Watching the Academy Awards a few weeks ago was a bit of a stressful experience.
I was obviously stressed about whether or not Emma Stone would finally win an Oscar, but the stakes were bigger than that.
From the very beginning of this awards season, the conversation was clouded by last year’s Oscar’s So White controversy, where the show’s 88th run was criticized for a lack of diversity among its nominees.
This year’s ceremony was definitely a test of the relevance and awareness of the Academy, but it represented something more.
The entire country watched this year’s Academy Awards with bated breath, with a sense the results of the ceremony said more about themselves than the actors.
Collectively, we tend to use pop culture as a barometer for how we’re doing as a country; is that really fair to either?
For the few (brief) moments La La Land was 2016’s Best Picture, I could almost see the furious typing of Buzzfeed opinion columnists, writing the think piece of the year about what La La Land’s defeat of Moonlight meant about race in America.
They appeared within minutes when Adele’s 25 beat Beyonce’s Lemonade for Album of the Year a few weeks earlier at another high-profile awards show.
It’s not an unfair criticism to make, it might even be a necessary one.
Commentary and discourse about the results of the biggest acknowledgement of excellence within the entertainment industry is what keeps it moving forward.
The problem occurs when we take it a step too far.
An interesting phenomenon has popped up in the discourse about Hollywood’s diversity: the application of that discussion for a wider purpose in the political sphere.
There looms a need to connect entertainment stories to more “important” stories, such as ones related to the political climate.
Everything that happens in the world of entertainment is played off to represent something bigger.
A perfect example of this was the inaccurate announcing of La La Land as Best Picture.
The unfortunate mistake saw Moonlight literally taking the most coveted award in the movie industry from La La Land’s hands.
The conflict between those two movies lasted all throughout awards season, and many saw it as a direct reflection of the political polarization taking place in America.
The trend of the underdog win has not gone unnoticed in the last several months, either.
From Donald Trump unexpectedly winning on election night to the Patriots’ fourth quarter comeback in the Super Bowl, many saw Moonlight as a reiteration of that same trend.
It provides an easy answer, and, in Moonlight’s case, it’s exactly the answer we want.
In a time of unprecedented political polarization, it feels good to think we can all be as accepting as Moonlight.
The reality is not that easy.
Pop culture isn’t really a direct reflection of our political climate.
In fact, it’s often the opposite.
One of the biggest reasons La La Land was so dominant this awards season was because of its sense of escapism – it was refreshing to see something so not important.
It wasn’t trying to reflect our current political climate, it wasn’t trying to teach the audience a lesson.
It was simply telling a story, which is what all pop culture really goes back to.
The age of Trump has turned everything on its head, however.
La La Land didn’t win Best Picture.
Moonlight did, and that’s whatever the opposite of what escapism is.
That detail may be indicative that people are looking for a more relevant pop culture.
Still, that doesn’t change the fact that it’s nothing more than wishful thinking.
Here’s what it comes down to: both entertainment and politics are a reflection of who we are.
Both take the struggles of real people and harness those emotions on a national stage.
There’s a fundamental difference between the two, however.
Politics is a direct reflection of who we are; politicians are elected by the people, after all.
On the other hand, entertainment is often a reflection of who we want to be.
The stories that are told, from Moonlight to La La Land and Lemonade to 25 represent where we want to be going, not necessarily where we are.
Using pop culture as a barometer is only somewhat effective.
Moonlight’s win at the Academy Awards does not mean racism in America is over, in fact it doesn’t even mean racism in Hollywood is over.
The Pop Culture Barometer as a construct is an oversimplification.
Hollywood’s failures are not America’s failures, their successes are not our successes, and vice versa.
Pop culture is a representation of everything we want to be, and it’s often a reflection of the very best of ourselves.
Using it to try to explain things like political polarization is where the comparison fails.
At the end of the day, understanding where we want to go is crucial to understanding ourselves, but it doesn’t do anything to describe where we are now.
So while it’s great to know we all want to be Emma Stone, it’s important to realize we’re not quite there yet.
RISE NEWS is a grassroots journalism news organization that is working to change the way young people become informed and engaged in the world. You can write for us.
This is an opinion piece. It is the opinion of the author and does not necessarily represent the views of RISE NEWS.
Cover Photo Credit: La La Land/ Facebook
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Why Is It So Hard To Move Away From Fossil Fuels?
By Sonam Ahluwalia
The idea of a one-hundred percent clean energy future seems to be a pipe dream right now.
