Shapiro said he regularly
seeks
out
perspectives
contrary to his own.
“I actually like multiple
opinions,” Shapiro said. “I am
in favor of hearing multiple
points of view.”
Shapiro’s
discussion
focused heavily on the threat
of
government
compulsion.
He said the current political
climate
champions
a
government that extends too
far into citizens’ lives.
“When
government
is
activated to invade the rights
of other people, even for the
purported good of the many,
that’s
when
government
is
a
bully,”
Shapiro
said.
“That’s what we are seeing
increasingly these days. The
call for socialism, in essence,
is a call to invade the rights of
others, on behalf of yourself or
on behalf of the greater good.”
LSA junior Kate Westa, vice
chair of YAF, said Shapiro’s
decision to accept the invitation
to speak at the University
was
fueled
by
a
growing
movement among conservative
speakers to promote right-
wing
ideologies
among
traditionally
left-leaning
communities,
noting
the
frequent protests on campus
and the recent movement to
divest from companies that
do business with Israel. Westa
compared the University to
the University of California,
Berkeley, a school with a well-
known liberal atmosphere.
“Michigan
is
such
a
powerhouse in the Big 10 for
liberals,” Westa said. “I think
that’s why a lot of conservative
speakers are drawn to it. I
think the first thing that
comes to people’s minds when
they think of leftist colleges
is Berkeley and those kinds
of places, but lately with the
BDS movement and protests
happening … a lot of people
are realizing that we are going
through a lot of the same things
that Berkeley is, and want to
come here and fight that.”
Shapiro
concluded
his
opening speech by discussing
how
the
restoration
of
American values was key to
maintaining a unified social
fabric, not government policy
predicated on compulsion.
“If
you
want
to
fuel
America … then we need to get
together and we need to form
a social framework without
government
forcing
people
to do so,” Shapiro said. “Then
what we end up with is a
government too big for anyone
to control and a government
that
in
essence
ends
up
controlling all of us.”
After his talk, Shapiro held
a Q&A session, during which
audience members broached
various topics, ranging from
abortion to school lunches. A
student asked Shapiro if he
considered the Civil Rights Act
of 1964 a violation of individual
freedoms because it took away
people’s ability to decide with
whom they wanted to work
or do business. Shapiro said
while he personally opposed
racism, he did not believe
the government was properly
situated to prohibit people
from discriminating against
one another.
“I don’t think the law has
any role whatsoever in banning
race-based
discrimination
by private actors,” Shapiro
said. “If I don’t have a right to
your services then I certainly
don’t have a right to ask the
government to require you
to provide me those services.
That
means
discriminatory
people are not punished by
government, they are punished
by everyone else who won’t
go
to
the
discriminatory
restaurant
because
they
realize
it’s
discriminatory.
They answer to the market.”
LSA sophomore Raj Aryal
attended the talk. He praised
Shapiro’s commitment to fact-
based arguments.
“I went to the Shapiro
event because I align with
him ideologically,” Aryal said.
“I really like his messages of
having diverse opinions and
perspectives on campus, and I
wanted to hear a conservative
voice … I feel that there’s a
lot within the conservative
movement that is controversial
… I like the way he addresses
his critics and how he leans
more on the intellectual side of
arguments.”
About two dozen protestors
gathered
on
the
steps
of
Rackham prior to Shapiro’s
talk, lining the entrance as
audience
members
arrived.
They flew an LGBT pride flag
and carried posters in support
of transgender people.
Robert
Jay,
media
director
for
Metro-Detroit
Political
Action
Network,
an intersectional civil rights
group, said hosting outspoken
commentators
like
Shapiro
potentially
normalizes
the
dehumanization of minority
identities.
“It’s
a
great
concern,”
Jay
said.
“Anytime
you’re
promoting
language
that
dehumanizes people, you’re
conditioning
people
to
accept
dehumanization.
No
matter what reason, you’re
dehumanizing someone. Once
people get comfortable with
that will start applying that
to different things they don’t
understand.”
