Fire, Aim, Ready! Militarizing Animus: “Unit Cohesion” and the Transgender Ban

President Trump’s currently litigated “transgender ban,” which excludes transgender persons from military service, is premised in part upon a claim that transgender persons’ presence in the military adversely affects “unit cohesion.” This use of identity- based “unit cohesion” as a justification for excluding a group from military service is the latest episode in a long history of the government asserting “unit cohesion” to justify excluding people from military service based on their identities. This Article contends that unit cohesion, when premised on identity, is always an impermissible justification for exclusion from military service because it is unconstitutional animus. Though the animus doctrine is incomplete, with only a few Supreme Court cases identifying its contours, its growing significance to equal protection jurisprudence should not be ignored. This Article demonstrates that unit cohesion is animus under each of the variants articulated by the Supreme Court and understood by animus scholars. Though this Article argues that all attempts to justify exclusion from military service using identity-based claims of unit cohesion are impermissible animus, it applies animus jurisprudence only to the current “transgender ban.” By applying animus jurisprudence to the transgender ban, this Article demonstrates that this latest use of unit cohesion should invalidate the ban

Obergefell and the Dignitary Harm of Identity-Based Military Service Exclusion

In Obergefell v. Hodges, the Supreme Court recognized the right of same-sex couples to be married.[1] In doing so, the Court remedied the demeaning exclusion of a historically disadvantaged minority group from a nationally cherished institution, noting the stigma and injury the exclusion caused.  The sweeping language of the majority opinion in Obergefell and its focus on exclusionary harm suggested a new era of inclusion for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender Americans.[2] This Article argues that the exclusion of transgender persons from military service constitutes the type of harm Obergefell and the Equal Protection Clause prohibit.This Article first provides background on the pre-Obergefell landscape for constitutional challenges to military service exclusion.  Second, the Article assesses Obergefell’s jurisprudential expansions of substantive due process and equal protection doctrines through its recognition of the exclusionary harm done to gay people by excluding them from the institution of marriage.  The Article uses the Court’s exclusionary harm analysis to assess the exclusion of a historically disadvantaged minority group from another nationally cherished institution: the Trump Administration’s ban on transgender persons serving in the military.  Third, the Article argues that Obergefell advanced a new equal protection doctrine: the government may not demean a group by excluding it from an important positive right resulting in dignitary harm.  The Article concludes that the transgender military ban constitutes the type of dignitary harm that Obergefell and the Equal Protection Clause prohibit. [1].       Obergefell v. Hodges, 135 S. Ct. 2584, 2608 (2015). [2].       While the opinion did not explicitly address transgender rights, the Court wrote, “[t]he Constitution promises liberty to all within its reach, [including the right] to define and express their identity.”  Id. at 2593.  Some commentators observed this extended protections to transgender people.  See, e.g., Scott Skinner-Thompson, How Obergefell Could Help Transgender Rights, Slate (June 26, 2015), https://slate.com/human-interest/2015/06/obergefell-and-trans-rights-the-supreme-courts-endorsement-of-identity-expression-could-help-trans-activism.html [https://perma.cc/ZF3W-PVWP]; J. Courtney Sullivan, What Marriage Equality Means for Transgender Rights, N.Y. Times (July 16, 2015), https://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/16/opinion/what-marriage-equality-means-for-transgender-rights.html [https://perma.cc/23M3-T2NV]

Cumulative effects modeling in the mountaintop removal mining region of the central Appalachians

