Opinion

JENNIFER CALFAS

EDITOR IN CHIEF

AARICA MARSH 

and DEREK WOLFE 

EDITORIAL PAGE EDITORS

LEV FACHER

MANAGING EDITOR

420 Maynard St. 

Ann Arbor, MI 48109

 tothedaily@michigandaily.com

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the University of Michigan since 1890.

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.

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
4A — Thursday, March 12, 2015

Claire Bryan, Regan Detwiler, Ben Keller, Payton Luokkala, Aarica Marsh, 

Victoria Noble, Michael Paul, Allison Raeck, Melissa Scholke, Michael Schramm, 

Matthew Seligman, Linh Vu, Mary Kate Winn, Jenny Wang, Derek Wolfe

EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS

L

ast night, I had dinner with a 
cousin with whom I haven’t 
had a real discussion in a 

while. She, an alum 
of Harvard and 
Stanford and now a 
federal prosecutor, 
is some 10 years my 
senior. Suffice it to 
say, we’ve rarely 
had much com-
mon ground from 
which to stimulate 
discussion at Pass-
over every other 
year, when I was 
going through my awkward phase 
(OK, it’s still going, but you get my 
point). Now, for really the first time, 
we could share a meal, a drink and 
carry a conversation.

Naturally, as tends to be the case 

with family, the dialogue inevitably 
turned to relationships. We spoke 
about hers (she’s been in one for 18 
months), mine (previous, not current) 
as well as our siblings’. An analogous 
thread became obvious — Cahans, 
as a family that gravitates towards 
high-stress occupations (doctors, law-
yers, the whole shtick), appear on the 
surface to date characters far more, 
shall we say, ‘relaxed’ than us. I guess 
there’s something in the water.

In any case, the law of romantic 

complements dictates that we are 
compelled to seek the yins to our 
yangs. 
Indeed, 
opposites attract. 

That always was the espoused truth 
for interactions in physics, as with 
physical interactions. So the rela-
tionship parallels we noticed are 
none too surprising, according to the 
 traditional doctrine.

However, recent research shows that 

the eternal mantra of synergistic differ-
ences in relationships may not be valid.

A fascinating article from the sta-

tistical blog FiveThirtyEight, titled “In 
the End, People May Really Just Want 
to Date Themselves,” challenges the 
pervading logic. The article, through 
thorough statistical analyses based on 
data sets from eHarmony, illustrates 

that “birds of a feather flock together.” 
Further, the avian phenomenon takes 
flight in two ways: firstly, people gen-
erally prefer those with traits like 
them and secondly, everyone prefers 
certain traits, and indicate even stron-
ger preference with regards to those 
which they, too, personify. To clarify: 
everyone likes blue birds. Red birds 
like blue birds. Red birds also like red 
birds. But blue birds really like blue 
birds. Amazingly, 23andme data actu-
ally codifies this nesting logic at the 
genetic level as well.

Now, to use another metaphor, this 

explains why we order what we order 
when we get to the restaurant. But 
how do we find the restaurant in the 
first place?

Another article, this time from 

practical-science blog Nautilus, titled 
“Casual Sex May be Improving Amer-
ica’s Marriages,” sheds some light on 
the question. The piece, written by 
the Chief Scientific Advisor to Match.
com, reveals a seemingly paradoxical 
point: one-night stands might actually 
be helping American marriages. The 
author, Dr. Helen Fisher, explains that 
one-night stands are but the initial step 
in a sequential, “slow love” process. 
Thereafter, the progression moves 
to “friends with benefits” (“commit-
ment-lite”), and then “devoted mating 
partner” (“commitment-heavy”), and 
then finally, formal marriage. ‘Delib-
erate’ seems the adjective of choice in 
comparison with the full force gale of 
historical companionship. Partner-
ship must be personified before being 
signed into the legal codes.

