Category: Opinions

Like many English and writing majors before me, I have considered journalism as a possible career path. Journalists write for a living, work in a community of other writers, and make a visible impact on society, all of which are extremely attractive qualities in a job to someone like me. It is a profession that relatives at Thanksgiving dinner recognize as legitimate and laudable. It has monetary value and may be associated with some prestige.

While I no longer dream of interning at NPR, I maintain a lot of respect for those who follow the path of a reporter. Journalists like Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times and Brooke Gladstone of WNYC’s On the Media podcast are among my personal heroes, and when they write, I read. From their work and work like theirs, I learn about the experiences of people I’ll never meet, gain insight into the socio-political climate in which I live, and am generally able to understand the world more complexly. Good journalism encourages empathy in its readers, which, as a fiction writer, is my goal for my own work. I have a lot to learn from great journalists.

However, the well-crafted and well-researched journalism I love has been under attack as of late. The President of the United States has publicly denounced the free press as “the enemy of the American people,” blatantly lied on national television and refused to correct himself, and sat back while the people who work for him tried to validate his lies by calling them “alternative facts.”

I have very little faith in the current president, so I was not surprised when he tweeted, “The FAKE NEWS media (failing @nytimes, @NBCNews, @ABC, @CBS, @CNN) is not my enemy, it is the enemy of the American People!” This is coming from a president who hired Steve Bannon, a founding member of Breitbart News, as an assistant and chief strategist in his administration. Breitbart is a news and opinion website that has been associated with the alt-right movement and relies on sensationalist headlines that are often murky on reality. For instance, this January, the syndicate published an article stating that President Obama had awarded himself a medal, when, according to the Associated Press (AP), the medal was presented to him by Defense Secretary, Ash Carter. They have also been known to run unproven stories, once claiming that Secretary of State, John Kerry, had funneled taxpayer money into his daughter’s charity without any basis in fact. Both articles attempted to discredit Democrats, and reinforce the idea that the “other side” is evil.

Breitbart and organizations like it are not new, they existed long before the digital age. People like to consume media that affirms their own beliefs. We know this. We experience it. But I think there is a crucial difference between someone with extreme conservative leanings reading Breitbart versus a liberal like myself reading the New York Times: facts. In her book The Influencing Machine, Brooke Gladstone reminds her reader that all journalists have opinions, and it is impossible to take oneself completely out of one’s work. It is possible, however, to write articles based on reliable sources and facts. As an editor for our little school newspaper, I have seen how printing something false, even by accident, is treated seriously. We have recalled stories, published letters to the editor that correct stories we approved, and apologized publicly to the parties that were misrepresented. This has only happened a handful of times in my time at the Star, but I have seen firsthand that it is a big deal to publish something false. People get upset, and they should.

The media has the power to plant seeds in our minds, and even if the incorrect information is recalled or denounced, not everyone will get the message. This is not as scandalous when the Star publishes the wrong date for a soccer game, but what about when the president falsely claims he was elected with “the biggest electoral college win since Reagan” and then cites he read it somewhere? If that is true, whatever he read was not good journalism. If it is not true, he needs to find a different excuse.

Either way, the American people need to recognize that the mainstream media, otherwise known as the “failing” publications the president listed, are their friends, not their enemies. They exist to help the public make good, informed decisions, and to understand their country’s decisions more complexly. And while the people who write and produce for these news outlets will certainly have their own opinions, they will also print the truth, or else face severe repercussions. Mr. Trump is not the first president to attempt to discredit the press, and he will likely not be the last. But the press is necessary to hold those in power accountable.

Before he became president, Thomas Jefferson wrote, “Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter.” The United States has a rich history of the relationship between the media and the government, and we are fortunate to have a system in which the press is free. But as consumers, we cannot let fake news outlets like Breitbart (or whatever that one person from our home church is posting) ruin real journalism for us. Continue to read with a critical eye as your education has taught you, but remember that the enemy of the American people is not journalism. It is blather.

After the most narrow victory in U.S. history with the votes 50-51, Betsy DeVos was voted into the position of United States Secretary of Education. Since she was first nominated, there has been a large population of people who have been worried about the possible effects DeVos’ policies and lack of experience may have on our System of Education.  

