CSUN On Point

As the battle over Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) intensifies in Congress, so does the fear of many LGBTQ immigrants, whose chances of being deported to a country that may not support their lifestyle are increasing.

Experts say that out of the 800,000 dreamers in the United States, around 75,000 identify as LGBTQ. Dreamers are children who were brought to the United States without documentation at a young age. Some 36,000 of those are DACA recipients, many of them living in California.

The White House announced in September that DACA would end for many dreamers on or before March 5, 2018.

“Many people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer, are not only LGBTQ, but also undocumented and people of color, and not just brown, but also black,” said Ronnie Veliz, executive director of Somos Familia Valle. “So, it is very important to us to understand that, within the immigrant population, the LGBTQ population is present, with papers and also without documentation. It affects everyone’s dreams, because it does affect also mixed status families, those who know the United States as their only country from a very early age.”

What happens to the LGBTQ dreamers who come out in the United States, and then are deported to an intolerant nation?

In more than 70 countries, same-sex relations are criminalized, and out those 70, ten have a death penalty for those in the LGBTQ+ community. Many DACA recipients come from countries that can be dangerous for LGBTQ+ people. Countries like Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador are the most common for asylum seekers.

“The risks are not only to be deported to a country that doesn’t even have marriage equality,” Veliz said. “…Keep in mind that marriage equality hasn’t stopped the famous videos of the killing of trans and queer people. It’s not just being deported to a country where you’re going to be killed, and mentally, psychologically, and spiritually abused, but it is also a fact that there are centers and corporations making profits from detaining immigrants.”

Although dreamers face an even greater risk of detention and deportation now, it is important to remember they can still exercise their rights. Practicing those rights before an encounter with an immigration officer, can prepare them.

“Immigrants, whether documented or undocumented, have rights and constitutional rights,” said Julia Vazquez, Southwestern School of Law Professor and the director of CSUN’s Student Legal Clinic. “Everybody should practice his or her rights ahead of time…if you don’t feel comfortable exerting your rights, [remember] the number one right that everyone has is the right to remain silent, and folks should exercise that.”

The DACA program has provided security, opportunity  and hope to recipients. They had the ability to obtain driver’s licenses, enroll in college, and legally secure jobs.

“It’s shameful we are now seeing the cycle of scapegoating, not only [against] immigrants,” Vazquez said. ” Now that we have the language, and more of a platform to really understand, that not every immigrant experience is equal, like people of color, like LGBTQ, and that when you combine those, [these groups] are going to be doubly oppressed by a system of laws that are failing to protect even the most privileged of that group.”

On December 8, in a 5 to 4 decision, the Supreme Court ruled the Trump administration does not have to turn over legal documents connected to its decision to end the program. The Court said it would consider the matter further.

Moderator: Diego Girgado

Producers: Morgan Ball and Minerva Medrano

Anchor: Joselynn Castro

Social Media Editor: Tyler Jones

Reporters: Morgan Ball, Joselynn Castro, Diego Girgado, Tyler Jones and Minerva Medrano

Fake news has been on the minds of most adults in America, including President Donald Trump, who recently told Fox News’ Lou Dobbs that he coined the now infamous phrase.

Its existence raises the question, how can people fight it?

Experts say media literacy is the most effective way to combat fake news, and becoming media literate will help everyone, including students, understand the differences between real and fake news. The National Association for Media Literacy Education recently held its third annual Media Literacy Week to raise awareness about the issue.

According to a recent Pew Research Study “nearly two-thirds of U.S. adults (64 percent) say fabricated news stories cause a great deal of confusion about the basic facts of current issues and events. About a third of U.S. adults (32 percent) say they often see made-up political news online, while 39 percent sometimes see such stories, and 26 percent hardly ever or never do.”

Pew Research Center also reports a ten percent increase since 2016 in social media use for people over 50 years old. And the study also saw a ten percent increase in nonwhite social media users. In addition, 45 percent of all Facebook users say they rely solely on the site to deliver their news.

“I think it is less about the mobile devices themselves, and more about how they have changed our culture,” CSUN Communications Studies graduate student Anya Crittention said. “Also, I think [the controversy over fake news] is damaging to journalism itself. While people are now ready to believe fake news, there’s also this increasing cynicism and distrust of the media. And, I think that is also dangerous since the media inherently is meant to be for the people and if we turn our back on them, that’s also dangerous.”

Media historians say social media outlets have allowed for an emergence of more voices, and that makes the news more democratic. And now the news cycle has become 24/7 due to the emergence of digital media technology, and that makes news and information more accessible to more people.

“I think there’s been fake news around for a long time,” CSUN Cinema and Television Arts Professor Anna Marie Piersimoni said. “We just have more of it because we have more of everything, and more voices doing that, but from the early days of yellow journalism, [from] the building of the Hearst Empire to the building of the Murdoch empire, there’s been fake journalism.”

Piersimoni said sensational ‘clickbait’ headlines cause people to jump from one article to the next without taking the time to evaluate the story. And since people are not reading the full story, they are relying only on their own beliefs, and not using the critical and analytical tools of media literacy. These strongly held beliefs and biases create filter bubbles, and limit the amount of information people are exposed to, or willing to read.

“I think that the awareness of your own biases is the only way that you can start to pierce the bubble,”  CSUN Department Chair of Political Science Dr. David Leitch said. “If you don’t know what your preferences are, and if they’re sort of unexamined, unaware, unconsciousness, then you don’t have any strategies for confronting them. And I’ll be an advocate: I will say it’s good to confront your biases, not just because it is healthy and democratic, because it is fun.”