Nonetheless, there has been ample 

handwringing over the millennial 
marriage issue. Much has been writ-
ten on the delayed nature of millennial 
marriages. Numerically speaking, the 
average pre-marriage relationships 
takes between 18 to 34 months and 46 
percent fewer millennials are married 
between ages 18 to 32, when compared 
to the baby boomers.

What to make of the concern?
It seems to me that the concern is 

misplaced. Neuroscientific research 

suggests two distinct timeframes in 
the early life of romantic relationships. 
The first, dominating the first eight 
months of relationships, is a sort of 
euphoria — the technical term being 
“limerence.” Neural circuitry in the 
subcortical, dopamine-rich, immedi-
ate reward regions is most active. The 
second timeframe blooms during the 
eight- to 17-month period, and reflects 
a sort of romantic commitment. Neu-
ral circuitry in the caudate body, asso-
ciated with reward deference, is most 
active. In other words, the romantic 
lens does not widen to include a long-
term horizon until between eight and 
17 months. Assuming couples wait 
around a year after engagement to get 
married, this falls right into the aver-
age pre-marriage length for relation-
ships mentioned above.

So, though in my previous piece I 

mentioned the “rationality” of millen-
nial relationships, perhaps my word 
choice was off. Rather, our relation-
ships appear intensely and intimately 
visceral. Driven by an incessant fear 
of a risk on the one hand and a slowly 
developing neuro-sensory attachment 
on the other, we are relying on our 
own feelings to navigate the seas of 
romance more than ever. We are wait-
ing until we’re ready because that’s 
when it feels right. We are partial to 
those most like us because they feel 
familiar, comforting and consistent 
amidst an ocean of uncertainty.

The other thing I forgot to mention 

about Cahans is that, for some odd 
reason, there hasn’t been a marriage 
yet in my generation. Long-term com-
panionship abounds, but legal part-
nership is nowhere to be found. Maybe 
we should date people more like us. Or 
maybe we should go out more (that 
much is certainly true). Or maybe, just 
maybe, we, like so many other millen-
nials, are just trying to weave our way 
through the waves that so poignantly 
symbolize the ups and downs of love.

No rush.

 
— Eli Cahan can be reached 

at emcahan@umich.edu.

Loving, eventually

ELI
CAHAN

A

dhering to its company policy of “no judgment,” recent action 
taken to ensure a transgender-friendly environment at a local 
branch of Planet Fitness in Midland, Mich. has raised public 

concern regarding transgender rights and individual rights to privacy. 
The company displayed a highly commendable response to the continual 
complaints made to employees and to other members about the presence of 
a transgender female in the women’s locker room at the gym. In response, 
Planet Fitness withdrew the membership of the complaining patron. 
According to a statement issued by the public relations director of Planet 
Fitness, members are allowed to utilize a locker room “corresponding 
with their gender identity.” Despite the progressive stance taken by Planet 
Fitness, these events illustrate the need to re-evaluate the current state of 
transgender protections and to promote anti-discriminatory policies at 
both the national and state level.

Protections for transgender individuals are 

severely lacking. According to the Transgender 
Law and Policy Institute, only 16 states — 
in addition to the District of Columbia — 
uphold legislation that forbids discrimination 
based upon an individual’s gender identity 
or expression. Michigan is not included 
among these states. In addition, transgender 
individuals are prohibited from serving openly 
in any branch of the armed forces, and under 
regulations, these individuals are deemed “unfit 
for service.” However, a recent army regulation 
minimally inhibits the discharge process of 
transgender service members by requiring the 
discharge procedures to be authorized by the 
assistant secretary of the army. Furthermore, 
these steps are small and ambiguous.

Currently, no legislation dictating which 

restroom an individual can use exists in the 
state of Michigan, similar to many other 
states. An individual who uses a restroom that 
doesn’t correspond with their biological sex 
could potentially be charged with “disturbing 
the peace.” Recent legislation proposed in 
Kentucky, Florida and Texas has sought to 
impose restrictions on transgender individuals 
from using a restroom that corresponds with 
their preferred gender identity. The bills 
propose varying degrees of fines or penalties 
for violating the provision.

