Opinion
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
4 — Friday, March 23, 2018

What does it mean to support free speech?

ANNA HORTON | OP-ED

T

he slang use of the word
“basic” emerged during my
high
school

years and was marked
by the appreciation of
Starbucks, UGG boots
and yoga pants. These
three
preferences

were enough to make
someone
“basic.”

According
to
an

article by Buzzfeed,
basic came into usage
around 2011. However,
according to the piece
“that original usage had nothing to
do with middle-class white girls.
Instead, ‘basic bitch,’ like so many
things that become commonplace
within mainstream (white) culture,
was
appropriated
from
black

culture.”

By 2014, the term basic as it

is now understood was widely
recognizable.
CollegeHumor

shared a video titled, “How To
Tell If You’re a Basic Bitch.” This
is where the slang version of basic
derived from: the designation
of a woman as a basic bitch.
However, as the Buzzfeed article
points out, “basic bitch” was the
slang primarily used by the Black
community. “Basic bitch” also had
different connotations before it was
co-opted by white culture when it
was also shortened to basic.

Basic, in its mainstream slang

form, is used to indicate a woman
(almost always white in this
iteration of the word) who likes
things that are popular. The sin of
a basic is consuming what other
white women consume. The basic
woman’s habits are boring. Of
course, she likes the popular thing.
She likes it because it’s popular.

The wrongdoing of someone

who is basic goes beyond that. The
basic woman is wrong because her
personality is hinged on her taste.
Her taste is unoriginal. Therefore
her whole being is unoriginal.
Therefore she is basic. Because
the regular thing to do is decide
that someone’s whole essence is
encapsulated by their pumpkin
spice
latte
order
and
thusly

condemn them. Basic is, or was at
one point, strictly negative.

Since then, basic has grown

and changed. Now, partaking in
any number of activities can make
a person basic. Basic activities

include (but are not limited to)
buying scented candles, wearing

Timberland shoes and
ordering white wine.
My most distinct basic
characteristics are as
follows: I like brunch,
Warby Parker glasses
and
the
musical,

“Hamilton.”
I
can’t

even track what’s basic
anymore. As far as I
can tell, you’re basic
for liking anything that
people like.

I do think that basic has lost

some of the power it once had. I
think we’ve collectively leaned
into it. While it may still tend to be
negative at times, women use basic
familiarly now, with affection. And
while it was never a particularly
impressive or barbed insult, it has
found an even more casual place in
the vernacular and serves just to call
white girls out for doing anything
that at least one other white girl
might like doing. It has even turned
to a term that can be used for
men, though basic dudes are more
commonly known as “bros,” as can
be seen in a CollegeHumor video
published the year after the basic
bitch video came out.

Even though basic isn’t the

insult it used to be, I think it’s
interesting that it existed at all.
If we deconstruct the motivation
behind calling someone basic, it
might shed interesting light on the
expectations we have for women.

When women call other women

basic in a judgmental way, we play
into a patriarchal assumption that
women have to prove their power
by belittling other women. In
media, we frequently see women
in competition. Female characters
are “frenemies” or straight up
challengers after the same man.
The purpose of female friendships
as they are often represented
is to exhibit rivalry — to
demonstrate that women are too
dramatic/petty/emotional (take
your pick of adjectives) to simply
be friends with another woman
or a group of women.

Think
about
how
it’s

supposedly a compliment to tell a
girl that she’s “not like other girls.”
That she’s better because she has
differentiated herself from other
women; other women typically

possess some shared, negative trait
but this one woman does not have
it. Using the designation of basic
convinced women to do this for
themselves, to boost their position
in the hierarchy by demeaning
the tastes of a different group.
Noreen Malone, in an article for
The Cut, writes that basic, as an
insult “derives its power from
the knowledge that if you can
recognize someone or something
as basic, you probably, yourself,
aren’t it.”

Basic also depends on the

oft-internalized idea that women
exist to be seen. It relies on the
assumption that women’s tastes
are
performative.
Basic
only

works because we expect that the
whole motivation behind women’s
preferences is to tell others (like
men) something about her, that
everything she does has the express
purpose of making people think
she fits into some specific group.
But when she picks the wrong
things, or wants people to feel a
specific,
arbitrarily-determined

wrong way about her, we deem her
basic. Women are not allowed to
just like things. Every single thing
they choose to consume is picked
with the purpose of crafting
a persona. Essentially, calling
someone basic assumes that what
a woman prefers — from clothing
to coffee order — was chosen for
the purpose of telling you who
she is, and that your judgment is
something that matters to her. It
probably doesn’t.

