W

hen I think of a social 
media influencer, I 
typically think of a 

young, white woman promoting 
skin care products and niche 
clothing brands to her 10,000 or 
more followers between posts 
about her glamorous life. I follow 
a couple of influencers, vaguely 
interested in the pseudo-fame that 
comes with having an Instagram 
platform and occasionally taking 
their book recommendations or 
recipe ideas. I associated these 
influencers 
almost 
exclusively 

with young people and direct-to-
consumer brands until I stumbled 
upon an article about Brooklyn and 
Bailey.

Brooklyn and Bailey are twins 

who attend Baylor University in 
Waco, Texas. They have almost six 
million followers on Instagram. 
Their feed is filled with wholesome 
pictures of themselves in lakes 
and 
parks 
with 
“highlights” 

about dating, hair and clothes. 
Other than their unusually large 
number of followers, they fit my 
preconceived notion of Instagram 
influencers. However, they do have 
one unusual paid partner — Baylor 
University — which has paid them 
for one to two promotional posts 
per semester since 2017. Neither 
Baylor nor the women have said 
how much they get paid for this 
partnership, but with millions of 
followers, Brooklyn and Bailey are 
considered “macro-influencers,” a 
status that allows them to garner 
up to $25,000 per post for product 
placements.

It is likely that I never would 

have heard of them had they not 
recently 
contracted 
COVID-19. 

Brooklyn and Bailey want to make 
sure you know that Baylor has 
“taken every precaution” and that 
“it is NOT due to in person classes 
that this happened.” The post is 
not sponsored by Baylor, but the 
sisters seemed to have anticipated 
that people would have questions 
about where they contracted the 
virus, and that as paid emissaries, 
they would be best-off supporting 
Baylor’s policies. 

Schools 
want 
to 
sell 
an 

experience. That’s why they hire 
young, “cool” students to post 
on 
their 
personal 
Instagram 

or Youtube accounts. Because 
COVID-19 forced students to forgo 
most of the campus experience 
that they’ve been sold on, there 

is conflict. Brooklyn and Bailey 
got caught in the middle, getting 
paid to make their school look fun 
and inviting while simultaneously 
contracting a disease that makes 
the fun and inviting campus 
experience impossible. 

While Baylor may not be 

explicitly paying Brooklyn and 
Bailey to promote its COVID-
19 safety plan, the University of 
Missouri is doing just that. The 
Missouri school contracted with 
an outside firm to hire up to six 
campus social media influencers to 
spread information about campus 
COVID-19 guidelines. The amount 
paid to each ambassador has not 
been made public, but Missouri 
paid the outside firm, Glacier, 
$10,300 for the project. 

The 
student 
ambassadors’ 

captions read like they were posted 
by the University of Missouri itself. 
“I’ve partnered with the University 
of Missouri to encourage the safety 
measures outlined in their Renewal 
Plan (available through the link 
in my bio!),” one post reads, later 
promoting the campus symptom 
checker app. Other student posts 
are slightly more colloquial, telling 
students “we gotta be safe” or 
including emojis.

Most of the Missouri students 

have between 1,000 and 2,000 
followers, 
which 
is 
nothing 

compared to the reach of Brooklyn 
and Bailey, but still a sizable 
number of followers for what is an 
inherently local campaign. 

I can’t quite figure out how 

I feel about the practice of 
paying students for social media 
promotional material. On the one 
hand, at least before COVID-19, 
social media promotional posts 
were 
almost 
certainly 
more 

effective than the thousands of 
emails and brochures that college 
send to students during their junior 
and senior years of high school. 
Peer to peer marketing, especially 
for my generation, is an increasingly 
successful and common marketing 
tactic. As students who are usually 
only a few years removed from 
high school, undergraduates are 
likely to have high schoolers, who 
are 
prospective 
undergraduate 

students, following their accounts. 

On the other hand, as blogger 

Anne Helen Petersen points out, 
it is ridiculous that influencers get 
paid for promoting their school, but 
college athletes, who often promote 

their schools on national television, 
do 
not. 
NCAA 
regulations 

expressly prohibit schools from 
paying students for name, image 
and 
likeness 
activities, 
which 

includes social media. Additionally, 
students of color are regularly used 
in school promotional materials 
without compensation. To schools, 
these students prove that their 
campuses are diverse, welcoming 
places in much the same way that 
paid influencers do, just without 
payment. 

