Iowa City Press-Citizen from Iowa City, Iowa • Page A9

Page9A Iowa City Press-Citizen Opinion Editorial Board: Tricia Brown, news director Dale Larson, general manager Emily content editor ommunity members: David Bright, Shams Ghoneim, Bob Goodfellow Emily Nelson, community content editor Phone: 319-887-5408 Email: Losing our sense of state history As a student at the University of Iowa, I am app alled to learn that the tate Historical Society is i danger of funding cuts that could eventually eliminate the Iowa City loc ation altogether. It is imperative that this issue be brought to the forefront public opinion, lest we lose all sense of our history. Legislators have maintained that cutting back taffing and operating hours is part of the proc- ss toward preserving he SHS. I fail to see the truth behind these claims hen cuts deny access to i mperative resources. History students, includ- i ng myself, use the SHS as a resource for theses that aim to uncover Iowa his- ory.

Without regular acc ess to SHS materials, these stories will never be old. Legislators maintain hat digitizing collections will provide more access to state records for Iowa citizens. While digital records are an important resource, the state refuses provide substantial funds to make this a reality. Furthermore, digitization can hinder historical research by eliminating experience. Would we rather read about President Herbert Hoover, or touch the pages of his speeches? Would we rath- read the names of Iowa soldiers in WWII, or pour over their recruiting post- rs, photographs and uniforms.

The SHS provides an opportunity for historians to dive into history that online access cannot. Finally, cutting SHS funding punishes a staff that works tirelessly to rovide Iowa citizens with access to our own ast. When history stud ents see that legislators lend no priority to our hosen profession, we wonder if our hard work, oo, will one day be obsolete. We dedicated students and historians do not agree with this blatant apathy toward our history, and we will not upport it. Taylor Finch Iowa City Current gun laws not making us safer If the NRA pushes for guns in schools, no background checks and no gun limitations, why are they oing the opposite at their national meeting in Tennessee? Stand your round laws.

Toddlers shooting moms. Have you noticed the increase in shooting news? Our legislature should go back to the gun laws when local sheriffs had control of who and how guns were sed. Then I would feel safer. udy Pfohl I owa City Sad to see olumns gone Iwas very sad to see that Jim Musser is no longer writing his Thursday columns for the Press-Citizen. But honest- Musser belong here anymore.

The P-C as reduced itself to a shell of its former self and Musser was the last of the ld guard in a new business model. begrudge the oung staff who work there. They are doing their best under difficult circumstances. But I do fault the pow- rs-that-be for allowing this local newspaper to ose people who brought heir experience, skills and unique voices to our ommunity. People make a difference.

How many can you lose before you ave cannibalized the eart and soul out of your newspaper? ames Dreier I owa City Letters April is onth. By now, nearly everyone has heard of autism, whether this is due to the latest estimates of autism prevalence (1in 68), any number of research efforts suggesting of autism or the latest controversy surrounding anti-vaccination parents. Autism is characterized by deficits in social communication and interaction, as well as restricted, repetitive patterns of behavior, interests or activities. There is no singular known and prob- a bly no singular either. Autism is heterogeneous, complex and almost assuredly of multiple etiologies.

Agrowing movement of autistic self-advocates, activists and parents of autistic children believe it is time to move past awareness campaigns and, rather, champion he active acceptance of autistic people. We understand autism in the framework of neurodiversity, which argues that atypical neuro- ogical development, as seen in au- ism, is a natural, human variation ather than a disease to be excised from humanity. Autism need not be cured, nor should we be preoccupied with winnowing out Our energy should be directed toward creating an inclu- ive culture and developing resources to support autistics and heir families. Consider how we talk about autistic people. Traditionally, using language (i.e.

per- on with was considered the way to refer to someone ho has received an autism diagnosis. Proponents of person-first language argued that describing someone as was stigma- izing and detracted from their personhood. The new generation autistic self-advocates and activists have, by and large, rejected person-first language, and instead embrace identity-first language. Jim Sinclair, an autistic activist, explains in his essay Mourn for is a way of being. It is pervasive; it colors every experience, every sensation, perception, thought, emotion, and encounter, every aspect of existence.

