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(11/12/13 4:26am)
October, with its endless midterms, interminable stress and great parties, has finally ended. With it came the end of another source of angst: Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Now, let me begin by saying that the idea of dedicating an entire month to the sufferers and survivors of this terrible illness is a noble one. I have nothing but respect for the people who actively work to try to cure cancer, to support survivors or try to raise awareness in a useful way. But every year I dread the arrival of October because, overall, the ways in which the theme of “breast cancer awareness” manifests are much more problematic and offensive than they are positive or helpful. Those who actually have a desire to combat this disease should not participate in the gimmicks of the month.
(10/28/13 1:24am)
It’s that time of year again — high school seniors are in the process of applying to college and/or panicking about the applications they have already submitted. A major concern that many high school students have is whether or not they have taken a sufficient number of Advanced Placement (AP) classes. Like most students at the University, I took a rigorous curriculum in high school, which included many AP classes. When I arrived at the University, I made the decision to retake most of my “AP-equivalent” classes, preferring the prospect of a repetitive or easy course to taking the credit and being overwhelmed by the upper-level classes. I quickly found, however, that my AP classes weren’t equivalent to their college-level counterparts at all. In my opinion, the Advanced Placement program is broken and somewhat corrupt, and the University should stop granting credits or exemption for AP tests altogether.
(10/21/13 3:05am)
This is not an academic or respectable way to start a column, but I just need to say it: Everyone needs to back the hell off. More specifically, the public and the mainstream media need to stifle their unrelenting and harsh criticism of celebrities. I will use Miley Cyrus and her recent controversies as my main case study, but my thesis applies more broadly. We need to stop treating celebrities as spectacles and start treating them with the human decency that they deserve.
(10/07/13 1:20am)
When it premiered in early 2012, HBO’s “The Newsroom” made waves with its opening scene, wherein a fictional news anchor, when asked what makes the United States the greatest country in the world, responded, “It’s not the greatest country in the world, Professor, that’s my answer.” It was risky territory for the show’s scriptwriters to traverse — for an actual politician or pundit to echo the sentiment in real life would be professional suicide. But it is possible that the United States is less than exceptional, and I think it’s time that we give that possibility some serious consideration.
(09/30/13 2:29am)
This week, The Cavalier Daily will humbly present you with its annual housing issue. Last year, my column in the housing issue aimed to illuminate the benefits of on-Grounds housing. But regardless of where you live, you’re still going to have to address this very important question: Who are you going to live with? For unless you’re a particularly lucky first year, a privileged upperclassman in on-Grounds housing, living on the Lawn, or wealthy enough to afford your own place off-Grounds, you probably have a roommate. It can be really intimidating to move into a room with another person, particularly if you don’t know them very well (but even if you do). Here’s my advice: Approach your roommate relationship with very few expectations. Be honest about everything. And appreciate the opportunity to hone your “people skills” if things start to go downhill. Trust me — this will help you later in life.
(09/23/13 1:32am)
Last week I was required to pay a visit to the Fralin Museum as part of a history course I am taking this semester. That same week, our hilarious and distinguished alumna Tina Fey visited and spoke about the importance of the arts as part of the President’s Speaker Series. The Symphony Under the Stars concert, performed by the Charlottesville and University Symphony Orchestra, also took place last week, although I was unable to attend. My point remains, however: At the University, we have virtually unlimited opportunities to experience the arts, and I think the arts are an aspect of our school that goes under-appreciated. Many of the arts-related events that happen on Grounds and in the surrounding Charlottesville area are conveniently located and cost little to nothing. More students should make it a priority to integrate the arts into their lives and to take advantage of the artistic opportunities that being a student at the University presents.
(09/16/13 2:47am)
Just like those jazzy hip-hoppers Salt-n-Pepa, I’m about to implore you, Wahoos: Let’s talk about sex. Sexuality and sexual behavior get a lot of attention. But they don’t get the right kind of attention. We have been raised in a sex-negative culture. Society, whether through insufficient and inaccurate sexual education classes, movies, books or our parents, has taught us that adolescence and young adulthood is supposed to be a cringingly awkward time. We have been conditioned to believe that our sexuality is shameful: something to be hidden, something we shouldn’t mention.
(09/09/13 3:20am)
Two weeks ago, my fellow Opinion columnist Russell Bogue wrote an article arguing that the government should bring back literacy tests as part of our voting procedure in the United States. Bogue’s column became the target of criticism from a variety of sources, ranging from U.Va. alumni to our public editor Christopher Broom. Bogue then wrote a follow-up column, published last week, which attempted to address some of our readers’ concerns. But I still think he missed the reason why so many people responded negatively in the first place. He failed to realize the most troublesome and fundamentally offensive aspect of his column, which our public editor came closest to articulating by saying: “Bogue betrays a lack of understanding of the history of the place from which he’s writing. And the privilege those of us with access to an excellent education enjoy.”