Anthropogenic alteration of natural land cover is a global driver of aquatic resource impairment. It is increasingly recognized that aquatic systems are impacted by multiple land use activities that combine additively and interactively to result in unique patterns of degradation (i.e., cumulative effects). Moreover, stream networks are multi-scaled, hierarchically structured systems wherein localized impacts can have both local (e.g., stream segment) and regional (e.g., watershed) consequences. Thus, there has been a recent push to construct statistical models capable of predicting and forecasting aquatic conditions under current and future landuse scenarios (i.e., scenario analysis) and characterize local and regional processes dictating observed patterns of ecological degradation.;Nowhere is there a greater need for decisive and empirically-driven aquatic resource management than within the Mountaintop Removal-Valley Fill (MTR-VF) mining region of the central Appalachians, where dramatic changes in land cover associated with large scale surface mining can produce strong measurable impacts to downstream ecosystems. However, several knowledge gaps currently limit aquatic resource management within this actively developing and socioeconomically important region. Notably, the extent to which surface mining-related stressors interact with those of other landuse activities is unclear.;In my first chapter, I tested for additive and interactive effects of dominant landuse activities (i.e., surface mining, deep mining, and residential development) on water quality (specific conductance and Se), habitat quality, and benthic macroinvertebrates via a uniquely designed watershed-scale assessment of the Coal River, West Virginia. I derived equations for predicting in-stream response to landscape changes and predicted the outcome of a realistic future scenario involving development of 15 permitted mines. I found that surface mining, underground mining, and residential development altered physical, chemical and biological condition through additive and complex interactive effects.;My second chapter focused on constructing landscape-based cumulative effects models capable of predicting in-stream response to future surface-mine development within the context of other landuse activities throughout the MTR-VF region. Predictive models provided precise estimates of specific conductance (model R2 ≤0.77 and cross-validated R2 ≤0.74), Se (0.74 and 0.70), and benthic macroinvertebrate community composition (0.72 and 0.65) and predicted high levels of chemical (33%) and biological (67%) impairment as a result of additive and interactive effects of surface mining, underground mining, and residential development. Of this total impairment, however, \u3c25% could be attributed to surface mining alone. Furthermore, the surface-mining level that results in exceedance of the 300 muS/cm conductivity benchmark increased from 4.4% in the presence of other stressors to 16.6% when only surface mining was present.;My third chapter focused on characterizing how multiple landuse activities control detailed patterns in local water chemistry. Principal component (PC) analysis identified 3 important dimensions of variation in water chemistry that were significantly correlated with contemporary surface mining (PC1, elevated dominant ions, sulfate, alkalinity, and selenium), coal geology and legacy mines (PC2, elevated trace metals), and residential development (PC3, elevated sodium and chloride). The combination of these 3 dominant sources of pollutants produced a complex stream-to-stream patchwork of contaminant mixtures. Seventy-five percent of headwater streams (catchments \u3c5km 2) had water chemistries that classified as either reference (49%), development only (18%) or mining only (8%). Only 21% of larger streams (catchments \u3e5km2) were classified as having reference chemistries, and chemistries indicative of combined mining and development contaminants accounted for 47% of larger streams (compared to 26% of headwater streams).;My fourth chapter was focused on quantifying the extent to which pervasive physicochemical degradation throughout the MTR-VF region influences regional metacommunity structure and processes. Notably, conservation of undisturbed headwater streams is a common management activity in disturbed watersheds because of their ability to preserve regional biodiversity. However, undisturbed headwater streams are often isolated within heavily degraded regions, leaving their communities at risk of losing sensitive, poor dispersing taxa (through decreased mass and rescue effects) and gaining tolerant, widely dispersing taxa (through increased dispersal and mass effects) from nearby degraded habitats. Results of this chapter suggest that both local (observed physicochemical conditions) and neighborhood (condition of streams within a 5km buffer) conditions explain significant variation in assemblage structure across all taxa. However, the strength of neighborhood effects varied as a function of taxon-specific tolerance and dispersal characteristics. Several taxa (Chironomidae, Hemerodromia, Chimarra) increased in occurrence and abundance with decreasing neighborhood conditions. Thus, invertebrate communities within even the most pristine streams are at risk when isolated within heavily impacted neighborhoods. Consequently, protection of regional species\u27 pools in heavily impacted regions will require more than simply conserving headwater catchments. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)

Mining and residential development interact to produce highly impaired stream conditions in an intensively mined Appalachian watershed

Large scale surface mining in southern West Virginia causes significant alteration of headwater stream networks. It is unclear, however, the extent to which mining interacts with other stressors to determine physical, chemical, and biological conditions in aquatic systems downstream. Through a watershed scale assessment of Pigeon Creek, the specific objectives of this study were to: (1) quantify the direct and interactive effects of mining and residential development on in-stream conditions; and (2) identify landscape thresholds above which biological impairment occurs. Our results indicate high levels of impairment to habitat, water quality, and benthic invertebrate communities within this watershed. Statistical analyses indicate that degraded conditions were linked to both mining and residential development; however, residential development appeared to exhibit a stronger individual effect. Both mining and residential development resulted in a significant decrease in sensitive taxa. The impacts associated with residential development, however, also resulted in the proliferation of tolerant taxa. Both mining and residential development resulted in significant alterations to water chemistry, primarily through increases in dissolved ion concentrations and specific conductance. Changes in water quality resulting from mining, however, were more acute. Conversely, residential development resulted in more acute alterations to physical habitat, primarily through decreases in habitat complexity. Our results further suggest that the individual impacts associated with mining and residential development are additive, leading to highly degraded conditions downstream. The combined effects of mining and residential development were almost always worse than the individual effects of mining, but never worse than the individual effects of residential development. Thus, residential development appears to be the limiting factor in determining ecosystem impairment. Lastly, several community metrics exhibited potential threshold responses to relatively low levels of both total mining (∼25%) and parcel density (∼14 parcels/km 2). These change points corresponded to conductivities of approximately 100 uS/cm and 60 uS/cm, respectively. This study shows that effectively managing impacts from new mine development and watershed restoration efforts must address the prevalence of non-mining related impacts throughout this watershed

Effect of Election Day Vote Centers on Voter Participation

In this article we study the effects of Election Day vote centers on voter turnout. Specifically we examine Texas and Colorado’s experience with alternative arrangements for the number and location of Election Day voting places and its impact on voter turnout in the 2006 and 2008 elections. We test our hypotheses at both the aggregate (i.e., county) and individual levels. We find evidence that vote centers increase voter turnout in presidential and midterm elections, and particularly among infrequent voters in midterms