Counter-protesters
in
support of Shapiro assembled
across
the
street
from
Rackham. Among them was
Batts
Adams,
a
resident
from Lansing who supports
Shapiro. Adams said having
conservative
speakers
on
campus is crucial to promote
freedom of speech.
“It’s a public university and
being a public university and
funded by the government,
they should uphold the U.S.
Constitution,”
Adams
said.
“The U.S. Constitution grants
every U.S. citizen the right to
the freedom of speech, and
so if somebody wants to come
here on campus and they want
to assemble and exercise their
freedom of speech, they should
be allowed to, whether I agree
with or disagree with their
personal views.”
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
News
Wednesday, March 13, 2019 — 3A
“Thanks, also, to the University
of Michigan History Department,
which apparently is sponsoring an
event titled, ‘When Provocateurs
Dabble in History: Ben Shapiro
and the Enwhitenment,’ which
seems mean … which will be really
fascinating to hear how these
history professors critique a book
they haven’t read since it’s not
released until next week,” Shapiro
said in his speech.
At the History Club discussion,
Berg
acknowledged
that
the
panel had not yet read the book,
and
instead
focused
on
its
controversial title.
“We haven’t read the book, so
you can’t debunk something that
you don’t know …” Berg said. “We
latched onto the title of something
that is deeply problematic.”
Berg introduced the event by
discussing the importance of
accurately reporting history.
“To me, when I see the use of
history in the public sphere I think
it’s a great thing, but I also think
it’s important that you don’t use
it to just provoke … rather than in
a sincere intellectual way or in a
sincere political way,” Berg said.
Berg
discussed
the
Enlightenment’s relationship to
his book title’s emphasis on reason.
She suggested Shapiro’s book title
fails to recognize the negative
consequences arising from the
Enlightenment
period,
citing
genocide, slavery and imperial
regimes.
“If
you
think
about
the
Enlightenment as a source of
thoughts and ideals that made
all of those events, both the
achievements of Western society
and societies elsewhere possible
... but also those discontents
that usually we can relegate to
aberrations of history,” Berg said.
Panelist
Angela
Dillard,
associate dean for Undergraduate
Education,
continued
Berg’s
narrative on the importance of
history.
“There’s a national debate about
history,” Dillard said. “I thought,
this is a great thing to want to do,
to think about how so many of
the arguments that we’re having
ideologically and politically really
are about the nature of history,
and what we think it is.”
Dillard
suggested
Shapiro’s
idealization of reason frames
historical events in a problematic
manner.
“It’s a really horrifying vision
about not accounting for the
damage of slavery and colonialism
and
the
robbing
people
of
personhood,” said Dillard.
The
panel
also
discussed
Shapiro’s other political stances,
including his critique of higher
education
institutions
in
his
2004 book titled, “Brainwashed:
How Universities Indoctrinate
America’s Youth.” LSA senior
Nikola Jaksic, Vice President
of the History Club criticized
Shapiro’s insinuation of students’
lack of autonomy.
“As a student of history, it’s
pretty
infantilizing
to
have
him imply that I am somehow
unable to have agency in my own
education,” Jaksic said. “That no
matter what I do, I’m just going to
be indoctrinated into this dogma
that he so fears.”
Associate history professor John
Carson discussed the perspectives
of a Shapiro supporter.
“Here’s someone who is telling
me that at least some of the things
that I have always believed about
democracy and about religion are
true …” Carson said. “(Shapiro’s
ideology)
re-instantiates
a
narrative and a world where they
feel very lost as to what’s going
on.”
Prior to the event, the History
Club received pushback from
critics on Twitter and Facebook,
who suggested the panel provided
a biased view of the subject. Jaksic
addressed this during the event.
“We didn’t want to sacrifice
having an explicitly conservative
voice at the expense of, one, making
sure that they people that are
presenting … feel welcome and safe
in the space and, two, to ‘pretend’
that there is any discussion in our
history community about these
topics,” Jaksic said.
Berg
said
that
while
she
appreciates a critical mindset, she
stands by the panel’s qualification
and depth.
