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8/2/2019 Spring Issue 4 Last Draft
1/20
BluePrintCAMPUS
MAYONLINE20
NCEugenicsProgra
m StudentLoanP
olicyOverhaul So
lutionstoRisingGa
sPricesTheStakesinVot
ing
8/2/2019 Spring Issue 4 Last Draft
2/20
2 MAY2012
THE FACTS ABOUT
RISING GAS PRICES
Dear Readers,
The stakes or voting in this primary
are high, and in this issue we look
into some o the reasons why you
should get out and vote on May 8th
election.
Students should vote or the tran-
sit tax because Raleigh-Durham-Cha-
pel Hill area is the largest metropoli-
tan area that doesnt have a light-rail
transit system and were expected to
double in size by 2030, said Student
Body President Will Leimenstoll. In
Chapel Hill, were such a walkable
city but the rest o the region is not
very accessible or students, espe-
cially ones who do not have cars.
In this issue, we explore how North
Carolina might oer online voter reg-
istration and its potential impacts
on voting, as well as the importance
o civics education and encourag-
ing voting in North Carolina. We also
prole o the coalition mobilizing
against Amendment One, a cause or
equality regardless o sexuality that
is more than worth the trip to the
new on-campus early voting site in
Rams Head Dining Hall, second oor,open rom April 23-28 and April 30 -
May 5.
Happy reading!
Chelsea Phipps
Editor-in-Chie
FROM THE EDITOR
CONTENTS
On the Cover: Most Important Meal
o the Day, by Asia Morris
chelseaphippseditor-in-chief
sarahbufkinassistanteditor
gracetatter, wilsonparkermanagingeditors
careyhanlincreativedirector
carijeffries, tylertranphotoeditors
michaeldickson, hayleyfahey, mollyhrudka, carey
hanlin, akhiljariwala, audreyannlavallee, ellen
murray, rachelmyrick, jennifernowicki, wilson
parker, libbyrodenbough, ludashtessel, gracetatter, nehaverma, kylevillemain, petervogel,
kellyyahnerstaffwriters
cassiemcmillan, jasminelamb, janiesircey,
paigewarmusproductionanddesign
annebrenneman, michaeldickson, mollyhrudka,
carijeffries, careyhanlin, wilsonhood, molly
hrudka, gracetatter, petervogel, kellyyahner
copyeditors
katiecoleman, gihanidissanayake, izaakearn-
hardt, sarahhoehn, rodrigomartinez, hannah
nemer, janiesircey, reneesullender, tylertran
photographers
rachelallen, cynthiabetubiza, sarahbrown,
michaeldickson, hayleyfahey, wilsonhood, sam
hughes, akhiljariwalajannajung-irrgang, jen-
nifernowicki, wilsonparker, gracephillips,
sarahrutherford, ellenwerner, akhiljariwala,
nehaverma, bloggers
travisclaytonsocialmediadirector
STAFF
The Bully Problem
Deciding the Race Question
The Facts About Gasoline Prices
Aordable Care Act in the Courts
No Child Le Behind
The NC Eugenics Program
The Real Silent SamAmendment One Activism
Civic Responsibility
Digital Age Voting
Disability in Lebanon
Student Loan Policy
Inhalable Caeine
THE EFFECTS OF THE
NC EUGENICS PROGRAM
STUDENT LOAN POLICY
3
4
5
6
7
8
1012
14
15
16
18
19
08
18
05
8/2/2019 Spring Issue 4 Last Draft
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MAY2012 3
30 percent o US students in grades six throug
10 are involved in moderate to requent bully
ing, as bullies, as victims, or as both.
86percent ofint
erviewedteens sa
id school
shootingsaremot
ivatedbyadesiret
ogetback
atthosewhohaveh
urtthem.
282,000 studentsarephysical
attacked in secondary schools
eachmonth.
77percentofstudentsarebulliedmen-
tally,verballyorphysically. Of those,
4percent said they experienced se-
verereactionstotheabuse.
n estimated 100,000 students carry a gun to
school. Twenty-eight percent o youths who
arry weapons have witnessed violence at home.
With the premier o the new docu-
mentary Bully, and the rising de-
e over gay marriage and homosexu-
ty in general, the topic o bullying is
wly becoming more and more dis-ssed in social circles. A belie pervades
ciety today that kids need to toughen
- that they are being coddled, and are
t learning how to cope in the world.
cording to this perspective, bullying is
atural way to make sure they do.
But it isnt. Lets toughen kids by teach-
g them to handle money properly, hav-
g them play baseball instead o Xbox, or
ping them learn to take responsibility
their actions. Bullying doesnt tough-kids up; it singles out their insecuri-
s and exploits them. It teaches kids to
te any nonnormative traits they might
ve. And it nurtures ear and promotes
lence in schools. Lets take it it upon
rselves to teach children to prepare or
e world, and stop bulling and harras-
nt in their tracks.
8/2/2019 Spring Issue 4 Last Draft
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4 MAY2012
Aer successully passing through abulk o Jim Crow laws in North Caro-lina in 1900, Gov. Charles Aycock ended
o words o congratulation, saying, Each
new generation will have to decide them-
selves an answer to the race question,
and each will decide it dierently. And
so while the Civil Rights Movement o
the 1960s spelled the end or the violent
white supremacy o the Jim Crow South,it doesnt mean that race aded as a nor-
mative issue rom the social conscious-
ness. Instead, the rise o the New Right
also heralded the transition into a new
orm o white supremacyone ground-
ed in unconscious and structural racism
and concealed behind a race-neutral dis-
course.
Hindsight is 20:20, and today its easy
to trace how the Civil Rights Movement
and its various orms o backlash had
turned the whole structure o politics
on a ulcrum o color, writes Pulitzer-
Prize-winning historian Taylor Branch.
The coalition o interests that is the New
Right began to rear its head during the
1964 election and today it has arguably
reached its maturity. The Deep South
votes almost exclusively Republican, and
the race-neutral narrative has permeated
our society to such an extent that the U.S.
Supreme Court is revisiting the constitu-
tionality o afrmative action programs in
higher education this year.
But the New Right could not have
survived this longand with this much
successi it merely painted a veneer o
racial respectability onto a segregation-ist platorm. Instead, a wide spectrum o
people identiy with its perspective, rang-
ing rom soccer moms to corporate Amer-
ica. The American Legislative Exchange
Council has drawn increasing attention
rom the media and various liberal move-
ments as a corporate ront-group that
dras model legislative bills in line with
its policies and its business interests or
state lawmakers. One such bill, tellingly-
labeled the Civil Rights Act, states, The
civil rights achievements o the 1960s
were designed to ensure that all citizens
are treated in a race- and gender-neutral
ashion. Its main provision? Eliminating
any sort o afrmative action program.