Overcoming acculturation: physical education recruits' experiences of an alternative pedagogical approach to games teaching

© 2015 Association for Physical Education Background: Physical education teacher education (PETE) programmes have been identified as a critical platform to encourage the exploration of alternative teaching approaches by pre-service teachers. However, the socio-cultural constraint of acculturation or past physical education and sporting experiences results in the maintenance of the status quo of a teacher-driven, reproductive paradigm. Previous studies have reported successfully overcoming the powerful influence of acculturation, resulting in a change in PETE students' custodial teaching beliefs and receptiveness to alternative teaching approaches. However, to date, limited information has been reported about how PETE students' acculturation shaped their receptiveness to an alternative teaching approach. This is particularly the case for PETE recruits identified in the literature as most resistant to change. Purpose: To explore the features and experiences of an alternative games teaching approach that appealed to PETE recruits identified as most resistant to change, requiring a specific sample of PETE recruits with strong, custodial, traditional physical education teaching beliefs, and whom are high-achieving sporting products of this traditional culture. The alternative teaching approach explored in this study is the constraints-led approach (CLA), which is similar operationally to Teaching Games for Understanding, but distinguished by a neurobiological theoretical framework (nonlinear pedagogy) that informs learning design. Participants and setting: A purposive sample of 10 Australian PETE students was recruited for the study. All participants initially had strong, custodial, traditional physical education teaching beliefs, and were successful sporting products of this teaching approach. After experiencing the CLA as learners during a games unit, participants demonstrated receptiveness to the alternative pedagogy. Data collection and analysis: Semi-structured interviews and written reflections were sources of data collection. Each participant was interviewed separately, once prior to participation in the games unit to explore their positive physical education experiences, and then again after participation to explore the specific games unit learning experiences that influenced their receptiveness to the alternative pedagogy. Participants completed written reflections about their personal experiences after selected practical sessions. Data were qualitatively analysed using grounded theory. Findings: Thorough examination of the data resulted in establishment of two prominent themes related to the appeal of the CLA for the participants: (i) psychomotor (effective in developing skill) and (ii) inclusivity (included students of varying skill level). The efficacy of the CLA in skill development was clearly an important mediator of receptiveness for highly successful products of a traditional culture. This significant finding could be explained by three key factors: the acculturation of the participants, the motor learning theory underpinning the alternative pedagogy and the unit learning design and delivery. The inclusive nature of the CLA provided a solution to the problem of exclusion, which also made the approach attractive to participants. Conclusions: PETE educators could consider these findings when introducing an alternative pedagogy aimed at challenging PETE recruits' custodial, traditional teaching beliefs. To mediate receptiveness, it is important that the learning theory underpinning the alternative approach is operationalised in a research-informed pedagogical learning design that facilitates students' perceptions of the effectiveness of the approach through experiencing and or observing it working

A Novel Ecdysone Receptor Mediates Steroid-Regulated Developmental Events during the Mid-Third Instar of Drosophila

The larval salivary gland of Drosophila melanogaster synthesizes and secretes glue glycoproteins that cement developing animals to a solid surface during metamorphosis. The steroid hormone 20-hydroxyecdysone (20E) is an essential signaling molecule that modulates most of the physiological functions of the larval gland. At the end of larval development, it is known that 20E—signaling through a nuclear receptor heterodimer consisting of EcR and USP—induces the early and late puffing cascade of the polytene chromosomes and causes the exocytosis of stored glue granules into the lumen of the gland. It has also been reported that an earlier pulse of hormone induces the temporally and spatially specific transcriptional activation of the glue genes; however, the receptor responsible for triggering this response has not been characterized. Here we show that the coordinated expression of the glue genes midway through the third instar is mediated by 20E acting to induce genes of the Broad Complex (BRC) through a receptor that is not an EcR/USP heterodimer. This result is novel because it demonstrates for the first time that at least some 20E-mediated, mid-larval, developmental responses are controlled by an uncharacterized receptor that does not contain an RXR-like component

Total Rhythm in Three Dimensions: Towards a Motional Theory of Melodic Dance Rhythm in Swedish Polska Music

In this article I present an ethnotheory of the music/dance relationship in Swedish polska, based on dance fieldwork and interviews I have conducted with polska dance musicians. I discuss three mechanisms that these musicians use to communicate movement patterns to dancers: iteration (entrainment via repetition), metaphor (timbral weight conveying motional weight), and sympathy (musicians’ movements mapping dance movements). I then discuss how musicians use these mechanisms to control four motional parameters: pulsation (rate and consistency of tempo), lean (degree and direction of tilt over the dance axis) viscosity (level of perceived air resistance), and libration (degree and timing of vertical motion). The work is intended in part as a case study of how theories of both music and dance can benefit from a focused analysis of the relationship between those two domains, as well as how studies of music/dance relations can benefit from the application of ethnographic research techniques