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

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
4 — Tuesday, April 5, 2016

“S

top Islam”

“Trump 2016”
“Build the Wall”

These 
were 

the 
words 

chalked 
onto 

the 
middle 
of 

the 
Diag 
last 

Thursday, March 
31. 
Muslim 

students 
then 

spent 
hours 

cleaning 
the 

mess 
because 

of the lack of 
response 
from 

the University of 
Michigan’s Division of Public Safety 
and Security and the University’s 
administration.

I am sorry to say I am not 

surprised.

The fact that DPSS and the 

University failed to take immediate 
action to clean the words from 
the Diag, forcing Muslim students 
to clean up the words of hatred 
directed at them, is despicable. But 
it’s a good example of how things 
always go for Muslims and minority 
students on this campus. Though 
President Schlissel and spokesman 
Rick Fitzgerald released statements, 
the University does not put forth 
real effort to mend its relationships 
with different minority groups on 
campus, and it is the members of 
the groups themselves that have 
to create their own safe spaces. 
Islamophobia has been prevalent on 
campus throughout the years and 
statements without regular action is 
not enough.

This is not an isolated situation 

in terms of how the University 
treats Islamophobia or even how 
Islamophobia is treated in general. 
Last year when UMix — a University 
program that provides students with 
a space to enjoy alcohol-free Friday 
nights — planned a screening of 
“American Sniper,” several minority 
student 
groups 
and 
individuals 

petitioned to not have the movie 
screened. The UMix organizers 

accepted this change at first, but 
after pressure from the media and 
others who called the incident an 
infringement of freedom of speech, 
they decided to play the movie 
anyway. During that week, Muslim 
students 
were 
blamed 
for 
the 

incident from all sides, and instead 
of the University administration 
standing up for Muslim students, 
Fitzgerald stood by the decision to 
keep the movie running in UMix.

Muslim and Middle Eastern and 

North African students had to create 
their own safe spaces during this 
time and had no public support from 
the University. They were their own 
spokespersons, their own safety net, 
their own validation.

I bring this up because since 

that time, not much has changed. 
Fitzgerald’s statement on Thursday 
felt as if the University was enforcing 
the rhetoric of Muslims being against 
freedom yet again:

“Attacks directed toward any 

member 
or 
group 
within 
the 

University of Michigan community, 
based on a belief or characteristic, 
are inconsistent with our values of 
respect, civility and equality,” the 
statement read. “We all understand 
that where speech is free it will 
sometimes wound. But our message 
is this: We are fully committed to 
fostering an environment that is 
welcoming and inclusive of everyone. 
Tonight we are reminded there is 
much work yet to be done.”

I fail to see any substantial work on 

the part of the University to combat 
Islamophobia or listen to minority 
students on campus. The very nature 
of Fitzgerald’s statement implies 
that Muslim students are simply 
wounded by freedom of speech and 
to imply that hateful speech should 
be expected, is a remark that stems 
from the same ideas that Muslims 
face because of Islamophobia.

The students who washed the 

Diag kept the chalk with the words 
“Trump 2016” in respect of freedom 
of speech demonstrating how the 
students’ intentions were not to 

censor speech, but to work against 
hate speech. To say that there is 
work to be done without making 
substantial effort is hollow. Muslim 
and minority students are not 
treated as students deserving of the 
University’s concern.

Everything 
adds 
up. 
Jim 

Harbaugh was revered for a tweet 
about watching “American Sniper,” 
while Muslim students were seen 
as attackers of freedom of speech. 
A 
member 
of 
Central 
Student 

Government yelled in my face when 
the only indication of my identity was 
my headscarf. No one called it a bias 
incident. A University medical school 
professor posted an Islamophobic 
comment on one of my articles. I 
am expected to be used to this and 
to accept it because otherwise I am 
just another Muslim that cried hate 
speech being discarded as being 
anti-freedom of speech. Despite the 
fact that freedom of speech exists in 
America does not mean that hateful 
speech should be tolerated in such 
a way that the victim of hatred 
gets treated like the perpetrator. 
Hateful speech is never as painful as 
watching people react as if there is 
nothing wrong with it.

The path to progress is not 

through tolerating hateful speech, it 
is in recognizing it, just as it was in 
the past with anti-Semitic speech or 
blackface or any other forms of hate 
written by few but accepted by the 
masses.

Every day, I get closer and closer 

to believing I will never truly be 
seen as belonging to this University, 
or in America for that matter — my 
University of Michigan acceptance 
e-mail and the fact that I was born 
and raised in the state of Michigan 
still does not feel like enough.

I should not expect hateful speech.
I should not accept hateful speech.
I should not be expected to accept 

hateful speech.

No one should.

— Rabab Jafri can be reached 

at rfjafri@umich.edu.

