Every Saturday morning since 
September 2003, members of 
Witnesses For Peace — an anti-
Israel protest group — have 
stood outside the Beth Israel 
Congregation 
on 
Washtenaw 
Avenue in Ann Arbor. Members 

of the group hold signs reading 
“Resist Jewish Power,” “Jewish 
Power 
Corrupts,” 
“Boycott 
Israel,” “Stop U.S. Aid to Israel” 
and 
“End 
the 
Palestinian 
holocaust.” Their demonstrations 
last from about 9:30 to 11:30 a.m., 
taking place during Shabbat 
services. 
After 16 years and more 
than 
800 
protests, 
a 
Beth 
Israel 
Congregation 
member, 
Marvin Gerber, motioned to 

sue the group on Dec. 19, 2019, 
claiming Witnesses For Peace 
have demonstrated anti-Semitic 
rhetoric. The lawsuit also claims 
the city of Ann Arbor has not 
taken the appropriate action to 
put an end to the demonstrations.
According to the litigation, 
the protests defy Ann Arbor 
regulations on public gatherings 
and stretch the legal limits on 
a person’s right to free speech. 
Gerber requested the city either 

eliminate the protest altogether 
or install certain restrictions. The 
plaintiff is also seeking financial 
retribution due to the protester’s 
constant “harassment.”
“The First Amendment right 
of free speech does not entitle 
a speaker to use that right 
repeatedly 
to 
bludgeon, 
for 
weeks and years at a time, in the 
same location,” the lawsuit reads. 

Lewis Raven Wallace, an 
independent 
journalist 
from 
North 
Carolina, 
spoke 
at 
Literati Bookstore on Tuesday 
evening to a crowd of about 
70 people. Wallace discussed 
his new book “The View from 
Somewhere: Undoing the Myth 
of Journalistic Objectivity” at an 
event sponsored by the store. 
Wallace is an Ann Arbor 
native who turned his activism 
to journalism. He currently 
hosts his own podcast, “The 
View from Somewhere.” In 

addition, Wallace started his 
own 
company 
called 
Press 
On, 
a 
Southern 
journalism 
collective 
providing 
training 
and education about challenging 
harmful bias in the journalism 
industry. 
During the book reading, 
Wallace 
read 
passages 
describing how his early career 
as a journalist was affected 
by the LGBTQ+ activism he 
participated in as a teenager. 
The excerpts detailed how he 
was fired from a job at a daily 
paper when he wrote a blog post 
titled “Objectivity Is Dead and 
I’m Okay With It,” which would 
come to define the rest of his 

career. 
Wallace, who is transgender, 
said 
he 
knew 
his 
opinion 
about 
objectivity 
would 
be 
controversial but did not realize 
the extent to which it would 
change his career.
“I wrote about my experience 
as a transgender journalist, never 
neutral on the subject of my 
own humanity and rights, even 
as they were being debated in 
‘both sides’ journalism,” Wallace 
said. “When I posted the blog, I 
knew it might be controversial. 
What I didn’t know was how 
dramatically it would change 
the trajectory of my life, as my 
own story became part of a tense 

national conversation over truth 
and journalism.”
Art & Design senior Brooks 
Eisenbise said it is important to 
challenge the idea of journalistic 
objectivity. 
“I like the message of pushing 
against journalistic objectivity 
because I feel like in our current 
fact climate where people can 
say whatever, it takes more 
than objectivity to tell people 
the truth and to know what’s 
real and what’s not,” Eisenbise 
said. “Talking to the source 
and talking with people on the 
ground is important. Telling the 
full story is really cool.”

A 
team 
of 
University 
of 
Michigan 
faculty 
and 
students have created iGYM, 
an augmented reality system 
allowing 
both 
able-bodied 
individuals and those with 
mobile disabilities to engage in 
physical games together. 
iGYM is designed to mimic 
physical sports by projecting 
an interactive court onto the 
floor. It can host multiple 
games featuring virtual goals 
and balls. Players interact with 
the projections to virtually kick 
and pass the ball to score goals.
Art 
& 
Design 
professor 
Roland Graf, one of the team’s 
leaders, said the game creates 
an 
even 
playing 
field 
for 
children with disabilities so 
they can compete and play with 
their able-bodied peers.
The 
team 
consisted 
of 
students and faculty from the 
School of Art & Design, the 
School of Information, 
the 
College of Engineering and 
the 
School 
of 
Kinesiology. 
Graf stressed the importance 
of having an interdisciplinary 
team to bring the research 
project to life.
“What united us was really 
a shared mission,” Graf said. 

