J

ames Madison wrote in 
the 
Federalist 
Papers, 
“Pure 
democracies 
have ever been spectacles of 
turbulence and contention; have 
ever been found incompatible 
with personal security, or the 
rights of property; and have, in 
general, been as short in their 
lives as they have been violent in 
their deaths.” He and the other 
Founding 
Fathers 
extensively 
studied historical governments, 
specifically of ancient Rome and 
Greece. They learned from these 
case studies to not only distrust 
concentration of power at the top, 
but to fear common people acting 
unwittingly against the public 
good in fits of passion or short-
sightedness. This is an important 
lesson 
that 
was 
relevant 
in 
their time, but remains equally 
applicable today.
This past week in a class 
of mine, my professor used 
California’s Proposition 13 from 
1978 as an example to illustrate 
the importance of good fiscal 
policy. This proposition passed 
with 65 percent of the popular 
vote and dramatically reshaped 
tax policy in California. The 
intended purposes were to ease 
the tax burden in California and 
to protect homeownership in the 
state. The legislation reduced 
property taxes to levels from 1975-
1976, capped the amount they 
could increase from year-to-year 
and established a requirement 
for a two-thirds majority vote in 
Congress to increase taxes.
In this lecture, we learned that 
the proposition immediately cut 
$6 billion from local government 
revenue and gave taxpayers 57 
percent tax relief. Unfortunately, 
school and highway spending 
is tied to the usually stable 
property tax revenue source, 

and soon California’s class sizes 
skyrocketed, 
while 
highway 
spending plummeted. In order 
to correct this hasty policy, 
California increased sales and 
income taxes so much that it is 
now the most heavily taxed state 
in the country, but the issue of 
property taxes remains the same.
What we can see from this one 
example is that the hasty and ill-
informed actions of the majority 
of 
Californians 
destabilized 
and mutated the state’s revenue 
sources, gutted local governments, 
put more control in the hands of 
the state over locals and required 
a patchwork solution to the 
problem they caused, all without 
accomplishing their original goal 
of lowering taxes in the long run.
This is obviously just one 
example, but speaks to the fears 
of the Founding Fathers. The 
U.S. Constitution is a complex 
document that sought to balance 
power 
between 
every 
party 
involved. This includes but is not 
limited to conflicts between the 
executive, legislative and judicial 
branches; the state and federal 
governments; and government 
and the people.
Alexander 
Hamilton 
once 
said “The body of people…do not 
possess the discernment and 
stability necessary for systematic 
government. To deny that they are 
frequently led into the grossest 
errors by misinformation and 
passion, would be a flattery 
which their own good sense must 
despise.” What I believe he is 
saying here is that the citizenry 
of this country is smart enough 
to know that we are not smart 
enough to govern. His concern 
was certainly well-placed, but 
today many pick and choose when 
to apply it. Many so passionately 
espoused 
this 
concern 
of 

inexperience 
when 
President 
Donald Trump announced his 
candidacy for presidency, yet these 
past midterm elections incited 
many different emotions. This past 
year has seen a dramatic increase 
in the popularity of citizen-drawn 
districts in states, with some states 
passing legislation or approving 
propositions to establish these 
citizen-commissions, 
taking 
away 
the 
power 
of 
elected 
representatives to draw districts 
in favor of normal citizens.
This 
Jekyll 
and 
Hyde 
personality of America regarding 
who should be trusted with power 
is something to be monitored and 
concerned about. What is scariest 
about this is that people do not 
even recognize inconsistencies 
in their own logic. They act with 
short-term 
interest 
in 
mind, 
clouded by their passions, at the 
cost of long-term goals. This 
past election, most of the failed 
measures would have increased 
taxes, far higher than the usual 50 
percent rate over the last 15 years. 
I am not arguing that Trump 
is 
unqualified, 
that 
citizen 
commissions are necessarily bad 
and certainly not that higher taxes 
are a good thing. What I do believe 
is that the common people will, 
when they are allowed, mortgage 
the future in favor of short-term 
interests. This debate over instant 
versus delayed gratification has 
been studied psychologically since 
Walter Mischel’s marshmallow 
test, in which kids were given the 
option between one marshmallow 
now or two later.

