Opinion
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
4 — Thursday, September 6, 2018

Emma Chang
Ben Charlson
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EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS

ADITHYA SANJAY | COLUMN
McCain showed why compromise matters
O

n 
Aug. 
25, 
Arizona 
Sen. 
John 
McCain 
passed away due to 
complications from brain cancer. 
After McCain was diagnosed 
with glioblastoma last July, his 
health 
steadily 
deteriorated 
until he made the decision to 
discontinue his treatment a few 
days before his death.
The late senator was a naval 
hero, having spent multiple years 
as a prisoner of war in Vietnam. 
He retired from the Navy in 1981 
and entered politics, blazing his 
own legacy as both a champion 
of conservatism and an ardent 
believer in compromise. See, 
McCain was a self-described 
maverick: a politician willing 
to cross political party lines 
to 
protect 
his 
values. 
He 
represented a brand of politician 
that is largely absent from the 
American political scene today.
I was shocked to see much 
of the response to the senator’s 
passing was critical. Instead of 
celebrating McCain’s legacy, the 
media largely used his death to 
attack President Donald Trump 
and even express dissatisfaction 
over McCain’s ideology. In fact, 
The New Yorker released an 
article that focused on Trump’s 
petty 
response 
to 
McCain’s 
death, calling Trump a “liar” 
and “crook” instead of focusing 
on McCain’s sizable legacy.
Why 
couldn’t 
people 
put their ideologies aside to 
celebrate McCain’s great career 
and sacrifices for the country?
In 
America’s 
current 
politically polarized state, it has 
become increasingly important 
to bring people from both sides 
together. 
While 
reflecting 
on McCain and his work in 
the Senate, it’s imperative to 
highlight and remember his 
efforts to put politics above 
party lines.
The 
U.S. 
government 
is 
extremely inefficient. It’s how 
it was constructed. Efficiency 
was compromised in favor of 
checks and balances. With a 
Congress that can switch parties 

every two years and a president 
that can switch every four, it 
is very difficult to produce 
lasting 
legislation 
without 
bipartisan support. Otherwise, 
legislation would just be rolled 
back every time the party in 
control switches.
Trump’s 
rise 
to 
the 
presidency 
has 
seemingly 
damaged the social fabric of 
the U.S., widening the rift 
between 
conservatives 
and 
liberals, 
thereby 
making 
it 
difficult 
to 
have 
discussion 
across party lines. Though much 
of Trump’s policy aligns with 
the moderate right, his rhetoric 
and alternative facts have been 

used to brand conservatives 
as a racist, uneducated and 
misogynistic group. 
But it’s not just the right 
that is hurt by this. On the other 
side, the rise of Democratic 
socialists has contributed to the 
polarization. Political leaders 
like Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders 
and New York congressional 
candidate Alexandria Ocasio-
Cortez have developed the left as 
socialist and at times intolerant.
This 
marque 
of 
radicalism has become quite 
counterproductive to achieving 
true political progress in the 
United States. The number of 
violent groups on either side 
has been increasing recently, 
and as a result has created a 
nasty facade to politics. People 
actively 
avoid 
showcasing 
their party allegiance publicly 
and stay away from politics 
entirely for fear of being 
judged and attacked. In fact, 

when I was canvassing for a 
local candidate this summer 
many individuals refused to 
put up yard signs or even talk 
to me for that reason alone.
Even 
worse 
than 
this 
is 
the 
rise 
of 
intolerance 
for 
even 
hearing 
out 
opposing 
arguments. 
Many 
top 
conservative 
thought 
leaders and polemicists have 
been actively shut out by 
students 
and 
even 
college 
administrators 
from 
even 
being able to simply share their 
ideas on campus. The University 
of California, Berkeley riots 
in opposition to people like 
conservative writer Ben Shapiro 
were one of the many examples 
of active infringements on free 
speech rights. 
At 
the 
University 
of 
Michigan, where a substantial 
number 
of 
students 
are 
Democrats, it is important to 
make sure the other side is 
heard out and respected. We 
must branch out of our own 
echo chambers and try to at 
the very least acknowledge the 
validity of the other side.
The other day I had a 
conversation with a couple of 
friends who were of opposite 
political ideologies. As politics 
go, the discussion got heated at 
times, but in the end we were 
able to compromise on certain 
issues. 
Political 
discourse 
needs to be open and factual 
discourse. No ad hominem. No 
racism or sexism. Just free and 
proper debate.
So 
instead 
of 
creating 
conspiracy out of McCain’s 
passing or blaming the current 
presidential 
administration, 
respect the senator’s legacy 
by making an extra effort to 
hear out both political sides. 
Practice politics in the spirit of 
the maverick. And who knows? 
Maybe it’ll change your mind. 
It sure did change mine.