As writer Dana Schwartz

once tweeted, “Let’s stop calling
girls basic for liking things that
are objectively likable...” Insults,
especially gendered ones, lose their
power when women refuse to bow
to the pressure of undermining
other women to secure their own
status.

With all of that being said, basic

has already started its descent into
so-last-year insults. It was weak at
best, and as the sheer inanity of it
becomes apparent, it just grows
weaker. It loses its power if you
lean into it, if you reclaim it, if you
decide that being basic just means
that you like things that are likable.
Good for you.

A

recently-published Vox
article claims a radical
counter-narrative
to

one of the most contentious
subjects on college campuses
across the U.S. According to
the news outlet’s co-founder,
Matthew Yglesias, “support
for free speech” is actually
on the rise among liberal
college students.

In
his
article,
Yglesias

calls out reporters at The New
York Times and Reason for
“bombastically”
exaggerating

university
“politically

correct” culture. The recent
protest
of
Christina
Hoff

Sommers’s lecture at Lewis
& Clark College, along with
the controversy over NYT’s
Bari
Weiss’s
op-ed
“We’re

All Fascists Now,” aren’t only
unrepresentative of free speech
decline — they’re distracting
from larger trends. In fact,
according to nearly five decades
of questionnaires by the U.S.
General
Social
Survey,
the

US is increasingly supportive
of
communist,
militarist,

anti-theist
and
homosexual

speakers. This acceptance of
“controversial”
viewpoints,

Yglesias argues, suggests free
speech is less of a contentious
issue than conservatives would
have us believe.

Yet several problems prevail

with
Yglesias’s
argument,

the most obvious being the
categories themselves. After
all, when was the last time you
went to hear a “communist” or
“militarist” speak, whether on
campus or otherwise? What
about an “anti-theist?” Not
only are these labels outdated,
but
equating
the
social

environment of 1972 (when
the study began) with today
ignores the dramatic historical
changes that have normalized
such views (the fall of the Soviet
Union, for one). What’s more,
the Foundation for Individual
Rights in Education has logged
371 speakers as “disinvited”
from
public,
private,
and

religious universities between
2000 and 2018, the majority
of whom were identified as
“conservative.”

Yet another inconsistency

in Yglesias’s argument lies in
the assumption that supporting
the
expression
of
certain

ideological paradigms is the
same as supporting free speech.
Imagine
you
were
asked

whether you’d be willing to
listen to a well-known feminist
speaker. Then imagine that
someone asked you whether
you’d be willing to listen to
someone dispute the gender pay
gap. Do you see the problem?
The reason self-dubbed “factual
feminist”
Christina
Hoff

Sommers is controversial isn’t
her label, but her unwillingness
to toe an ideological line.
As she argues in a video for
Prager University, “(feminist)
activists make claims … to
support their views” that don’t
stand up to scrutiny. Yet rather
than subjecting her and other
“controversial”
speakers
to

similar
treatment,
students

reject their ideas as acceptable
or
unacceptable,
good
or

bad.
Rather
than
objective

information, facts have become
political territories waiting to
be staked by whichever party
they are interpreted to support.

It’s easy to let the partisan

brain take over at this point.
After all, aren’t certain groups
just twisting facts to support
their
political
agendas?

Christina
Hoff
Sommers,

as one Salon article puts it,
is nothing but a “bigot who
makes a living propping up
misogynist myths.” What’s the
point of having such a speaker
on campus anyway?

In yet another Vox article,

ironically titled “Science is
already political. So scientists
might as well march.” David
Roberts argues that science
is made up of two aspects:
scientific theory (“science-t”)
and
scientific
practice

(“science-p”). Science-t is pre-

interpretive fact — the raw
data produced by replicable
research. Roberts notes that
since science informs rather
than proves, it must rely on
consistency before it can be
considered a fact. Science-p,
however, is science taken to
its logical end in supporting,
not supporting or complicating
a hypothesis. Thus, while we
need science-t to determine
trends, we need science-p to
decide what that those trends
mean — a process Roberts
labels as inherently political.

Humans
need

interpretation — it’s how we
make sense of being bombarded
daily with data. But we also
need to constantly check our
interpretations for bias. As
Peter Boghossian, a philosophy
professor at Portland State
University, notes, “obfuscation
is a litmus test of an ideologue.”
If we, as college students,
truly want to support free
speech, our allegiance must
lie with facts, not ideologies,
and reasoned belief rather
than
acceptable
dogma.

Likewise, if we truly hold to
certain
political
opinions,

welcoming alternative views
should be part of maintaining
our credibility.

