Dartlog

SOPA: Bigger, Badder, Back

2012-02-22T22:14:32Z

The dreadful Stop Online Piracy Act was thankfully killed due to tremendous public pressure, but the internet faces a new threat to its independence: the UN. On February 27, the UN will begin deliberations to use the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) to establish “international control over the internet.” According to FCC commissioner Robert McDowell, some of the regulations in consideration include:

• Subject cyber security and data privacy to international control;

• Allow foreign phone companies to charge fees for "international" Internet traffic, perhaps even on a "per-click" basis for certain Web destinations, with the goal of generating revenue for state-owned phone companies and government treasuries;

• Impose unprecedented economic regulations such as mandates for rates, terms and conditions for currently unregulated traffic-swapping agreements known as "peering."

• Establish for the first time ITU dominion over important functions of multi-stakeholder Internet governance entities such as the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, the nonprofit entity that coordinates the .com and .org Web addresses of the world;

• Subsume under intergovernmental control many functions of the Internet Engineering Task Force, the Internet Society and other multi-stakeholder groups that establish the engineering and technical standards that allow the Internet to work;

• Regulate international mobile roaming rates and practices.

Russia and China are leading the effort to exert control over the historically free internet. These two countries are notorious for their imperious grip on free speech and the right to protest. After a year that saw social media facilitate major revolutions and social movements across the world, the idea of putting the internet in the hands of an international commission is terrifying.

The internet is inherently an open realm that can be used by anyone. Since 1998, nongovernmental organizations have handled the operation of the internet through a “multi-stakeholder” governance. Centralizing control of the internet is antithetical to its existence and should trouble anyone who values international free expression.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy apparently sides with domineering, rights-crushing countries like China and Russia, however.

“You have given every individual the chance to be heard everywhere by anyone. People have never had this chance before in history, but that right cannot be held by destroying the rights of others…Governments are the legitimate guardians of our societies and do not forget this.”

While Mr. Sarkozy seems to forget that certain governments (Libya, Egypt, Syria etc.) are not such “legitimate guardians,” he finds no harm in allowing bureaucracy to run the internet.

With so much of the economic growth in the past two decades coming from the internet, it is astounding that anyone would want to burden its accessible, expeditious infrastructure. The internet is currently a prime example of the virtues of the free market, but some countries are threatened by this unrestricted sphere.

The disastrous economic climate in Europe right now should be a harbinger of regulation run amok, and the pathetic state of human rights in countries like China should remind us of what happens under free speech limitations.

If the United States wants to uphold both its deep seated commitment to free market capitalism and protect economic, political, and social interests of the entire world, it should fight to resist these measures.

--William R.F. Duncan

Indian Tennis Finishes 3rd in ECAC Tournament

2012-02-22T18:29:55Z

Photo Credit: Dartmouthsports.com

Behind upsets of two nationally ranked Ivy League opponents, Indian tennis marched to a third place finish at the ECAC Championship hosted at the Boss Tennis Center. To kick-off the weekend, the Dartmouth Indians defeated their hated rivals and 70^th ranked Princeton Tigers, 4-2. The Indians started by winning the crucial doubles point as Michael Laser ‘12 and Alex de Chatellus ‘13 won 8-5 with Cameron Ghorbani ‘14 and Brandon DeBot ’14 winning 9-7 just minutes later. In singles, Chris Kipouras ’15, Brandon DeBot, and Michael Laser all won handing Dartmouth the victory. After DeBot finished off his opponent in the final set, 6-1, the Dartmouth players erupted into celebration running onto the court to celebrate the victory.

Saturday treated the Indians less favorably as the 60^th ranked Harvard Crimson handed Dartmouth their first loss of the season. Harvard struck first winning all three doubles matches giving them a 1-0 point lead entering into the singles portion of the match. In singles, Michael Laser continued his string of great play beating Denis Nguyen in three sets, and Cameron Ghorbani provided the other victory for Dartmouth sweeping both sets, 6-4 and 7-5, against Alex Steinroeder. Unfortunately, Harvard won the other singles matches giving them the victory, but the Indians would strike back the next day to end the tournament on a high note.

On Sunday, the Indians dominated 50^th ranked Cornell to finish third at the ECAC Championship. Due to time constraints, the teams played the singles matches before the doubles matches, and the singles matches would be all that the Indians would need to defeat Cornell. Picking up his third straight singles victory of the tournament, Michael Laser defeated Sam Fleck 6-4, 6-1. Laser, the Indians’ all-star for the weekend, finished the tournament without a singles loss, held his opponent to 2 games of fewer in a set four times, and ended with a cumulative 38-21 game advantage over his singles opponents. Chris Kipouras, playing in the fourth spot, beat Quoc-Daniel Nguyen, 6-4, 7-6, and in the fifth spot, Brandon DeBot picked up his second singles victory of the weekend with a 6-3, 7-6 victory over Alex Sidney. The final victory went to Chris Ho ’12 as he topped Jason Luu 6-2, 6-3.

