrolling onto other tweets. Being desensitized to humor was like being desensitized to orgasms or birthday cake; it sucked. In her viral stand-up set  the Australian comic Hannah Gadsby laments that comedy has suspended her “in a perpetual state of adolescence.” A joke is marked by brutal efficiency: It has a set-up and a punchline shorn of inconvenient details to deliver quick release. Maintaining constant hysterics demands Gadsby deprive herself of a richer, more complicated story. Her early stand-up was “wall to wall” lesbian content, with jokes coloring over painful experiences of homophobia. A drunk man nearly beat her up at a bus stop, she says, confusing her for male. The audience laughs. But later, when she reveals that she truncated the story, that she did in fact get beaten up after the man realized she’s a lesbian, the audience doesn’t know what to do with themselves. For Gadsby, comedy functions as a form of self-abuse, requiring her to reproduce anguish for laughter. “I froze an incredibly formative experience at its trauma point and I sealed it off into jokes,” she states. The cycle of producing and defusing tension with selective rehearsals of trauma makes her sick: “I have to quit comedy,” Gadsby declares. It’s this refusal to accept laughter as God that makes   so extraordinary. I’m jaded by comedy’s promise, in 2019, to live everywhere, do everything. Commercializable humor offers us an  ,  , and   It purports to  , challenging the powerful and mighty. Meanwhile, the comedy industry itself hides its abuses:  ,  , and  , which makes it difficult for anyone who isn’t well-connected in the industry to make a living. In December, the “disgraced” comedian Louis C.K. returned to the stage after admitting to sexual misconduct in 2017. In his set, he mocked school shooting survivors for being uninteresting and Asian men for having small dicks because “they’re all women.” While he gets a stage, those who are traditionally excluded from comedy are constantly forced to bargain between their ambition and their morality. An uncritical embrace of comedy posits laughter as a default good. Laughter is valueless: It’s not the medicine for collective ills as much as the faucet water that eases the pill down your throat. To believe that it performs social good is to assume that what you’re swallowing is healthy. Plato thought of laughter as an expression of malice and scorn, a means of overpowering others. Those who easily dismiss Plato should remember the searing testimony of Christine Blasey Ford: “Indelible in the hippocampus is the laughter.” The funniest people I ever met had no intention of being funny. They were 55-plus-year-olds at a philosophy circle I joined the summer my partner broke up with me. One was a retired IT professional who attended five think tank lectures a day and wrote 95-page   posts on “American values.” Another was a lonely private-sector pollster whose most repeated statements were “meritocracy does not encompass a moral vision” and “you’re so lucky you’ve found someone.” There was a French woman with Kool-Aid red hair, a sober financial lawyer, and a democratic socialist who signed off his emails “YO!” I liked them for the boldness with which they inhabited the Tenleytown Public Library, shrieking at each other over Hume, getting riled over the pronunciation of “égalité.” I liked how they didn’t strain to present themselves as cool or witty or relatable. They were funny in their refusal to be anything, perform anything, that they were not. There’s a difference between the private humor you practice for yourself and then the public persona that you’re forced to repeat until it becomes a commercializable personality. A friend of mine, a stand-up comedian, used to worry about being cured of depression because, as he claimed, “I’m less funny when I’m happy.” I thought about that as I considered returning to all of my old drafts I wrote that summer. The exercise of always having to distort your experience into something  , worth the attention of other people, can be dehumanizing. There are spaces and uncertainties in my life that I cannot distill easily into something suitable for public consumption. And so the sketches and short plays stay buried within my Google Drive, abandoned for late-night calls with friends and trips to museums, post-grad job searches and documentary filmmaking. I think quitting comedy will make things better:  I’ll rediscover subtle pockets of levity in my everyday life. I’ll find more things funny.  

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/the-hatred-of-comedy/

Why I Might Not Sign My Daughter Up for Gymnastics

Shira Hoffer

For 12 years, gymnastics was my whole life. I spent more time in the gym than I did seeing my parents or doing homework…combined. I dreamed of opening a gym one day and, if I were blessed with kids, training them too. As I wrote in my college essay, “Gymnastics was a rigorous cycle of immense gratification,” and I could not imagine my life without it. But then I had to.  I fractured my back in 2013, a stress fracture from repeated hard landings. Devastated but determined to compete again, I completed an intensive course of physical therapy and was back out on the floor a year later. Unfortunately, after only one competition, I found out my back was fractured again and was advised by doctors to stop doing gymnastics or risk permanent injury. I was 14.  I had no idea what my life would look like without gymnastics. It was the perfect activity: a combination of fun and hard work, both a team and an individual sport, a melange of the thrill of flying through the air and the dazzle of competing. I loved it all.  But I have strong reservations about signing my future daughter up for classes.  In retrospect, the gymnastics culture in which I was immersed had many, many flaws. While there are certainly exceptions, gyms have a reputation for being cutthroat and having a “get over it” attitude about injuries. Coaches can easily take advantage of the naivete of their gymnasts, pushing them to learn skills before they are ready, teaching them to dismiss real safety concerns, or pressuring them to disregard their mental health in pursuit of a gold medal. Moreover, as has come to international attention recently, the risk of sexual abuse or assault in gymnastics is unfortunately all too real.  There have always been murmurs of concern in the gymnastics community about male coaches in charge of impressionable young girls in leotards for many hours a week, but the case of Larry Nassar has amplified this murmur into an international roar. Nassar was given a life without parole sentence after sexually over 300 women and girls — Olympic champions and amateur athletes alike. The toxicity of sexual misconduct is not, however, restricted to individual coaches and may even rise to the top of gymnastics’ institutional pyramid. Indeed, although it is unclear whether or not USA Gymnastics, the governing body of gymnastics in this country, was aware, there is significant evidence that they reporting abuse to law enforcement at least in other cases.  As a starry-eyed 12-year-old who wanted to be like Simone Biles, I was blissfully unaware of these flaws, but looking back, I was certainly impacted by them. I remember one practice during which I had a mental block (similar to what is currently called the “ ”) on the balance beam. I stood there and stood there but could not get myself to go for the skill. The longer I stood, the more anxious I became until I began to cry. My coach responded by letting all of my teammates rotate to the next event but telling me I could not join them until I completed the skill five times. Trapped and towering over my teammates on that balance beam, I felt humiliated as I watched them reluctantly walk away, shooting me sympathetic looks.  I remember another time when I showed up to the gym having been bitten by a dog the day before and asked my coach if it would be ok to skip practice that day because I could not move my hand. She responded dismissively, saying I was being a little crybaby. None of these instances really stuck out to me at the time; that was just the way things were. I thought about it simply: I still loved gymnastics all the same, but some days were harder than others.  As more and more gymnasts have recently come forward to speak out about their experiences with sexual abuse, I have reflected on my time in the sport, becoming aware of norms or rules that, in hindsight feel inappropriate. For example, there is a rule that, if your leotard slips in competition such that your bottom is revealed, you may not fix it, or you will receive a score deduction. I remember spraying some sticky substance on my body to try to prevent my leotard from slipping, but nevertheless, I always got a wedgie, and I never fixed it.  I also remember that my (female) coach would slap our butts as we ran around the mat, encouraging us to go faster. I remember feeling some sense that that was strange, but not really second-guessing it. In another standout policy, my gym prohibited gymnasts from wearing spandex shorts over their leotards in practice, claiming it was “unprofessional.” This led to painful shaving habits and a significant amount of embarrassment during puberty. The 2020 sexual assault against one of the coaches at my gym after he was accused of rape by a fellow gymnast prompted me to reflect on my experience even further. He was not my coach, but I certainly knew him, and I remember I was scared of him. When I heard the news, I cried, shocked at how close I was to the situation. Thank God, I was never sexually abused or assaulted. But I also did not really know what sexual abuse was until after I stopped doing gymnastics altogether, which speaks to how scary this naivete can be. I like to think that I would have known if something was wrong, but I cannot be certain, and I am not sure what I would have done about it. I was vaguely aware of , “a wholly independent body to investigate allegations of sexual misconduct in Olympic National Governing Bodies,” but I had to look it up in writing this article to remember what it is and does.  While my reflection on my years as a gymnast has been necessary, it has been devastating. I still look back fondly on my time in the sport, but I cannot watch a competition without thinking about what may have happened during the competitors’ careers to get them there. Gymnasts whom I idolized so much have endured such abuse to become those idols that I feel guilty looking up to them. Coaches I dreamed of training with have been as complicit in this massive scandal or with sexual abuse themselves.  Honestly, I feel intensely torn. Gymnastics was so good for me; it taught me to persevere and to have tough skin. It taught me to trust myself and to perform. I learned discipline, grace, and competitiveness. And I always dreamed of putting my future daughter in the gym to learn these things too. But I will not until there are some real reforms.  The German Olympic team has made a brave statement, unitards during competition as a stance against the sexualization of gymnastics. Simone Biles’s of her mental health at the Olympics has led to an international conversation. And USA Gymnastics has to “learn from [their] past failures.” But there is more to be done. Gymnasts need to be educated from a young age about signs of abuse, and what to do about it. Coaches need to go through rigorous training. Gymnasts need to be permitted to wear whatever (functional) clothing they want, both in practice and in competition, and not only for religious reasons.  I do not have a problem with gymnastics being a competitive, at times stressful, and elite sport, a sport with hard days and sore muscles, a sport in which gymnasts push themselves to the limits, — I want it to be that — but its culture of abuse must be changed before my daughter is ready, or I will go looking elsewhere to teach her these qualities.  If you have experienced sexual assault and wish to report the incident or make use of Harvard’s support resources, please see the information below:  Confidential and open to all .

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/daughter-gymnastics-sign-up/

The Weapon of the Century: Contemporary Politics Through the TikTok Algorithm

Bryant Valenzuela

It’s 1:00 a.m. You are lying on your bed, phone in hand, scavenging the great depths of a social media platform that has already consumed 12 hours out of your 24 hour day. Post after post, eyes almost shut, you continue scrolling through hundreds of videos featuring creators advocating for political and social justice, from the Black Lives Matter movement to the campaign to Stop Asian Hate.  Tiktok, a social media platform designed as a mixture of Instagram and Snapchat, has become the prime avenue for political messaging in the 21st century, beating out televised campaigns, advertisements and other media structures. Consequently, with its foolproof and politically intuitive algorithm distinct from any other, Tiktok has become the new and invincible source for the creation of political echo chambers in the 21st century.  As soon as creators began deliberately using its algorithm to spread news and rhetoric, Tiktok changed the world of political messaging. Do you ever wonder why the videos users see throughout their feeds are always geared towards their likings, even when they do not follow any particular creators? Or why one’s “For You” page is filled with content that aligns exactly with one’s political affiliations, even if they do not regularly follow politics? The answer is the , which works in accordance with several metrics to gauge users’ opinions and effectively transform their feeds into political . The first phase of TikTok’s regime involves monitoring one’s in-app activity. User interactions (i.e. the posts and accounts one likes, comments on, and follows) are each taken into account in order to create a person’s “For You” page, a customized stream of content tailored exactly to a user’s previous interactions. Even when first signing up, Tiktok gives users a set of popularized videos on their initial page to obtain their primary set of likings. From the moment one downloads the app, if a user interacts with posts that lean either left or right on the political spectrum of either left or right, their future feed will follow suit. Content information (i.e a post’s “captions, sounds and hashtags”) can also embed users into their respective political echo chambers. Tiktok monitors the captions and hashtags of each post one interacts with, so posts that contain captions featuring commentary —  such as those on “ ” the political page for progressive news outlet “NowThis News” —  leaning to a political party will affect one’s “For You” page further. Device settings (including location, language, and device type) and repeated viewership may also affect, although minimally, the types of videos one gets on their “For You” page. Regarding the latter, for instance, if a user were to view a specific video affiliated with the Democratic Party several times, similar content would likely gain prominence in their feed. It can be argued that the algorithms of all social media platforms create political echo chambers, but Tiktok’s algorithm does it best. Instagram’s, for example, works much like that of TikTok’s, except when building the “Explore” page, Instagram only considers a user’s followed accounts, the posts that they upload, and the interactions they have with different pages and content. As a result, if an Instagram user does not explicitly follow, like, or comment on any politically affiliated accounts, political content will likely not appear on their explore page. On the other hand, TikTok’s algorithm, in addition to traditional metrics, uses subliminal interactions — even the mere length for which one views a specific video — to curate and determine a user’s in-app experience based on their political preferences in just the first 10 to 15 minutes of using it.  In the past, political rhetoric and campaigns strictly involved posters, billboards, T.V. commercials, and other means that are now redundant and obsolete. TikTok has, however, filled the void, innovating on the strategies that old media first employed. For instance, whereas T.V platforms limit political content’s reach by setting restrictions on what can be shown in commercials, movies, and shows Tiktok places few to no limitations on users’ content, thus broadening the accessibility of political rhetoric.  Ultimately, TikTok introduces a distinct and new field for politicians and political activists to utilize the echo chambers it creates and spread their beliefs to those who already agree with them. Many have already taken this opportunity. In Fall 2020, for instance, Donald Trump’s became a victim of Tiktok’s viral political messaging techniques when a user on the platform uploaded a video, now made private, sarcastically exclaiming that it would be awfully unfortunate if they were to RSVP for Trump’s rally event and simply not show up due to “outside circumstances.”  Thanks to the TikTok algorithm, the post was circulated to millions of users who, like the video’s creator, had Democratic political leanings. As a result, many viewers were inclined to act on the post’s suggestion to RSVP for a rally they had no intention of attending. With a stadium capacity of 19,200 people, and over a million people to the event, the former President Trump’s campaign expected a packed house. On the day of the event, though, he and his team were caught by surprise when met with rows upon rows of vacant stadium seats: all due to the political messaging and activism conducted through TikTok. over 1 billion users in 150 countries and leveraging a unique and particularly effective algorithm, it is clear that TikTok has a mammoth and unprecedented political impact. As its ability to reinforce confirmation bias and create political echo chambers gains potency, Tiktok is poised to continue changing how political information is shared and how its users, especially children and teenagers, develop their political identities. TikTok is the most powerful political weapon of the 21st century, and it will continue to impact the many realms of U.S politics in the years to come.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/tiktok-politics-algorithm/

The Cultural Economics of Quitting

Sophia Scott

With fall comp season behind us and an uncharted semester ahead, many Harvard students are now finding themselves swamped with a variety of new and residual extracurricular obligations on top of the mounting pressure of acclimating to an unfamiliar course schedule. Surrounded by the whirlwind of culture and the competitive processes to which even the Spring is far from immune, it is easy to feel overwhelmed and even easier to feel obligated to take every opportunity available. This is especially true as comps — Harvard’s club-joining procedures — have increasingly shifted to completion-based models from having historically operated on a competitive basis, making it easier for students to plug in to Harvard’s many extracurricular outlets.  Nonetheless, after spending copious amounts of time applying, interviewing, competing, and training for membership in different student organizations, many may now find themselves disinterested in and unfulfilled by the groups that they have ultimately joined. Despite this, students remain reluctant to quit due to all of the effort they have already expended throughout the comp process. Economists call this dilemma the —a phenomenon that motivates people to continue pursuing a goal or activity simply because they have already invested a lot of time, money, or effort into the project. This kind of status quo bias is often intensified by the pressure of an ongoing commitment like a club or a team. While our social aversion to quitting can help us persevere through challenges, it can also transform into a dangerous force when we are confronted with too many hurdles at once. Recently, student life has exemplified this problem of compounding challenges. From an to remote classes to a campus-wide spurred by to , it’s been a rough couple of years. Outside of our campus gates, though, similar accumulated struggles have led people to do exactly what Harvard students often don’t: quit. In the wake of the pandemic, we’ve witnessed a global uptick in people quitting their , their , and even their . With such dramatic life changes becoming more prevalent around the world, why is quitting still so stigmatized at Harvard? Beginning in early childhood, we are bombarded with a fusillade of anti-quitting propaganda. Old adages like “winners never quit and quitters never win,” can be heard everywhere from youth soccer games to SAT prep sessions. These aphorisms reflect our collective social disdain for the act of giving up. We have all been implicitly and explicitly indoctrinated to believe that quitting is weak, lazy, and shortsighted, while persisting against all odds is admirable, worthy of respect, and inevitably gratifying. This stigmatization of quitting as a cowardly act has likely compelled us to push past barriers and accomplish many impressive feats. But what if, sometimes, quitting is the best thing to do?  While pithy phrases meant to motivate high achievement may seem harmless, they fail to acknowledge that our time and effort are limited commodities. An economist would reference the principle of opportunity cost: every second you spend on a club you’re not truly passionate about, every ounce of effort you pour into a class that you dread, represents effort and time that can no longer be spent anywhere else. We choose where to create our joy. When we put our resources into things that ultimately are not satisfying, we will be unsatisfied.  At Harvard, there’s a constant urge to always be doing something. Not necessarily something you love. Not necessarily something you’re passionate about. Just To the College students out there, I urge you not to allow this impulse to compel you into a project you are not passionate about simply for the sake of being productive. You will always feel unproductive at Harvard until you realize that your own personal fulfillment can be a product of value. Downtime is not necessarily wasted time. When we devote significant amounts of time and energy into anything, it becomes increasingly difficult to leave it all behind, even if it is making us miserable. I’m not arguing that quitting is always the best course of action or that one should give up whenever something gets a little too difficult. In fact, I truly think there’s a lot to be learned from persevering in the face of obstacles. That being said, I suggesting that, often, quitting is better than remaining unhappy.  I’m surely not the first to suggest that when you can avoid unpleasantness, you should take every reasonable avenue to do so. Don’t continue headlong into an effort with blind ambition, and instead, learn to recognize when the drawbacks outweigh the benefits before your sunk costs become so heavy that you are unable to resurface. If you find yourself dissatisfied with a long-term engagement, don’t keep going simply for the sake of “not quitting.” Keep going only if your impetus for doing so is genuinely meaningful to you. Remember: you’re not quitting because you’re weak or unmotivated, you’re quitting because you’re smart enough to prioritize decisions that work for you. So, if you realize that you have made a bad choice or held on for too long — regardless of how heavy your sunk costs may feel — this is your sign to quit.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/cultural-economics-quitting/

Media’s Dangerous Ignorance of Missing People of Color

Naomi Corlette

The recent Gabby Petito case sparked outcries for her safe return. Sarah Everard, Mollie Tibbetts and Hannah Graham have all become household names due to their tragic disappearances. Yet every year, thousands of people of color go missing and receive little to no media coverage. Missing Black and Indigenous people do not receive the same attention and public support as White women with similar stories, which puts these communities at risk of being ignored and consequently denied vital resources for their search operations. When young White women go missing, their stories often the most media attention and coverage. Many of these cases also become fodder for fans of true crime, who follow these cases closely. This phenomenon is called the  “missing White woman syndrome,” a term by the American news anchor Gwen Ifill. Although this has occurred for many years, new mediums of communication, especially social media, have only exacerbated the issue. While people from all over the world post about these womens’ stories, missing Black and Indigenous people are often overlooked by those outside of their communities.  The way the media portrays missing persons cases is also skewed. Media around the disappearance of White women often focuses on their roles in their community, highlighting how they were a good mother, daughter, or friend. This causes people to sympathize with them and their families, and push for their safety. Conversely, the media often highlights the problems present in the lives of people of color. Criminal history, drug use, or dangerous living situations are all used to justify the tragedy, and between media consumers and the victims. This distance is dangerous because it normalizes these tragedies and generates apathy for other missing people of color. Jelani Day was a Black man who went missing in August 2021, around the same time when Gabby Petito’s case occurred. Although their tragedies were similar, he received significantly less attention from the public. His family has the local police department, stating that they believe the investigation was incomprehensive and disrespectful. In 2020, 543,018 people were reported missing in the United States. Black people make up only about 13% of the American population, yet almost one third of the people last year were Black. This reveals how Black communities are affected by this issue disproportionately. Despite this, the necessary resources are not being allocated to address the problem.  According to the Black and Missing Foundation, Black children who go missing are often to be runaways by police investigating their disappearance. Cases classified as runaways do not receive amber alerts, which means that people in the area are not made aware that a child is missing. As a result, these children become even more difficult to find. Police departments are also less likely to devote time to looking for children classified as runaways because they believe that they will just run away again after they are found. This leaves missing Black families without the same support that their White counterparts receive in the same situation, rendering it even more difficult to find their missing children. The combination of a severe lack of media attention and fewer resources provided to communities of color has a detrimental effect on the likelihood of locating missing Black children. In the same vein, many Black adults who go missing are often classified as being involved in a crime by the police departments that are tasked with finding them. Similar to runaways, the disappearances of presumed criminals are not publicized in the same way that normal missing persons cases are, leaving people unaware and therefore unable to help. Police are also less likely to devote resources towards searching for someone who they have classified as a criminal because they assume they will only continue to run. Black and Missing Foundation co-founder Natalie Wilson a 2009 case in which 11 women went missing in Cleveland. When their families tried to report the case to law enforcement, they were denied because it was assumed that the women had been on drugs and fled.  This response has become the status quo: Black people are presumed to be criminals or live in crime-prone areas, and the general public has become desensitized. When people that violence is a normal occurrence in the lives of people of color, they are less likely to be able to “relate” and go out of their way to help when a person of color has gone missing. Without proper media coverage, people aren’t able to relate to missing people of color, which only the criminalization of communities of color. Additionally, emergency departments need more advanced training in identifying a variety of missing persons cases so that they don’t mistakenly attribute someone’s disappearance to leaving of their own volition.  Furthermore, the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women crisis throughout the United States and Canada does not receive sufficient coverage. The homicide rate for Indigenous women is about six times as high as it is for White women. Despite this, missing Indigenous women 27 times less newsprint coverage. On top of this, the coverage Indigenous women receive tends to be less personal and detailed. While White women’s cases are described comprehensively, with more information included about their personal lives, Indigenous women’s cases are usually clinically, if spoken about at all. This only contributes to the danger that Indigenous women face of being misrepresented or ignored.  However, poor coverage is only partly responsible for these disparities. Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women often do not receive the same resources or see the same time invested into their cases, leaving their families scrambling to locate them with limited institutional support. For instance, Bessie Walker’s family that the sheriff’s office did not keep them updated on their efforts to solve the case and left the family to search for her themselves. Families of Indigenous women who have gone missing report having little to no communication with their local police departments who were designated the case. They have been left in the dark consistently, with no way of knowing what is happening. Indigenous women’s cases are solved at alarmingly low rates in comparison to White women. According to the Native Women’s Association of Canada, almost half of the homicide cases involving Indigenous women are , compared to only 16% of cases overall. More coverage, attention, and care devoted to the Indigenous community is imperative to ensuring their safety. All missing people deserve to have their disappearances covered and for the public to care about their safety. White women who go missing deserve to have people care about them, but so do the thousands of other missing people whose stories don’t get the same attention. The media is a powerful tool that can be used to make people aware about issues taking place outside of their communities, but it only works when the issues are actually being responsibly represented, and not being portrayed in an apathetic way. Every person who goes missing plays a role in their communities, and deserves to have their positive traits portrayed. A lack of coverage, while it may seem insignificant, becomes dangerous when people don’t receive the support that they need.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/missing-people-of-color/

GenEd 101: Learning About Failure

Jay Hong Chew

I failed my driving test. Yes, I know it’s a small deal — believe me, I tried to reason with myself on that — but it was still a bitter pill to swallow. The moment I had the results slip in my hand, a million what-ifs started running through my mind: if it was the car, the instructors, the coffee jitters… I really didn’t want to be disinvited from any road trip plans because I couldn’t take the wheel.  It dawned on me that I instinctively responded by berating myself for my incompetencies — “Don’t fail again, you loser” — instead of thinking about whether I was confident enough to bring myself (and the car, of course) across the country in one piece. Success is often perceived as the singular goal, while failure remains an unfortunate by-product of that process. In hindsight, however, it was my inability to metabolise that failure which drew my attention away from what mattered most — ensuring that I would be safe on the roads — and inhibited me from courageously learning from where I messed up.  It’s easy to assume that we are rational enough to take the setbacks that we face in stride and even use the refrain “bouncing back stronger” as consolation, with this assumption in mind. Yet this often well-intentioned desire to quickly rebound  brushes under the carpet the importance of allowing ourselves to process our failures and learn from them. In short, failure should no longer be slighted as the ugly duckling of our success stories, as it has been in our politics, sports, and schools. To embrace a sustainable, authentic approach to growth and achievement, we need to learn how to accept failure better. Failure, if left unaddressed, can have dangerous consequences.  When people do not get what they want, they may have two responses: either stay in denial, or choose to concede. We think we can lay down our egos to do the latter, but the truth is that we often fixate on myopic narratives that obscure the bigger picture.  Take the tumultuous few years that we’ve had at the White House. Even at the highest echelon of American politics, there are leaders who stick to their own delusions and are not able to accept and process their failures. With their influence, they bring multitudes of followers, bolstering the credibility of the conspiracies through strength in numbers. When mobilized, denial can turn into anger, and anger into violence. This has never rang truer than in former President Donald Trump’s own words on that fateful morning of Jan. 6: “We will never give up. We will never concede. It doesn’t happen.” Emboldened, mobs of Trump supporters violently stormed Capitol Hill. What happened there resulted entirely from one man’s inability to eat humble pie. More insidiously, when we cannot emotionally reconcile our failures, the more we then condition ourselves to think that they are reflections of our worth. “I’m not good enough” is what we instinctively tell ourselves when we do not hit the anticipated bar, but it takes an intentional effort to separate ourselves and our identities from our actions, a critical process which is too frequently neglected. Spates of top athletes withdrawing from high-profile events represent how crumbling it can be when this conditioning is taken to the extreme. When we fall and tell ourselves to come back up, we develop a drive that comes from a fear of failure. For these athletes, this stems from a fear of failing to meet expectations, and while such ‘resilience’ can bring an individual to achieve historic feats, there comes a time when all this pressure — paradoxically, more that is liberally heaped on you when you succeed — is all too much.  Japanese tennis pro Naomi Osaka and American gymnast Simone Biles are undisputed world champions in their respective crafts. However, under constant scrutiny, there comes a time when the “weight of the world,” which Biles in her shocking withdrawal from the women’s team final, can be too much to bear. The actions of these two world-class athletes have created a paradigm shift away from our relentless pursuit for sporting excellence by deliberately separating their self-worth from their defining achievements and choosing to prioritise their own well-being. Yet, in most echelons of our society, this is not the case. Let’s take Harvard, for example. A straight-A student who fears risking their unblemished record chooses not to take challenging but arguably more intellectually fulfilling courses, erring on the side of caution by taking easier “gem” classes. In so doing, college is a breeze, but one loses out on the rare chance to explore and enrich themselves without restraint. I have to admit; I’m very much guilty of this. Even before coming to college, I found myself slipping into this mindset due to the nature of the college application process. Having been part of the admissions cycle in recent history was daunting, to say the least. Each part of the process felt like a minefield where one misstep could see you land straight into the rejection pile: There is an overwhelming pressure to present perfection when we are anything but. “Suck it up! Stop obsessing over failure. C’mon, bounce back stronger and faster.” There’s nothing wrong in telling ourselves, or others, to toughen up — we should! But the expectation that we do so stronger and faster changes things completely. When failure is a direct motivator for success, it is unsustainable to expect better and better, in shorter time periods. It also means that the subsequent achieved success is inauthentic, even fraudulent, when pushed by fear rather than a true desire for self-fulfillment.  Both Osaka and Biles have cited losing interest in their sport and the joy of competing in their premature exits. “Put mental health first, because if you don’t, then you’re not going to enjoy your sport and you’re not going to succeed as much as you want to,” Biles in a press conference after her withdrawal. It is only in reckoning with failure that one understands that success comes from a genuine desire to excel for excellence’s sake, and when lost, success loses its meaning too. While certain critics have the two athletes as being unable to confront their failures and pick at their poor showings, they largely miss the point: Stepping out of the spotlight has instead given Osaka and Biles the necessary space and time to face their failures head-on. Perhaps this is the reason why they enjoy enduring success: They are not just sportspeople who win and then fade into obscurity, but dynamic, whole-functioning individuals who realize that sport is not all there is. In a counterintuitive way, this mentality may even have allowed them to elevate their game to new heights. Well, we should embrace failure.  When we devote time to process it and separate our actions from our abilities, we allow ourselves to understand failure’s enduring importance. We realize the right motivations that bring us forward; we see the flaws we’ve made and address them boldly. We fight the urge to cover our shortcomings up and move on, because now we recognize failure to be the strong foundation of every worthwhile success. We take for granted that failure is learnt implicitly when we are unable to succeed. What if instead of success, we learn to expect failure and build ourselves up from the unique opportunities it presents? Such questions — easier as mere conceptions than concrete actions — are always at the back of our minds, yet rarely talked about. It’s why we need to find space in our classrooms, our routines, to normalize open discussions about failure. I’ve got a driving retest next week. Wish me luck.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/gened-101-learning-about-failure/

