4A - Friday, October 18, 2013
The Michigan Daily - michigandailycom
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MELANIE KRUVELIS
and ADRIENNE ROBERTS MATT SLOVIN
EDITORIAL PAGE EDITORS MANAGING EDITOR
ANDREW WEINER
EDITOR IN CHIEF
Unsigned editorials reflect the official position of the Daily's editorial board.
All other signed articles and illustrations represent solely the views of their authors.
F RO0M T HE D A ILY
Ignoring research, wasting time
Studies show same-sex marriages aren't harmful to children
n Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Bernard Friedman said a rul-
ing on Michigan's ban on gay marriage would not be decided
until February - a loss for those in the state anxiously awaiting
equal rights. Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette previously filed a
brief to the court that stated, "The understanding of marriage as a union
of man and woman ... is age-old, universal, and enduring. As illustrated by
a plethora of research, social scientists have consistently recognized the
essential connection between marriage and responsible procreation and
childrearing." Lawyers for the state - charged with spending taxpayers
money to defend the ban - have claimed that same-sex relationships are
harmful to society. This offensive and marginalizing view contradicts the
numerous social-science studies that disprove any notion that same-sex
marriages are harmful to children and families.
From campaign slogans to
Twitter handles. From tele-
vision ads to governing phi-
losophy.
Michigan Gov.
Rick Snyder has
carefully culti-
vated an image
as "One Tough
Nerd" - the
rational politi-
cian above parti-
sanship who uses ALEXANDER
data, facts and HERMANN
colorful charts
to push his state-
wide agenda.
But who knew nerds could be so
secretive?
Snyder's NERD Fund is being
broadly criticized again this week
following his testimony under oath
claiming that he did not know who
donated to the fund. The deposi-
tion was part of the City of Detroit's
ongoing bankruptcy proceedings.
The New Energy to Reinvent and
Diversify Fund, a nonprofit estab-
lished shortly after the governor
took office, has been controversial
since its inception. Critics claim the
organization could function as a sin-
ister mechanism to accept untold
"campaign donations" under a cloud
of secrecy.
Funds like NERD are common
across the state and nation. Its stat-
ed goal, to defer some cost of gov-
ernance to willing private-sector
participants, is broadly appealing
in an era of increasing budget con-
straints and cost-cutting measures.
Currently, for example, NERD
pays Detroit Emergency Manager
Kevyn Orr's $4,200 monthly con-
dominium bill as well as some travel
expenses - money otherwise owed
to him by the city under Public Act
436, Michigan's new emergency
manager law.
So what's so controversial about
NERD then, really?
For starters, unlike most non-
profits controlled by public offi-
cials, NERD funders can donate
anonymously - a clear violation of
governmental integrity, transpar-
ency and accountability. Special
interests, major corporations and
wealthy private donors are free to
give unlimited sums to a nonprofit
controlled by the top-elected offi-
cial in the state of Michigan with-
out any public disclosure.
Generating the greatest skep-
ticism, for example, is Richard
Baird's six-figure salary paid for
by NERD. Baird is one of Snyder's
top aides, with the almost playfully
antagonistic job title "Transfor-
mation Manager," but where the
money really comes from is not pub-
lic knowledge. And the governor's
office isn't telling.
Compounding matters, trans-
parency and accountability have
already been a primary critique
of Snyder in his first term. In fact,
Mark Schauer, gubernatorial can-
didate and frontrunner for the
Democratic nomination in 2014, has
already lambasted the "secretive
NERD Fund" as a medium through
which "special interests" can oper-
ate outside the public gaze.
Frustratingly, the solution to Sny-
der's public-relations problem is as
rational, fact-driven, and nerd-like
as it is manifest.
Like similar nonprofits, embed-
ded in NERD's mission should be a
voluntary commitment to sunshine
on par with public-sector regula-
tions. Instead of vague IRS filings,
like the $522,866 2011 expenditure
for "the promotion of civic action
and social welfare by promoting the
common good and general welfare
of the residents of, and visitors to,
the state of Michigan," let's spell out
detailed contributions and impact.
Instead of anonymous donations,
let's foster an environment promot-
ing public inclusion.
If Snyder is reluctant to reveal
funders that have already made
donations under the assumption
of anonymity, then fine. But, as a
gesture of good faith, he should
revamp NERD immediately, which
would simultaneously foster an
environment of transparency and
cut off allegations of cronyism,
wrongdoing and secrecy heading
into an election year.