The subtle power o todays racism per-
meates the day-to-day, lived experience
o the average American. Although grand
statements about racial equality sound
good and well, the real issues that keep
parents up at night are whether or not
their children are receiving the best edu-
cation and whether or not they will still
have a job next month. Afrmative action
becomes the college admission spot that
will be withheld rom your daughter in a-
vor o a black student who did not work
as hard; it becomes the job that you did
not get because the ofce needed more
diversity. Thus, race-conscious policies ap-
pear as i they are merely giving an unair
advantage to minorities over whites.
To counter this narrative, the Le
needs to make clear how much todays
social structures unairly prop up white
advantage. We need to give greater con-
text to the American myth o the individ-
ual climbing the socioeconomic ladderthrough the strength o his or her own
work ethic. Today, Pakistan is home to
greater social mobility than the United
States; a 2004 study calculated that 50
percent o an Americans wealth is based
on his or her genetic inheritance. Yet as
Timothy Noah notes in The New Republic,
Americans are less likely to believe that
their chance o nancial success depends
on their parents incomes (42 percent)
than are Canadians (57 percent), even
though Canadian society is up to three
times more socioeconomically mobile
than our own.
And this lack o mobility is clearly
skewed against black amilies: In 1984,
white households had 12 times the
wealth o black households. Today,
based on the latest Pew study, released
in 2011, median white wealth is now close
to 20 times that o black households, the
highest since the survey began, writes
Isabel Wilkerson in the March 1 edition o
The New Republic. Until Americans come
to terms with the act that our society
is still structured to benet whites over
blacks, we will not be able to approach
the race question with anything close to
conviction.
WHY HAVING HONEST CONVERSATIONS ABOUT RACE MATTERS
SARAH BUFKIN
DECIDING THE RACE QUESTION
FOR ANOTHER GENERATION:
8/2/2019 Spring Issue 4 Last Draft
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MAY2012 5
$3.89 or a gallon.
At that price you might think you were
buying milk rom the grocery store, but its
actually the price o gasoline in the state o
North Carolina, an amount which has risen
$0.70 in the last our months. Conservative
pundits have blamed the president or ail-
ing to keep gasoline prices stable. But what
really dictates oil prices? And what roles do
oshore drilling, the Keystone XL pipeline,
biouels and Obama really play?
Below are several common misconcep-tions about the oil market.
Boosting oshore drilling and drill-
ing on ederal lands would alleviate
high gas prices.
Ramping up drilling operations is a red
herring. Seventy-two percent o the price o
gasoline is based on the price o crude oil.
The rest is split among taxes, rening and dis-
tribution. Crude oil is a commodity traded on
the global marketplace, which means that ithas a truly world price. Even i the U.S. were
to suddenly exploit all o its ecosystems in
order to suck black gold rom the depths o
the Earth, a surge in domestic oil production
would have a negligible eect on global oil
prices because the U.S. only produces less
than nine percent o global oil production.
The inow o crude oil rom the Key-
stone XL pipeline would make gas
cheaper at the pump.The Keystone XL pipeline, which will con-
nect Albertas tar sands with Gul Coast ren-
eries, has been touted by Republicans as the
ultimate savior or gasoline prices. However,
a bottleneck o crude oil transportation to
Gul reneries rom the Midwest has had
the opposite eect, causing a glut o surplus
MISCONCEPTION IN THE MARKET:SEPARATING FICTION FROM FACT FOR VOLATILE GASOLINE PRICES
crude oil that has actually depressed gasprices there. The Keystone XL pipeline aims
to provide record prots to Transcanada by
connecting the center o this surplus (Cush-
ing, Oklahoma) to reneries in Texas and the
Gul Coast that are in high demand o this
crude, which would raise Midwest gasoline
prices. Transcanada itsel even admitted that
approval o the pipeline would actually raise
American consumers oil expenses to Cana-
da by $4 billion a year.
Obama is to blame or high gas prices.
Republicans may accuse President
Obama o trying to strangle working
Americans into environmental submission
through elevated uel costs, but the truth is
that Obama couldnt raise oil prices even i
he wanted. As mentioned above, approval o
the Keystone pipeline and opening up ed-
eral lands or drilling would hardly aect gas
prices. Interestingly enough, domestic oil
production per year has actually risen everyyear since Obama took ofce, aer alling
eight years straight under Bush. Obamas
one option is to release oil or the Strategic
Petroleum Reserve to hedge against serious
oil shortages. According to Daniel Weiss at
the Center or American Progress, this strat-
egy might be able to reduce gas prices by
$0.24 or several months, but the eect at
best is limited and very risky.
The only way to solve our oil problemis with biouels or electric cars.
While this might be true long-term,
America does not need a massive x or at
least another decade as long as we take
some common-sense efciency steps to
reduce demand or oil. Amory Lovins, one
o the preeminent experts on developing a
clean-energy economy, points out that moreefcient end-use o oil, such as raising CAFE
standards to 54.5 miles per gallon, is worth
our economy the equivalent o $12 per bar-
rel, which is about 10 percent o the price oil
is currently trading at. Savings rom these
improvements could reach $70 billion per
year by 2025, and all o these could be imple-
mented virtually immediately.
What does aect gas prices?
The top actors are state taxes on gaso-
line, rising demand rom India and China
and speculation about geopolitical aairs.
So the next time you cringe as you look at
the ratcheting dial on the gas pump, youll
have a clearer idea why your wallet is being
drained so quickly. Maybe you should be
driving a Prius to the grocery store instead.
AKHIL JARIWALA
Environment
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6 MAY2012
As it appears increasingly likely thatthe Supreme Court will strike downPresident Obamas health care law in
June, the current conservative court is
poised to become one o the most activ-
ist courts in years.
Following three days o oral argu-
ments beore the Supreme Court, court
watchers have backtracked on their origi-
nal predictions o a strong majority sup-
porting the constitutionality o the indi-
vidual mandate and the health care law.
Many are now orecasting a 5-4 majority
overturning the mandate.
The turn o events has led many liberal
commentators and politicians, including
President Obama, to warn against what
they see as a potential overstep by the
Court, led by conservative justice John
Roberts.
Id just remind conservative commen-
tators that or years, what weve heard
is, the biggest problem on the bench
was judicial activism or a lack o judicial
restraint that an unelected group o
people would somehow overturn a duly
constituted and passed law, Obama said
at a news conerence April 2, reerencing
conservatives long-held complaints o
liberal activism by the court system.For many legal analysts, the growing
judicial activism o the Roberts court is
shown in decisions like Citizens United.
