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In June, the Department of Homeland Security released draft amendments to the United States’ asylum policy. The 161-page document recommends narrowing the definition of persecution, and subsequently, the grounds for asylum in the United States.
With all that is happening in the world today, it is easy to get lost in what seems to be an endless slew of hopeless news. Between rising cases of COVID-19 and the ugliness of police brutality in the United States, it seems there is little reason to be hopeful for America’s future. I, however, look to the future not with despair, but with hope; the Black Lives Matter movement has renewed my faith in our ability to improve American society.
On July 8, the Supreme Court ruled 7-2 in Little Sisters of the Poor v. Pennsylvania to uphold a regulation that allows employers to deny women access to birth control coverage. Specifically, the decision allows employers with a “sincerely held religious or moral objection” to appeal to the Trump administration for the right to deny their employees insurance coverage for contraception. Previously, under former President Obama’s Affordable Care Act, employers were mandated to provide insurance coverage for contraception with no out-of-pocket expenses. The Supreme Court’s new ruling broadens the already existing exceptions to this mandate, allowing most employers to seek exemption from paying for employees’ contraception on religious grounds. The court’s decision is both patriarchal and anachronistic. It is time for decision-makers to stop restricting the rights of women and realize that infringing upon women’s reproductive rights sets back the United States as a whole.
As of late, political leaders have been painting an optimistic picture of a quickly recovering macroeconomy. These high expectations, however, are not always based on fact. Rather than forming these unrealistic expectations for the future, the prominent voices of today should focus on what we can do in the present moment.
In 2020, Black people are still being killed because they dare to be Black in America — because they dare to walk in their own neighborhoods or go for a drive. These killings, however, represent only a fraction of the violence the Black community faces. Current definitions of violence — specifically those regarding identity-based violence — are too narrow to accurately portray the violence that marginalized groups face. This violence goes beyond the physical and explicit — it lies in the subtext of individuals' language and behavior, outside of the traditional definition of violence. We must change our understanding of what constitutes violence so that Black people no longer have to be beaten or murdered in order for racial justice to be perceived as an issue worth pursuing.
On July 1, the Board of Trustees, College President Phil Hanlon and his senior leadership group sent an email to campus that emphasized the administration’s commitment toward racial justice.
Even before setting foot on campus, college students are warned about peer pressure. The danger of peer pressure is its ability to normalize harmful behavior. However, just as the development of the atomic bomb resulted in the creation of a clean energy alternative, our collective understanding of this psychological weapon gives us an opportunity to use its power for good. While peer pressure can normalize harmful behavior, it can also effectively normalize healthy behavior. The same way that there are dangers to the use of nuclear power, there are admittedly potential flaws to using peer pressure in the pursuit of a positive goal. However, it is overall an effective tool that acts as a guiding force for the uninformed in determining acceptable behavior.
When and if college students return to their campuses this fall, they’ll have to grapple with a lot of change tied to COVID-19 and social distancing. Sadly, one thing that will remain the same is the danger of sexual violence. In the United States, approximately 23 percent of undergraduate women and 5 percent of undergraduate men experience sexual assault or rape. With prevalence rates this high, all of us know a survivor of sexual misconduct, whether we’re aware of it or not. That’s why it’s vital that we take action to protect students and survivors on college campuses. The New Hampshire House of Representatives is currently considering a bill that would do just that.
In response to the killings of George Floyd, Tony McDade, Breonna Taylor and several other Black Americans at the hands of police in recent weeks, massive protests nationwide have called for police reform and racial justice. The premise of the recent protests — that all people deserve equal treatment regardless of race — reflects a fundamental truth, and one to which we as a society still fail to hold ourselves. Systemic racism and white supremacy are national and even global issues, but they manifest themselves at the individual and community scales. And Dartmouth is no exception.
This column is featured in the 2020 Commencement special issue.
This column is featured in the 2020 Commencement special issue.
This column is featured in the 2020 Commencement special issue.
Police brutality against the Black community has spiked in visibility over the past week. In reaction to these events, many people I follow on social media have been expressing their horror at the blatant transgressions of basic civil rights. All over social media, one finds reposts of Instagram stories, words of solidarity, the #BLM hashtag and links to donations for organizations such as the Minnesota Freedom Fund. The topic has taken online platforms by storm, and people are rightfully angry. We want to educate each other, and we want to spread the word that Black lives matter because the world has missed that message by a huge mark, time and time again.
In preparing to write this column, I considered many different topics related to the LGBTQ community: from the prejudice within the LGBTQ community, how certain identities are considered more acceptable than others, how one’s level of queerness alters one’s experience both within and outside of the community, the lack of intersectionality within most portrayals of queer characters or corporations’ profiting off of Pride. Even then, some part of me felt that all of these topics were too niche and too specific to the queer community for readers unfamiliar with these debates to find worthy of their time.