I

t’s the worst when it’s 
our friends. Because we 
couldn’t possibly have seen 
it coming, otherwise he 
wouldn’t be a friend. 
But then he tells us that 
the #MeToo movement 
is a witch hunt. He tells 
us that women have too 
much power. He tells us 
that he lives in fear.
So to those boys who 
think they have the right 
to tell us that they live in 
fear of being accused and 
having their lives ruined, 
you are wrong. You don’t even 
know what fear is.
Do you know why you’re 
afraid? Because this is the first 
time anyone has told you your 
actions are wrong. You have just 
seen all these mighty men, many 
of whom you probably looked up 
to, fall to their knees. And you 
recognize some of your behaviors 
in those men, behaviors that have 
never been fully recognized as 
harmful, at least not by men, and 
by extension, general society. 
And instead of thinking, “I never 
realized this before, but maybe 
my actions are harmful. I should 
change that,” you wonder, “Am 
I next?” And then you lash out. 
You bury these insecurities and 
blame it on the system, relying 
on a society that has put you on a 
pedestal since the beginning of 
time to back you up. You do not 
feel fear, you feel guilt. You just 
don’t realize it.
So to dissuade this buried 
guilt, you change the topic. “It’s 
just an issue of ‘innocent until 
proven guilty’ and cold hard 
evidence, gender has nothing 
to do with it!” You think that by 
framing this argument in terms 
of the justice system you can get 
away with saying sexist things 
because they don’t sound sexist. 
You cover up your sexism with 
claims of justice — justice for the 
man wrongfully accused, but not 
for the women who have been 
silenced. You give yourself the 
privilege of taking gender out of 
the equation, a privilege that only 
you are granted. But sexism is a 
constant companion of rape cases. 
You cannot separate the two, and 
trying to ignore this inherent 
truth is, in itself, sexist.
When that doesn’t work, you 
play the victim card, though you 
lack the deck from which it came. 
You cry that men are the real 
victims; that their lives can be 
ruined by these women; that any 
man can be wrongfully accused; 
that 
the 
#MeToo 
movement 

is a witch hunt. You equate a 
stained reputation, one that often 
doesn’t even get them barred 
from a job (take the 
Supreme Court for 
example), to lives 
being ruined. You 
think some of the 
sensational 
media 
stories applies to 
every man who has 
been accused in this 
#MeToo era being 
crucified and sent 
to rot in jail. And 
you 
conveniently 
forget how much sexual assault 
ruins the woman’s life. Not only 
is she assaulted, but when she 
has the courage to come forward, 
she is tormented, ridiculed and 
threatened. By people like you. 
You are so self-important that you, 
for some reason, think that women 
will drag themselves down just to 
take you with them. Ask yourself 
why someone would do that. And 
don’t tell us that it’s because there 
are bad people in the world. We 
already know that. They walk 
behind us at night, they come up to 
us in clubs, they sit at our breakfast 
tables. We look them in the eyes 
every day.

What you could do instead is 
understand that you will never 
understand. 
You 
will 
never 
understand what it is like to be a 
woman and to constantly live in 
fear. You were not taught to fear 
from the moment you were old 
enough to walk. You will never 
understand the courage it takes 
to stand up for yourself when 
you have been hurt, even when 
everyone around you is telling you 
to stop and calling you a liar. But 
that’s OK. We don’t expect you to 
understand. We just expect you to 
support those who do. You have 
seen this massive shift in a society 
that has previously protected 
you from consequences, and that 
change, like any other, is scary. 
We are, as a country, in a period 
of growth and change. And that 
change comes with doubt. But 
there are other ways to handle this 