At the same time, unabashed
criticisms of the efficacy of NERD,
despite the obvious shortcomings in
implementation, are unfounded.
When used correctly, nonprofits
like NERD can be an effective, cost-
saving and cutting-edge tool of gov-
ernance as part of a broader trend in
local and state government toward
public-private partnerships. Such
partnerships seemingly defray tax-
payer costs and unburden unwieldy
government bureaucracies. Locally,
for example, the Detroit Economic
Growth Corporation is a private
nonprofit organization whose
board is appointed by the mayor of
Detroit and confirmed by Detroit
City Council. DEGC executes con-
tracts for the city and shares staff
with public development agencies
such as the Downtown Develop-
ment Authority.
But the benefits of public-private
partnerships, with NERD serving
as an example, are only meaningful
given that proper mechanisms of
compliance, transparency and pub-
lit accountability remain intact.
Given the clear outcomes of bet-
ter governance, healthier political
discourse and improved reelection
chances, "One Tough Nerd" should
be more concerned with being "One
Transparent Governor."
- Alexander Hermann can be
reached at aherm@umich.edu.
I
I
Originally, this case was brought to the
courts challenging the ban in Michigan
against same-sex couples adopting chil-
dren, but the women who brought the case
expanded it to challenge the ban on same-sex
marriages in the state brought on by a voter-
approved amendment to the state constitu-
tion. A decision was expected on Wednesday,
and many people were hopeful that the ban
on gay marriage would be overturned. How-
ever, a decision was not made, and it was del-
egated instead to a trial that will be held in
February of next year, leaving gay couples
who want to get married in limbo.
According to state attorney Kristin Heyse,
the concept of the "optimal home environ-
ment" is one that involves a marriage between
a man and woman. Beside insulting the numer-
ous families headed by parents of the same sex,
there is substantial evidence that doesn't sup-
port this claim. There is evidence that proves
there is no difference in the well-being of chil-
dren when it comes to whether they are raised
by same sex couples or by a heterosexual couple.
The American Sociological Association says
that "greater stability in a relationship, whether
same-sex or opposite-sex, does improve child
well-being."
If marriage helps to improve the rela-
tionships of same-sex couples, children of
same-sex couples could benefit from the
legalization of same-sex marriage in Michi-
gan. According to an article in Lawyers Jour-
nal in response to the U.S. Supreme Court
ruling the Defense of Marriage Act uncon-
stitutional, "the invalidation of DOMA will
have a primary beneficial effect on the chil-
dren born to or adopted by a same-sex cou-
ple." Allowing same-sex marriage also allows
for children of same-sex couples to be treated
the same as children born to or adopted by
heterosexual couples. If Friedman is wait-
ing for social science to show that gay family
dynamics can be negative for children, he is
waiting for proof that isn't going to surface.
Findings on gay family dynamics clearly indi-
cate that gay family dynamics are just as good
for children as heterosexual couple families. -
The judge has decided to wait until Febru-
ary to make a decision that could change many
people's lives for the better and make the state
more appealing to the LGBTQ community.
Waiting for more evidence in regard to social
science is simply not a reasonto have to wait for
a decision that could, and should, grant same-
sex couples the right to marriage in Michigan.
..
Rape culture is real
EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS
Kaan Avdan, Sharik Bashir, Barry Belmont, James Brennan, Eli Cahan,
Eric Ferguson, Jordyn Kay, Jesse Klein, Melanie Kruvelis, Maura Levine,
Aarica Marsh, Megan McDonald, Adrienne Roberts,
Paul Sherman, Daniel Wang, Derek Wolfe
JESSE KLaEIN ld|sa
Asexual ouble standar dbd
Over the summer The New York Times
printed a lead story relevant to many stu-
dents, "Sex on Campus: She Can Play That
Game, Too"." This article makes the same
argument that almost every newspaper arti-
cle and psychologist has made in the past
three years when tackling this subject. The
article states that women as well as men are
engaging in the increasingly popular type of
relationships known as hookup buddies. And
in an even more typical 21st-century thought,
the women in the article say they don't want
relationships because they are too busy with
school and extracurricular activities to put in
the time. Hookup buddies give women a sex-
ual outlet without the effort of a relationship.