When asked about his thoughts on the weekend, Chris Kipouras ’15 said “We knew going in that this was going to be a tough tournament and I consider our results successful.” Kipouras saw the Indians success as a “group effort” and “The teams we played against didn't seem as in sync as we were. Throughout the whole weekend, I felt that each team didn't bring the intensity that we've practiced consistently throughout the last month.” Another factor in the Indians successful weekend was Dartmouth’s toughness, especially when compared to their opponents. Kipouras said that the other teams “all just seemed soft”, and that the fans that came out to the games played a role as “A lot of people came out for our matches against Princeton as well as Harvard and with fellow Big Green supporting us, the other teams felt a little intimidated. When playing against Princeton, I felt like my opponent was a bit rattled by the crowd. It's just more proof that we are tougher than these teams.” This weekend provides a great launching point for Dartmouth Indian tennis as the team looks forward to the spring. Kipouras summed it up well by saying “We are definitely a team to look out for” and that he’s “really excited for the spring and for the big things to come.”

--Peter Hill

The Supreme Court to Hear Controversial Case out of Texas

2012-02-22T16:57:45Z

Image courtesy of the Wikimedia Foundation

On Tuesday, the Supreme Court of the United States agreed to hear another controversial case, only instead of ruling on healthcare or immigration, they will now be passing jugement on a contested affirmative action policy. Becasue of its high political stakes, it is sure to garner national attention in the coming months.

The facts of the case sound strikingly similiar to those of Gratz v. Bollinger, the 2003 decision that deemed the University of Michigan's undergraduate affirmative action policies unconstitutional. This time, however, its the University of Texas system that's underfire. In 2001, it adopted a policy that allowed the state university to automatically admit any Texan graduating within the top ten percent of his or her high school class. Abigail Noel Fisher applied for admission for the Fall of 2008. Finishing outside of the top tier of her graduating class, she had to compete with both out-of-state students and other students whose GPA did not warrant their automatic acceptance for the remaining spots. After being denied while observing "less qualified" minority applicants get in, she sued, claiming that she was discriminated against when competing for a spot because of her race. This, her counsel contends, violates the equal protection clause under the Constitution.

The nation's High Court has already ruled on this issue twice in the past ten years, striking down the University of Michigan's "minority point accumulation system," but later upholding its law school's policy of making race a factor within a "wholistic evaluation." With subsequent changes in the bench, however, the court may set a new precedent that looks less favorabely upon the consideration of race in admissions. Since then, Justice Samuel Alito has replaced Sandra Day O'Connor as a more reliable opponent to such policies. At the same time, affirmative action adovcate, Elana Kagan, has announced her decision to recuse herself. This leaves the possibility of a 5-3 vote against the University of Texas's policy. However the vote breaks down, this case is sure to be a high profile subject of controversy in the months ahead.

--George Mendoza

Occupy MoCo!

2012-02-21T16:05:02Z

Courtesy of MontgomeryCollege.eduA community college outside of Washington D.C., Montgomery College, will be offering a course on the Occupy Wall Street Movement this summer as part of its Youth Summer Program. At the cost of $190, honors students in ninth through 12th grade can learn about the Occupy Movement in this course titled, "Occupy MoCo!", which stands out among the other courses offered in the program, including "Battle-Bot-Build-a-Thon" and "Passion for Fashion."

While the school's communications director, Elizabeth Homan, claims that Montgomery College, "does not take a stance on the Occupy movement," the college's description of Occupy MoCo! suggests otherwise. The course description, in a clear ploy to recruit young students to join the Occupy Movement, states, "We are at an exciting time in the history of the world. People all over the planet are taking democracy into their own hands and working together to create solutions for a better world...Young people hold the power to change their community, their schools, their future -- are you ready to join the movement for justice?" Homan has assured that the wording of the description was not meant to be controversial, but simply to excite students about the material.

Instead of falsely advertising the course, why not present it in an objective manner? Perhaps administrators rightfully understood that if students knew what this ludicrous course actually entailed, nobody would sign up. Bringing the Occupy Movement into the classroom demonstrates another pitfall of the American public education system. This course will not teach students anything worthwhile or substantial, except for maybe how to protest, destroy property, defecate on a car, and make anti-semetic comments.

--Elizabeth A. Reynolds

A Good Man [Abroad] is Hard to Find

2012-02-20T22:13:31Z

The Chronicle has a story up about the lack of men in study abroad programs. Apparently over two thirds of the participants in such programs are women--but why?

A few answers are offered. For one thing, it stands to reason that the majority of college students are women. Add to that the abundance of women studying the fine arts and languages, and you've got clear correlation.