The Power of Looking: Critically Engaging with Images of Black Women

Kiersten Hash

Over winter break, I Issa Rae’s HBO television series, . As a young Black woman constantly searching for holistic, diverse portrayals of Black women and Black womanhood, I found this show stunning. Issa’s friends Molly, Kelli, and Tiffany, along with the rich array of other Black characters, demonstrates the show creators’ intentionality in providing an honest lens into Blackness. I am not alone in this opinion: is for its authentic depictions of Black women and men, particularly by Black fans who themselves represented in the show. As I reflect on what this show means to me and so many other young Black women, I am reminded of why it is so groundbreaking and novel. Historically, Black women have rarely been given control of our own narratives, both in television and film. America has an age-old, twisted legacy of cultural gatekeeping that has prevented Black women from assuming leading roles and them into stereotypical archetypes. These archetypes, rooted in slavery-era minstrelsy, have consistently been used to denigrate Black women, us to extreme caricatures and our oppression. From the hypersexualized Jezebel and the subservient Mammy, to the ornery Sapphire and the pathetic Tragic Mulatta, these images reinforce the expectations of a society that is subsumed in racist messaging.  Black women have responded to this cultural marginalization through a critical engagement with depictions of us on the screen. The critical lens through which we consume media is what late Black feminist scholar referred to as the “oppositional gaze.” In Hooks’ series of essays titled, “ ,” she asserts that, “there is power in looking.” She then goes on to describe the power in being able to gaze upon society with a critical eye, and how marginalized groups can utilize this gaze as a method of resistance rather than domination: “Subordinates in relations of power learn experientially that there is a critical gaze, one that ‘looks’ in order to document, one that is oppositional.”  For Black people, in particular, Hooks explains that “all attempts to repress our/black peoples’ right to gaze had produced in us an overwhelming longing to look, a rebellious desire, an oppositional gaze.” By using this oppositional gaze, Hooks asserts that we, as Black people, say: “Not only will I stare. I want my look to change reality.” We have always used our gaze to analyze and critique the racist structures of our society, and thereby defy the dominant culture that gazes at us through a lens of White supremacy. Black women’s oppositional gaze shapes cultural conversations about contemporary media. For instance, the high demand for YouTube video essays produced by Black women/femme creators reflects the growing prevalence of the oppositional gaze. Creators like Kimberly N. Foster (For Harriet), Khadija Mbowe, Amanda Maryanna, and Yhara Zayd, have built platforms with huge followings by engaging with popular culture through a feminist/Black feminist lens. These creators highlight the misogynoir in popular media, with content ranging from racism in the horror genre, White savior in film, and the of Black women in romantic comedies. These creators are prime examples of the power of the oppositional gaze in shaping perceptions of Black women. As a Black girl growing up, I had no choice but to consume media through the oppositional gaze. I remember being confused when I watched children’s shows and did not see any Black faces. I remember cringing when the shows I loved would introduce a Black character, only to villainize or reduce them to a comedic caricature, a mere punchline in the episode. I remember wondering why my favorite shows portrayed the only Black female characters as unattractive and trivialized their romantic desires when I thought that they were beautiful and worthy of  romantic partners. Although I did not have the language to describe my feelings then, I now understand that my racial and gender identity has always been integral to my understanding of cultural representations in media.  This Black History Month, I celebrate the creation of contemporary media like , and the growing opportunities for Black women to be in front of and behind the camera. It is high time that we see accurate depictions of all facets of Black womanhood: the good, the bad, the ugly, and everything in between. Ultimately, we must recognize that our collective oppositional gaze has made way for and other media that spotlight our stories meaningfully. There is power in our oppositional gaze, and we continue to shape culture through our resistance. The original artwork for this article was created by Harvard College student article was created by Harvard College student Duncan Glew for the exclusive use of the HPR. Writer headshot by Aaron Kang.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/the-power-of-looking/

Separate and Unequal: Black Americans’ Fight for Education

Nahla Owens

In the face of the systemic oppression that prevents access to equal educational opportunities, Black Americans still dedicate themselves to pursuing high quality education for themselves and their children. Yet the very community that has fought so hard to secure equal access to education — often risking life and limb — is also blamed for perceived unequal achievement by current educational standards. However, even when students and parents overcome these challenges, they are ridiculed, their achievements are minimized, and in some cases, they are even arrested. Kelly Williams-Bolar, for example, was and put on three years of probation for daring to register her child in an adequately resourced school district. Furthermore, Black students who have earned admissions to competitive universities are with the backward notion that their admission was only due to affirmative action policies. Through a close study of the educational barriers that Black educators and students have worked to overcome but continue to face, one can dismantle the dangerous perception that the Black community does not care about education. Though many students at Harvard would think that a choice between learning and life is the stuff of dystopian novels, for enslaved African Americans, this choice was a daily reality. At the risk of whippings, beatings, and death, they often gathered in churches under dim candlelight to teach themselves how to read. Dr. Jarvis Givens, a professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, describes this covert form of teaching and learning as “fugitive pedagogy.” Facing an onslaught of anti-literacy laws, Black Americans crafted a pedagogical response to White opposition. They found power in their pens and strength in classrooms of their own creation.  Fugitive pedagogy can still be observed today as teachers contemporary attempts to withhold knowledge from minority students. Nowhere is this clearer than in the Anti-Critical Race Theory Laws. Educators are at a high risk of losing their licenses and livelihoods for simply using terms like “racism” or “slavery” in their classrooms. While it’s disgusting and unacceptable that today’s educators must fight the same battle as those from centuries before them, it’s another testament to the Black community’s dedication to promoting anti-oppressive learning. Despite the challenges that Black Americans have faced, they have shaped the very foundations and establishment of public education in the United States. During the Reconstruction Era, newly emancipated African-Americans over 3,000 schools in the former Confederate states. In doing so, they paved the path for nationwide systems of public education and inspired laws that would guarantee public education for all residents. However, this success was met with yet another systematic attempt to deny Black people access to high quality education — segregation. Black students received inadequate funding, insufficient staff, and poor facilities.  It would take another 100 years and the tireless efforts of Black activists to legally integrate schools. However, even after integration, racial disparities in educational resource allocation and de facto forms of segregation still stubbornly persist. Racial disparities in access to housing due to policies like redlining ensured the continuation of geographic segregation in some cities and, subsequently, the segregation of public schools. Current public school funding pathways — or the lack thereof — ensure that racial disparities in education quality are upheld. According to Ericka S. Weathers and Victoria E. Sosina, two researchers at the Stanford Center for Education Policy Analysis, Black students are “ in separate school districts from White students in the same state, total revenue shifts in a way that disfavors the typical Black student’s district, even after controlling for racial differences in poverty.”  Born into a family of Black educators, my parents made sure that I understood the historic sacrifices that enabled me to pursue higher education and the systemic barriers that continued to make educational pursuits challenging. In my own school district in Fulton County, Georgia, incredible disparities between primarily White and Black schools demonstrate the urgent need for systemic change. Researchers at Kennesaw State University that in Fulton County, Black students were still less likely to have access to advanced programs, more likely to be placed in overcrowded classrooms, and more likely to attend under-resourced schools. Scholars have proved, time and time again, that these disparities are not an issue of misplaced priorities within the Black community. Rather, they are fundamentally driven by inequitable policies. A 2015 poll by Education Post, an equal education advocacy group, that “Black parents care about the education kids receive; are the most hopeful about what they can achieve; and are among the biggest supporters of public schools.” It’s unbelievable that Black parents and students have fought, tooth and nail, for hundreds of years to create equal educational opportunities for their communities, just for many to assume that they don’t care for or prioritize education.   The blame placed on the Black community for disparate academic performances and low-quality schooling allows policymakers to ignore the systemic issues that create these disparities. It’s imperative that we push back against the negative stereotypes about the Black community that permeate the discourse on education and academic intelligence. We must hold state legislators accountable when they attempt to pass legislation that restricts access to quality education. Everyone must take action and relieve the Black community of its unfair, long-held burden in the battle for equal educational opportunities. article was created by Harvard College student Duncan Glew for the exclusive use of the HPR. Writer headshot by Aaron Kang.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/separate-and-unequal/

Why I Don’t Care to Have a Black Woman on the Supreme Court

Amari Butler

Following the announcement of Justice Stephen Breyer’s retirement from the Supreme Court, President Joe Biden’s campaign pledge to appoint a Black woman has to the fore. Biden has been called out by Black , , and to keep his word. But although the President has a lot of heat for breaking promises in the past, this is one promise that I – as a Black woman – have no desire for him to keep.  Biden’s vow to appoint the first Black woman Supreme Court Justice reeks of performativity and manipulation. Before the South Carolina primary, Biden’s presidential prospects seemed rather unfavorable. But his promise, made only days before the primary, helped the endorsement of Black Congressman Jim Clyburn and consequential support of many Black voters in South Carolina. However, in the time that Biden has been serving as president, he has done little to substantively benefit the lives of Black people.  Soon after inauguration, Biden’s administration swiftly to put Harriet Tubman on the $20 bill — lip service that does absolutely nothing to address material needs. Historically speaking, he has also played a much more active role in perpetuating oppression against Black folks, including President Ronald Reagan to be even tougher on crime. Accordingly, any promises that Biden makes to “uplift” Black people must be considered in the historical context of his opposition to our well-being. Such token gestures should not be applauded. Moreover, Biden’s promise exemplifies the liberal co-optation of identity politics. The Combahee River Collective, a Black Feminist lesbian organization, the term “identity politics” in 1977, claiming “the most profound and potentially most radical politics come directly out of our own identity.” In their statement, the Collective emphasized the significance of identity as a personal source of political radicalization and creativity. But since then, “identity politics” has been and redefined by the American political establishment as superficial “representation” of various identities. Such identity-reductionist ideology typically entails the ostensible empowerment of people with marginalized identities, even – or rather, especially – when their views and actions are antithetical to the liberatory politics championed by the Collective.  Biden’s choice for Vice President, Kamala Harris, exemplifies identity reductionism. Harris is continuously praised for being the first Black, South Asian, and female Vice President, but this praise ignores the harm her politics have caused Black people everywhere. In a 2010 debate for California Attorney General, Harris herself on“increasing the conviction rates” and “sending twice as many serious and violent felons to state prison” as San Francisco District Attorney. Her satisfaction in contributing to mass incarceration, which disproportionately Black people, is vile and unprincipled. Harris’ Blackness does not absolve her of this, and it does not make the novelty of her Vice Presidency worth celebrating.  Even if the soon-to-be Justice’s politics aren’t as blatantly egregious as Harris’, the placement of Black people in high positions within oppressive institutions does not bring us any closer to liberation. On the contrary, it legitimizes and condones a system that protects the elite. The problem with the Supreme Court is not merely the individuals who serve on it. The Court is an institution founded to uphold a constitution by wealthy, slave-owning White men and based on oppressive principles. That fact won’t change regardless of who is sitting on the Supreme Court.  So no: I don’t care to have a Black woman on the Supreme Court. Forgive me for not wanting a seat at a table serving a piece of Biden’s identity-reductionist pie. I urge other Black folks to instead turn to the original identity politics — the one that was actually by Black women and not weaponized against us. Our identity can enable the most profound and most radical politics, so let’s aspire to more than a few Black faces in elite spaces. Black people – Black women – deserve so much better than that. The original artwork for this article was created by Harvard College student Duncan Glew for the exclusive use of the HPR. Writer headshot by Aaron Kang.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/the-supreme-court/

Not So Black-and-White

Srividya Maganti

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/not-black-and-white/

The Gayby Boom is Here to Stay

Tosca Langbert

However, such a triumphant narrative can make it easy to forget that “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” was repealed under a decade ago, that the Democratic Party did not publicly support same-sex marriage on the national stage until 2012, and that there is still no federal law protecting LGBTQ Americans from discrimination in the workplace, as well as from discrimination in accessing housing and other public accommodations. “What was it like being raised by gay parents?”, indeed. Whether the person asking realizes it or not, such a question demands one answer: “Amazing!” Any other response, even if simply accounting for a family’s nuanced experience, might as well be an outright admission of failure on behalf of the entire LGBTQ community. It is important to note that there have always been LGBTQ parents. But prior to the latter half of the twentieth century, the majority of these parents had children via traditional marriages (that is, from buried deep in the metaphorical closet). Hence, the face of LGBTQ parenthood changed dramatically almost overnight, only compounded by the fact that adoption agencies began working with same-sex couples around the same time that in vitro fertilization and professional surrogacy became commercially available. For the first generation of same-sex couples becoming parents outside of previous heterosexual relationships or co-parenting arrangements, the path forward was often murky and fraught with legal complications. For example, when Strah and his partner considered their own path to parenthood, surrogacy was off the table. “It wasn’t really an option for me at the time. It seemed like going to the moon,” Strah explained. Strah, who ultimately adopted his sons, detailed how the prospect of having children has emerged only in the past two decades among LGBTQ couples. “When I was dating in my twenties, no one was talking about having kids.” “When my dads were trying to have a child, adoption agencies wouldn’t let them. … Surrogacy was the only thing that came through for them,” Simard-Halm told the HPR. Fortunately for them, by the late nineties, a select number of doctors were willing to refer LGBTQ couples to assisted reproduction agencies; of the limited agencies available offering such a new technology, even fewer were willing to take on non-heterosexual couples. For Darlene Pinkerton, sexuality was never a barrier to entry for her clients. As the president and CEO of A Perfect Match, one of the few agencies willing to work with LGBTQ intended parents that that paired clients with egg donors and surrogate mothers, Pinkerton bore witness to the anxieties unique to LGBTQ intended parents. “I can’t tell you how many times [gay clients] would call me and they would say, ‘Are you sure she [the donor] knows we’re a gay couple? Are you sure she’s okay with helping us?’… There were some donors that would just say no, ‘I’m not gonna help a gay couple,’ but most donors were like, ‘Of course I want to help! There’s no other way they can have children.’” However, the children of LGBTQ parents – myself included – found that the biggest difference in their experience was how others reacted to their families. Although experiences could vary widely depending on the region or neighborhood, they constantly had to ‘come out’ on behalf of their parents, often with mixed results. “A lot of the fear was internal for me. I remember growing up I was really self-conscious. … At a low point, I told one of my classmates that one of my dads was my uncle, and I was betraying the people that loved me the most because I was scared. Now I know not to blame myself one hundred percent because obviously there were forces that make us feel like we don’t belong, and it’s not just other students. It’s the law, it’s the way that media depicts gay families,” Simard-Halm shared. “I think something that [we] uniquely have to deal with is internalized insecurity a lot of the time and feeling alone. She continued: “It’s almost certainly stigma from the outside. Every family has its differences and quirks, and what’s unique for being the child of LGBTQ parents is having to deal with homophobia from the moment you were born. [We’re] born into a family that’s been historically despised by a lot of demographics. I mean, my parents tried for upwards of ten years to have a child and were met with scorn and hatred around every bend, and that bigotry doesn’t go away immediately,” Simard-Halm explained. “It feels like the rights of the community at large are riding on whether or not this community succeeds by the metrics of success that society has created, and I think that’s really difficult because our families are different, but not extraordinarily [so]. But we have issues too–challenges that every family has–and it feels difficult sometimes to be able to speak honestly about some of the issues we might have. We have to present in a way that if somebody who wanted to find evidence to write back the rights of the community, [we] wouldn’t be giving them fodder for that, [we] wouldn’t be an excuse for the government to roll back liberties that the community has fought for.” Although the Gayby Boom has rendered LGBTQ families more commonplace, many LGBTQ parents and their children are resisting the urge to minimize what makes their families unique.“Normalcy is not the goal. … I think something that the queer community really values is acceptance and equality, equity more broadly, and love,” offered Simard-Halm. “Those are the things we want to highlight in society, and that means accepting differences and extraordinary circumstances.” Strah added, “We don’t have the same cultural norms that apply to us, or constructs, or constrictions. And so it’s like, who’s going to make dinner? Who’s gonna clean? You know, it’s no longer the woman stuck in more of the parental role, or housekeeping role, and I think kids see that, and they grow up with a freer way of thinking about gender norms and gender roles.” “[They are] at a focal point of those movements, as a youthful, often progressive community that’s been exposed to bigotry from a very young age. I think that they’re in a unique position to speak out and advocate against it. On a social and cultural level there’s still a lot of bigotry that families face,” said Simard-Halm. However, one thing about her family is just the same as any other. “Having two loving parents… [they’re] the people that raised me, that read to me, that taught me to swim, that drove me to school – the people that are my family and I love the most. And I think those people should be treated as parents, not as second-class citizens.”

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/the-gayby-boom/

From Salsa to Señorita: Cultural Exchange in the Cuban-American Relationship

Kendrick Foster

Over 20 years ago, Peter Schmuck of the stepped off a plane in Havana to a frosty reception. While he was there to report on a goodwill baseball game between the Baltimore Orioles and the Cuban national team on March 28, 1999, the Cubans were having none of it. As he recalled in an interview with the HPR, “The Cubans did not want to have any media for that home-and-home series.” They eventually allowed him to enter — only after barring him from attending the game. Although he was not there to witness it, that baseball game, the first time a Major League Baseball team had played in Cuba in over forty years, in Cuban-American relations. It also represents the complex cultural interaction between the United States and Cuba: Even though American teams had not played on the island for decades, baseball originally to Cuba through an American-educated Cuban student.  Baseball is perhaps the most significant American contribution to Cuban culture. As Schmuck observed, “Cubans love baseball more than Americans do, and it’s our national pastime!” Indeed, MLB teams have spring training camps and played well-attended games in Cuba since the turn of the 20th century. Cuban-American cultural interaction has also extended far beyond baseball, reaching rap, jazz, and even the American pop charts.  But the political relationship between the two countries has always hung over this interchange, especially after Fidel Castro’s 1959 revolution changed the countries’ relationship for the worse. The long history of Cuban-American cultural interaction suggests that the two cultures have embarked on a productive cultural exchange despite the political obstacles. Under a receptive U.S. administration, both nations can use this pre-existing cultural interchange to improve diplomatic relations.  Cubans and Americans in New York City lost no time in combining their musical styles. Afro-Cuban jazz in 1947, when Afro-Cuban percussionist Chano Pozo joined Dizzy Gillespie’s jazz orchestra, mixing elements from traditional American jazz and Afro-Cuban rhythms. Meanwhile, Cuban music styles such as calypso, mambo, and cha cha continued the American music scene into the ‘50s. Then Castro came to power, and the United States cut off diplomatic relations a year later. “Cuba had become anathema. It lost its status as a friendly, happy, tropical country,” Deborah Pacini, professor emeritus of anthropology at Tufts University, told the HPR. But musicians on both sides continued creating new musical styles, with the ‘60s marking the high point of , an American-based evolution of the Cuban . The song “Guantanamera” exemplifies a shift in Cuban-American cultural interchange. Instead of building something new with Cuban and American influences, a pop group named the Sandpipers Americanized a “very traditional Cuban song that need[ed] to be translated somewhat,” as Chris Molanphy, a pop critic and chart analyst, told the HPR. The song also represented a counterpoint to the frosty political relationship at the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis, as internationalist Pete Seeger it across the globe as a call for peace between the two countries. In these ways, it seems that the phenomenon of distinctly American reinterpretations of older Cuban music stemmed from the nations’ political relationship. Since the embargo the previous interchange of information, music, and media, communities in both nations turned to improvisation.  Despite that embargo, musical interchange continued as young Cubans began getting their hands on American rock music. Cultural interchange “was not happening in state- or industry-sponsored networks,” Pacini said. “It was the product of personal connections: If you knew somebody who happened to have a rock record, you could hear it.” As the Beatles gained worldwide popularity in the late 1960s, their records found a way to circulate across the island, and Cubans began founding rock bands, such as Los Van Van, that explicitly drew inspiration from American rock.  According to Pacini, as Cuban rock evolved, some artists aimed “to incorporate more Cuban elements into it, whether Spanish-language lyrics or lyrics about local issues.” Sintesis, a band founded in 1978, perfectly this theme by combining American rock chords, traditional Afro-Cuban beats, and Spanish lyrics. Its name, meaning “synthesis” in Spanish, perfectly encapsulated its mission and music.  Acceptance of rock the way for rap’s 1980s emergence in the Cuban cultural scene. Rappers, too, found ways to circumvent the embargo. As Sujatha Fernandes, a professor at the University of Sydney, pointed out in an interview with the HPR, young Cubans got interested in hip-hop by putting up “antennas outside of their windows with wire coat hangers to try and get hold of the music.” These rappers would “take background beats from American songs, get a tape recorder, and loop those beats until they had a full background beat, and then they would just rap over that,” Fernandes explained. Lacking modern rap equipment (largely due to the embargo), Cuban rappers would “use Afro-Cuban music with traditional instrumentation for their beats,” along with beatboxing, to add a distinctive Cuban spin. Cuban rap and hip-hop also increasingly became a vehicle for Afro-Cuban social criticism, similar to how African-Americans used rap and hip-hop.  Across the Straits of Florida, Gloria Estefan continued the trend of Americanization in Cuban-American crossover hits like the 1985 hit song “Conga”, which English lyrics and hip-hop beats onto its base of Cuban conga music. Meanwhile, the Buena Vista Social Club, “a supergroup of the greatest Cuban musicians of the late ‘90s,” as Molanphy described it, played off Americans’ nostalgia for pre-communist Cuban music and culture. The group’s debut album was not necessarily a response to the Americanization of Cuban music, but rather a reminder of the Cuban balladry that had largely escaped the notice of the American market for 40 years.  Buena Vista Social Club would not have been possible without a unique set of circumstances. While Cuba started to to the global economy to recover from the sudden loss of Soviet support, the United States the Trading with the Enemy Act in 1988, enabling new cultural flows between the two countries. As Fernandes argues, these new interactions between Cuba and the rest of the world allowed Cuban art to “make commentary on a broader global system.” The March 28, 1999 game took place within this broader between the United States and Cuba — if only for the political wrangling of Peter Angelos, the Orioles’ owner. As Schmuck explained, Angelos “was a huge donor to the Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee. He wanted to do this, and he contacted the Clinton administration and the State Department. That was probably the biggest thing that made it happen.”  Schmuck argued that the game began a “loosening” of relations between the Cuban baseball federation and MLB which eventually led to a stream of Cuban players entering the league. That stream has accelerated recently: “There are a lot more star-caliber players in the big leagues now than there were when Cuban players started defecting,” Joe Kehoskie, a former agent for Cuban players, told the HPR, naming several high-profile players such as Aroldis Chapman, Yasiel Puig, and Jose Abreu. These players have added immensely to the sport; Chapman, for instance, the fastest baseball pitch ever.  Although the second Bush administration introduced a new on relations, the Obama administration its predecessor’s belligerence. Indeed, the administration realized the potential to use the countries’ shared cultures as a reconciling force: Obama a baseball game between the Tampa Bay Rays and the Cuban national team as part of the first trip to Cuba by a sitting U.S. president; that Obama’s presence at this game did more for detente than speeches and statements ever did. And before that game, a comedy skit between Obama and Pánfilo — a character in the popular Cuban TV show — him to “harness humor and popular culture to connect with the Cuban people on a quotidian level,” as Yale’s Albert Laguna argued.  Meanwhile, more formal cultural exchange also took place. The American Ballet Theater visited Cuba in 2010, where it performed and conducted workshops for Cuban dancers; both sides impressed with the other’s technique and started discussing plans for further interaction. In May 2016, the Minnesota Orchestra, harkening back to its 1960s concerts in Cuba, played two concerts. As Yale undergraduate Rhea Kumar , its astute choice of pieces, including Prokofiev’s , projected a “strong and direct” message of cultural unification.  While the Obama administration tried opening the door, the Trump administration it shut, scaling back many of Obama’s changes. However, interaction in the musical sphere has continued apace, with Camila Cabello, a Cuban-American artist, and Cimafunk, a purely Cuban one, exemplifying the trend. The Cuban influences in Cabello’s 2017 breakout hit “Havana” appear obvious: The song is named after Cuba’s capital and Cabello’s birthplace, and Cabello croons that “half of [her] heart is in Havana,” representing the Cuban-American exile experience. Additionally, the clave that makes the song so catchy from a traditional Afro-Cuban jazz clave. As Molanphy put it, “It was the first time she was putting her Cuban roots front and center, and a metaphor for her expressing her independence in general.”  Cabello’s next number one hit “Señorita” features a key note reminiscent of that of “Havana,” while the lyric “land in Miami” clearly references the center of Cuban-American émigré life. However, the song makes pretensions of authenticity; the fact that the song is a “American-feeling pop record” made it popular for American audiences, Molanphy argued. Nonetheless, the success of both songs indicates the Cuban-American diaspora’s presence in American culture and the increasing diversification of American pop.  In contrast to Cabello, who mainly swoons for American pop audiences, the Cuban artist Cimafunk, called the “Cuban James Brown,” has in the United States and Cuba with an innovative blend between hip-hop, funk, and traditional Afro-Cuban standards, fundamentally representing America’s influence on Cuban pop music. The overwhelmingly positive to his 2019 tour showed that artists no longer need to pander to American audiences in order to achieve popular success. In addition to showing the wild success of the amalgam of Cuban and American music, his tour also addressed the two countries’ political relationship: He free concerts at low-income high schools and discussed common interests between the two countries.  That approach, which seemingly paid dividends, could be used as an example of cultural diplomacy, which political scientist Milton Cummings as “the exchange of ideas, information, art and other aspects of culture among nations and their peoples to foster mutual understanding.” Indeed, effective cultural diplomacy is not a one-way street, but rather an exchange that requires equal participation of all countries involved. American policymakers largely seem to have missed the point, though, and many Cubans the United States intends to totally change Cuban economics and politics.  If American diplomats confine their goals to normalization, though, cultural diplomacy can certainly help bring the two states and peoples closer together by turning the formerly political question of American policy towards Cuba into a more personal question. For Schmuck, his 1999 trip changed his perspective on the Cuban-American relationship. “I’m a right-of-center guy, and when I was a child, I swallowed the whole pro-American, anti-Castro stuff. When you get there, you realize how stupid [the embargo] is.” That cultural diplomacy would likely fall under two areas: mutual artistic exchange  and baseball diplomacy. From the U.S. side, the exchanges would to establish goodwill, dispel negative stereotypes about American popular culture, and send a message without relying on tropes of imperial domination. The exchanges would do the same for the Cuban side, especially helping to change the opinion of hardline Cuban-Americans. Indeed, as Laguna , “Postrevolutionary popular culture … has helped build bridges between generations of the diaspora and back to the island.” As the Cimafunk concerts and Schmuck’s experiences in Cuba show, these mutual exchanges can also help to establish meaningful dialogue about issues of common concern to Cubans and Americans, supporting political diplomacy.  Likewise, baseball diplomacy, if practiced successfully, can help bring the two countries together by emphasizing common ground and increasing person-to-person contact if fans travel to the other country. And as , Cuban baseball players have given Americans a more human perspective of the island. For one, Kehoskie is cautiously optimistic. “The more Cubans and Americans interact, the more the baseball programs interact long-term, it can only be a good thing,” he said.  Ultimately, rapprochement may lie in national rather than international politics, since successful cultural diplomacy both the American and Cuban governments to open themselves up to the other side’s culture. Yet they seem capable of doing so given how their cultural relationship has historically continued even without political rapprochement. Now, both governments can take a page from the book of the Cuban rappers and American singers who have made all that cultural interchange possible. Like good negotiators, artists who bridge the divide are ready to speak, but also willing to listen.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/cuban-american-culture/

