Opinion
JENNIFER CALFAS
EDITOR IN CHIEF
AARICA MARSH
and DEREK WOLFE
EDITORIAL PAGE EDITORS
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MANAGING EDITOR
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The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
4A — Monday, December 14, 2015
CSG continues silencing minority voices
SINDHU SREEDHAR | MICHIGAN IN COLOR
F
our months ago, I had an
epiphany while working at
my beloved sleepaway camp.
As I lay awake in
my
child-sized
bunk bed, feeling
genuinely happy
for the first time
in a long time,
I realized that
I had things to
say and I wanted
to find a way to
say them. Eight
Daily
columns
later, I am ready
to reflect on the
heart of what I was really trying to
communicate.
In my first column, I described how
I began feeling empty and sad around
this time last year. My heart and mind
had finally come to terms with how
disconnected I felt at the University,
and I had trouble thinking of valid
reasons to get out of bed each morning.
Luckily, I was able to rediscover
happiness over the summer by doing
what I loved (working at my camp)
with people I loved (shout out to my
campers and co-counselors). Yet even
while on such a high, I was perceptive
enough to worry that I might relapse
into depression as soon as I set foot on
University property.
Miraculously, it’s finals week and
I’m just as happy as I was back in
August. However, I had to completely
change my attitude this semester to
ensure my happiness would stick,
a process that I described through-
out my columns. Learning to see
life through a positive lens has been
draining at times, especially on bad
days when I want to give up and revert
to my old mentality. But staying opti-
mistic has also made life so much
more enjoyable.
According to Forbes contributor
Travis Bradberry, specific steps are
required to stay optimistic, such as
identifying positive thoughts and
writing down negative thoughts to
evaluate them more rationally. My
attempted optimism began more
haphazardly. I decided I was sick of
being sad, and therefore I no longer
tolerated sad thoughts. Whenever
one surfaced, I attributed it to sleep
deprivation and moved on.
Unsurprisingly,
my
simplistic
optimism failed, and I crashed from
my happy summer high right before
classes started. I had just Skyped my
best friend from home, who told me I
was the most smiley and enthusiastic
she’d ever seen me. I informed
her that I had finally attained true
happiness and my depression was
gone forever. But as soon as I hung
up, the wonderful feelings vanished.
It dawned on me that I had to finish
two more semesters at a place that
didn’t feel like home, with people I
didn’t connect with. I wasn’t sure if
I could get through it, and worse yet,
I felt disingenuous for proclaiming
that I had finally found happiness
when I clearly hadn’t.
In retrospect, I’m glad I crashed
as early as I did. When I woke up
feeling happy again two days later,
I realized this wasn’t depression.
This was just a bad day. If I could get
through this bad day, then I could
get through all the future bad days
thrown my way. As the semester
progressed, I rediscovered coping
strategies, such as journaling and
working out, which reduced my
bouts of sadness from days to mere
hours. And of course, taking time
to connect with people and do my
favorite hobbies gave me something
to look forward to every time I start-
ed feeling down.
At first, I thought having a positive
attitude meant being positive about
everything in my life. But eventually,
I realized it meant knowing when to
step up versus walk away graciously.
While seeking new connections
with people who made me happy,
I sacrificed a lot of superficial
connections that had contributed
to my emptiness and depression. I
called my mom several times and
told her I felt like a quitter, but she
assured me I made the right choice
and that I needed to re-label it in my
head to sound more empowering.
Like the song from “Frozen,” I wasn’t
giving up; I was letting go.
With all the positive changes in
my life, I finally feel true happiness
in relation to my college experience,
and I no longer worry about the good
vibes disappearing. Though it took
me longer than most, I think I fig-
ured out how to do college right and
I can’t wait to see where my positive
attitude takes me next semester.
I’m in a place where there is
no shortage of opportunity to do
what I love, and no shortage of
people to whom I can connect. I’m
curious to see what will happen
when I graduate and find myself
in a whole new environment. After
my first column, a University alum
reached out and said that the coping
strategies she learned while dealing
with tough situations in college
prepared her to deal with future
challenges in her life and career.
Based on her experience and my
own unwavering optimism, I’m
confident that I will be prepared for
whatever obstacles come my way.
Finding a platform to say all the
things I wanted to say this semester
was such a privilege. Thank you so
much to everyone who supported
me along the way.
— Annie Humphrey can be
reached at annieah@umich.edu.
Editor’s Note: The original version
of this Michigan in Color piece was
published November 30. The Michigan
Daily temporarily retracted the piece
due to factual inaccuracies brought to
the Daily’s attention after publication.
This is the final version of this piece.
On November 22, I, along with
the other 10 members of the Campus
Inclusion Commission under the
Central
Student
Government,
resigned. The original goal of the
commission was to provide a space
within
the
student
government
where students with marginalized
identities felt safe voicing their
concerns.
