7-Opinion

Opinion

I 

rubbed the sleep out of 
my eyes and reached 
through the darkness for 

my phone. It was 4 a.m. on a 
March 2020 morning and the 
screams coming from outside 
my apartment were making 
it impossible to sleep. I sat 
up and looked down from my 
second-story window to the 
thin road below. Bathed in 
the orange light of a street 
lamp a group of people were 
dancing in a circle, their 
maniacal laughs and screams 
echoing up and down the 
otherwise silent street. While 
this 
alone 
wouldn’t 
have 

made it a notable event on the 
famously raucous Greenwood 
Avenue, the fact that this 
group of dancers was wearing 
nothing but their smiles was 
a little too crazy even for this 
party-street. But I was hardly 
surprised.

Ann Arbor had been abuzz 

with massive parties for days 
on end. After a student tested 
positive for COVID-19 and 
classes were canceled, many 
rushed to party with their 
friends and enjoy one final 
week of college life before 
returning home. Despite the 
University and public health 
experts telling us to remain 
in our dorms and apartments, 
on every block, from sunup 
to sundown, a party seemed 
to rage. Adding to the danger 
of the situation, University 
students had just returned 
from spring break a week 
earlier, likely bringing more 
than 
just 
souvenirs 
and 

wicked hangovers back to 
Michigan. 

A 
few 
weeks 
after 

witnessing this naked dance 
party in the middle of my 
street, Michigan, particularly 
Detroit, had already gained 
the unwanted designation as a 
dreaded COVID-19 “hotspot.” 
Unlike most other American 
metropolises, 
citizens 
of 

the Motor City and other 
communities 
throughout 

southeast 
Michigan 
were 

uniquely vulnerable to this 
new 
respiratory 
disease. 

Like it had done in New 
Orleans a few weeks prior, the 
coronavirus took advantage 
of the states’ glaring legacies 
of racial and environmental 
injustice. 
While 
many 

nursing 
and 
senior living 

facilities were devastated by 
the disease, communities of 
color 
throughout 
southern 

Michigan 
were 
hit 
even 

harder. 
Of 
the 
1,000,000 

Black Michiganders tested for 
COVID-19, an average of over 
16,000 test positive. For white 
people, the positivity rate 
per million is only a fraction 
of this, at less than 6,000. 

Michiganders of color, as a 
consequence of generations 
of environmental racism, also 
find themselves significantly 
more likely to succumb to the 
disease. 

Heavily 
polluting 

industries, like the Marathon 
Oil refinery and trash burning 
facilities, have been allowed 
to nestle their ways into 
minority 
communities 
and 

dirty the air with government 
approval for decades. Filling 
the 
workplaces, 
hospitals 

and homes of Detroiters with 
stinking, chemical-filled air 
— unfit to breathe by anyone’s 
standards 
— 
has 
resulted 

in higher rates of chronic 
asthma. This, paired with 
less access to green areas, 
healthy foods and exercise 
facilities, is linked to other 
health problems later in life, 
like obesity and diabetes, 
which 
Black 
Michiganders 

also 
have 
higher 
rates 

of. 
The 
prevalence 
of 

preexisting 
conditions 
in 

these communities has had 
devastating effects.

Black 
Michiganders, 

despite making up less than 
14.5 percent of the state’s 
population, 
constitute 

nearly half of the total death 
count from COVID-19 and 
are four times more likely 
than 
individuals 
of 
other 

demographics to succumb to 
the virus. While the pandemic 
has shined an intense and 
tragic light on the effects 
of environmental injustice, 
public health officials have 
long been aware of them. Dr. 
Anthony Fauci, director of the 
National Institute of Allergy 
and Infectious Diseases, said 
that he hopes the pandemic 
will be the wake-up call for 
America 
to 
narrow 
these 

inequalities. “We will get 
over Coronavirus, but there 
will still be health disparities, 
which we really do need 
to address in the African 
American community,” Fauci 
said. 

The University of Michigan’s 

Michigan Medicine, one of 
the most prestigious health 
institutions 
in 
the 
world, 

could 
play 
an 
essential 

role in this mission. With 
University 
President 
Mark 

Schlissel himself a renowned 
immunologist, 
I 
at 
least 

expected our University to 
acknowledge the fact that 
our nation is not ready for 
in-person classes to resume. 
My street alone is littered 
with broken bottles, destroyed 
furniture, beer cans and red 
solo cups from the countless 
parties I saw there in just a 
two-day visit. The University 
could have chosen to be the 
role model on how to safely 
and 
innovatively 
adapt 
to 

yet 
another 
surmountable 

challenge 
in 
its 
203-year 

history. Instead, the school 
has chosen to endanger the 
very Michiganders it was 
founded to serve. 

