Opinion
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
4A — Monday, November 25, 2019

Alanna Berger
Zack Blumberg
Emily Considine
Emma Chang
Joel Danilewitz

Cheryn Hong
Krystal Hur
Ethan Kessler
Magdalena Mihaylova
Michael Russo

Timothy Spurlin
Miles Stephenson
Joel Weiner
Erin White 
Lola Yang

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Managing Editor

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EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS

CHAND RAJENDRA-NICOLUCCI | COLUMN

Social media makes cancel culture unique

KIANNA MARQUEZ | COLUMN

JOEL WEINER | COLUMN

Why we should turn to carbon capture

It is time to kill the death penalty

W

ith each passing 
day, I, and many 
other 
students 
at the University 
of Michigan, give 
more 
and 
more 
hours of thought 
to 
how 
we 
can 
use 
our 
degrees 
after college. This 
decision takes time 
to plan out, rethink 
and develop into a 
carefully 
planned 
trajectory 
for 
what we expect our societal 
purpose to be. After months 
of thinking every day about 
where I want to go in life, 
I 
decided 
on 
a 
specific 
engineering pathway I could 
pursue: carbon capture.
A relatively novel topic of 
research, carbon capture is 
the process of recollecting 
carbon 
dioxide 
emitted 
into the atmosphere and 
reinserting 
the 
material 
back 
into 
underground 
storage. By converting the 
carbon dioxide gas into its 
liquid form for easy storage, 
the carbon capture process 
creates an immediate effect 
of greenhouse gas reduction 
in the atmosphere. Based 
on the extent of greenhouse 
gases that can be taken 
away from the atmosphere 
using this method and other 
similar ones, I believe the 
process of carbon capture 
will be the defining method 
to fight climate change in 
several major ways.
For 
instance, 
Chevron 
demonstrated 
one 
major 
benefit of carbon capture 
by developing greenhouse 
gas mitigation technologies. 
This company has been one 
of the pioneers of developing 
this 
process 
despite 
challenges in the research 
process 
and 
in 
making 
this process economically 
feasible. In this way, Chevron 
is guiding the models for 
carbon capture and storage 
implementation throughout 
global 
institutions 
and 
frameworks geared toward 
reaching the goals of the 
Intergovernmental Panel on 
Climate Special Report on 
Carbon Capture and Storage. 
Consequently, the company 
is doing its part to promote 
the systematic and effective 
development of the use of 
carbon capture and storage 
technologies.
In 
another 
example, 
Petra 
Nova, 
an 
energy 

provider based in Texas, 
has 
demonstrated 
the 
successful 
repurposing 
of 
carbon into fuel. 
This company has 
carried out both 
large 
quantities 
of 
carbon 
capture 
as 
well 
as 
a 
significant 
increase 
in 
oil 
production, 
signifying 
a 
revolutionary 
method 
of 
repurposing a nonrenewable 
resource. In addition, the 
company 
has 
set 
itself 
apart 
by 
implementing 
a process that uses and 
reuses 
natural 
resources. 
In this way, Petra Nova is 
showing the practicality of 
carbon capture and storage. 
Consequently, the company 
is allowing other institutions 
to realize the feasibility of 
implementing 
the 
carbon 
capture process.
A final example can be 
seen with Shell’s mentality 
when 
it 
comes 
to 
the 

widespread implementation 
of the carbon capture and 
storage 
process. 
Sally 
Benson, a director of Shell’s 
Global Climate and Energy 
Project, commented on the 
idea that the research energy 
companies do to develop 
the carbon capture process 
doesn’t carry any meaning if 
it’s not used or implemented 
by policy. 
“As academics, we can do 
all the laboratory research 
to show the technology’s 
power. But until we have 
the industry implementing 
projects and sharing their 
insights, we’re not going 
to 
make 
the 
significant 
progress required to meet 
our climate goal,” she said. 
In this way, this company 
is working toward making 
policymakers aware of the 
importance they hold in the 