A couple weeks ago, a protest occurred against DeVos at a D.C. public school, which involved protesters denying her access to the building. As an educator, I don’t believe she’s qualified for the position and I disagree with many of the policies she plans to implement. However, denying DeVos access to public schools will only cause more damage to our public school system. How do we protest the actions of someone who works so closely with our children without creating other issues and halting productivity in our schools? How do we allow our voices to be heard, without our words being at cost to educational professionals, parents, and students? Recently, protesters have handled the situation rather poorly. We need to make it our goal to make DeVos hear our voices without damaging the day to day operations of our schools.

The main concern with DeVos is her focus on privatizing education and her perceived anti-public school agenda. DeVos believes teachers in charter and private schools are better equipped, and more likely, to lead the way toward better education. She believes charter and private schools provide education that will move away from standardized testing, and prepare students for the current job climate. These beliefs, however, are not based on empirical data. In fact, the U.S. Government site for education states, “Today, high school graduation rates are at all-time highs. Dropout rates are at historic lows. And more students are going to college than ever before.”

DeVos seeks to take tax payer money from public schools by investing in voucher programs. This process involves taking both a student and tax money which would’ve gone to a public school, and instead places them in a private school, leading to an increase in underfunded public schools. This presents a larger problem as the success of public schools has been shown to have a direct correlation to their funding. If a school cannot buy supplies or afford arts and music programs, they are less likely to succeed. If DeVos gets her way, we will see more public schools underperforming to the extent that DeVos claims they are.

Across the country, people are worried that public education will not receive the necessary funding and legislative focus it deserves, and so desperately needs. We need to speak out against her initiative to privatize and funnel money away from public schools in a more productive way. We need to ensure that DeVos spends more time in public schools, not less. We need to write letters, make statuses, and talk about what she’s doing. Increasing awareness of her actions while encouraging her to spend more time in public schools, not keeping her out of them.

Public schools are exactly where DeVos needs to be right now. It’s only when she gets in those buildings that she will begin to see the great work public school teachers and other education personnel are doing every day to prepare our students for the future. Discouraging her from entering public schools will only prevent the prosperity of the public school system, and the children being taught in it. Additionally, this will discourage DeVos from learning about public schools, which is detrimental to the public school system. Lastly, we need to find places to make our voices heard in places that aren’t schools. Our schools should be respected as institutes of learning and we shouldn’t seek to slow down the goings on at any school with protests. Protest at your town halls, not at our children’s schools.

In our society, there are so many opinions, ideas and prototypes thrown at us for what the ideal body looks like.  Sure these standards may change every few years or so, from small women to tall men, from skin and bone European models to our cultural fascination with “thicc,”but there is always a standard.  With lines of beauty clearly defined by society, there are always many people that do not fit into that mold of “beautiful” or “handsome.”

The people that fall outside these beauty standards feel inward shame, anger, and sadness.  These feelings  alone are a terrible effect of cultural image standards, but even more disheartening is that some people then form unhealthy eating as a solution. However,  this isn’t entirely a matter of choice, as Eastern University’s assistant professor of psychology, Michael Thomas, pointed out in chapel on Monday.  Biopsychology has found a genetic leaning that, with excessive pressure to meet a bodily standard, causes people with a certain genetic makeup to resort to disordered eating.  Disordered eating is not genetic-based or choice-based alone.   

Both women and men, but more often women, will conceptualize what they need to look like to be beautiful. To achieve this, some people undergo large periods of fasting (a day or more), with either large binges of massive calorie consumption or small meals between these fasts. Or they may restrict all their food and calorie consumption.  Others may eat vast quantities of food and “purge” it after a meal by vomiting or excessive workouts.  Some may feel they are two skinny and desire to be “thicc” so much that they eat to the point of pain and illness at every meal.

More people are affected by this than we think, and definitely more than we can see.  So what can people without eating disorders do to help?

Primarily, remember that everyone is different.  A key concept I’ve learned from my psychology degree, my Christian faith, and my friends who suffer from eating disorders is to  be empathetic.  Loving your neighbors and being empathetic towards them doesn’t seem like a breakthrough, but that is where we, as Christians and peers, should always start.  We must love our neighbors enough to pay attention to those around us.  Notice if someone is rapidly gaining or losing wait, notice if they binge or they go to the bathroom right after most meals (they might be vomiting each time), notice if they are losing vibrancy and energy.  Some people you think might have an eating disorder, may not in fact.  We make mistakes, but that’s ok because we’re still displaying God’s love by paying attention to our neighbors.