However
we,
as
a
commission, came to the conclusion
that CSG’s efforts to make campus
more
inclusive
weren’t
entirely
genuine and we felt that working with
them wasn’t in our best interests.
We left, not because the chair of our
commission was fired, but because of
what we believe are the reasons why
he was fired — for making noise, for
demanding justice, after I, personally,
faced discrimination within CSG, for
questioning CSG’s homogeneity, and
for advocating for minority voices. In
our opinion, for doing his job.
As a woman of color, I often feel
as though I have limited influence
in spaces. Because of that, I often let
problematic things go unchecked and
don’t say anything for fear of retalia-
tion. This experience will not be one of
them. Here’s my story.
This past September, an Executive
Committee member of CSG met with
me to inform me of a significant change
within student government structure
— three separate commissions would
be merged into one larger Campus
Inclusion
Commission.
As
the
executive chair of the LGBTQ Issues
Commission, that decision would
significantly impact my role. However,
before I could say anything, he seemed
to imply that if the commission didn’t
comply with the new structure, we
could leave CSG, and they would find
people to replace us. The preemptive
threat caught me off guard and I felt
pressured to go along with what he
was saying, simply because of the
power dynamic. He is a white man in
a higher position than me, and had just
implied that that I was dispensable.
I’m a woman of color with seemingly
no real authority in that space. Whose
voice really matters here? I felt as
though the LGBTQ community that I
was advocating for had suddenly lost
any voice that it may have ever had
in CSG.
That meeting set the tone for the
rest of my involvement in CSG. How-
ever, despite that encounter, I still
tried to be open to the idea of working
with the student government because
of the credibility they have under the
administration and the reach they
have with students. I continued to
brush that event and my skepticism
aside in order to do what I came to do
— create a more inclusive campus.
Things moved quickly from there,
as they do in CSG. Applications were
sent out for a chair position of what
we now called the Campus Inclusiv-
ity Commission, or CIC. While I was
invited to apply, I doubted I’d stand a
chance in the process and didn’t have
additional time to give an organization
that had already shown they didn’t
care about me. I ultimately decided not
to, and a new commission chair was
appointed soon after. The new com-
mission first met in mid-October, and
by the middle of November, we had
three large projects in process, and the
members of our new team began to get
closer. Feeling decently comfortable
with them, I offhandedly mentioned
the unsettling interaction I’d had with
the CSG Executive Committee mem-
ber. Our chair immediately suggested
that we report the microaggression
to the rest of the Executive Commit-
tee, and after a day of thinking over
it, I decided it should be addressed.
Though I didn’t want to cause trouble
or ill will within CSG, I believed that
discussing the comment and its impact
could begin to create a more inclusive
campus, one person at a time. Espe-
cially given that doing so aligned with
the mission of the inclusion committee
that student government had just cre-
ated, I’d believed we would have their
support. I was very wrong.
After the CIC chair and I reported
the incident to the rest of the Execu-
tive Committee, we attempted sev-
eral methods of restorative justice. We
tried implementing an ally training for
all members of the assembly. We tried
getting the Executive Committee
member who’d made the comment to
go to an ally training. We tried creating
a new position on the Executive Com-
mittee to hold them all accountable to
using inclusive language and taking
the needs of marginalized students
into consideration. These initiatives
were either not taken seriously, were
not done to CSG’s best efforts or didn’t
even happen. For example, the person
who had committed the microaggres-
sion against me was supposed to go
to a Growing Allies retreat, a training
that would educate him on microag-
gressions and social identity. Though
he did receive a link to the wrong web-
site — which was not his fault — he still
knowingly signed up for and attended
a sexual assault training instead. His
failure to question the training he
was attending and how it related to
the harm he did indicates to me that
he was merely fulfilling a mandatory
requirement instead of showing a true
dedication to learning.
Finally, I met with the CSG advis-
er and president last week to talk
about the original microaggression I
had faced, at this point, two months
ago. I explained it yet again, thinking
this would be my final dealing with
this issue. Instead of simply listening
to what had happened and helping
me find the solution I’d wanted, they
began probing me about the commis-
sion chair — the person who’d helped
me report in the first place. They
asked me how I felt that our commis-
sion chair had taken charge in deal-
ing with the issue and making sure
I was treated fairly. Though I didn’t
fully understand why I was being
asked about our commission chair,
I was honest with them in saying he
only took charge in dealing with the
issue when I had asked him to. At the
time, I’d believed they were just try-
ing to support me, but I now see that
they had been trying to ambush me
into providing the Executive Com-
mittee with an excuse to fire him.
I realized this on November 20,
when I saw an e-mail in my inbox
from the Executive Committee. It
said, very bluntly and without expla-
nation, that our commission chair
had been fired. In their words, “the
chair of the Campus Inclusion Com-
mission was vacated.” The now-for-
mer commission members met with
a member of the Executive Commit-
tee and the CSG adviser for one last
meeting, in which we were told sev-
eral of the reasons the commission
chair was fired. While some of the
reasons given were understandable,
other factors they listed and implied
should have never been considered.