future of our contribution to 
climate change solutions.
In different circumstances, 
these 
three 
companies 
exemplify only a few of the 
many ways that the process 
of carbon capture can create 
a crucial, beneficial impact 
on our society today. By 
leading 
the 
initiative 
to 
promote the use of these 
technologies, 
providing 
information that proves this 
process’s functionality and 
emphasizing the significance 
of systematic implementation 
of 
the 
research 
behind 
these 
technologies, 
these 
companies 
are 
propelling 
society’s 
perspective 
on 
the carbon capture process. 
In 
doing 
so, 
they 
have 
demonstrated the influence 
that carbon capture can have 
not only on the quality of 
our environment, but also on 
how our society approaches 
the climate issue.
Considering 
the 
proven 
benefits of carbon capture, 
I believe the adoption of the 
initiative models are enough 
to effect the drastic change 
necessary for environmental 
improvement. 
Therefore, 
these 
adoptions 
should 
occur 
at 
institutions 
throughout the world. Here 
at the University, College 
of 
Engineering 
faculty 
and staff are leading the 
Blue Sky Initiative aimed 
at reducing and removing 
the 
emission 
of 
carbon 
dioxide into our atmosphere 
as 
well 
as 
repurposing 
collected carbon gas into 
other 
infrastructural 
materials. 
Volker 
Sick, 
DTE 
Energy 
Professor 
of 
Advanced 
Energy 
Research, 
commented 
on 
the 
opportunity 
that 
we 
have as a society to utilize 
the carbon capture process: 
“We 
believe 
innovations 
in carbon dioxide removal 
and utilization technologies 
can 
generate 
a 
carbon-
negative, 
dollar-positive 
effect 
that 
will 
reduce 
emission 
footprints 
while 
generating billions of dollars 
of 
economic 
activity 
in 
the decades ahead.” As a 
result, we should continue 
to push for this type of 
interdisciplinary, 
multi-
beneficial 
work 
for 
its 
monumental influence on the 
quality of our environment.

Kianna Marquez can be reached 

at kmarquez@umich.edu.

R

odney 
Reed 
was 
scheduled to be dead 
by 
Thanksgiving. 
After 
sitting 
on 
death row in Texas 
for over 20 years, 
his death sentence 
was 
suspended 
indefinitely. Reed 
was 
arrested 
in 1996 for the 
murder of Stacey 
Stites, a 19-year-
old 
woman. 
The 
key 
piece 
of evidence tying him to 
the crime was the semen, 
appearing to match Reed’s, 
found in Stites’s body. He 
maintains that the two of them 
were in a consensual sexual 
relationship, but at the time of 
his conviction, no witnesses 
came forward to corroborate 
the 
statement. 
However, 
Reed’s lawyers say someone 
has recently backed up Reed’s 
claim of a consensual sexual 
relationship with the victim 
— a claim that should lead 
to a new trial. Moreover, his 
lawyers say that Stites’s fiancé 
at the time, Jimmy Fennell, a 
former police officer, admitted 
to the crime while imprisoned 
for kidnapping and rape of 
a different woman in 2008. 
In 
addition, 
the 
District 
Attorney’s office has refused 
to test the murder weapon, 
a belt, for DNA. Examples 
of convictions where there 
still exists some doubt as 
to 
whether 
the 
defendant 
is 
guilty, 
such 
as 
Reed’s 
case, demonstrate that the 
death penalty is an immoral, 
expensive and biased form of 
punishment. 
Cases like these rise to 
prominence every few years: 
Someone who has been sitting 
on death row for an extended 
period of time tries as hard 
as possible to be heard when 
they say they are innocent. 
The media tends to report it 
as the date of execution draws 

closer, petitions for a new 
trial circulate the internet and 
the accused sits in his cell (it 
is almost always a 
man, as only 54 of the 
almost 2,700 people 
on death row are 
women), 
wondering 
if he will be granted 
a 
new 
trial. 
The 
complications 
surrounding 
the 
death penalty make it 
so problematic that it 
should be abolished. 
Even if someone supports 
the death penalty on moral 
grounds, they may support 
its 
abolition 
because 
of 
how 
expensive 
it 
is. 
In 
Pennsylvania alone, estimates 
put the cost of the death 
penalty at more than $350 
million. 