But if we do find a friend is showing signs of disordered eating, what should we do?  The worst thing to do, as a friend or peer, is to try to give the person therapy ourselves.   Instead, we should start by simply being present and being a friend.  Ask someone you noticed displaying disordered eating habits how they are doing, take an interest in their lives, and show that you care about their well-being. Please do not explicitly (and bluntly) ask a person right away if they have an eating disorder.  For example, show you care about the person by mentioning you’ve noticed they have lost a lot of weight recently or that they don’t really seem to be eating much at meals and ask them why. Then, both you and the person of a suspected eating disorder, should continue talking and pray God gives you wisdom and direction.  You may find out you’re wrong, or you may need to suggest they go to the counselling center if their condition seems dangerous.  Another option is to go online to the “counseling services” section of Houghton College’s website and refer someone (or yourself) to take a “free online confidential screening” if they are afraid of gaining weight or are worried about their eating habits.   But remember, you cannot force anyone to go to the counseling center, or to take a test.

There are no clear guidelines because every situation is different and people who have disordered eating symptoms are unique in how they deal with them. But I promise, if you approach an individual with a true sense of empathy and compassion for their well-being, you will be heading in the right direction.

I grew up in an area much like this one, where Confederate flags were spray painted on trucks with slapdash exuberance and men walking down the roadside with guns slung over their shoulders didn’t seem out of the ordinary. People in my town took care of my single mother and her four children: stray groceries and fifty dollar bills were always finding their way into our beaten up minivan. And when that minivan broke down, you betcha our mechanic fixed it for free. That’s why I love my area, and the area surrounding Houghton. That’s also why I am so upset at the rhetoric surrounding Donald Trump’s election. It demonizes those people and places I care for so deeply, and I am ashamed to say our college has not done much better at understanding the nuances of the situation.

Before you start feeling too self-righteous (or run away screaming), let me also say this: I consider myself to be liberal, and I understand the situation I described in the first paragraph might not work the same for everyone. I’ve often wondered if the color of my family’s skin would have affected our neighbors’ generosity, had we been a minority group. I’ve also wondered how it must feel for people of color to drive down those rural Western New York roads and see a bunch of white guys openly carrying rifles. Probably not too cozy. I deeply empathize with those who have felt marginalized or threatened in that way, and I understand why Trump’s presidency is so disturbing. It’s disturbing to me too. However, that does not change the fact that he is our president. The only thing we can examine and change now is how we react to it.

Thus far I have seen many of my progressive brothers and sisters act in an unbecoming way when dealing with Trump’s election. I’m not talking about peaceful protests: my husband and some of my best friends have participated in several post-election marches. I’m talking about the riots and the days of mourning without action and the language that tells many of my family members and friends that they are sexist, bigoted racists for voting for Trump. But many, perhaps most, of the people who voted for Trump didn’t choose him because of his immigration policies or his misogynistic “locker room talk.” They chose him because they didn’t think they could survive another term under a Liberal administration. As my uncle so eloquently put it over Christmas dinner, “I know Trump’s bat shit crazy, but at least minimum wage might not go up.”

To many of you, my uncle’s statement might seem callused and unaware. But if you understood that he’s a small business owner, desperately trying to keep a tiny grocery store afloat, what would you say then? What if you could see that grocery store, the only business in town, and one of maybe two job opportunities within a thirty minute drive? My grandfather opened it forty years ago, built it up from the ground, and my uncle is scrambling to keep the doors open. With the incremental climb of minimum wage, along with increased taxes and healthcare costs, he’s worried he might have to lay off more employees.

My uncle is not alone in his feelings of being overlooked by a Liberal administration. A man I spoke with recently, a first generation Chinese-American combustion engineer, was laid off when the coal energy plant he worked at was closed by the Obama administration. He had little sympathy for the environmental reasons behind President Obama’s decision because he and many others in his community no longer had jobs. These are not the people we think of when we sling insults around about Trump supporters.