The well-known New Yorker legal writer,
Jeery Toobin, cited the case as he paint-
ed a picture o a highly political, activist
Court in a recent article ollowing the oral
arguments.
Now the Supreme Court acts as a
sort o supra-legislature, dismissing laws
that conict with its own political agen-
da, Toobin writes. This was most evident
in the 2010 case Citizens United v. Federal
Elections Commission, when the ve-
Justice majority eviscerated the McCain-
Feingold campaign-nance law (not to
mention several o its own precedents).
The ate o Obamas health care law,
however, has yet to be decided and the
precedents that led court watchers to
predict a ruling in avor o the law still ex-
ist.
Michael Gerhardt, he Director o UNCsCenter or Law and Government, agrees
that the case is ar rom decided, and
pointed to the recent Supreme Court
decisions Gonzales v. Raich and United
States v. Comstock as examples o prec-
edents that could persuade a swing vote
to uphold the health care law.
There is denitely a potential h
vote rom Justice Kennedy, Gerhardt
wrote in an email. In Comstock, the Court
also expressed, as it did in Raich, enor-
mous deerence to a ederal law based
on Congress exercise o its powers un-
der the Necessary and Proper Clause and
Commerce Clause. The law in this case is
based on a similar combination o pow-
ers.
The three days o harsh questioning
rom the ve conservative justices (really
ourJustice Thomas, as usual , asked no
questions), prompted court watchers to
issue grim warnings over the ate o the
health care bill, but may not be truly re-ective o the Courts current position.
We should remember that the jus-
tices understood that whatever they said
in the arguments would be made public,
so that most i not all o them were prob-
ably asking questions with the likely pub-
lic ramications or their images in mind,
Gerhardt said.
KYLE VILLEMAIN
AFFORDABLE CARE ACT
IN THE COURTS:
DEBATING THE CONSTITUTIONALITY OF
OBAMACARES INDIVIDUAL MANDATE
PHOTOFROM
THEWHITEHOUSEWEBSITE
President Obama greets doctors and nurses after signing the Affordable Care Act.
Health
PH
OTOFROM
THEWHITE
HO
USEWEBSITE
8/2/2019 Spring Issue 4 Last Draft
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MAY2012 7
Ten years ago, in 2002, Avril Lavigne was
cool, CDs trumped iPods and most o to-
days undergraduates were under ve eet
tall and just starting to read chapter books.
The same year, President George W.
Bush signed the No Child Le Behind Act
into law. The act redened the K-12 experi-
ence by ocusing on testing, school choice
and accountability and subjects such as
technology, math and literacy.
But although the tenth anniversary o
the law caused many to question its im-
pact on test scores, ew have paused to
asked about its eect on the very children
it meant to protect many o whom have
grown up and are now in college.
Academics and researchers have long
bemoaned how No Child Le Behind al-
tered the way American students were
taught, saying that it overemphasized
standardized tests and le little room or
creative curriculums and lesson plans tai-
lored to the specic needs o students.
But no one has investigated the eects
on students, said UNC Public Policy proes-
sor Douglas Lauen. Did more students who
were in elementary school in 2002, when
the law was implemented, go to college
as was promised? Were nearly all students
le behind in areas like critical thinking
skills and meaningul learning skills, as
ormer Assistant Secretary o Education Di-
ane Ravitch promised would happen in her
2007 condemnation o the law?
Many critics have attacked the act or
dumbing down schools. So, that begs
the question: are todays undergraduates
dumber?
What the law promised
In a September 2002 government re-
port, then-Secretary o Education Rod Paige
described how, with the enactment o No
Child Le Behind, the nation was embark-
ing on a new era o how we educate our
children. The report announced the law
would change the culture o American
education.
And indeed it did. According to the 2002
report, the law which was passed with
overwhelming bipartisan support had
our main principles: to increase account-
ability o schools and states; to increase
states power in how they spend education
unds; to give parents rom disadvantaged
backgrounds more choices or their chil-
dren and to emphasize teaching methods
that work. Additionally, the law promised
to enhance the quality o teaching and to
ensure all American students learn English.
So, in theory, students who grew up
under the law should have had better
teachers and higher literacy skills. More
shouldve gone to higher-quality schools
chosen by their parents rather than low-
perorming neighborhood schools. Minori-
ties and disadvantaged groups should be
better represented in universities like UNC-
Chapel Hill.
Learning how to learn
But despite the overwhelming biparti-
san support or the law, critics in 2002 im-
mediately warned the public this wouldnt
happen and have continued to do so
throughout the past decade.
Kristen Stephens, an assistant proes-
sor o education at Duke University, ex-
plained the pitalls o the law in an e-mail.
One o the most overwhelming criticisms
o the law has been how its changed the
way teachers teach and thereore, how
its changed the way students learn.
Beore NCLB, teachers engaged their
students in project-based learning, which
aorded students the opportunity to en-
gage with content on a deeper level, prac-
tice critical skills and immediately apply
what they were learning in a meaningul
context, she said. Following NCLB, teach-
ers abandoned such learning experiences
and resorted to a more drill or kill mental-
ity.
Stephens said that in her research, she
has ound most teachers eel they are be-
ing orced to reject the methods they know
work best and that this has adversely a-
ected students. She said she notices a di-
erence in the undergraduates she teaches
at Duke.
I think it is more difcult to get stu-
dents to think creatively and respond to
open-ended questions or which there is
no, one right answer, she said. It seems
a test-driven society conditions students
to expect that teachers are shing or a
single, correct response rather than asking
questions or the purpose o exploring vari-
ous perspectives, thinking critically about
the issues and ollowing [or] pursuing wild
hunches.
Policymakers and academics have also
charged the law by lowering academic
standards in order to create the illusion
that more students are procient than ac-
tually are. In a 2007 Wall Street Journal edi-
torial, C.E. Finn, president o the Fordham
Institute, said the law dumbed education
down and caused problems or students
in middle school, who were unprepared
because o the low bar set by No Child Le
Behind standards in elementary school.
Additionally, a literature review done by
NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND:THE EFFECT ON TODAYS UNDERGRADUATESGRACE TATTER
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8 MAY2012
Tenielli Trolan, a PhD candidate at the Uni-
versity o Iowa, and Kristin S. Fouts o the
University o Western Michigan, suggested
that the many cheating scandals associat-
ed with No Child Le Behind-mandated ex-
ams could aect the moral development
o students.