Performance Art as an Activist Tool

Jessica Morandi

“Everything is political.” This statement is both an acknowledgement of the inherently political nature of existence in a hierarchical world and a direct quote from every person interviewed for this article. “Everything is relational, and everything has a power relation,” Amy Elizabeth Alterman, a PhD candidate in Culture and Performance at UCLA, explained in an interview with the HPR. “So, everything is political.” Art is no exception. Although there are artists who insist that their work is not political, this claim ignores the stakes of representation; for any artist to deny that their actions have political implications is to deny the fact that media and entertainment shape the way that people view the world and everyone inhabiting it.  It is important to acknowledge a distinction between bursts of protest and sustained activism. Both play crucial roles in political progress, and art can function as either depending on its implementation, but the two styles of advocacy serve different purposes. Protest often consists of sporadic, individual instances of critiquing injustice and is fundamentally an attempt to raise awareness about an issue. Art is therefore a natural fit; its emotional resonance is indispensable in efforts to grab the public’s attention and to change hearts and minds. Activism, on the other hand, requires continued engagement, with a focus on solutions rather than just calling attention to an issue’s existence. That is not to say that art is no longer a suitable tool — in fact, the reality is quite the opposite. Art is most often thought to be politically powerful because of its ability to reach new audiences; in this capacity, art is comparable to political protest as primarily a method of raising awareness. However, an often-overlooked capability of performance art is its potential to arm audiences who are already sympathetic to a cause with the specific knowledge necessary to take action, serving as a sustained form of activism. Two organizations that exemplify the latter strategy are ’s comedy tour and UCLA’s .  Beyond performance art’s power to touch people emotionally, it can be a very effective educational tool, especially when dealing with stigmatized topics.  In an interview with the HPR, co-creator of Lizz Winstead highlighted the importance of going beyond providing information: “If you’re going to point out what’s wrong and just let people sit with that, if you don’t give them a call to action, it’s creating quicksand.” Especially with the proliferation of social media, the number of injustices in the world can easily become overwhelming. As Winstead points out, from an activist-artist’s perspective, it is not enough to simply draw attention to political problems; clear explanations of specific, actionable solutions are necessary to channel the audience’s energy into productive next steps. Following this principle, Winstead founded the reproductive rights nonprofit Abortion Access Front in 2015 to combine her expertise in political satire with “the freedom to say, ‘And here’s what you can do about it.’” AAF’s year-round comedy and music tour serves as a prime example of the potential for art to arm audiences with the tools for continued activism. “Abortion AF: The Tour” is a component of AAF’s work that brings feminist comedy shows to cities across the country to destigmatize abortion. The effect of comedy in this setting is three-fold: it attracts people to the event, it breaks the stigma surrounding abortion by getting the audience to relax, and it allows a conversation to begin. “There’s something specifically about humor and comedy that loosens people up,” affirmed Alterman, whose dissertation is an ethnographic study of AAF’s tour as a new model of performance activism. “It resonates for people in a way that other formats, other forms of communicating, don’t.” AAF’s tour is not designed for bipartisan appeal. With a topic as divisive and inflammatory as abortion, there is no such thing as material that pleases everyone. “I think too many progressive organizations are trying to reach across the aisle,” commented Alterman. Instead of focusing on changing perspectives, AAF is “taking people who kind of already have a perspective, and they’re offering them more education and tools of things to do.” Importantly, the shows feature talkbacks with local abortion providers, giving audience members information about abortion access in their region, as well as ways to support independent clinics through donating, volunteering, and voting. To Winstead, “it completes the evening” to end in dialogue: “You’ve learned something, you’ve learned what you can do about it, and you can do it right there in the room, and then you can sign up to continue being part of the solution.”  Above all, this comedy tour captures the unique power of art to be emotionally compelling. Unlike traditional methods of consuming information, like reading articles and watching the news, decidedly political art informs viewers without feeling like a mental chore. Viewers are more likely to retain information and follow up with action after an enjoyable experience rather than a dry one, which is why it is key to give the audience concrete next steps in order to capitalize on this energy. AAF is not alone in prioritizing action. “Knowledge is powerful; power is power,” Bobby Gordon, a performance artist and sexual health educator with an M.A. in Applied Theatre Arts from UCLA, told the HPR. “It becomes less about just knowing the information but collective strategizing about how to push back against these oppressions.” Like AAF, Gordon’s approach to sex education is focused on going beyond providing information. He believes that interactive forms of performance in particular encourage students to retain more information than traditional styles of teaching.  To address this unmet need in the field of sex education, Gordon founded Sex Squad, a UCLA student group that uses participatory theater to educate at-risk youth about sexual health. It is not enough, Gordon argues, for students to be able to regurgitate answers on a test — especially not for an issue as personal as sexual health. “You have to be able to translate it for yourself and put it into action in your own life,” he explained. And for him, nothing is better positioned to achieve this than interactive art: “Active participation and engagement, especially in a way that requires creativity and rewriting things for our own contexts, pushes us to learn in a way that we can actually use.”  Similarly to AAF’s comedy tour, Sex Squad leverages the art of humor to break the stigma surrounding sexual health, which allows a fruitful conversation to occur. Taking it one step further, Sex Squad encourages students to participate in the performance in order to practice handling challenging scenarios by themselves. This active engagement is a key benefit of using theater and comedy and is particularly effective for education. “‘We transform when we actively participate in transformation,’” Gordon quoted from Augusto Boal. “I can’t transform you. … I can make an invitation and an offer to you, but you have to be the one to do it.”  But of course, neither of these organizations could pursue the work that they do without funding, which frequently comes from institutions that uphold hierarchical systems of oppression. Academia in particular provides many activists with the opportunities that they need to pursue their art, yet universities in the United States often unintentionally perpetuate institutionalized racism in a variety of ways, from the to the . Gordon struggles with the tension between artists’ aspirations to do good work and the competitive nature of grant writing. “Whereas the rest of society underestimates the power of the arts for social change,” he said, “we in the arts, because we need to make a case for it, get really good at making a case for it.”  In an ideal world, seeking funding from ethically questionable sources would not be necessary, but in reality there must be room for nuance. Nonprofits don’t have to betray their morals to ensure financial security; while monetary incentives may encourage artists to exaggerate the projected effects of their proposals, the core goals of the art remain the same. As Winstead stated, “The funders fund us because of our mission, not in spite of it.”  The following metaphor enables Gordon to persevere despite this contradiction: “One hand being full doesn’t empty the other.” In other words, the unethical nature of working in institutions that reinforce supremacy does not negate the knowledge and positive impact that the resulting art creates; rather, the two truths coexist.  Imperfect progress is better than no progress at all. Society benefits from political art, and very few artists could financially or emotionally afford to pursue their work in addition to a full-time job without supplementary monetary support. If morally objectionable funding sources enable artists to educate and inspire audiences, to introduce them to activism in an inviting and feasible way, then more is gained than lost. As long as artists are conscious of the unjust systems in which they work — “productively suspicious,” in Gordon’s words — flawed circumstances should not prevent them from engaging in activism with the best intentions. Artists cannot remove themselves from politics if they are unsatisfied with surrounding institutions; everything is political, after all.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/performance-art-activism/

From Tourists to Travelers

Andy Wang

“Everybody’s posting online and I’m like, I want to go. Take me with you. Put me in your suitcase,” said Tate and Camden, two young travelers preparing to embark on a 21-day adventure across Europe. The duo agreed to share their plans with the HPR as they paced around the boarding area at O’Hare Airport restlessly. After drawing inspiration from Pinterest bucket lists, they had created a rough itinerary, scoured Omio for cheap flights, and booked Airbnbs between sites. It would be their first time ever leaving the United States. Nervous but excited, the pair represented the changing face of travel: young, well-informed, and unafraid to seek out unique experiences. Tate and Camden’s journey took place just as travel has exploded globally. Worldwide increases in real income, loosening of travel restrictions, and rises of low-cost airlines have made travel, regardless of the destination, both easier and cheaper. As a testament to the travel boom, nearly were taken in 2018, a stark growth over the 2.6 billion taken at the start of the decade. Tourism brings international attention to cities and money to local economies. Worldwide, the tourism industry contributed to of global GDP in 2019. Moreover, travel serves as a unique vehicle to exchange local cultures and to bring people together from different walks of life. However, this is often balanced with decreased quality of life for many residents of “over-touristed” cities, who see their city overrun by visitors. Hallstatt, a picturesque Austrian town, is just one of many cities to fall prey to this issue. The town sees tourists a day despite a population of just 780: accordingly, the cost of living has and many residents have lost their privacy. Locals dodge selfie-takers on their way home while the museum of village history remains empty. As more and more travelers journey across the world, it is becoming clear that rejecting the culture of mass tourism and embracing individual experiences in conjunction with local communities uniquely provides for a sustainable and enjoyable future of tourism. As travel has increased in popularity, the average age of travelers has decreased. Data provided to the HPR from the American Society of Travel Advisors shows that millennials are the most likely Americans to travel, while Gen-Xers are right behind. Erika Richter, communications director of the ASTA, explained in an interview with the HPR that “when we look at the different generations and where they are in their life stages, we see millennials wanting to experience the world because they value experiences more than they value things.” Travel provides opportunities for individuals to immerse themselves in another culture, an adventure that cannot be replicated at home. Travelers now have more access than ever to information about their destinations, which helps in crafting a trip. Beyond traditional sites like , social media has become a tool for researching travel. A growing source of travel information comes from influencers, who share their personal experiences, while friends seek to share their unique destinations. “Instagram is one of the biggest influencers in determining where millennials are traveling and how they’re traveling,” said Richter. “They do it for the Insta. That’s the game.” Young people feel pressure to travel as a result of what they see on social media, but the diversification of information sources has also greatly influenced travel habits as well. Social media can highlight unique destinations, while other travelers can visit sites off the beaten path that traditional travel media would not cover. As a result, young travelers have resources that greatly increase the potential variety of their travel. With a greater desire to travel and more information at their disposal, young people also travel in a markedly different way from their older peers. They choose to spend time away from major destinations and focus on immersing themselves in the local culture. Young travelers “tend to stay longer and interact more closely with the communities they visit than the average tourist,” World Tourism Organization; “as such, youth travel has emerged as one of the most promising paths towards a more responsible and sustainable tourism sector.” It seems an authentic sense of community is important for young travelers, and this comes with positive side effects. Staying longer means from travel, while genuine interaction with the local community promotes the actual local culture. Thus, immersive stays should be the goal for all travelers. The recent growth in tourism can lead directly to a degradation in the local culture if not managed properly. Many sites, like Prague and Venice, have long been tourist hotspots. The duo serve as examples of : “an extreme concentration of tourists in one place.” This trend may display itself as a clumping of tourists in just one part of the city, like Prague’s old town, or the entire city, like Venice. In order to serve these tourists within concentrated areas, businesses and cultural institutions cater their offerings to a culture of mass tourism. These often manifest as kitschy tourist shops or tours designed for visitors to snap a quick picture in front of major sites. This culture of “fast tourism” does nothing to share an actual understanding of culture, while at the same time contributing to a decrease in livability for locals. In contrast, young travelers are more likely to apply their interests to create an in the local culture. A majority of young travelers cite meeting locals as important to their reasons to travel. This desire “brings young travellers closer to local communities and means that they have more direct economic, social and cultural impacts on the communities they visit,” according to the WYSE Travel Confederation. In contrast, “fast tourism” does not even attempt to bring locals and visitors together in interaction. Richter also explained that increasingly, “people want to do more than just tick off landmarks on a list of things to do or places to see: they want immersive experiences.” Until now, travelers have often been forging their own paths to get these experiences: In order to promote a sustainable future of travel, cities need to start promote experiential tourism. Cities have started to respond to this new traveler behavior by realizing its benefits to their local communities. Instead of having mass tourism focused on photographing sights, travelers who have a specific interest are likely to interact in authentic ways with the locals and take away more of the culture, which they can then share with the world. As a result, cities have slowly begun to adopt tourism strategies that highlight immersive experiences in order to attract these visitors. The city of Weimar, in eastern Germany, has adapted their tourism marketing strategy in order to tap into these experiential travelers’ interests. Besides being a picturesque small German town, Weimar is also home to the German classical literary tradition, as well as to the seat of the German modernism movement.  Recognizing its strong heritage on these two fronts, Weimar has tailored its marketing to find travelers with the same interests. “We have created a persona,” shared Serge Strekotin, a tourism marketer of the city, in an interview with the HPR. “Who is a classics lover? It’s mostly the visitors in their golden ages who are into high culture.” Reaching out to this target demographic group, then, increases the chances that a traveler interacts in an authentic manner upon arrival, as opposed to someone visiting just to snap a quick picture of the scenic town center. Indeed, these tailored experiential visitors look to take part in the local culture. According to Strekotin, the classics visitors “want to have evening programs to the theater or a very good restaurant,” while Bauhaus visitors “would like to visit the ateliers and to buy or see the Bauhaus designs and their modern interpretation.” These tourists then contribute more to the local economy and culture by supporting traditions and businesses that already exist. Weimar’s ties to its cultural heritage are not driven by tourism. Instead, tourism empowers an already salient part of the city’s culture. As a result, travelers who venture to Weimar are able to find experiences tailored to them, and Weimar itself is able to avoid the classic problem of over-tourism, which can lead to a dilution of native culture. Another solution to over-tourism is to divert travelers from crowded tourist hotspots by highlighting alternatives. Typically, travelers arrive in “gateway cities” with large airports, many hotels, and a large population. Getting travelers out to other cities has been a large focus of many national tourist boards, including the Netherlands. “In the past, Amsterdam was not only a highlight and a very important city for us to promote, but it was one of our icons besides the windmills, the tulips, and the cheese. But that is changing,” said Antonia Koedijk, North American director for the Netherlands Board of Tourism & Conventions, in an interview with the HPR. This iconic status has led to a crowding of the capitol, with residents complaining of the city center only catering to tourists and a treatment of their city as “ .” In order to alleviate the crowding in the capitol, the Dutch board has put forward a plan called Perspective 2030, which aims to allow all Dutch residents to live in harmony with and benefit from tourism. Key to this is managing tourist flows. “If you keep on promoting the same areas, you will eventually run into a problem of too many travelers in one area and another area not benefiting from tourism,” explained Koedijk. Therefore, more attention has been put by the board on cultural experiences away from the capitol, such as visiting cheese farmers in rural Holland. Growing tourism focused on local cultures ensures sustainable development in under-touristed areas as their culture is enhanced and promoted, while the bulk of the returns goes straight to local residents and businesses. In that way, the plan aims to ensure that tourism enhances the quality of life for locals. “The city should be livable, lovable and valuable, not only to the travelers but even more so to the residents,” shared Koedijk. “We have to be careful that we focus on the quality visitors that incorporate the residents.” Tourism that does not suit the needs of local communities does more harm than good, especially because many communities may feel that their own culture is under attack by a mass tourism culture. Simply growing tourist numbers for the sake of increased tourism ignores the cultural nuances of individual communities, while focusing on immersive experiences hand-in-hand with local communities provides opportunities to share local customs authentically worldwide.  The sustainable and equitable future of tourism must focus on personalized experiences that work in conjunction with local communities. Only by doing so can the problems associated with mass tourism be alleviated. Tourism should seek to empower local communities and to share their unique culture. As such, cities and countries should target visitors that match the cultures and sites unique to them.  For visitors, too, the quality of travel is improved with unique experiences and authentic interactions. The surface-level visits of mass tourism are replaced with an immersive experience led by locals. Furthermore, visitors know that their experiences are unique: their visit is tailored to their individual interests. Of course, the debate over the future of tourism is multifaceted and brings further questions. Catering to experiences and uniqueness could shut out travelers with fewer resources who may not be able to venture further from gateway airports. Spreading out travelers geographically may not directly solve the environmental impact of travel, but at least it attempts to make visits more meaningful. In spite of the possible questions, though, the future of tourism seems to be headed in a better direction. For Tate and Camden, the final boarding calls sounded, marking the start of their journey across the Atlantic. Soon enough, they would be visiting the destinations they were most excited about – for Tate, a glacier tour in Iceland, and for Camden, the Giant’s Causeway in Ireland. They would be following a trip of their dreams, just like hundreds and thousands of young travelers before them. One by one, these determined travelers seeking their own experiences have led to a movement, bringing us the tourism revolution that we so desperately need.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/from-tourists-to-travelers/

Women Take the Floor: The Resilient Reclamation of Feminine Resistance

Sraavya Sambara

There’s something very poetic about feminist reclamation: the idea that women can retrospectively take back aspects of our past to support contemporary feminism. How do we as women engage with all facets of our history as we construct such movements of resistance, not just the heroic episodes which burn brightest in our minds, but “average” ones as well?  “Women Take the Floor,” an ongoing at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts (BMFA), is unafraid to tackle such complex questions. Conceived as both an internal reckoning with the BMFA’s historic shortcomings in gender diversity and inclusion and as a call for future equity-based progress, the exhibit was curated in honor of the 100-year anniversary of the historic 19 Amendment. Central to its ethos is a commitment to platforming diverse, femme narratives in art, including newer, emerging voices and those which have been overshadowed in the past. The experience is wonderfully comprehensive, featuring intriguing installations on furniture, prints, jewelry, action paintings, and more, and feels like a genuine celebration of the many permutations of femme identity. Feminism is, at its core, a very simple directive: bell hooks once it as “the movement to end sexism, sexist exploitation, and oppression.” And yet, the intricacies of it can often feel nebulous and wildly intangible as we go about our daily lives. To me, “Women Take the Floor” candidly illustrates the blurred line between issues of feminist idealism, feminist pragmatism, and a restlessness to finally transcend the weight of the struggle. It doesn’t offer any easy answers, but rather illuminates a constant tension between various realities, possibilities and fantasies. Of the many visions it seeks to show, the exhibit is particularly fascinated by the idea of repossessing traditional constraints of femininity as tools of progress. Its first installation, “Subversive Threads,” is a thoughtful exercise in reclaiming textile work, once pejoratively considered a domestic and “effeminate” activity, as a canvas for critical commentary. One piece, at the onset of the installation, overlays various Angela Davis and Letty Pogrebin quotes on poncho-style cloths. These “Magma Ponchos” draw on artist Carla Fernandez’s Mexican heritage and were conceptualized as protest wear for the 2017 Women’s March, transforming the casual fashions of a “feminine” craft into a bold sort of political armor. Another piece, “Nike of Samothrace with Golden Wing,” reimagines the Greek goddess Nike and other Greco-Roman muses as beautiful, powerful women blazing with individuality. Every piece in the installation takes the traditional, even quotidian, practice of weaving and uses it to forge new stories, thereby retelling an old one. But for all the revitalized tales “Women Take the Floor” crafts, it perhaps perpetuates an antiquated idea: the notion that adequate representation can be a self-sufficient goal rather than a necessary stepping stone to something larger. There’s a point in which the sheer volume of gender representation in the exhibit feels overwhelming. And while it’s definitely beautiful and important, I wonder if it suggests that the work is done once representation is achieved. Presently, when gender equity remains unrealized in many regions of the world and areas of our society, I do think that sufficient representation must be the first step in any conversation. But still, it does feel trite sometimes to simply acknowledge that a voice exists, especially as relegating marginalized gender groups to conversations only about gender further skews power away from them. Ideally, instead, marginalized gender groups should have unfettered opportunities to express themselves on any subject.  Thankfully, the exhibit does suggest that representation and free argumentation are not exclusive processes. The featured “Broken Treaty” series by Gina Adams, for example, is a group of quilts lettered with language from treaties between the U.S. government and Native American Nations, treaties which were ultimately broken by the U.S.. The piece draws on Adams’s identity as a woman in order to ground further political critique on indigenous peoples’ disenfranchisement. It’s a beautiful overlap between recognizing the artist’s identity but also going a step further. In a similar spirit, “Apsáalooke Feminist #1” by Wendy Red Star is an assertively normal self-portrait photograph of the artist and her daughter. The photograph weaves in themes of Native American femininity, while also challenging typical ethnographic portrayals of Native American women and eloquently reclaiming their public image.  It’s tricky and occasionally frustrating for one’s thoughts to be prefaced by “As a fill-in-the-blank-identity,” but the agency of artists—like Adams and Red Star— who have reclaimed their everyday womanhood to transverse social and political realms has been heartening, reminding me that maybe such limitations are a mild temporary discomfort in service of worthwhile reparations. Still, while identity can be a source of nuance and immense empowerment, there are moments when you want to absolve yourself of all labels and tethers. The simple exercise of categorizing oneself can be exhausting when done continuously and makes you yearn for something beyond rigid identity restrictions and the conventional conceptions of femininity. To that end, the most striking installation in the exhibit was one that captured this fluidity and multidimensionality of womanhood perfectly: “No-man’s land.” The space links together a series of deep landscape paintings with no people in sight, from striking landscapes by Georgia O’Keeffe to paintings that unite nature and the body by Luchita Hurtado. It made me wonder about a place beyond identity characterizations — who are we when we’re alone, when there are no expectations to satisfy? How much more of ourselves can we reclaim absent society’s instrumentalization of identity?  I don’t walk around feeling like a South Asian woman all the time — it’s taxing to go through the motions of celebrating, understanding, and advocating for myself based precisely on my membership to a larger group, and while I definitely love it all, it’s a lot sometimes. “No-man’s land” breathes truth into the idea of forgetting, if only for an instant, who we are in terms of commas and hyphens. It’s a captivating thought, a true respite. Inevitably, one must pass through the installation to a different one bustling with thoughts on reclamation, representation, and everything in between, but “No-man’s land” position in the middle of the exhibit offered a glimpse into something peaceful amidst the vibrance of everything else. Its key theme— that women are entitled to their own free experience within feminism— is one that subtly flows through the rest of the exhibit, even as its contents grow less overtly resistant.  Walking through subsequent installations on kitchenware and furniture design, which may seem like pretty mundane objects at first glance, I thought about the many manifestations of that free feminine experience, of women who may not fit into our current ideas of feminism, independence, or rebellion. How do we think about “normal” women, who wove or created the domestic wares featured earlier in the exhibit for a living, women who may be more “ordinary” than the dazzling heroines we remember? There are plenty of women whom I love who seem to fit a traditional, antiquated mold of femininity. Should it be uncomfortable to think about them through the lens of modern feminism?  I’m not sure. I don’t think anybody is perfectly subversive or submissive, old-fashioned or modern — I think most women are just doing their best with dignity, and it’s important to view them with kind eyes. When reclaiming the past, we must look lucidly at all angles of women’s history, so we can understand exactly how to move forward, rather than selectively filtering people and moments to fit a certain narrative of strength. Feminism is principled for good reason, but there is also space within it for freedom, peace, and a compassionate acknowledgment, daresay, reclamation, of the past — of all the moments, ordinary or remarkable, resistant, or demure, from which women have risen to “take the floor.” 