I, however, see a different view of hook-
ing up. Articles and psychologists continue
to insist that these relationships benefit men
more than women. The article cites the sta-
tistic that men were more likely to receive
oral sex than give it to their female hookup
partner. Psychologists agreed, stating that
hookups were more about benefiting the male
partner than the female. This, however, could
be due to the fact that blow jobs for men are
much more socially acceptable, and it's pos-
sibly less stressful for a girl to give oral sex
than to receive it.
I see hookup buddies as allowing women to
have casual sex with the same person, instead
of a continual string of one-night stands. Men
may be seen as enjoying one-night stands
more than women because there's no emo-
tional attachment. While this article states
truthfully that women want a singular physi-
cal relationship as much as men, it's harder
for women to only want that and ignore the
societal influences that say they can't have a
solely physical relationship.
The double standard of how many people
one sleeps with means a women cannot have a
string of casual one-night stands without being
labeled a slut and thus not "girlfriend material."
Hookup buddies allow a women to have casual
sex withoutincreasing her number every night.
One of the Pennsylvania State University
students interviewed for the magazine said
of her hookup buddy, "We don't really like
each other in person, sober." While this may
be true of some relationships, I would guess
there are other factors at play, like "We like
each other but not enough to actually work
at a relationship." It's possible that hookup
buddy has deal-breaking features that make
a relationship not worthwhile or even out of
the question. Maybe he is too much of a pot-
head or drinks too much and studies too little.
Maybe it's all in the timing. It's not worth get-
ting heartbroken because a guy is leaving for
study-abroad next semester or lives in a dif-
ferent state during the summer and wants to
be single duringthose periods.
I also think this switch from relationships
to hookups demonstrates the significance
this generation puts on relationships. I know
people who will hook up for months, clas-
sify their relationship as exclusive and still
not call each other boyfriend and girlfriend.
Many students have grown up with divorced
parents. Out of my group of friends in high
school, only myself and one other have par-
ents still together after their first marriage.
Being in a relationship means more than
just being exclusive. It's a combination of
assets and feelings that is harder to break off
when things go wrong. Students just aren't
willing to make that commitment until they
know the output is worth the input. And let's
face it, every time but once, it won't be.
Jesse Klein is an LSA junior.
t's almost impossible not to
think of Steubenville, Ohio
when hearing about the
recent case in
Maryville, Mis-
souri. For those
who haven't
yet heard of the
Maryville case
- or the Steu-
benville case,
for that matter KATIE
- both involve ST N
the alleged rape
of an intoxicated
teenaged girl by
hot-shot football players, and both
involve the community rising to the
defense of the alleged rapists.
The Maryville story is a long,
horrifying ordeal that's been, for
the most part, buried from the eyes
of the public until recently. To sum-
marize: In January 2012, 14-year-
old cheerleader Daisy Coleman
sneaked out with a friend to meet
up with 17-year-old football player
Matthew Barnett. She was encour-
aged to drink excessively out of
the "bitch cup," and was allegedly
raped by Barnett while his buddy
filmed it with an iPhone. Her friend,
Paige Parkhurst, just 13 at the time
- under the age of consent in Mis-
souri, by the way - was also alleg-
edly sexually assaulted by another
football player. After all of this,
Coleman was left on a front lawn
in below freezing weather for her
mother to find in the morning. This
was more than a year ago, and most
people are just hearing about it now.
I encourage you to read more on it if
you're interested in educating your-
self further and ruining your day.
But today, those football bud-
dies are off at college, free from all
charges of sexual assault - or any-
thing, for that matter. Even with all
of the evidence against the alleged
rapists - even after Sheriff Darren
White reportedly stated that this
would "absolutely" result in a con-
viction - the boys still were able to
walk free. Sheriff White's advice to
the Colemans? "I guess they're just
going to have to get over it."
Rape cases are already hugely
underreported, so when something
as heinous as the Maryville case gets
utterly brushed to the side, what kind
of message does that send?
It sends a message that says
Maryville supports its football
players, supports masculinity and
"boys will be boys" - but ladies
who get mixed up with these boys
are "skanks" and "crazy bitch-
es." In short, Maryville supports
rape culture.
