Profile Piece

WSU Graduate Student Brings Flavor of Diversity to Pullman

Each year less than 1 percent of Washington State University’s 25,000 undergraduate and graduate students receive the President’s Award, given to the student who best represents exceptional leadership and service to the university and the community. 

Elliott Flavors, a 25-year-old graduate student, was the recipient of one of the 40 President’s Awards of 2008 for his demonstration of high character, leadership and engagement. 

While the President’s Award is one of the top achievements Flavors’ has worked for, his biggest satisfaction comes from trying to make the world around him a better place.

Flavors was born to Trolice and Anna in Seattle and gives much of the credit for the person he is today toward his family upbringing and how family developed him into the person he has become.

“From a traditional sense our family was very conservative,” said Flavors.  “We weren’t allowed to watch any so-called bad movies or curse or anything like that.  Basically we were like any family out there, Dad was the disciplinarian and Mom was the one you could run to.”

Trolice Flavors, a former Black Panther, was involved in a sit-in at Seattle’s Franklin High School where African-American students protested after African-American female students were sent home because they wore their hair as an afro.  Trolice’s decided to sit-in because African-American students wanted to have more diversity by having more African-American administrators, teachers, and an increased learning of prominent African-Americans throughout history.

The elder Flavors’ ideals of being involved in community issues, standing up for what is right and standing up for what you believe in became the template the younger Flavors based his life on.

“As I became older I realized I became who my father was,” said Flavors.  “Everything from the corny jokes to becoming involved with my surrounding community, I saw my father when I looked into the mirror.”

During Flavors’ junior year these morals and values were tested as a result of an alleged racist taunt directed toward an Asian female student. 

In 2005, two former WSU men’s basketball players Robbie Cowgill and Alex Kirk were accused of harassing former WSU student Nina Kim at the Multicultural Student Center in the Cub.  According to reports, the players were accused of “dancing around and slanting their eyes” as they walked by the student center where Kim worked.

Upon hearing of the incident, Flavors and a group of WSU students staged a protest at a WSU basketball game where they held signs and chanted to the crowd. 

After a lengthy investigation the players were cleared of any wrong doing by WSU Student Conduct, a ruling that Flavors feels was unjust. 

“Here you have two male student-athletes, who by more than one account were identified as having taken part in this incident where racism was evident and for the ruling to clear them because of ‘adolescent behavior’ there’s something wrong there.”

Even though the outcome wasn’t what Flavors wanted, the results of the protests led WSU to change the way harassment was viewed at the university.

After a few months of evaluating harassment policies WSU called for changes including a zero-tolerance policy regarding racism, diversity training and the diversity requirement for students pursuing their undergraduate degree. 

As a result, Flavors co-chaired a group called Black Men Making a Difference.  The groups’ premise was to address social issues such as racism and sexism. 

The group held workshops and public forums to raise and educate students on diversity issues.  BMMAD is the reason Flavors began to appreciate Pullman.

“Here you have a bunch of people coming together all trying to get the same message of diversity across,” said Flavors.  “The first time someone asked why our name was ‘Be Mad’ and not ‘Be Happy’, I told them can’t you see this smile on my face I’m happy and proud to be doing this.”

If Flavors sees his father when he looks into the mirror, the man in the mirror must surely be proud.

Elliott Flavors (206) 856-2623

Profile Proposal

I want to do a profile on Officer Brock Germer, the College Hill beat cop, of the Pullman PD. This is a guy who I know, from various students on campus, who is respected and disliked. My thought here is to get his story on the job that he does, what goes into it, why he is liked/disliked...etc. I feel this could be interesting because with his interaction and understanding of college students maybe there is a stereotype that perhaps shouldn't be implied when dealing with Germer. People I could interview are "Pro" Germer, those who work with him or have had positive encounters with him, or "Anti" Germer, those who have negative encounters with him or perhaps those who favored former Officer Bell. The newspapers that this could be published in are Germer's hometown (wherever that may be) and any newspaper here in Pullman.

War Critique

  Everyone has heard the song “War, uhhh, what is it good for absolutely nothin’”.  While many hold this common belief that no war is a good war, the coverage of war by the mass media has lead to many debates about whether the agenda of the media is to promote or oppose the war back home in the States.  Whether the information is being exhibited through video, political cartoons, commentary or a soldier stationed in Iraq there are many techniques used to help calibrate opinions here on the home front. 