Paying students to be COVID-19 

safety influencers seems different 
in that their target audience is 
primarily people who already pay 
tuition. It’s about behavior, not 
directly about generating future 
tuition revenue. But as cases 
spike in Boone County, where the 
University of Missouri is located, 
it’s hard not to feel like a couple 
of social media posts calling on 
students to wear masks and use 
the symptom tracker serves only 
to gloss over the severity of a 
pandemic potentially spreading 
across the campus and university 
community. The University of 
Michigan doesn’t pay social media 
influencers for promoting COVID-
19 safety measures or otherwise, 
at least publicly. And why should 
they? During a normal September, 
Instagram would be flooded with 
thousands of unpaid students 
posting pictures of themselves 
smiling and dressed in head-to-
toe U-M gear. This September, I’ve 
reflected on whether or not I want 
my personal social media feed to 
be an inadvertent advertisement 
for the University. In wake of the 
University’s botched responses to 
sexual violence in our community, 
disregard 
for 
the 
safety 
of 

faculty and staff and seeking an 
injuction against its own Graduate 
Employees’ Organization, I can 
not bring myself to post with 
pride about the Block ‘M’ anytime 
soon. Number of followers aside, 
personal posts about U-M are 
advertisements for a university 
I cannot in good conscience 
advertise right now. To my fellow 
students who may be tempted to 
post a cute picture of themselves 
in Maize and Blue: I get it. But free 
advertising for the University of 
Michigan? I don’t think so.

S

omething seemed off.

On an unseasonably 

cold Thursday evening in 

Freeland, Mich., the “American 
Carnage” president stood side-
by-side 
with 
the 
so-called 

“American 
Dream” 
Senate 

hopeful. 
The 
crowd 
broke 

out into a chant, yelling “we 
love you,” at the bi-racial duo. 
President Donald Trump ceded 
the floor as, miles from a Black 
Lives Matter protest, a former 
victim 
of 
police 
violence 

praised law enforcement. In 
the automotive capital of the 
world, the businessman lauded 
the 
president’s 
trade 
war 

that hurt the manufacturing 
sector. In a former hub of 
the 
underground 
railroad, 

the great-grandson of a slave 
celebrated the president who 
called his ancestral homeland 
a shithole.

John 
James 
stands 
with 

Trump 2,000%.

On the campaign trail, John 

James, a Republican candidate 
for Senate, likes to tell the 
story of his family going in 
four generations from slave to 
sharecropper to truck driver 
to potential senator. However, 
James’s retelling of this story 
omits some key details: While 
his father did work as a truck 
driver, he also founded a multi-
billion-dollar company. While 
James likes to claim he hit a 
triple, the reality is that he was 
born on third base. 

James was raised in the 

upscale Detroit community of 
Palmer Woods. He attended 
an 
overwhelmingly 
white 

Catholic high school, Brother 
Rice, in the posh northern 
suburb of Birmingham. At 
Brother Rice, James learned 
the values of a warrior — their 
official mascot — despite the 
school’s 
logo 
resembling 
a 

rejected first draft of Chief 
Wahoo. Naturally, these values 
led James to become an actual 

warrior, 
graduating 
from 

the military academy at West 
Point in 2004 and serving as 
a combat pilot for eight years, 
including multiple tours in 
Iraq. After obtaining his MBA 
from University of Michigan’s 
Ross 
School 
of 
Business, 

he was hired at his father’s 
company, the James Group 
International, and became the 
director of operations.

JGI 
has 
a 
complicated 

business model which cannot 
be easily summarized in a 
sentence or two, but crucially, 
they 
rely 
heavily 
on 
the 

automotive industry. In 2012 — 
with the industry revitalized 
by the Obama administration’s 
bailout 
— 
business 
was 

booming. James leveraged the 
company’s success to obtain 
media plaudits, earning a place 
on Detroit Business Journal’s 
30 in their 30s — producing an 
incredible picture — and The 

Michigan Chronicle’s 40 under 
40, but he was not content to 
rest on his laurels. Instead, 
once he was promoted to the 
unclear position of “president” 
while 
his 
brother, 
Lorron, 

leapfrogged him to become 
CEO, James waded into the 
political 
arena, 
challenging 

popular incumbent Sen. Debbie 
Stabenow, D-Mich., in 2018.

If 
John 
James 
wasn’t 

qualified to lead his family 
company, he isn’t qualified to 
lead Michigan.