Deplatforming political celebrities

HANK MINOR | COLUMN

M

ilo Yiannopoulos, the 
“alt-right” firebrand 
and 
provocateur, 
fell from grace far earlier 
than many of the political 
entertainers raised high by 
President 
Donald 
Trump’s 
election. He was permanently 
banned from Twitter in 2016, 
resigned from Breitbart as a 
senior editor in 2017 and lost his 
spot at the Politicon convention 
in 2018. His college speaking 
engagements, 
once 
a 
major 
engine for his career, have 
largely dried up. Now, in front of 
his much-diminished audience, 
he’s melting down.
“I have been betrayed and 
abandoned by everyone who 
ever 
called 
themselves 
my 
friend, with a small handful of 
notable exceptions … I almost 
single handedly ignited the 
current 
debate 
about 
free 
speech on campus and NO ONE 
has ever matched my ability to 
draw attention to these issues … I 
have lost everything standing up 
for the truth in America, spent 
all my savings, destroyed all my 
friendships and ruined my whole 
life,” Yiannopoulos wrote in a 
(lengthy) Facebook post.
I’ve never been entirely 
convinced that protest with 
the goal of “de-platforming” 
ideologues is very effective. 
Organization 
against 
highly 
public 
stunts, 
like 
college 
speaking 
tours, 
seem 
to 
primarily 
serve 
as 
fodder 
for the Fox News outrage 
machine. 
“De-platforming” 
has to have support from a 
higher level — news companies, 
tech companies and financial 
interests — to truly work. That 
said, Yiannopoulos’ accelerating 
public decline has made me 
reconsider, somewhat. Without 
sustained 
pressure 
from 
a 
general mass of progressives, 
would entities like Twitter and 
Politicon have taken action 
against Yiannopoulo’s in the 
first place?
Political 
celebrities 
provide a circuitous method of 
advertising. Radical websites 
can’t pay for ads in The New York 
Times, but their figureheads 
serve a nearly indistinguishable 

purpose 
simply 
by 
being 
covered. 
“De-platforming” 
Yiannopoulos, 
however 
it 
happens, robs his fans of a 
valuable resource: access to the 
mainstream press. Furthermore, 
feeling marginalized suppresses 
meaningful political activity; 
by reducing the clout of a 
movement’s leaders, you reduce 
its efficacy overall.
This isn’t a groundbreaking 
observation, 
admittedly; 
there’s a reason people like 
Trump, former State Secretary 
Hillary 
Clinton 
and 
New 
York congressional candidate 
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez draw 
so much sustained criticism 
and attention. The difference 
between 
a 
politician 
like 
Clinton and a media figure 
like Yiannopoulos, though, is 
institutional power — influential 
politicians 
can 
raise 
their 
defenses in situations where a 
more isolated private citizen 
cannot. 
Yiannopoulos 
didn’t 
have the institutional power 
necessary to preserve his status.
Was it protest, though, that 
collapsed Yiannopoulo’s career? 
Initially, his importance came 
from his ability to provoke 
direct action from supposedly 
deranged college liberals — in 
other words, protests. Now, 
ceteris 
paribus, 
deranged 
college liberals are responsible 
for Yiannopoulo’s decline? His 
departure from Breitbart and 
expulsion from Twitter both 
occurred after media scandals; 
if 
protests 
had 
continued, 
sustaining his reputation, I 
find it hard to believe that 
either Breitbart or the Mercer 
family would have reacted.
Protests 
signal 
some 
segment of the country — and 
therefore 
some 
segment 
of 
consumers — find someone’s 
brand so repulsive that they’re 
willing to show up in person 
and spend their time repeating 
their outrage. They don’t, for a 
provocateur like Yiannopoulos, 
scare 
away 
funding 
that’s 
already signed up for public 
stunts and drama. Some might 
argue violent protest, as carried 
out by segments of antifa, is the 
key; if Yiannopoulos cannot 

