Violence is a public health issue. Violence is getting harder to talk about. Every other public health issue I can think of is in this same boat. Before I get into that…
Did you do your homework?
I told you last week there would be a quiz, and this is it. Did you call your representatives? Do you have time right now to give ‘em a call? I think you absolutely should make your voice heard on vaccines, food safety inspections, and any other public health issue that you see on your feeds and get anxious about!
Did I call my reps? You betcha—and they hung up on me initially due to high call volume. I called 30 minutes later and got through. What did I say? I praised several recent actions by the office of the governor including improving COVID-19 vaccine access to our state and calls to end political violence. I ended by saying that I want to see an initiative in our state for free childcare, similar to New Mexico’s program launching later this year (check the end of this newsletter for some more details on their program).
On Violence Prevention
People are working all over the country to end violence. This problem requires significant collaboration across disciplines to prevent violent acts, political or personal. Achieving a goal like violence prevention requires creating systems of safety and support, similar to what I discussed last week, that make it very difficult to enact violence. Seat belts are an imperfect intervention that saves lives—we have similar violence interventions that could save lives and we refuse time and again to implement them.
Trying to prevent gun violence is particularly maddening. The current media and political environment almost always ensures gun violence never makes it past the absolute beginning of discussing the problem, never mind discussing solutions. There is a defeatist attitude around the idea of gun violence prevention, rather than a genuine understanding that laws can be implemented or changed to increase safety and ensure safe, gun-free schools and communities. Instead of even discussing policy or building political will, the conversation seems to just stop at the words “second amendment.”
That’s bad enough, but our university system that trains public health professionals and social workers that could help create and implement violence prevention programs is proving to be very brittle, and I think this problem is exacerbating the issue of discussing and teaching public health solutions. If we can’t even talk about these problems in depth, how could we ever address them?
If you haven’t been in or around academia in a while, there is an air of fear regarding “being political,” including in public health classes. Public health is just inherently political, it truly can’t be sanitized of the political elements—some public health interventions are simply the correct intervention, even if there is a political movement that disagrees. The politicization of vaccination is a great example. Public vaccine requirements save lives, but this is not viewed as a simple and straightforward fact supported by a flood of evidence, it’s “political.”
It’s understandable why professors are cautious, or even flat out afraid. Just this week, a professor was fired and at least two administrators that defended her were also removed from their roles because of a viral video of a student arguing with the professor about the course materials. Texas legislators put pressure on Texas A&M after the video went viral, because the professor said there was more than two genders. Apparently, there are now plans to audit the entire course catalogue of A&M. I can’t find anything specific on what they will be looking to remove from the course catalogue, so who knows what this even means for professors and students, going forward. This is a clear example of academic freedom being held in a Republican choke hold.
Meanwhile, UC Berkley turned over a list of students and faculty to the Trump administration as a part of their “antisemitism probe.” Judith Butler, feminist philosopher and professor included on the list, rightfully told the San Francisco Chronicle that this list embodies “echoes of McCarthyism.” It would be an understatement to say that freedom to teach and learn are under attack in our nation’s universities. These moves have deeply entrenched a culture of fear within higher learning that will take significant effort to undo. Efforts we can’t even begin because of how relentless this anti-university push has been.
The news this week has largely been dominated by the public assassination of Charlie Kirk on a college campus that allows open and concealed firearm carry. The far-right calls for retaliation and revenge (and war, in some cases), will likely contribute to continued or worsening fear of violence on college campuses. As of the time of writing this, we don’t know the motives of Kirk’s killer, but the need for instant responses online mean blame is already placed on the political party that is condemning political violence. Over the course of today, I’ve noticed temperature seems to have cooled down on the right on social media, which indicates that they might be trying to ideologically distance themselves from the motives of the killer.
If that’s not enough, the far right calls to violence are having direct effects on HBCUs. Threats to these schools have caused at least 6 institutions to cancel classes or lock down out of an abundance of caution. The Trump administration also announced cuts to grant programs that benefit minority students this week. This is furthering unnecessary and undue burdens on these student populations. By hindering student access to education, we are limiting the pool of people that could dedicate themselves to solving problems like gun violence.
It seems that no matter who is the victim of gun violence, whether it be the now-regular school shootings, the assassinations of legislator of Melissa Hortman and her husband and dog, or now Charlie Kirk, the conversation can’t progress past the beginning. It’s like everyone has just now heard of gun violence for the first time, every single time. We must establish condemning the violence, over and over again, with no actual action outside of this. I’m glad there are some republican voices condemning the calls for revenge, such as Senator Thom Tillis and Utah governor Spencer Cox, but we must get the conversation past this point so we can actually implement lifesaving solutions.
This playbook on preventing any discourse on gun violence from proceeding past condemnations of violence is going to be applied to all forms of higher learning. Buried in the news this week is RFK Jr’s MAHA report on chronic disease in children. The report troubles me, especially recommendations around removing fluoride in drinking water, which is considered one of the greatest public health achievements in the 20th century. This report also calling for changes in medical school accreditation that would allow the government to dictate new accrediting agencies oversee medical school curricula. Here’s a short explainer from a practicing physician breaking this problem down further (thanks, Dr. Rubin!):
By the way, the report doesn’t say anything about the leading cause of death to children and adolescents, which is firearm-related deaths. This is madness.
Some good news
First up, Trump states vaccines work. He also said "They're not controversial at all. And I think those vaccines should be used." It would be quite unlike Trump to not take credit for the COVID-19 vaccines developed during his first administration, which I believe is why he is not backing RFK Jr on his vaccine “skepticism.” I’m not hopeful this will do anything to boost vaccination access or vaccination rates this flu season, but Trump is absolutely right that vaccines do work and they are largely uncontroversial. It truly seems like being anti-vaccine is mainstream in today’s political climate, but polling doesn’t back this up. Check out this story from The Associated Press—the polls indicate lower vaccine support than 30 years ago, but also indicate that somewhere between 7 and 8 people out of 10 support childhood vaccination.
On an even better note, New Mexico will be providing free childcare to all residents. I think childcare workers deserve the world, as do the children and families they serve. This is a huge policy victory that will hopefully stimulate the state economy while also giving families more flexibility. I predict this will greatly stabilize families at all income levels, after reading Holding It Together, by Jessica Calarco, earlier this year. I can’t recommend that book enough, if you’re interested in the current childcare climate and difficulties faced by families across the United States. Congratulations to New Mexicans, here’s hoping we see initiatives like this across the nation!
If you haven’t, give your reps a call and ask them to prioritize public safety and violence prevention initiatives.
See y’all next week,
Professor Batty