During the campaign, James 

became a darling of the right 
wing, dubbed by party leaders as 
a rising star due to his unicorn 
status as a Black Republican. In 
the primary, a perfectly timed 
Trump endorsement carried 
him over the line, beating Sandy 
Pensler by 9.4%. However, in 
the November general election, 
Michigan voters brought the 
rising star down to earth, 
delivering James a swift kick 
in the rear and reelecting 
Stabenow by a 6.5% margin.

For most politicians, this 

would be the end of the story, 
but John James’ ingratiation 
with the president boosted 
him to the top of the list of 
candidates 
to 
run 
against 

Michigan’s other Democratic 
senator, Gary Peters, D-Mich., 
in 2020.

James 
announced 
his 

second bid for public office 
on Fox and Friends on June 
6, 2019 — the anniversary of 
D-Day — by highlighting his 
military service and railing 
against “career politicians.” In 
the early days, the campaign 
looked the same as before — 
with many appearances on Fox 
News and other conservative 
outlets in a craven attempt to 
raise money. However, about a 
year later, when George Floyd 
was tragically murdered in 
Minneapolis, 
Minn., 
James 

saw blood in the water. As a 
Black man, James was uniquely 
positioned to talk to several 
audiences, and he threaded the 
needle like a true politician, 
releasing a Twitter video days 
after the incident where he 
said, in part: “Ending injustice 
in this country is not a political 
talking point, it’s a matter of 
survival for me and my boys … 

That said … normal officers are 
heroes. They put their lives on 
the line every single day for us, 
even when provoked by rioters 
like last night.”

While this statement sounds 

nice, in the last part of the 
quote, he refers to the peaceful 
protests in Detroit on May 31 
as “riots,” which is simply an 
egregious mischaracterization 
of the facts.

It’s waffling, double-talking, 

misleading 
statements 
like 

this that have earned James 
praise from the media on both 
sides of the aisle, and that is 
fundamentally 
wrong. 
The 

man talks out of both sides of 
his mouth on race, knowing 
that he can manipulate mass 
media into giving him positive 
coverage. Meanwhile, his paid 
advertisements in the Metro 
Detroit area include almost no 
mention of his conservative 
policies, while many of his 
ads in Upper and Western 
Michigan feature almost no 
mention of his race. However, 
since we are at a time when 
white 
journalists 
aren’t 
in 

the position to oppose a Black 
man on race — especially now 
— James’s strategy has been 
largely 
successful, 
peeling 

off some Black support from 
Peters while bolstering his 
support among rural whites. 
Many journalists may be scared 
to call out James’s lifetime 
of privilege, his lack of clear 
policy goals and his disturbing 
record on race, but I am not.

John James is a fraud.
Growing up, as a Black man 

from the northern suburbs, 
I would scoff at the idea that 
someone like me could ever 
have success on a national 
stage. When I first saw James, 
I smiled for a second, proud to 
see someone who looked like 
me with a background like 
mine attaining a momentous 
achievement as the first Black 
major-party 
nominee 
for 

Michigan Senate in my lifetime. 
However, once I did more 
research on the man, the grand 
illusion 
of 
the 
36-year-old 

combat veteran was shattered 
along with my hopes that he 
was above the party line. 

Sadly, James succumbed to 

the bright lights of Fox News, 
revealing himself to be an 
inauthentic politician whose 
praise of the racist, sexist, 
transphobic orangutan with a 
bad dye job in the White House 
offends my sensibilities as a 
human being, an American 
citizen and a Black man. I 
cannot justify voting for James, 
especially 
when 
the 
man’s 

hypocrisy is so blatant. That 
is something that everyone, 
Republican, Democratic and 
Independent can understand.

9 — Wednesday, September 23, 2020
Opinion
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

Improve your mindset to improve the mindset of others

SAM WOITESHEK | COLUMN

Block the ‘M’ posts

JESSIE MITCHELL | COLUMN

Keith Johnstone can be reached at 

keithja@umich.edu.

As a Black man, I am ashamed of John James 

KEITH JOHNSTONE | COLUMN

M

iserable. If I had to 
think of one adjective 
to 
describe 
the 

impacts of COVID-19, it would 
be miserable. With everything 
we as a nation have encountered 
these 
past 
six 
months 
— 

quarantine, 
a 
heightened 

intensity of the Black Lives 
Matter movement and a divisive 
presidential election — you 
would think we’ve reached our 
collective breaking point. Yet, 
for many of us, personal events 
have brought an additional 
source of despair in this already 
discouraging time. 

