Opinion
SHOHAM GEVA
EDITOR IN CHIEF
CLAIRE BRYAN
AND REGAN DETWILER
EDITORIAL PAGE EDITORS
LAURA SCHINAGLE
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
4 — Tuesday, February 2, 2016
Claire Bryan, Regan Detwiler, Caitlin Heenan,
Jeremy Kaplan, 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, Hunter Zhao
EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS
M
onday, Jan. 25, students crowded the
seats in the Pendleton Room to listen
to students share their experiences
with Islamophobia. The
event was organized by
a committee of Muslim
students as well as the LSA-
sponsored event “Sharing
Stories, Building Allyhood:
Student
Voices
Against
Islamophobia.” This event
seemed to finally be a step
in the right direction —
with great attendance in
terms of demographics and
size — because a safe space
was created that allowed
students affected by Islamophobia to share
their stories without fear. One student was even
able to lay claim to the story she had submitted
anonymously to the group, thanking people
for creating a space where she felt welcomed.
After the first part of the event, in which
students shared their stories, people broke up
into groups to discuss what it means to act as
an ally for Muslim students. This would have
been more effective if there was more time for
discussion and if there was more room capacity.
Regardless, this is the kind of action that the
University should be taking in order to enhance
Muslim student voices. I interviewed Prof.
Evelyn Alsultany, director of Arab and Muslim
American Studies, afterward, and she pointed
out the effect of LSA organizing such an event,
as opposed to a student group organizing
one. She started by speaking to me about the
University administration’s plan:
“I think that it’s yet to be seen in terms
of ‘they have this plan for diversity, equity
and inclusion, we’ll do our part by doing a
report and then it’s really in their hands,’
” Alsultany said. “I think a good sign right
now is that this event was actually organized
by the LSA undergraduate division, which
says something. In the past it’s usually that
students organize something or a mosque
organizes something and it doesn’t draw a
crowd like this, and I think having the support
for LSA for this event was meaningful.”
The event demonstrated positive aspects
that I hope will be carried through in future
programs. With the help of LSA, the event
was advertised better than any solely student-
organized event, and done in collaboration
with a group of students so that it did not feel
isolated from the Muslim community. When
the University organizes events with similar
goals, such as the diversity summit events, they
should try to use similar methods to welcome
students of different backgrounds to bridge
the gap and foster trust in the University.
I also talked to Nadia Aggour, a graduate
student in the School of Social Work who is
training with CAPS, about the effectiveness
of the event. Aggour attended the event and
offered a lending ear in case the event itself was
triggering to students, which was comforting
and mindful of the organizers. I asked Aggour
what she thought about the effectiveness of
the event and she, like Alsutany, said some of
the departments are better at being attentive
to the history of the institution’s awareness of
the effect of sociopolitical events on students,
but that other initiatives are just meant
to appease students. She also commented
on the effect of discrimination on student
mental health: “I definitely think any form of
discrimination or fear for safety affects mental
health of students. Your body is put into a
completely different response when it feels you
are in danger.”
Recognizing Islamophobia on campus as an
issue that genuinely affects students’ mental
health is important. Mental health is often
viewed as a separate issue that the University
needs to tackle, but the intersectionalities
between the minority and discrimination
issues and mental health and assault were
often not realized. Students at our university
should not have to fight for their voices to be
heard. This event also demonstrated the need
for more diverse professors and faculty to be
hired at the University, because their role in
supporting students can be used for initiatives
to improve campus climate.
The final portion of the event, where
students worked together to talk about how
to act as an ally, served as a reminder to all
students and faculty that the problem does
not stem from students that are affected
by discrimination, but instead stems from
people who act as aggressors and those who
remain silent.
Rabab Jafri can be reached
at rfjafri@umich.edu.
Inner conflict, the right way
T
his past summer, I found
myself sitting across the
table from the rock band
Highly
Suspect,
educating
the
group
on
the
features of Apple’s
newly
launched
music
streaming
service. This was the cooler part
of my job as an intern for the
New York-based record label 300
Entertainment. This internship also
required me to sift through all the
nuances of this new Apple Music
platform. When the largest company
in the world enters the music
streaming space, 300 and the rest of
the music industry watches. From
labels to bloggers, this summer
raised an important question from
everyone: What is the future of
music streaming?
