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

Edited and managed by students at 

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 — Wednesday, September 30, 2015

I 
 

realized that I no longer belonged to the 
church as I made my way up to the altar, 
arms crossed tightly across my chest. I 

glanced nervously around, 
noticing some heads turned 
and stares directed my way. 
I imagined a door straight 
to Hell itself opening the second my feet 
touched the front of the church, but was met 
instead by a kind, smiling priest who laid his 
hand on my shoulder to give me a thoughtful 
blessing. On the way back, I didn’t even notice 
the eyes that were glued to my back.

Religion is not my thing. And this past 

April, I attended mass for the first time in 
quite a long time. Although Catholic, I have 
admittedly lacked a presence at church for 
the last nine years — unless, of course, you 
count watching “The Ten Commandments” 
on ABC every Easter.

In 2013, the daily news revolved around 

the reelection of a new pope. I watched as 
my deeply religious high school friends raved 
and frequently asked, “Who are they going to 
choose to lead the Church?” as if a “Dancing 
with the Stars” finale was approaching. Most 
days, after listening intently until I became 
lost, I went back to my turkey sandwich, 
uninterested and not willing to spark up yet 
another debate about religion.

At the time, I considered myself a “bad 

Catholic” for not being present at church on 
Sundays and for believing in things not con-
doned by the Church. Soon, I began to identi-
fy as a “nonaffiliate” and saw all church-goers 
as that one guy who stands at the corner with 
a megaphone screaming that we must all 
repent our sins or risk winding up in Hell.

I lost touch with religion because it was 

easy — easier than trying to explain that I was 
a “Catholic that is totally OK with (insert) and 
(insert) and (insert).” I never looked back too 
much on religion and began to enjoy my church-
free, cartoon-filled Sunday mornings. That is, 
until recently, when I heard that Pope Francis 
would make a historic visit to the United States.

I tried to think back — Who was Pope 

Francis? All I had heard about our new pope 
over the past two years was that he was quite 
progressive. Not horribly, but enough to make 
me turn my eyes to the head of a Church I had 
all but abandoned.

So, I decided to find the answers to my 

questions. Along the way, my friend forwarded 
me an article from CatholicVote.org, which 
immediately caught my attention. It focused 
on the pope’s papal visit to bless AIDS victims 
and, because the most at-risk groups are 
homosexuals, I was preparing myself to find 
a harsh response in the text. What I read was 
surprisingly open and heartfelt, especially 
since it was coming from what my mind 
viewed as the most conservative person on 
the globe.

“God loves you all, without distinction, 

without limit,” he said. “He loves those of 
you who are sick, those who are suffering 
from AIDS and AIDS-Related Complex … He 
loves all with an unconditional and everlast-
ing love.”

The pope’s further comments continued to 

provide support and blessing for all who have 
suffered greatly, welcoming those individuals 
into the heart of the Church.

I could feel my illusion of the Church 

cracking and shattering from its very foun-

A GDI in defense of the Mud Bowl

A same kind of different

Remembering how to 

write by hand

W

hoever is responsible for 
the phrase “no press is 
bad press” couldn’t have 

foreseen 
the 

flurry of news 
stories, 
social 

media posts and 
general nonsense 
that has swirled 
around 
Greek 

life 
at 
the 

University these 
past few months. 
Fraternities and 
sororities 
have 

been 
told 
by 

administration 
that they’re partly responsible for 
a devaluation of degrees, resulting 
from Michigan’s “party culture.” 
Similar comments made by Dean 
of Students Laura Blake Jones 
referenced 
a 
“work-hard, 
play-

hard mentality” and “downward 
spiral.” Suffice it to say the Greek 
life community has been taking a 
beating for the past few rounds and 
needs to get off the ropes. With the 
Mud Bowl, they might just have 
their opportunity.

