Opinion
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
4A — Wednesday March 13, 2019

Emma Chang

Joel Danilewitz

Samantha Goldstein

Emily Huhman
Tara Jayaram

Jeremy Kaplan
Elias Khoury

Magdalena Mihaylova

Ellery Rosenzweig

Jason Rowland

Anu Roy-Chaudhury

Alex Satola

 Ashley Zhang

Erin White

FINNTAN STORER

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Editor in Chief
MAGDALENA MIHAYLOVA 

AND JOEL DANILEWITZ

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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

M

ost know the dangers 
climate change poses 
to both our present and 

future, but I will give 
a refresher. We are 
already experiencing 
its impacts. Climate 
change 
exacerbated 

the drought in the 
Middle 
East 
that 

partly 
caused 
the 

Syrian 
Civil 
War, 

increased 
the 

frequency 
of 
the 

wildfires that ravaged 
California 
in 
the 

fall and one intergovernmental 
report found climate change 
causes 
400,000 
premature 

deaths every year.

That is just the tip of the 

proverbial 
(melting) 
iceberg. 

The Paris climate accord urged 
governments to collaborate to 
keep long-term global warming 
below 1.5 degrees Celsius, but 
reaching that goal is becoming 
a pipe dream. With 2 degrees 
Celsius of warming (the Paris 
climate 
accord’s 
catastrophe 

threshold), 
98 
percent 
of 

coral reefs will die, sea levels 
will rise by approximately 50 
centimeters 
(displacing 
more 

than a billion people by 2060), 
the Mediterranean region will 
have 17 percent less freshwater 
available and heat waves could 
increase. But now, 2 degrees 
of warming is looking like a 
relatively positive outcome.

Pledging to get to these 

thresholds 
is 
meaningless 

without actually taking action. 
Right now we are more on course 
for long-term warming in the 
range of 3.1 to 3.7 degrees Celsius, 
according to Climate Action 
Tracker. There are few estimates 
that translate these predictions 
into direct loss of human life, but 
if we are experiencing 400,000 
premature deaths with barely 
1 degree of warming, nearly 4 
degrees will be Armageddon.

That all of these outcomes 

are rough estimates is part of 
the problem. Climate change 
will bring about continuous, 
unpredictable 
and 
dangerous 

change — a complete loss of 
normality for the rest of our 
and our children’s lives. And all 
of these impacts have and will 
continue to disproportionately 
impact people of color, low income 
and working class communities, 
women, LGBTQ individuals and 
indigenous communities. 

These 
global 
challenges 

are so daunting that it is hard 
to know how to start trying to 
fight them. This Friday’s Global 
Climate Strike may be the last, 
best chance we have to broadcast 
student voices around climate 
action. 

The Global Climate Strike is 

being led by high school students 
around the world. This wave 
of activism began with Greta 
Thunberg, a 16-year-old Swedish 
activist, who has skipped school 
every Friday since August to 
demand the Swedish Parliament 
uphold its commitments to the 

Paris agreement. Her movement 
has spread around the world, 
and tens of thousands of students 

will be walking out of 
classes on Friday to 
protest global leaders’ 
failure to adequately 
address 
climate 

change.

It 
is 
important 

that everyone walks 
out of class on Friday 
at 11:11 a.m., comes to 
the subsequent rally 
at 12 p.m. on the Diag, 
and to the march at 1 

p.m. because climate organizing 
of this magnitude does not 
happen often. The last march 
of this size was in 2015, when 
more than 600,000 people took 
to the streets in 175 countries 
around the world to push for a 
strong Paris agreement. If we 
wait another four years before 
making our voices heard, it will 
be too late. The most recent 
Intergovernmental 
Panel 
on 

Climate Change report called 
for 
dramatic 
reductions 
in 

greenhouse gas emissions by 
2030. We simply cannot afford to 
wait another four years.

While this strike will not 

have the same numbers as the 
2015 march did, it could be 
more powerful. Striking is more 
powerful than marching because 
it shows that we are willing to lose 
something to make our voices 
heard, even if that something 
is as trivial as lab attendance or 
iClicker points.

Furthermore, while in 2015 

we were marching to show 
world leaders that we wanted 
an ambitious plan for global 
emissions reductions, now we are 
calling out leaders for failing to 
deliver on their promises. Hence, 
this strike is not organized 
by 
established 
environmental 

organizations and leaders; it is led 
by high school students inciting 
grassroots organizing around 
the world. Our claims have more 
urgency and more authority now 
than they did four years ago.

This strike is also important 

because we need to play our 
part by taking responsibility to 
influence the decision-making of 
the institutions we are a part of. 
If we do not actively try to change 
our institutions, we are complicit 
in their inaction. Conveniently, 
this strike comes at a critical 
juncture for our institutions at 
multiple levels. The University 
of Michigan, Ann Arbor, the 
state of Michigan and the entire 
United States all face critical 
climate decisions in the coming 
months that we have the power 
to influence.

