Volume 36, Issue 3 (March 27, 2018)

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Issue 3. 2017 -18

March 27, 2018

INTERNAL Behind the Scenes of After Party Read about what went into planning AP from the planners themselves! pg. 8

INTERNAL Humans of NT The females of North Toronto share their sexual assault experiences.

pg. 9

EXTERNAL What Happens in One School Affects All Schools Read about the Parkland Shooting. pg. 13

Illustration by Angela Miljanovic.

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Contents Internal

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After Party

Read about the planners of After Party and what inspired them to continue the North Toronto tradition.

External

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Serial Killer Charged with the Murders of Six Men Flip to page 11 to find out more about this tragedy.

Arts and Culture Infinity Mirror Exhibit at the AGO

18 Photo by Kathleen Foran. pg. 18

Read about the new exhibit at the AGO.

Features

NT: Past and Present

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A former NT student shares his highschool stories from the 50’s.

Opinion

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Work Hard No Play Are the students of North Toronto working too hard? Read about Katarina Makivic and Hannah Argiloff ’s opinions on the matter.

Photo from Sofia Platnick. pg. 20

Humour

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Shopping for Products for “Her” If you’re a woman, you may relate to some of these shopping problems.

Sports

Interview with Danielle Im: Former NT Student and Olympic Athlete Im, who played hockey at North Toronto for four years, talks about being a student athlete at NT and about being an Olympic athlete.

35 Photo from Danielle Im. pg. 35

Gum Shoes 2 by Avishai Sol

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Internal

Photo from The Student Council.

How to Run for Student Council

David Chu and Julia Yacoub

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re you thinking about running for the next student council election? The experience of a student council election is not as scary as you may think. In fact, it is a great way to put your name out there and show that you are capable of many leadership positions beyond student council. Before we begin our list of hints on how to run a successful campaign, let us outline some of the characteristics that any student council candidate must have: 1. Be hard working and committed to following through on promises 2. Be positive and creative thinkers 3. Be open-minded to working with others. It is a committee, making teamwork crucial for it to function properly.

4. Be willing to put 110% into everything, be it assemblies, meetings, or spirit.

Now, let us outline some helpful hints on how to run a successful campaign for student council: 1. Do it. The biggest barrier between you and a seat on student council is

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you. You have to tell yourself that you can do it; and you can.

2. Make your election speech fun, engaging, and memorable. Everyone will remember a good speech and it is entirely possible to win an election with a good speech and no other forms of campaigning (not even social media). While we would recommend taking advantage of all possible ways to campaign, your speech is definitely the most important. A good speech will be funny (throw in some jokes), memorable (do something creative), and engaging (get the audience involved).

Also include why you are the best candidate, highlighting what you plan to do for the school and why people should vote for you. You have it in you!

3. Make yourself look like a great candidate. You want people to vote for you because you are a “good person”. No one wants to elect a pretentious, selfserving snob; at the same time, you have to show that you are confident in yourself and your abilities.

4. Find a memorable slogan. The slogan that you pick will define the

mood of your campaign. Pick one that will stick with people so that they will remember who you are even if they do not particularly remember you.

Like “don’t be a noob, vote Yacoub” or “David Chu makes your dreams come true”. Even grade 10s come up to David and say, “Hey, are you that guy who ran for president?”

5. Do something creative for your campaign. When asked about creative ideas, Tanner, the NTAA male president, said that “Ella and [he] did a Snapchat filter”. Julia wore a neon shirt with her name on it for the campaign week. Jocelyn Rough (previous SVP and NTAA female president) wore striped socks all week.

6. No phone or other social media? No problem. David did not have Facebook or any other type of social media before he joined student council. You may view it as a barrier, but you will find ways around this. If you are a creative thinker, you will certainly find a solution.

7. NEVER GIVE UP! Julia Yacoub, current SVP, ran for student council in grades 9 and 10 but was unsuccess-

ful and placed 3rd each time before running again in grade 11. Believe in yourself and your capabilities, and you can accomplish anything.

Running for student council is not as daunting a task as you might think.

In fact, even if you think you have no hope of winning, you may be pleasantly surprised. Regardless of whether you acquire the elected position, you should be extremely proud of yourself. Just putting yourself up on stage in front of your peers is really hard and not something people do lightly.

You should be proud of your courage.

Others recognize this and you’ll find yourself being encouraged toward other leadership opportunities.

We would be lying if we said running for student council is easy. It isn’t for everyone. It takes drive and persistence to run the race to the top, although only a few will win. And although you may try and fail, the experience is worth it all. You will be amazed at yourself and your accomplishments for just even trying. After all, there’s nothing to lose. See you on the stage in May!