One of our problems at Houghton is that we don’t have much interaction with the folks in our extended community. We are a city on the hill, so far removed that we can’t see the hurting people who live at the bottom. On the news, we see a man with a beer belly and a trucker hat hurling racist insults in the name of Trump, but we don’t see the moderates, the people who are just trying to survive in the only way they know how. My challenge and my hope is that you would go into our community and actually listen to these people, without defensiveness or excuses. If you can’t do that, I understand, but please: stop asking how Trump was elected and start trying to understand those who elected him.

Boy and girl meet at Houghton. Boy and girl become friends and spend years together, laughing and enjoying each other’s company. Boy and girl do not date or get married or fall madly in love.

Wait, what? How is that possible? This is Houghton. Couple Capital of the North East, where hopeful romantics come searching for the love of their lives, and in special cases, even walk away with a degree.

We have all experienced the constant pressure small, Christian school culture places on students to be in a serious relationship. Think about how quickly assumptions are made when a guy and girl establish a friendship: they are constantly required to defend the innocence of their relationship and claim, “No! We are just friends.”  “ Just friends” implying that there is something more to achieve, beyond the understanding, compassion, sacrifice, joy, sadness, and beauty present in every healthy, long-standing friendship, something that involves walking around the Quad four times, a wedding band, and lots of babies.

But, what if instead of believing that dating/marriage is the highest friendship, we starting believing that friendship is the highest form of friendship? Within the bonds of deep, genuine friendship, men and women can learn respect, honor, compassion and forgiveness for people so different from themselves, and we can learn to want the absolute best for someone, whether they are a stranger or a partner.

Of course, I am not asking us to disregard the unique intimacy present in romantic relationship or how they provide a distinctive view into the Love of Christ. But romance is not the only context in which guys and girls can interact, and we cannot forget that.

There are two major problems that arise when we idolize romantic relationships over strong friendships.

First, those who do not desire or are unable to date often become ostracized at worst and pressured to change at best. Whenever two single people chat or have lunch, their friends start prodding and winking. It is as if being single or not wanting to date is a curse we must overcome to reach complete humanness. But we are not made complete by the romantic addition of another human being.

We would agree that if a dating relationship exists only for physical touch and contained zero friendship, it would be rather unhealthy. So why do we consider a guy-girl friendship that does not involve physical intimacy unhealthy? Is not friendship the part that makes it so wonderful and valuable?

But the second, more problematic issue is that if we see every person of the opposite gender as a potential spouse or date, then we stop seeing him or her as a human being and lose the ability to foster positive co-ed interactions. We are afraid to grab a coffee or strike up an unexpected conversation with the opposite gender because it will look like a date. Seriously, if you saw a guy and girl eat lunch alone together twice in one week, what would you think?

The stigma and pressure surrounding guy-girl interactions prevents us from learning more about the opposite gender. We need to learn how to understand and serve those different from us without the fear that a friendly conversation is actually a date. We need to see those around us as brothers and sisters in Christ, as people we want to demonstrate sacrificial love to. Communication and empathy are crucial to displaying Christ’s Love, real, genuine, selfless love , to those around us. Besides, Jesus loves you more deeply, fully and completely than any human ever could, and you don’t see him trying to go out with you.
Chivalry is not dead at Houghton. Let us hope friendship is not either.

Most of us remember when Paula Deen used racial slurs and sexist comments about one of her employees of color in her restaurant in Southern Georgia. While still an issue, this overt racism is not the heart of the problem in the American discussion on race. The heart of the problem is the systematic approach that this kind of racism occurred within.

The scapegoating of one person, Paula Deen in this example, is an attempt to push the blame off of ourselves. We want to say that she is bad and we are good. We want to distance ourselves from the actions that have occurred because we don’t think that we would have acted in that way. But really, we shouldn’t be asking why she reacted that way or why she said the things that she said. Instead, we should be asking how we, as a society, produced someone who could act and talk in that way.  

So how did we?  Perhaps it’s because I, and everyone I know, is racist. Let me make it clear that this is not me pointing my finger at you and casting blame.  I don’t think that each and every one of us live in such a way that screams such apparent racism. Instead, this is me putting my arm around your shoulder and asking you to reflect with me on society, on the systematic racism that we live inside of.