First, 
 
the 
 
University. 

President 
Mark 
Schlissel 

just 
created 
the 
President’s 

Commission 
on 
Carbon 

Neutrality, 
tasked 
with 

recommending 
emissions 

goals for the University. The 
commission’s members need to 
know that students recognize 
the existential threat climate 
change poses to our futures, so 

they act urgently to make the 
University carbon neutral by 
2030. But the University needs 
to know that how they get to 
carbon neutrality is important 
too; purchasing carbon offsets 
allows the University to continue 
burning 
fossil 
fuels 
without 

accountability, while expanding 
the new Central Power Plant will 
bind the University’s hands in an 
enormous investment that will 
entrench our reliance on fossil 
fuels.

In 
Ann 
Arbor, 
city 

councilmembers are considering 
abandoning climate action. In 
November 2017, voters agreed 
to devote 40 percent of a new 
millage 
to 
climate 
action, 

including the creation of a 
sustainability office, as part of a 
larger plan that set how the city 
would use the money. However, 
new city councilmembers want 
to nullify the resolution without 
an alternative plan for climate 
action funding.

Last month, the Republican 

Michigan 
legislature 
rejected 

Gov. 
Gretchen 
Whitmer’s 

executive order to strengthen the 
Department of Environmental 
Quality by giving it greater 
oversight over water pollution.

Nationally, 
our 
two 

Democratic senators, Gary Peters 
and Debbie Stabenow, have not 
signed on to the Green New 
Deal, the ambitious framework 
for addressing climate change 
recently proposed in the Senate.

While 
a 
massive 
strike 

may 
not 
directly 
lead 
to 

climate action from any or all 
of 
our 
representatives, 
our 

demonstrations 
matter. 
By 

showing we are willing to take 
risks and that we actively care 
about climate and our futures, 
our demands for climate action 
will be taken more seriously.

In his terrifying article on 

worst-case 
climate 
scenarios, 

David Wallace-Wells mentions 
how Jim Hansen, one of the first 
influential 
climate 
scientists, 

criticized 
environmental 

scientists 
for 
“scientific 

reticence” — they knew climate 
change was an issue, but were 
not bold enough to declare it 
an 
unambiguous 
crisis. 
The 

University, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 
the U.S. and countries around the 
world are performing their own 
institutional reticence. They are 
taking it slow or doing nothing 
at all when it is essential to take 
dramatic action right now.

It should be unacceptable 

for any of our institutions or 
representatives 
to 
continue 

slow-walking the process of 
climate change mitigation and 
adaptation. Our futures are at 
stake. Alone, we are just a bunch 
of 
college 
students 
yelling. 

But our voices are made more 
powerful in conjunction with 
the tens of thousands of students 
striking with us. Let’s play hooky 

MARIA ULAYYET | COLUMN

We must come back to our true roots on activism
A 

fellow 
writer 
recently 

wrote a column with an 
 
 
 
 
 

interesting perspective on 

student activism and divestment 
that inspired me to give our campus 
community a quick history lesson. 
This column commandeered the 
impact of the late Martin Luther 
King Jr. in an attempt to highlight 
the need to practice activism to fight 
for the “outsider.” It is insulting to 
use King’s legacy to memorialize 
oppression as is done in the column. 
King himself was placed on an 
“enemies of the United States” 
list that included terrorists, spies 
or anyone the FBI perceived as a 
threat. Historic movements are 
seldom popular in the present and 
we only celebrate King now after 
years of a low approval rating.

The passion behind this piece 

truly struck me and also inspired 
me to dispel the misconceptions on 
campus and beyond surrounding 
divestment 
and 
the 
conflict 

between Israel and Palestine. Just 
as many rightfully possess a deep 
love and loyalty to their Jewish 
roots, I urge people to consider the 
sense of devotion that Palestinian-
Americans owe to their roots as 
well.

The 
on-campus 
push 
for 

divestment campaigns stems from a 
passion for human rights — not anti-
Semitism.

The 
Boycott, 
Divestment, 

Sanctions (BDS) movement is 
referenced as “hate-filled,” in the 
column. As a form of nonviolent 
pressure 
on 
Israel, 
the 
BDS 

movement 
calls 
for 
boycotts 

against Israeli and international 
companies involved in the violation 
of Palestinian rights. Divestment 
campaigns urge the withdrawal 
of investments from companies 
involved in the Israeli violation 
of 
Palestinian 
human 
rights, 

encouraging 
sanctions 
to 

pressure governments to fulfill 
their obligations to hold Israel 
accountable for its violations of 
international agreements. Today, 
movements 
are 
decentralized 

with millions of participants, and 
thus it is impossible to credit such 
movements to a few individuals. 
Categorically calling out a few 
people on behalf of an entire group, 
as is done in the article, is racism 
in and of itself. According to the 
movement’s official website, the 
BDS movement “works to end 
international support for Israel’s 
oppression of Palestinians and 
pressure Israel to comply with 
international law.”