With the pandemic still 

increasing in intensity in 
many parts of the country, the 
responsible move would be to 
make classes fully remote, 
encourage students to stay 
at home and avoid a highly 
predictable 
public 
health 

disaster. With students at 
many universities calling for 
tuition cuts for online classes, 
and some opportunistic ones 
even 
suing 
their 
schools, 

the University has instead 
bucked common sense and 
morality and has let greed 
become its guide. In the 
attitude of the multi-billion 
dollar corporation it often 
resembles, the University has 
chosen to ignore the health 
of Michiganders for money. 
Even worse, the effects of this 
dangerous choice will be felt 
disproportionately by Black 
communities. In wake of the 
Black Lives Matter movement, 
and 
with 
Michigan 
State 

University canceling classes 
two weeks ago, the fact the 
University is trying to feign 
ignorance that this choice 
will put thousands of Black 
lives at risk is inexcusable. 

By 
beckoning 
students 

back to Ann Arbor with this 
“hybrid semester,” the most 
brilliant minds in Michigan 
are tempting an explosion 
of coronavirus cases. With 
a 
massive 
student 
body, 

the Black communities of 
not only Ann Arbor and 
neighboring cities are at risk 
but all of southern Michigan. 
While it is impossible to 
say 
if 
Michigan 
students 

will 
resist 
the 
partying 

and irresponsible behavior 
that they fell prey to at the 
beginning of the pandemic, 
it’s difficult for me to get 
those glistening buttcheeks 
from March out of my head.

Why in-person classes are a racist mistake

RILEY DEHR | COLUMNIST

E

ditor’s Note: The author 
of this op-ed is a staff 
member at the University 

of Michigan. They have been kept 
anonymous due to their fear of 
retaliation.

Listening to the University 

of Michigan’s President Mark 
Schlissel for the last five months, I 
am shocked by the degree to which 
a Trump-like disregard for truth 
has overpowered our institution. In 
Donald Trump’s America, obvious 
lies are told without consequence, 
and unwelcome truths are silenced 
to avoid confronting inconvenient 
or 
unprofitable 
inevitabilities. 

Watching Schlissel mislead and 
lie to reopen the campus, I’ve 
asked myself: has truth become 
meaningless here, too? 

The answer is yes. For the 

past four years, I’ve held out 
hope that our institution could 
serve as a respite from the 
madness of Trumpian rule. I 
believe that despite its flaws, 
the university remains the most 
important institution in society 
for its contributions to freedom, 
democracy and reason. But I was 
wrong to believe we could avoid the 
deterioration and rot that has run 
through our country. Now Schlissel 
runs our college like Trump runs 
America: with dishonest impunity, 
at grave risk to us all.

President 
Schlissel 
often 

reminds us that he is a scientific 
authority. He told us we could 
reopen 
in-person 
“while 

maintaining the same level of 
safety we’d be experiencing if we 
were fully remote” and bragged 
that he has “the best research.” 
But he ignored requests from 
thousands of faculty, staff and 
students to see this “best research.” 
He refused to share the science 
behind his decision to call 30,000 
students from all corners of the 
world back to campus in the middle 
of an uncontrolled pandemic, even 
after admitting we lack sufficient 
testing capacity. 

President Schlissel said testing 

played a harmful role in the AIDS 
crisis, so we shouldn’t pursue 
more testing now. But a legendary 
AIDS activist called this the most 
egregious lie he’s heard this year.

President Schlissel demeaned 

worker demands for widespread 
testing as “science fiction” that 
was “not essential.” But a study 
out of Harvard and MIT said there 
was no way to prevent a near-
total outbreak without testing 
everyone on campus every two 
days. Another Harvard expert said 
Schlissel showed “a fundamental 
misunderstanding of the purpose 
of testing.”

President Schlissel proclaimed 

the 
University’s 
efforts 
were 

informed by our top public health 
experts. But a U-M respiratory 
infectious disease expert told 
The Michigan Daily that none of 
the colleagues she’s spoken with 
believe the University’s reopening 
plan is safe, and top experts 
nationwide 
harshly 
criticized 

Schlissel’s “lack of commitment to 
keep[ing] everybody safe.”

President 
Schlissel 
blamed 

students for forgetting their ethical 
responsibility to our community. 
His office placed culpability for 
controlling the virus’s spread 
squarely on their shoulders — if 
they didn’t avoid hooking up 
altogether, the outbreak would be 
their fault. But in July, his office 
failed to release a report from its 
own COVID-19 Ethics Committee 
that expressed “with urgency” 
that the U-M administration’s 
plans to reopen were unsafe and 
the negative consequences were 
predictable. 
The 
suppressed 

report leaked on social media in 
late August, after most students 
returned to campus.

President 
Schlissel 
lists 

diversity, equity and inclusion 
among his top priorities. But 
U-M’s Chief Diversity Officer sat 
on that ethics committee, and the 
suppressed 
report 
emphasized 

that “communities of color and 
other vulnerable people will be 
the hardest hit” by the University’s 
actions.

President Schlissel spoke of 

reducing law enforcement. But 
he supported a new policing 
program that formalized a city-
wide anonymous snitch system 
and expanded the mandate of the 
AAPD, which has still not been 
properly investigated for killing 
Aura Rosser. Similar programs 
elsewhere 
have 
been 
applied 

disproportionately on communities 
of color.

