Opinion
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
4A — Friday, February 22, 2019
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
Erin White
FINNTAN STORER
Managing Editor
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EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS
I
t’s a Friday night in Ann
Arbor and the promise of
the weekend has students
flocking to Main Street bars
and clubs to engage in the great
American pastime of intoxication.
But
with
an
undergraduate
population of more than 29,000,
some of these revelers are bound to
be underage. In line, Zach, aged 18,
fumbles for something in his pocket
when he reaches the bouncer.
Thirty minutes later, Zach is
at the bar ordering his fifth shot
of tequila before stumbling home.
This scenario is made possible
by a simple invention: the fake
ID. Couple this technology with
a tendency for underage binge-
drinking and you have a potentially
dangerous cocktail for the social
landscape of American college
towns.
As a freshman new to the
social scene of Ann Arbor, I set off
across campus to talk to students.
First, I wanted to learn more about
fake IDs and how they texture
the experiences of students at
the
University
of
Michigan.
Second, I wanted to examine the
particularly American brand of
binge-drinking that these fake IDs
afford to underage drinkers and the
alternative drinking cultures found
around the world. I was convinced
these trends were two symptoms
of the same disease, and that by
finding the heart of the issue, young
Americans could begin to develop
a culture with more safe and
responsible drinking habits.
The fake ID is an expanding
American personality (touted in
popular songs and joked about
in blockbuster movies) with an
entire
underground
economy.
The
Northwestern
Business
Review writes, “The quality of
the product varies due to minute
changes in the polyvinyl chloride,
spectrophotometer
matched
ink and luminescent holograms.
Up-front
costs
including
the
printer and templates can run up
to $2000 alone.” I spoke to some
students on campus to see if these
popular anecdotes were consistent
with their experiences. First, I
interviewed a student who had just
ordered their first fake ID ever:
MILES: How did you get in
contact with the maker?
STUDENT 1: My friend asked
me if I needed one and I said, “Yes,
I do.”
MILES: How much did you
pay?
STUDENT 1: $80. I estimate
there are about 30 people in my
order, which makes it cheaper.
MILES: Why are you getting it
now?
STUDENT 1: In high school,
the local liquor store would sell us
alcohol even if we didn’t have a fake.
In Ann Arbor, you need one to go
out with friends to bars.
MILES: Are you nervous about
purchasing it and using it?
STUDENT 1: Normally I would
be, but the guy who I’m buying it
from does them very routinely and I
know people who have gotten fakes
from him before. Using it, yeah … it
seems kind of sketch.
Next, I spoke to a student
from the undergraduate class of
2020 who told me a story about
purchasing a fake ID:
“When we were in high school,
you couldn’t get IDs online. You
had to get them from people.
We had a car to go get it and we
texted this shady-ass dude all our
personal info. It was $150 an ID.
We brought $300 cash and met this
dude at midnight in an abandoned
warehouse parking lot near (San
Francisco Bay Area). Dude rolls up
in a black Suburban, pulls in behind
us, blocks us in and gets out of the
car with a pit bull.”
After an initial frightening
episode, the high schoolers gave
him an envelope with money and
drove home. Phony Tony, the
maker of the IDs, remains a local
legend in the Bay Area, but this
story articulates the potentially
dangerous situations students are
involving themselves in to bypass
21+ American drinking laws.
Finally, I spoke to not a supplier
of fake IDs, but a liaison between
customers and makers. This person
characterized their position as
“organizing orders (of fake IDs)”
and said that they had about 10
customers in Ann Arbor at one
point. Most of their fake IDs were
modeled off of real East Coast IDs.
So, what’s the solution to this
potentially dangerous scheme?
An article in the U.S. National
Library of Medicine titled, “Will
Increasing Alcohol Availability
By Lowering the Minimum Legal
Drinking Age Decrease Drinking
and
Related
Consequences
Among Youths?” questions the
theory that drinking laws should
be made more lenient to cultivate
responsible
drinking
culture.