For the past eight decades, the 

gentlemen of Sigma Alpha Epsilon 
have preserved this tradition on their 
front lawn, combining muck, adren-
aline and the sheer beauty that is 
two-hand touch football. To put this 
into perspective, the original Mud 
Bowl game was played in 1933, when 
Franklin Delano Roosevelt was in his 
first year as president and World War 
II was just peeking over the horizon. 
Since then, the contest has become 
a staple of Greek life, as fraternities 
vie each year in a tournament for 
the privilege of playing SAE. The 
game, usually held during homecom-
ing weekend, has raised more than 
$100,000 for Mott Children’s Hospi-
tal in the last five years alone.

However, this year is different. 

The SAE chapter has been operat-
ing off campus for four years now, 
following their suspension in 2011 
due to allegations of hazing, and this 
summer had its charter revoked by 
the national organization. Combined 
with the administration’s recently 
tense attitude toward Greek life, the 
responses to this year’s game have 
been unusual and complicated. Devin 

Berghorst, an assistant director of the 
Office of Greek Life, has discussed 
sanctions for fraternities seeking to 
enter this year’s tournament, based 
on the Interfraternity Council’s poli-
cy against attending events hosted by 
non-sanctioned groups. The Univer-
sity hasn’t outright forbidden frater-
nities from entering the tournament, 
but instead threatens punishment for 
participation. This is unprecedented, 
considering the guarantee in the IFC 
constitution of self-governance.

I would like to stop for a minute 

and recognize the fact that I am, in 
fact, a GDI*, unaffiliated with any fra-
ternity and by no means an authority 
on the inner workings of the IFC or 
the event. However, I am a third-par-
ty observer with the added bonus of 
freedom from bias and agenda.

That being said, with all the 

diplomacy and finesse of a dump 
truck, the choice of the administra-
tion to insert itself into this conflict 
is emblematic of the misguided, 
short-sighted nature of the new 
campaign to corral Greek life. The 
University’s approach is reminiscent 
of a substitute teacher attempting to 
settle down a horde of rowdy school-
children. The Mud Bowl exemplifies 
some of the best aspects of Greek 
life — charity, a deep love for tradi-
tion and the ability for a community 
to come together for a common goal 
(thousands of dollars to a children’s 
hospital). So why pick this fight? 
Students have entered as individu-
als, completely unaffiliated with 
their fraternities and national orga-
nizations, yet the University’s overly 
watchful eye remains.

The University should disabuse 

itself of the notion that attempts 
like this, meant to preserve order, 
will do any more good than unnec-
essarily provoking and victimizing 
nearly 20 percent of the under-
graduate population. Party culture 
and Greek life are not synonymous; 
speaking as someone who isn’t in a 
fraternity, I can guarantee that if 
that fifth of the population were all 
to drop out tomorrow, there would 
still be parties at Michigan. Stu-
dents would still tailgate on Satur-
days and underage drinking would 
continue to occur. Events like the 
Mud Bowl exemplify the organiza-

tion and responsibility that Greeks 
often bring to this sometimes 
overly criticized “party culture.” 
Despite 
concerns 
about 
safety 

from the Office of Greek Life, for-
mer SAE president Brett Mizzi has 
confirmed that students have hired 
security, purchased event insur-
ance and formulated risk manage-
ment plans for the 2015 Mud Bowl.

Philanthropic organizations such 

as the Juvenile Diabetes Research 
Foundation, Service for Sight and 
Camp Kesem are consistent ben-
eficiaries of the efforts of college 
students who will be playing and 
spectating at Mudbowl LXXXII. 
On-campus groups such as Dance 
Marathon field several teams every 
year from Greek life. Their con-
tributions to the community are 
immense, but what kind of message 
does the University administration 
send when it lets such a staunch 
position against Greek life stop stu-
dents from doing something as light-
hearted and altruistic as the annual 
Mud Bowl game?

If September’s events are any 

indication, the relationship between 
University administration and the 
Greek life community this aca-
demic year will be nothing short of 
ridiculous. Only the University and 
administrators like Berghorst can 
steer clear of this.

How? 
Treat 
fraternities 
and 

sororities with respect, instead of 
like misbehaving children. Accept 
that the work-hard-play-hard men-
tality is something that draws a 
lot of highly motivated students to 
apply to the University in the first 
place. Be willing to recognize the 
positive contribution that commu-
nity makes to our school.