change. Instead of telling us they 
live in fear, some boys tell us that 
now are more careful about what 
they do. They tell us they try to lend 
their support to women and put 
them in the spotlight where they 
can finally be heard. But others 
equate this sudden realization that 
their actions have consequences 
to living in fear, which is outright 
disrespectful. You cannot equate 
your fear of being accused to the 
fear of being raped. Because at 
the end of the day, you can change 
your actions to be less harmful and 
less likely to draw retribution. We 
cannot change our gender.
I live in fear of walking at 
night. I walked home from a club 
meeting that got out across town 
at 12:30 a.m., and I was terrified. 
I saw a group of men outside a 
store and I immediately crossed 
the street, my heart pounding, 
my palms sweating. My parents 
found out, and both of them 
yelled at me. And you told me 
that I can prevent walking home 
alone. Like it’s my fault and my 
job to change my behaviors. We 
must assume the worst could 
happen and fix ourselves, rather 
than the problem itself. You tell 
us we must assume the worst, 
but also criticize me for doing the 
same in a trial setting. You tell us 
to assume the worst of women, 
but give men the benefit of the 
doubt.
I live in fear of being alone 
with a boy. Even boys that I am 
friends with. Because I was 
taught that I could not trust 
any boys with myself. And you 
tried to invalidate my fear by 
telling me that you, too, live in 
fear of being alone with a girl, 
because she could accuse you of 
rape when you’ve done nothing 
wrong. Like that’s just as bad and 
just as common as being raped.
I live in fear, and I have never 
been harmed. I don’t even know 
what it’s like to actually go 
through this. But I have heard 
enough stories; I have talked to 
enough friends; I have been told 
enough times that I know the 
fear.
I live in fear that I will write 
this article again. I’ve written 
it before. My fingers are tired 
of typing. My head is tired of 
pounding. My heart is tired of 
aching. I am tired of living in 
fear.
You live in fear? You don’t 
even know what fear is.

Opinion
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
4 — Tuesday, December 4, 2018

Emma Chang
Ben Charlson
Joel Danilewitz
Michael Russo
Dana Pierangeli

Tara Jayaram
Jeremy Kaplan
Magdalena Mihaylova
Ellery Rosenzweig
Jason Rowland

Anu Roy-Chaudhury
Alex Satola
Ali Safawi
Ashley Zhang
Reid Diamond

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

DAVID HAYSE | COLUMN

Passion and misinformation

To the boys who tell us they live in fear

DANA PIERANGELI | COLUMN

David Hayse can be reached at 

dhayse@umich.edu.

Dana Pierangeli can be reached at 

dmpier@umich.edu.

T

he 
Ohio 
House 
of 
Representatives recently 
passed 
a 
piece 
of 
legislation about abortion that has 
been dubbed a “heartbeat bill” by 
a whopping 60 votes for and 35 
votes against. The bill would ban 
abortions after a fetal heartbeat 
can be detected with absolutely 
no exceptions. To describe this 
bill as “hardline” would be to 
woefully understate things.
Abortions needed due to rape 
and incest would not be allowed 
outside of this time frame. Does 
that seem right to you? While 
a fetal human heart may start 
beating as soon as four weeks, 
it usually cannot be detected 
by existing medical technology 
before 
six 
weeks. 
Assuming 
national trends more or less apply 
to Ohio, this would effectively 
criminalize 65.4 percent of all 
abortions.
If passed by the Ohio Senate, 
the bill would also shift the legal 
status of fetuses from “unborn 
human” to a person with full 
legal protections under Ohio law. 
In other words, the contents of a 
pregnant woman’s reproductive 
system would be deemed a life 
equal to yours or mine. The 
ramifications of such a change are 
nothing short of depraved.
This provision means that 
women who seek out and receive 
successful abortions after the 
allowed period would be subject 
to first-degree murder charges. 
Really. I’m not making this 
up. What makes this provision 
especially sinister is that Ohio is 
a state in which the barbaric and 
unconstitutional death penalty is 
still legal. In practice, a woman 
who receives an abortion at six 
weeks because she’s carrying her 
rapist’s child could be subject to 
murder under state law.
And while crazy laws with no 
chance of passing get proposed in 
state legislatures all the time, this 
“heartbeat bill” certainly does not 
fall into this category. For starters, 
the Ohio Senate — where the bill 
is now headed — is completely 
dominated 
by 
anti-abortion 
Republicans. Furthermore, Ohio 
governor-elect 
Mike 
DeWine, 
one of President Donald Trump’s 
lackeys, has promised to sign the 
bill should it be brought to his 
desk. It is far more likely than not 
that this bill becomes law.