While there has been some tremendous progress made by private industry in the creation of innovative technologies to lead the transition from non-renewable resources like coal and natural gas to natural elements, the process has been painfully slow.
No matter the number of technologies created, private companies cannot move forward without the public’s support.
The largest challenge is unity.
The private sector lacks the current partnerships to address current issues with renewable energy.
For example, currently, wind turbines use many magnets derived from rare earth minerals- most of which are ripped out of the ground in China.
This has created an ecological disaster in areas there.
These minerals are also unreliable in the longterm because they are limited.
After all, you can only take so much out of the ground before you run out and searching for alternatives to these minerals requires collaboration, which can occur through partnerships that generates a more dependable and sustainable wind turbine.
Furthermore, there also needs to be unity between companies and the general public they service.
If engineers working on magnetic wind turbines or photovoltaic solar panels view their role as imperative innovators, the public can take the role as active supporters or consumers that create a market for renewable energy.
In short, we all have to be pushing in the same direction in order for this to work.
In order for the public to support the private industry, vice versa, the communication gap between these two entities needs to be closed.
This can happen through proper education and through transparency.
Many people do not understand the benefits of cleaner energy, or how much energy we currently waste and have stored in grids from excess.
Just like people learn how to turn on the lights, set up the television, and turn on the water, people should also know where these luxuries come from.
Proper education of the current, wasteful methods can influence a large portion of the public to support cleaner energy.
As people become more educated on sustainable options, a market for cleaner energy sources needs to be created – another challenge.
Supply and demand are interdependent.
For the private sector to gain more momentum, the public needs to show an appetite for cleaner energy sources.
As the demand for renewable energy increases, competition to meet the public’s requests will stimulate production of more affordable sustainable products with higher quality.
Affordability is imperative to consumers, and it is easier to convince someone to buy something that is more energy sustainable when they are able to understand the financial benefits.
Adding competition to the mix will push companies to fabricate better, cheaper ideas.
This in term will allow those products to be available to the general public at a competitive price point.
This sector’s growth requires regulatory policies to ensure that the energy is actually clean.
Since clean energy is an ever-changing field, creating policies to assure quality is a fairly new conflict the government must learn to follow.
RISE NEWS is a grassroots journalism news organization that is working to change the way young people become informed and engaged in the world. You can write for us.
Cover Photo Credit: Activ Solar/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)
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Japan Seems Ready To Do Anything In Order To Strengthen Ties With The US
The Trans-Pacific Partnership was bashed in the 2016 elections by both Democrats and Republicans.
It was portrayed in the campaign as another “bad” trade deal that would cost our country decent jobs and lower wages.
It was no surprise when President Donald Trump pulled the U.S. out of the TPP in his fourth day of office and suggested focusing on more bilateral trade agreements.
Whether or not Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe tried to convince Trump in November to stay in the TPP during their first meeting, it is apparent he has changed his tune now.
Abe seemed optimistic about replacing the TPP with investments from Japan in America’s infrastructure, suggesting a railway that uses their high-speed technology and increased bilateral trade during a trip to the US.
Sounds too good to be true?
The Japanese government has already invested two million in a maglev line project that would connect Baltimore, Maryland to Washington and expects the forty-mile line to open in a decade at an estimated cost of ten billion, with them covering much of the cost.
Many young Americans may be unfamiliar with this meeting, but as our generation starts to shape the public opinion of the time, it is critical that attention is paid to East Asia, as well as other parts of the world.
A 2015 survey by Pew Research Center found that seventy-three percent of Americans had never heard of the Japanese Prime Minister, who has served since 2012.
I asked Dr. William Boettcher in the Political Science Department at North Carolina State University why our relationship to Japan should matter to the incoming generation.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe meeting with American Defense Secretary Jim Mattis. Photo Credit: Jim Mattis/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)
“Japan is the chief U.S. ally in East Asia (with South Korea a close second) and is a key contributor to stability in this very important region,” Boettcher told me. “Japan hosts significant deployments of American troops and is also our fourth-largest trading partner.”
While future relations seem unclear and the two countries have had a rocky history, for the past seventy-some years the relationship has been deeply rooted in mutual trust.
This trust has its beginnings in the U.S.-Japan Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security, signed in 1960.
The treaty has been strengthened over time with the US Japan Economic Harmonization Initiative in November of 2010 and the release of the revised U.S.-Japan Defense Guidelines in 2015.