The author goes on to refer to 

the Middle East as a sea of “illiberal 
theocracies and failed states.” 
However, the author does not put 
this in its proper context, thereby 
failing to give justice to the complex 
history of the region. Unlike Israel, 

the Arab countries share the 
characteristic of being post-colonial 
and are still suffering from the 
remnants of imperialism. The CIA 
has also openly interfered in Middle 
Eastern elections repeatedly, which 
has severely impeded their ability 
to form effective democracies. The 
support of the United States and 
other Western powers via aid to the 
Middle East has curtailed anything 
related to democratic reform, as the 
U.S. would rather work with puppet 
dictatorships instead of independent 
democratic governments.

A democracy is defined as “a 

country in which power is held 
by elected representatives.” Just 
because Israel is a country that 
elects its own officials and is a 
“democracy” by definition does 
not mean that it is a nation of equal 
rights for all, nor that is not in 
violation of international law.

The BDS movement is presented 

as looking away from the “real evil,” 
but what about the tangible policies 
that Israel implements and that place 
a barrier on other human beings? 
Currently, Israel is in breach of 
more than 30 UN Security Council 
resolutions for actions including 
the installment of concrete walls, 
military watchtowers, barbed wire 
fences on Palestinian land, as well as 
ethnic cleansing, which primarily 
consisted of the forced removal of 
700,000 Palestinians and the illegal 
annexation of East Jerusalem and 
the Syrian Golan Heights. Which is 
really the “real evil”?

Furthermore, 
the 
Israel 

Defense Forces has functioned 
under the Dahiya Doctrine, in 
which it views civilian villages as 
military bases and justifies the use 
of disproportionate forces in such 
civilian areas. Israeli authorities 
have also been found to allow 
pharmaceutical companies to test 
weapons and drugs on Palestinian 
and Arab prisoners and children. 
The idea of harnessing such 
disproportionate force dangerously 
mirrors the principle of Manifest 
Destiny implemented by the United 
States that saw the genocide of 
Native Americans. Israel continues 
their version of Manifest Destiny 
today by building more than 1,000 
homes for Jewish settlements on 
Palestinian land.

These 
injustices 
are 
the 

exact types of issues that should 
be combated through student 
activism. As mentioned in my fellow 
columnist’s piece, Martin Luther 
King Jr.’s words “remind us all 
that it is our duty to stand against 
injustice, wherever it may exist” and 
that “none of us can sit idly by while 
our fellow members of humankind 
are denied their God-given rights.” I 
agree with the reverend and believe 
that my fellow columnist and I both 
have a shared mission towards 

peace and equality. The Palestinian 
people’s drive for equality mirrors 
the “outsider” feeling embodied by 
the African-American community 
during the civil rights movement. 
The mission of movements such as 
BDS centered around human rights 
serves as a student’s outlet to stand 
against the injustices imposed by 
the Israeli government onto the 
Palestinian people.

Peaceful 
coexistence 
is 

unfortunately not the reality in 
Israel. In the case of the Arab-
Israelis that are referenced as 
“equals,” a recent Pew Research 
Center study found that 79 percent 
of Jewish Israelis believe that they 
should have preferential treatment 
over Arabs and that nearly half 
agreed “Arabs should be expelled or 
transferred from Israel.” Currently, 
thousands of Palestinians must 
go 
through 
Israeli 
military 

checkpoints, where they wait from 
3 in the morning or earlier to secure 
a place in “cage-like lines” to Israeli 
and Palestinian cities beyond the 
Green Line, simply to go to work 
every day.

Palestinian and Arab-American 

students alike here at the University 
of Michigan possess a care for the 
rights of their people and showcased 
this 
through 
the 
#UMDivest 

campaign. The campaign was 
simply intended to investigate 
alleged human rights violations 
committed by companies operating 
in Israel and urge the withdrawal of 
investments in companies involved 
in such violations. The movement 
by no means sought to propagate 
hate-filled rhetoric toward Jewish 
people or Israel as a country, but 
rather serves to provide a voice 
to the marginalized Palestinian 
community.

Ignoring the state of the 

Palestinians 
and 
Arab-Israelis 

who are treated like second-class 
citizens is inhumane. Securing 
the freedom of some at the cost 
of others’ rights is hypocritical. 
Claiming anti-Semitism as a factor 
for all movements detracts from 
the discussion of human rights 
issues that are occurring. There is a 
historically emotional undertone to 
the anger within these movements, 
and this stems from the pain of 
decades of such abuses. This is 
the pain that Palestinian and 
Palestinian-American students face 
and deal with.