Expected to accept hate 

RABAB 
JAFRI

T

his 
Sexual 
Assault 

Awareness Month, I stand 
with survivors who are 

too often silenced by a culture that 
refuses to believe them.

I advocate for survivors who 

never told anyone, not even their best 
friend, their mom, their partner.

I believe survivors who stay silent 

because they feel what happened to 
them “doesn’t count.”

I 
support 
survivors 
who 

experienced 
coercion 
or 

manipulation and don’t think what 
happened to them “counts” as sexual 
assault.

I am here for the survivors who 

don’t tell anyone because they don’t 
want to hurt the perpetrator of their 
sexual assault, who may be a friend.

I fight for every single survivor 

because I refuse to accept that sexual 
assault impacts thousands of students 
on this campus — many of whom face 
the effects of their experience alone 
— yet only a handful ever see justice.

Silence is a tool of oppression. Our 

call to action is not to blame those 
who are silent; it is to identify and to 
change the culture and the systems 
that silence people. Survivors stay 
silent for many reasons, and these 
reasons often relate to their identities. 
Lesbian, gay, transgender, queer or 
gender non-conforming folks may 
stay silent for fear of being outed. Men 
may fear being asked, “Why didn’t 
you fight back?” Many people believe 
that sex workers cannot be sexually 
assaulted because their services are 
being paid for. Trans women of color 
face overwhelming violence and the 
confluence of risk factors that make 
it incredibly difficult to speak up and 
find help. Religiously conservative 
groups may feel silenced due to the 
stigmatization of sexuality. Women 
are treated as if they are responsible 
— questioned about what they were 
wearing, what they were drinking 
or what they’ve done in the past. 
Undocumented 
immigrants 
may 

experience human trafficking or 
fear sharing their story due to fear of 
deportation.

When the odds are stacked against 

anyone so unfairly, it is no wonder 
they stay silent.

According to the 2015 Campus 

Climate 
Survey 
on 
Sexual 

Misconduct, 11.4 percent of all 
students, 
undergraduate 
and 

graduate, 
experienced 
sexual 

assault in the year preceding the 
survey. 
More 
than 
22 
percent 

of 
undergraduate 
females 
were 

assaulted in a year. 

Shockingly, more than half of 

those survivors reported telling no 
one about what happened to them. 
That means in the year preceding 
the survey, about 2,600 survivors 
never talked to anyone at the Sexual 
Assault Prevention and Awareness 
Center, at the University of Michigan 
or in law enforcement. They never 
even told their story to their best 
friend.

While I recognize that these 

numbers are not necessarily accurate 
due to survey limitations, and raw 
numbers are always inadequate 
to measure the full costs of sexual 
assault, that number is simply too 
high to accept. Any number of 
students who are violated so deeply 
is completely unacceptable. Further, 
those rates only measure sexual 
assault and not the other forms of 
sexualized violence that impact 
college students like intimate partner 
violence and stalking.

On campus, there are many places 

for survivors to go — SAPAC is an 
excellent confidential resource for 
all survivors. The primary place 
to seek non-confidential help from 
the administration is the Office for 
Institutional Equity, which is meant 
to address Title IX violations. Title IX 
prevents sex-based discrimination 
in education, and since sexual 
harassment 
and 
sexual 
assault 

inhibit a student’s ability to learn in 
an equitable environment, it is the 
University’s legal responsibility to 
address sexual violence on campus.

In 
January, 
the 
University 

released its Fiscal Year 2015 report 
on Office for Institutional Equity 
investigations under the Student 
Sexual Misconduct Policy. Despite 
the fact that nearly 5,000 students 
experience sexual assault in a year 
alone, just 97 incidents were reported 
to the University.

The subsequent 25 investigations 

found 
seven 
perpetrators 

“responsible.” You read that right — 
last year, the University only found 
seven 
perpetrators 
responsible 

for 
sexual 
assault. 
With 
the 

preponderance of sexual assault 
on campus, it is unbelievable to me 

that only seven perpetrators will see 
some form of academic discipline 
for creating an intolerable campus 
environment. It speaks to both a 
campus culture that discourages 
survivors from coming forward 
and to the failure of the sexual 
misconduct policy to adequately 
address the incidents that are 
reported. Our University’s system 
fails survivors, and our culture fails 
survivors when it silences them.