speak 
because 
of 
security 
concerns, he’s clearly being 
“de-platformed” (at least in 
one area). There remain dozens 
of 
other 
platforms, 
though 
(television, social media, etc.), 
where 
threats 
of 
violence 
are 
ineffective. 
Physically 
preventing 
someone 
from 
speaking on one campus or 
another does not prevent them 
from speaking to millions of 
fans online, or millions of live 
TV viewers.
I believe protests are an 
important 
demonstration 
of solidarity and a way of 
demonstrating the strength of 
one’s conviction. I’m also not 
shedding any tears for wildly 
popular, 
well-compensated 
celebrities being denied the 
chance to make money and 
headlines on college campuses, 
either. I am still unconvinced, 
however, that direct action with 
the goal of “de-platforming” 
people like Yiannopoulos is 
enough. Preventing someone 
from speaking on campus may 
be 
an 
independently 
good 
thing, but it doesn’t appear 
effective toward the larger 
cause of removing someone 
from the public stage. The 
journalist who publicized that 
clip of Yiannopoulos appearing 
to defend pedophilia did more 
damage to his career than all 
of the people involved in the 
subsequent protests, for all of 
their righteous intentions.
It seems likely we’ll have at 
least one campus controversy 
this academic year over a 
speaker on campus, and there 
will — and should — be protests. 
Organizing them with the goal 
of “de-platforming,” though, 
is to misunderstand the way 
political 
celebrities 
wield 
and grow influence. Denying 
someone space to speak is 
clearly effective, but only when 
that denial is far reaching and 
total — “de-platforming” one 
head of the hydra does not 
prevent it from growing back 
two more elsewhere.

More than just a teen romance

AMANDA ZHANG | COLUMN

T

he 
summer 
of 
2018 
marks the revival of the 
romantic 
comedy, 
or 
rom-com — a genre once often 
overlooked as artistically lazy 
and trite. With major box office 
hits like “Mamma Mia! Here 
We Go Again” and “Crazy Rich 
Asians,” it seems as though 
Americans have finally admitted 
to themselves an architect racing 
against time to stop his one true 
love from boarding a plane is 
both exhilarating and satisfying. 
As a lifelong fan of the classically 
cheesy tropes native to the rom-
com, I was not particularly 
shocked by the genre’s return 
to the spotlight, but I was 
pleasantly surprised to see the 
influx of Asian representation, 
especially 
in 
the 
Netflix 
original film “To All the Boys 
I’ve Loved Before.”
Adapted from fiction author 
Jenny Han’s young adult novel 
and 
starring 
Vietnamese-
American actress Lana Condor, 
“To All the Boys I’ve Loved 
Before” follows Lara Jean Covey, 
an endearingly awkward half-
Korean, 
half-white 
teenage 
girl, after five of her privately 
written 
love 
letters 
are 
unexpectedly mailed out. To 
avoid confronting a recipient 
of one of the letters, Covey 
begins a fake relationship with 
recently single Peter Kavinsky, 
and teenage romance ensues.
On its surface, the film is light 
and lovable 
— the ideal late-night 
Netflix indulgence. But as an 
Asian-American girl who grew 
up watching countless rom-coms 
in which none of the female 
protagonists had skin, hair or 
eyes like mine, “To All the Boys 
I’ve Loved Before” is much more 
than a jovial tale of young love — 
it is a stark reminder that until 
very recently, Asian-Americans 
have had virtually no leading 
roles in Hollywood.
As much as I value what 
actors like Jackie Chan and Ken 
Jeong have done for the Asian 
community, I would prefer the 
representation 
of 
my 
entire 
race on the big screen were not 
limited to kung-fu masters and 
Mr. Chow from “The Hangover.” 
Enter Covey, a relatable 16-year-
old girl who just happens to be 
half Korean. That’s it. Covey does 
not embody any classic Asian 
stereotypes. She is not timid like 
that freakishly quiet beatboxer 