Regardless of whether you

find someone like Christina
Hoff Sommers convincing, at
least consider this: Her message
begs a counter-narrative, not a
walkout. Judging people on a
categorical basis ignores the
nuance of individual belief, and
listening to speakers who’ve
refused to align with neat
politically-correct paradigms
may be about challenging our
views, not bashing theirs. If
we can agree that the only
message poisoned by facts is a
poisonous message, we should
also agree on this: Current
trends in campus free speech
are hardly antidotal.

In defense of “basic”

DANIELLE COLBURN | COLUMN

Emma Chang
Joel Danilewitz

Samantha Goldstein

Elena Hubbell
Emily Huhman
Tara Jayaram

Jeremy Kaplan

Sarah Khan

Lucas Maiman

Magdalena Mihaylova

Ellery Rosenzweig

Jason Rowland

Anu Roy-Chaudhury

Alex Satola
Ali Safawi

Ashley Zhang
Sam Weinberger

DAYTON HARE

Managing Editor

420 Maynard St.

Ann Arbor, MI 48109

tothedaily@michigandaily.com

Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan since 1890.

ALEXA ST. JOHN

Editor in Chief
ANU ROY-CHAUDHURY AND

ASHLEY ZHANG
Editorial Page Editors

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.

EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS

Danielle Colburn can be reached at

decol@umich.edu.

Anna Horton is an LSA senior.

O

n Sunday night, a woman
riding a bicycle in Tempe,
Ariz., was killed by a

self-driving Uber SUV in what has
been reported as the
first
death
caused

by
autonomous

technology
in
the

United States.

It is fair to say

that we are entering an
era of unprecedented
technological progress
and
productivity
—

over the past 40 years,
we have witnessed
exponential growth
in areas like computing efficiency,
computer
memory
and
non-

commercial flight distance.

But this technological boom

has not come without its fair share
of problems, and the recent Uber-
related death may just represent the
tip of the iceberg as it relates to the
dangers of autonomous technologies
becoming increasingly public. If
anything, this should serve as a
warning to our computer-crazed
society that we should take a step
back and see if the upward trend of
technological progress is really the
safest direction to be traveling in.

Earlier this month, I attended

a talk in Chicago by Thomas
Friedman, a columnist for The New
York Times. Friedman, who writes
as the newspaper’s foreign affairs
columnist, was speaking about
his newest book, “Thank You For
Being Late: An Optimist’s Guide to
Thriving in the Age of Acceleration.”

Friedman’s book describes the

ways in which the current era of
technological revolution is reshaping
various elements of our society,
ranging from the climate to politics
to the workplace. The name of the
book came from a personal anecdote:
One time, when a colleague ran

15 minutes late to a meeting and
frantically apologized upon arrival,
Friedman responded by thanking
him for being late. The extra 15

minutes
had
allowed

Friedman to collect his
thoughts on a topic that
was escaping him.

His book boiled down

to the idea that technology
is increasing at a rate
humans cannot keep up
with, and in the process
of trying to keep up,
we often forget to slow
down — even when it
might be beneficial.

The events that transpired Sunday

in Tempe present an additional piece
of evidence that both supports and
complicates Friedman’s narrative.

Insofar
as
Friedman
talks

about the dangers of technology
— the exponential increase in
global warming and the straining
of geopolitical tensions due to
globalization — the death of the
Tempe woman fits in this narrative.

And while this was the first death

caused by autonomous technology, it
is not the first time a similar incident
has occurred. In 2016, the National
Transportation
Safety
Board

partially faulted Tesla for a deadly
crash involving its autopilot system
in Florida, and earlier this year a self-
driving Uber car ran a red light in
California, prompting the removal
of all such cars by the California
Department of Motor Vehicles.

Similarly, in the wake of this

recent tragedy, Uber announced
that they would halt the testing of all
autonomous vehicles in the United
States and Canada.

In his book, Friedman attests

to the exponential development
of
technologies
over
time,

demonstrated by Moore’s Law, a 1965
theory created by Intel Co-Founder

George Moore that argues for
the doubling of computer power
every two years at the same cost.
However, the shutdown of Uber’s
self-driving car program represents a
technology giant slowing down their
own trajectory for fear of negative
consequences — a clear departure
from Friedman’s narrative.

This is all to say that while

Friedman gives us guidance on how
to keep up with technology, we may
be better off staying in place.

Friedman’s end goal is to prove

that there are ways for humans to
catch up to the rate of technological
progress, such as inventing new
algorithms that make educating and
governing more widely applicable
and efficient. He claims that when
humans do catch up, it will make
technology all the more powerful and
helpful for countries across the world.