Action is whatever you want 

it to be — there is no right way to 
feel, no right way to act, no right 
way to share. But in the spirit of 
transforming silence to action, 
here are a few ideas. Request an 
educational workshop from our 
Peer 
Educators 
or 
Bystander 

Intervention 
and 
Community 

Engagement 
programs. 
Engage 

with survivors in your community 
by hosting a confidential survivor 
speakout. Attend a SAPAC event 
or collaborate to host one in your 
community. Contact your elected 
representatives in the Michigan 
legislature and in Congress to 
ask about what they are doing to 
end sexual assault on campuses. 
Contact the University’s Board 
of Regents to tell them that you 
demand action from our campus 
administration on sexual assault in 
our community. Read the Student 
Sexual Misconduct Policy and 
educate yourself on the changes 
that will go into effect on July 1. Go 
through ally training or volunteer 
training 
with 
SAPAC. 
Most 

important of all, start conversations 
in your community. Bring up the 
subject with your friends. Support 
survivors by saying, “I believe you,” 
“It’s not your fault” and “There’s 
no right way to heal.” Be kind and 
empathetic. Take care of yourself 
while talking about these important 
but heavy issues.

The campus climate survey found 

that 37 percent of survivors who did 
not report did not do so because 
they didn’t think anything would 
be done about it. Let’s prove to 
them that we will believe them 
and that something will be done. 
#WeBelieveYou.

Laura Meyer is a networking 

publicity activism SAPAC student 

volunteer co-coordinator.

From silence to action

LAURA MEYER | OP-ED

Claire Bryan, Regan Detwiler, Caitlin Heenan, 

Jeremy Kaplan, Ben Keller, Minsoo Kim, Payton Luokkala, 

Kit Maher, Madeline Nowicki, Anna Polumbo-Levy, 
Jason Rowland, Lauren Schandevel, Melissa Scholke, 

Kevin Sweitzer, Rebecca Tarnopol, Ashley Tjhung, 

Stephanie Trierweiler, Hunter Zhao

EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS

W

atching 
our 
current 
political 

circus is no longer amusing. The 
corrupting forces pulling us toward 

accepting the xenophobic 
tendencies that have long 
disrupted human progress 
— see our treatment of 
Native Americans, Chinese 
Americans 
or 
Irish 

Americans, among others — 
are becoming terrifyingly 
omnipresent. 
It 
seemed 

that after many twists and 
turns, we finally learned 
to be better than our fears, 
that 
we 
had 
accepted, 

however grudgingly (for 
some), the importance of 
bringing outsiders into our classrooms, our 
lives and our country.

Though some discomfort around new people 

and ideas is expected and normal, there are 
ways to combat this that do not devolve into 
exclusionary, and now oftentimes blatantly 
racist, language. We must condemn such 
language for what it is: Bigotry that alienates 
citizens at home and whole groups of people 
around the world.

In recent months, the flagrant disregard 

for our country’s founding ideals from the 
leading Republican candidates has created a 
toxic environment that not only ostracizes our 
friends and neighbors, but also endangers our 
values more so than any threat coming from 
abroad. Without a strong rebuke from those of 
us yet to be targeted, we risk endangering the 
very pluralism that many Americans have long 
taken for granted.

The unfortunate fact remains that this 

bigotry radiates from both of the leading 
Republican presidential candidates. It is not 
unreasonable to surmise that these derogatory 
statements, whether they be directed at women, 
Mexicans, Muslims or more recently anyone 
who protests at a Trump rally — especially if 
they are not white — signify a deep-seated fear 
among many Americans that they are in danger 
of losing out on their American Dream.

The idealist in me wants to think that many 

Americans are being manipulated by a well-
staged campaign playing on their deepest 
fear: Fear itself. I want to believe that upon 
reasoning their way through these illogical 

and often unapologetically racist arguments, 
Americans will find them both logically flawed 
and morally reprehensible.

This is exactly what I thought upon hearing 

that, apparently, most Mexicans in this country 
are rapists and murders (with some good 
people among them, of course). But instead 
of falling to the wayside after the initial 
shock that these statements sent through our 
collective discourse, proponents (a group that 
is unfortunately growing) have only further 
hardened their resolve to alienate groups 
who do not share their nationality, religion 
or ignorance. These statements have yet to 
dissuade potential voters and many in the 
Republican political establishment who have 
yet to disqualify offenders for their remarks 
outright.

My inner cynic is now leaning toward 

another explanation for our current political 
environment. Instead of living in a nation 
that welcomes diversity and attracts the best 
and brightest from all over the world, instead 
of living in a nation devoted to the pluralism 
inherent to our founding ideals, instead of 
living in a nation that provides a source of 
hope and opportunity to people living all 
around the world, we are living in a nation 
of parasitic opportunists who — while happy 
to extend a welcoming hand to further their 
goals — are now trying to desperately grasp 
at a malformed ideal of days gone by to save 
a way of life built on the back of inequity and 
discrimination.