Our society is filled with covert racism. This is subtle, and it is sophisticated. It can take the form of racially biased decisions and hidden discrimination that is deep within the fabric of our society. This prejudice is often unnoticeable on the surface or done in a passive way, then it is rationalized through explanations that our fragmented society can accept.

Drew Hart, in his book The Trouble I’ve Seen, comments on the way white society stigmatizes people of color. He states overt racism, like Paula Deen incident, isn’t the deep-rooted problem. The problem is we isolate incidents like this and fail to acknowledge the larger pattern running throughout society. There are patterns in the ways those in authority are suspicious of and target people of color. There are patterns in the tragic killing of youth of color, from before 1980 all the way up to the present. There are patterns in the way we think white youth who do drugs are “just trying it out,” but youth of color are instantly thought of to be a threat.  

We need to think about the way we come into these conversations, to remember  they are not used to build ourselves up and tear down others. We need to come into the dialogue with an open mind and, along with that, we need to stay aware of our biases and slowly start to rewrite them.

Further in his book, Hart gives an example of a conversation he had with his white pastor. His pastor told Hart that the cup between them had writing on either side of it and they needed to share with each other what was written on the other to fully understand each other’s perspectives. Hart dismisses this idea saying he already knows about his pastor’s point of view because it was all he was ever taught growing up.

Talking about our whiteness doesn’t help the privilege that comes with being white. Hart’s pastor didn’t enter into communication with an open-mind, he came in with an idea about how he could be a potential white savior to the hurt that could come with hearing Hart’s story. Then, he would tell his and try to make the playing field equal. The playing field is not equal. Until white America can move past their side of the cup, the one that is preached from every angle, and see the ways our society is hurting others in the body of Christ, we cannot move forward.

Jesus chose to be with the minorities. He sat among people that were different from him and called us to love our neighbors as ourselves. We need to be intentional about the love and unity we build in our communities, we need to agree that black lives matter, all of them, and we need to consciously battle the subtle racism and implicit biases we have wired into our society.

Although I cannot claim to know the answer to such a loaded conversation, I do know that reconciliation is possible and that we as believers are called to a ministry of reconciliation. So go offer a seat at your table and rewrite the biases in your life.

And I urge you: love your brothers and sisters well. Listen to their side of the story, not to gain anything for yourself, but to understand that their pain is valid and their voices are worth hearing too. Then, by hearing their hurt and victories, notice the similarities and celebrate the differences.

Despite the overwhelming negativity many people have expressed towards the United States in the past few months, however justified or unjustified, we remain an extremely blessed country. One of those blessings is the right to freedom of speech. It is this right which has given us the freedom to be negative or express dissent in the first place. However, if we are to call ourselves Christians we must realize this right is superseded by the responsibility of free speech.

There have been many exceptions to our American right throughout history, starting with the Alien and Sedition Acts at the turn of the 18th century, part of which was later revised and codified as justification for Japanese and German internment camps during World War I. The 20th century also saw heavy use of the Espionage Act against dissenters of war and other acts of foreign policy. People were prosecuted and convicted on the grounds of posing a “clear and present danger” for as little as throwing antiwar pamphlets out a window. Americans are just as bold, if not even bolder in expressing their opinions today, especially with the outlet of social media. If such laws were enforced as widely today as they were then, the majority of Americans would most likely be considered criminals.

In recent decades, discussion surrounding free speech has turned to international agreements and legislation prohibiting ‘hate speech,’ which is defined as “any advocacy of national, racial, or religious hatred that constitutes incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence.” Despite these regulations and the success of domestic laws in other countries, the stance of the United States appears to be against such laws because of its understanding of freedom of speech. For better or for worse, the constitutionality and real-life effectiveness of hate speech laws is still up for debate.

No matter where one falls in this debate, surely something must exist to uphold any personal convictions to treat each other with dignity across boundaries of race, ethnicity, religion, or gender, and to allow us to hold each other accountable for the things we say. Such a law does exist, but not in the realm of politics. It exists in the law of Christ. The whole biblical story is one of inclusion and defense of human dignity, and we should not forget that as gentiles, we all would be lost if it wasn’t. The Bible also specifically addresses how we should speak. For example, Ephesians 4:29 says “Don’t use foul or abusive language. Let everything you say be good and helpful, so that your words will be an encouragement to those who hear them.” Striving to follow Christ means that our words should come from a place of love and should be used to build up each other and the Kingdom.