Proponents of this idea argue
that the 21-and-over drinking age
stigmatizes alcohol consumption
to such a degree that young
Americans are learning to drink
in unsupervised spaces and that
more permissive legislation would
allow these underage drinkers
to learn from more responsible,
societally-normalized
sources.
After all, Europe has a safer
drinking culture with its younger
age drinking laws, right? In the
popular
imagination,
French
12-year-olds are sipping wine
with their parents at dinner and
are learning to drink responsibly
— it’s America that’s obsessed
with taking shots and “blacking
out.”
This, however, is not the case.
“If you look at the data, there’s no
evidence to support the idea that
Europe, in general, has a safer
drinking culture than the US …
European teens ages 15 to 19 tend
to report greater levels of binge
drinking than American teens,”
writes German Lopez of Vox.
When looking at the percent of
15 and 16-year-olds who report
being drunk in the last month,
Denmark, the U.K. and Austria
are the most severe with 49, 33 and
31 percent respectively. The U.S.
by contrast, is on par with Latvia
at 18 percent. Furthermore, nearly
all available evidence suggests
that stricter alcohol policies can
reduce deaths, and another article
by the U.S. National Library of
Medicine titled “Case closed:
research evidence on the positive
public health impact of the age
21 minimum legal drinking age
in the United States” puts this
misconception to rest.
So it seems that a 21-and-over
drinking age is safer, but maybe
it’s less about the actual age and
more about the cultural attitudes
and behaviors toward drinking.
There’s an unspoken acceptance
that
underage
drinking
will
happen, especially in colleges,
and yet the legal angle doesn’t
reflect this. “Drinking alcohol has
become a rite of passage for some
young people in this country, and
many students come to college
having learned to drink during
their high school years,” says the
University Health Service.
And yet, besides special cases
of medical amnesty, the looming
threat of receiving a Minor in
Possession violation, which entails
a $250 fine to the 15th District
Court,
often
disincentivizes
underage drinkers to seek help
from authorities. Here, perhaps,
is where the opportunity to learn
from international practices truly
lies.
Canadian universities have
begun
to
implement
“drunk
tanks,” or spaces for intoxicated
underage drinkers to recover
safely and without the threat of
punishment. The University of
Guelph’s campus alcohol recovery
room and the University of
Calgary’s post-alcohol support
space solve the stigma issue and
potentially save lives. CARR
is a “six-bed space equipped
with buckets that opened last
year inside a campus residence
building,” while PASS is “staffed
by
both
volunteers
and
a
registered nurse.”
A
coupling
of
America’s
safer,
21-and-over
drinking
laws and Canada’s more lenient
enforcement
could
decrease
avoidable
underage
drinking
accidents and save the lives of
young college students. As for the
prevalence of fake IDs, it’s likely
that an underground industry
like this will continue to thrive,
especially as new technology
develops that further blurs the line
between real and fake for alcohol-
serving establishments. And their
readiness
proves
dangerous,
as it enables students to more
easily engage in binge drinking.
If something’s to be done, it’s
to ensure young Americans are
protected by the safest laws and
they have the proper resources to
reach out when someone pushes
them too far.
Miles Stephenson can be reached at
mvsteph@umich.edu.
Soccer : The geopolitical game
O
n
May
13,
2012,
Manchester City Football
Club won the English
Premier League title in one of the
most dramatic finishes in sports
history. Down 2-1 to Queens Park
Rangers on the final day of the
season, Manchester City needed a
win to overtake crosstown rivals
Manchester
United,
something
that they accomplished through
goals in the 92nd and 94th minutes.
For City fans, the championship
represented
the
glorious
conclusion to a momentous rise
from irrelevance to stardom — the
club had spent years bouncing
between the top two divisions of
English soccer, and hadn’t won
England’s top league title since
1968. While City fans were ecstatic,
for club owner Mansour bin
Zayed Al Nahyan, this was just the
beginning.
Four years earlier, in 2008,
Manchester City was coming off
a decent — but unremarkable —
campaign, having finished 9th in
the Premier League. However, the
club’s owner, former Thai Prime
Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, had
become embroiled in a series of
political scandals, which had led to
the freezing of his bank accounts.