Media literacy experts say it’s important for students to read opinions written by sources they don’t necessarily agree with, and to be exposed to more viewpoints, even if they have to look hard to find them.

“The best thing, I tell my students, is to not only follow the money, but to follow the breadcrumbs,” Piersimoni said. “Especially if you go to Wikipedia. Down at the bottom of the page, check all the little footnotes, and double check, and then cross-reference. It is the best thing that you can do. And then see if you can find the opposite view of what you’re looking at.”

Moderator: Minerva Medrano

Producers: Diego Girgado and Tyler Jones

Anchor: Morgan Ball

Social Media Editors: Joselynn Castro and Shannon Ozburn

Reporters: Morgan Ball, Joselynn Castro, Diego Girgado, Tyler Jones, Minerva Medrano and Shannon Ozburn

Californians no longer have to think twice about where their new pets come from, now that a new law requires pet stores to sell animals acquired only from shelters and rescue organizations.

Governor Jerry Brown signed AB 485 this month. The bill was written by California State Assembly members Patrick O’Donnell (D – Long Beach) and Matt Dababneh (D – Woodland Hills), and it makes California the first state in the nation to regulate the breeding of pets and their sale to this extent.

“Basically what it will do is create a statewide ban on the sale of puppies, dogs, kittens, cats and rabbits in for-profit pet stores when they’ve been gotten from puppy mills,” Dababneh said. “We’re not going to let animals be sold in our state as pets when they come from inhumane breeding facilities that treat these animals as commodities, and don’t have any regard for the animal’s health or wellbeing.”

This new bill rules out the selling of animals that come from puppy mills or kitten factories, but independent breeders will still be able to sell their animals to pet stores. It primarily applies to the selling of dogs, cats and rabbits.

“This bill is extremely important,” said Charlotte Laws, an animal rights activist. “It will hopefully end the killing in the shelters. Right now, in Los Angeles, I believe we adopt out something like 84 percent of the animals that come into the shelters.”

“I think what the bill will do is promote more responsible pet ownership,” Bunnyluv Rabbit Resource Center representative Jody Springborn said. Springborn said that rabbits are the highest killed animals in shelters because they face a multitude of challenging health issues commonly affecting their teeth and eyes.

The bill’s supporters said that since rescue organizations are ‘no kill’ and require thorough adoption screenings, the placement of rescue animals into pet stores will help prevent the killing of many animals unnecessarily. Many shelters are recognized as being ‘no kill’, but others do have to euthanize animals with in critical health conditions or who have not been adopted within a certain time period.

The bill will go into effect on January 1, 2019.

Moderator: Shannon Ozburn

Producers: Joselynn Castro, Diego Girgado and Tyler Jones

Anchor: Minerva Medrano

Social Media Editors: Joselynn Castro and Diego Girgado

Reporters: Morgan Ball, Joselynn Castro, Diego Girgado, Tyler Jones, Minerva Medrano and Shannon Ozburn

Since this summer’s announcement of Executive Order 1100, many CSUN students and faculty have expressed concern about how the order would affect them. In late September, the Faculty Senate and its Standing Committees voted not to participate, freezing any action by the Faculty toward implementing the order at least until the Senate’s October meeting.

CSU Chancellor Timothy White issued the Executive Order in an effort to help more students graduate more quickly. Current four-year graduation rates are at approximately 18 percent, and White said he hopes to double those rates by streamlining the CSU graduation requirements at some campuses. Students are currently required to take the Title V courses covering a variety of subjects, but some campuses, CSUN among them, have added requirements in comparative cross-cultural studies.

“At what price are we going to ease graduation rates?” CSUN English Professor Scott Andrews asked. “Being culturally competent in a diverse community, the way the United States is, is just as essential as that Title V education.” Andrews is a member of the 2016 Task Force on the Advancement of Ethnic Studies.

CSUN’s Section F requires students to pass six units in comparative cultural studies, which can include gender, race, class or ethnicity studies and foreign languages. Executive Order 1100 removes that requirement, a change many fear could also lead to lower student enrollment and cuts in faculty in many departments.

“It would be an incredible loss,” Gender and Women Studies Chair Breny Mendoza said. “Gender and Women Studies is a discipline that is already 50 years old, and I think in the CSU systems, there are only two Gender and Women Studies departments. We are … a powerhouse as a department.”

With the addition of a GWS department at California State University Los Angeles, there would be three in the CSU system. However, even with the addition, many other departments, like Chicano/a studies, Asian-American Studies and Queer Studies could be facing cuts.

“Some of the faculty said ‘no, we’re not going to do that, we’re not going to comply’,” Chicano/a Studies Department Chair Gabriel Gutierrez said.

Many students have also expressed their concern over the content of their education without Section F, when campus diversity and knowledge on multicultural perspectives is something CSUN prides itself on.

“I think it’s more important for the students … [to]… have to take these courses, so that they get exposed to things outside of their comfort zone, outside of their background, outside of their own familiarity,” Andrews said, “because that’s what living in a diverse culture is about. It’s about encountering people who are different from yourself.”

Moderator: Morgan Ball

Producer: Diego Girgado

Anchor: Joselynn Castro

Social Media Editors: Tyler Jones and Shannon Ozburn

Reporters: Morgan Ball, Joselynn Castro, Diego Girgado, Tyler Jones, Minerva Medrano and Shannon Ozburn