Is Greek life perfect? Absolutely 

not. But the Mud Bowl is about 
healthy tradition, raising money for 
charity and a group of college guys 
pushing each other around in the 
mud. It’s fun, it serves a cause and 
it’s relatively innocent.

So can we please start treating it 

that way?

*Editor’s note: GDI stands for god 

damn independent.

— Brett Graham can be reached 

at btgraham@umich.edu. 

L

ast fall, I enrolled in Classic Civiliza-
tion 101 to fulfill my first-year writing 
requirement, knowing full well that 

it would require a heavy 
workload of both read-
ing and writing. Drafting 
papers was still somewhat 
new to me, especially ones 
built around such specific 
topics or given prompts, 
like those I knew I would 
encounter in this class.

In order to tackle the 

challenge 
of 
first-draft 

composition, 
I 
started 

by getting out a stack of 
notecards and writing my 
way through lists of bullet points. But even 
with those cards set out in front of me, the 
white page of my word processor stubbornly 
refused to fill with text. So instead of staring 
at the screen, I armed myself with a mechani-
cal pencil and one of my well-worn yellow 
legal pads, decided how many pages I needed 
to fill to meet my word-count goal and got 
started scribbling words.

When workshopping the early drafts of our 

papers in class, I mentioned that my neatly 
typed pages of text had started out as hand-
writing, and drew incredulous stares from my 
peers. None of them had written their papers 
by hand, and all took a moment to think about 
how that might work. We were writing fairly 
long papers, aiming for 1,600 words — about 
eight double-spaced pages, which, for me, 
meant seven or eight pages, handwritten. In 
filling those pages, much of what I wrote was 
mediocre, and the content wasn’t incredibly 
cohesive, but I got something down to meet 
my word- and page-count goals.

It was in transcribing those 1,600 words 

that something changed. In so closely going 
back over what I had written, I gave myself a 
chance to edit while still in a stage of initial 
composition. Instead of trying to find connec-
tions between my ideas, the material and how 
to transcribe them, I was putting down a lot 
of raw material and watching with satisfac-
tion as it filled up the pages of my blank piece 
of paper. By not starting on the computer, I 
came back to what I had written with a more 
organized idea of where I wanted the writing 
to take me, and now I had a quantity of text 
already written, from which I could begin to 
more thoroughly develop my ideas.

As a matter of fact, we use different 

neurological pathways when we write out 
words by hand versus when we type — so I’ve 
been told by fellow writers, and as has been 
confirmed by a variety of studies, including 
a 2012 study conducted by researchers 
Karin James and Laura Engelhardt at 
Indiana 
University. 
Through 
imaging 

children’s brains, the researchers found that 
handwriting activates different regions than 
typing, and with greater overall stimulus. 
The study also addressed the variety found 
in handwriting, and how, when writing on 
paper, creative and personal expression can 
come into play. Everyone’s handwriting, even 
their styles of shaping letters, are incredibly 
diverse. It’s by practicing shaping those letters 
that children can come to better understand 
what each one means.

Compositions on paper can also be eas-

ier to navigate than ones on the computer; 
there’s complete freedom to write notes in 
margins, box off parts of a page, or to circle, 
underline or highlight passages of text. And 
then there’s the content that’s generated — 
not just an abstract, virtual document made 
of megabytes, but something more solid and 
real. Even while in the process of composing 
words, the time it takes to write them out and 
later to type them up allows a deeper reflec-
tion on the ideas being presented, as well as 
on the composition and cadence of sentences.

While it may seem like a daunting task to 

write a paper longhand before a single word 
makes it into your blank document, I believe 
it saves time in the long run. Writing a com-
position before typing it grants space that’s 
needed for ideas to sink in and form more 
fully. Having a break between modes also 
leaves breathing space for an author to see his 
or her text with fresh eyes, and to more easily 
pinpoint spelling errors, grammar mistakes 
and breaks in continuity. While keyboards 
must play a role at some point — and while 
I only deem my papers complete after care-
ful refinement on the computer — typing on 
the computer isn’t the only way to transcribe 
a first draft or to do writing that’s academic 
and serious in nature.