According to the State Department, the latter allowed for expanded forms of security-oriented cooperation, which brings us to the uniqueness of our relationship with Japan.
Due to Article Nine of the Japanese Constitution, the county cannot enter into war and can only use their forces in matters of self-defense.
As Japan’s only treaty partner, we are committed to protecting it with the presence of our forces.
The 2016 Index of Military Strength stated that we currently maintain “38,000 military personnel and another 5,000 Department of Defense civilian employees in Japan under the rubric of U.S. Forces Japan (USFJ).”
Japan offsets some of the cost by providing around two billion annually, but they have been pressured in recent years to provide more and increase their own military.
This was especially expressed by Trump during his campaign as he espoused that our allies must give a little more for relationships to continue.
Photo Credit: Metropolico.org/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)
Japan has loosened some of their restrictions on defense and arms sales in recent years, and they can do more.
The reason a strengthened relationship with the U.S. is so important: China and North Korea.
While President Obama practiced “strategic patience” with North Korea, the rogue regime practiced more missile tests and failed to return to any negotiations.
The long term goal of rejoining families and reinstituting democracy in the North will be a long way off if it is continued to be put on the back burner for issues in the Middle East (an important lesson for President Trump).
Read More: Why This Vietnamese Student Studying In The US Still Loves America Despite Trump’s Hate.
Both the United States and South Korea support the policy of reunification, but a policy of constructive engagement from the U.S. may prove to be more effective.
Japan’s formidable neighbor, China, has not been sanctioned for facilitating North Korean prohibited behavior and does not seem to share concern for the safety of our allies in East Asia.
To move toward the reunification of Korea, it stands to reason that our presence in East Asia should not be depleted, but enlarged.
How does this support President Trump’s claims that our allies need to do more?
Japan can do more and it appears that now that they have been pressured, Prime Minister Abe is rising to the occasion.
The first foreign leader to jump on a plane and meet with our new president, this is a man who is interested in not only dinner, but chocolate and roses too.
Japan has asserted its dominance in East Asia in recent years, meaning it has a dog in the fight.
In 2010 China challenged Japan over the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands in the East China Sea, and the Obama Administration responded by saying that the islands were protected under the security treaty between the United States and Japan.
Then the Japanese central government furthered tensions with China by purchasing three new islands in 2012.
While we must uphold our end of the security treaty, in the coming years Japan must strengthen the Japanese Coast Guard, increase defense expenditures so as to strengthen the Self-Defense Forces, reinforce the National Security Council, and alter its interpretation of the right to collective self-defense.
The Economist maintains that some of the money to improve American infrastructure can come from Japan’s $1.2 trillion public-pension fund, the world’s largest, so perhaps this can also support their own needs to improve and expand defense.
We can increase our militaristic and economic ties with Japan as long as they are willing to do the same.
While in the past public opposition to altering the Japanese constitution would have made it difficult, the increasing buildup of the Chinese military and Japan’s desire to work with the U.S. has changed the public’s outlook.
These short-term changes are now possible to work toward our common long-term goals of standing up to North Korea and China.
It looks like this alliance might make for a sweet relationship after all.
RISE NEWS is a grassroots journalism news organization that is working to change the way young people become informed and engaged in the world. You can write for us.
Cover Photo Credit: Metropolico.org/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)
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My Mom Was Killed By A Man With A Gun And It Didn’t Have To Happen
By Angie Bartelt
Raw emotion can be hard to humanize when seeing it on the faces of our leadership, especially during such a partisan time in America.
Time and time again we watch as these men and women deliver news to their people that something terrible has happened with straight faces.
Terrorism, outbreaks of deadly viruses, and mass shootings are reported in the world everyday and we watch with exhaustion- and often frustrations, as world leaders respond.
It is especially disconcerting when we do see our commander-in-chief, brought to tears on national television while professing the need for common sense gun regulation. President Obama spoke of the deaths of those worshipping in Charleston, the college students in Santa Barbara, and the first graders in Newtown.
As a fellow human being, I can clearly understand why the thought of twenty children being murdered under my watch and my administration could have, at least once, brought me to tears.
When we witness death from firearms everyday, it is hard to look at the problem and not want to hunt out a solution.
In 2001, my mother was murdered with a gun by her ex-husband on the front steps of our apartment.
She had been stalked and assaulted multiple times throughout the year prior. He would beat her to a pulp in front of myself, my brother, and our younger cousins. He broke in through our back door and held a knife to her throat, again in front of us children.