(09/02/13 1:00am)
“We sentence people to incarceration. We do not sentence them to untreated medical conditions. We don’t sentence them to untreated gender dysphoria just as we don’t sentence them to untreated kidney failure, untreated infections, or anything else of the sort.” – Lauren McNamara, a noted LGBT activist, while appearing on CNN’s “The Lead.”
(08/29/13 1:30am)
Expectation is the root of all heartache. These oft-quoted cautionary words, while they may be cliché, are not inaccurate. When you attach expectations to a person, an experience, or an event, you are mentally creating demands that may or may not be fulfilled. Even if the experience overall is positive and rewarding, it may not match your personal vision. It may be different than you hoped it would be. People of all kinds know this experience well. But when you’re an optimist, you don’t have mere expectations—you have high expectations. You have dreams. And far from the bitter taste of disappointment or the small twinge of resentment that most may feel when they are let down, optimists will feel so much more. Rather than heartache, we will feel heartbreak.
(08/22/13 1:26pm)
I am no longer pre-med.
(04/22/13 3:27am)
I can get a little loud about political issues. Like most people who choose to advocate for causes, I’ve taken positions on many of today’s pressing political questions. Social issues are easy to talk about and particularly divisive. Not a day goes by that we don’t hear something about abortion, gay marriage or marijuana legalization. But one aspect of politics about which I am passionate fails to cultivate much attention in regular conversation: campaign finance and political spending. It sounds dry, it sounds nonthreatening and it’s not as easy to get fired up about, but events in recent weeks have proven that there’s nothing we should be talking about more often or more loudly. Specifically, I think we need to discuss political spending and the influence it had on the Senate’s recent gun-control vote.
(04/15/13 1:19am)
I am a proponent of the idea that Americans have a civic duty and a democratic obligation to inform themselves and vote in both local and national elections. But I have to say, when it comes to the Virginia gubernatorial election, I’m at a complete loss.
(04/08/13 2:34am)
I’ve been in a really good mood this week. The weather has finally turned around — knock on wood — and it seems I may be able to put my winter jacket away for good. Seeing the sun has been wonderful, but initiatives by individual University students and organizations have done more to impress me and keep my spirits up.
(03/25/13 2:32am)
While writing my column this week I struggled to find the right words to articulate what I was feeling, which was offended, shocked and saddened. This week, two football players from the athletically prominent Steubenville High School were convicted of raping a 16-year-old girl. The arguments against rape and sexual assault don’t need to be made — most everyone realizes that both are heinous and unacceptable crimes. If this is true, though, how can we explain the disappointing and skewed news coverage of the trial? The Steubenville controversy disturbs me because it points to the larger societal problem of perpetuated rape culture. Society as a whole needs to work on changing attitudes towards rape and its victims.
Throughout the Steubenville trial, media outlets such as CNN almost exclusively played the role of rape apologists. Again and again the public was asked to empathize with the convicted boys. The New York Times used a photo of the boys crying to accompany their news story. CNN drew notable criticism for their coverage of the trial, which attempted to humanize the two convicted boys by focusing on their athletic talents and their academic achievements rather than their crime. CNN reporter Candy Crowley posed the question: “What’s the lasting effect … on two young men being found guilty in juvenile court of rape?” CNN’s Poppy Harlow discussed how the boys had to watch their “lives fall apart” and CNN’s Paul Callan said being labelled as sexual offenders would “haunt them for the rest of their lives.” A better concern to raise would have been the emotional impact the crime and the highly publicized trial would have on the victim, and what the trauma meant to her future, but this perspective was rarely explored.
The central issue in this case became that the victim had been drinking prior to being assaulted by the boys. Despite numerous text messages written by the victim on the night of her assault, which read “I said no” and “[the boys] were taking advantage of me,” along with testimony that she had never been seen more intoxicated and photographic evidence that she was at one point passed out unconscious and being carried away by her eventual rapists, the victim’s credibility and honesty were constantly questioned. Had she been aware of what she was doing? Had she actually consented to the sex acts? For those who don’t know, rape wasn’t the only charge in the trial. The defendants also circulated nude photos and video of the girl and bragged about their sexual triumphs on social networking sites. Who would consent to that? The victim’s classmates can also be seen in the video laughing and taking no action to intervene.
Let me make something very clear: if a girl (or anyone) is passed out or clearly intoxicated at a party, the right thing to do is to call her an ambulance, a cab or at the very least leave her alone. Women do not invite rape, ever, and the fact that issues like intoxication level or choice of attire are even brought up in criminal rape trials demonstrates how twisted our view of the crime is. Those boys made a conscious choice to impose themselves upon a girl in a compromising situation. The girl should not be shamed; the boys should.