However, the article goes on into strange territory. It discusses the dubious notions that women are more likely than men to heed the word of their parents, that men are more easily influenced by their friends, and that men "need to be told why culture is important." Strange, and perhaps a bit too little credit than is due to college men.

--Adam I. W. Schwartzman

The More You Know

2012-02-20T01:28:09Z

Photo Courtesy of the ALA

While attending a class session in the Rauner Special Collections Library this past week I noticed a strange molded oval plaque on the wall of the study room I was in. The text read "DARTMOUTH MEDAL" and featured a classicized female head of Athena, garlanded by grape vines, along with a small notation, '1973.' Curious about the simple but beautiful piece's origins, I took to the internet, where I learned that the Dartmouth Medal is an award sponsored by the College and given out yearly by the American Library Association to recognize achievement in the creation of "a reference work of outstanding quality and significance." How appropriate then, that the medal graced the room where I had the pleasure of turning the pages of an original edition of the Nuremberg Chronicle (1493), perhaps the West's first significant reference book. Like those old commercials say, 'the more you know.' Read more about the Medal at the ALA's website.

--Benjamin M. Riley

Perception is Reality

2012-02-18T23:01:54Z

The Vagina Monologues, coming soon to an iniquitous gender center near you.

Well folks, it’s almost upon us; V-Week is right around the corner. Although the official kick-off is not until Sunday, the perennially ridiculed event might as well have just begun. True to form, the twelve-day-long “celebration” has already proved controversial, setting the campus abuzz with disdainful anticipation. As an administrator, you know that you have a problem when you have to publically justify your programming before it has even started. This is precisely the position in which the Center for Women and Gender (CWG) has found itself. In an inane little piece entitled “Addressing the Gender Divide,” director of the CWG, Jennifer Jennrich, took to the pages of The Dartmouth to defend the event against popular ridicule. Providing a series of excuses, Ms. Jennrich attempted to address the charge that V-Week is nothing but an institutionalized bout of corrective sexism. However, where a careful defense of her office’s efforts was warranted, she chose to go on the offensive in an ugly and ineffectual way. Reacting to “annual calls” for the creation of a male focused event, she produced a tactless mass of bureaucratic hot-potato, blaming the men of Dartmouth for the absence of P-Week initiatives. Running through a catalogue of failed events that includes the Men’s Project and V-Men-related programming, she reasoned that “there has never been a large group of Dartmouth men interested in creating a performance devoted to understanding men’s sexuality in a similar way…” While she is not entirely wrong in expressing such a sentiment, never does she ask what has led the male community to shy away from such initiatives. Unbeknownst to her, her op-ed contains the answer, but for all of the wrong reasons.

Buried within her criticism of the lack of male initiative lies a particularly telling declaration. Mid-way through her first column, Ms. Jennrich asserts that, “Nothing would excite me more than for the students on this campus to work with the Center for Women and Gender to create a similar performance piece and week of diverse events related to understanding the complexity of masculinity and men’s sexuality.” The significance of this statement cannot be overlooked, for within this textbook case of antithesis lies the reason for the relative absence of male participation.

Try as I may, I cannot think of a single Dartmouth man who would willingly work with the Center for Women and Gender in support of masculinity-related events. This is not a matter of misplaced bravado, as some would contend, but one of bad marketing. If the intent of the Center for Women and Gender is really to promote the equality of sexes in a non-preferential way, why on earth would it institutionalize a finite link between women and gender-related issues within its title? This is a self-defeating moniker if there ever was one. By adopting such a name, the Center for Women and Gender has drawn a distinct gender line that men dare not cross. While we all have sexual identities, their insistence on associating women and gender has created the unmistakable sense that male-related issues should not be the focal point of campus discussions. In so naming themselves, the CWG has placed gender roles firmly in the realm of the female, a territory into which most males will not stray. This reality easily explains the absence of an organized P-Week, much of the negativity directed toward V-Week, and the failure of the Men’s Project. As laudable as the goals of “empowerment, personal narrative, sexual positivity, and demand for the end of violence” are, they are also associated with an iniquitous preference for women and their sexual identity largely because they are propagated by a blatantly iniquitous organization.

Criticism of V-Week does not come from male aversion to celebrating the female gender; it comes from the absence of a similar celebration about masculinity. While Ms. Jennrich and her colleagues at the CWG can blame the community for the failure of their limited male-oriented initiatives, the fact is that such events will never find success when men think that gender is a female-dominated issue. As is so often the case, perception is reality, and when the College supports female-oriented gender projects and ordains female-oriented offices, a perception that the interests of women are to be unfairly elevated in the gender discussion becomes inevitable. With this as the prevailing impression, is it any wonder that men feel alienated from efforts like V-Week?