Even after exhausting the use of a restraining order and witness protection, she still wasn’t safe.
There was no hesitation when it came to her decision to alert the proper authorities when her life had been threatened, but the laws relating to domestic violence in 2001 failed her and my family.
According to a statistical report by the Law Center To Prevent Gun Violence in 2012, abused victims are five times more likely to be killed by their abuser if the abuser owns a firearm.
According to a statistical report by the Law Center To Prevent Gun Violence in 2012, abused victims are five times more likely to be killed by their abuser if the abuser owns a firearm.
I remember being a small child and seeing my stepfather’s home a few years before the murder.
He had many guns of all sizes, and it never crossed my adolescent brain to question why someone who, by that point, I knew was a gang member could have so many weapons at his disposal.
It was never a question to him, when he owned that many firearms and even a silencer, how he could most easily take my mother’s life.
In 2001, my mother’s murder was cut and dry. An ex-member of the Hells Angels who had access to illegal guns could surely hunt down a single mother in her last semester of college.
But in 2016, I hope that this can be prevented.
The data shows that prohibiting the purchases of a firearm by a person subject to a domestic violence restraining order is associated with a reduction in the number of intimate partner homicides.
In 2014, California Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law AB-1014, a bill to allow concerned family members or law enforcement officers to petition a court for a Gun Violence Restraining Order (GVRO).
The GVRO will temporarily prohibit the individual from purchasing or possessing firearms or ammunition and allow law enforcement to remove any firearms or ammunition already in the individual’s possession.
With this as an example of common sense law, the lives of endangered Americans can be spared.
The statistics go on in regards to the all too-often problem of victims who are being threatened or violated by a partner, more often than not when a firearm is present.
Again, abused women are five times more likely to be killed by their abuser if their abuser owns a firearm.
Some more facts from the Law Center To Prevent Gun Violence:
“A recent survey of female domestic violence shelter residents in California found that more than one-third (36.7%) reported having been threatened or harmed with a firearm.
“In nearly two-thirds (64.5%) of the households that contained a firearm, the intimate partner had used the firearm against the victim, usually threatening to shoot or kill the victim.”
Shockingly, women who suffer from domestic violence are eight times more likely to be killed if there is a firearm in the home.
These women, like my mother, flee to protect themselves and their children, but that is not always the final solution.
Guns create a problem bigger than the need for self-defense. Whether or not the gun in the home is meant for protection, the truth is that instead of being used as a safety tool, guns are being used by abusers to harm or kill women more than they have saved them.
As a direct victim of the worst scenario of domestic violence, I urge you to fight for the lives of our families, friends, and fellow mankind.
As a direct victim of the worst scenario of domestic violence, I urge you to fight for the lives of our families, friends, and fellow mankind.
The most common weapon men use to kill women is a gun.
This is a fact. This is not a random quote that crossed the internet. It is something you won’t hear out of the mouths of any of the Republican presidential candidates, but this ruins, and often ends, lives.
This is not just my story. This is millions of families in our country, not just the ones we see on the news. This epidemic of gun violence used against women is a fight bigger than women rights.
This is about human rights and human lives.
The president’s tears should not be on the forefront of the debate as to why common sense gun regulation is necessary in 2016 America.
Instead, we need to be talking about the ways in which these kinds of regulations, from improving tracing of lost or stolen firearms to proper background checks, can work in a bipartisan legislation to make our country safer and protect our women and children.
As a person whose entire perspective on life was shattered by gun violence as a child, I urge anyone who sees common sense gun control as negative to reconsider.
Take a moment and think about what your life would have been like if a criminal with a gun took your mother’s life.
I urge you to think about the children in our country going through that at this very moment.
Angie Bartelt (bottom right) with her mother. Photo Credit: Angie Bartelt
According to the Brady Campaign, every day 31 people in this country are murdered with a gun.
That means that since my mother’s murder, 169,725 people have been murdered, with women being five times more likely the victim of this heinous crime.
I beg of anyone to reconsider their views on gun regulation for our mothers.
How many more people have to lose their mother like I did?
How many more people have to lose their sister, father, daughter, son, cousin, uncle, aunt, or friend?
How long will it be before it won’t be weird for me to say I lost my mother to gun violence because it has become normal? I wouldn’t wish this pain on anyone.
I hope you feel the same.
Cover Photo Credit: Elvert Barnes/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)
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