Judges tend to be more 
sympathetic 
in 
hearing 
appeals of death penalty cases 
than in most other cases. The 
majority of cases in which the 
prosecution seeks the death 
penalty do not end in capital 
punishment. The ones that do 
go through a lengthy appeals 
process, during which many 
of the sentences are reduced 
to life without parole. This 
means that most of the death 
penalty cases will end with 
the same ruling as life without 
the possibility of parole, but 
the process will be far more 
expensive due to an appeals 

process and draw resources 
away from areas where they 
could have more of an impact. 
These 
extended 
processes, 
however, are necessary for 
the death penalty to continue 
because of how serious such 
cases tend to be. One of the 
greatest risks in any trial is 
the possibility the accused is 
actually innocent, but those 
stakes become exponentially 
higher 
in 
death 
penalty 
proceedings.
Capital punishment is also 
biased in its sentencing because 
it is disproportionately used 
against 
African-American 
defendants. More than half of 
the current death row inmates 
are people of color. In the 
early 20th century, when it 
was most used against people 
accused of rape, 89 percent 
of the defendants were Black. 
Moreover, in the 38 states that 
still use the death penalty, 
98 percent of the prosecutors 
are white. That means white 
people are deciding that Black 
lives should end at a higher 
rate than white lives. Capital 
punishment, 
therefore, 
worsens the inequality of 
an 
already 
discriminatory 
system. Such disparities are 
unacceptable in a country 
that bases its criminal justice 
system on the idea of equality 
under the law. The death 
penalty is also unequal gender-
wise. The vast majority of 
people on death row are men, 
and defendants are almost 
seven times more likely to be 
handed a death sentence if the 
victim is a woman. 
That brings us back to 
Rodney Reed. He has fought 
tirelessly to get a new trial, and 
was lucky enough to receive 
it. Regardless, the high costs 
and problematic enforcement 
of the death penalty means it 
should be abolished.

“

Cancel culture” is back 
in the news thanks to 
President Barack Obama’s 
recent 
comments 
on the standards of 
“wokeness” 
among 
young 
people 
and 
in social media. As 
people argue cancel 
culture’s merits and 
causes, they invariably 
point to generational 
or political factors, 
such as the unique 
sensitivity 
of 
young people or a 
particularly 
offensive 
political atmosphere. However, 
these explanations miss the 
mark. To fully explain the 
phenomenon of cancel culture 
we have to look at the structure 
of social media.
Young people calling out 
harmful 
speech, 
demanding 
resignations 
and 
organizing 
boycotts is not new. What has 
changed is the means by which 
they do these things. Before 
the growth of social media, 
people were limited to paper 
petitions, 
in-person 
protests 
and 
newspaper 
op-eds 
for 
spreading their message and 
taking action. Now, anybody 
can log on to Twitter and send 
out a tweet, and if things go 
right, it will go viral, potentially 
reaching millions of people. 
This is incredibly powerful. It is 
what has driven movements like 
the Arab Spring and #MeToo. 
It has contributed to genocide 
in Myanmar and mob violence 
in 
India. 
Analyzing 
cancel 
culture 
requires 
examining 
the powerful mechanisms that 
drive social media.
Often, it seems as if cancel 
culture takes place in another 
universe. Typically, I don’t know 
the cancelers or the canceled 
personally, but I see their content 
online and feel the effects of 
their interactions offline. How 
does a small group of people 
on the internet dominate the 
national 
conversation 
and 
have real effects on people’s 
lives? Through platforms that 
encourage virality, engagement 
and extremity. 
Social 
media 
companies’ 
primary source of revenue is 
advertisements. 
More 
user 