“The accusation of bias is
one
that
I’m
fundamentally
sympathetic to,” Berg said. “I want
my students to disagree. To me, it’s
a signal to the kind of work that
we do that people feel comfortable
doing that … I don’t think that the
panel was biased in a way that
was trying to erase various parts,
I think people were generally
honest about their intellectual
trajectory.”
PANEL
From Page 1A
CSG
From Page 1A
IRAN
From Page 1A
SHAPIRO
From Page 1A
RACISM
From Page 1A
LSA
sophomore
Maya
Chamra told The Daily after the
event she felt the teach-in, a form
of
alternative
programming,
was the appropriate response to
Shapiro’s visit.
“I think that the idea of
alternative
programming
is
much
more
effective
when
responding to somebody like
Ben Shapiro, because he thrives
off of this perception that he is
just presenting facts, and he’s
presenting information, and he’s
very logical and pragmatic, and
that’s why a lot of people are
attracted to him,” Chamra said.
“And it’s not because they have
very extreme views — they’re
just intrigued by what he says.”
Chamra said the teach-in did
not feed into Shapiro’s narrative.
The teach-in itself was attended
by more than 30 students and
focused on providing a history
of white supremacy at the
University activists say is largely
ignored.
“I think we can make change
just starting by educating people,
and I think a teach-in is much
more effective in doing that,
than say protesting, because
Ben Shapiro and the organizers
for that event can predict all
the tactics for protesting or just
buying tickets, and it feeds very
well into their narrative, but a
teach-in does not look good to
them,” Chamra said. “It doesn’t
work well with their narrative
because all we’re just trying to
do is educate people.”
Samei stressed that the goal
of the event was to highlight
the University’s role in allowing
white supremacists to speak,
including their decision to pay
for Shapiro and other speakers’
security.
“This particular individual
really likes to create intellectual
debate around saying really
harmful things to people,” Samei
said. “So instead of allowing for
a platform for that violence to
occur, we were like okay, we’re
not going to make this between
organizers
and
the
white
supremacists. We’re gonna make
this the elephant in the room,
which is that the University
is paying for his security, and
the University has paid for the
security of white supremacists,
which is actually a lot of money.”
While the organizers of the
event chose to utilize alternative
programming for this particular
speech, some maintained that
direct action tactics are also
successful.
Music,
Theatre
&
Dance
senior
Isabelle
Malnar’s
organization, Radfun, a social
justice organization, co-hosted
the
teach-in.
Malnar
said
direct action, such as protests
and marches, were effective in
preventing white supremacist
Richard Spencer from choosing
to speak at the University, even
if the University did not pursue
legal action to prevent him
from speaking. The University’s
decision
to
allow
Richard
Spencer to speak last year
caused controversy and spurred
a protest movement dubbed
#StopSpencer.
“I would like to add that things
like that have been successful,”
Malnar said. “Last year there
was a lot of direct action work
against Richard Spencer and he
didn’t end up coming, so I think
that it’s not good to say that it
isn’t always successful, but in
this instance we thought more
of a teaching and healing and
discussion space would be more
effective for this particular
event.”
Hoai An Pham, LSA senior,
and Vidhya Aravind, a master’s
student
in
the
School
of
Information, led the teach-in.
Pham and Aravind started their
presentation by speaking to the
power of student activism.
“Everything good at this
University
exists
because
of
student
activism,”
Pham
said. “That includes SAPAC
(Sexual Assault Prevention and
Awareness Center), Spectrum
Center,
the
Department
of
African American Studies, and
others.”
The panel later addressed
the
ways
they
believe
the
University has been complicit
in
white
supremacy,
such
as
administration’s
initial
refusal to rename the building
formerly known as C.C. Little,
a eugenicist, and the decline of
African-American
enrollment
rates
at
the
University
in
response to affirmative action
lawsuits.
Chamra said most members
of the U-M community are
unaware of the University’s
history with white supremacy,
something
she
claims
the
University
has
purposefully
worked to hide.