For example, the Executive Commit-
tee member mentioned he didn’t like
that the CIC chair told him to check
his privilege during several meet-
ings. Even though our committee
explained to him that this is a crucial
part of inclusion work, he continued
to complain that the CIC chair was
belittling him for not understanding
certain issues. Because of comments
like this, it seemed that what the
Executive Committee member was
most upset about was the CIC chair’s
challenging his perspective — a bias I
doubt was applied to his friend (who
made the microaggressive comment
to me) when deciding what conse-
quences would befall him.
Though I will always be invested
in advocating for a more inclusive
campus, I (and the rest of the former
CIC members) have realized that
within student government is not the
place to do it. From the unchecked
comments to the subtle power plays
to the unjust firing of our com-
mission chair, CSG is no longer an
organization I trust or am willing to
work for.
Sindhu Sreedhar is a Michigan
in Color contributor
ANNIE
HUMPHREY
Maintaining happiness
FROM THE DAILY
Phase out fossil fuels
The University must investigate divestment from oil and coal
C
oinciding with the last five days of the United Nations
Climate Change Conference, Divest and Invest — the student
campaign advocating for the University to divest from fossil
fuel companies — hosted a Pledge to The Planet Climate Action Week
to raise awareness about the University’s role in combatting climate
change this past week. Similarly, during his last fireside chat of the
semester, University President Mark Schlissel answered questions
about his stance on fossil fuel divestment. While Schlissel maintained
that the University is committed to sustainability, he believes fossil fuel
divestment is ineffective and a “mostly symbolic action.” One day later,
Schlissel released a statement on the University’s role in addressing
climate change, sustainability and the possibility of divestment.
Though
his
concerns
are
realistic,
Schlissel’s
logic
regarding
fossil
fuel
divestment is flawed. Divestment from fossil
fuels is more than symbolic; it’s a tangible
action that demonstrates the University isn’t
complicit in an industry that’s destroying our
environment. Schlissel must reconsider his
statement and request that the University’s
Board of Regents form a committe dedicated
to investigating the University’s investments
in fossil fuel companies — which is what
the Divest and Invest campaign is currently
advocating for.
There is a three-pronged requirement for
the University to form this committee: there
must be a consensus on campus for the issue,
the industry or issue is antithetical to the
University’s core values and the organizations
being examined are uniquely responsible for
the issue at hand. Divestment from fossil fuel
companies fits all three criteria.
According to the Divest and Invest
Campaign, the University has about $1 billion
of its $10 billion endowment invested in
fossil fuels. However, the group only seeks
to have the University investigate coal and
oil investments, providing a gradual and
reasonable way for the University to divest
from fossil fuels.
In March, Central Student Government
passed a resolution supporting the divestment
campaign. The Senate Assembly also voiced
its support for the resolution just last month.
Agreement on the issue of climate change by
both students and faculty demonstrates the
urgency of the issue, which the University
should not ignore.
Other universities have already taken steps
to reduce their financial investment in fossil
fuels. Three months ago, the University of
California system sold the $200 million it
had invested in coal and oil sands. Stanford
University,
Georgetown
University
and
Syracuse University have pledged to divest
from coal mining companies. Other schools,
such as New York City’s New School, have
not only dropped fossil fuel stocks from their
investment portfolios, but have also reshaped
curricula to promote sustainability and
combat climate change. About 40 universities
have made such commitments, and the list of
corporations and financial institutions that
have fully or partially divested is large and
growing fast.
However, the University has yet to make
a comprehensive study of divestment that
would weigh its commitment to sustainability
against the effect divestment might have on its
endowment. No large research university can
afford to mismanage its endowment, nor can it
fail to examine its options when it can clearly
identify investments that stand opposed to
its professed values. Indeed, the Board of
Regents has dropped socially irresponsible
investments twice in the past, divesting itself
of tobacco companies and entities associated
with apartheid in South Africa.
Schlissel objects to divestment in part
because it would not reduce carbon emissions.
But neither of the University’s previous
divestments were expected to solve their
associated problems. They were steps taken
on principle in the interest of the global
community and human life. For reasons that
are impossible to ignore, the board must form
a committee to research the possibility of
divestment from fossil fuel companies, and
then make its findings public.
E-mail joE at jiovino@umich.Edu
JOE IOVINO
Claire Bryan, Regan Detwiler, Lillian Gaines, Caitlin Heenan, Ben Keller,
Minsoo Kim, Payton Luokkala, Aarica Marsh, Anna Polumbo-Levy,
Jason Rowland, Lauren Schandevel, Melissa Scholke, Rebecca Tarnopol,
Ashley Tjhung, Stephanie Trierweiler, Mary Kate Winn, Derek Wolfe
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