engagement allows more ads 
to be sold. Because of this, 
companies focus on driving 
user 
engagement, 
searching for ways 
to 
grab 
users’ 
attention and hold 
it for as long as 
possible. And what 
content drives the 
most 
engagement? 
Studies 
find 
that 
negative, 
divisive 
emotions 
such 
as 
fear and anger do. 
So, thanks to the 
structure 
of 
social 
media, posts that provoke these 
emotions – content related to 
cancel culture certainly fits 
this category – rise naturally. 
Additionally, the emphasis on 
virality leads to features that 
quickly amplify and distribute 
content. Twitter trends, the 
Facebook 
news 
feed, 
the 
YouTube recommender system 
and the Instagram discover 
page simultaneously push viral 
content to keep you engaged 
and use you to make content 
more viral, a positive feedback 
loop 
that 
circulates 
posts 
quickly and widely. This is how 
a disproportionate amount of 
content related to cancel culture 
ends up in our feeds, on our 
minds and in our conversations.
Without social media, cancel 
culture would manifest itself as 
relatively normal generational 
activism. There would be good 
and bad, overzealousness and 
moral clarity. All still exist today, 
but now they exist alongside the 
democratization of information, 
the magnification of shame, 
the anonymity of social media 
and the growth of permanent, 
searchable 
digital 
records 
of our lives. This emboldens 
some people and makes others 
feel 
vulnerable, 
leading 
to 
aggression, defensiveness and 
self-censorship, 
fueling 
the 
influence of cancel culture as 
a concept and as an agent of 
change.
But what about the good, 
the speaking of truth to power, 
the legitimate criticism that 
is often labeled derogatively 
as cancel culture by those 
threatened by it? Doesn’t social 
media 
empower 
movements 

like #MeToo? Doesn’t it give 
a voice and a platform to the 
marginalized? Yes. This is the 
paradox of social media — its 
vast capacity for both good and 
bad. Implementing technology 
that deemphasizes virality or 
engagement could undermine 
important 
social 
movements 
and mute constructive criticism. 
Yet, maintaining the status 
quo is clearly not desirable 
either. Does the answer lie 
beyond technology? Education, 
morality and art — do these 
institutions have the answer? 
It seems to me that these 
non-technical 
institutions 
do indeed hold the answer, 
if there is one. Social media 
companies have no incentive to 
change the mechanisms driving 
their platforms — virality and 
engagement are key to their 
bottom line. Additionally, it’s 
not clear we should want them 
to. Many of the same features 
that drive the negative parts of 
cancel culture give a platform 
to marginalized people, and 
are 
an 
important 
tool 
for 
social 
movements. 
This 
is 
where 
non-technical 
factors 
come in. Education, morality 
and art all have the ability to 
change people’s minds. For 
example, 
Mary 
Gaitskill’s 
novella 
“This 
is 
pleasure” 
explores 
cancel 
culture 
and #MeToo from multiple 
perspectives, 
producing 
a 
complicated, 
nuanced 
piece 
that is thought-provoking and 
demands 
moderation 
from 
readers. 
Theoretically, 
art 
like “This is pleasure” could 
inspire meaningful, widespread 
changes, making people less 
likely to use social media for 
gratuitous 
denunciation 
and 
encouraging 
less 
charged, 
more offline engagement. I’m 
not 
particularly 
optimistic 
about such a transformation, 
though. It would require a 
collective awakening that seems 
impossible in today’s highly 
polarized environment where 
more pressing issues such as 
climate change fail to garner a 
similar response. I guess we can 
hope though.

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The process of 
carbon capture 
will be the 
defining method 
to fight climate 
change

Chand Rajendra-Nicolucci can be 

reached at chandrn@umich.edu.

Joel Weiner can be reached 

jgweiner@umich.edu.

White people 
are deciding that 
Black lives should 
end at a higer rate 
than white lives

SUBMIT TO SURVIVORS SPEAK
The Opinion section has created a space in The Michigan 
Daily for first-person accounts of sexual assault and 
its corresponding personal, academic and legal 
implications. Submission information can be found at 
https://tinyurl.com/survivespeak.

KIANNA 
MARQUEZ

CHAND 

RAJENDRA-

NICOLUCCI

JOEL 
WEINER