Shinawatra, desperately needing to
offload the team, sold it to Mansour,
deputy prime minister of the
United Arab Emirates and Emirati
businessman, and his private equity
company, Abu Dhabi United Group.
Mansour, whose family has an
estimated net worth of well over $1
billion, made it clear immediately
he wasn’t there just for show —
he intended to build an elite club,
whatever the cost might be. Since
taking ownership of the club,
Mansour has followed through:
City has spent £1.4 billion, won
three Premier League titles, and
has become one of the biggest clubs
in Europe. But this begs a question
— why would a Middle Eastern
investor sink billions of pounds
into a soccer club based thousands
of miles away from Abu Dhabi in
Manchester, England?
Historically, sports have served
as a valuable asset for promoting
“soft power” — a mechanism by
which countries gain international
standing not through brute force
or economic might, but rather
by seeming attractive to foreign
states and citizens through cultural
appeals. Traditionally, this was
done through hosting or doing well
in either the Olympic Games or the
World Cup — the two truly global
sporting events. However, as the
Premier League developed into a
worldwide phenomenon, Mansour
has been able to harness it as a tool
for soft power.
For Mansour and his nation,
the United Arab Emirates, club
ownership isn’t only a financial
investment, but also a cultural and
political one. Mansour is a member
of the UAE’s elite economic and
political class, which are highly
intertwined thanks to the UAE’s
oligarchical
government.
In
addition to being the owner of
Abu Dhabi United, Mansour is the
half-brother of the UAE’s current
president and is the chair of the
ministerial council for services and
Emirates Investment Authority.
Historically, the UAE has not
been a particularly powerful nation
— it only gained independence
in 1971. However, thanks to the
discovery of (some) oil, the creation
of favorable incentives for foreign
corporations, and an increase in
tourism, the country — especially
the cities of Abu Dhabi and Dubai
— has enticed the blossoming
of glamorous metropolises over
the past 15 years. In coordination
with the UAE’s sudden increase
in wealth, it makes sense the
country would want to promote
itself internationally and sports
ownership is an excellent way to
accomplish that.
Mansour and Abu Dhabi United
Group are, in many ways, the UAE’s
representatives to the West. Their
philosophy seems quite simple: In
order to create a positive reputation
in the West, they must associate
themselves with elite teams in the
world’s most popular sport.
However, the UAE’s sports-
based rebranding project is far
from the wholesome, educational
endeavor it claims to be. Rather,
it
is
highly
problematic
and
disingenuous.
Mansour
may
promote the UAE as a glamorous,
exotic country whose ownership
represents the nation’s own success
and positivity, but that simply isn’t
true. As City’s obscenely expensive
squad runs circles around their
Premier League opponents, there
are many things going on back
in the UAE that Mansour would
probably prefer weren’t mentioned.
MILES STEPHENSON | COLUMN
Solve dangerous drinking
N
one of us will forget
the polar vortex that
passed through Ann
Arbor in January 2019. Almost
everything was shut down
and almost everyone spent
time taking advantage of the
curiosities this rare weather
phenomenon
offered.
We
joked about how long we
would last outside, willingly
threw water only to watch
it instantly freeze in the
air before drifting to the
ground and counted how
many seconds would pass
before our shower hair froze
when we stepped outside.
We
watched
it
happen
through the windows of our
rooms, felt utter joy when all
academic obligations were
called off and the rest was
history to us.
Meanwhile,
at
least
21
deaths, as well as dozens of
frostbite injuries occurred
across the Midwest due to
weather-related
incidents
brought upon by the polar
vortex.
These
tragedies
were most common for the
homeless,
senior
citizens
and
people
whose
access
to heat was not consistent
or
reliable.
Though
not
necessarily a bloody, graphic
disaster, it’s clear that the
brief displacement of Arctic
temperatures to our region
of the country was enough
to punish those who were
unprepared. What remains
in question is whether their
incapability
to
prepare
was their fault or not, and
what could have been done
if they were not in such
disadvantaged positions to
begin with.