Eects o NCLB hidden at UNCFor all the criticisms o No Child Le
Behind, a study by Lauen showed that
the legislation raised minority students
achievement. But this has not necessarily
translated into more diverse universities
at least not at UNC-Chapel Hill. The num-
ber o admitted Arican-American students
actually dropped slightly rom the all o
2006 to the all o 2010, when students
would have been more aected by No
Child Le Behind.Proessor John Kasson, who has taught
in the history department or more than 40
years, said he has not noticed a dierence
in his students who grew up with NCLB,
but suggested that the eects o the law
could be seen more clearly elsewhere.
We cant measure the eect o No Child
Le Behind with undergraduates here be-
cause o our admissions results, he said.
UNC is not a good index o general educa-
tion.
The impact
Race to the Top and No Child Le Be-
hind waivers promise to change K-12 edu-
cation yet again. But it might be too late or
those who were raised under the measure.
We need learners who can nd the
questions that need to be answered rather
than learners who can answer questions
or which there are already known an-
swers, Stephen said. Only then can we
produce innovators.
But, Stephens said, those are not the
skills that have been taught in public
schools or the past decade. Perhaps more
research should be done to determine i
we were the children who got le behind.
P
regnant aer being raped at the
age o ourteen, Elaine Riddick en-
tered an Edenton hospital in 1968 to
give birth to her son. During the C-sec-
tion procedure, doctors sterilized her
without her knowledge.
The Eugenics Board o North Caro-
lina had concluded that Riddick was
eebleminded, promiscuous and
didnt get along well with others.
Aer reading a ew paragraphs about
her lie, the group made the unani-
mous decision that Riddick should be
sterilized.
Between 1929 and 1974, the Eugen-
ics Board o North Carolina authorized
the sterilization o over 7,600 men and
women, targeting the poor, uneducat-
ed and mentally unstable. Some vic-
tims were as young as ten years old.
Riddicks situation warranted much
more than a ew paragraphs o sum-
mary.
My problem was environmental. Icouldnt get along well with others
because I was hungry. I was cold. I
am not eebleminded, I was a victim
o rape, Riddick said through tears
at a hearing beore a state panel last
summer.
Social workers told Riddicks grand-
mother that i she did not sign the
consent orm, Riddick would be taken
to an orphanage. Illiterate and unsure
o what she was signing, Riddicks
grandmother eventually put her X on
the orm, allowing doctors to perorm
the procedure.
They cut me open like I was a hog,
Riddick said.
When she was nineteen, married and
ready to have children, Riddick nally
realized she had been sterilized. She
was orced to deal with the harsh real-
ity o what the state had done to her.
And unortunately, Riddicks story is ar
rom rare.
At the time, the state viewed steril-
ization as a way to limit the public cost
o welare.
They knew their reasons were
wrong, but they ound ways to justiy
their wrongs, their wickedness, their
cowardliness, Riddicks son, Tony, said
at the hearing.
In 1974, the Eugenics Board was or-mally disbanded, and ormer North
Carolina Governor Mike Easley issued
a ormal apology in 2002. He called
sterilization a regrettable issue and
told victims that we will not orget
what they have endured.
But Gov. Beverly Perdue has taken an
unprecedented step urther.
NEHA VERMA
COMPASSION
THE AFTERMATH OF THE
NC EUGENICS PROGRAMTO ACTION
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MAY2012 9
In 2010, Governor Perdue established
the Justice or Sterilization Victims
Foundation, and in 2011, she appointed
a ve-member Eugenics Compensation
Task Force, consisting o a ormer judge,
a historian, a ormer journalist, a physi-
cian and an attorney.
Victims have courageously stepped
orward to tell their stories and their
courage has inspired
more people, Char-
maine Fuller Cooper,
executive director o
the Foundation, said.
So ar, the Foundation
has received more
than 1,300 phone in-
quiries.
The number o veried sterilization
victims is rising more than 100 people
have been matched to state records
and others are still coming orward.
North Carolina was not the only state
with eugenics laws, but its practiceswere particularly extreme.
North Carolina operated the most
aggressive eugenics program in the na-
tion, sterilizing the majority o its pro-
gram victims aer World War II and the
Holocaust, Cooper said.
In January, the Task Force recommend-
ed providing a $50,000 payment and
mental health services to each victim o
sterilization, the creation o travelling
eugenics exhibits and the continuation
o the Justice or Sterilization Victims
Foundation.
I am putting together the compen-
sation plan or inclusion in my budget,
and I encourage anyone who believes
they are a victim to contact the Justice
or Sterilization Victims Foundation,
Governor Perdue said in a release.
It was really hard to arrive at a gure,
Phoebe Zerwick, the ormer journalist
on the task orce and a current proes-
sor at Wake Forest, said. We kept hear-
ing rom victims that the amounts wewere suggesting were insultingly low,
yet we needed to propose a value that
would be approved by the legislature
and politically easible.
While the state legislature is respon-
sible or the determination o the nal
type and source o compensation, the
matter has received bipartisan support.
I North Carolina does compensate ster-
ilization victims, it will be the rst state
to do so.
North Carolina state Representative
Larry Womble (D-Forsyth) has been a
key driver in the push or compensa-
tion.
We are the only state in this nation
trying to do something to address this
ugly chapter in history,
Womble said.
North Carolina is at a
position to be a leader in
social justice, setting an
example or other states
to display not only com-
passion, but also action.
And or sterilization victims, that ac-
tion is long overdue.
You are not orgotten, and you will
not be orgotten, Womble has assured
them.
Willis Lynch o Warren County, who
spoke at last summers hearing, wassterilized in 1948 when he was our-
teen years old. For decades, he has
been waiting or the state to amend the
pain it caused him.
Im 77 years old, aint got much time
to live, he told the hearing board. I just
hope I can see something happen.
My problem was environmental. I couldnt
get along well with others because I was
hungry. I was cold. I am not eebleminded, I
was a victim o rape. - Elaine Riddick
PHOTO FROM WIKIMEDIA COMMONS
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10 MAY2012
31 2
4
The Real Silent SamBY ZAINA ALSOUS
The Real Silent Sam Coalition gathered on April 4 or an event at the Silent Sam Monument. Held on the anni-versary o the assassination o Dr. King, with the Trayvon Martin and Troy Davis tragedies still serving as reshwounds, we sought to interrogate topics that are too oten repressed at the Universityissues o race, memory, and
welcoming in our own community.