Lily from “Pitch Perfect” or 
saddled 
by 
an 
overbearing 
tiger parent like Lane from 
“Gilmore Girls.” Instead, Covey 
is articulate and actually funny. 
Her primary concern in life 
is a fake relationship with a 
cute boy and, before leaving 
for her school’s annual ski 
trip, she endured a painfully 
uncomfortable sex talk with 
her father.
Covey is the classic female 
rom-com protagonist. Yes, she is 
half Korean, but it is the subtlety 
with which her ethnicity is 
incorporated that makes “To 
All the Boys I’ve Loved Before” 
such an important work. This 

film represents an extraordinary 
moment 
for 
Asians 
in 
Hollywood, 
not 
because 
it 
blatantly censures deeply rooted 
racism in the film industry, but 
simply because the lead is Asian 
and her ethnicity is neither a 
statement nor a punchline.
Despite the fact that Covey’s 
Korean heritage is never a central 
plot point in the film, it does not 
go 
completely 
unrecognized. 
“To All the Boys I’ve Loved 
Before” includes a number of 
refreshingly subtle scenes that 
introduce aspects of Korean 
culture. In one of my favorite 
moments, Kavinsky is picking 
up Covey and her little sister on 
the way to school and asks what 
her sister is drinking. She is 
drinking a Korean yogurt called 
Yakuroto commonly found in 
Asian grocery markets. The 
charming love interest gives the 
yogurt a try and playfully strikes 
a deal with the sister, promising 
to take her to school every day 
in exchange for a bottle. The 

scene is an endearing moment in 
which Kavinsky begins to win 
over Covey’s precocious little 
sister, but it is also a delightful 
example of open-mindedness 
and cultural exchange.
Growing up as a child of 
Chinese 
immigrants, 
I 
was 
always slightly hesitant to reveal 
aspects of my culture. Out of fear 
of appearing unconventional, I 
used forks instead of chopsticks 
around my white friends and 
always suggested going to other 
people’s houses to hang out. 
While I have since overcome this 
anxiety, Kavinsky’s immediately 
positive reaction to the yogurt 
and the casual manner with 
which they discuss it are a 
gentle reminder that exposure 
to different lifestyles is the key 
to promoting a more integrative 
and 
inclusive 
society. 
The 
film’s subtle nod to a common 
Asian household item offers 
a 
powerful 
message 
that 
Hollywood thus far has largely 
neglected 
— 
our 
different 
backgrounds are not meant to 
be tucked away at home, but 
instead shared with others.
Though Asians have seen a 
rise in Hollywood representation 
this summer, there are still 
massive strides to be made as 
the film and television industry 
is still replete with archaic 
standards of beauty and worth. 
When she was first approaching 
production 
companies 
to 
convert her novel into a film, 
Han reportedly turned down 
multiple offers after producers 
pressured her to whitewash 
Covey. This is not particularly 
surprising, considering it took 
a quarter-century for a major 
motion picture to anchor a 
predominantly Asian cast with 
this summer’s box office hit, 
“Crazy Rich Asians.”
Needless to say, these films 
featuring Asian leads were not 
produced without their fair share 
of adversity. “To All the Boys I’ve 
Loved Before” is a momentous 
film for the Asian community, 
but it is not enough for the 
little girls like me who grow up 
believing only white women 
deserve to be fantastically swept 
off their feet. Hollywood needs 
to do better.
Political discourse 
needs to be 
open and factual 
discourse. 

Though Asians 
have seen a rise 
in Hollywood 
representation 
this summer, 
there are still 
massive strides to 
be made.

Amanda Zhang can be reached at 

amanzhang@umich.edu.

Adithya Sanjay can be reached at 

asanjay@umich.edu.

HANNAH MEYERS | CONTACT HANNAH AT HSMYERS@UMICH.EDU

Hank Minor can be reached at 

hminor@umich.edu.