While transgender protections and resources 

at the national and state level need to undergo 
major reform, the University maintains a fairly 
progressive approach to ensuring an inclusive 
environment. The Spectrum Center offers 
a wide array of resources for transgender 
faculty and students, and the University itself 
features a non-discriminatory employment 
policy for faculty. The University, likewise, 
offers gender-inclusive housing for students 
and gender-neutral restrooms across campus. 
For example, the Gender Inclusive Living 
Experience includes a section of rooms in 
East Quad and gender-inclusive restrooms are 
located in East Quad, Alice Lloyd, Markley, 
Mosher-Jordan and Baits II residence halls. 
One drawback of the University’s approach is 
that available resources are under-publicized. 
Ensuring an inclusive campus environment 
is an issue of importance for most on campus, 
and yet, many students may be unaware of 
the existence of gender-neutral programs and 
areas. The goal of the University — as well as 
the state and the nation at large — should be 
to be considerate of all individuals. Through 
numerous institutions and public structures, 
we must ensure that adequate gender-neutral 
options are widely available and that action 
is taken to provide a welcoming and safe 
environment for all individuals.

Protecting all identities

FROM THE DAILY

MATT FIDEL | VIEWPOINT

Moving on, moving forward

My fellow Wolverines,
As an elected representative of the Central 

Student Government and as a member of 
Greek life, I owe each and every member of 
the University community an apology. Over 
the weekend of January 16-18, my fraternity 
and I went on a ski trip. On that ski trip, some 
members caused extensive damage to the 
host resort. While my fraternity is making full 
restitution to the owner, the destruction was 
appalling and inexcusable, and I condemn it in 
the harshest terms. I am even more saddened by 
the damage that my fellow students caused to 
the reputation of the University. It pains me to 
know that members of my own fraternity were 
able to tarnish the good name of our fraternity, 
Michigan Greek life and the entire University.

Let me say in the clearest terms — I did not 

commit any damage to the resort, nor did I 
witness any destruction as it was taking place. 
When I discovered what had happened, I was 
horrified and deeply ashamed of the behavior 
of my peers. I immediately began working with 
other members of my fraternity to mitigate 
and control the situation to prevent further 
destruction.

As a leader on this campus, I am accountable 

to each of you. Leaders do not run away from 
problems; they confront them and work toward 
solutions. Since that weekend, I have helped lead 
my fraternity brothers in an attempt to right the 
wrongs that were committed. I organized four 
build sites through Habitat for Humanity that will 
be dedicated shortly. In order to begin mending 
the ties with our neighboring communities, I 
planned a chapter service trip to Detroit, with 
the help of The Detroit Partnership. I am a strong 
believer in the principle of restorative justice, and 
the fraternity is working to repair relations with 
our neighbors.

I refuse to be defined by the actions of others. 

My record speaks for itself. I have dedicated 
my time on campus to positive, worthwhile 
causes and have worked to impact meaningful 
change. While serving on the boards of SRC 
and GARP, I devoted time to maintaining Greek 
self-governance, 
safety 
and 
responsibility. 

As an LSA representative on Central Student 
Government, I have pursued change within 
the dining department, planned events such as 
the Police Brutality Speak-out and worked to 
increase diversity on campus by serving on CSG’s 
On-Site Admissions Task Force. I have met with 
administrators to discuss problems on campus, 
and I have worked with administrators to create 

solutions to these problems. Most recently, I 
worked with the Dining Department to design a 
program that will allow students to donate their 
leftover Dining Dollars and Blue Bucks at the 
end of the year to local food pantries. Beginning 
at the end of March, all students will be able to 
donate money in $1 increments at all campus 
stores, like U-Go’s, Victors and the Blue Apple. 
The money that is raised will be used to purchase 
local, sustainable, non-perishable food that will 
be donated to local food pantries, including our 
campus’ own student food pantry. As a student 
leader, I have worked to represent the interests of 
fellow students and to build a better campus for 
all communities.