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/women-take-the-floor/

Patriotic Education: Pride or Problem?

Thor Reimann

When Texas Governor Gregg Abbott signed into law in June of 2021, his first target was the DMV. But instead of combating or the general inconveniences of driver services, Abbott may have actually made the DMV experience even worse — all thanks to the : a committee to promote “patriotic education,” partly through informational pamphlets given to individuals receiving new driver’s licenses. These pamphlets must contain information highlighting Texan values and iconic Texan histories, like the Texas War for Independence, Juneteenth, the indigenous people of the Texas land, and, with an unfortunate lack of irony, Texas’ “heritage of keeping and bearing firearms in defense of life and liberty and for use in hunting.”  Now, while mandatory pamphlets at the DMV may feel novel, the broader concept of patriotic education is certainly not, nor is it limited to Texas. Indeed, especially after the revival of racial tensions following George Floyd’s murder and recent talk of including critical race theory (CRT) in the classroom, “patriotic education” at large has become a nationwide conservative talking point. As the United States debates how to approach its racial past (and present) in our education system, one thing is abundantly clear: we must approach it factually and apolitically. While “patriotic education” claims to highlight our nation’s bedrock values and commemorate American progress, it runs the risk of celebrating unfulfilled accomplishments and undermining ongoing injustice. Artificially injecting patriotism into our education system is therefore dangerous and has the potential to be inaccurate — if not revisionist. Ultimately, Texas House Bill 2497 and similar movements prove to be more problematic than patriotic. To start, the term “patriotic education” itself feels like a red flag. Patriotic education programs are indeed used in other parts of the world, but they definitely aren’t parts of the world that Republicans like Abbott would want to emulate; China, for one. The Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) pro-communist patriotic education programs back to 1994, when a post-Tiananmen Square CCP tried to regain tighter control over the country. These education requirements were again tightened in 2019 as new waves of Democratic movements sprung up in Hong Kong. Although China is just one example, the worldwide cohort of leaders promoting patriotic education is indicative of their autocratic tilt and their states’ attempts to limit critical thought and restrict free academic inquiry. By enacting patriotic education in Texas, then, Governor Abbott is playing with fire. To be fair, the Texas 1836 Project has yet to turn out any curriculum. Yet, that the project creates an opportunity to romanticize and revise true Texan history are still warranted. Indeed, while the bill does require mentions of indigenous people, Juneteenth, and more, it is yet to be seen how these events are discussed and just how wholly these pamphlets portray Texas’ racist, and otherwise inequitable, past. Given that, since the creation of the 1836 Project, Texas legislators have classroom discussion of racism in the United States, the state certainly isn’t moving in a promising direction. Patriotic education campaigns aren’t just taking hold in Texas, though — they’re seeping across the country. Many states, in largely Republican-led efforts, are to legislate the way we talk about race and identity in the classroom. Most recently, these campaigns specifically respond to CRT and the , both of which examine United States history through the lens of slavery and its systemic present-day ramifications. To concede, it’s true that while the 1619 Project has been critically acclaimed, winning such accolades as the Pulitzer Prize,  historians have not universally of its centering of slavery in the founding and history of America. Even so, conservative reactions to including race in education are unnecessarily divisive and deliberately misleading. Take Tucker Carlson, for example, who that CRT teaches kids to hate the U.S. and to judge each other based on skin color. At face value, Carlson’s reporting would prompt anyone to be wary of such an “ideology.” But when you take the time to read what CRT is, you see that Carlson isn’t reporting at all: he’s fear-mongering.  As critical analyses like CRT have taken the stage, Republicans have been pushing “patriotic education” as a direct rebuttal; it is no coincidence that Texas’s 1836 Project is titularly parallel to the New York Time’s 1619 Project. Consequently, even things as quotidian as school board meetings, normally on the periphery of the average citizen’s radar, have become racial battlegrounds. At a June 14th school board meeting in my hometown district — Independent School District 196 in Minnesota — a white freshman to the school board about feeling “uncomfortable” as the principal of his school was giving “condolences […] to other races and leaving just one race out,” as if his school was “punishing” him for his skin color. The freshman also felt that teachers were pushing “leftist” ideology, and that, as a conservative, he didn’t feel safe in his learning environment. Attendees cheered in his support as he left the podium. Such dialogue, although disheartening and vitriolic, gravely misrepresent racial realities in their content. And while statements that teachers tend to lean liberal do have , the idea that schools are pushing leftist ideology through their curricula does not. In truth, schools have frequently accommodated right-leaning concerns. In 2015, for instance, backlash from conservative public officials prompted the College Board to their original AP United States History (APUSH) outline to add discussion of American Exceptionalism, among other edits. The status quo of the American education system is not leftist. It is not anti-American, or anti-white, or anti-democracy. Rather, it is favorable to our history. It is celebratory of the Constitution and appreciative of the progress that we have made. It acknowledges the faults in our nation’s past, but also acknowledges what we have done to fix them. By claiming that American education is indoctrinating students with liberal ideas, conservatives are pushing a false narrative that, in turn, enables to indoctrinate students with their own conceptions and agenda. The Texas 1836 Project, or the recent in Florida, in which students and staff at public universities will have to register their political beliefs in order to maintain “viewpoint diversity,” are perfect examples of this trend.  It is, however, important to draw a distinction between Republican-branded “patriotic education” and a genuine academic emphasis on civic engagement and government. I am by no means attempting to suggest we should not teach the importance of civic engagement and education: both are absolutely necessary to sustain democracy. However, we must not, under the guise of “patriotism”, use civic education as a vehicle to neglect the ugly side of our history.  Ultimately, the role of our education system is to teach students to dive into and think critically about the problems that society faces. This will not happen if the state is pushing a heroized version of its history. What’s more, we should not to teach patriotism. It should be a byproduct of a successful, just and equitable country. If we must teach national pride, it implies that we are living in a nation where that pride may not occur organically. So, instead of approaching education as a vessel for faux patriotism, let’s use it to build an informed citizenry that acknowledges and learns from our history to solve today’s most pressing challenges. And, in doing so, let’s create a country that will make us proud, one that warrants authentic patriotism — no strings or hidden agendas attached. 

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/patriotic-education/

The Woefully “Woke” Critics of “Woke” TV

Imaan Mirza

If your initial reaction to diverse representation in Hollywood is more skeptical than supportive, your feelings aren’t unfounded. There have been too many well-intentioned faux pas as content creators attempt to feature people of color. Seeing Black characters function as human catalysts for a white protagonist’s self-fulfilling journey to racial awareness in “The Blind Side” or “ ” was enough to make me steer clear of every Hollywood attempt at meaningful “representation.” Not only are these portrayals distasteful, but they also have real and painful for minorities, specifically Black and Indigenous communities.   Recent outpourings of promising films and shows, however, foreshadow an optimistic future for diverse storytelling and the possibility for creators to do their  characters and viewers justice. In 2021, people of color took the mantle in screenwriting and directing, and actors of color were represented in casts at levels proportional to their presence in the U.S. population. As a result, people of color are less frequently being sequestered into cultural pigeonholes, spending airtime painstakingly explaining their identities or serving as the token fill-in-the-blank. Peacock show “We Are Lady Parts” characterizes this cultural moment in its of a British Muslim all-female punk band, epitomizing the pull and promise of subversive and resonant content for viewers of color. It features Muslim women doing things—like playing in a punk band!—that do not relate back to their cultural backgrounds, offering a necessary antithesis to some overtold narratives about their relationship with religion. Unfortunately, this uptick in arguably “woke” content has regretfully awakened the “woke” critics. Digital ecosystems like Twitter are bursting with officious users who castigate POC-centered media by penning self-righteous diatribes and thriving on the negative welter generated in their wake. From the precincts of their social media pages, they wreak considerable damage on the reception of these multimedia, discouraging other viewers from watching and uplifting the work of creators of color. Worse, in clamoring for “authentic” representation, detractors place disproportionate burdens on storytellers of color to create work that is all encompassing and unintentionally reinforce perceptions that minority communities are monoliths. Consequently, creatives of color are often from writing, producing, and portraying POC narratives. The result is a frustrating retrogression to Hollywood’s square one: the comfortable dynamic of white characters and white stories overwhelming our television screens. After all, digital critics don’t brew Twitter storms about the portrayal of a white male protagonist.  The rise of these “woke” pundits has placed the new, important onus of conscious viewership and discernment on consumers of contemporary media. With the upsurge of individuals who excoriate diverse content comes the increased necessity for viewers who can both identify unfair criticism and prevent themselves from becoming discriminatory consumers of POC media. Such a calling requires gaining insight into the insularity of the “woke” critics themselves. What exactly are they nitpicking, and why? How well-founded are their arguments, and when juxtaposing the criticism POC media receives with that of their white counterparts, can we truly say “woke” viewership is championing an even playing field?   Before we can address these questions, we must clarify that calling for increased understanding of POC multimedia is not analogous to exempting it from criticism. What is essential, however, is analyzing the nature and degree of criticism being levelled towards POC media, and specifically how it varies from that of their white counterparts.  For instance, one of the most common patterns of criticism reserved exclusively for POC media is that the perceived stereotyping of a racial or ethnic group does more harm than good. Cultural experiences portrayed in the media are immediately subject to scrutiny, and often these moments are decried as stereotypical or inaccurately portraying a minority community. Stereotypes and reality, however, are not binary entities. They can be rooted in truth and reflect real patterns that exist in communities. For instance, when protagonist Kumail Nanjiani in “The Big Sick” his white girlfriend to his Pakistani parents, the tense encounter recalls an experience that holds true for many people of Pakistani heritage who face resistance in choosing partners outside of their ethnicity.  More important to consider in this context is whether the perceived stereotypical experience is portrayed with the necessary nuance, and whether such depictions offer a fresh outlook that rejuvenates a seemingly tired trope. After all, if a show or film disincluded these so-called stereotypical experiences, then the critics would be equally as unhinged by the lack of “authenticity.” And if the critics were to see experiences that resonated with them, they would cease their criticism, even if all the same criticism about “stereotypical storytelling” continued to apply. Clearly, then, the alleged stereotyping itself is not what’s truly driving a detractor’s motivation to criticize. Further, in presenting one experience, a show or film isn’t implicitly negating other experiences. Critically-acclaimed HBO show “Ramy” subverts the binary portrayal of brown men as an Abrahamic prophet or “Al-Qaeda Terrorist #4” through its titular Muslim Arab American protagonist, who is flawed and perpetually struggles with being a “good Muslim.” Amidst the outcries that creator Ramy Yousseff was appeasing white audiences through “Westernized” depictions of Muslims, the response from Yousseff was : “This is not all Muslims. There’s so many Muslim experiences. There are Muslims who will watch this and be, ‘that’s not my experience,’ and I think that’s great because I think we all have a different way that we come at it.”  On the topic of “stereotypical storytelling,” critics are also outspoken about “negative” portrayals that can be harmfully misconstrued. As a result, creators of color often feel the need to dilute their stories to avoid such criticism. In a written for British newspaper the “i”, creator of “We Are Lady Parts” Nida Manzoor laments the pressure she’s felt to portray marginalized characters through a solely positive lens. Still, she resists, maintaining that it is our “dark parts as humans [that] make us interesting and cool and relatable” and that she can only commit to responsible representation by being “honest” and “true.”  Manzoor’s nuanced portayal of Muslim women in “We Are Lady Parts” further indicates that, if POC themselves are sharing stories about the community to which they belong, a full spectrum of experiences—the good, the bad, and everything that falls in between—can be depicted responsibly and appropriately. In turn, their content will reflect that characters of color are equally as three-dimensional and flawed as their white counterparts.  The unjust barriers that Manzoor and other creatives of color face must motivate us to be thoughtful consumers of POC media and to acknowledge the context and purpose of POC content. For example, rather than joining the “woke” critics in berating perceived superficiality in comedies like “Ramy” and “We Are Lady Parts,” we should instead consider that these shows cannot address dense identity issues without detracting from their light-hearted and comedic tones. In evaluating POC media through the same metrics by which we measure all other media, we’ll ensure that creators of color aren’t forced to be the singular mouthpiece of a spotlighted community and that their creations are appreciated for what they are rather than what they are not. Within the context of an article about films and shows, it’s appropriate to channel some melodrama in the following assertion: the future of the media industry rests in our hands as content consumers. In refusing to join wanton social media onslaughts, we’re committing to forging a more diverse, enriching creative arts industry, one where our skepticism for diverse representation is instead replaced with unbridled joy at seeing our experiences reflected back at us on the big screen.  .

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/woke-critics-woke-tv/

We Should Say Goodbye to the Grammys

Joyce Chen

On March 14, 2021, performers and viewers from all corners of the world waited with bated breath to celebrate the world’s newest Grammy recipients. The Grammy Awards—among the most prestigious accolades a musician can receive—are conferred each year by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, also known as the Recording Academy. Yet, according to some of the music industry’s most prominent artists, the world’s most highly regarded music award show is and .  A focal point of their criticisms? The Grammy Awards .  While individual artists and their labels can submit music to the Recording Academy for consideration, public input stops there: after each submission is reviewed and categorized, thousands of industry experts turn over award nominations to anonymous committees of “ .” Members of the Recording Academy then participate in a second round of voting to decide the winners of each category. Although anonymous committees purportedly exist to uphold accountability and “eliminate the potential for a general-awareness bias” in the finalist selection process, they are also able to undercut public will by inserting additional names into the final ballot. After the controversial 2021 Grammy Awards, however, anonymous committees were for all categories except those pertaining to “Craft” (such as composing, packaging, or production).  In 2020, Deborah Dugan, former Recording Academy CEO, voiced numerous grievances about the Grammys in a 46-page statement to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Commensurate with the many criticisms already highlighted by artists like and , Dugan the Recording Academy as a “boys’ club” rife with favoritism, gender imparity, abuse of power and financial inconsistencies.  Year after year, women and people of color are also consistently underrepresented in Grammy Award rosters. The Recording Academy cannot justifiably defend the notion that only five people of color have warranted the Best New Artist title in the past two decades, that Herbie Hancock has been the since 2008 worthy of an Album of the Year title, or that deserved nominations for Best R&B Album in 2020. Individually, these examples could be outliers. But when BTS, the world’s fastest-growing Korean pop group, has to their music to earn a Grammy nomination; when The Weeknd—who shattered records in 2020 with his hit album, —is snubbed of any recognition from the Academy, both creators and the public have grounds to question what happens in the adjudication room. Artists like Frank Ocean and Eminem have, thus, chosen to boycott the Grammys altogether, the “dated” nature of “the awarding system and the nomination system and screening system.”  As viewers, we ought to join them.  A boycott would specifically involve artists refusing to attend the Grammys and viewers refraining from discussing or watching them. The impetus is both moral and pragmatic: a symbolic, public rebuff of the Recording Academy would not only be intrinsically valuable, but its effects would also spill over to institutions in the entertainment industry—such as the Oscars and Emmys—plagued by similar allegations of racism and sexism.  When we boycott, we speak with our dollars. Awards shows like the Grammys are corporations at their core; in fact, in a 2014 for Complex, Rob Kenner—a Grammy voter—even admitted that “famous people tend to get more votes from clueless Academy members, regardless of the quality of their work” if it means they’ll attract an audience.  Since viewership correlates with profit, it follows that an alarming drop in public support would drive the Grammys to acquiesce to public demands for greater equity and transparency. The media attention generated by a widespread boycott would also create space for sustainable dialogue about recognizing marginalized artists, a conversation that would hopefully persist even after reporters’ camera flashes dim.  Not all exposure, after all, is good exposure—at least not for the industry status quo. In fact, a 2013 of boycotts and reputation management run by Dr. Brayden King of Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management concluded that initially “symbolic attempt[s] to appease activists” can make “an opening for those activists to have some influence” and “a shift in values in the organization” as a whole.  It is unfortunate that a collective boycott is needed to catalyze change, but the progress attributed to movements like # bears testament to the fact that public shows of disapproval can spur change. When, in 2015 and 2016, zero actors and actresses of color were nominated for Oscar awards, from ordinary social media users as well as celebrities like Will and Jada Pinkett Smith, Spike Lee, Idris Elba meant that the following year’s iteration of the Oscars saw people of color nominated in .  In 2016, Roger Ross Williams, the first Black director to win an Oscar, discouraged a boycott of the ceremony on the grounds that “staying away from something that needs to change is no way to change it.” To some degree, his argument stands. Boycotts against companies attached to a significant personal cost—BP for its culpability in oil spills, Chick-fil-A for its stance on same-sex marriage, fast fashion companies for their use of unethical labor—often fail to gain traction because the general public demurs to long-term losses in convenience. Uniquely, however, a boycott of the Grammys would only last a single night. What’s more, while corporate boycotts often involve two diametrically opposed  interests, the Recording Academy and its observers ostensibly hold the same end objective: a just, inclusive recognition process.  After the Recording Academy’s Diversity & Inclusion Task Force formed in 2018 for the Academy to take steps to ensure “better representation[s] of music’s diversity,” promote “female producers and engineers,” and “identify qualified, diverse candidates for committees,” among other objectives, these directives — and the Academy’s responses — largely targeted a symptom, not a cause, of inequity in the awards process. Upon closer inspection, the Academy was still “not convince[d]” by a call for a ranked choice voting system for General Field awards and did not address central points of concern in its award decision-making process, such as an unclear adjudication rationale and failure at times to recognize the cultural weight of music over profitability.  Evidently, there is still much room for improvement—and although hiring a diversity officer, creating the Black Music Collective for the “inclusion, recognition and advancement of Black music” and welcoming more women into the institution’s higher echelons have been commendable steps, such actions are insufficient for systemic change. The Academy does not need empty promises of fairness; it needs tangible changes to its nomination and judging process. It does not just need a diversity officer; it needs complete inclusion of people of all cultures and from all places.  The path to equality runs through the Recording Academy’s gleaming halls. It branches into the fight for diversity and inclusion in the broader entertainment industry, in national legislatures and in everyday life. For criticisms of this institution to actuate change, however, consumers and artists must reprimand it in languages it speaks: money, time and attention.  Until that shift happens, it’s time to say farewell.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/say-goodbye-grammys/

The New Kids in Town

Alvira Tyagi

I am a devoted member of Generation Z. At 18 years old, I spend my time doing what most teenagers do: refreshing my social media pages, sending my friends amusing memes and browsing trending news stories. A few months ago, I was munching on some delicious avocado toast and slurping down my vanilla latte (with oat milk, of course) when I came across an on my phone: “Why the ‘Z’ In ‘Gen Z’ Means ‘Zombie.’” I nearly choked on a chunk of avocado. Hours of research later, I found dozens of online blogs hammering and disparaging Gen Z to the core: Internet users everywhere had seemingly allied themselves, intent on bullying this generation — my generation. It became apparent that we needed some backup and that someone from Generation Z was going to have to provide it. So here I am, fervently typing, in hopes of restoring some credibility to our generation as one empowered to reform the current and future condition of our world. With its first members born in 1996, Generation Z witnessed the reelection of Bill Clinton as toddlers, lived through the rise of the internet, Pokemon and eBay, and, by now, has had a front-row seat to the evolution and repeated upheaval of modern society. Already possessing a wealth of experience at a young age, an intrinsic understanding of powerful technological tools and a competitive drive to be seen and heard, Gen Z is poised to have a positive and lasting influence on the world.  But what truly is Generation Z? Who are we? What do we stand for? What is our role in the context of all our preceding generations? These are questions on which I have begun to reflect, particularly while navigating the transition to college and embarking on my first steps into adulthood. Elder generations have sought to answer these questions themselves and have come to less than positive conclusions. Many, for instance, have doubted our participation in societal matters: In my experience, “What wars has Gen Z fought and died in?” is one popular question. In fact, the answer is several, including conflicts in Iraq, Iran and Syria. But more importantly, Gen Z, unlike its predecessors, is acutely aware that waging endless war is not the only way to fight in this modern era. Armed with a diversity of knowledge and a sincere willingness to advocate for change, we have found other outlets for activism and engagement to be more meaningful and effective than belligerence. Indeed, Gen Z has directly disputed the idea that we are apathetic and lazy by mobilizing and participating in large-scale worldwide protests to advance our passions about issues such as climate change, gun control and racially motivated discrimination. Even if it does not wield the guns or don the military uniforms of previous generations, Gen Z’s dedication to action is evidenced by various teen-driven coalitions and initiatives: Take the , for example. This Gen Z-led grassroots organization not only coordinates nationwide climate strikes but also fearlessly petitions local and national government representatives to take drastic action. Another broad-based movement by eighteen-year-old climate activist Greta Thunberg, “Fridays for Future,” encourages students to advocate for climate awareness at their schools by forgoing Friday classes to attend demonstrations, and has earned Thunberg global acclaim. She even a thirteen-day, cross-Atlantic voyage to decrease her carbon footprint when traveling to the United Nations Climate Action Summit two years ago, and while she has faced attacks from many, former President Donald Trump, Thunberg relentlessly continuous activism, even in the midst of a raging pandemic. And let’s not forget the continuously expanding movement for gun control. Just days after being confronted by horrifying gun violence at their high school, young students in Parkland, Florida unfurled a campaign dedicated to ensuring that such mass suffering would never occur again. Adults, in their disregard for and enabling of the nation’s gun violence epidemic, had them, resulting in the loss of seventeen of their peers. In response, this country’s young people, and now of others, have come together to protest their political leaders’ inaction, refusing to accept that daily gun violence is just the reality of American life. It’s clear: our generation is the driver of political action nationwide. Compared to generations of the past, Gen Zers are viewing and learning more about activist movements, especially online, are increasingly conversing about the deep-rooted societal structures underlying the issues for which organizers are campaigning and in turn are physically doing more to be a part of the change. According to the New York Times, the vast majority of in-person demonstrations we have seen across the country have been by the teens and young adults that comprise Generation Z. This has likely been aided by the technological immersion of our generation, with many spreading awareness on social media and online networks. Indeed, a Yubo poll from June 2020 that nearly 90% of Gen Zers recurrently utilize social media to demonstrate their solidarity with and support for the Black Lives Matter movement. Of that percentage, 73% of young BLM advocates employ Instagram for their activism, 26% use TikTok, 25% use Twitter, and 12% use Facebook. My fellow members of Generation Z acknowledge that we will live our lives in a state of emergency if reform is not implemented, and after years of oblivion and ignorance, Gen Z is ready to tackle these problems head-on. Driven by that consciousness, we have powerfully and purposefully stood up for change: These so-called “zombies” are, in reality, bold and unflinching heroes. Day in and day out, we read and hear about the world apparently crumbling around us, with a dynamic and urgent list of problems to address every day. The odds are stacking up, and Generation Z has been left with the burden of surrendering their adolescence to correcting this globe’s cruel course, the conditions of which were created and facilitated by the neglect of older generations. Yet, in the midst of it all, I feel a sense of hope. An emerging passion. A thirst for change, activism and growth in response to these complex issues. Enough is enough. Now, it is time to honor Gen Z’s work; it is time for us to realize our potential for persistent future impact and work to leave this world better than it was when we entered it. So I will continue my extravagant avocado toast feasts, drinking my vanilla oat milk latte on the side. I will continue perusing Instagram and Snapchat guilt-free. And I will continue to steadfastly support my peers as they fight to change the world. I’m with Gen Z, and you should be, too. The new kids are in town, and we’re not going anywhere anytime soon. .