Music streaming is at a critical
point — though it only makes
up about a quarter of all music
consumption
today,
it
seems
inevitable
that
streaming
will
become the dominant medium for
listening. Music companies are
engaged in a battle for market share,
known as “streaming wars.” The
winners of these so-called streaming
wars will collect data generated
from hundreds of millions of active
streamers. Really, the streaming
wars are part of a much larger battle
for data.
The
music
industry
has
collectively been trying to answer
the question of how to use data
effectively. With declining album
sales and slowed overall growth,
record labels and their artists
desperately need to find ways to cut
inefficiency. Labels have partnered
with tech firms, and music analytics
companies such as Next Big Sound
have emerged — all with the hopes
of understanding data’s relationship
with the music business. And while
the future role of data in music is still
mostly unclear, streaming services
are in a position unlike anyone else
to tackle this problem.
Which brings us to Spotify.
Already a leader in the crowded
music streaming space, Spotify just
announced acquisitions of startups
Soundwave and Cord Project, each
indicative of where streaming is
headed.
Soundwave
will
likely
improve social features for finding,
sharing and talking about music.
When I hear a song that inspires me,
discussing it with others is a natural
first instinct. Better messaging
systems
on
these
streaming
platforms seems obvious for that
reason, but isn’t happening outside
of Spotify.
Apple Music’s attempt at a social
network — which they call Connect
— is actually not very social at all.
Only artists have profiles, not users.
This seems backwards. Artists have
enough social networks to regularly
update with Twitter, Facebook,
Instagram
and
Snapchat.
Does
another one make sense?
The second Spotify acquisition,
Cord Project, could be even more
important for its potential in the
evolution
of
data
capabilities.
Not
only
would
discovery
and
curation
improve
with
a
greater understanding of music
consumption patterns, but Spotify
could repurpose that information
for record labels as well. The labels
are interested in using that data
for things such as optimized tour
schedules,
targeted
marketing
campaigns and more efficient album
releases.
As Spotify grows, it will collect
more data and its product will
get better. In a sense, quantity is
quality. The focus on Spotify has
been to reinvest now and worry
about profits later. As long as they
continue to grow, profitability won’t
be an issue. This is another reason
why Spotify is an outlier in the
streaming landscape. Pandora is a
public company, Deezer attempted
to launch an IPO and SoundCloud
is working on a new subscription-
based model. Spotify’s competitors
are trying to cash in now, but the
real money will come later.
The list of competitors is deeper
than you may think. YouTube,
Rhapsody, Tidal and even Amazon
Prime offer streaming products.
Yet out of all of them, nobody
else is integrating social features
like Spotify is. And nobody else is
working to analyze the data that such
social features will help to generate
either. Spotify has an opportunity to
break away from the competition as
it continues to acquire key startups
and grow its active user base.
I
could
be
wrong,
though.
Between
Apple,
YouTube
and
Amazon, there are plenty of other
big-name players now. Ultimately,
all the investment into streaming
is a good sign for a struggling
industry. Music is going through a
transitional phase because album
sales have been cannibalized by
streaming. As streaming services
fight
among
themselves,
they
will be forced to solve problems
that will benefit the industry as a
whole. Whether you use Spotify
or not, we should all be rooting for
them. Creating better products and
smarter ways to utilize data will
connect more fans to artists and
allow the music business to grow. A
win for Spotify is a win for music.
Zach Brown can be reached
at zmbrown@umich.edu.
Why we should root for Spotify
ZACH
BROWN
C
iting the 33,636 deaths the Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention attrib-
uted to firearms in 2013, President
Barack Obama seems intent
on placing gun violence at
the forefront of our national
conversation. The National
Rifle
Association
seems
equally intent on arguing
the opposite of whatever he
says. Neither side, though,
has comprehensive, repro-
ducible data supporting
their
arguments.
While
both rely on anecdotes and
natural
experiments
—
both of which can be quite
convincing — the CDC remains mute on how
to achieve one of the primary roles of govern-
ment: protecting its citizens.
In 1996, former U.S. Rep. Jay Dickey (R–
Ark.) successfully lobbied on behalf of the NRA
for putting language in the budget preventing
the CDC from advocating for, or promoting,
gun control. This, by former Rep. Dickey’s own
admission, unintentionally stymied all CDC
research on gun violence prevention and has
led to two decades of silence from our primary
public health research center.