As a candidate for CSG vice president with The 

Team, I plan to continue and expand upon this 
important work. I want to ensure that as the voice 
of the students, our CSG is representative of all 
communities on campus, not just those of a few. 
It’s time for all students to have easy, convenient 
access to their elected representatives so that 
CSG gives students a chance to share their ideas 
and accomplish their goals. CSG has tremendous 
potential to be a driver of collaboration with 
and empowerment of student leaders, not of 
competition and politics. Student leaders should 
be able to rely on CSG’s budget, administration 
connections and clout as a platform to advance 
their great work on campus. Together, we can 
support and empower student leaders across 
campus to better address important issues such 
as increased minority enrollment, increased 
sexual assault awareness and prevention efforts 
and an improved campus climate. By working 
together, our collective potential is much greater 
than that of any individual.

I ask you to judge me based on my 

accomplishments 
and 
my 
ideas 
rather 

than on the actions of some members of 
my fraternity. I am not my fraternity. I am 
Matt Fidel. I am running for Vice President 
because I see the great potential of CSG, and I 
want to continue serving you. I am a member 
of The Team, and together we can focus on 
the real opportunities and challenges that lie 
ahead. With your input and support, we can 
partner to accomplish our shared goals. We 
have serious work to do, and I look forward to 
getting started.

Feel free to e-mail me at mhfidel@umich.edu 

if you have any questions or ideas that you would 
like to discuss together.

Matt Fidel is an LSA sophomore.

“I

t sounded like a good idea 
seven months ago!”

I ran past a bystander 

holding this sign 
during 
my 
first 

half-marathon 
and fluttered back 
and forth between 
wanting to laugh 
and 
wanting 
to 

punch 
him. 
My 

friend Crystal and 
I signed up for the 
Disney 
Princess 

Half 
Marathon 

over the summer, 
thinking the February race would 
motivate us to keep up our running 
routines during the winter. We took 
into account that the race would 
require us to train hardest during the 
coldest, snowiest time of the year, but 
we quickly brushed this off. “We’ll get 
cute winter running gear!” we ratio-
nalized, and booked our tickets to 
sunny Florida.

Fast forward to three weeks ago. 

Crystal and I stepped off the plane in 
Orlando sporting sneakers and leg-
gings, pretending to be runners. I wish 
I could say our cute winter running 
gear allowed us to stick to a training 
plan. I wish I could say we diligently 
ran our mid-week speed workouts 
next to each other on the Landmark 
treadmills while we looked out the 
windows at the snow. But if I’m being 
honest, our training mostly consisted 
of logging a quick two miles every five 
days or so, combined with an occa-
sional cross-training routine where 
we watched Bravo while pretending 
to do planks on Lululemon yoga mats.

In the two days leading up to the 

race we walked around the Disney 
parks, attempting to pick out our fel-
low runners. This was much more 
difficult than it seemed, considering 
running shorts and tennis shoes seem 
to be an unspoken uniform for all 
theme park attendees. We wondered if 
anyone was looking at us, trying to fig-
ure out if we were runners, looked at 
each other, and laughed. If they were, 
we made it difficult for them to guess 
due to the fishbowl-sized margarita 
and jumbo-sized order of nachos we 
were carrying around.

On Saturday night, we decided 

to get serious about the race. At that 
point, though, all “training” efforts 
would be useless, and the best we 

could do was hydrate and carb-load 
for our long run the next morning. 
Unfortunately, all of the other 20,000 
runners came prepared, taking up all 
the reservations at the Italian res-
taurants across Disney World. We 
settled for tacos from a quick-service 
Mexican booth and a pastry from a 
French bakery.