So who were the victims of the
Maryville incident? Well, there
were of course the boys, whose rep-
utations and football careers were at
stake. A parent of one of the teens at
Barnett's house is actually reported
as saying, "Our boys deserve an
apology, and they haven't gotten it
yet." There were the poor cowork-
ers at Mrs. Coleman's old work-
place, who had to deal with her
"stress." There was even Barnett's
daddy, a GOP politician in Missouri
who decided to stay out of the case
because it "would have been bad for
me." As far as the girls who were
allegedly raped? "F--- yea. That's
what you get for bein a skank : ),"
reads ose tweet in response to the
dismissed charges.
Victim-blaming is nothing new;
we've heard it all before. She drank
too much; she was asking for it;
she should have known better; she
shouldn't have worn that outfit;
she shouldn't have been hanging
around boys that age; she was out
too late at night; why didn't she take
a cab? Why did she take a cab? She
should have called the police sooner
- it goes on and on and on.
There's the flip side of victim-
blaming, and that's rape apology, but
I'm thinking even more specifically
of a bizarre form of rape sympathy
that I've been noticing. The focus, in
the case of rape sympathy, is taken
off the victim, and placed on the
repercussions that the rapist will or
would have to potentially face.
I'm thinking of those photographs
in The New York Times - of those
poor Steubenville boys who could
have had it all, dressed in neat but-
ton-downs, rendered weeping into
their palms in the courtroom because
of some stupidgirl who ruined every-
thing for them. I'm thinking of CNN
anchor Candy Crowley's response to
the Steubenville rapists' sentencing
- "I cannot imagine how emotional
the sentencing must have been." I'm
thinking of endless hateful tweets
aimed at "sluts" and "skanks" of all
ages all over the world. I'm thinking
of the incident in Torrington, Con-
necticut - another rape case involv-
ing football players.
This case involved two 18-year-old
football players, Edgar Gonzalez and
Joan Toribio, who were convicted
of rape after they had sex with two
13-year-old girls, with the age of con-
sent in Connecticut being 16. What
happened next was a slew of online
harassment targeted toward, of
course, these girls - these girls who
were still in middle school. "What
was a 13 year old girl doing hang-
ing around with 18 year old guys..."
one girl posted on Twitter. I'd ask
the question in response, what were
18-year-old boys doing have sex with
girls who weren't even out of middle
school? "You destroyed two people's
lives" another tweet reads, refer-
ring, of course, to the boys' lives. This
is past the point of rape apology -
it's sympathy.
One of the football players, Gon-
zalez, won the title of MVP for
his team, and in response to the
charges, Torrington High School's
Athletic Director Mike McKenna
stated, "If you think there's some
wild band of athletes that are wan-
dering around then I think you're
mistaken ... These things happen
everywhere and we're not any dif-
ferent than any other community."
And he's right.
I think it's worth stopping and
considering how this all-American,
sports-centric model that exists in
so many high schools - and colleges
- affects how people view masculin-
ity and sexual assault. I'm not say-
ing football is to blame for rape, just
like too many shots at a party, a short
skirt, not having a boyfriend, letting
him pay for you at the bar ... is not to
blame for rape. Rapists are to blame
for rape. It's been said so many times
and yet it still hasn't quite seem to
have gotten through to everyone.
So what happens when the Uni-
versity has its very own sexual
assault scandal involving a football
player? We sweep it under the rug,
pretend it never happened, and head
to the game to lose our voices cheer-
ing on our beloved Wolverines. In
2009, current University senior
and placekicker on the University
football team Brendan Gibbons was
arrested for allegedly raping an
18-year-old woman at a fraternity
party. Washtenaw Watchdogs has a
detailed synopsis of the allegations,
and Daily blogger Emma Maniere
wrote about Gibbons fairly recent-
ly, but for the most part, it's been
willfully ignored by the University.
Many University students and Wol-
verine fans still don't know about
the allegations, and even after they
do find out about them - well, the
thought of there being a potential
rapist on the field while we sing the
fight song is kind of uncomfortable,
so we dismiss those thoughts.
In the Gibbons police reports, it's
written, "(Gibbons) stated his whole
life will probablyget ruined, and that
the girl always wins." Let's make
one thing clear: The girl does not
always win. According to RAINN, as
many as 97 percent of rapists are not
charged. The girl very rarely "wins."
And anyway,. sex should not have
a "winner." A woman you want to
take to bed is not your opponent. Sex
is not just another sport - another
way to reaffirm your masculinity-
and machismo.
Rape culture is real, and it's
important to be mindful of how
we're participating, even if it's just
as spectators.
- Katie Steen can be reached
at katheliz@umich.edu.
9
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