Lt. Col. Craig Whiteside described media news as ‘being negative, but perhaps that is the nature of journalism and perhaps people’.  After having served in Iraq in a tour of duty, Whiteside said he came back with a different perception on what was being reported back home to what was really going on in Iraq.  Most notably, Whiteside referred to an article in Esquire where a member of his troop was held on trial for wrongful murder.  He felt that the article was poorly written because he felt that the reported ultimately fell in love with Michael Hensley, the man in question, and because of this the story lacked any objectivity.   Whiteside also talked about a story in The Washington Post in which the journalist wrote a story that he stumbled upon instead of the story the troop was offering.  Both stories in which Whiteside was a part of seemed to have struck a chord within him because as he put it “There are many good things going on, but it seems as if the negative stuff is all that is being said.”  Whiteside said perhaps most of these negative stories are being written because over the course of the war, many of the foreign correspondents are paying local stringers to cover the story.  This poses the problem of getting the local Iraqi angle on the story, and due to certain beliefs and threats from oppositional forces could lead the stringer to write a story that is highly negative for American troops.   

The first article is from Matt Gurney of nationalpost.com.  The title of the article “Defeating the Taliban may be Impossible.  It’s also not Necessary” tells the reader right away the writer’s stance on how he feels about the War on Terror.  Within the first few paragraphs of the article, the author does a great job explaining his point of views as he cites numerous examples of why dealing with insurgents is so difficult for the coalition because they don’t follow the same strict routine and bylaws that traditional military forces do.  Gurney continues with past examples of war such as Vietnam and World War II and that because of the various tactics used against the coalition it limits/hinders how they are able to fight.  Gurney becomes political by saying that the election of President Obama is a good thing for the West because it allows for a fresh start for redefining the goals of the so called “War on Terror”.  I like this article a lot because even though the author doesn’t agree with the war, he provides great examples through historical and current context to give the reader something to think about. 

The second article is from a CNN.com report on a group of suicide bombers that attacked a rally near Baghdad in July.  The article focuses on the series of attacks during a period in which Shiites attended a holy shrine.  The article gives a brief history of conflict between the Kurds, Sunnis and Shiites so the reader can get an insight as to the possibilities on why the attacks could have occurred.  The article does a good job getting context and even some insight from the sides involved.  The part where the article does the best job is acknowledging that female suicide bombers is becoming an increasingly larger problem as the conflict in Iraq progresses and how the Iraqi government is going about trying to solve/limit the problem.  Since this is an online source, the article also has links, video, and various pictures of the event which do a good job bringing the conflict into the homes of Americans. 

Military.com provides a photo journal of images from the Iraq War that once again gives vivid imagery as to what is going on in Iraq.  Before analyzing the pictures and captions that go along with the photos it should be noted there is going to be obvious bias toward the military effort because the site has an interest in the U.S. military forces.  The first picture in the pictorial is of an Iraqi family grieving.  The picture does a great job capturing the emotion and at first the caption does a good job recapping the even that caused the family to grieve.  However, the last part of the caption “…and residents blamed U.S. troops for the tragedy” makes the military to be the scapegoat for the death of civilians in Iraq.  The next picture shows a group of “Iraqi Martyrs” that are marching with AK-47s.  The picture tries to show what the enemy looks like and what military forces are up against.  The picture that struck me the most was a picture of a soldier tearing up as he attended a memorial service for a fallen soldier.  The picture brings to life the raw emotion that soldiers go through as they are faced with losing the people they are closest within their infantry, and it gives the viewer an idea of the type of people that are serving our country overseas. 

The biggest problem I’ve had with the media coverage over the course of the War on Terror is the death of Pat Tillman.  For those who don’t know Pat Tillman was an ex-NFL player who retired prematurely in order to enlist for the war in Afghanistan.  Tillman died because of friendly fire and what ensued was the mass media putting Tillman above all others who have served their country.  For instance, in an April 2004 article in USA Today Greg Boeck praises Tillman for his sacrifice and service to the country.  While Tillman’s story is unique because of his “celebrity status” without his name and professional accolades his story is just like many others who enlisted in the armed forces after 9/11.  The bigger story that came out of Tillman’s’ death was the military cover-up that ensued after his death.  While there was substantial coverage over the cover-up I feel that majority of the coverage came because of Tillman’ celebrity status.

Al-Jazeera is an Arabic based media network that provides coverage world-wide.  In an archived article from 2004 involving a US led attack in Fallujah there is a different style in what was reported compared to US mediums.  The article focuses more on the violence and damages caused by the US led forces, compared to the mission/reasoning of the attacks that are seen in US papers.  The article is very descriptive using phrases such as ‘lit up the night sky’ and ‘precision strikes’.  The article includes a little blurb about US Marines who were killed, which after reading the whole article lets the reader know where Al-Jazeera stands in terms of who/what they support because the only times the US is mentioned deals with violent aspects.  Even though the article is primarily against the US led attacks the article does a good job informing the reader of the events that took place.  Much like American papers the article is written toward the audience involved, in this case the Arab world.  

Sources 

Gurney Article

Female Suicide Bombers

Photo Journal

Pat Tillman

Al Jazeera