The race began at 5:30 in the morn-

ing, and due to the large number of 
people participating, Disney sug-
gested boarding the buses by 4 a.m. 
Logically, our fellow runners began 
leaving the parks around 7 p.m. on 
Saturday night to get a good night’s 
rest. Crystal and I found the temp-
tation of a nearly empty park and 
short wait times for popular rides to 
be entirely too strong, and ended up 
staying at the park until closing. We 
did not see the error of our ways until 
our alarm went off just a few hours 
after we set it. Time to run.

After stumbling around in the dark 

to find our tennis shoes and bibs, we 
hopped on a bus. Once we got to the 
pre-race area, we were able to stretch 
a bit and take some photos. It was 55 
degrees that morning, or, as it’s known 
locally here in Michigan, a heat wave.

If you’ve never seen pictures from 

a Disney race, it looks pretty different 
than your typical half marathon. Rac-
ers sport tutus and costumes resem-
bling their favorite Disney characters, 
and about every half-mile, there is a 
different character photo spot where 
you can wait in line to take a picture 
with Mickey or Buzz Lightyear. A 
fairy godmother sends each of the 16 
corrals on their way, and fireworks 
accompany each of these starts. It’s 
one of the least intimidating long-
distance races, which probably con-
tributes to the fact that over half of 
the runners were first time half-mar-
athoners. Solidarity, group of Cinder-
ellas to my left. To quote my favorite 
Disney Channel original movie, we’re 
all in this together.

Since we were in one of the middle 

corrals, we didn’t actually cross the 
starting line until 6 a.m. As we ran 
past mile marker three, we saw some 
of the fastest runners blow by mile 
marker 10. Crystal turned to me, eyes 
wide, and shouted “life goals!” above 
the music. I looked back with my eye-
brow raised. My parents always told 
me I could do anything I set my mind 
to, but I’m pretty sure running a half 

marathon in under an hour and a half 
is out of my reach. I was just out there 
trying to finish the race.

One of the most famous aspects 

of the Princess Half is the fact that 
around the halfway mark, participants 
get to run through Cinderella’s Castle 
in Magic Kingdom. Up until that point 
we felt great, which was amazing con-
sidering the last time we ran six miles 
was in November. Once we reached 
this point, though, Crystal’s ankle — 
previously weakened by a September 
football pregame-related ankle injury 
involving a ledge and a few trips to the 
nearest urgent care center — began 
bugging her. We hobbled along until 
we found a medic tent, which was 
about the same time we discovered the 
free Clif Shots volunteers were pass-
ing out. These small pouches of saving 
grace provided the same effect as if we 
were in a video game and collected an 
extra life — our fictional battery power 
meters returned to 100 percent.

From then on, it was pretty smooth 

sailing. We really tried to focus on stay-
ing in the moment, noticing what dif-
ferent causes people were running for 
and enjoying this experience the two 
of us got to have together. Toward the 
end of the race the course goes up an 
overpass, and the vantage point allows 
runners to see the thousands of people 
following them on their journey to 13.1 
miles. Around this point, it hit me that 
I was going to finish a half marathon 
with my best friend and accomplish a 
goal I didn’t have the confidence to go 
after alone.

We crossed the finish line and col-

lected our medals, not able to fully 
comprehend that we actually just 
completed the race. We spent the next 
few days walking around the parks 
in our race swag, looking like two old 
ladies who needed canes a result of 
not training properly. But that was 
 

worth it.

We’re half marathoners now. Of 

course, we definitely should have 
trained more consistently. But we 
didn’t use our failure to prepare as an 
excuse to hold us back from our goal. I 
think sometimes all you need is a best 
friend and a fairy godmother to ignore 
all the reasons why you can’t accom-
plish a dream. I know I’m grateful 
 

for mine.

 
— Katie Koziara can be reached 

at kkoziara@umich.edu.

A best friend and a fairy godmother

KATIE 
KOZIARA