NT Hack: How to Win an Athletic Award Without Being Athletic Annie Doane

If you are anything like me, you watched the Olympics, saw that one girl who did the halfpipe event who didn’t do a single trick and thought “that’s me”. Some of us just aren’t athletically inclined. That’s ok. However, if you have ever wanted to find a loophole in the system and shock your friends by winning an athletic award, there is a way. As a school with an abundance of walk-on teams, it is fully possible to collect enough points, without ever having to worry about getting cut from the team. Some of the teams you have to choose from include field hockey (girls), footPhoto by Chloe Hung. ball (guys), cross country, curling, swim, ski, snowboard track and rugby. If you start playing 4-5 of these sports every year, there is a good chance you can land yourself a junior/senior athletic award. You just need to show up, try your best and have fun.

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Obituary: Bill Glied Dana Aronowitz

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n February 17, 2018, Holocaust survivor Bill Glied unexpectedly passed away.

In April of 1944, Bill was deported along with his entire family from his home town of Subotica, Serbia to Auschwitz-Birkenau.

In June 1944, he was transferred to the Dachau concentration camp in Germany where he worked as a slave labourer, building the infamous Ringeltaube. He was liberated by the US Army on April 29, 1945 and came to Canada as an orphan in 1947. Mr. Glied had a tremendous heart and always believed that kindness really can change the world. North Toronto staff and

students had the privilege of hearing Mr. Glied’s story at the 2017 Holocaust Education Assembly. To honour Bill, North Toronto raised money for the Bill Glied Memorial Fund for Holocaust Education, a fund created by his family to ensure that stories like Bill’s are never forgotten.

Photo taken from Obituary.

Impacts of the TDSB Travel Ban on North Toronto Students Joshua Chong

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n early February, TDSB trustees voted to ease restrictions on travel to the United States. The decision came following an uproar by students and staff across the TDSB who believed the ban took away from unique learning opportunities.

Since March 2017, the TDSB barred all students and staff from participating in any educational trips to the United States in response to President Trump’s executive order, which blocked citizens of Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen from entering the United States. Since first signing it, the executive order has undergone multiple changes and challenges in the American court of law.

The most notable change occurred in early March of 2017, when Iraqi citizens were removed from the list.

According to a news release on the TDSB’s website, the board enacted their own ban against travel to the United States, so that “students [will] not be placed [in] situations of potentially being turned away at the bor-

der.” The board also highlighted their commitment to fairness, equity, and inclusion as factors that influenced their decision.

The most vocal opposition towards the TDSB travel ban likely came from high school students who are a part of DECA, an organization which focuses on fostering business, marketing, and leadership skills. Many DECA members feared that they would be unable to travel to the United States and participate in the International Career Development Conference being held in Atlanta between April 21-24, 2018.

A petition created by a DECA chapter at Earl Haig Secondary School asking the TDSB to reverse the ban garnered more than 1500 signatures. “The Board was of the view that students’ educational opportunities were being significantly impacted by continuing to restrict student travel to the United States for competitions,” said Chair Robin Pilkey. Despite the almost complete reversal of the ban, the TDSB continues to maintain the rule that

if any TDSB student or staff is turned away at the border, the trip will be cancelled.

The petition was a factor that influenced the TDSB’s decision to reverse parts of the ban. According to Meagan Leider, a Grade 12 North Toronto student and co-chair of the TDSB Student Senate for Learning Centre 1, the Student Senate noticed the backlash towards the travel ban and brought the issue up with the trustees.

One signatory of the petition was Diana Chung, a Grade 12 North Toronto student who is a member of DECA. As the DECA conference grew closer, Chung became nervous that she might not be able to attend the event. “[We] studied, prepared, and trained hard for [the] last stage,” Chung said. When she heard of the TDSB’s decision last year, she found it “pretty heartbreaking”.

Nikoo Aleyasin, a Grade 11 student from North Toronto, also weighed in on the TDSB’s decision. As a dual citizen of both Canada and Iran, Aleyasin feels lucky to

hold Canadian citizenship as it “helps [her] pass through the border without many problems.” However, she understands that other Iranian students who do not hold a Canadian passport face major problems at the border, including being turned back.

Yet, Aleyasin still felt the outright ban by the TDSB was unfair to students. “It should be sorted out on a case by case basis,” said Aleyasin, “If a school has a team with a person who might be turned away at the border, then I think the staff advisor or principal should take it upon themselves to see whether or not the trip should still continue. However, if a school does not have anyone that can be affected, the other students are missing out on some great opportunities.”