Recently, 
Fox 
Sports 
1’s 

Skip Bayless criticized Dallas 
Cowboys 
quarterback 
Dak 

Prescott for publicizing his 
emotions following his brother’s 
suicide in April. Prescott said 
that he “experienced emotions 
he’d never felt before” during 
the period of isolation, including 
“anxiety 
and 
depression.” 

Bayless responded by stating 
that he doesn’t “have sympathy” 
for Prescott’s depression as 
“the quarterback of America’s 
Team.” He emphasized that a 
quarterback 
shouldn’t 
show 

signs of “weakness” because 
it hinders his credibility as a 
leader.

People eventually die, yes. It 

is the most inevitable outcome 
in life, right alongside taxes. 
However, suicide is perhaps the 
most unexpected cause. One 
person takes their life every 
40 seconds, yet few people can 
pinpoint warning signs, making 
it an extremely traumatic event 
to process. 

Personally, I am shocked 

at the senselessness of Bayless’s 
judgement. 
Mental 
illness 

cannot be controlled with a 
switch; 
it 
doesn’t 
instantly 

shift 
from 
on 
to 
off. 
It’s 

uncontrollable — Prescott can’t 
choose whether or not he has 
it. According to the Anxiety 
and Depression Association of 
America, there are roughly 16.1 
million other Americans who 

suffer from depression as well.

Additionally, 
individuals 

internalize 
grief 
differently. 

What if Prescott opening up 
in an interview facilitates his 
recovery? Maybe he’s finally 
reached the acceptance stage in 
his grieving process. Bayless, on 
the other hand, has yet to even 
learn the psychology behind it. 

Not to mention, Prescott 

speaking up about a “taboo” 
subject makes him a stronger 
leader. The action itself can 
inspire others to use their 
voices. I imagine Prescott’s 
teammates are ready to run 
through a wall for him and 
may confide in him before 
other players. When a support 
network is created through 
an 
emotional 
circumstance, 

especially at a poignant time, it 
creates unbreakable unity.

As much as some of us would 

like to categorize how we feel 
solely 
as 
“pandemic-related 

depression,” we cannot. These 
days, it is nearly impossible 
to separate the causes of our 
internal 
emotional 
status. 

Someone can simultaneously be 
anxious about contracting the 
virus and saddened by forced 
isolation from others. Worse 
yet, the two distinct emotions 
can be strikingly similar. Now, 
add the impact of a family 
member’s death. That burden 
bears 
exponentially 
more 

weight.

In our society, there are 

too 
many 
individuals 
who 

fail to understand both the 

seriousness of depression and 
lack the ability to sympathize 
with those affected by the 
illness. 
Bayless 
could 
have 

publicly apologized the next day 
on his show and emphasized 
that he made a grave error in 
judgement. But he didn’t. How 
apathetic can a person be before 
they realize the extent of their 
words?

I believe we, as humans, are 

compassionate at our core. Even 
though we don’t always show it, 
we always contain the ability 
to help others. We want to 
counsel those who are grieving, 
by lessening their isolation and 
thus easing their pain. Why 
should we settle for anything 
less?

In 
this 
current 
time 

especially, 
we 
have 
to 
be 

proactive in assisting those 
with mental illness. We cannot 
idly stand by, watching them 
become worse while knowing 
we can help. Instead, we must 
ask ourselves — and others — 
how we can facilitate aid. For 
those of us who are unsure of 
how to do so, we can start by 
educating ourselves. We don’t 
need to be heroes, but even a 
small, concentrated effort can 
make a big difference. 

When COVID-19 reaches its 

conclusion, I hope that people 
realize the power of altruism 
to produce good in this world. 
This selflessness can come in 
many forms, but it is required. 
The ability to sympathize with 
and comfort those in pain 
will be different for everyone. 
Regardless, providing emotional 
support is a task we are more 
than capable of accomplishing. 

If you or someone you know 

has a mental illness, is struggling 
emotionally, or has concerns 
about 
their 
mental 
health, 

there are ways to get help. Call 
1-800-273-TALK (8255) or text 
“HELLO” to 741741.

Even a small, 
concentrated 

effort can make a 

big difference.

Sam Woiteshek can be reached at 

swoitesh@umich.edu.

Jessie Mitchell can be reached at 

jessiemi@umich.edu.

I cannot justify 
voting for James, 

especially 

when the man’s 
hypocrisy is so 

blatant.

JENNA SCHEEN | CONTACT CARTOONIST AT JSCHEEN@UMICH.EDU