While the benefits of this type of

growth are high, the risks are even
higher. As firms continue to compete
for the fastest computing power,
replacing humans day by day, it
comes at a cost that may even equate
to a human life.

So what does this mean for the

average college student?

It
means
confronting
the

technology obsessions that resonate
through each of our daily lives,
from food delivery applications to
cash transfer services. It means
taking a moment, or two, to slow
down and realize that the dangers
of technology may not be present
immediately, but have wide-ranging,
tangible consequences.

It might even mean taking

your foot off the gas when you’re
running late to a meeting or lecture
— trust me, your classmates won’t
go anywhere.

Hit the breaks

BEN CHARLSON | COLUMN

Demystifying peer review

PEGGY RANDON | OP-ED

T

he idea of peer tutoring
has always seemed to be
a misnomer. In order for

someone to tutor, certainly his or her
abilities in the subject surpass the
abilities of the person being taught.
For writing — even in the humanities
and social sciences — I generally
understood knowledge to be black
or white. Therefore, the cultivation
of these skills could only come from
a very controlled source.

Looking back, it makes sense

that my transition to college was
more difficult with this mindset. The
standards of writing that I had grown
up with were now completely turned
around. In high school, though the
abstract tool of peer review was highly
marketed to students, the idea only
might have extended to a quick check-
in of page length and grammar and
perhaps the remodeling of a sentence
or two. In college, help is primarily
given by tutoring programs staffed
with undergraduate and graduate
students. The expectation is that
knowledge is generated between
knowledgeable
students
and

that truth is as actively created
as it is shared.

Nevertheless,
whenever
I

extended my learning beyond the
classroom, it was always away from
student critique and toward office
hours and professors. Admittedly,
I rarely learned much more than
I did in the classroom. As much
as the professors would try to
relate to and inspire me, nothing
clicked. Of course, this is not the
same for everyone. Many students
are enriched by individual time
with teachers. Still, a vast majority
can sympathize with a student
that experiences a devastatingly

unhelpful session of office hours.
Personally, the belief was always that
people are only as good off paper as
they are on paper. Maybe, instead, I
should have switched the order.

Collaborative work — specifically,

verbalizing ideas with like-minded
individuals in a form of peer
review — can be very beneficial to
improve one’s writing. Recently,
more research has been conducted
assessing trends in open dialogue
between peers with an increase in
students’ overall problem-solving
skills at the post-secondary level.
In fact, 2017 research by Chad Loes
and Ernest Pascarella asserts that
the act of engaging with others on
academic work improves “openness
to diversity … a greater ability to
transfer
information
from
one

setting to another … and the ability to
generate new ideas and solutions,” all
of which can be applied to and used
to benefit writing.

Essentially, where traditional

learning
practices
(relying
on

office hours and professors) may
be unsuccessful, students should
consider
complimenting
those

efforts with peer review. In both
roles, tutor and student, the learning
is as plentiful as the conversation
is constant. Instead of thinking of
it as encouraging confusion, “peer
tutoring” can be more accurately
understood as the pooling of
information, ideas and experiences to
enable deeper, reorganized thought
and increased understanding.

Not to mention, the environment

of peer review often breeds friendly,
non-hostile
conversation,
which

could be helpful to those who might
feel anxious talking with their
professors. In fact, the process of

sharing ideas is most successful
when it is between students, because
the insecurities and drawbacks of
divulging your thoughts to an adult,
much less the one allocating grades
for your writing, are eliminated.

In short, many will form their

own habits to study and get support,
but few will turn to peer review as a
sustainable option, not recognizing
its core benefits to college learning.
The wonderful thing about writing
is that it is not necessarily about
assigning a right and wrong; it is the
provocation of thought that might
critique what is right or wrong, and
the continuous improvement of
one’s abilities.

Evidently, great writing forms

by a never-ending conversation with
oneself, and foremost, with others
in social settings. In fact, I might go
as far as to agree with K.A. Bruffee
that writing is “a social artifact,” if
by that he means it demands to be
reshaped and impacted by continued
conversation and human interaction.

It might also relate to the

idea that fully grasping a concept
requires the ability to concisely
explain it to others. As understood
by Peter Smagorinsky, “the process
of speaking itself often serves as a
vehicle through which new thoughts
emerge,” it allows people to organize
ideas and build off of them. With
that said, while I will continue to
go to my teachers for guidance and
use other resources for reference in
writing, I will no longer devalue the
insight potential share of knowledge
achieved by simply talking with my
peers.

DANIELLE
COLBURN

Peggy Randon is an LSA freshman.

Ben Charlson can be reached at

bencharl@umich.edu.

BEN

CHARLSON