Now that the TDSB’s travel ban has been lifted, students and staff have started planning trips to the United States. For Chung, the DECA trip in April is on track to go on as planned. This huge about-face has shown the influence of students, staff, and parents on the policies created by TDSB trustees.

Guess Who’s Back (Maybe) Madeleine Wesely

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Photo by Chloe Hung.

uring the spring of 2017, students across the TDSB learned that Snapchat, Ins-

tagram and Netflix would be blocked on TDSB Wifi for an indeterminate amount of time.

Although many students and teachers are not fans of the

restriction, it allows the TDSB to focus on upgrading networks at its schools and staff to complete required tasks. Snapchat, Instagram and Netflix take up a significant amount of bandwidth, so blocking it creates faster internet speeds because internet traffic is significantly reduced. However, the moment all students have been waiting for may be soon: the work on transitioning TDSB schools to a newer network is expected to be finished by the end of June.

Peter Singh, the TDSB’s Executive Officer of Information

Technology Services, said that, “Once we have been able to see how the network responds to these updates, we will revisit the decision [to block Snapchat, Instagram and Netflix].” So, worry not: by September, TDSB students may be able to add their first day back to their Snap story, catch up on the newest seasons of their favourite Netflix shows, and scroll through their Instagram feed, all without using their data or a VPN.

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March 27, 2018 • Internal

Hana Sharifi and Sarah Ha

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hen you hear the term “class rep”, what benefits come to your mind?

Is it a resume item? A boost for your university application?

Genuine care for one’s class? A popularity point?

Class reps are, by the school’s general definition, representatives of a homeroom class that are expected to voice the class’s concerns to the student council to help implement changes desired by the majority of the student body. However, though this sounds like a job demanding a certain level of responsibility and commitment, it seems that class reps may not be all that “responsible” behind the closed doors of those infamous monthly meetings.

Julia Yacoub, NT’s current senior vice president, remarks that the situation is “really frustrating”. She notes that at monthly meetings, along with the council, she gets a chance to see how class reps truly handle their responsibilities. At recent meetings, for example, they had been asked for feedback regarding charity week. According to Yacoub, “some people give good feedback, but some people just sit there and look around”. And this is only what she’s seen from people who attend. At this point of the year, only five grade 12 reps attend regularly, and reps from other grades barely come at all.

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dents at NT that not only do most class reps rarely ever show up to meetings, but they also seldom contribute to them with their respective homeform’s opinion. This was made evident with one of the big votes that was taken earlier this school year – Art Council needing votes to get on Student Council. The outcome of the vote may have revealed a nature of class reps that has been hidden from the rest of the students: some classes realized that their class reps did not follow the classes wishes in their votes of yes or no. Yacoub believes that this is a direct result of an abuse of power.

“They have a lot of power,” she says, “so they can say yes, no, whatever they’re feeling. And some reps didn’t even bother asking their classes – they just decided on their own, [even when] we specifically emphasized to do what your class wants”.

A Grade 11 student at NT who is a class rep finds it difficult to understand why class reps would meddle with their classes’ opinions in the first place.

According to her, it “may just be because they thought they deserved to, or they just didn’t care about what their class thought”. Another thing she has noticed is that the level of contribution from class reps has been significantly decreasing, and although “the year started off with a lot of people going, the attendance has almost decreased by half at this point,”

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Class Rep Meetings

and that “nobody ever contributes”. However, this is unfair to class reps who diligently attend every early morning meeting when they too would rather be studying for a test or sleeping in.

and “they don’t end up showing up to anything”. Class reps are apparently given volunteer hours and food but “there’s only so much you can do, they have to play their part”.

Is there anything that can be done to prevent class reps from taking advantage of their position? Student council has thought of other ways to communicate with the students, such as conducting school-wide surveys that gathers students’ opinions on school events, and this might very well come into play. At the beginning of the year, teachers are contacted when class reps aren’t regularly attending meetings, but for the rest of the year, there isn’t much else that can be done, given that it is a volunteered position.

Perhaps the underlying problem is school spirit. It is clear from our declining charity week profits over the last few years that students at NT are losing that spark of spirit and selflessness that once made our school special. This evident deterioration in school spirit reflects the way class reps have been acting as of late: ignoring meetings, minimal contribution, and rigging the votes for important matters within the school.

I wish people would try. We don’t know what to do.

The most interactive way still seems to be electing a rep.