As of fiscal year 2015, the CDC received $0
from Congress for gun violence prevention
research. President Obama, in response to
the Sandy Hook shooting in December 2012,
called for an end to the moratorium on feder-
ally funded scientific research exploring the
causes of gun violence. The 2015 bill, which
allocates $10 million per year until 2021 for
CDC research on gun violence prevention,
remains buried in subcommittee.
This is not to say that no private funding
for gun violence prevention research exists.
Several universities — including Harvard and
Johns Hopkins — have centers or parts of cen-
ters devoted to firearm research funded by pri-
vate sources. Private funding and the resulting
research, however, can — rightly or wrongly
— be accused of bias more convincingly than
public funding.
Private funding’s presence, then, cannot
make up for the perception that the govern-
ment isn’t trying to fund the CDC, which
makes gun violence research a pariah to the
scientific community. It also inhibits this
research and effectively blocks a consensus on
how to best prevent the avoidable accidents,
injuries and deaths attributed to gun violence.
Contrast this with the CDC’s estimated annual
$47.2 billion in medical expenses and produc-
tivity loss due to gun violence and the need for
federally funded research becomes irresistibly
reasonable.
It is so reasonable, in fact, that Mark Rosen-
berg, former director of the CDC’s National
Center for Injury Prevention and Control —
who claimed to be fired for his commitment
to gun violence prevention research — and
Dickey have come together to advocate for
increased federal funding for gun violence
prevention research. Through a joint appear-
ance on NPR and an op-ed in the Washing-
ton Post, Dickey and Rosenberg accept that
though they have vehemently disagreed with
each other in the past, they now both accept
that substantial changes are imperative to
improving our knowledge base and protecting
our citizens.
Not only is public health funding necessary
to fill a hole in our public health infrastruc-
ture, it is also an opportunity to inspire and
train the next generation of eager students
of public health. The University of Michigan,
for example, is poised to open degrees in Pub-
lic Health to undergraduates — following a
national trend. What better way to engage a
new generation of students than to address
one of the leading causes of avoidable injuries
and deaths?
Gun violence is often associated with mass
shootings, tragic events that occur with a
depressingly normal frequency. But it is also at
play during criminal acts, homicides, suicides
and accidents. These avoidable tragedies mani-
fest themselves differently throughout various
regions and within the impressively diverse
communities that define our national iden-
tity. Without federal funding, then, we can-
not effectively develop, promote and prescribe
tailored interventions that best decrease the
needless deaths of tens of thousands of Ameri-
cans each year.
Our federal government, to best protect its
citizens and provide them with the opportuni-
ty to thrive absent the horror of gun violence,
must lift its embargo on CDC funding for gun
violence prevention research. Not doing so
would not only be a shirking of responsibility,
but a passive acceptance of a disgraceful norm.
Danny Sack can be reached
at sackd@umich.edu.
Prevent violence, fund the CDC
CONTRIBUTE TO THE CONVERSATION
Readers are encouraged to submit letters to the editor and op-eds.
Letters should be fewer than 300 words while viewpoints should be 550 to 850 words.
Send the writer’s full name and University affiliation to tothedaily@michigandaily.com.
DANNY
SACK
I
owa — I didn’t travel six hours
to Iowa via Ford Fusion Hybrid
looking for laughs (though I did
have high hopes
Sam and Allison,
the other Daily
staffers I was
with, would be
able
to
crack
a couple jokes
over the course
of the trip).
We
were
there to cover
the
impending
presidential
caucus, after all
— a serious matter, no doubt. Feb.
1, Iowa voters will have the first
turn in voting for who will be the
presidential nominee for each party.
And with the races neck and neck
on both sides, there isn’t too much
for any candidate to laugh about.
It’s a serious race to rally as many
voters as possible to get out and
vote, since whoever wins in Iowa
has the momentum for the coming
primaries and caucuses.
However, when reflecting on the
events I attended this past weekend, it
became evident to me how important
comedy is when campaigning. All
three candidates I saw — former
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton,
Sen. Bernie Sanders and Donald
Trump — all invoked humor in some
form, be it through quips or prepared
lines, during their events.