Perhaps we need to rethink our understanding of the phrase “free speech.” Even though it places limitations on what we can say, the Bible is all about free speech, but in the sense that words have the power to set people free. Romans 8:1-2 says “Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death.” When people cry out to the Lord, he frees them from fear, guilt, oppression, prejudice, and hate. With one word he frees them from physical and spiritual disability and tells them to get up and walk. With the Spirit of Christ in us, we have the power to do the same. Instead of being inebriated with our right to freedom of speech, we should be honored by our responsibility to speech of freedom.

Does this mean that we forgo some of our American rights as Christians? I think it does. And I think freedom of speech is only one example. But if we consider ourselves blessed by our freedoms in the United States, how much more will we be blessed by acting for the Kingdom of God? I know that in my own life, my allegiance falls to the Kingdom first.

But I cannot speak for all Christians, and Christians certainly cannot speak for everyone in this country. Therefore, we should do our best to defend freedom of speech. Clearly there are many dangers if we don’t keep a watchful eye on its protection, and we have a lot to learn by listening to different opinions. However, we must also be careful that in defending someone’s right to freedom of speech we are not also defending hatred, discrimination, or messages that are damaging to anyone’s freedoms as a child of God.

I am a conscious human being with a decent sense of humor and consistent access to wifi, which is to say I love memes. Especially Gordon Ramsay memes. (And Harambe memes, Kanye memes, and my current favorite: CASH ME OUTSIDE, HOWBOW DAH). Memes are great because they are simple, condensed expressions of often complex cultural humor and even cultural critique, and social media platforms allow virtually anyone to participate in this new form of entertainment. At their best, memes are funny, they’re ironic, they’re egalitarian, they’re Micah-approved.

Any negative opinion I have about memes, then, is directed at those that are not true to what memes ought to be. There are, in my view, certain kinds of memes which are in fact destructive to our relationships, communication, discernment, and intelligence.

The memes I have in mind are those which serve as news for many individuals. These usually are of some sort of political persuasion, be it Libertarian, Green Party, Democrat, Republican, or anything in between.

For example, on the same day of the Women’s March on Washington I came upon a meme with the text “Claim Trump will destroy the country, [while they] actually destroy the country.” The photo showed a group of young African American people sitting on top of a car, with fire, protesters, rioters, and police officers surrounding them at a Ferguson, Missouri protest in 2014. (I know this because I did a google search on the image).

There are several problems here: the first, of course, is the blatant misinformation the meme spread by insinuating that the protests happening across the world that day were anything like the (arguably justified) unrest in Ferguson. The second is the not-so-subtle racism embedded in the picture and text combination. There’s a reason the creator of the meme used a photo of black protesters allegedly “destroying the country” rather than a photo of white people rioting. Which groups voted for Mr. Trump in droves, and which groups took to the streets following his election (and how)?

The third problem with this meme is that it uses the same method of humorous memes on news, which inevitably corrupts the truth. There is no way that the textual claim of the meme will actually communicate what those who are resisting Mr. Trump’s administration are claiming about themselves, nor does it communicate what those loyal to Mr. Trump see as “destroying the country.” Perhaps it is the opposite of “Make America great again?” We cannot know for sure if we are using memes as our guide.

It isn’t only those in Mr. Trump’s camp who do this. Many of my progressive/Democrat friends have shared a meme that by social media standards is pretty ancient, though it still pops up often in my news feed. The text, laid over a picture of Dwight Schrute from The Office, reads “You think being anti-abortion makes you pro-life? False. You are simply pro-birth with no regard for the quality of life.”

I suppose I agree with the very core of the sentiment, that one cannot be truly “pro life” without supporting political candidates and measures which would protect the sanctity of life after birth too. Yet I have to admit that this is what I am bringing to the meme: my own reasoned, nuanced idea which I’ve had years to ponder over. Is that kind of reflection what this meme is encouraging, though? I think not. In fact, I think this meme would have me lump all those who oppose abortion into a single group. It would have me ignore pro-life feminists and Democrats. It would have me lump those who wish to restrict abortion together with those who wish to restrict SNAP and Social Security disability benefits. It would have me uncritically assume that those who are anti-abortion/pro-life don’t blink an eye at poor kids and struggling single moms.