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/new-kids-in-town/

Before You Rain on Rainbow Capitalism

Fresh Pisuttisarun

To any visitor, America during Pride Month is truly a sight to behold. The cities are, quite literally, painted rainbow — stores triumphing pride flags, billboards touting colorful logos, streets feverishly striped in flamboyant shades. As a meek traveler setting foot on JFK Airport for the first time, I felt as though I had been transported to an alien planet.  It wasn’t long before I was warned that such colorful apparitions are a symptom of Rainbow Capitalism. The term, usually insinuating problematic intentions and consequences, refers to the phenomenon whereby brands incorporate queer appeal into their image in order to seem inclusive and welcoming of the LGBTQ community. Viewed through this critical lens, Rainbow Capitalism is the disingenuous effort to tap into the purchasing power of LGBTQ consumers. Disney, for example, tweeted about its inclusivity at the start of Pride only months after the production of its first LGBTQ-led animated film. Many viewed this cancellation as a failure to commit to true queer representation. Similarly, PayPal adopted a rainbow logo on social media despite its transgender users to change their birth name and gender on their accounts. The company came under fire for its attempt to celebrate Pride without first rectifying this discriminatory policy. Upon hearing about such instances, I tried to see through the rainbow as nothing more than a halfhearted month-long marketing ploy. However, I could not help but feel that there is an intrinsic value in rainbow logos and storefronts that these critics take for granted. Sure, I agree that, at best, these efforts are shallow and short-lived, and at worst, they are hypocritical and appropriating. Still, I would feel oddly entitled to be so quick to dismiss the show of solidarity as a universally detrimental gesture.  Two years ago, as my family bustled through the streets of New York, we came across a large poster ad. It read, “I Adore My LGBTQ Kid.” My mom, who was vaguely aware that I am queer, though had never acknowledged it, gave those words a long, hard stare. Although she never spoke about what she saw, I could tell that a foreign realization had occurred to her: A world bigger than her own had recognized a part of her child she had not. For me, it was immeasurably gratifying. Upon passing by the same ad, some queer New Yorker would probably discount the ad as a clever facade designed to lure in “woke” customers. Instead, my mind quickly fantasized about what would happen if this poster was not adorning a liberal street in New York but the street on my way to school, in my hometown of Bangkok, Thailand. I imagined the shock of parents who do not think it was possible, let alone celebrated, to adore their LGBTQ kid. There are still many, many parts of the world, like my native land, where not a single rainbow will be seen during Pride Month. Where rainbows exist, it is easy to accuse them of mercenary, corporate deceit. It is harder to recognize that the very ability to make this complaint is a privilege of Western (and usually upper-class) critics for whom LGBTQ support already exists in relative strength. In order to demand consistent and sincere support, a community must first have support, period. This privilege is not shared by many others. For example, 86% of countries in the world have not legalized same-sex marriage. Eighty-nine percent of countries do not legally recognize a transgender person’s gender identity. These numbers illustrate how the work of Western activists is predicated on progress that is rather anomalous compared to the rest of the world. Concerns against Rainbow Capitalism, though valid, do not reflect the priorities of most LGBTQ people, who are embattled in fights for much more fundamental rights. With the LGBTQ community so sparsely supported across the globe, first steps still need to be taken in many places. That is why we should not overlook the ripple of solidarity, visibility and conversation that public statements and Pride paraphernalia can bring to some queer people, for whom LGBTQ celebration is not the norm — for whom, a splash of rainbow may be the only color they see during a lusterless month.  If an app changing color is enough to bolster the hope of a gay boy in the Middle East or a trans woman in South America, that is a small win that we should first accept, rather than shun completely. I doubt that many queer communities have the luxury of being selective about the support they choose to receive.   Once again, I am not refuting the very valid argument that these establishments should dive beyond surface-level stunts and strive for tangible changes and consistent commitments. I am not advocating that we should ultimately settle for less because, clearly, these purported allies have the capacity to actuate so much more support through donation, employment, and legislation.  Instead, all I hope for is that we be mindful that the fight for LGBTQ rights is not yet at a geographically level playing field. We should recognize that steps taken in the right direction look different in some places than others. Neglecting these nuances in order to conform to the standards of Western activism may, in one way or another, jeopardize the infancy of progress for others. Rather than intimidating activists and allies worldwide  out of making early efforts for reform, I believe we should accept — even take pride in — whatever rainbow victories we can achieve for now.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/rainbow-capitalism/

Devaluation and Tragedy in the Global South | PRE x Culture

Trey Sullivan

Two days. That’s how long it took to after the destruction of Notre Dame. Five days. That’s how long it took to of that for the in Lebanon at risk of imminent collapse following last October’s explosion in Beirut, including famed edifices like Sursock Palace which holds Middle Eastern art and religious artifacts. Similarly, the tragic wildfires that swept across Australia dominated Western media and garnered immediate celebrity attention. Everyone from Kylie Jenner to Chris Hemsworth pledged money and urged their tens of millions of followers to do their part. Just a few months after, the floods that swept across East Africa –– displacing around 1.5 million people and killing hundreds –– barely made a headline. The pattern is clear. Time and again, the disparate attention paid to tragedies in the Global North and Global South reveal underlying inequities.  To be clear, I do not aim to invalidate the tragedies of Notre Dame or Australia by highlighting these discrepancies. Notre Dame is a cultural staple and a site of immense religious importance to Christians across France, Europe and beyond. Likewise, the Australian wildfires caused immense ecological damage, led to the death or harm of billions of wildlife, resulted in the displacement of tens of thousands of residents, and served as a poignant example of the necessity of comprehensive climate policy reform. However, we must also acknowledge the stark disparities between the cases of France and Australia and those of Lebanon and East Africa.  So why is there such a troubling disparity? An easy explanation for this phenomenon would be that the Global North — comprised of the world’s wealthiest and most “advanced” democracies — simply does not care about those suffering in the Global South. Historically, this answer might have some validity: see Winston Churchill’s refusal to allocate proper resources to India during th or the Clinton administration concealing information about the atrocities of the in order to justify America’s nonintervention. Yet, in the 21st century, this answer seems overly simplistic and untrue. In the new “progressive” era of Western politics, blatant apathy toward the Global South is not politically acceptable. Rather, upon deeper analysis, I find that the root of the issue is twofold: First, there is a pervasive undervaluing of non-Western culture; Second, the Western world has generally desensitized itself towards trauma in the Global South.  The devaluation of non-Western culture is not new. Indeed, it was the ideological bedrock of slavery, land theft and imperialism. The Western world viewed its civilization as superior to those it attempted to conquer. Poems like Englishman Rudyard Kipling’s and France’s political praxis of evidence the ubiquity of this ideology.  With the end of imperialism, at least in its traditional sense, overt white supremacy exited the mainstream by the end of the 20 century, but its impact is still felt. There seem to be vestigial thoughts that Western culture is the pinnacle of human achievement, while non-Western culture is a relic of a bygone era. Even in our post-imperialist setting, this sort of thinking leads to the belief that the damage of a 500-year-old church in France is infinitely more tragic and urgent than the loss of a 1000-year-old mosque or records of indigenous religious practices in the Middle East. Both are devastating, and both cultures have something to offer the world. Yet often only one story is told.  While this subconscious Western superiority complex helps explain the relative lack of outrage when The Great Mosque of Aleppo was , it does not address the lack of media coverage or government action vis-à-vis human-centered catastrophes. The reason for this disparity is less tangible than the centuries of cultural ideology discussed prior. Rather, I argue that on a psychological level, those in the Global North have been conditioned to expect disaster throughout the rest of the world. Just as many Americans have become to gun violence, so too has the West been desensitized to tragedy in the Global South. While news from the Global South is underreported, when it is covered by Western media, the narrative is nearly always : snapshots of starving children and war-battered refugees. Since images of suffering are the only ones associated with the Global South in the collective Western psyche, far too many believe and accept that death and destruction is an expected, even natural, part of life there.  There is a cruel irony to this phenomenon. In denying sufficient attention to the many issues facing the Global South, the Global North ignores its role in manufacturing them. When examining natural disasters such as flooding and drought caused by anthropogenic climate, for example, the irony lies in that while the Global South contributes the least to climate change, it is affected more harshly than any of the Western nations that have historically done the most to harm the environment.  These same nations fail to act when nations in Africa experience climate trauma. The and fires were met with public outcry and politicians’ promises to do better, but similar climate catastrophes in the Global South received no such response neither from the powerful nor the public. In truth, we, as citizens of the Global North, have power. If not the ability to stop corporate pollution ourselves, we have the ability to at least pressure our governments to change. Yet, somehow, we have been lulled into a belief that tragedy in the Global South is inevitable and thus do nothing to fix it. So, what is the solution? The process of learning and unlearning should be at the forefront. Citizens across the Global North must unlearn implicit biases and assumptions that prize Western culture as the zenith of the human experience. From a young age, children should be exposed to the wonderful diversity of human culture and be taught that difference does not mean inferiority. Far too often, in , geography, and social studies across the West, children learn that non-Western cultures were backward and underdeveloped prior to European contact. There should, of course, be a celebration of Western advances, but also an equal appreciation of the artistic, cultural, and technological innovation of peoples from across the Global South. While push-back to a structural overhaul of education systems is inevitable –– the whirlwind of backlash to Nikole Hannah-Jones’ , which reframes American history through the lens of slavery, is evidence of that. However, petitioning school boards, superintendents and administrators to rethink the way we talk about the many cultures of the Global South is necessary work. This may seem daunting, but give me hope.  The more challenging goal is to reorient the North’s view of the Global South in general. We must consciously ensure that we don’t assume and accept the worst when considering the Global South. The perception of the Global South as a monolithic entity where tragedy is bound to strike at any moment is incredibly damaging and obfuscates the fact that billions of lives are impacted.  When disaster does strike, Western media –– from student publications to international news conglomerates –– should cease to paint these tragic stories with broad strokes and instead look beyond basic statistics. Loved ones were lost, children will never have the chance to grow up, fiancés will never have their wedding days. We should be in the business of humanizing the Global South, not treating it as some downtrodden “other.”  Like all matters of international solidarity and development, this issue is complicated –– rife with centuries of complex and often painful history. I do not purport to have all the answers, but I do hope that, in beginning to unpack the web of underlying biases that result in stark disparities between the Global North and South, an important conversation is sparked about our own cultural perceptions.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/devaluation-and-tragedy-in-the-global-south/

Never Have I Ever Season 2 is Representation Done Right

Isabel Mehta

Representation is always good, but the second season of Mindy Kaling’s teen dramedy “Never Have I Ever,” starring the young and eclectic Maiteryi Ramakrishnan, takes it to the next level. This time around, the show spotlights our favorite angsty brown teen, Devi Vishwakumar, not just existing in space, as most examples of “representation” in television do, but filling the frame of a holistic and flawed person at the center of her own journey. “Never Have I Ever” creators Mindy Kaling and Louie Lang churned out an original, rich, moving second season that reckoned with, when it comes to brown women, themes so rarely addressed on public storytelling stages. Devi  — 16, hormonal, horny, sensitive — is a mess. Whether it be due to grief, insecurity, love, identity, that much is clear. What the second season does, in a slow-burn, warm-glow kind-of-way, is show viewers that an Indian girl, just like any other girl, can learn to love and forgive herself and forgive others. That she can grow, make mistakes, and emerge better and stronger from the mess. That making mistakes and even becoming a bit unhinged are  strengths in and of themselves. The second season finds Devi with not one, but two romantic prospects. Contestant one: Ben — Devi’s intellectual equivalent but cringey in almost all other ways. But sweet. Contestant two: Paxton — hot. Kind of smart, but mostly hot. Devi has to choose, but she can’t, so instead she proceeds to juggle both of them.  Devi two-timing her beaus is more than just a boy-crazy phase. This is the first moment in which the second season captures so vividly the deep insecurity and desperation of brown girls to be accepted by “cool” high school boys after spending a lifetime believing their non-white appearance renders them undesirable. Similar to how she offers her virginity up on a platter to Paxton in season one, second-season Devi still harbors much impulsivity, immaturity and naivete when it comes to men. This results partially, I think, from a society that tells young South Asian women they will never really be desirable to white or traditionally attractive men unless hypersexualized. So when we finally do get attention from men, it’s overwhelming. It’s hard to learn how to navigate the boundaries of how we want to be treated and how they are treating us. It’s a space uncharted. And we don’t know how to choose. In classic Devi fashion, the whole situation implodes and sours her relationships with both boys. Because not only did she cheat on both of them, but she ruined Paxton’s swimming career by, more or less, being the reason he broke his arm. But then, something miraculous happens. Devi and Paxton rekindle a friendship, and one dark and stormy night, he shows up at her window in traditional rom-com fashion to make out with her for “a bazillion hours.”   Watching Paxton climb into Devi’s bedroom night after night for a steamy hookup, I couldn’t help but feel bad for Devi. She knew something wasn’t right. But there was a part of her that felt she deserved Paxton’s treatment — making her do his homework, declining her invitation to the dance and, most notably, asking her to keep their relationship a secret — because of how much she screwed up earlier. She’s desperate for his validation, still, and so if their relationship has to be on his terms, maybe that’s just how it has to be, she thinks. Devi thinks she’s crazy. And, because Devi thinks she’s crazy and makes poor decisions —  and hasn’t forgiven herself for those decisions — she thinks she doesn’t deserve respect. It’s something we women do a lot: take crap from others, oftentimes men, because we don’t know how to forgive ourselves. Instead, we internalize blame for being “unhinged” when in reality we are just being human. I believed I was crazy, too. In high school I was emotional, impulsive, high and then low, kind and then mean, steady and then brash. Like Devi, I certainly didn’t treat everyone in my life perfectly, and I knew I had to take ownership for that. But I seemed to think that was a reason for others—particularly boys, but also girls— to point out my flaws like they were something for inspection or judgement. Part of this originated in a three-fold idea: first, that, as a young woman, I had to be contained; second, that confrontation and standing up for myself heightened my vulnerability; and third, that vulnerability made me weak. A larger part of this originated in a deeper, more internal idea that as a South Asian girl, it was abnormal to be mentally unstable. And so I was ashamed, and that incongruence was hard to deal with. Like Devi, I saw my moments of craziness as moments that tarnished my character. What Devi realizes, though—something that I wish I realized for myself earlier— is that her situation with Paxton is not how it has to be at all. Overcome by his sweating, sensational body bench-pressing in his living room, Devi rejects Paxton in the very same space she, only a few months ago, offered up her virginity without a care in the world. It’s a critical moment of tremendous growth, a moment where she realizes what she so desperately wants is not what she needs, or what’s good for her; that just because Paxton is the hottest boy in school and she is the nerdy Indian girl doesn’t mean there should be an imbalance of power between them. “What is so great and complex about the Devi-Paxton storyline,” said Kim Nguyen, a comedy director who directed the third episode of the second season in an interview with the HPR, “is her growth and evolution into feeling comfortable enough with herself and her voice to be able to take that space, and reject it. And gain his respect within that.” Just before ending things with Paxton and after a particularly trying moment that involves breaking into her mother’s maybe-boyfriend’s hot tub, Devi rushes to her therapist’s office in desperation—is she really crazy like everyone says? Because it sure seems like it. “You’re not crazy,” her therapist replies. “Because you feel, your life is going to be beautiful and rich.” Devi leaves her therapist’s office with new armor. One that isn’t designed to shield emotion but constructed from the strength of vulnerability itself. And so, shortly after, when she rejects Paxton, she does so with the knowledge that her past mistakes don’t cloud her self-worth, but enhance it. This is how Devi’s character pushes us closer to seeing Asian women as deep and flawed humans who are capable of evolution. It is a journey of self-love that is so special and new and real. Now of course, isn’t the first show ever to have a South Asian, female protagonist. There have been not many, but a few productions that have inched us closer to where we are now: Kaling’s and the web series being just two of them that come to mind. These projects both surely showcase the emotional depth, sexual desires, and tribulations of brown women. But what makes different is that Devi is a teenager, and so all of the themes of the show are amplified by the fact that she is young, confused, and endearingly desperate to find her footing in the world.  The media atmosphere is generally concentrated, though, with inauthentic Asian stories riddled with stereotypes and devoid of truth. When I asked Nguyen to name a few shows she believes really nail the portrayal of Asian characters, she paused. “I’m used to seeing Asian-American women being portrayed as successful,” Nguyen said. “Being able to see the real, complicated elements of a young woman finding her way and her voice in the world—there is so much more gradiance to that.”  Indeed, this idea is the foundation on which “Never Have I Ever” builds castles for its viewers, particularly it’s brown, female viewers. To recognize the emotional instability of a young brown woman, and then to portray it not as a weakness but as a way in which she can learn and grow, is groundbreaking.   “To see somebody struggling, stumbling, failing, and needing to confront her own accountability in those stumbles—this is something that is very rare to see,” said Nguyen. “Never Have I Ever” already took strides in season one by introducing a brown female protagonist who’s messy and loud and imperfect. But the second season reaches out a hand to young girls and says: “it’s okay to be crazy. We all are ” It matters not that we’re crazy but that we try to be better —  kinder, more patient with others and with ourselves — and realize the respect we deserve. We fuck up. It’s ok. Then we rebuild our own hope, brick by brick.  .

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/never-have-i-ever-season-2/

The Dangerous Subtlety of the Alt-Right Pipeline

Aidan Scully

In recent years, adherents to the alt-right, a radically nationalist and xenophobic faction of the American right wing, have increasingly made their presenceknown, both in the digital sphere and in the streets. But while the term “alt-right” may evoke images of its most prominent partisans — white supremacists and neo-Nazis — in practice, it is a much more dangerously complex spectrum of political views. Despite this, most discussions of online radicalization largely around the descent into these extremist groups, and not the subtle ways in which the echo chambers and deliberate isolation of the alt-right’s indoctrination networks operate. These networks, collectively known as the “alt-right pipeline,” are especially dangerous to young men, but a narrow discussion of the pipeline’s threat means that the full scope of the issue is rarely addressed. From the violent extremes to the tamer, but much broader, wing of the “alt-lite” (a faction dominated by popular conservative commentators and public firebrands), the same tactics are used to exploit and radicalize the rising generation. I speak from personal experience when I say that failing to address the alt-right pipeline as a complex and multidimensional issue only serves to make it stronger. The is that the alt-right pipeline targets white men who are angry at the world, a group that originally self-identified as “involuntarily celibate,” birthing the abbreviation “incel.” These observers rightfully point out the pervasive misogyny of the alt-right, and treat it as a vehicle and prerequisite for radicalization. While this interpretation of the alt-right, one that emphasizes the pipeline’s exploitation of latent misogyny and sexual frustration through “male bonding” gone horribly awry, is accurate in many cases, it cannot be applied to every case of alt-right internet radicalization. I, for example, was only thirteen when my fall down the pipeline began. My fatal element was not male rage but self-doubt. For most of my childhood, I was incredibly susceptible to peer pressure. I developed a personal identity, but my public identity was often whatever I thought would fit in best. The problem was only exacerbated when I hit puberty. I was an atheist when my predominantly Catholic friends were bonding over teaching religious education classes at their churches, a progressive but only beginning to understand the importance of what that meant, and starting to come to terms with what I now know to be my bisexuality. At the time, I was unsure of who I was supposed to be, or even who I was.  This was around the same time that YouTube began to play a larger role in my life, and there, I found my gateway drug to the alt-right: Dave Rubin. In Rubin, I saw a vision of myself; he was an openly gay atheist man who called himself a “classical liberal.” I began watching the Rubin Report on YouTube religiously, and slowly but surely bought into his message: the modern left’s obsession with “identity politics” went too far. The assertion was straightforward enough for me to understand, and having next to no frame of reference with which to refute it, I did the only thing I thought epistemically sound: accept it as true. I was working my way through Rubin’s content when I found his multi-part interview with alt-right provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos, during which Yiannopoulos half-heartedly described African-Americans as being the last oppressed group in the United States. I had no experience with the nuance of condemnable views in American politics, so even Yiannaopoulos’s begrudging admission of any form of systemic racism was enough to convince me that he was worth more attention than I previously thought. With Yiannopoulos’s points going unchallenged, I was led to believe that his rhetoric held a legitimate place in the political spectrum. Once again, with no frame of reference to do otherwise, I accepted that I must have been wrong about him, and considered myself responsible for learning more about his perspective.  I gradually cycled through the videos that my new, extremely skewed frame of reference deemed “acceptable,” avoiding only the most flagrant content. By then, however, YouTube had worked its magic and determined what would appeal to me most moving forward. Videos recommended through the YouTube algorithm for 70 percent of time spent on the site. Without thinking, I let the “up next” timer run down, and I was directed to the next video then the next, each more aggressive than the last. And so began a months-long tumble down the alt-right pipeline, but I was never able to acknowledge that I was trapped. I still considered myself a progressive; in my mind, I was not buying into the alt-right’s rhetoric, I was learning their arguments to make my progressivism stronger. But I was more easily persuaded than I knew, and even if my intentions were sound, Ben Shapiro spoke too quickly and Steven Crowder too aggressively for me to be able to process what I was hearing beyond a superficial level. My teenage mind could not keep up, and without any conscious understanding, I was cheering along with Jordan Peterson as he “destroyed” feminism and as “SJWs” were “owned” with “facts and logic.” Before I could think through what I had watched, I was onto the next video, and my internal understanding of the world became echoes of Louder with Crowder, the Daily Wire, and PragerU.Assuming I was merely developing a more nuanced understanding of the world, the true weight of what I was watching never set in with me. I began referring to myself as a “social conservative,” but never publicly. I figured discussing it with my friends was a non-starter; after all, in my mind, they had fallen victim to the machinations of the “radical left.” I was the enlightened one. But even as I tumbled headfirst down the alt-right pipeline, I never fell far enough to seal myself into a true echo chamber. In fact, what I broadly defined as my “social conservatism” rarely left YouTube. The outside world continued around me unaffected; the only impact was in how I saw it. I certainly never shared these hateful views with anyone, because on some subconscious level, I still knew that they were unacceptable for a reason.  I resigned myself to the fact that I would forever be misunderstood, because the alt-right only knows, and therefore only teaches, two emotions: anger and fear. Both of these are generalized and are used to target, broadly, “the unknown;” anything the alt-right does not understand, like, or benefit from, it views as inherently dangerous. In my time, the prime example of this was the concept of “intersectionality.” I never learned the true definition of intersectionality, that racial, ethnic, and class identities intersect with one another and should be included in progressive movements. Instead, I learned Ben Shapiro’s definition, that “according to current leftist orthodoxy, your opinion only matters relative to your identity.”  I began to see the world the way those commentators saw it. I felt threatened where there was no threat, attacked where there was no attacker, and defensive of this new identity I had been given, an identity I had never wanted to have. The world I experienced and the world I saw were fundamentally disconnected. Overwhelmed, I sank into a depression. Their anger and fear had broken me, but it had not made me angry or afraid. It had just made me sad. In the end, that disconnect was what saved me from sinking into the fascism and white supremacy of the alt-right’s public persona. Real life is not as rapid-fire or one-sided as alt-right YouTube, and when I found my peers discussing the ideas that I had been indoctrinated to believe, I realized that the people I respected had clear and concise refutations to each of those ideas. The pipeline had given me definitions of things like intersectionality, social justice, and even feminism that were dangerously inaccurate, and when I actually began challenging the views pressed upon me, they fell like dominoes. During my time in the alt-right pipeline, I found myself echoing reactionary talking points because I had been told to see conflict where none was necessary. I was inexperienced, and that made me the alt-right’s perfect target. If we as a society are to genuinely address the root causes of the alt-right pipeline, we must come to terms with what it actually is. While it often capitalizes on the worst of human impulses, it also capitalizes on naivete and ignorant innocence, regardless of age or circumstance. It looks different for everyone, from the veteran told to fear “racial replacement” by Tucker Carlson to the teenager who lingered too long on a promoted Will Witt video on Facebook. For those who know no better, the alt-right is a comprehensive and comprehensible way of understanding the world. Refutations and rebuttals of alt-right talking points must also be adapted to the digital sphere. Right-wing pundits and commentators have the most popular podcasts, Facebook pages, and YouTube channels, meaning that they are often the first thing a person genuinely looking for political discourse will find. The alt-right has already adapted to the internet and is using their head-start to indoctrinate a generation. To combat this, viable alternatives to the alt-right’s demagogic rhetoric must be available to discourage people from internalizing its narrative. Lastly, the alt-right pipeline must be addressed as a public health issue. I was never happier when I “found my identity” in the alt-right than I had been before or than I am now. Caught in the alt-right spiral, I told myself the world misunderstood me, when in reality, I had just cut myself off from it. My mental health only recovered when I escaped the pipeline. Falling down the alt-right pipeline is an intensely personal process, and it must be addressed as a personal issue. But more importantly, it must be acknowledged that the alt-right pipeline doesn’t lead anywhere: It just keeps descending. And while that means it will become harder and harder to address with time, it also means no one is ever too far gone. Returning from the alt-right pipeline was without question the greatest triumph of my adolescent life. Only then was I able to fully appreciate the rich diversity of our world and understand the nuances necessary to make genuine progress. More than ever before, too, I was able to understand myself, and fully embrace who I truly was, not the person the alt-right told me I should be. The internet is still largely in its infancy, but the alt-right and its intermediaries have already been able to establish a funnel to create new acolytes. To combat it, we must first understand it, in all of its complexity.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/alt-right-pipeline/