I vividly remember the
late fall of 2018. It was a ripe
part in my first semester at
the University of Michigan,
a
blend
of
addressing
academic responsibilities and
responding to the desires I
had to explore this campus
and to explore myself. The
energy of the campus was
refreshing and vibrant. Our
football team had achieved a
massive victory against our
rivals and would go on to
defeat another on one of the
colder days of the season. We
stressed about exams and
de-stressed over the weekend,
tuning into the fluctuations
of our student lives and living
in what would come to feel
like the only world we knew.
During this time, at least 77
deaths, as well as hundreds
of missing persons reports,
occurred as a result of the
blazing wildfires that passed
through regions of California.
The
slow
obliteration
of
residences and commercial
buildings continued by the
thousands, not to mention the
destruction of 240,000 acres
of land among various regions,
including Los Angeles and
Malibu. In the end, not even
the wealthy were safe from
the
physical
damage
and
emotional trauma that our
environment brought upon us
as its behaviors momentarily
became different than what
we were used to. While these
wildfires have emulated what
the end of times could be
like on a microscopic scale,
I know this is not yet the
true end. The end will have
infinite power against all of
us, but we have to recognize
that there is still some power
that remains in our hands.
What
concerned
me
the most at the end of last
summer was starting classes
at the University. The end of
August was both a swell of
excitement and a melancholy
farewell to my childhood. It
felt like an onward push into
the new world — whether
I was prepared for it or
not. This time marked the
beginning of my quest to
find my people, to be who
I wanted to be, to connect
with those who had similar
interests to mine and to
enjoy myself in the process. I
embraced the big change and
was swept away by the uproar
of excitement that came with
the new school year, relishing
in the newfound freedom.
In
the
meantime,
the
news was acknowledging the
anniversary
of
Hurricane
Maria,
a
natural
disaster
that caused a total of 2,975
deaths in the U.S. territory
Puerto Rico in September
2017. While this hurricane
was considered as the worst
recorded natural disaster in
the Caribbean, it’s also worth
noting that the American
citizens in Puerto Rico lived
in disadvantaged conditions
with a stigma that prevented
any significant benefits from
coming their way even before
they were tormented by this
natural disaster. Our nation’s
response to this disaster was
a disgrace, but why?
I
believe
that
our
government’s response was
disgraceful
because
what
people in power today lack
is compassion; what modern
society lacks is compassion.
As college students, we are
too invested in our own lives
and self-fulfillment, thinking
about where we are going to
go without thinking about if
there will even be a place to go
as a result of our actions — or
lack thereof. We don’t think
enough about the people who
are suffering as a result of our
prospering, who are living in
conditions that we can’t even
imagine and who recognize
that privilege is a gift while
we complain ungratefully. It
pains me when some don’t
realize that it doesn’t have
to be this way, that some are
reluctant to help others out
of fear of causing their own
disadvantage and that some
are unwilling to recognize
the
humanity
in
shared
prosperity.
In our defense, we are
almost required to be fully
invested in our own lives.
We carry our own futures
by addressing the countless
responsibilities that are set
upon us every day. Even so, I
think we all need an attitude
check. The way that we feel
around people who are not
like us is something that we
can control and something
that more people have to be
aware of. In the same way,
we have to recognize that our
environment
suffers
from
our apathy just as people do
and that we have to act in
consideration
of
everyone
and everything if we don’t
want to bring the end upon
ourselves.
KIANNA MARQUEZ | COLUMN
How compassion can save our environmental future
CONTRIBUTE TO THE CONVERSATION
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Kianna Marquez can be reached at
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Zack Blumberg can be reached at
zblumber@umich.edu.
ZACK BLUMBERG | COLUMN
Read more at MichiganDaily.com
Historically,
sports have served
as a valuable asset
for promoting
“soft power”
We don’t think
enough about
the people who
are suffering as
a result of our
prospering
There’s an
unspoken
acceptance that
underage drinking
will happen