“I don’t think it’s widely
known at all and I think the
University
plays
a
part
in
making sure there’s not a lot of
bad information spread about
them and it’s really fallen on
organizers and activists to make
the information known not just
to themselves, but to the broader
public,” Chamra said. “That’s
why an event like this is really
important, because it’s really
hard to get involved in activism
if you’d like to get involved, but
it’s also even harder to learn
about the ways in which the
University’s been resistant to
activism. And it really isn’t
widely known and it’s really
a shame. Because we could
make a lot of great changes if
more people knew about this
information.”
Read more online at
michigandaily.com
In September, the U.S. Sixth Circuit
Court of Appeals ruled the University
must change its sexual misconduct
policy to give the student who is accused
of sexual assault the chance to cross-
examine the accuser. The University’s
previous policy did not require a cross-
examination or an in-person hearing,
and the policy was revised to include
these aspects in October.
Following the ruling, the new student
group Jane Roe created a petition asking
the University to adjust the policy to
have the cross-examination conducted
by an advisor instead of the alleged
perpetrator. As of March 12, the petition
had 64,824 signatures.
Jane Roe continued their efforts
to change the policy by meeting with
a sexual misconduct case manager,
according to Walker.
“We then met with a sexual
misconduct case manager in the Office
of Student Conflict Resolution,” Walker
said. “In this meeting, we inquired
about why this policy was implemented,
whether students were notified about
and given a chance to critique the policy
and whether the University have plans
to revise the policy, especially its cross-
examination model. Similar to other
exchanges with administrators, this
conversation followed a pattern.”
Walker further said the administrator
told them the University did not want
to turn an administrative process into
a court-like proceeding and feared not
all students would be represented by
counsel. According to Walker, proposed
Title IX regulations require institutions
to provide an adviser for the duration of
cross-examination.
Walker said Jane Roe insisted the
University include student input by
forming an advisory board to revise the
policy and to allow students to provide
feedback, as well as to notify students
about the policy change.
“Although the University fulfilled
our secondary request, the cross-
examination model has not yet been
revised,” Walker said. “As long as this
policy stands, it will be applied to every
single student case of sexual assault
at the University of Michigan. This is
likely to have a devastating impact on
survivors and on our campus safety.”
Sandberg agreed with Walker and
said the policy did not ensure student
safety at the University.
“Enforcing this policy is a gross
deviation
from
the
University’s
responsibility to protect its students,”
Sandberg said. “This form of cross-
examination is unnecessary, and I
personally consider it to be cruel.”
Sandberg
called
the
cross-
examination model inhumane and said
the University’s investigative process
will have consequences for both those
who go through with the process or
those who decide against it.
“The University of Michigan has
argued that those who decided on this
cross-examination model have the best
interest of survivors of sexual assault
in mind,” Sandberg said. “To rephrase,
the University actually believes that
survivors of sexual assault would find
it less traumatic to be grilled by their
rapist or assaulter than by a third party.
I can’t speak for all survivors of sexual
assault, but I believe I can speak for
the vast majority when I say that being
questioned by one’s perpetrator would
be significantly more traumatic than by
any attorney.”
LSA
freshman
Sam
Braden
questioned the equality of the policy. He
discussed the possible inequity present
if one of the parties can afford a more
expensive lawyer and asked about how
the University assigns a defense attorney
to students.
“I know we say the whole court
system is very equal, but people who
can afford better lawyers are more likely
going to win a case,” Braden said.
CSG Speaker Austin Glass, Rackham
student, said although he understands
equity concerns regarding the policy,
clinical studies have shown a third
party agent should conduct a cross-
examination. He said administrators
have not found the need to include
student voices in the creation of the
policy.
“I recognize your equity concerns,
but at the end of the day, the current
system is almost unbelievable,” Glass
said. “To a passive observer, I think the
attempt here is to address the fact that
the system is one which, in discussion
with administrators, the student office
on this hasn’t found any significant
desire to make change to.”
The Assembly referred the resolution
to the Resolutions and Communications
committees.
During the event and as
described in his book, Rezaian
explained he was imprisoned
at
the
start
of
the
Joint
Comprehensive Plan of Action,
an agreement between Iran and
the P5+1 (China, France, Russia,
United Kingdom, United States
and Germany) regarding the
Iranian nuclear program. In
an interview with U.S. News,
Rezaian described how because
he was taken by the IRGC, who
did not want the Iran deal to
continue, he quickly became a
part of the negotiations.