There may be a connection to voting for anti-abortion/pro-life candidates and supporting other conservative political agendas, but that is something one learns from sustained attention to reputable news sources, not simplistic memes.

I admit, the problems I’ve noted with each of these specific memes are symptomatic of the real issue. What makes the trend of political newsmemes so alarming is that so many uncritically absorb them with stunning ease. Perhaps this is because we have been trained to see photographs as solid proof or evidence; if we’ve got a photo, we don’t need research. Perhaps we feel too stressed and busy to commit to being politically aware and active, so we share concise memes instead. The reasons are understandable, but they don’t erase the fact that newsmemes do not and will never live up to the standard of reliable journalism. It seems to me that the most useful thing they’re good for is sorting how your Facebook friends voted.  

If you want real, quality news, stop believing memes. Stop reading fake news from Daily Dot, Daily Buzz, Buzzfeed, Huffington Post, Fox News, Mic.com, The Blaze, and Charisma News. Instead, close out your Facebook app and read the New York Times, The Washington Post, BBC, and Politico.com, all of which have apps for your phone and tablet.

In a small cafe in Western New York I overheard a conversation that exemplified why I care about immigration issues. Three men sat in the early hours of the morning drinking coffee together, as they do every weekend: two locals, and one Asian-American man.

Together they laughed, discussed Trump’s election, and their excitement over his recent decisions regarding immigration. “Trump’s gonna make America great again!” one man exclaimed, as they chuckled together. But then he paused, and turned to his Asian-American friend, “Are you gonna be okay? You know, with all this immigration stuff?” He was in support of large-scale immigration reforms, but when it came to his friend? He was worried. He cared because he had a relationship, and while it might not have changed his personal opinion, it certainly affected me.

His Asian-American friend is safe from the immigration reforms suggested by the Trump administration, but many refugees from around the world are not. Immigration from seven countries (Iraq, Iran, Syria, Somalia, Sudan, Libya, and Yemen) have been severely restricted for the next 120 days, giving the administration time to create a stricter vetting program for immigrants from those countries, with a ban on Syrian refugees indefinitely. The decision was made in response to the threat from Fundamentalist Islamic Terrorist groups like ISIL, which operate in majority-Muslim countries.

Starting the week after the executive order, I have been and will continue to protest this decision. From a purely humanitarian perspective, banning refugees from Syria indefinitely is a travesty of justice. As 11 million refugees fled from life-threatening conflict, they found themselves on foreign shores seeking asylum. It then became the responsibility of the free nations of the world to aid them.

With the introduction of the executive order, I believe it also became my responsibility to protest the ban. To march for the thousands of people whose lives will be turned upside down, and may never recover. I march to show solidarity to these people. Every march I have attended thus far has had refugees from the countries on the list in attendance as well. They spoke passionately, thanked us for joining them in protest, and mourned with us over the decision. This form of mass solidarity is powerful, and many people who came up to speak left the stage with tears in their eyes, emotional at the display of camaraderie. It helped me to understand those truly being affected by the ban, not militant warriors, but women and children, students and parents, simply trying to find a place to live.

According to Quartz, as of 2016, the US accepted 14,333 refugees from Syria. Due to the nature of this already long and difficult process, that number wasn’t likely to rise quickly. With the recent executive order, this number will likely shrink, as green cards and asylums are revoked, and Syrian refugees are detained and put on planes out of the United States.  

But if the decision would really protect American citizens from terrorist attacks, I would at least consider supporting it. The statistics surrounding Syrian refugees (and, in fact, refugees from all seven countries) however, do not support this. As of right now, there have been zero Americans killed by terrorists from any of the countries listed on the temporary ban, with most attacks on American citizens coming from Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, and Lebanon, none of which have been included in the ban.
Despite all this, refugees from Syria have been labelled as dangerous, and are being turned away from seeking asylum in the United States. The decision has been made regardless of the fact that most refugees from Syria are women and children, who would otherwise be resigned to live difficult lives in refugee camps, with limited resources and opportunities for their families.

