Columns

RUBASHKIN | What Now?

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Last Tuesday, Americans across the country went to the polls and voted for the candidate they felt most deserved to be president of the United States. By a still-growing margin, they chose former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, but the reality is that it will be Donald Trump, and not Hillary Clinton, entering the White House in January. There will be a lot at stake these next four years. Power is in the hands of those who seek to unravel all of the progress we have made since President Obama took office. The Affordable Care Act, Dodd Frank financial regulation, climate change accords, the Iran deal and much more hang in the balance, and already Republican congressmen and senators are salivating over the thought of rolling back the products of the last eight years.

Letters To

LETTER TO THE EDITOR | The Tears I Shed Allow Me to Debate

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To the editor:

Amidst all the criticism of elite university students being fragile liberals, a letter to the editor was submitted to The Sun, which claims that students who were hurt to the point of tears ought not to be taken seriously. Frankly, after reading that letter I was painfully frustrated with the notion that students who cried were simply stubborn, disappointed toddlers. While I cannot speak for the students who organized the Ho Plaza “Cry-In,” I can speak for myself. I was utterly devastated by Donald Trump’s victory. So I, too, have a confession: I’m an undocumented student with DACA and I cannot vote.

Columns

WANG | The One Thing He Has to Do

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Looking around, pop culture has been shaken. I personally blame Donald Trump. He’s made the people who make progressive taxation necessary choke a bit on their fruit infused water every time they see his name. If you’re technologically sound, you might’ve noticed the trend amongst the line of A-list celebrities that recently threatened to leave the country if he managed to win the presidency. Bryan Cranston became a man of God.

Columns

BANKS | I Suppose I Have No Choice Now

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On Thursday night, I had a conversation with a black graduate student in which he described how he has spent the semester reeling from an endless onslaught of racist bullshit from faculty and colleagues, along with a dreadful display of apathy on the part of his department. In response to my friend’s plight, his committee masked a self-preservationist agenda with gallingly tepid concern, conveying in the most unrepentant of terms that the program’s reputation superseded a black student’s right to be treated with dignity or humanity. In recounting the events to me, my friend described the rest of the country — or, at least, the rest of the country’s black people — as having finally caught up to his level of silently subdued rage and chronic uneasiness with those who claim to share his values or support his causes. And though he uttered this sentiment in an understated, almost humorous way, it struck me as simultaneously tragic, profound and disquieting. Indeed, I have spent the past few days teetering on the precipice between a stubborn commitment to love and a desire to recoil from everyone and everything.

Letters To

LETTER TO THE EDITOR | In Defense of Campus Diversity

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To the Editor:

You can discern a lot about a person’s character by the way she handles disappointment. I’m concerned that Cornell’s current culture of safe spaces is hindering students from developing the character required to handle disappointment graciously and courageously. If I had to hazard a guess, I’d say most of you are disappointed by the results of the recent presidential election which should give you the opportunity to reflect on the values you hold that have made you dissatisfied with the direction you see our country moving in. I encourage all of you to take this time to reflect on your commitment to diversity. Just a few months ago, The Cornell Daily Sun published an editorial arguing for the College Republicans to renounce Donald Trump.

Letters To

LETTER TO THE EDITOR | Collecting Emotions and Ourselves

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To the Editor:

My politics, like those of many academics, are liberal. On Wednesday, though, unlike some professors, I held my classes. I did so without thinking much. I was too shaky to think much, too shaky to stay at home alone. I started crying as I walked to my first class.

election 2016

LETTER TO THE EDITOR | The Path Forward

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To the Editor:

As I left Trump Tower late this morning, I was overwhelmed by how much spirits had been bolstered among a group that had never expected to come out the winners in a brutal election cycle that seemed like an uphill battle from the beginning. With the fresh taste of victory on their tongues, they had but a single question remaining: now what? The election of Donald J. Trump was the final cry for help from an increasingly desperate working class that could no longer be ignored. The President-elect’s coalition is built up of people who are overqualified and underemployed, voters whose swelling dissatisfaction with their downward economic spiral exploded into a populist movement that few pundits anticipated. A message of returned greatness did not echo for them thoughts of the 1950s or the pre-civil rights era; instead, it was a promise of once again being able to feed your family without working so long that you never got to see them.

Columns

HAGOPIAN | What to Do When You Know the Worst Is Coming

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Sanders/Castro 2020

Now that that’s out of the way, I want to make a few points about what just happened. I grew up in a rural small town. My family was working class, as was everyone else. I stuck out a little because of my Middle-Eastern heritage, but for the most part life was great. I had friends.

Columns

MALPASS | Angry Does Not Begin to Describe it

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It’s only appropriate that an election opinion piece should run alongside the sex columns, because this piece will also be about getting fucked. I never really believed that a man so hateful could be elected, but it shows how much common sense can be trusted nowadays. Call it liberal tears, but based on the reactions of the people in my newsfeed, I feel as if I’m writing a eulogy. This is what happens when you have a broken political system. This is what happens when politicians get so corrupt, Congress gets so deadlocked, and wealth disparity grows so large.

Columns

TRUSTEE VIEWPOINT | The Impact of Female Leadership

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Representation matters. As a recent Time article pointed out, representation changes the scope of our imagination. Representation stimulates aspirations in underrepresented minorities throughout our country — expanding their perceptions and furthermore, broadening their opportunities. As members of society begin to see more women and underrepresented minorities in positions of power, the corporate hierarchy changes as employers inherit an increased confidence in diverse leaders. Nevertheless, leading up election day, the excitement towards electing the first female president of the United States dwindled.