The Real Silent Sam Coalition hopes to promote honest public dialogue and provoke critical thought surround-
ing the monuments and buildings in Chapel Hill and Carrboro. Perormance has been a signiicant element o our
movement. By engaging students and community members we seek to make understanding our history a collec-
tive act. With this event, the message o Can You Hear Us Now? draws attention to the struggle o students and
community members o color who eel that their presence is silenced by a monument to a violent racialized past,
while also underscoring resistance to a culture o social amnesia that perpetuates silence rather than critical ques-
tioning, dialogue, and reconciliation.
PHOTOS BY HANNAH NEMER
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5 6
7
1) The Real Silent Sam Coalition hopes to increase the
visibility o the untold histories o the University, using
the voices o the coalition to shape a more complete
historical narrative that emphasizes the implications
o Silent Sam or members o the community. Share
your own voice by tweeting about the campaign: #can-
youhearusnow
2) Hoping to create a space or conversation, the Can
You Hear Us Now? event took the orm o a communi-ty dialogue, inviting community members to join with
students in generating a orum or discussion.
3) The Real Silent Sam Coalition meets in ront o the
Silent Sam monument, which eatures a plaque that
makes no mention o the dedication speech in which
the speaker celebratory stated that he had once horse-
whipped a negro wench until her skirts hung in shreds
near the monuments campus location. The coalition
seeks to include an additional plaque on Silent Sam
that recognizes the monuments historical context.
4) Students and community members share views on
The Real Silent Sam and the ways in which the Uni-
versity can better address its past race-based injustices.
5) A UNC graduate student returns to campus to con-tribute to the Real Silent Sam Coalitions discussions.
6) Students voice concerns over Silent Sams promi-
nent and oen unquestioned place on campus.
7) Students and community members joined together
to discuss The Real Silent Sam.
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In these times o strong partisan poli-tics, it is easy to become disillusionedwith the government and political pro-
cess because o the lack o action in
Washington D.C. But to change this,
hundreds o students across UNC-
Chapel Hills campus are taking action
against Amendment One and are trying
to promote awareness or the upcom-
ing vote.
The amendment reads, Marriage be-
tween one man and one woman is the
only domestic legal union that shall be
valid or recognized in this State.
Amendment One is directed at mar-
riage, but gay marriage is already illegal
in North Carolina, said rst-year Peter
Vogel, chair o the Amendment One
Committee or Young Democrats and a
sta writer or Campus BluePrint. I this
amendment is deeated, things dont
get better or those people in North
Carolina, they just dont get worse.
Young Democrats are among many
campus groups mobilizing against the
amendment.
[Young Democrats] has a multi-tiered
strategy that was initially ocused oneducation, Vogel said. We transitioned
rom education to voter registration,
and in a ew weeks well transition
again to a get out the vote phase.
As many as 200 new voters registered
in a recent week, but Vogel says that
the Young Democrats will continue en-
couraging students on and o campus
to vote.
Recently, a multitude o bright yel-
low shirts advocating against Amend-
ment One have been visible on UNC
Chapel Hills campus. Sophomore Josh
Orol, who has been working with the
Campus Y Coalition Against Amendment
One, ordered shirts with anti-amend-
ment text.
Any students or adults can go and
meet once a week with the coalition to
plan or dierent initiatives, he said.
Initiatives include developing rela-
tionships with political parties and
NGOs, registering voters in the pit, can-
vassing and phone banking.
UNC students have also reached to-
ward the arts to raise awareness. Soph-
omore Rachel Kaplan created a 10-min-
ute musical ash mob that perormed
in the pit to raise awareness. A video o
the ash mob, which can be ound on
YouTube, now has almost 2,000 views,
and the video o the original musi-
cal Kaplan wrote now has more than
11,000 views.
On April 11, the UNC Wordsmiths helda poetry slam in the pit to speak out
against Amendment One, and on April
20, beore Relay or Lie, the Campus Y
Coalition will take over the quad with
demonstrators, a capella groups and
other bands.
The easiest thing to do is inormal
campaigning, Vogel said, which is sim-
ply talking to your riends about it.
UNC students are also planning to
voice their opposition in the most tra-
ditional, but ultimately eective way
through the vote. From April 23 to May
A CIVICO P P O R T U N I T Y
Amendment One Inspires UNC-Chapel Hill Students to Become Activists
ELLEN MURRAY
UNC sophomore Madison Scott shows off her
t-shirt advocating against Amendment One.
P H O T O S B Y E L L E N M U R R A Y A N D K A T
I E C O L E M A N
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5, students will be able to go to Rams
Head and cast their vote beore the o-
cial vote on May 8.
Anyone can go and vote, Orol said.
Even i you havent registered, you can
do it there.
This upcoming vote is pivotal or the
issue o gay marriage and civil union
rights on a national scale. Twenty-nine
states have already passed amend-
ments similar to Amendment One, and
North Carolina will set the tone or the
our states planning to vote on the is-
sue later this year.
I eel like its one o the major civil
rights issues in this country today,
Orol said.
The amendment will aect many
North Carolinians o all sexual orien-tations. Children o unmarried parents
could lose healthcare, and unmarried
parents o adopted children could have
issues with custody rights. The passage
o Amendment One would also apply
domestic violence protections only to
married couples.
Cases involving accusations o do-
mestic violence take much longer in
this situation, Orol said.
The Coalition to Protect North Caro-
lina Families points out situations in
states like Ohio, where this loophole
has allowed many convictions to be
overturned.
Thus ar, Vogel says the coalition
against the amendment has drawn
rom all sectors o society.
Its something our generation is uni-
ed on, he said. It is an issue that is
not dened by party lines.
A recent poll by Elon University indi-
cates that 60 percent o North Carolina
residents oppose Amendment One,
and that the action taken by students
and citizens across the state is makinga dierence.
Yet another poll released in March
rom Public Policy Polling ound that
58 percent o likely primary voters
planned on voting yes while 38 per-
cent planned on voting no. Given that
results in primaries are determined by
dedicated likely voters and not mere
residents, the PPP gures are most
likely more accurate.
But perhaps the most important nd-
ing o the PPP poll was how conused
likely voters are about the amendment.
When inormed that Amendement One
would ban civil unions, support or the
amendment plummets rom 58 per-
cent to just 41 percent.
UNC senior Je Deluca, a leader o
the the Coalition Against Amendment
One, hopes that the Elon poll captures
a more inormed ballot but stresses
that when voters know the true con-
tents o the Amendment, they reject
it. For Deluca, Orol, and the rest o the
millennial generation, now is the time
or action.Im going to stand up and scream
my head o, Orol said, because this is
whats important right now. More im-
portant than my homework, my class-
esthis can make a real impact.