So why do I march for refugees? I march because I believe that the United States has a responsibility to the suffering people of Syria, and to other countries being most affected by the refugee crisis. I believe that everyone has a right to safety, and to a legitimate process for seeking asylum in what has sometimes been the immigrant capital of the world. Most of all, I march because I understand that the refugee crisis is a human one, and that immigrants – like the gentleman in the cafe – can join the American community, form relationships and add to the beauty of our country. I march because refugees make America great.

“So was there, like, a huge breakdown at your college after the election?” Of all the potential questions I was prepared to answer about the election, this was never one I considered. Who I voted for, yes. Why I voted for them, yes. If my college was a sobbing, quivering mess on November 9? Not so much. Yet it’s a question I find myself having to answer. To grandparents. To aunt and uncles. To family friends. To the sweet gentlemen who administered my road test on Wednesday, as I was trying to parallel park. (I passed, in case you were wondering.)

My gripe with the question, besides my own inability to answer it, is that I think it’s the wrong question. Please don’t misunderstand; I’m not trying to minimize the legitimate reactions of celebration and grief felt by Americans after the election. Those reactions were important, but as we move farther and farther away from the election, our immediate responses to Donald Trump’s victory can’t continue to take precedence.  Of greater concern to me right now are the policies he’s announced since his victory, the splinter in our country, and the splinter in the church.

The last is particularly upsetting. No matter our political origins, I would like to think people of a loving and kind God could manage to show that same love and kindness, if not to the world around them, at least to each other. As a first time voter I can only hope the hatred and venom that parts of the church displayed during this election are not typical. Ultimately it is this behavior that I find concerning, far more than either Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton. The sorts of questions I want to be asked are “did you listen to people who disagreed with you?” “Did you treat them with kindness?” It no longer matters who cried when and where.  I want to know how our splintered churches are going to be made whole again.

My conclusion thus far: we need to look to what holds us together. Democrats or Republicans, we can agree in a common love for humanity. We can agree that God has given us stewardship of this earth and we need to take that responsibility seriously. We can agree that it is our responsibility to stand with and for the vulnerable. Proverbs 31: 8-9 states “speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy.” On these tenants, we can find common ground.

What, then, do we do with politics? This presidential election vividly displayed that common principles do not always result in a unified decision. So do we abandon the political arena altogether? I don’t think that’s the answer. The problem with presidential elections is that they fool us into thinking that they’re the pinnacle of political engagement. They’re not. They’re a piece of a much bigger system that affords its citizens all sorts of opportunities to stand up for their beliefs and put them into practice. The more we take our principles and use them to engage with post-election politics, the more we switch our focus from the things that divide us to the things that unite us.

These opportunities are not trite or irrelevant, especially on the lower levels of government. From a purely statistical standpoint, an individual has a much greater chance of changing decisions on a state or local level than on the federal level. It takes fifty percent of America to elect a president, but according to congressional staffers, it takes as few as fifteen Americans to sway a congressman’s vote. Fifteen!  It’s as easy as a phone call or an email. Five minutes out of a day to talk to a staffer or type a message. Five minutes! Houghton College, surely we can handle five minutes.

Even more, we can do it together. Every Thursday, a group of students run the “Do Something Table” by the steps of the cafeteria during lunch.  Their end goal: convince Tom Reed, the Congressional Representative of Houghton’s district to visit and in the meantime, sway his voting. Each week they prepare scripts for phone conversations and information about legislation that they feel needs to be opposed or supported. They alternate between advocating for the vulnerable with better immigration reform, and for the earth by supporting wise environmental policy. And they do it with one another, standing in unity instead of division.

As of November 8, I was deeply concerned about the presidential election. I voted. I discussed. I ranted and I researched. I watched a debate. But after November 9, my priorities changed. I’ve stopped worrying over who holds office.My interest now lies in how I can be an agent for change in this world. My interest now lies in how I can be part of the healing of the nation and involved in protecting the things I’m called to protect. What I offer you here is one solution. There are others. But if you, like me, are done with questions about crying and are ready to do something, it is one you might want to consider.