Making Change When Change is Hard: Civil Society and Advocacy in Singapore

John Chua

“We need to shift from a government that focuses primarily on working for you, to a government that works with you. Working with you, for you.” That was how Singapore’s Deputy Prime Minister Heng Swee Keat articulated the changing philosophy of governance of the ruling People’s Action Party, in a widely-reported 45-minute speech outlining the priorities of the next generation of PAP leadership.  For some observers, Deputy Prime Minister Heng’s speech a liberalizing shift in the state’s relationship with civil society. In Singapore, the government has traditionally played a leading role in defining the policy agenda and determining its implementation. Heng’s call for the government to partner with the people seemed to echo the increasingly common refrain of engaging and consulting civil society, reflecting the changing dynamics of state-society relations. His assurance that “we may have different views but so long as you have the good of Singapore at heart, we can work together,” also appeared to signal a break from a past where groups with views to the government were seen as dissidents and troublemakers. In doing so, Heng hinted towards the government’s intention to work not merely with establishment groups, but also with civil society organizations whose views might not immediately align with the state’s.  Despite the promise of Heng’s vision, however, Singaporean civil society groups remain confronted with challenges in advocacy that they have had to learn to navigate. Ultimately, the state’s commitment to truly partnering with civil society will be tested by its willingness to broaden the space for advocacy groups to operate, as well as to engage with those holding contrary and even critical perspectives. In line with a shift towards greater engagement with civil society, a number of Singaporean civil society organizations that the HPR spoke to attested to how the government has sought to work collaboratively in developing policy solutions. Sumita Banerjee, executive director of HIV/AIDS prevention advocacy group Action for AIDS, recounted examples of how the authorities have acted upon its suggestions. The organization’s advocacy contributed to the state’s decision in 2015 to the ban on foreign persons living with HIV entering Singapore on social visits, she said, as well as helped to make available new biomedical options recommended by the World Health Organization. Most recently, Action for AIDS launched its in December 2019 and is “looking forward to actually having some good collaborations” with the government to implement its proposals.  The state has also made efforts to consult civil society organizations in the legislative process. Jiang Haolie, a founding team member of Yale-NUS College student group the Community for Advocacy and Political Education, described how parliamentarians solicited members’ feedback when drafting new laws. “[Member of Parliament] Louis Ng reached out to us through a few of our members who were his own legislative assistants,” he explained. When a controversial bill against fake news had been mooted in Parliament, Ng connected the group with Minister for Home Affairs and Law, K. Shanmugam, who met and spoke with students about the proposed law on multiple occasions. Although members of CAPE remained skeptical after the sessions, one positive outcome, Jiang reflected, was that the students “understood how [the government] was working, and [the government] understood how [the students] were working as well.” Other members of civil society, however, are less sanguine about the state’s promises of consultation. Civil society activist and freelance journalist Kirsten Han expressed doubts about the process to the HPR. “How many national dialogues have we had, and what has come out of them?” Han asked. Some civil society activists now harbor skepticism about “how genuine such engagement is,” she noted, which discourages further involvement. In a conversation with the HPR, social worker and human rights activist Jolovan Wham also questioned the state’s willingness to undertake the potentially far-reaching reforms that might be required. It is not clear, he suggested, whether the reinvigorated attempt at national dialogue would “actually make any significant changes to the landscape, to the policies and laws that need to change.” More practically, negotiating the unspoken boundaries of acceptable advocacy vis-à-vis the state can be challenging. One frequently-described challenge is a fear of adverse consequences, whether real or perceived, as a result of dissent. Speaking based on her experience in journalism, for instance, Han related that individuals are hesitant to go on-the-record “because we still want access to this ministry or that minister, or it would jeopardize our work or it would jeopardize our organization.” Consequently, civil society groups describe a continuing tension between exercising caution in order to avoid displeasing the government and staying true to their organizational missions and aims. Speaking to the HPR, Jaya Anil Kumar, a case manager at the migrant worker advocacy group Humanitarian Organization for Migration Economics, explained how the opacity of the state complicates this process. Because what the government might deem as inappropriate is not always obvious, she observed that it is important to occasionally push boundaries, without which “the work may stagnate.” Some civil society organizations, therefore, strive to minimize misunderstanding by positioning themselves and framing dialogue carefully. CAPE, Jiang explained, attempts to avoid potentially loaded language in its public-facing material. It shies away from terms like “democracy” or “activism” unless they are used purposefully, favoring instead less provocative ideas like “active citizenry.” On a philosophical level, Jiang invoked the National University of Singapore legal scholar Lynette Chua’s concept of “pragmatic resistance” to characterize the nature of CAPE’s work. Chua coined the phrase in her in Singapore, describing how activists, sensitive to legal restrictions and cultural norms, adopt a strategy that is non-confrontational and non-threatening towards the political order. Yet, civil society activists are also cognizant of the limits and pitfalls of such an approach. Jiang highlighted how “internalizing this depoliticization” was a constant concern across the different cohorts of CAPE’s leadership. “We’ve been very worried about internalization of ‘pragmatic resistance,’ where after a certain point of time, it’s just pragmatic, and there’s no more resistance,” he reflected. Han similarly drew attention to how “pragmatic resistance” might function more effectively in certain contexts than in others. Advocating for animal welfare would demand an entirely different tack from more controversial causes such as campaigning for the abolition of the death penalty or the controversial preventative detention law, the Internal Security Act. In the case of a civil rights group seeking the repeal of the ISA, for example, Han suggested that adopting “pragmatic resistance” would be “very difficult for them because the ask is so politically sensitive.” In the face of a multitude of challenges, civil society groups in Singapore have devised strategies that have proven effective in advocating for change to the government. One important element of this process lies in creating awareness and building support among the public. HOME, for example, has relied on highlighting stories of vulnerable migrant workers who have encountered exploitative conditions at work to gain support for its cause. “Part of the reason why stories are published is because they are very impactful,” Kumar observed. “You don’t need to know the law, or know the regulations of MOM [the Ministry of Manpower], to understand stories.” With a groundswell of public concern surrounding an issue, she pointed out, the government is more likely to be responsive to the need for change.  Credible advocacy also necessitates proposals for change that are rooted in evidence-based research. Shailey Hingorani, head of research and advocacy at the gender equality advocacy group AWARE Singapore described the extensive primary and secondary research that AWARE undertakes to the HPR. “We’re not plucking things out of thin air,” Hingorani said, referencing AWARE’s qualitative research methodologies when conducting its fieldwork, along with secondary research that considers policy options shown to be effective in other countries. After an initial period of data-gathering, AWARE presents its findings back to the communities that it serves, taking their feedback into account before lobbying the government. Pairing service delivery with advocacy helps ensure that research of this sort does not become abstracted from the lived experiences of those it seeks to serve. Action for AIDS, for instance, runs the largest anonymous HIV/AIDS testing centers in Singapore, as well as support groups providing psychosocial and mental health support. Banerjee commented, “We get the evidence directly from the community, and that’s what actually helps.” Providing services allows the organization to better understand the landscape of needs while gathering data that is useful in formulating policy solutions, adding to the persuasiveness of its research. Apart from direct advocacy towards the government, empirical research can also be presented through international human rights mechanisms as another means of working towards change. HOME, for instance, has made various submissions to the United Nations, including its Shadow Report for the UN Committee on the Protection of Migrant Workers and Members of their Families, and its Universal Periodic Review for human rights. These, in turn, draw attention to the need for the review of policies or legislation that may be inadequate, giving the government a stronger impetus to reexamine them. However, these strategies depend eventually on the government’s receptiveness government to the possibility of change. Civil society groups, therefore, seek to be sensitive to the political climate, timing advocacy efforts such that they appear aligned with the state’s policy agenda. Hingorani described how AWARE strategizes areas of focus at the beginning of each year based on its reading of the government’s priorities. In choosing between either focussing on the rights of foreign spouses or eldercare responsibilities at the start of 2019, for example, AWARE “analyzed the political climate, the announcements that the government had been making, and realized that caregiving and aging were topics already in the national conversation,” she said. Thus, it chose to concentrate on the latter issue, because “the chances of that research being picked up, and the chances of the government’s listening to [them] would be higher.” Even though members of civil society are acutely aware of the difficulties surrounding advocacy in Singapore, they remain generally hopeful about the prospect of long-term change. One frequently cited positive development is the recent resurgence of youth activism in Singapore, with campus groups and other youth-led, ground-up initiatives sprouting up in recent years. “I’m optimistic about the people in civil society and pessimistic about the environment in which you have to operate,” Han commented. “I see young people who are very keen and very savvy wanting to get involved like CAPE — I mean, they’re doing amazing work,” she added. Confirming this, Jiang observed that there has been a “wellspring of student activism.” It is a “myth,” he asserted, that youth in Singapore are apathetic or civically disengaged. Recognizing that change is unlikely to happen overnight, civil society activists also take the long view, seeing their efforts as laying the groundwork for the future. Even if the results are not immediately apparent, Han remarked, “keeping conversations alive, even if they are smaller scale, is really important.” In the meantime, what continues to give purpose to members of civil society is the difference that they make in the lives of those they serve. Indeed, Hingorani explained that although she and her colleagues “work for twelve hours a day,” the words of gratitude from those in the community encourage them to persevere in spite of the many challenges they face.  Ultimately, the state’s commitment to “engagement” with civil society will be tested with time. The litmus test of this brand of consultative politics is its willingness to accept dissenting opinions and policy suggestions that sit uncomfortably with the , and to dispel any lingering worries that these critical perspectives might result in reprisals. It will be seen in the readiness of the government to collaborate in good faith with contrarians and naysayers and to thoughtfully engage with the proposals of activists like Jiang. As he put it, “We all love Singapore, for God’s sake. … We just disagree on how things should be run.”

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/singapore-civil-society/

When Art Met Activism: The 2021 Met Gala

Liana McGhee

Per usual, the 2021 Met Gala, an extravagant celebrity gathering to signal and fundraise for the opening of the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s annual exhibit, was a flurry of elegance, oddities and a little bit of confusion. This year’s theme — In America: A Lexicon of Fashion — drew out style, media and political heavyweights to express their interpretation of American fashion through the years. Ranging from Yara Shahidi’s to Josephine Baker to Olympian Suni Lee’s , this year’s Gala saw brilliance coincide with beauty as attendees focused on key assets of American culture.  Embedded within the Hollywood nostalgia and athletic luxe was another quintessential component of American culture — activism. Several attendees utilized this year’s red carpet to amplify powerful political declarations. Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez donned a white gown emblazoned with her signature phrase “Tax the Rich” and model Cara Delevigne proudly wore a dress across which the words “Peg the Patriarchy” were boldly written.  While some have lauded these statements as a powerful expression of principle, others have criticized them as out of touch and performative. The stark contrast between public reactions to these statements is emblematic of a larger debate about the space that activism does or should occupy in art, performances, and public forums.  Ultimately, those at the 2021 Met Gala who leveraged their outfits to make political statements epitomized the very function of art; that is, to encourage independent interpretation and spur conversation. The Met Gala is one of few fashion events that is guaranteed to generate enough publicity that the outfits worn become a dominant topic in societal discourse. Celebrity attendees may not have a moral obligation to utilize the Met Gala as a space for advocacy, but those this year who did should be applauded for encouraging observers to reevaluate their perspectives and reflect on pertinent social issues. The Met Gala is often referred to as “Fashion’s Biggest Night Out,” and for good reason. Chances are that in the days following the Met Gala, you can’t swipe for five minutes on your TikTok or Instagram feed without seeing someone analyze, review or question aMet Gala outfit. Even as early as the day after the Gala, Snapchat articles and lifestyle publications are filled with pieces asking “ ?” or offering various interpretations of attendees’ outfits.  It is this very publicity and the conversations it inspires that elevate the Met Gala to the storied position it holds in the fashion and media universe. Good art provokes interpretation and inquiry, and few forums exemplify this as effectively as the Met Gala. After all, the only thing more entertaining than watching celebrities wear audacious outfits is dissecting them afterward.  The Met Gala understands that fashion is an expressive art form, the purpose of which is only realized when it has a responsive and curious audience. In the same vein, those who included activism in their outfits can be credited with understanding how the Met Gala’s convergence of celebrity and art effectively guarantees an engaged audience for their advocacy,   Many have recognized the Met Gala’s fashion activists for their ingenuity and awareness. When about Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s “Tax the Rich” dress by the New York Times, former New York City Mayoral candidate Maya Wiley praised the Congresswoman’s ability to crystallize a large societal conversation. “To walk into a space that’s about art, fashion, luxury and wealth and say, ‘Here is the conversation we have to confront, but I’m going to confront it in the vernacular of the event,’ is brilliant,” says Wiley.  In the same manner that social movements capture the consciousness of a society at a given moment in time, so does art. The structure of the Met Gala lends itself to this ability, requiring designers and attendees to design their outfits around given themes that often reflect larger social phenomena. Harper’s Bazaar and Elle group fashion director Avril Mair as “the only red carpet where directional fashion has a place, as opposed to other red carpets, which are about finding something flattering.”  Met Gala fashion is not meant to be wearable or even conventionally aesthetically pleasing. As noted by celebrity stylist Rebecca Corbin-Murray in a with Harper’s Bazaar, the Met Gala is “…the culmination of a designer’s imagination… It’s a showcase for fashion in its most pure art form.” At the Met Gala, the outfits function as conduits for the expression of that artistic imagination. This, combined with the grounding of this year’s theme in American culture, makes it increasingly logical that some attendees took the opportunity to advocate for a social issue that is salient for America.  The beauty of activism is that it has no parameters. It can take the form of protest, literature, or, as we’ve begun to discuss, fashion. Andrew Bolton, the Curator in Charge of the Met’s Costume Exhibit, even grounded his vision for this year’s Met Gala in the understanding that fashion is a powerful medium for activism. He with Vogue that he’s “been really impressed by American designers’ responses to the social and political climate, particularly around issues of body inclusivity and gender fluidity.”  Just as activism has no specified medium, it has no designated effect. From starting conversations to creating tangible political change to illuminating marginalized perspectives, activism has manifold implications, existing anywhere and for anyone.  Critics slammed AOC’s “Tax the Rich” dress and Cara Delevigne’s “Peg the Patriarchy” outfits as superficial forms of pageantry from out-of-touch celebrities. While the Met Gala cannot be separated from its existence as a confluence of celebrity and privilege, what appears to be ignored by critics is how essential leveraging celebrity to start conversations is to driving forward tangible change.  Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez rejoiced on her Instagram story that Google searches for “Tax the Rich” spiked after this year’s Met Gala. Faiz Shakir, the manager of Bernie Sanders’s 2020 presidential campaign, confirmed the value in the eye-catching, eye-brow-raising activism in which Ocasio-Cortez participated. Shakir noted that “There’s an art to it: Politics is theater. You’re figuring out ways to animate it.” This animation can inspire constituents to generate the necessary energy to motivate politicians to address problems and create solutions, reinforcing the value of artistic activism.  It’s clear: The Met Gala positions attendees to amplify ideas or initiatives that often go ignored by society. With the world’s eyes on them, each guest makes a conscious decision about the message they want to communicate through their outfit. Every individual maintains the agency to make their message purely artistic or activist, but the efforts of those who leveraged the platform bestowed on them by the Gala to navigate the intersection between the two — to advocate for causes that matter to millions through fashion should be appreciated for starting the conversations imperative to progress.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/art-activism-2021-met-gala/

“Never Have I Ever” Can Do Better

Meena Venkataramanan

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/never-have-i-ever-can-do-better/

“Tomorrow’s Harvest”: The Present Foretold

Benjamin Roberts

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/tomorrows-harvest/

Tweeting for Justice: Social Media is a Double-Edged Sword

Smit Chitre

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/tweeting-for-justice/

The PPP From an Applicant’s Perspective

Christine Mui

: Documents by Pixabay are licensed under CCO

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/ppp-applicants-perspective/

Luminous and Revelatory: ‘A Promised Land’ Reinstates a Pre-Trump America

Isabella Cho

Had it been released freshly after Obama’s eight years in office, “A Promised Land” would be what most people think it is — a buzzworthy, stirring autobiography of a man who formerly helmed the White House. However, the unprecedented traumas of the past year, including the COVID-19 pandemic and the storming of Capitol Hill, have served as an illuminating indictment of American exceptionalism. Indeed, if the erratic pendulum swing of the sequential Obama, Trump, and Biden presidencies is any indication, the United States remains in a state of confused sociopolitical flux. In this conflict-ridden climate, Obama’s memoir expands in scope from a personal account to an essential historical text.  Though the former POTUS trains his gaze forward, “A Promised Land” is equally valuable in a retrospective context — one cannot help but place Obama’s political tenets in conversation with Trump’s presidential legacy. Trump acted on impulse; Obama exercised restraint. Trump capitalized on animosity; Obama underscored the necessity of mutual discourse. The memoir’s recurrent emphasis on diplomacy and compromise serves as an implicit response to the tribalistic rhetoric of the Trump era.  Barack Obama is one of Capitol Hill’s most iconic personalities, that rare breed of politician who has both a silver tongue and an intellect to match. He is not, however, admired by all. If anything, his centrist views and willingness to reach across the political aisle have generated a good deal of Democratic brow-raising in past years. Before Trump’s inauguration in 2016, talk of bipartisanship and American cohesion often seemed hackneyed and idealistic.  The divisiveness of Trump’s presidency, however, has reaffirmed the importance of collaborative politics. The homogeneity and distrust that marked Trump’s administration have thrown into sharp relief what Americans once perceived as a given — a leader who at least acknowledges, challenging though it may be, the importance of cooperation. In a post-Trump America still reeling from violence and partisanship, Obama’s call for a patchwork wholeness presents its own radical potential. At certain moments, Obama’s ruminations on “unity” — that essential yet too often defanged political slogan — come across as moralizing and heavy-handed. It does not help that, in his first days of office, President Biden has somehow already managed to overuse the term to vapid effect. Even so, reflecting on his Illinois Senate run, Obama notes, “My stump speech became less a series of positions and more a chronicle of these disparate voices, a chorus of Americans from every corner of the state.”  Though these broader reflections are valuable, the memoir’s most stirring accounts of togetherness emerge in passages that draw power from Obama’s intimate accounts of camaraderie and shared purpose. The former president recalls a “physical feeling, a current of emotion” that bridged him and his audience during good nights on the campaign trail. Reveling in the memory of the connection, he claims, “your voice creeps right up to the edge of cracking because for an instant, you feel them deeply; you can see them whole.” His deft transition from “I” to “you” lends a cinematic immediacy to the text. In “A Promised Land,” Obama does not simply relay a neutral account of his political ascent. He allows readers a privileged glimpse into private revelations — including the enthralling connection he felt with audiences — that contribute nuance and dimension to his journey. The Honolulu native’s account of his winding path to the White House is so achingly familiar — so rich with humanity and introspective largeness — because, counterintuitively, the story is not his alone. It is the shared story of vastly different people cohered by a singular, if at first unfocused, conviction to advance an idea larger than themselves.  Over the course of the memoir, the former commander-in-chief delivers countless character studies of ordinary people essential to his presidential journey. The idiosyncratic charms of those who accompanied him on the campaign trail — from body man Reggie’s inability to choose between a deep-fried Twinkie and Snickers bar at the Iowa State Fair to supporter Edith Child’s campaign rallying cry “Fired up! Ready to go!” — permeate Obama’s dense account with warmth and familiarity. As the text progresses, these particular anecdotes converge and gain momentum. Readers experience in real-time the aggregate power of these individual encounters as though witnessing the campaign coalesce into its full form. Much of Obama’s identity has been reduced to an amalgam of conflicting halves — president and husband, public and private, White and Black. The complicated, liminal spaces between these identities lend rich material for introspection, an opportunity the political leader takes in characteristic stride. Indeed, as a college student at Columbia University in the City of New York, he recalls running counter to the jaded political assessments of his peers, admitting that, despite its flaws, “the of America, the of America: this I clung to with a stubbornness that surprised even me.” As a young man, Obama’s feverish political hunger belied a more personal desire — a desire to co-create an “America that could explain me.” Arguably, though, the memoir is at its best when Obama lays bare his fraught inner contemplations. Though much of his prose is imbued with a subtext of steady optimism, some of the memoir’s most illuminating moments occur in situations when his faith — in both his nation and himself — momentarily falters, revealing darker undertones of self-doubt, cynicism, and disenchantment. When he transitions from community-based organizing in Chicago to Harvard Law School, Obama concedes he took into account the “narrower questions” of his personal ambitions. Years later, as the possibility of a 2008 presidency gradually crystallized, he wakes up from a dream, realizing that his “fear came from the realization that I could win.”  By demonstrating the tension between his personal aspirations and the public good, Obama portrays the moral ambivalence intrinsic both to him and, in some way or another, the lives of his fellow Americans.  Through Obama’s self-aware prose, “A Promised Land” illuminates a common truth: In this day and age, it is challenging — and for some, impossible — to disassociate the personal from the political. For many Americans, political involvement is not merely an intellectual exercise — it is the surest way to advocate for the structural support necessary to preserve their safety and dignity. Through detailing the hyperawareness of his dual identity, his purported “otherness,” Obama limns the intrinsic interplay between the personal and the political.  “A Promised Land” is one of those rare texts that gracefully moves toward timelessness. In relaying his experiences, the former president turns his gaze from his own story to those of readers themselves. The volume is not merely a memoir — it is the translation of one man’s uncompromising conviction to his readership, his fellow Americans. Antithetical to Obama’s political aspirations of mutuality and partnership, Trump’s presidency has affirmed that even the most fundamental democratic principles must not be taken for granted.  What sort of “land” America will become remains to be seen and debated, built and written, Obama contends as he concludes the first volume of The Presidential Memoirs. Through conferring this dual burden and responsibility to those who will listen, the former president calls attention to the urgent work that must be done — the fraught beauty and enduring humanity of the American democratic project.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/luminous-and-revelatory/

For the Record: The Hidden History of ‘A Promised Land’

Kendrick Foster

Everyone in the generations before me remembers where they were on 9/11. For me, an equally seminal moment was Barack Obama’s inauguration. Even in ruby red Texas, my third grade class excitedly gathered around the television to watch the United States’ first Black president take the oath of office. At the time, none of us realized what the next eight years would bring; we only squirmed in our seats as the ceremony ate away at our recess time.  Reading the inaugural portions of Obama’s new memoir, “A Promised Land,” I thought back to that moment in third grade and realized how much our politics has changed since. The book is a particularly potent reminder of that shift, especially since Obama sets out to explain his presidency’s key decisions with an eye towards clarifying those decisions for future readers and historians. More than that, though, Obama hopes to humanize the office, to “give a sense of what it’s like to the president of the United States.” He unequivocally succeeds in both those goals: “A Promised Land” offers an inside look at both his presidency’s momentous occasions and its greatest defeats. Beyond that, though, “A Promised Land” is a profoundly useful historical document, written with a clear eye towards preserving Obama’s legacy in the historical record.   Obama begins with a brief overview of his political career, picking up more heavily in 2007 with the story of his presidential campaign. Subsequent chapters deal with the major issues of his term as he saw them: the economy, wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and healthcare. As he grew into the presidency and made progress on many of his major initiatives, he details how his administration dealt with crises as they popped up: the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, Greece’s debt crisis, and the Democrats’ drubbing in the 2010 midterms all get significant treatment.  Structurally, the book does not proceed along strictly chronological lines. After all, Obama points out that “A president has no choice but to continually multitask,” so he instead adopts an issue-by-issue framework. This framework allows us to grasp the contours of one particular issue more easily without having to constantly switch focus. Because the book moves at a brisk pace, though, this semi-chronological structure presents a problem: It assumes readers already have a good grasp of the timeline involved. Amidst a 700-page tome, however, I lost my sense of how the different topical issues fit together, especially since the book contained very few orienting dates.  The book concludes with Obama recounting the process that ended in the death of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. Although Obama brings valuable insight about the decisions he and his staff made leading up to that fateful raid, the book terminates rather abruptly. Even though he employs otherwise easily recognizable transitions, Obama doesn’t leave me with a sense of where the following book may be headed, nor does he justify his choice of the bin Laden raid to bifurcate his two memoirs. I wonder why he chooses not to divide it more clearly between the first and second terms of his presidency, or at least offer a quick preview of what is to come.   Beyond those comparatively minor structural issues, the book shines for a mass-market audience. For starters, Obama is a consummate storyteller, making even dry policy discussions sound interesting. He often introduces important policy issues with engaging anecdotes; he segues into climate change by recounting his daughter Malia’s desire to save the tigers, for instance. Even though Obama occasionally gets into literary descriptors, these do not bog down the prose, which moves along at a rapid clip.  In terms of content, the book does not have any hallmarks of a presidential memoir. Craig Fehrman, who has written a book on presidential memoirs, the New York Times that these accounts often “quickly derail amid policy wonkery, self-justification or score-settling.” “A Promised Land” does none of these things.  To begin, while Obama is a self-proclaimed policy wonk, he does not fall into the first trap. Even when he could dwell on the details of his team’s economic response or Obamacare, he does not. After all, we can easily consult other publicly available sources for more technical details regarding both issues and others. Instead, Obama offers a more candid account of the political negotiations that went into passing legislation and executing his administration’s agenda, providing unparalleled insight into the inner workings of the Obama White House. This insight adds clarity to the historical record, shedding light on incidents and actions that perhaps went unexplained in contemporaneous sources.  Obviously, Obama does engage in some self-justification. After all, explaining why a president makes the decisions that he does is an important feature of a presidential memoir. But responding to critics is not the book’s primary purpose, and he takes full responsibility whenever he commits an error or faux pas. When Obama receives the call informing him that he had won the Nobel Peace Prize, he is at his most humble: “For what?” he wonders. “Less than a year into my presidency, I didn’t feel that I deserved to be in the company of those transformative figures who had been honored in the past.”  Finally, Obama does not engage in significant score settling. Admittedly, he does take some shots at Republican obstructionists in Congress. He writes that Lindsey Graham always “seemed to find a reason to wriggle out” of previous commitments he had made, and Mitch McConnell used his “discipline, shrewdness, and shamelessness” in the “single-minded and dispassionate pursuit of power.” But even when he felt significant annoyance at Republican obstructionism or remarked on the birther movement led by one Donald Trump, he resists the temptation to go all out against them. We need an to make the book derisive.  In the aftermath of the insurrection on Capitol Hill, this calm and reasoned tone emphasizes the contrast between the Obama administration and the Trump administration. Trump devoted his entire administration to taking shots at his enemies; Obama spent his administration trying to pass legislation and gain Republican support, even if they would not vote for his proposals in the end. In all, “A Promised Land” succeeds not only in offering us a look inside the depths of the presidency, but in further distinguishing Obama’s years in office from Trump’s for the historical record. At this moment in time, the book reminds us what democracy has looked like, what it should look like, and what it can be again. 