A crowd of UNC students gather in the pit in a rally against Amendment One.
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In light o long-running trends and re-
cent events, no logical debater would
argue against the act that Americans in
general could use a good dose o politi-
cal knowledge and civic re-
sponsibility. National voter
turnout is just barely more
than 50 percent or presi-
dential elections. Public mis-
conceptions o government
ofces and powers dictate
campaigns and lead candi-
dates to blatantly misrepre-
sent political principles and structures.
And a horriying number o Americans
apparently know more American Idol
judges than they do First Amendment
rights.
The obvious solution is a month-long
remedial civics course or all Americans,
to be administered by the long-margin-
alized minority that is high school civ-
ics teachers. Think o it as goal-orientedpoetic justice.
Thats not easible, you say? That
would be an egregious waste o tax-
payer money, you say? You hated your
high school civics teacher more than
you hate bird poop or hospital ood,
you say?
Well, youd be right, although you cant
MICHAEL DICKSON
This shit in teaching methods may
require an inordinate amount o eort
to pull o uniormly and properly,
but our civics education warrants and
demands more than just a quick x.
POLITICAL LITERACY AND CIVIC RESPONSIBILITY AS THE
FRAGILE CORE OF DEMOCRATIC LIFE
REIMAGINING CIVICS EDUCATION:
speak or everyone. We cant put up-
ward o 200 million voting-age citizens
in classrooms or a month and make
them memorize constitutional amend-
ments or teach them which powers the
president actually has, no matter how
much we may want to.
What we can do, however, is set up the
next generation to be a little bit more
prepared, engaged and aware. Our civ-
ics programs as they currently operate
are obviously not working, and political
literacy in high school has been declin-
ing, according to the National Assess-
ment o Educational Progress.
Fortunately or us, the path to reorm
has already been marked. The answer,
beyond a simple re-prioritizing o civics
within the educational system, is what
is being called action civics, or the
more targeted idea o digital citizen-
ship suggested by the Education Com-
mission o the States.These new governmental initiatives
re-evaluate the traditional civics educa-
tion, moving the ocus away rom the
basic knowledge o dates and names
and emphasizing instead an active par-
ticipation and involvement in public is-
sues rom the beginning.
This ull engagement is urther en-
couraged and made possible by the
technological skills o the new gen-
eration. With social media and Inter-
net access, students can immediately
become a part o the public discourse
on issues important to them. Helping
them to nd these issues they care
about opens up their perspective to
the political community around them.
This initial awareness and interest is
needed to set them on the path to civic
engagement and political literacy.
This shi in teaching methods may re-
quire an inordinate amount
o eort to pull o uniormly
and properly, but our civ-
ics education warrants and
demands more than just a
quick x.
This method o getting stu-
dents to act independently
in the political realm can
have tremendous benets or this gen-
eration and the uture. Civic engage-
ment now means civic engagement
later, and action civics is exactly what
we need to create a more socially and
politically conscious wave o youth.
By giving young people this type o
education, we are giving them the tools
and the orientation necessary to be
productive members o this political so-ciety and to work or substantial posi-
tive change in the world. Maybe thats
what we need to shake up the publics
systemic ignorance o the processes
and principles o our political structure
and re-imagine what it means to unc-
tion in democratic life.
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Long lines have become a staple o re-cent election cycles, prompting manyto speculate whether online voting or
general elections is in the works. The
concept seems simple enough: instead
o waiting or hours at the end o a
work day at a designated voting sta-
tion, eligible voters would be able to
cast their ballots in the comortand
convenienceo their own homes.
I think online vot-
ing can only help voters
because its so easy, its
something you can ac-
cess rom anywhere in
the world at any time,
especially people living
abroad and the troops,
said Austin Gilmore, president o UNC
Young Democrats.
Rob Weber, a ormer IBM Inor-
mation Technology proessional and
manager o the Cyber the Vote! blog,
agrees with Gilmore.
Online voting increases participa-
tion among younger working voters, agroup that traditionally does not vote
in numbers representative o their de-
mographic. As a result politicians and
elected ofcials oen ignore the needs
and opinions o younger voters, Weber
said.
Yet serious concerns remain over
how secure and reliable online voting
can be, especially in a large general
election with so much at stake. One
such concern is the ability o a desig-
nated voting website to handle such
extreme amounts o trafc without re-
gional blackouts, which could seriously
impact overall voting counts.
In February o 2009, Finland experi-
mented with an online voting service
or its general elections, and approxi-
mately two percent o all votes went
missing due to internet glitches. Since
many states in the 2008 presidential
election were decided by relatively
small amounts, including North Caroli-
na, such glitches could be catastrophic.
In act, Finlands highest court ended up
tossing the results o the online votingin avor o a second, paper-based elec-
tion.
Online voting is not transparent,
and i you lose votes, you cant retrieve
them, said Joyce McCloy, author o the
North Carolina ElectionsProtecting
the Vote blog. You dont have the pri-
vacy o the voting booths-- votes arent
anonymously cast, and ballots arent
secret. This means that people can co-
erce you into voting a certain way, you
could sell your votes, or you could be
punished or casting a wrong vote.
Another major concern is the pos-
sibility o security breaches, both rom
aulty computer soware and hackers,
who may be enticed by the opportunity
to spoil a major election.
Peoples computers
are not getting more se-
cure, wrote Avi Rubin, a
proessor o computer sci-
ence at Johns Hopkins Uni-
versity, in the CNN article
Why Cant Americans Vote
Online? Theyre getting
more inected with viruses and under
the control o malware.
Despite the drawbacks, Gilmore
sees online voting as a potential cure to
the voter-ID bills that have been spring-
ing up across the South, which have
been accused o discouraging minori-
ties rom participating in elections.Online voting is the silver bullet
or the disenranchisement o voters,
Gilmore said. At this point, though, I
cant really see online voting as a real-
ity within the next ew election cycles
in North Carolina since its going to take
such a massive coordinated eort on
behalf of a lot of people.
JENN NOWICKI
Online voting increases participation
among younger working voters, a group
that traditionally does not vote in numbersrepresentative o their demographic.
VOTING INTHE
DIGITAL AGE
ONLINE VOTINGCOMING SOON FORNORTH CAROLINA?
NOT LIKELY.
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Discrimination against people withdisabilities ableism is a so-cial reality that ew acknowledge. In
the United States, many scholars in the
eld o disability, including Simi Linton,
the Co-Director o the University Semi-
nar in Disability Studies at Columbia
University, argue that ableism exists be-
cause being disabled is antithetical to
what it means to be American.