It is ot possible to separate the autism from the person and if it were possible, the person have left would not be the same person you started Also consider the as narrative, which describes autistic children as and emphasizes the toll that hese take on families. Autism (and by extension autistic people) is a worst-case scenario, a bogeyman. Is it any surprise that ne mother, interviewed for a New ork Times piecesaid, when justi- ying her decision to not vaccinate her child: you want to wake up one morning and the light is gone from her eyes with autism or As the parent of a brilliantly lit autistic son, I can tell ou that this is patently absurd in addition to being outrageously off ensive. Being autistic is not easy or always some kind of The intensity of sensory input and social i nteraction, bullying, pressure to act the lack of reliable ommunication for many non- speaking autistics, and the sometimes comorbid anxiety, seizures, sleep difficulties and gastrointes- inal troubles can all be, without doubt, disabling. ut acceptance means that we consider the social model of disability in the midst of medical pathologizing.

Disability has a lot do with man-made barriers ot just broken bodies in need of repair. An example: If you saw my son in a public restroom, you would likely find him hunched over, hands covering his ears, frightened and looking for an escape. He would probably seem very autistic and disabled to even the casual observer. Public restrooms are horrible places for many autistic people: automatic toilets with industrial-strength flushes, the new generation of jet-engine powered hand-dryers that often start if you much as walk by them all encased in a cramped echo-chamber. This type of sensory onslaught is not just frightening; it is painful.

Now, imagine a restroom with a stack of paper-towels on the sink, and a hand-dryer designed not to be triggered accidentally. When you see my son here, he will not be owering; he will be washing and drying his hands like everyone else. He will not seem so disabled, because, in fact, he is not so dis- a bled in this bathroom. I we accept autistic people we elieve that, in the words of autistic activist Nick Walker, nurturing the development of Autistic individuals, the goal of parents, ducators, therapists, should be to produce healthy, thriving, A utistic people, rather than Autistic people trained to stifle their rue selves in order to pass as Iwant my child to be proud of who he is, to never feel broken, and know that he really did end up on the right planet. I you see someone different, or maybe making unusual noises or moving in an unexpected way, remind yourself and whoever i with you, that autistic people belong here, and are part of the end- ess, incomprehensible and beautiful diversity of creation.

Dina Bishara is an Iowa City resident. Time to champion the acceptance of autistics Dina ishara Guest pinion The Family Folk Machine will present its spring program, Where Planted: Songs from Farm to Tab at two upcoming concerts. At 2:30 p.m. Sunday, we will perform at the Old apitol Senate Chamber as part of the for theme semester and in conjunct ion with the excellent exhibit at the Old Capitol Museum called Land rovides: Culinary At 3 p.m. April 19, we will perform on our home turf at the Iowa County Senior Center in downtown Iowa City with special uests from Table to Table a nd Local Foods Connec- ion.

At this concert, be collecting canned food donations for the Crisis Center. ou might be surprised to discover how many great songs there are a bout vegetables. Some ardeners sing by inch, row by row to themselves every spring but do they know the Anti-Garden and they might relate to the bsessive vegetablephilia the songs and Once you know the Metamora song it will come to mind every time you are planting or igging spuds. Greg brings out the poetry in ood preservation: alittle of the summer: put it all in he stage for these songs about vegetables is set with others about pring and farming, inc luding the Dreyer to be you believe the rass just grows? Sun and rain, the earth it just knows Never stop being a One of the Folk achine kids informed me that he need instructions on how to be happy always happy. We sing, you believe that this child of ine has brightened the colors of my Farming is being re- orn in Iowa and across our country, and the classic Buffy Sainte-Marie song of the i an homage to farming as sacred work that rings as true today as it did in he 1960s.