Good news for stressed-out 
students: there may be a link 
between stress in early life and 
longer lifespans, according to 
researchers at the University of 
Michigan.
The research is being conducted 
at the Jakob Lab, a molecular, 
cellular and developmental biology 
laboratory, and focuses on oxidative 
stress, a natural byproduct of 
metabolism, 
and 
its 
potential 
ability to increase lifespan. The lab 
uses genetically identical worms to 
study aging.
Postdoctoral 
fellow 
Daphne 
Bazopoulou, a key contributor to 
the ongoing project, explained 
what oxidative stress is and why 
the group chose to study it in 
worms. 
“These are oxidants that every 
organism produces, and these are 
byproducts of metabolism, and 
these have been linked to oxidative 
damage which contributes to 
aging,” Bazopoulou said. “Worms 
produce those oxidants at very high 
levels during development and they 
do that naturally … so this was a 
little bit weird because we knew 
from studies before that excessive 
oxidants might do harm, however, 
these juvenile worms were able to 
recover by themselves.”

Starting 
this 
April, 
undergraduate students can 
apply to the Ford School of 
Public Policy for acceptance 
into the new public policy minor 
for Fall 2020. The minor will be 
open to students from LSA, the 
College of Engineering, Ross 
School of Business, School 
of Information and School of 
Public Health.
Sharon 
Maccini, 
faculty 
director of the undergraduate 
program at the Public Policy 
School, said the impetus for 
the minor came from hearing 
students express interest in 
studying public policy without 
necessarily majoring in it.
“The idea was to attract 
students who are primarily 
committed 
to 
another 
discipline and to supplement 
their education with public 

policy studies,” Maccini said. 
“We offer essentially a toolkit, 
various types of skills and 
ideas that can be useful for 
pursuing effective change and 
leadership in essentially any 
field.” 
According 
to 
the 
press 
release, 
sophomores 
and 
juniors 
are 
able 
to 
apply 
from April 1 to May 15. The 
application consists of an online 
form, resume, transcript and 
two short essays. Students will 
hear their results by mid-June, 
and 25 students are expected 
to be offered admission into 
the minor. 
LSA 
sophomore 
Sarah 
Abdelbaki intends to major in 
economics and international 
studies. However, she said 
she is also interested in public 
policy. After learning about the 
new minor program, Abdelbaki 
said she was excited about the 
opportunity. 

michigandaily.com
Ann Arbor, Michigan
Wednesday, January 8, 2020

ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-NINE YEARS OF EDITORIAL FREEDOM

GOT A NEWS TIP?
Call 734-418-4115 or e-mail 
news@michigandaily.com and let us know.

INDEX
Vol. CXXIX, No. 40
©2019 The Michigan Daily

N E WS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

O PI N I O N . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

CL A SSIFIEDS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6

S U D O K U . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

A R T S . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

S P O R T S . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
michigandaily.com

For more stories and coverage, visit

AR game 
increases 
access for 
children

TECHNOLOGY

Federal lawsuit challenges anti-Israel 
demonstrations at local synagogue
Litigation addresses 16-year protest at Beth Israel Congregation

‘U’ study:
longevity
impacted
by stress

RESEARCH

Follow The Daily 
on Instagram, 
@michigandaily

BARBARA COLLINS & 
SAMANTHA SMALL
Daily News Editor &
Daily Staff Reporter

See STRESS, Page 3A

ANGELINA BREDE
Daily Staff Reporter

Research team creates 
gaming system for kids 
with differing abilities

Results show early-life
stressors may lead to 
increase in lifespan

HANNAH MACKAY
Daily Staff Reporter

Dean expects to enroll approximately 
25 students in 16-credit program

Ford School 
to offer new 
minor next 
school year

Independent journalist discusses 
‘myth of objectivity’ in industry

Lewis Raven Wallace reflects on personal experience as LGBTQ+ activist

 JASMIN LEE 
Daily Staff Reporter

See JOURNALIST, Page 3A

See LAWSUIT, Page 3A

FRANCESCA DUONG
Daily Staff Reporter

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 ALEC COHEN/Daily
Author Lewis Raven Wallace speaks about his book “The View From Somewhere Else” during an event at Literati Bookstore Tuesday evening. 

statement

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 ALLISON ENGKVIST/Daily
Members of Witnesses for Peace, an anti-Israel protest group, have protested outside of the Beth Israel Congregation for the past sixteen years. 

See MINOR, Page 3A

SPORTSWEDNESDAY

See GAME, Page 3A