In a country where a persons value
rests on what she can produce, soci-
ety un-ables its citizens with impair-
ments by creating words such as spe-
cial needs and designing space with a
bias toward the able-bodied. In other
words, being able-bodied is a premise
to civic recognition here in the United
States, an observation which may ex-
plain why the term ableism is not as
readily used as its sisters sexism and
racism.
Earlier last month, I was in Lebanon
to look at ways in which ableism oper-
ates in another social, political and eco-
nomic context. I sought to understand
two things: how and why are people inLebanon unabled by society? To an-
swer those questions, I sat down with
Dr. Moussa Charaeddine, a prominent
disability activist in Lebanon and the
greater Middle East.
Background on Dr. Charaeddine:
Charaeddine is a physician who
ounded an organization called The
Friends o the Disabled. He started
his advocacy work in 1973. Initially, he
merely wanted to provide his two sons,
both physically and mentally impaired,
with a lie in which they would be rec-
ognized as people rather than objects
o philanthropy. Upon return, with a
degree rom John Hopkins University
in 1986, he ounded The Friends o the
Disabled.
For the last decade his organiza-
tion has run a private institution in the
Beirut area, which provides people with
disabilities with a wide range o servic-
es including therapeutic care to regular
educational activities. Charaeddine is
oen called upon to advise the United
Nations on its Convention on the Rights
o the Persons with Disabilities, which
was established in 2006.
Dr. Charaeddine, what are the chal-
lenges that people with disabilities ace
here in Lebanon?
Lack o civic inrastructure:The most serious challenges in the
eld o disability in Lebanon are the hec-
tic economic conditions and the lousy
social policy. There are a lot o inappro-
priate priorities and the governments in
this region tend to deal with their inter-
ests and to leave behind the coverage
o essential human rights. One example
is accessibility. There is a code o acces-
sibility or new buildings, which means
that in ve to 10 years, new buildings
will ensure physical mobility o people
with disabilities. But there is no Braille
or sign language included in the new
reorms.
Sectarian politics:
Lebanon is a multi-sectarian country
where you can nd a lot o minorities
and almost all parties are trying to gain
their rights and demands. Among these
dierent people are people with dis-
abilities who have their own demands
with regard to social rights, but whom
are divided among the socially diverse
society based on sectarian lines.
Philanthropic discourse on dis-
ability:
Sometimes people reer to people
with disabilities as invalid people hav-
ing special needs. They pity them and
approach them as people who should
be philanthropically supported as op-
posed to having their ull rights recog-nized. It is a big lie when they call them
people with special needs. All these
needs people require or their lives are
not special. They are vital needs: hous-
ing, medicine, schooling, riendships,
equal opportunity.
International
REVISTING DISABILITY
The Road to Unabling Citizens in LebanonAUDREY ANN LAVALLEE
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Classifcation:
People with disabilities are deprived
rom being able. People with disability
are able-bodied persons i they receive
the proper tools and services. Then they
will unction like others. What we hear
rom able-bodied people is their classi-
cation o the disabled: that some are
mildly, moderately or severely or pro-
oundly disabled. They classiy them in
levels o inability. For us, people who
are living with disability, we claim that
the problem is not these people being
classied. They are normal people like
you and me. What needs to be leveled
is the support system mild, moderate,
severe support systems. People are in-
capacitated because somebody is un-
abling them.
Socioeconomic dierences:
Ninety-ve percent o children with
disabilities are out o school, hospitals
and centers. Only ve to 10 percent are
enrolled in special education. One one-
thousandth (0.001) percent are included
in public schools, labor markets or inde-
pendent living. This is despite the act
that 15 o the 18 Arab countries ratied
the Convention on the Right o the Per-
sons with Disabilities.
There are no subsidies or stipends
allocated by the government to house-
holds that have people with disabilities.
There are no governmental schools or
them. People with disabilities are en-
rolled in private schools, which cost a
lot o money. The house that we created
with the Friends o the Disabled is a pal-
ace because rich parents gave us money
to build it. It cost about seven and a halmillion dollars to make the center. We
accept almost all children ree o charge.
We do receive six dollars by day rom the
government or tuition ees, but services
like psychotherapy and ergotherapy are
15 dollars by day.
Are there diferences between the
way disabled men and women are treat-
ed?
Being a woman is a double disabil-
ity; being a woman is one thing and be-
ing disabled is another. A woman in the
eastern countries are the providers at
home. They are aceless, voiceless and
nameless. They are the service providers
or theirs sons with disabilities, their a-
thers with disabilities, their uncles with
disabilities. They are the holders o all
the catastrophes. They suer rom all
the disabilities because they provide
the services, not the government. There
are women with disabilities, but it is
rarely underlined that there are women
without disabilities dealing with the dis-
abled in their amilies. I the person with
disability is not enjoying his lie at home,
the mother is held responsible. On the
other side, i one ather ties his sons
shoes in public, people will say Oh,
what a great ather, while the woman
who, day and night, eeds hims, changes
diapers, brushes his teeth--nobody tells
her what a good mother she is.
How are the Human Rights Conven-
tion on the Rights o Persons with Dis-
abilities applied in Lebanon?
The United Nations discovered that
80 percent o people with disability live
in developing countries and 20 percent
live in developed countries. In 1983, the
United Nations started to make recom-
mendations or countries around the
world, and I was among seven experts
to put this disability track in the U.N.Now it is the Arab decade or the rights
o the disabled, which will end in 2013.
In 2006, the U.N. issued the U.N. Conven-
tion on the Rights o Persons with Dis-
abilities, which is a socio-political tool
to be adopted by the governments o
the world so that people with disabili-
ties can access their human rights. For
three days in Cairo, I studied the ate o
implementation o item 12,19,23 o the
U.N. Convention or the Rights o People
with Disabilities.
Supporters as opposed to guard-
ians:
Item 12 is about the legal capacities
o persons with disabilities. A person
should enjoy the ull range o his per-
sonal rights, such as the decisions o
marrying, going to the bank, etc. This is
not the case in the Arab world right now.
A person with disabilities who wants to
get married needs to be with a guardian.
People with disability should enjoy the
ull range o decision-making. People
might say, but how can the people with
mental disabilities have the ull capac-
ity to choose their lives? This question,
the how, is your problem, not theirs.
We went to the moon, we made atomic
bombs, why cant these people enjoy
this right? Do you consider these people
not human?
Aer 18 years o age, there should
not be legal guardians or people with
disabilities. Fathers, mothers and sisters
do not have the right to sign or to mar-
ry on someones behal. A person with
proound mental disability can choose
a support person. This person must un-
derstand his needs. It can be his ather
or mother, but it can also be someone
he knows and trusts and who is able to
translate his needs.