I am not condoning irresponsible drinking practices. The safest choice would be to go to a party, remain completely sober and be aware of your surroundings. But there is something unjustified in the fact that women are taught by their parents, rape prevention seminars in college, and other sources to anticipate rape if they happen to get drunk. Instead of sympathizing with guilty men so easily, parents and institutions should focus on teaching respect and decency.
Rape culture needs to be eradicated, and there are many ways we could do that. I am not saying all rapes are committed by men, or that the victims are exclusively female. That is not the case, and all types of sexual assault are abhorrent. Generally, though, parents, schools, and the news media should teach men to respect a woman’s space, privacy, and vocalized opinions instead of focusing on indoctrinating women with a constant sense of fear.
In sexual education classes, the importance of consent should be discussed frankly alongside things like birth control and STI prevention. We should focus more resources on funding PSAs and ad campaigns about consent and how to navigate difficult situations such as parties with alcohol. We also need to encourage media outlets to be more responsible with their coverage of delicate topics such as rape and to present a factual and unbiased, rather than emotional or sensationalized, view of the issue.
The Steubenville case effectively proves that rape culture is pervasive and yet almost unacknowledged in American society. There are resources available to educate oneself about issues such as these, but most people are not proactive or concerned enough to take advantage of them. Some people don’t think twice before labeling a girl a “slut,” making a rape joke, or feeling sympathy for a convicted rapist. We are all responsible for the perpetuation of unfair stereotypes, such as the mistaken conviction that victims, drunk or sober, could ever be “responsible” for their rapes or that boys are only being boys when they commit sex crimes. We need to be more conscious of our actions and words to combat this trend. We need to train ourselves to speak more delicately, reach out to victims, and sift through the biased coverage that news networks offer us until things change in a more permanent way.
(03/18/13 4:19am)
College students are often looking to make a statement. Sometimes, such statements are political and manifest themselves through a boycott of a company or product. A few months ago, for instance, a large number of Chick-fil-A customers vowed to end their patronage after Dan Cathy, the company’s president chief operating officer, publicly made anti-gay remarks and it was revealed that Chick-fil-a profits had been donated to a group that fights marriage-equality efforts. While I understand and admire the intention of the Chick-fil-A boycotts and think that promoting equal treatment of LGBTQ Americans is a worthy cause, it seems to me that college students are misplacing their activist efforts. Boycotting companies that actively promote discrimination or send a blatantly negative message with their products would be a better choice.
(02/26/13 3:56am)
Fair warning: This column is about honor. By the time this article runs, voting on the proposed reforms of the honor system will be under way and The Cavalier Daily’s incessant coverage on honor will likely be winding down. Before we close the discussion, however, I would like to address a final point. I don’t want to talk about what the result of the vote will or should be. Rather, I’d like to argue that regardless of the decision students make this week on whether or not to approve the Restore the Ideal Act, the honor system will remain an integral part of the University community beyond its role as a guard against cheating. It pains me to hear people speak of our “broken system” just because we may be in need of some administrative and legislative tweaks. The honor system is more than a committee that punishes wrongdoers. It is more abstract, more broad. The honor system is the basis for our community of trust, and that community has value above and apart from the committee or its trials.
(02/19/13 6:09am)
Philadelphia has gained a reputation in the past few years as a hub of homicide. Hardly living up to its promise of brotherly love, the city has been grimly nicknamed “Kill”-adelphia, for it has one of the highest murder rates in the nation. A couple weeks ago, New York Times reporter Jon Hurdle discussed a hospital-based program based in Philadelphia called Cradle to Grave, which seeks to educate teenage students about the dangers of gun violence and ultimately temper the homicide rate in the city. The program may seem controversial, as it exposes students to the grisly reality of shooting victims, but I personally commend the efforts of Temple University Hospital and believe the program could have a positive impact on its participants.
(02/11/13 4:35am)
I have been proud to be a Wahoo lately. University Dining has recently been promoting vegetarianism through initiatives such as “Meatless Mondays” and “Vegan Love.” As a vegetarian, I’ve been particularly encouraged by these efforts. I absolutely endorse the University’s attempts to make vegetarian options more accessible and market vegetarianism as a valid lifestyle choice. To me, the decision to be a vegetarian was as much moral as it was environmental and nutritional. But I’d like to focus on the latter two benefits to explain why more people should try to eat less meat, or even cut it out entirely.
(02/04/13 4:41am)
IT’S EASY to disparage social media. Facebook can make us feel alienated and detached from our friends just as often as it can connect us to them. Endless scrolling on Tumblr can be a waste of time. And yes, skateboarding dogs and embarrassing “American Idol” auditions act as fodder for hours of mindless amusement on YouTube. I will not deny that social media websites can lead to unproductiveness, but I also see their potential — as have many entrepreneurs, artists, authors and educators during the past decade or so.