If the intent of this week’s programs and the efforts of the CWG are really to promote gender equality, then preferential titles and policies must go. These serve only to do damage by building more barriers between the sexes. Until the powers at be change their strategy, individuals like Ms. Jennrich will continue to answer the “annual question” of why is there no P-Week as ineffectively as ever. Maybe next year…

-- Nicholas P. Desatnick

USS Score Political Points

2012-02-15T23:32:45Z

Last Friday Navy Secretary Ray Mabus announced that the Navy’s new variant littoral combat ship (LCS) will be named for former Arizona Democratic Representative Gabrielle Giffords. Mabus said that the since “unwavering courage has defined the Navy for 236 years… it’s very appropriate that LCS 10 be named for someone who has become synonymous with courage.”

The military community, however, thinks differently.

“Here is the issue,” said Retired Rear Admiral George Worthington, former commander of the Naval Special Warfare Command, speaking to the Daily Caller, “we think fallen Marines and perhaps supporting sailors should go on fantails before random victims.” Worthington stated that military friends have agreed with his sentiment, saying that they are “shocked and angered” by Mabus’s decision.

Clearly Giffords has been making an inspirational recovery from a nearly tragic assassination attempt, but does her getting shot really warrant the naming of a Navy vessel after her? What about all of the members of the military who willingly put their lives on the line to fight for their country and defend freedom? Giffords, a relative no-name before the shooting, never risked her life in a fashion that showed “unwavering courage” like a Marine does on a daily basis.

I don’t want to suggest that we should not admire Giffords for her brave recovery, but naming a ship after a fallen soldier like Dakota Meyer, who received the Medal of Honor, would be much more appropriate and motivating to a sailor aboard a Navy ship.

Politics should stay out of the military so that we can recognize the true guardians of freedom for our country.

--Will Duncan

A Step in the Right Direction?

2012-02-15T18:21:36Z

Congress Ryan, one of the deal's loudest critics (courtesy of Bloomberg News).

Congressional negotiators have reached a deal to extend the payroll tax holiday, unemployment benefits, and Medicare payment rates for doctors. It also includes $50 billion in cuts to go toward a reduced deficit. Senior aides in both parties have praised the deal, stating that it is a step in the right direction that will prevent doctors from seeing a drop in rates paid by Medicare.

However, not all GOP members are happy about the compromise. Representative Paul Ryan of Wisconsin has been ripping the deal apart, arguing that the budget "not only doesn't fix our debt situation, it makes it worse. It is a net-spending increasing budget when spending is the biggest problem." He has gone as far as to compare the nation's current financial situation to that of Greece, using the hashtag, #AskTheGreeks on Twitter.

Lawmakers are optimistic that a broad deal will be announced Wednesday and approved by Friday. "It is a compromise. We knew we were going to have to compromise," said Representative Renee Elmers (R- NC).

--George Mendoza

Local Basketball Team Embroiled in Controversy

2012-02-13T02:01:21Z

While 'local' is a relative term, I've passed signs on the highway for Rutland, Vermont so that's local enough for me. The small city (population 16,000) is receiving a bit of national attention for a seemingly unremarkable thing - a local Catholic school's basketball team. As the New York Times reports, the success of Mount St. Joseph's Academy's high school varsity basketball team has caused quite a stir in the Rutland community, although perhaps not for the expected reasons. The team, which was been a perennial loser has suddenly found success, going from a 2009-2010 record of 2-18 to a 2010-2011 record of 16-7. The success has continued this year, with the team currently 15-1 and in line to contend in the state playoffs.

So what changed? Well that's exactly what has some Vermonters so upset. The team's upswing is tied to the transfer of five students, all of whom hail from the Bronx. The boys' coach in New York, Mugsy Leggett saw a chance for the boys to escape the violence and crime of their projects and play basketball while getting a good education in the process. When Leggett contacted Mount St. Joseph coach Mark Benetatos, the match was confirmed immediately. But not all has been rosy for the boys, who live with area host families. Though the Mount St. Joseph community has embraced them and celebrated their on court success, others are none too pleased. They have been the target of racial epithets and derogatory chants. Further, others complain about the Bronx boys taking playing time away from local players.

But both Benetatos and the school's principal, Paolo Zancanaro, have maintained that their actions are pure. They cite the numerous international students who attend the school as evidence that the Bronx boys are not merely hired athletic guns but a chance for the school to practice its mission of creating a just world. Unfortunately, the tensions have ensured that Mount St. Joseph will not be receiving any more students from Mr. Leggett, who has placed over 60 students in high schools outside of New York City in his twenty five year coaching career. While other placements have been smooth, the outcry in Rutland has turned Mr. Leggett off from Mount St. Joseph, at least for the time being.

It's a shame that petty prejudices have soured what seems to be a truly symbiotic relationship. Racial tensions are alive and well in this country, although perhaps more hidden than in the past. The sooner tolerance pervades every aspect of our society, the better. I think that's something we can all get behind.

--Benjamin M. Riley