I urge students to continue 

using their passionate voices to 
fight against the inequality and 
injustice they see and I hope we can 
all eventually see eye to eye in the 
search for peace through student 
activism.

Maria Ulayyet can be reached at 

mulayyet@umich.edu.

CONTRIBUTE TO THE CONVERSATION

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Send the writer’s full name and University affiliation 

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TARA JAYARAM | OP-ED

I

magine you’re driving in 
London or New York, 
inching slowly through 

patience-testing traffic. You 
look to your left, peer into the 
car next to you, and see that 
there’s no one there. You look 
to the other side and notice 
there’s no one inside the car 
to your right either. This is 
a future we can expect: rows 
of driverless gridlock, empty 
cars 
slowly 
roaming 
the 

city, dutifully cruising until 
their owners get out of work, 
all in the name of avoiding 
expensive 
urban 
parking 

fees.

In a recent publication 

in Transport Policy, Adam 
Millard-Ball 
and 
his 

colleagues at the University 
of 
California, 
Santa 

Cruz 
illustrate 
possible 

alternatives that autonomous 
vehicles can use instead of 
parking. 

Society 
doesn’t 
seem 

to have made up its mind 
on 
autonomous 
vehicles. 

According to a Pew Research 
Center 
study, 
Americans 

are both enthusaistic and 
worried about their adoption. 
In academia, scientists have 
split opinions on whether 

future driverless cars will 

positively or negatively affect 
the environment. On the one 
hand, driverless cars fuel 
urban sprawl, but since their 
design 
optimizes 
spatial 

efficiency, they are also seen 
as an opportunity to redesign 
cities to promote walking and 
cycling.

In the face of future 

ambiguity, 
there 
is 
one 

clear 
consequence 
of 
the 

adoption 
of 
autonomous 

vehicles: the effect on traffic. 
An 
inevitable 
but 
rarely 

addressed aspect of these 
cars is their ability to bypass 
expensive parking fees in 
ways 
that 
increase 
drive 

times and worsen already 
rising urban congestion.

One option is to send the 

car home after the passenger 
is dropped off. While this 
may seem like a harmless 
high tech chauffeur, there 
are distinct environmental 
costs to this practice. The 
number of trips the car takes 
is doubled, resulting in more 
congestion and more vehicle 
emissions per person.

Another, 
more 
eerie 

option, is called cruising. 
After 
the 
passenger 
is 

dropped off, the car drives 
around the city as slowly as 
possible so as to minimize 
fuel costs. Instinctively, the 
cost of driving all day seems 
higher than parking in a 
city. But Millard-Ball’s study 
found that it is by far cheaper 
than parking, costing less 
than 50 cents per hour in 
contrast to the $4 per hour 
cost of parking in many large 
cities.

Also, when multiple cars 

engage in cruising, each with 
the incentive to go as slowly 
as possible, the chance of 
gridlock 
is 
high. 
Picture 

hundreds, even thousands of 
cars, sitting in the middle of 
residential streets, waiting 
patiently 
for 
the 
return 

of their owners. Even in 
relatively 
small 
numbers, 

less than 4,000 autonomous 
vehicles are needed to slow 
some streets down to under 
two kilometers per hour.

This 
traffic 
nightmare 

comes with a breath of solace 
in its possible solutions. Free 
or 
subsidized 
peripheral 

parking, 
similar 
to 
the 

cell phone parking lots in 
airports, can encourage more 
sharing of AVs and limit 
congestion within cities.

It has also added credence 

to 
the 
proposition 
of 

municipal congestion pricing, 
a policy that has also been 
proposed as a response to 
the increased traffic caused 
by ride-sharing companies 
like Uber and Lyft. Without 
the 
offset 
of 
congestion 

pricing, cities stand to lose 
a significant portion of their 
municipal 
revenue 
from 

the 
decrease 
in 
parking 

popularity. For example, in 
2016, New York City made 
$545 million in parking fines, 
a significant potential loss if 
not remedied by the approval 
of congestion charges.

While the adoption of 

autonomous vehicles seems 
inevitable, we can’t know 
exactly how our cities will 
look 
when 
autonomous 

vehicles gain popularity. We 
can only hope that the traffic 
they bring doesn’t add to our 
road rage.

Tara Jayaram can be reached at 

tjayaram@umich.edu.

Solomon Medintz can be reached at 

smedintz@umich.edu.

Why I’m striking for the climate on Friday

SOLOMON MEDINTZ | COLUMN

SOLOMON
MEDINTZ

Ghost traffic, a driverless problem