The Rebecca iots song speaks to the cultivation of our inner gardens, and oody addresses issues of migrant farm work and i ndustrial agriculture, rev erberating with current concerns about the separation of families through deportation policies and the lack of dignity afforded to people facing deport ation. The young people of the Family Folk Machine ave re-written the traditional song I first came to this from a perspective. It has ecome I first dropped off the grid, I was not a happy and they on to sing about the var- i ous problems they encounter trying to set up their new life in the wild erness. The kids have also enjoyed learning the classic Sesame Street ong i which and are encouraged to improve their eating habits by a strange new superhero. After all these food-re- ated songs, we remind ourselves that that comes from lants deserves to have a second and sing about composting in the Tom Chapin song Please join us for one of these two free concerts! or more information a bout the Family Folk Machine, visit familyfolkma- chine.org.

Jean Littlejohn lives with her family in Iowa City and directs the Family olk Machine. She can be reached at Choir is celebrating spring by singing for our food Jean Littlejohn Community music On an atypically warm Saturday evening last onth, I leaned my head out a kitchen wind ow, hoping to take in a bit the night air. My friend ives in Iowa pedestrian mall, and as I plunked my elbows onto his windowsill, I noticed a group of college-aged men smoking by the fire escape. One of them mumbled something I hear, and he group erupted in laughter. My ears perked.

Realizing that this was the first and perhaps the only ime be privy to the dialogue of an all-male space, one in which no women were presumed to be listening, I did something that may have been a mistake: I eavesdropped. I help myself. ne of the men was alking about how much like to quit smoking. In response, a friend passed on a bit of wisdom a buddy had given him: if like to quit anything addicted to, just ave sex every time the add ictive urge overcomes you. The initial guy laughed.

he asked, I find that any girls to go home with I want to smoke cons The group agreed. hard to get one girl to go home with me, much less a many as need for is getting laid so much Etc. Then someone dropped this bomb: what roofies are for, my surprise, another bout of laughter. I like to say that the conversation ended there, or at least that I had the good sense to shut the window. But neither of those statements would be true.

I nstead, I stuck around to hear the men speculate a bout whether, if not enough women could be corralled, resort to getting sex from other en, and how many such instances it would take to ender them At my end, I began to formulate just what shout down at these guys to end the affront that was their dialogue when someone else did the work for me, just by opening a door. It was a woman. She have to say anything. At he first appearance of her face, all the smoking men fell silent. A an adjunct at the University of Iowa, I tread strange social ground.

till young enough to be considered marginally relevant young enough, on he right night, to be catcalled (and when that occurs, I respond with a line borrowed from a friend: you talk to all of your professors that but too old and too culturally estranged to pretend that I live in a realm of shared experience with my undergrads. So when my class a literary service-learning course met the week following the indow night, I did the nly thing I could: I repeat- the conversation overheard line for line. I reminded my students of the insidious power of hate peech. I let them know hat uniquely capa- le of fighting the tide of ape culture on our campus, because uniquely embedded in it. These, after all, are their eople.

A pril is Sexual Assault A wareness Month. According to a 2014 report from the White House Council on Women and irls, about one in five omen in the United tates is raped in her lifetime. A significant plurality of these rapes and related sexual assaults occur on ollege campuses. The University of Iowa is no xception. Fortunately, the university has made a staunch commitment to increasing awareness of sexual violence and advocating for road-spanning change.

On April 14, the Bijou Film oard a student organization devoted to bringing high-quality, socially relevant films to the UI comm unity will team with the Communication Stud- i es Department to present ascreening of Hunting a documentary that treats the culture of sexual violence on college campuses. A panel discussion will follow the screening, featuring a campus sexual assault examiner, members of the Resource and Action Center (WRAC) and the Rape Victim Advo- acy Program (RVAP), and UI students whose experience and expertise ill shed light on the issue of sexual assault at Iowa. We hope you can join us. Mallory Hellman is an adjunct lecturer at the University of Magid Center for Undergraduate Writing and serves on the Bijou Film Board. Reminded ofthe ower ofspeech Mallory Hellman Guest Opinion If you go Hunting Panel discussion to follow screening.

When: 6 p.m. April 14. FilmScene, 118 E. ollege St. Cost: Free for all students..