Future o Disability:
Item 18 o the Convention talks about
the inclusive education. There is a need
to put children in the same place wherethey would be put i they were not dis-
abled. Inclusive education has a long
way to go. It is a journey. You cannot
just dump them there, you need a wel-
coming area with multiple stakeholders
who can play a role in the process, like
parents, the administration and the gov-
ernment.
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As the cost o attending college
soars, the job market stagnates
and states slash their unding or pub-
lic schools, students are increasingly
turning to private and ederal loans to
pay or their education. The market or
student loans, which exceeds $1 trillion
in the United States, is regulated by the
new Consumer Financial Protection Bu-
reau. While the CFPB is rapidly expand-
ing its mandate, its actions might be
too limited in scope to provide relie or
indebted students at UNC-Chapel Hill
and across the country.
The CFPB, an independent regulatory
agency housed inside the Federal Re-
serve, was created by the 2010 Dodd-
Frank Wall Street Reorm and Consumer
Protection Act in order to help con-
sumer nance markets work by mak-
ing rules more eective, by consistently
and airly enorcing those rules and by
empowering consumers to take more
control over their economic lives.
To this end, Rohit Chopra, the Bureaus
Ombudsman or Student Loans, has
launched the Know Beore You Owe
act sheet and the Student Debt Re-
payment Assistant, two tools designed
to educate students about the costs
o borrowing. Furthermore, on Mar. 5,
Chopra announced that the CFPB was
open or business and ready to hear
student complaints about the privateloan industry.
According to Kristin Anthony, UNCs As-
sistant Director or Financial Aid, the
private student loan industry lacks the
same consumer protections as ederal
loans. And because subsidized and un-
subsidized ederal loans or students
cap out well below the cost o atten-
dance, students increasingly must en-
ter the private loan market.
At Chapel Hill, 34.7 percent o graduat-
ing seniors took out loans in some orm
during the 2010-2011 academic year. The
same year, average cumulative indebt-
edness or Carolina students reached
$15,472.
In the past, this expanding market
or students may have been a boon or
duplicitous private lenders, who the
CFPB reports, do not generally have
the same borrower protections such as
military deerments, discharges upon
death or income-based repayment
plans as ederal lenders do.
But with increased oversight on the
way rom the CFPB, Anthony says pri-vate lenders such as Wells Fargo and
Sallie Mae have been lowering interest
rates to attract students and are clean-
ing up their act. For instance, banks are
making ewer loans to sub-prime stu-
dents who cannot aord to pay them
back.
While these reorms undoubtedly
improve the market or student loans,
they come too late or many young
Americans. For the rst time, Americans
owe more in student debt than in credit
card debt. The CFPB ears ongoing neg-
ative amortization- a phenomenon in
which interest on student debt grows
aster than students can pay o their
principals, meaning that student debt
can grow even i students drop out
o school and start paying down their
debts.
Faced with the prospects o mountain-
ous debt, students across the country
are looking or ways to save money.
John Son, a UNC rst year, says he is
considering graduating in three years
to save money and advises students tonever, ever, ever take private loans.
Alyssa Leib, another Carolina rst-year,
warns that nancial decisions made in
the early years o college can ollow
students or the rest o their lives.
I know people in their thirties who
are still paying o their student loans!
she said.
TOO LITTLE, TOO LATE?PETER VOGEL
How the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is Changing Student Debt
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warning to its maker detailing a list o
saety concerns, particularly about the
untested eects o caeine being ab-
sorbed through the lungs. (Breathable
Foods claims their product does not
enter the lungs. No word on whether
theyll be considering a company name
change.)
But U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer (D-
NY) wrote a statement prior to the FDA
warning that raised another question:
could AeroShot become the next Four
Loko? Four Loko, which savvy Schumer
mentioned by name, was a caeinatedalcoholic beverage that rose to wild
heights o popularity at rat parties and
ootball pre-games a ew years ago. It,
too, inspired an FDA warning. Four Loko
has since been reintroduced to the mar-
ket as a stimulant-ree product.
The FDA is probably right in ques-
tioning the saety o AeroShot. But Im
only an amateur ood-saety expert my-
sel, so Ill leave that call to them. My
unease, though, has less to do with
the awed mechanics o AeroShot
and more to do with Schumers im-
mediate assumption that college stu-
dents would start snorting their way to
drunken oblivion as soon as they got
their hands on some. This is
not to say that I disagree;
on the contrary, I commend
Schumer or having his n-
ger so rmly on the pulse
o Americas youth.
But isnt it a sorry
shame that we have to get
the FDA to ofcially warn
against products like Aero-
Shot rather than picking our heads up
out o the toilet and steering clear o
alcohol + caeine overdoses or a cou-
ple o weekends? Shouldnt we eel a
pinch o embarrassment that our elect-
ed ofcials logically assume the mereavailability o concentrated caeine will
necessarily lead to sel-harm among
college students? So, I say lets prove
em wrong. I you cannot resist the en-
ticement o that sleek inhaler, use it
or an exam-season energy boost. That
is, i the FDA does not remove it rom
shelves by then.
H
ave you always thought that the
one thing missing rom your gas-
tronomic experiences is aerosol? Have
you longed or calorie-ree avor deliv-
ered via inhaler, right to your hungry
stomach? Breathable Foods, Inc. is pre-
pared to give you just that.
Unortunately, consumers o the
companys most popular
oering, a blast o ca-
eine called AeroShot,
may be seeking not
space-age cuisine, but
blackout drunkenness.
AeroShot comes in
a small gray-and-yellow
inhaler that resembles
a bullet casing. Its web-
site advises using your AeroShot when
hitting the gym, taking a road trip or
staying awake at your desk aer de-
vouring a bacon double cheeseburger
at lunch. These suggestions appear
over an image o a hot, 20 somethingmale (he reminded me vaguely o A.C.
Slater) who is slickly pulling an Aero-
Shot out o his aded chambray shirt
pocket as he gazes down at it with a
very small, very smug one-sided smile.
The whole thing oozes sexiness.
AeroShot made headlines a couple
weeks back when the FDA issued a
BREATHING IN
ENERGY
The FDAs possible ban on caffeine inhalentsLIBBY RODENBOUGH
Shouldnt we eel a pinch o
embarrassment that our elected ofcials
logically assume the mere availability oconcentrated caeine will necessarily lead
to sel-harm among college students?
8/2/2019 Spring Issue 4 Last Draft
20/20
20 MAY2012
Published with support rom:
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