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/for-the-record/

“Death to 2020”: The Mockumentary That Mocks Us

Penelope Alegria

December: the most reflective time of year. As the last month, it’s often when people evaluate the past 365 days and brainstorm how they can do better next year. It’s a time to see what’s been gained and what’s been lost, to remember what happened and what we survived. December, in addition to personal introspection, is punctuated by end-of-year recaps. Google’s Year in Search has popular search queries since 2010. YouTube Rewind summarizes the preceding year by highlighting its top trending videos and creators. Even the most critically acclaimed commercials elicit goosebumps and groans alike, as corporations attempt to offer insight on the year. Such reflections have become an annual American tradition. As trite as the adjective has become, this year is truly unprecedented. Packed with a global health crisis, social unrest, and political turmoil, 2020 has prompted YouTube to do the unexpected: YouTube Rewind 2020 for the first time since its inception. In its place, Netflix released “Death to 2020” on December 27.  “Death to 2020,” the Netflix original production, is a British mockumentary featuring fictional characters giving interviews in response to the realities of the past year. Characters include a New Yorkerly News reporter, a racist historian, a satirical conservative spokesperson, a self-described “Karen” soccer mom, and of course, an average citizen. The juxtaposition of the footage’s seriousness and the narrator’s sarcasm works to market this end-of-year programming as a dark comedy. “Death to 2020” had the potential to be a fresh breath of entertainment, a novel satirical discussion of a deeply traumatic year. With the involvement of “Black Mirror” co-creator Charlie Brooker and actors Samuel L. Jackson, Hugh Grant, and Lisa Kudrow, the comedy had every chance to be fresh, edgy, and undoubtedly hilarious. The film, however, ultimately falls short of expectations. It’s just not funny to call national lockdowns across the planet “the most successful global franchise since the Marvel cinematic universe.” At best, the narrator’s attempts at humor reflect the same memes, Tweets, and TikToks seen all year. Jokes that social distancing was enjoyable for antisocial introverts — as the film’s resident psychologist Dr. Maggie Gravel, played by Leslie Jones, says in the film — have already been made on the Internet. Moreover, its familiar criticism of the rise in American polarization in response to health, social, and climate crises has grown banal. The mockumentary, for example, shows unrelated, trivial footage — like a woman blindly juggling — over scientist Pyrex Flask’s, played by Samson Kay, explanation of COVID-19 to reflect a popular public sentiment that nobody cares about the facts. But the exhaustion concerning coronavirus news has been felt throughout the entirety of last year, and as such, the joke comes across as obvious and overused.  While its commentary had potential, “Death to 2020” could have made a more clever and original jab at the realities of this past year. Instead, critics agree that “Death to 2020” ultimately fell short, with a score of  37% on and 41 out of 100 on . The film is simply predictable and surprising only in that it is a comedic disappointment So why was “Death to 2020” popular? The film’s saving grace is its scope. From wildfires to impeachments, to coronavirus, protests, and national elections, a decade’s worth of events were packed into one year. While “Death to 2020” isn’t particularly good, the film does offer a way to digest this past year, to see a video of a burning forest and remember that time.  “Death to 2020” is not groundbreaking, but it is still valuable in how satirical discussion can help process deeply traumatic and unsettling events. The film portrays the contradiction of feelings felt all year, of feeling safe and even desensitized at home while news outlets announced rising death tolls. Furthermore, this film is indicative of how many Americans handled arguably the most trying year in history: with sarcasm and Netflix. In a time with little retrospective programming, the mockumentary serves as tangible evidence to prove that this year truly did happen. “Death to 2020” tried to bring a light hour or so of entertainment into an overall dark year. And though its exaggerated portrayal of 2020 might be cringe-worthy, it did give a glimpse of what future generations will think of this time. When the mockumentary shows something that didn’t happen, like claiming COVID-19 was created by Bill Gates, it forces you to consider what actually happen. Oftentimes, the reality is not any better than the satire. Ultimately, the film is decidedly unfunny, but to be fair, so was the year 2020. At least “Death to 2020” will serve as a compilation of the year’s most significant moments to look back on and remember their insanity.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/death-to-2020-mockumentary/

Still Looking: A Glimpse at Obama’s Promised Land

LyLena Estabine

I first opened “A Promised Land” — former President Barack Obama’s latest book and my Christmas gift — two days after the attack at the Capitol building. Now, looking over my notes from those first few chapters, there is more cynicism in my scribbles than I’d care to admit.  I was six years old when Obama was sworn in as the 44th president of the United States. His administration is the first of which I have any memory, and as a bi-racial kid from Kansas, he was one of the few real-life “heroes” I could look up to. His impassioned calls for solidarity and compassion still ring in my mind: “There is not a Black America and a white America and a Latino America and an Asian America. There’s the of America.” This famous line from Obama’s 2004 Democratic National Convention speech, included in “ Promised Land , reminds me of days spent watching his leadership make history from my living room television. His example had given me courage, and as he often mentions in his book, “the audacity of hope.”  Then Donald Trump was elected. Trump’s administration starkly juxtaposed the one I had known before. Rampant xenophobia, racism, sexism, and partisanship wore on my idealized image of America year after year. Obama writes that the famous line from his 2004 Convention speech was an aspiration, but one he believed was achievable. With the recent assault on the very foundation of our democracy, however, I wondered: If America really is the place that Obama painted, how did we get here?  It was with this question that I opened “A Promised Land,” searching for an explanation from the man I so dearly respected, but whose promised land seemed like it may have only ever been a dream.  The 701-page volume follows Obama’s professional career, from briefly outlining his early life to detailing the difficulties of his Senate and presidential bids.  His writing gives an all-access look at various moments of his presidency: the Affordable Care Act, BP oil spill, Arab Spring, and fight against climate change. This in-depth, 29-hour long saga doesn’t require the eyes of a history or policy buff, or even someone who remembers the details of Obama’s presidency. For each disaster, victory, or anecdote that Obama recalls from his time in office, he provides the reader with both his own perspectives and any historical and situational context needed to help readers understand.   Even more valuable than the recap, Obama’s words give a voice to both those who passed through his life before his time in office and the politicians with whom he regularly engaged while in the White House. People like Hillary Clinton, Ted Kennedy, Nancy Pelosi, John McCain, Claire McCaskill, and Joe Biden become a cast of characters brought to life by the unique humanity so rarely present in the news cycle. We also get to take some minuscule comfort in the caricatures of people like Mitch McConnel, Lindsey Graham, and even Donald Trump, a reminder that they have been causing many Americans grief for longer than just the last four years. Obama’s commentary, such as “Lindsey’s the guy who double-crosses everyone to save his own skin,” fits well in our current political moment. In the book’s opening pages, Obama claims that he wants his words to reach young people. He skims over his youth, describing his lack of effort and the trouble he sometimes got into, later having it used against him during his campaign. Yet, nothing was enough to truly derail his efforts. I wonder if the same will be true for my classmates with political aspirations, as our generation has grown up with nearly all of our lives documented by social media. We’ve also been forced to fight for our rights and become aware of our government’s impact at a much younger age. As Ted Kennedy tells Obama when he questions whether or not to make a run for the presidency: “You don’t choose the time, the time chooses you.” It’s an interesting notion and certainly relevant for young people living through this historical moment. Obama isn’t perfect, and there are, of course, moments that cause you to wince and groan. The book includes a description of Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak having a “Roman nose” and  a mischaracterization of Tunisia as a “repressive but reliable ally.” But these are only part of Obama’s written candor, present in the occasionally questionable quotes, the self-doubt and headfirst forward charges, the questions to God and the moments of spirituality. In these instances, Obama doesn’t put on a mask of political perfection or glorify the job he carried out. There is no heroic triumph: only a human given a massive responsibility and carrying it out as best he can while refusing to give in to the belief that things can’t change. His narrative ends after the killing of Osama Bin Laden, with Obama reviewing and planning for the months ahead. The work continues for him, just as it does for us.   As I closed the book, I returned to the question with which I started: how did we get here after being so close to what looked like the promised land? After eight years of Obama preaching the human connection, did Trump emerge as the chosen one because people considered those bonds artificial? I don’t want to believe that, but the comments of “Go back to Africa” and “Go back to your country” that I’ve heard increasingly over the last four years certainly curbed my belief in anything better. As I read, it seemed to me that Obama’s vision of a promising America was really just a picture of people overcoming the challenges that “America” presents. But maybe that is the point.   To deny the very real divides that separate us is to overlook the underlying rifts and important differences in perspective and belief that make up this nation. That being said, though, Obama’s conviction — that we should consider our similarities as more than just footnotes to our differences — was the start of a revolution. Just like the revolutions by which Obama claims to have been inspired while navigating his life, learning to balance our intrinsic commonality and crucial polarity has been and will continue to be messy, but I don’t believe it to be impossible. As people continue to talk about the crumbling of our democracy, there is one scene from “A Promised Land” that sticks out to me. Obama is informed that he needs to contact Mike Mullen so that the US can officially begin military operations, “except the state-of-the-art, secure mobile communications system … apparently wasn’t working.” Instead, he ended up making that important call from his cell phone. I’m not suggesting that we do away with necessary security measures, but the image is compelling — our Commander in Chief issuing orders from an old cell phone. It is a reminder that the high-functioning, complex system that we have created may sometimes glitch. But our democracy doesn’t and will not fail because it doesn’t rest in the formal complexities; it rests in the hands of leaders — true leaders — like Barack Obama. That restores in me at least some hope for tomorrow.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/still-looking/

Why Tackling the Climate Crisis Means Transforming our Culture

Ilana Cohen

Speaking at the World Economic Forum in 2019, Swedish teen climate activist Greta Thunberg a continuing generational frustration among today’s young people: we don’t want to pick up slack for the generations most responsible for the climate crisis. We want them to act.  strives to inspire that action and explain the inertia that has stalled it in her new book “ ” Weintrobe, a psychoanalyst and Fellow of the Institute of Psychoanalysis in London, considers an understanding of human psychology critical for understanding the climate crisis — of how human-caused climate change came to be a “crisis” and why we’re still facing it today. Through a combination of psychoanalysis, social theory, memoir, and history, she deftly illustrates how neoliberals have exploited human nature to keep the systems and policies needed for a just and sustainable future from coming into place, even as public opinion increasingly demands them. By offering a critical and comprehensive view of the psychological factors underpinning an exploitative and extractive status quo, Weintrobe shows how we can start transforming it. Weintrobe attributes the climate crisis in large part to “neoliberal Exceptionalism,” or the phenomenon by which those who are ruled by their inner exception and promote deregulated capitalism dominate society’s political agenda. To have this inner exception or a part of us that says we are special, ideal, and beyond reproach is natural. Problems arise, however, when it takes control. Weintrobe argues that over the last few decades, the ascent of neoliberal Exceptions to political power has bred a culture of carelessness in which parts of broader society have colluded, unleashing the worst of our humanity. Hence, working ourselves out of the climate crisis requires enacting robust political, social, and economic frameworks that breed a “culture of care,” unlocking the best of our humanity  —  our empathy and compassion for one another and the planet. Enacting such frameworks requires good leadership unafraid to harness our emotional responses to climate change to move people to action and advance frameworks of care, like the Green New Deal (which Weintrobe interestingly calls a “vital mental health measure”).  Perhaps what I most appreciated about Weintrobe’s argument is that it hits on a fundamental truth about human nature: its duality. Our capacity to create is rivaled by our capacity to destroy — to wishfully think ourselves out of harm’s way, to see anything that doesn’t square with the preservation of our self-image as a threat, to see ourselves as exceptional and therefore, invincible. And in some sense, it’s this duality that can save us from the climate crisis: because if we can care, we can care again. For followers of progressive climate thought-leaders like writer Naomi Klein and fans of the Sunrise Movement end of the climate activism spectrum, Weintrobe’s argument feels somewhat intuitive. It’s predicated on ideas like the need to limit economic growth on a finite planet and the impossibility of techno-thinking humanity’s way out of the climate crisis, which such followers readily accept. Her critique of neoliberal Exceptionalism confirms and deepens a now prevalent mentality among many youth climate activists. Those who don’t already subscribe to such beliefs, however, may find themselves unsatisfied. Even as the book seems on its surface to present an apolitical argument and does in some respects cut through the political noise in its psychoanalytic orientation, it’s hard to imagine conservative ideologues or many who lean right on the political spectrum following Weintrobe to her conclusions. Moreover, some aspects of Weintrobe’s book may jibe less well with environmental justice advocates. Namely, the book leans heavily on Extinction Rebellion (XR), the nonviolent environmental movement which first arrested public attention (pun intended) when it in London — where Weintrobe is based — and called on the UK government to declare a climate emergency. XR’s focus on truth-telling and emotion-sharing makes it a prime example of the culture Weintrobe wants us to strive toward. But XR is far from the only climate group employing the methodologies and philosophies critical to this “culture of care.” The frequent references to XR, then, seem to come at the exclusion of others who have done similar work, with much less public recognition, for longer. In the past, XR, a predominantly white middle-class group (at least, in its founding), has faced for lacking racial diversity and connections to frontline communities, and for centering language about mass species extinction over the immediate and human costs of environmental degradation, born largely by low-income communities of color (which Weintrobe recognizes). While I don’t think Weintrobe’s reliance on XR discredits the book or diminishes her core argument, it does risk leaving readers with a narrow view of the climate movement and who in it is pioneering the cultural transformation for which tackling the climate crisis calls.  Though Weintrobe’s book holds invaluable insights for people of all ages and masterfully breaks down academic jargon for a popular audience, it reads as most clearly directed toward the “adults” in the room —  readers who don’t identify as contemporaries of the “youth” climate movement (which I will define as including everyone from elementary school-aged climate strikers to the 20-something-year-olds leading the Sunrise Movement). At some moments, it speaks even more directly to today’s grandparents: “We oldies who will soon be dead have the luxury of thinking the damage is too hard to face, and that the work to repair the world that we damaged is too hard to undertake.” For these generations who won’t live long enough to see the worst effects of climate change, putting the climate crisis out of mind comes easier than for today’s children, which is precisely why Weintrobe sees children as “our best source of hope.” You don’t have to understand Arctic sea ice decline to care about climate change, she posits; you just have to care about your granddaughter not living in a world plagued by conflict over finite resources, where human rights go unprotected and basic needs unmet.  Weintrobe’s choice to speak directly to her own generation, an older one, makes sense to me. After all, research shows that younger Americans are already the most worried about climate change (a 2018 Gallup poll that 70% of Americans age 18 to 34 are worried a great deal/fair amount about global warming, compared to only 56% of Americans age 55 and older). In her book, Weintrobe recognizes today’s children as “the realists.” As a young person and a climate activist reader, I found this portrayal personally vindicating as well as culturally apt. We Gen Z-ers and to some extent, Millennials, who have grown up doom-scrolling posts about rampant wildfires and mass migration due to natural disasters know no reality other than one in which the need for bold climate action is iminent. We’re speaking out on the world stage, organizing global climate strikes, and pressuring elected officials to say no to fossil fuel money. Most of us really don’t need about climate change telling us it matters, that it will impact our generation and any children or grandchildren we might hope to have more than it will our parents and grandparents. Calling for systemic change sounds much less radical when you know your future is on the line. But we need the people whose futures aren’t on the line mobilizing alongside us. It’s older people, our parents’ and Weintrobe’s generations, who now control most of our political and economic systems. And if we want to avoid dangerous levels of warming, we need them leveraging their power as community members, employees, pensioners, and public leaders to accelerate a transition off of fossil fuels. Weintrobe’s book helps make the case for their action, from one “oldie” to another. In setting our mental wheels in motion and prompting us to start relating differently to each other and the planet — cultivating an alternative culture of care — Weintrobe reminds us that, in order to save tomorrow, we must empathize with and acknowledge the climate psychology of today.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/psychological-roots-climate-crisis/

Octopi, Pendulums, and Revolution: Ten Books from Lockdown Days

Annelisa Kingsbury Lee

Last March, as the nation moved into quarantine, I decided to read everything anyone recommended to me, no matter how appallingly boring it sounded. Without naming names, recommendations came from friends who major in math and last read a novel in 2013, the AI recommendations from my library app, someone whose idea of a good time is a gallon of beer and an anthology of Raymond Carver, and even the occasional Twitter thread of a stranger. Each book on this list surprised me; many expanded my worldview; all of them occupied my free time, accompanied me on walks and into conversations, and gave me a precious gift: the rediscovery of childish curiosity. I’ve presented ten of them below in the thematic order of this exceptionally odd year, one whose moods and twists I was happy to navigate in their pages.  “There is an ache in my chest today, sweet, searching, and painful, like a tongue that is cut and tingles with sweetness and pain after eating a strong pineapple.” From those words on, I was all in. The late Binyavanga Wainaina had a gift for images, and his memoir about growing up in Kenya is fizzly, punching, and lyrical in turns.  Wainaina begins with a Joycean conceit: his child self’s memories are told in a child’s voice, simple and alive with the kind of metaphor no adult would think of. In tandem with his personal development, he sketches out Kenya’s socio-political and cultural changes. The book weakens slightly in the second half, as the adult Wainaina moves to South Africa, realizes he wants to be a writer, and is amazed to discover how Kenya’s tribal and ethnic politics have shifted in his absence. But Wainaina ultimately pulls off an impressive balancing act, managing to engage with Kenya as both a political entity and as the place of his childhood.  I picked this book up by accident in a used bookstore right before lockdown thanks to the gruff and incomprehensible directions of the owner. This turned out to be a real stroke of luck, probably the only stroke of luck I experienced that month. Every time I picked it up, I got to wholly inhabit Wainaina’s language, and the panic, fear, and boredom of the early-pandemic faded away. This is my uncle’s favorite book ever, and I started it somewhat dutifully. Then I cancelled my dinner plans and read the entire book in one sitting. The plot is so simple as to hardly merit description: a group of ne’er-do-wells throw a party for their friend Doc, a marine biologist, during the Great Depression. Things go poorly. Many, many, many frogs are involved. Cannery Row is beautiful and also extremely funny. It slots neatly into the trope of location novels, written out of nostalgia for a very particular place, a neighborhood full of capital-C Characters that also happens to be a Character all on its own. The marine biologist character is a love letter to Steinbeck’s beloved friend Ed Ricketts, and also serves as a representative of Steinbeck’s conceit: Cannery Row is a rich ecosystem, swimming with history and description. I bore a deep grudge against Steinbeck in high school and would never have expected that I’d be calling him a master of American letters. But I’ve got to acknowledge the simple power of his writing: reading this book made me miss, intensely and almost feverishly, a place I have never even seen. Effectively, Eugenie Grandet is a Victorian moral tale of a miser’s familial troubles. The characters are little more than archetypes (Naïve Girl, Dandy Love Interest, Controlling Father, Tragically Ill Mother, Loyal Servant), and Balzac clumsily signals the tragic ending from the first page. I dreaded reading it, but my library app — which rarely imposes this sort of dictate — insisted that it was a “Book You Might Like.” Well, as you can guess from his inclusion on this list, Balzac surprised me. Yes, Eugenie Grandet is a bit of a relic. But it’s also a stunningly sad critique of what money, and the accumulation thereof, does to a person’s soul. The French countryside here is its own character, and a palpable sense of its imminent dissipation fills the book. Despite all the foreshadowing, the exact nature of the tragic ending is slippery throughout the novel, and the sense of fading anticlimax is killer. There’s an awareness of what-happens-after-the-party, of lives lived out under the shadow of missed opportunity. I think that’s a feeling that might resonate with a lot of people this year. A friend of mine runs a Black Radicalisms reading list, and an excerpt from The Black Jacobins was one of her daily mailings a few months into quarantine. Trinidadian historian C.L.R. James’s history of the Haitian revolution was published in 1938 and is as fervently relevant as a text written yesterday. Toussaint L’Ouverture — genius, leader, and political thinker — is the central figure of the volume; James evokes both the brutality of slavery and the brutality of Western-dominated narratives of the Haitian Revolution. He re-centers the history of revolution from France to Haiti and discusses not only the influence of Enlightenment thought on the Haitian revolution but also the absolute necessity of including Black people in any analysis of “permanent revolution.” Black Jacobins is a gem on this list not just as a document of Black liberation, as relevant as ever in the present moment, but also as a masterpiece of history and storytelling. Okay, I’m cheating a little bit here, since I was actually forced by my Classical Chinese teacher to read the Daodejing in its original tongue. I figure most HPR readers might be willing to settle for a translation, though, and let me tell you — Ursula K. LeGuin does it like no other. LeGuin’s translation skips over the intricacies of the Warring States philosophical context, which I can reliably inform you are really quite intricate, and the long tradition of Chinese scholarly interpretation, which I can also reliably inform you is really quite long. Instead, she reveals to the Western reader the profound paradox and the utopian political vision that characterize this foundational Daoist text as simply as possible. LeGuin includes a few personal annotations which demonstrate her long and close spiritual relationship with the “Daodejing.” In her hands, it becomes a sweet and deep well of wisdom from which everyone can draw.  At the same time, LeGuin avoids the pitfalls of Orientalist translation. The book is neither the stilted over-foreign translation most Chinese classics have been subject to, nor is it chock-full of generically mystical Pinterest quotes. In my view, it’s as close as a non-Chinese speaker can get to experiencing the original. This is best illustrated with an example: “Hollowed out, Clay makes a pot. Where the pot’s not Is where it’s useful.” LeGuin’s annotation: “One of the things I love about Lao Tzu is he is so funny. He’s explaining a profound and difficult truth here, one of those counterintuitive truths that, when the mind can accept them, suddenly doubles the size of the universe. He goes about it with this deadpan simplicity, talking about pots.” Many of my friends were surprised to hear I was reading “a biomathematics book” – and quite reasonably so, since I barely passed 8 grade algebra. Luckily for me, Ian Stewart makes it his business to explain math to the clueless. The book is organized in essay form, and each essay takes you through some of the history of biomathematics and then some recent progress made in the field. Reading it forced me to ask questions I’ve never asked myself before: I know what DNA is, but I have no idea how the information contained in DNA actually becomes a fetus. I know how evolution works, but I’ve never stopped to consider exactly how it happens – after the first monkey is born with, say, blue fur, how does that mutation become widespread across a population? Stewart reminds readers of the miraculous and beautiful complexity of life and also of the power of mathematical thinking. Topology proves unexpectedly useful to understanding DNA; network mapping to neurobiology; 1one-dimensional geometry to viruses. Don’t be intimidated if you don’t know what half of those words mean – Stewart’s writing explains everything, succinctly and with brilliant clarity. In the process, he opened my eyes to a whole new world. I’m probably not the only person who read “Long Walk to Freedom” in lockdown. But I am probably the only person who read it because my aunt told me a story about my grandfather ripping a fence down and marching onto a rugby field in protest of the 1981 South African Springbok tour of New Zealand. (Historians, take note of possible exaggeration — I suspect he may not actually have single-handedly ripped the fence down.) This inspired me to pick up what I think can fairly be called the defining book of the 20th century. This decade, Nelson Mandela looms ever larger in historical importance and in moral message. What I most enjoyed about “Long Walk to Freedom,” though, were the early segments, before Mandela goes to prison and becomes the symbol of the anti-apartheid movement, when he’s just a young activist. Mandela is sharp as a tack in his analysis of the politics of the early movement – tribal interests, Colored and Indian groups, and the intra-group squabbles with which anyone in activist spaces is familiar.  For me, this book was a reminder that we cannot rely on tales of individual heroism in place of analysis of the systems they’re fighting against. Mandela is brutally honest about what young activists faced and are facing. He is also an icon of moral fortitude and perseverance, and his writing presents two much-needed things: a path forward, and a reminder of the people — grandparents, community elders, thinkers and activists scattered across time and around the globe — on whose shoulders we’re standing. “Annelisa,” you say. “This list is so far pretty good, and already has a few novels on it. But I feel an urge to read a novel by an Italian. Maybe … a 600-page magnum opus that is mostly a satire of esoteric conspiracy theories and 1970s radical politics, but is also kind of about semiotics, and also, against all odds, is a really enjoyable adventure.” Well, I have got the book for you.  “Foucault’s Pendulum” is not at all what it says on the tin; French theorist Michel Foucault doesn’t come into it at all, and French physicist Léon Foucault (and his pendulum) only really gets, like, one scene. After you read this book, you will know a lot more about the Knights Templar, Kabbalah, and Brazilian religious syncretism than you ever really wanted to, and you will sort of suspect that most of what you know is fictional. The friend who recommended Eco to me is a charmingly eccentric high-math high-theory quasi-genius, and the book is as thought-provoking and experimental as that description suggests, but (much like the aforementioned friend), it is first and foremost quite a lot of fun. An acquaintance’s family friend’s favorite science podcast let me in on this quick and dirty secret: you actually don’t have to spend eight to twelve years in higher education to learn a little bit of physics. In fact, you can read professional physicist Carlo Rovelli’s book in an hour, and I will bet you that hour will be the best hour of your week.  “Seven Brief Lessons on Physics” outsold Fifty Shades of Grey in Italy, and in my opinion it deserves to outsell Fifty Shades of Grey in every other country in the world (sorry, E.L. James). In less than 80 pages, Rovelli gently unfolds Einstein’s theory of relativity, several basic facts about black holes, time, and probability, the theoretical promise of quantum gravity, and a few hard-hitting revelations about the human race. This book made me feel exactly the way I felt as a child when someone first told me, on some late starry night, that every star I was looking at was just a ball of fire, and all of it had come from a mysterious quantum fluctuation called the Big Bang. It’s beautiful, it’s simple, and it’s as close to a miracle as you’re likely to get. My mom told me that this book was “trendy among the eco-friendly types a while back” and that I would probably like it. Although I resent this blatant stereotyping (c’mon, just because I’m an environmental science major?), she was right. “H is for Hawk” is part moving elegy for MacDonald’s late father, part love letter to vicious wild things, and part psychoanalysis of B-list English author T.H. White. After I read this book, I spent weeks sitting by the river, looking for that elusive flutter of wings. I called my parents a lot. I listened to bird calls on my phone and tried to match them to what I heard on my morning walks.  The book is as smart as it is touching, and MacDonald doesn’t hesitate to critique falconry, bound up as it is with Englishness, imperialism, and class. It’s more relevant than ever, politically, in an age where climate change awareness is turning into climate despair. The clearest image with which this book left me was the falcon Mabel, incongruously perched in an English suburban living room, bating from her roost in helpless, wild fear. Image Credit:  by   is licensed under   

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/ten-books-lockdown/

Unpacking the Pervasive Toxicity of Republican Loyalty

Sofia Andrade

On January 6, a mob of insurrectionists stormed the U.S. Capitol at the behest of the former president, Donald Trump. “We’re going to walk down to the Capitol,” Trump had the insurrectionists — armed with pro-Trump banners, confederate flags, , and a makeshift gallows —  before urging them to “ .” And they did. The violent insurrectionists police officers, destroyed government property, and forced lawmakers and aides to under desks and in closets out of fear for their lives. They chanted their desire to “ [former Republican Vice President] Mike Pence” and rallied around the same that the former president had been spewing for months, that the election in U.S. history was stolen and that Trump was the rightful winner.  The riot led to the of five people, including one Capitol police officer. Two other officers committed suicide after the events of that day. In the aftermath of January 6th, Trump became the only president in U.S. history to be impeached twice: once for of power and obstruction of Congress, and once for inciting an insurrection against the U.S. government. And yet, the impeachment hearing which culminated in Trump’s acquittal was just the latest in a string of incidents proving that, for Republicans, there is no limit to partisan loyalty.  Even after witnessing first-hand what Democratic Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer “the most despicable act any president has ever committed,” the vast majority of Republican lawmakers chose to side not with democracy, but with the former president who spent his last months in office dead-set on destroying it. Only Republican representatives voted to impeach Trump, and when it came time for the Senate to convict him on Feb. 13, just seven Republican senators sided with the 50 Democrats in declaring Trump guilty, ten short of the supermajority needed to convict and bar the president from ever running for public office again. To be sure, Republicans were quick to play scapegoat. Many indeed condemned the physical presence of the insurrectionists at the Capitol. Republican Senator Rob Portman of Ohio, for example, ,“The right to protest peacefully is protected under the Constitution but the actions by violent mobs against our law enforcement and property at the @USCapitol building today are not,” before calling on Trump to “condemn this unacceptable vandalism and violence.”  But when it came to disavowing the singular person whose inflammatory rhetoric and disinformation was responsible for setting the insurrectionists loose on democracy in the first place, most Republicans were silent. Indeed, Senator Portman, like many Republicans who criticized the riot, still vindicated and voted to acquit Trump. The few who call out the former president for his role in the attack did little to turn their words into action.  Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, for example, garnered some for his cutting rebuke of the doubly impeached president. “Former President Trump’s actions that preceded the riot were a disgraceful, disgraceful dereliction of duty,” he said on Feb. 13 to a Senate chamber filled with colleagues who, like him, had feared for their lives only a couple of weeks before.  But the Senator only spewed such a scalding reproach, calling the former president “practically and morally ” for the insurrection, after having voted to acquit the very target of his speech. McConnell’s words were just that: words. Like the 43 other Republicans who voted in favor of acquittal, McConnell did nothing to repair the damage on the institutions he accused Trump of trying to “ .” Instead, blind loyalty to Trump’s Republican party created an environment in which not even a president who set his supporters loose on the government itself could be deemed unfit for governing.  The Republican Party has become increasingly polarized and far-right in recent years, and the Trump presidency is only the most obvious symptom. As their favor with the American people has steadily dropped — Trump lost the popular vote twice, and the 57 senators who to convict represent 76.7 million more Americans than the 43 Republicans who voted to acquit — the party’s impulse towards unpopular power grabs have become increasingly common. Think back to the recent moves to unconstitutionally undocumented immigrants from the Census count in order to reduce the political power of predominantly Democratic cities, for example, or the rushed Suprme Court confirmation of Justice Amy Coney Barrett just weeks after the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. In doing so, Republicans have managed to secure federal authority despite less and less of the country.  As they’ve done with the pressing issues of the climate crisis and systemic racism, Republicans chose to stick their heads in the sand, even and especially when the facts become increasingly obvious. Notably, many did so after months of forwarding the same lies as the president himself, the very falsehoods that found their echo in the Capitol chambers on Jan. 6. Even the most visceral threat to U.S. democracy to date was not enough to sever the Republican party’s ties to the cult of Trumpism and the disinformation that necessarily fuels it. Just look back at the annual Conservative Political Action Committee, or CPAC, conference this past year, where the former president’s vitriol towards Senator McConnell — who did not receive an invitation to the event despite being one of the most prominent Republicans in office — was met with support from the largely maskless crowd. It’s clear that even post-Trump, the former president’s grip on the “Grand Old Party” remains comfortably intact.  The Republican Party continues to be flimsy and hypocritical — two traits which prime its leaders and supporters for what appears will continue as an ongoing attack on the very pillars of American democracy: from the government, to the press, to truth itself. And if inciting a violent insurrection threatening both the life of the former Republican Vice President and of hundreds of lawmakers is not enough for Republicans to decide to convict one of their own for the sake of democracy, then what is?