“So I see my arrest in that
context,” Rezaian said in the
U.S. News interview. “As an
attempt by internal forces in the
country to make problems for
the (President) Hassan Rouhani
administration at the time when
they were engaged in these
negotiations with world powers
including the United States.”
Rezaian
said
during
his
imprisonment his interrogators
attempted to get him to admit to
espionage. Though he found it
difficult, Rezaian said he never
admitted to this crime, which
he did not commit. McCarren
commended him for holding
his ground in the high-pressure
environment.
“You’re not the first journalist
to be held in prison,” McCarren
said. “But there seemed to be a
pattern where journalists could
be released if they would state
that a charge was real, even if it
seemed like no one had believed
the charges. You didn’t do that,
you stood your ground … As a
journalist, I was incredibly proud
that you would do that.”
LSA
senior
Olivia
Abedi
described to The Daily after the
event how valuable she believed
Rezaian’s
actions
against
pleading guilty were, especially
for students.
“In cases like these, staying
true to yourself and what you’re
doing ring through,” Abedi said.
“The fact that Jason never plead
guilty to make things easier on
himself was a good thing I think
for all students and anybody to
understand.”
McCarren and the National
Press Club, as well as the general
spread in media awareness of
Rezaian’s situation, contributed
greatly to the release of Rezaian.
Lynette Clemetson, director of
Wallace House, described the
organization’s vast efforts toward
Rezaian’s case.
“Bill and his colleagues at
the National Press Club fought
tirelessly for Jason’s release,
even at one point holding a read-
a-thon where they read Jason’s
work for 24 hours in shifts,”
Clemetson said. “They made sure
that Jason’s name stayed in the
news and that his story stayed in
the news and that pressure stayed
on the officials who needed to
take getting him out of there
seriously.”
The
conversation
between
McCarren and Rezaian ended
with a discussion on Anthony
Bourdain, who not only made
an episode of his CNN show
“Anthony
Bourdain:
Parts
Unknown”
about
Iran
and
Rezaian, advocating on his behalf
while Rezaian was in prison, but
also published Rezaian’s book.
Rezaian described his profound
gratitude for the late journalist.
“I think for Yeganeh and me,
he’s our champion,” Rezaian
said. “Lots of people had seen
the episode of ‘Parts Unknown’
that we were on, some people
know that he was a big and vocal
advocate for us when we were
in prison, but after we were
released, he became a friend, and
he was an incredible source of
advice and inspiration.”
The formal event ended with
recognition of Emilio Gutiérrez
Soto, a Mexican journalist in
the University’s Knight-Wallace
Fellowship program. Gutiérrez
was recently denied asylum in
the U.S., despite his fear for his
safety upon returning to Mexico
because of his reporting on
crimes committed by members
of the military in Chihuahua,
Mexico.
At
the
event,
McCarren
welcomed Gutiérrez onto the
stage and presented him with
an honorary membership to the
National Press Club, created for
honoring outstanding journalists.
An emotional Gutiérrez stood
before a standing ovation from
the audience as he received the
recognition.
“We have never extended
this honor to an international
journalist, someone who is not a
U.S. citizen, and we want to do
that today for Emilio Gutiérrez,”
McCarren said while presenting
the membership. “We want him
to be one of our group, and to be
one of that special group within
our group.”
Abedi
described
the
importance of students learning
about different cultures through
the experiences of journalists
such as Gutiérrez and Rezaian,
and how understanding these
experiences can help spread
awareness globally.
“It’s important to highlight the
different parts of the world you
may not understand,” Abedi said.
“For instance, I think Iran is a
beautiful country. I’ve been there,
I love so many parts of Iranian
culture, but unfortunately, the
government and the treatment
of its citizens isn’t always just. I
think it’s important for students
to see the inner workings of other
countries and firsthand accounts
of what people have done in order
to raise awareness throughout
the world.”