I desperately hope that my inner cynic is 

wrong and that we use this impasse as an 
opportunity to move forward: to take another 
small step toward overcoming the xenophobic 
tendencies of our past by rejecting bigotry at 
the ballot box. To stand together in a “purple 
coalition” that overwhelms what separates 
red from blue, Republican from Democrat. As 
a silent majority of Americans on both sides 
of the aisle that has for too long watched with 
bemused detachment, we must now raise our 
voices and let the world know that we will not 
rationalize racism. We will not resign ourselves 
to the persistent bigoted contortions that aim 
to divide us. We will instead come together to 
prove, once and for all, that love trumps hate.

— Danny Sack can be reached 

at sackd@umich.edu.

Love trumps hate

DANNY
SACK

On the evening of Tuesday, March 29:

“#StopIslam” and “Stop the Rape of Europe” 

were chalked in the Diag, targeting Muslim 
identities at the University of Michigan. This 
incident was not singular, but joined a suc-
cession of other Islamophobic instances that 
continue to marginalize and create a hostile 
environment for Muslim students on campus. In 
the last three years, Muslim students have faced 
multiple attacks on their identity and safety:

When Students Allied for Freedom and 

Equality launched the #UMDivest movement 
and proposed a resolution to create a committee 
to investigate investments that allegedly facili-
tate the violation of Palestinian human rights, 
members of SAFE as well as their allies faced 
verbal attacks on social media and in person, 
and were unable to attend class without Depart-
ment of Public Safety and Security escorts.

After a widely supported letter was written 

to the Center for Campus Involvement request-
ing the cancellation of an “American Sniper” 
screening, the University of Michigan tempo-
rarily canceled the screening of the film. Though 
many organizations representing non-Arab and 
non-Muslim students endorsed the letter, this 
proposition led to a disproportionate number of 
verbal, physical and social media attacks on stu-
dents with Muslim and Arab backgrounds.
When is enough?

Time and time again, Muslim students have 

found the administration absent when its sup-
port was needed most. Muslim students feel 
unsafe, unwelcome and unheard in a space 
that is meant to be inclusive of all identities. 
In response to the Diag incident, University 
President Mark Schlissel released a statement 
emphasizing the importance of education and 
community-building, but has yet to provide 
actionable steps or key resources to address 
these issues.

We recognize the importance of free speech, 

but it is crucial to examine how our actions 
impact the ability of our fellow community mem-
bers to have equal access to education. With the 
glacial pace of the administration to ensure the 
safety of its students, it is our responsibility to 
create an inclusive and welcoming atmosphere 
for our peers. It is unquestionable that differing 
perspectives create mutual understanding and a 
more holistic view of the world. However, abus-
ing this right to free speech to espouse hatred is 
not an ideal anyone should aspire to.

As student leaders on this campus, we believe 

it is imperative to not only voice our solidarity 
with the Muslim community, but also to firmly 
oppose any attacks on one’s religion, race or eth-
nicity. To those who believe in spreading hate: 
We do not support you. This campus does not 
support you.

We will not sit passively as students face bla-

tant discrimination in a community we are all 
meant to call home. And we are calling on the 
administration to do the same. Our adminis-
tration needs to publicly announce visible and 
proactive measures to ensure the Muslim com-
munity feels supported and valued on this cam-
pus.
To our fellow Wolverines:

We cannot distance ourselves from this issue. 

When any marginalized group on our campus 
feels unsafe, we all suffer. We lose the value of 
our institution when our university’s reputation 
is tarnished with such blatant discrimination. 
We lose the incredible curiosity, brilliance and 
light that these students bring to our campus. 
We lose the spirit of Michigan, as the commu-
nity we love and cherish becomes biased and 
selective.

We, as student leaders of the University of 

Michigan, call upon our peers to defend our 
campus against acts that propagate discrimina-
tion. As a student body, we must let the world 
know that we will not tolerate hate and hostility 
shrouded in the rhetoric of free speech. As the 
leaders and the best, we must unite.
To the Muslim community on campus:

We support you. And we thank you for con-

tinuing to show your strength as others expose 
their weaknesses. In this country, we enjoy the 
liberty to believe and practice whatever creed 
we wish. This freedom extends to people of all 
faith traditions. We repudiate the discrimina-
tive messages that have been cast, and it is your 
right to freely be as you are. And those who 
oppose your free exercise of belief oppose us as 
well. We are one. This University is hoMe to all 
of us. 

— Demario Longmire, current Michigan in 

Color managing editor, and Gaby Vasquez, former 

Michigan in Color managing editor, along with 

other student leaders on campus, helped to author 

this letter in support of solidarity with the Muslim 

community. For a list of student organizations who 

signed on, please visit michigandaily.com. Please 

e-mail Demario Longmire (dmolong@umich.

edu) to be added to this letter of solidarity. 

OPEN LETTER | OP-ED

Uniting our Campus