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/unpacking-republican-loyalty/

A Novel of Our Times: “Normal People”

Tarun Timalsina

Sally Rooney may have only published two novels so far, but reading the young Irish author has already a status symbol among today’s generation. as the first great millennial author, Rooney deftly captures the zeitgeist of our contemporary world through her lucid prose and spellbinding narratives. In both her novels, Rooney employs a handsomely straightforward style — unburdened with flashy metaphorical language — to explore the complicated romantic entanglements of equally complex characters. Yet her narratives have a deeper resonance and challenge the reader at an intellectual level to grapple with the realities of existence in the present age. Published in 2018 and subsequently adapted into a successful television series, “Normal People” is Rooney’s second and most recent novel. Longlisted for the Booker Prize, the novel chronicles the complicated relationship of Marianne and Connell as they leave behind their homes in small-town Sligo to attend the prestigious Trinity College in Dublin. Connell, though poor, is athletic and popular in school, while Marianne is aloof and shunned by her peers. They form an unlikely — and furtive — relationship which dissolves tragically towards the end of school. They meet again in Dublin where they both attend the same college — except, now, Marianne, with her brilliance and wealthy background, blossoms into a social butterfly while Connell, beset by his underprivileged upbringing, struggles to fit in. Their sexual chemistry, however, is reinvigorated at Trinity — but it doesn’t take long for things to fall apart again. Tracing the extraordinary journeys of two young students who discover themselves as they navigate love, relationships and college, “Normal People” may initially resemble a standard coming-of-age tale. The novel, however, embraces heavier contemporary themes like toxic masculinity, anxieties about capitalism, political correctness, mental health crisis, as well as class and gender politics. Rooney’s greatest strength in the novel comes from her ability to masterfully weave such serious themes into her narrative without distracting her readers from the natural flow of the story. Rooney’s characters are deeply flawed but profoundly human, often reminding us of our own fallibilities. Connell’s awkwardness, timidity, and teenage obsession with his peers’ approval are presented in stark opposition to Marianne’s smug self-assurance and lack of regard for her classmates. Connell is full of self-doubt and seems perpetually confused about what he should do — at one point he is troubled by a sense that he is in fact “two separate people.” Even though he likes Marianne, he keeps his relationship with her a secret for the fear of being judged by his classmates. And despite treating Marianne in a humiliating fashion, blinded by his toxic masculinity, he does not muster enough courage or sense to apologize, which he later regrets.  Rooney, however, does not shy away from condemning these flaws, which she often does in a blunt and unapologetic fashion in the novel. When Connell ditches Marianne and instead invites another girl to the school formal, his mother Lorraine rebukes him harshly. Lorraine’s indignance at her son’s actions is manifest: she calls him “a disgrace” and admits to being “ashamed” of him. Rooney does not mince words, and her matter-of-fact approach makes conversations in the novel sharp and forceful. One of the most riveting developments in the novel is the dramatic reversals of fortune that befall the two central characters: in school, Connell is considered handsome and popular while Marianne is shunned by her classmates as ugly and antisocial; in Dublin, however, Marianne, with her upper-class upbringing and intelligence, gets more attention than Connell, who feels out of place among the privileged students at Trinity.  Rooney, an Marxist, presents a strong critique of our class-based society through Connell’s experience. During his early days at Trinity, Connell feels “a sense of crushing inferiority” to his classmates who can “express their opinions passionately and conduct impromptu debates.” The privileged kids from Dublin think and act differently from Connell, which leads him to accept that he will probably never understand them. Coming to Dublin exposes Connell to the reality of his situation and imbues him with a class consciousness he did not have back in Sligo. Despite being a diligent student, Connell struggles to fit into the crowd of mostly entitled and privileged students at his college. At the first party he attends in Dublin, Connell is anxious that “everyone around him is disturbed by his presence.” He is forced to reckon with the fact that his clothes are “cheap and unfashionable” and wonders “if he had upgraded himself accidentally to an intellectual level far above his own.”  Readers are given access to Connell’s intimate thoughts through which they can empathize with him and understand the psychological toll of class divide in our society. This is one of Rooney’s greatest strengths — by frequently diverging from the mantra of “show, don’t tell,” she presents readers with the opportunity to explore the inner worlds of her characters and better understand their concerns and insecurities. Exposure to Connell’s unfiltered thoughts help readers understand his inner turmoil and develop sympathy for a character who is a victim of the class hierarchy that continues to define our society. Despite the novel’s brevity, Rooney manages to weigh in on several big questions of our contemporary age. When Connell finds out that Marianne’s boyfriend from college was responsible for inviting a Neo-Nazi to speak in the name of free speech, he playfully chides her: “Your boyfriend is a Holocaust denier.” By setting this scene at a party, Rooney ensures that the conversation remains light-hearted, but at the same time she ensures that the issue is recognized as important, especially at a time where debates around political correctness and limits of free speech have never been more pronounced. Rooney’s knack for invoking heavier themes in her novel without letting them consume the entire narrative is impressive and helps keep readers interested. At an earlier point in the novel, when Connell and Marianne visit an abandoned house, Connell wonders why the house could not just be sold, to which Marianne replies: “It’s something to do with capitalism.” Connell then reinforces this: “Yeah. Everything is, that’s the problem, isn’t it?” Rooney however does not use this as a launchpad to spark a passionate debate about the ills of capitalism; rather, the characters just get on with their lives.  Rooney carefully draws her readers’ attention to the problem of modern capitalism, but instead of dwelling on it, she trusts her readers to have their own debates outside of the novel. Throughout her novel, Rooney manages to successfully highlight the many problems that ail our society without feeling compelled to resolve them for the readers. This helps her keep her readers engrossed in the narrative and at the same time imbue them with a sense of agency to assess these problems on their own. “Normal People” is a novel of our times. Rooney captures the modern reader’s imagination through simple form and unpretentious language while managing to touch on pressing issues of today’s world through her narrative. Readers are invited to inhabit the psyches of the characters, and not only experience their anxieties and insecurities but also confront topical themes through their lives. Rooney’s novel is a beautiful story that captures our heart with its brilliant portrayal of young love whilst simultaneously inspiring us to meditate on the bigger questions of life. .

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/normal-people/

Spongebob, The Alternative, and The Art of Queer Failure

Jordan Barton

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/spongebob-queer-failure/

In Pursuit of a Childlike Ideal

Winona Guo

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/childlike-ideal-2/

Welcome to the #Markeyverse

Allison J. Scharmann

It began with a bang — or rather, a bomber jacket.  On April 12, Sen. Ed Markey of Massachusetts tweeted a photo of himself decked out in a slick green jacket, Boston Red Sox facemask, and Nike high top sneakers captioned: “If you have to go outside, wear a mask.” The photo went viral, amassing over 13,000 likes and fashioning the senator into an unlikely style icon. Young people flooded the replies with comments like “ ,” “ ,” and “ .” Sangeeta Singh-Kurtz, , dubbed the outfit “a sick fit.”  But the outfit itself is less important than what its popularity signifies. Markey, a 73-year-old incumbent, is in the thick of a high-profile, hotly contested Democratic senate primary. His opponent? 39-year-old Massachusetts Rep. Joe Kennedy III. In a sea of young, progressive Democrats and Democratic Socialists launching primary challenges against establishment incumbents across the U.S., this particular race is a bit of an anomaly. While both candidates have laid claim to the mantle of progressivism, Markey is widely considered to be one of the most progressive members of the U.S. Senate.  Young people are paying attention.  Enter: The Markey Stans. Over the past months,while the rest of us stared in horror at cake videos and downloaded, deleted, and re-downloaded Tik-Tok, a different social media subculture began taking shape.  It started with just a few accounts: Ed Markey’s Reply Guys (@edsreplyguys) and Students For Markey (@students4markey), populated by high school and college-aged organizers invested in both Massachusetts state politics and memes. As time went on, the number of Markey-related accounts grew in number while also narrowing in scope. The accounts “Gingers for Markey” (@gingers4markey), “MA-04 for Markey” (@ma04for), and “Has Joe Kennedy Given a Good Reason for Running?” (@whyisjoerunning) gained prominence over time, and the various accounts grew their audience by interacting with one another.  And then, @gingers4markey, came “the second Cambrian explosion.”  Theater kids for markey. Hot girls for markey. Dogs for Ed Markey. Moms4Markey. Bisexuals for ed markey. Astrology girls 4 ed. Cowboys for ed markey. PupsForEd. Indie Girls For Markey. Barbz for ed markey. Lesbians for Markey. Clowns for ed markey. Ed markey for ed markey. Joe kennedy for ed markey. The accounts, with varying norms of capitalization in their titles, multiply with each passing day.  With each new account comes a new set of niche memes fine-tuned to its title. “Plants for Ed Markey” tweets support from the perspective of “photosynthetic eukaryotes.” “Quabbin Reservoir residents for Ed Markey” does so from the perspective of the fish that live in the Quabbin Reservoir. Thanks to “Bald Gingers for Markey,” there are now two separate accounts for redheads at varying stages of hair growth or loss. One account is just a sentient bottle of ketchup tweeting in support of Ed Markey. Welcome to the #markeyverse.  When Emerson Toomey created the “Ed Markey’s Reply Guys,” she did not expect it to blow up the way it did.  “I initially made a tweet back in — oh my gosh, when was it? Maybe in March?” she said. “I made a joke tweet about the ‘Ed Markey Reply Guys Caucus’ and 20 people liked it almost immediately, and I was kind of like: ‘What, is this a thing that I should actually do?”  In a matter of months, the self-described group of “guys, gals, & non-binary pals hyping up @edmarkey one tweet at a time,” amassed over 2,000 followers. Toomey, who is a third-year political science major at Northeastern University, became familiar with Ed Markey while working with Sunrise Boston and Boston City Councilor Michelle Wu. She runs the account (which is not affiliated with the Markey campaign) with five other college students and recent graduates, posting dozens of tweets a day that run the gamut from to to a . “Most of the tweets that we’ve been making are very stream of consciousness,” she said. “Whatever we think of we just tweet it.” The account is popular for its around-the-clock delivery of memes, jokes, and sincere words of encouragement directed at Ed Markey, Markey supporters, and others who pop up on its radar. One Reply Guy “Good Night @EdMarkey” throughout the months of April and May. Another Reply Guy penned a of Wheatus’ “Teenage Dirtbag” that the band Wheatus to perform at a virtual event in support of  Ed Markey. Most recently, the Reply Guys Gracie’s Ice Cream in Somerville, MA to create the flavor “Ed Markey’s Green New Deal With It Mint Chip.”  “Our stuff that does the best is typically the [Tweets] that don’t make a lot of sense,” said Toomey. “One time, I think someone tweeted ‘ed markey is ed markey, and it got, like, 50 likes.” “It’s like the Virginia Woolf of the modern political world,” said Jenny Chen, referring to the Reply Guys’ stream of consciousness style. Chen, a sophomore at Providence College, is well acquainted with the ins and outs of the Ed Markey Twittersphere. She could not vote in 2016, but still felt like the presidential election was a wake-up call, and she got to work. Today, she is the youth vote strategist for the grassroots group Students For Markey. Her responsibilities as a member of the group’s leadership team include editing its blog,The Markey Times. In her previous role, which focused on digital outreach, she produced a policy-themed podcast,The Markey, and organized content for the group’s Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Tik-Tok accounts. Another early player in the Ed Markey Twitter game, Students For Markey tweets more than its of while also recruiting volunteers and organizing phonebanks.  “It’s a universal language because it’s humorous, it’s uplifting, it’s funny, it’s wholesome, and it gets people’s attention,” Chen said of Markey-themed memes. “We draw them in and we tell them about all the things behind the candidate that’s on the meme, and it’s a really good way to build community at a time when that’s really hard.” Chen likens “campaign Twitter” to “a giant Slack” where kids on the internet who are passionate about progressive politics are able to share jokes and information rapidly. She says that this encourages people not only to laugh, but to connect with candidates and learn more about the issues they care about.  “We want to create the space for people to tell their stories and I think, as leaders, we recognize that this was never about us or about Ed Markey,” she said. “It was about the hopes, the dreams and aspirations of people across the country and their personal stories of why they’re here at all.”  It was on a Students for Markey organizing call that Chloe, a resident of Brookline, got the idea for her account: “MA-04 for Markey” (@ma04for). Someone mentioned that Ed Markey was popular in Brookline, which is part of Massachusetts’ Fourth Congressional District, represented by none other than Joe Kennedy III. Chloe thought: “There should be somewhere for Massachusetts’ Fourth for Markey. And I was like, well, this doesn’t exist. Why don’t I do it?”  Her account is in keeping with a format popularized by @gingers4markey, an account that purports to advocate on behalf of redheads who support the “non-redheaded junior senator for Massachusetts.” The accounts are two of several that highlight support for Markey from those who, for reasons both satirical and serious, may otherwise be compelled to vote for Kennedy. One of the Gingers “4” Markey account’s earliest tweets reads: “it’s so easy to be a redhead and *not* run a reactionary pro-establishment primary campaign against one of the strongest progressives in the senate. the owners of this account are doing it right now!”  “Has Joe Kennedy given a good reason for running?” (@whyisjoerunning) draws attention to a different question at the center of this congressional primary: Why is Kennedy primarying Markey in the first place? Most days, the account tweets an update (i.e. “ ”). The answer has yet to change.  “On Twitter, there are accounts called, like: ‘ ’ and it’s one of those things where it just tweets every day: ‘No,’” said the Boston-area college student who runs the @whyisjoerunning account. “Its kind of a bot, almost, but I didn’t want to just be a bot in that way. I want to be interactive with the whole Kennedy-Markey senate race. So I thought it would be fun.”  While not initially familiar with the accounts that had already formed around the race, @whyisjoerunning was quickly indoctrinated into the fast-growing community. The Markey stans were not the only ones who noticed. The account, which is a bit more snarky than many of its counterparts, has of none other than Joe Kennedy III’s communications director Emily Kaufman. The two had a brief back-and-forth on May 21 regarding Ed Markey’s voting history on reproductive freedom.  “I actually got [Kaufman] to respond to me, which I think is funny because you would think that a communications director would have more things to do,” they said. “I have no leverage. I’m just a Twitter account.”  While this may have been true at one point, things have changed. On July 16, Playbill’s of a Joe Kennedy III fundraiser featuring Sara Bareilles, Rita Moreno, and a slate of other Broadway stars provoked a massive social media response from a litany of Markey supporters, fan accounts, and some celebrities, too.  “If you live in MA please vote for Ed Markey, please,” comedian Joel Kim in response to the event. Others the announced participants’ replies, after which artists Kelli O’Hara, Solea Pfeiffer, Andrew Barth Feldman, and more chose to pull out of the line-up. O’Hara and Pfeiffer their appreciation for the young people that reached out to challenge them on their choice to participate. On July 19, Playbill that the fundraiser would be postponed indefinitely.  “We are heartbroken by the cyber-bullying so many of our event participants were subjected to,” reads from the Kennedy campaign. “The toxic nature of political Twitter is nothing new, but the level of vitriol Senator Markey and his supporters have unleashed during this campaign is unprecedented.” Many Markey supporters the accusation.  That the Kennedy campaign acknowledged them at all suggests that the influence of the Markey fan accounts extends far beyond their timelines. When the COVID-19 pandemic put a stop to traditional, door-to-door campaigning, it made online organizing more important than ever before, and Markey campaign fever is catching the attention of more than just young people on Twitter.   “It’s attracted a lot of attention from people in D.C. and people who work on campaigns,” said Toomey of the Reply Guys account. She is not convinced, however, that the atmosphere of the Markey accounts is transferrable.  “I think people are looking for ways to replicate it,” she said. “But also I think that it’s something that was more of a perfect storm of events and of conditions than anything else.” Memes aside, many are still wondering why all of these young people are so excited about re-electing 73-year-old Markey in the first place. If you ask them, it has less to do with the memes and more to do with Markey’s legislative contributions.  “Yeah, he has the coolest sneakers and is great at basketball, but also he wants us to be able to live on a planet without Massachusetts falling into the water. He wants us to have breathable air and drinkable water,” said Chen. “And he’s not going to be here a hundred years, but some of us might be and our children will be.” Chen is referring to the Green New Deal, a proposed package of climate legislation Markey co-authored with Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Of the five students interviewed for this piece, each one cited climate change as a major issue compelling themselves and other young people to support Markey.  “I’m not a single issue voter,” said the person behind @whyisjoerunning. “But one of the most important issues to me is climate change.” Chloe of “MA-04 for Markey” called him the “Father of the Green New Deal,” and Toomey, along with another Reply Guy, shouted-out his commitment to climate legislation. One of the more recent, absurdist Twitter accounts made is titled “Emissions for Ed Markey,” in which greenhouse gases their support for Ed Markey in the hopes that the Green New Deal will give them a break. “My hope is that this doesn’t sound like ‘I’m so smart,’ but I wasn’t surprised,” said Paul Bologna, digital and creative director for the Ed Markey campaign. “I was familiar with the fact that Ed was leading on the issues that matter most to young people.”  While he is only affiliated with Ed Markey’s official accounts, Bologna considers it part of his job to interact with Markey’s growing online fan base. “Ed twitter is completely out of control,” Bologna tweeted on July 29, when over 15 Markey-themed accounts were created in a single 24-hour period. With so much frenzy surrounding the memes and the accounts, it is easy to forget about the person who inspires them.  That first viral photo of Markey, the “sick fit,” feels lightyears away from what exists now. “Nobody asked him to wear that jacket, right? Nobody asked him to wear those sneakers,” said Bologna. “It’s just who he is. He’s just a regular person who lives in Malden.”  And perhaps it is this air of authenticity that, alongside the sneakers, the memes, and the legislative record, is drawing young people to campaign for Markey with a never-before-seen level of enthusiasm and creativity.  The Markey stans gave campaigning a 21st century makeover such that, whether or not Markey wins, it will be difficult to forget.  by

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/welcome-to-the-markeyverse/

Where Are The Autistic Women in the Media?

Rosanna Kataja

My older brother is autistic. Having been exposed to and interested in issues regarding this disorder since early childhood, I considered myself highly knowledgeable and passionate about the subject. I have celebrated the TV representation of prominent individuals on the spectrum, such as in or . However, my expertise took a hit when I only recently stumbled upon Paige Layle’s . Layle is autistic herself and makes advocacy videos focusing on autism in girls. How could I, such an “autism expert,” have missed this entirely? Where are all the autistic females in the media? All the TV shows mentioned above, and most others that discuss autism, are centered on the male experience. This lack of female representation certainly does not serve well to the current problem of autism spectrum disorder in girls. In one of her videos, Layle reveals that although she got her autism diagnosis at age 15 — considered early for a girl — a male friend of hers got his diagnosis at age two. Receiving a diagnosis in early childhood is standard for boys; in fact, my brother was diagnosed at the same age of two. In Layle’s videos, which have collected millions of views, she opens up about her struggles with having her autism questioned due to her “not looking like autistic” and not fitting into prevalent stereotypes associated with the disorder. ASD has long been considered a “male” disease, and there four times more males than females with the diagnosis, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. However, researchers have started this prevalence can be attributed to misdiagnosis in girls, not the nature of the disease. To this day, the disorder has, for the most part, been studied exclusively on males, and the diagnosis model has been developed accordingly. Yet, females often manifest different symptoms than the stereotyped lack of eye contact and poor social skills.  In one of her videos, Layle references this discrepancy when sharing that she is “overly social” and gives “way too much eye contact.” Narrow special interests, another characteristic associated with autism, can appear more mainstream and acceptable in girls, such as in the case of liking boy bands or horses. At the same time, boys tend to show their obsessions in quirkier subjects like train schedules. Such gaps in research have led to situations where many females do not fit the ASD model and are, therefore, from appropriate treatment.  An by the Child Mind Institute presents a real scenario with two siblings who both have an autism diagnosis. But while the daughter’s symptoms were much more obvious than her brother’s, it took her much longer and many more doctors to find the appropriate diagnosis. This scenario sheds light on how even when girls do fit into the “stereotypical” ASD model, their symptoms are overlooked with providers going so far to try and explain them through other reasons besides being on the spectrum.  Misdiagnoses and delayed diagnoses can also lead girls to end up doing what Layle calls masking. When they aren’t provided with a clear-cut reason for their symptoms, the autistic individual starts copying their peers’ behavior in detail and eventually starts appearing like them, even though they do not feel natural doing it. Needless to say, masking can take a significant toll on the individual’s mental health as the mistreatment of ASD often leads to depression, anxiety, and the loss of self-esteem — ramifications that will persist as long as the media representation of autistic individuals does not cater to less stereotypical people on the spectrum.  Currently, the most popular works and all of the many I have seen in the media representing autism, are about socially awkward males, like Sam Garnder in While the show’s representation of ASD is cause for praise, it is about a white, heterosexual male. And for those whose autism manifests in almost entirely opposite traits than depicted — which holds true for many girls — the show contributes to the one-note media portrayal of autism that invalidates individual experiences. As long as autism is predominantly represented through these stereotypes, only a handful of individuals on the spectrum will benefit. For several others, it will cause more harm than good.  Accurately portrayed autistic female characters on TV means more women can associate their personal symptoms directly to autism, encouraging them to reach out for a diagnosis. Although there have been female characters on TV who have manifested ASD symptoms, they are rarely the focus of the show. Take Saga Norden from the Scandinavian show , for instance. While the media the show’s portrayal of her apparent autism when she showed such distinct traits like bluntness and inability to build friendships and understand jokes, producers never explicitly confirmed anything, unlike the Netflix show which vastly revolves around Sam’s condition.  It is crucial to remember that the extensivity of the autism spectrum poses challenges for media representation. Although portraying an autistic character with savant abilities, by far the most common portrayal of autism in the media, is not inaccurate, it only around 10 percent of individuals on the spectrum. Moreover, it is crucial for people on the spectrum themselves to be aptly included in the making of media content depicting autism, so representation is based on real, individualized experiences rather than stereotypes.  While research and enhanced medical treatment remain the key tools for improving the diagnosis model and treatment of individuals on the spectrum that fall outside stereotypes, having relatable role models in the media can immensely help women understand themselves better. A more expansive portrayal of all that the spectrum can encompass may also help these women no longer feel like outsiders once they have their previously inexplicable features explained. Take for example Greta Thunberg, a climate activist and Nobel Peace Prize nominee, who by publicly calling her Asperger syndrome a “superpower,” has inspired many and helped light on the injustice people on the spectrum can experience due to indifference and lack of support. In keeping the ball rolling, the stories of women with ASD need to be spread if they are to inform a more diverse, accurate, and open media representation.

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/where-are-the-autistic-women-in-the-media/

“Y yo no me voy a quedar callado”: Anti-Blackness and Colorism in Miami’s Latinx Community

Sofia Andrade

Image Credit:

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/anti-blackness-miami-latinx/

Where Are The Autistic Women in the Media?

Rosanna Kataja

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/autistic-female-representation/

Racial Justice in Rural Colorado

Johneth Price

https://theharvardpoliticalreview.com/racial-justice-in-rural-colorado/