President Schlissel claimed he 

“didn’t know how to interpret” 
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s call to 
all state universities to close their 
campuses and tell students to stay 
home. But her words were clear.

President Schlissel called U-M 

a “family.” But he admitted that 
the University may fire its most 
vulnerable staff members and 
dismissed the idea of using the 
$10 billion endowment to protect 
workers, 
asserting 
that 
new 

construction projects will take 
precedence over existing staff.

All of this provides plenty of 

reason to worry, but we now come 
to perhaps the most troubling 
development 
of 
all. 
President 

Schlissel 
said 
he 
is 
guided 

by U-M’s values as a public 
institution. But when the decision 
was made to reopen, U-M’s Board 
of Regents was chaired by one of 
Ann Arbor’s largest landlords, 
Ron Weiser — a billionaire Trump 
megadonor who has given more 
than $100M to U-M in the last 
six years. He closed a new $30M 
gift within days of U-M’s decision 
to reopen. In one of the biggest 
conflicts of interest imaginable 
between 
public 
health 
and 

private wealth, Weiser’s company 
McKinley, which he founded and 
of which he is majority owner, 
stands to take a financial hit if 
students didn’t come back and 
pay rent.

To sum things up, President 

Schlissel said this would be 
a 
“public 
health 
informed 

in-residence 
semester,” 
but 

the public health experts are 

upset and afraid. Thousands of 
community members are upset 
and afraid. And our megadonor 
landlord regent is satisfied that 
he’ll profit from the students told 
to return to campus by President 
Schlissel.

People will soon begin dying 

avoidable deaths from COVID-
19 and the University will be 
culpable. Why did it come to this? 
Thousands of us were shouting 
warnings 
and 
demanding 

answers all summer, but we were 
ignored, silenced, made to feel 
powerless in our isolation. 

Authoritarianism 
happens 

wherever an institution lacks 
the 
safeguards 
to 
hold 
its 

leadership accountable to facts. 
I would tell you we stand at the 
edge of authoritarianism, but 
the truth is we have crossed 
that line. In front of our noses, 
a tiny group that is supposed to 
serve us has consolidated power 
over the largest public research 
university in the world, rendered 
truth meaningless and led us 
into an avoidable public health 
disaster. To point out the obvious 
invites 
harsh 
punishment, 

so this editorial is published 
anonymously. Many of you will 
be too afraid to even share it 
publicly; such is the culture of 
fear these rulers have created. 
If we learn anything from this, 
I hope it’s that the current 
leadership model has and will 
continue to fail us when we need 
it most. 

Perhaps in hindsight, this 

public health failure is not so 
different 
from 
the 
repeated 

failures 
to 
diversify 
the 

university. Or the failures to 
contribute positively in Detroit. 
Or the failures of allowing 
top offices to be occupied by 
sexual predators. If we ousted 
President 
Schlissel 
tomorrow 

but did nothing to change the 
increasingly privatized model 
of public education, we should 
not be surprised when history 
repeats itself with even more 
devastating consequences.

We are out of time to save 

our community from the most 
immediate 
consequences 
of 

President 
Schlissel’s 
public 

health lies, but I still hold out 
hope for a better future. This 
university is composed not only 
of a few powerful people at the 
top, but of tens of thousands of 
committed students, faculty, staff 
and 
surrounding 
community 

members who care passionately 
about 
education, 
intellectual 

freedom, 
truth 
and 
justice. 

We can run the University 
collectively 
and 
sustainably 

by 
forming 
representative 

stakeholders’ associations that 
prevent anyone from making 
major 
decisions 
without 

justification or accountability. 
Together, we can better serve 
the interests of our students, our 
workers and our society.

Another university is possible. 

The necessity of building it has 
never been clearer.

ERIN WHITE
Managing Editor

Stanford Lipsey Student Publications Building

420 Maynard St. 

Ann Arbor, MI 48109

 tothedaily@michigandaily.com

Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan since 1890.

ELIZABETH LAWRENCE

Editor in Chief

BRITTANY BOWMAN AND 

EMILY CONSIDINE

Editorial Page Editors

EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS

Riley Dehr can be reached at 

rdehr@umich.edu.

ANONYMOUS | OP-ED

The University’s summer of lies

Zack Blumberg

Brittany Bowman
Emily Considine
Elizabeth Cook
Jess D’Agostino

Jenny Gurung
Cheryn Hong
Krystal Hur
Min Soo Kim
Zoe Phillips

Mary Rolfes

Gabrijela Skoko

Joel Weiner
Erin White

Stanford Lipsey Student Publications Building

420 Maynard St. 

Ann Arbor, MI 48109

 tothedaily@michigandaily.com

Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan since 1890.

ELIZABETH LAWRENCE

Editor in Chief

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

The school 

has chosen to 

endanger the very 
Michiganders it 
was founded to 

serve.

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