As someone who enjoys comedy in
most mediums and because I think
I’m funny myself (character flaw,
sorry), I place an added importance
on the candidates’ abilities to be
humorous. To me, humor is a sign of
intelligence, especially in the form
of off-the-cuff lines. If candidates
use it right, it is an excellent way
to connect with voters, especially
with people they have little in
common with. Because as much as
I want to hear about policy from
the candidates (How will you keep
us safe from ISIS?!?), I also want to
know they’re human and, even in
serious times, I don’t want them to
always take themselves so seriously.
Clinton started her event strong
on humor. Because there was a
technical error that didn’t allow a
short montage to play, immediately
after she walked in, she told the
crowd of 200, “We had a video we
were going to show you, but we had
a technical difficulty, so you’ll just
have to settle for me.”
Though she loses points for
laughing at her own joke, to me that
quip represents an endearing sense
of self-loathing. I’d like to believe
she hadn’t had that line pre-planned.
The jokes didn’t end there,
though. Luckily for Clinton, this
past weekend played right into her
hands. Given that the town hall I
attended was in Clinton, Iowa, I
think everyone saw this joke coming
from a mile away:
“I’m pretty excited about being
here in Clinton County. You didn’t
have to name it, I would have come
anyway.”
Unbelievably corny? Yes, but it
was absolutely necessary that she
told it.
Though the rest of her speech
didn’t contain really any more jokes
worth noting, Clinton shined in the
Q&A portion of the event.
When someone in the audience
brought up how Fox News has been
hammering her about her age, she
responded with a smile, “They say
nearly anything about me, I gotta
tell you.”
She then continued with a funny
story about how her mom watched
Fox News, and when Clinton would
ask why she kept watching, her
mom replied, “Well I gotta know
what they’re saying so I’m ready.”
Laughter, including Clinton’s, filled
the room.
And while discussing the role her
husband, Bill Clinton, would play in
her administration, she said, “The
other day I said, ‘Well I’ll test him
out, see how he does. You can start
talking at the kitchen table, and if it’s
good, we’ll go from there.’ ”
There were plenty of other solid
lines, even better than that one, but
ultimately what I gained was that
through those lines, I was given
a sliver a hope that, underneath
the years of being a politician and
being paid by Wall Street to give
speeches, there remains a real,
down-to-earth person.
Bernie Sanders, on the other hand,
displayed more sarcastic humor, and
he used it to give validation to his
campaign and his supporters.
“In the last couple of weeks of
campaigns, a lot of things are said,
a lot of comments are made and
you’ll be shocked to know that not
all of them are true. I know that I
shock you when I say that,” Sanders
said dryly. “And one of the myths
that is being perpetrated by the
Clinton campaign is ‘Well you
know, Bernie Sanders is a nice guy,
he combs his hair beautifully … GQ
kind of guy. But despite all of those
fantastic attributes, he just can’t
win. He can’t defeat the Republican
candidates in November.’ ”
This isn’t just classic old Jewish
man humor (trust me, I know
from experience), but it was an
effective
way
to
immediately
engage the audience before he dove
into discussing his platform. And
though he didn’t use much humor
throughout the rest of his stump, his
emphatic hand gestures drew plenty
of smiles.
As for Trump, well, I kind of had
to imagine the whole thing as one
big comedy act for my own sanity.
Though he did have a couple good
lines about Ted Cruz, one being:
“Look, you know who’s going to
approve the (Keystone Pipeline) deal
fast? Ted Cruz. He’s from Canada!”
Other than that, I’m not sure
I’ve ever been so scared for the
future of this country (still debating
whether the tipping point was
when a Trump supporter told Sam
and me, “(Trump) knows so much,
he just hasn’t told us yet” or when
Trump had everyone look at the
media standing in back and called us
“sleazebags”), but I digress.
Of course, when voting for who
you want to be the next president of
the United States, it matters to vote
based on what values you have and
policies you agree with (duh). But
we can’t forget we’re voting for a
person, a complex entity of emotion
and past experiences.
So the way I see it, seeing who
can get the most laughs makes a
difference.
Derek Wolfe can be reached
at dewolfe@umich.edu.
DEREK
WOLFE
Finding humor in Iowa
RABAB
JAFRI