As for abortion providers, 
doctors 
that 
administer 
an 
abortion 
post-fetal 
heartbeat 
would be guilty of a fifth-
degree felony, punishable by 
up to a year in prison and a 
$2,500 fine. There have been 
some questions surrounding the 
constitutionality of this bill. Does 
it conflict with Roe v. Wade’s 
set legal precedent? Answers 
may vary, but make no mistake: 
The Republican majority in the 
Supreme Court will not strike 
down or oppose this bill should it 
become codified law.
Those pushing for this bill 
to pass call themselves “pro-
lifers.” This is wrongheaded. If 
they were really pro-life, they 
would be pooling their time and 
resources into striking down the 
death penalty not just in Ohio, 
but on the federal level. How can 
you be “pro-life” and pro-death 
penalty?
Those who subscribe to this 
twisted way of thinking may 
claim that they are opposed to the 
taking of innocent life and that 
certain criminals do not deserve 
to live. This may seem reasonable 
on its surface, but, upon further 
investigation, 
this 
argument 
proves to be a fallacious one. 
For starters, studies reviewing 
exonerations and post-mortem 
pardons have found that at least 4 
percent of death row inmates are 
innocent.
So long as our justice system 
is operated by fallible people, 
error in convictions will exist. 
Should we do what we can to 
reduce judicial error? Of course. 
However, as long as our system 
of law and order is imperfect, 
drastic 
and 
irreversible, 
capital punishment is simply 
unjustifiable.
The 
second 
part 
of 
the 
aforementioned 
argument 
is 
based on an incorrect premise. 
Life 
is 
a 
constitutionally 
enshrined right, not a privilege. 
Therefore, one does not have 
to “deserve” life, as it is an 
inalienable right. To ignore this 
is to rip out the foundation of our 
entire code of laws. This would be 
unwise at best, and wretched and 
rogue at worst.
Self-avowed 
Republican 
“pro-life” advocates also tend to 
support endless war which, of 
course, leads to the brutalization 

and destruction of the lives of 
so many. They also fall in line 
with a party that has waged a 
seemingly never-ending crusade 
against 
America’s 
already 
embarrassingly bounded social 
safety net. In other words, they 
may want you to be born, but 
are not too concerned with what 
happens afterwards.
It is precisely this that so 
limits the appeal of the “pro-
life” movement. While half of 
Americans identify with the “pro-
life” stance in regards to abortion, 
so many of them simply cannot 
sign on to what this movement 
has become. The wildly hardline 
approach to the issue exhibited 
by this “heartbeat bill” is not 
only alienating, it’s evil. The 
frothing-at-the-mouth bloodlust 
for women who get abortions, 
as exhibited in this piece of 
legislation, is even causing people 
who find abortion to be largely 
immoral to see the “pro-life” 
movement as adversaries.
Pro-choice 
advocates 
often 
label those on the other side of 
the issue as anti-women. While 
this is certainly not the case for 
all, it is not wholly unjustified 
either. This bill proves that. 
The sweeping language of the 
bill makes it unclear whether 
or not women who miscarry 
would be legally allowed to get 
surgical procedures to prevent 
infections and other potential 
complications.
The fact of the matter is that 
the movement is not “pro-life,” 
it’s just anti-abortion. I feel 
comfortable calling myself pro-
life, because I am consistent. 
45,000 
Americans 
die 
every 
year for lack of ability to afford 
healthcare — I’m against that. 
Our country, shamefully, has 
been at war for 225 years out of its 
242-year existence — I’m against 
that.
What I am trying to say is that 
the pro-life worldview should be 
just that: a worldview. “Pro-life” 
should be a praise only afforded 
to those who exhibit that stance 
across the board. Being pro-life, 
truly pro-life, is the only way 
forward for a nation that aspires 
to justice and morality.

Not pro-life, just anti-abortion

ELIAS KHOURY | COLUMN

Elias Khoury can be reached at 

ekhoury@umich.edu.

EMILY WOLFE | CONTACT EMILY AT ELWOLFE@UMICH.EDU

Read more at MichiganDaily.com

DANA 
PIERANGELI

You don’t even 
know what fear 
is.