Even these words, though they have under-

gone changes after I transcribed them onto 
a screen, were drafted first by hand. And in 
future writing exercises, I fully intend to 
continue using a mix of analog and digital 
in generating and refining my ideas. Though 
it may require I invest more time in the pro-
cess, I know the effort I put in will result in 
me building a more complete understanding 
of the ideas I’m ultimately trying to put forth. 
Besides, who needs to spend all those hours 
staring at a computer screen when a pad of 
paper is so much easier on the eyes? This 
fall, I plan to once again fill my yellow legal 
pads with ideas written out in hasty graph-
ite scratches, knowing with full confidence 
that I’ll be able to turn those scribbles into 
polished, word-processed text by the time my 
paper’s due.

— Susan LaMoreaux can be 

reached at susanpl@umich.edu. 

Claire Bryan, Regan Detwiler, Ben Keller, 

Payton Luokkala, Aarica Marsh, Adam Morton, 

Victoria Noble, Anna Polumbo-Levy, Melissa Scholke, 

Michael Schramm, Stephanie Trierweiler, 

Mary Kate Winn, Derek Wolfe

EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS

SUSAN

LAMOREAUX

dations. Was all that I had thought 
about religion for the past couple 
years a lie? A new pope, one who 
could see the entire community, 
demonstrated an inclusiveness that 
the Church was always supposed 
to 
provide. 
Contemplating 
this 

big question, I returned from the 
excerpt only to find the shocking 
revelation that this description was 
not of Pope Francis, but Pope John 
Paul II. In the 1980s.

People think they understand 

what the Catholic Church is teach-
ing, but when we see something we 
disagree with, it’s easier to back 
away than try to understand and 
search for answers. The Church 
is inclusive, and the pope embod-
ies the unity of a congregation of 
people, all different yet viewed 
the same in the eyes of God. I had 
judged an entire religion based on 
my experience in one small church, 
in one small town; I had based my 
thoughts about the inclusion of all 

different kinds of people on matters 
I thought all Catholics believed in. I 
didn’t want to be a part of a church 
that seemed to close its doors to the 
differences found in all people.

In my search for answers and 

clarification, 
I 
found 
beautiful 

words and acts of kindness from 
Pope Francis himself during his trip 
to our country, most of which were 
not so different from those before 
him. Sure, Pope Francis might have 
what the the author Stephen White 
affectionately 
states 
a 
“family 

resemblance” to his predecessors, 
yet he takes on his teachings with 
an off-the-cuff air of lighthearted-
ness filled with wisdom and humor. 
After arriving on American soil for 
the first time, he stopped to bless a 
young boy with cerebral palsy. And 
while reinforcing the virtues of 
family, he added in a light “I won’t 
speak of mother-in-laws” riff before 
launching into the teaching, captur-
ing both attention and laughter. 

I believe, though, that Pope 

Francis will gain a recent and large 
following not only through his 
compassionate and inclusive nature, 
but also through his ability to inspire 
people to dream higher and live 
the lives we were meant to live. His 
teachings and words of wisdom can 
apply to all people, whether devoutly 
religious, completely nonreligious, 
simply on a break from church 
or anywhere in between. If wise 
and compassionate words are ever 
needed, look to to Pope Francis and 
his desire to motivate and give hope 
to every person on this planet.

“Sure, 
a 
person 
sometimes 

dreams of things that are never 
going to happen,” Francis said in a 
recent speech in Cuba. “But dream 
them. Desire them. Open yourselves 
to great things.”

— Megan Mitchell can be 

reached umeg@umich.edu.

BRETT 
GRAHAM

 
 

— Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards on Tuesday, September 30, in 
testimony before the U.S. House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

“

NOTABLE QUOTABLE

The latest smear campaign is based on 
efforts by our opponents to entrap our 

doctors and clinicians into breaking the law 

— and once again, our opponents failed.”

MEGAN 
MITCHELL