Yacoub realizes that by doing that, sometimes it is a popularity contest. She points out that especially in grade 9, since elections happen at the beginning of the year, people don’t really know anyone else so the “funniest” guy in the class gets elected

However, class reps that show up consistently and continue to do their jobs diligently do exist. Despite the duty being quite tedious, with a fair amount of responsibility required, these class reps have proven to be very attentive and eager during meetings. Not only do these class reps deserve a massive thank-you, they are the ones that all other class reps should look up to. Of course, no one is expecting every single class rep to be present for every meeting or to participate and appear enthusiastic all the time; just to put in a certain amount of effort.

“I wish people would try,” Yacoub expresses. “We don’t know what to do.”

NT Hack: How to Avoid Being Late Diana Kagan

Don’t we all wish that NTCI started at noon, so all of our constantly sleeping brains could get enough sleep, and stop waking up to the annoying sound of an alarm clock at 6:00 am. Although delaying the school is not possible, there are some great hacks you can follow to avoid the NT late line. Firstly and most importantly, plan a very exciting breakfast that you will be looking forward to. Before a very hard day in school, it is always very soothing to enjoy a delicious breakfast. Planning this before going to sleep can actually help you to look forward to waking up and stuffing your face with those favourite Eggos and maple syrup. Another very important hack to wake up on time is to put your alarm across the room so that you physically have to stand up to shut up the disgusting noise that is reaching your half asleep brain.

Trust, an early walk across the room is way better than missing a half of your physics class because you were waiting to pick up a late slip. In addition to setting your alarm clock, make sure that you are drinking a glass of water before you go to bed, as it relaxes your body and allows it to restore more efficiently overnight. After keeping your body hydrated, also remember to find a big fuzzy blanket that will keep you warm; the best sleep is between 16 to 21 degrees. Keep your body and mind healthy by getting enough sleep and avoiding a look of disappointment in George’s eyes when you walk at 9:05 am into the doors of NT.

Photo by Maya Sternthal.

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Wired

Katherine Kian

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ou have six projects due this week, so you sit down, stash your phone away in the nearest drawer, and get to work, right? If so, you are either in the minority, or you are lying to yourself. Our phones are so connected to us that our nerve endings bond with our phones to form a fifth limb. When is the last time you left the house without your phone? If you answered that question easily, here is another one: when is the last time you purposefully left the house without your phone?

You have most likely experienced the sudden onset of panic from reaching for your phone in your pocket only to find nothing there. Could it be possible that we have developed an instinct to check our phones? My phone usage, relative to the collected data which will be discussed later, is less than average. Not very inspiring information, seeing as I average three to four hours of exposure to my phone per day. This is shown by the Moment iPhone application used to track my phone usage over a month.

In this same month, I crammed for each test I took and rarely had time to study ahead. It follows that balance and awareness of phone usage are necessary for efficient time management. To test the hypothesis of my phone-checking instinct, I placed my phone in a friend’s bag and began studying. The results were disappointing. It was tremendously difficult to break the habit of picking up the phone. Not doing so was quite angst-inducing. Twenty-two minutes into studying, I instinctively reached for my phone. It was off, of course, but I did so again after forty-

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Figure 1

three minutes. Then after sixty-five minutes as well. And one last time, after a hundred and six minutes. Moment later informed me that I unlock my phone an average of sixty times a day, every eleven minutes. Rationalizing this urge to stare into the black mirror took some time. Admittedly, I am not in any position of power or authority that requires the constant caressing of a phone. However, the electronic era has conditioned those born after the millenium, including myself, to be acutely aware and intune with their notification sounds.

Maturing from iPod to iPhones was a common middle-class child experience. We were raised struggling through homework with one hand on the pencil and one hand on the device. From an early age, our time was split between the paper and the screen.

This split leads to constant complaints about the lack of time during the day. But how productively do we spend our waking moments? To determine the average time spent on phone applications, I collected screenshots of battery usage from fifteen young people ranging from the ages of fourteen to twenty-one.

Within a seven-day time span, every person had Snapchat in their top ten most used applications (usually in the top three). People used Snapchat an average of 5.4 hours per week.

Texting applications? 2.7 hours.

The highest data point for a single person’s weekly snapchat usage was nearly double the average, at 10.7 hours (Figure 1), and 8 hours for texting applications (Figure 2). Someone spent 9.6 hours on Instagram, as seen

in Figure 3.

Have you checked your usage lately, if ever? Harrison Garside, a grade twelve student at NTCI, learned that he spent 4.6 hours on Instagram; he said he “can’t believe it.” He suggested that his marks may improve with more time spent on his work as a result of less time spent on his phone, but admitted that he will “probably keep using [his] phone just as much.”

Garside was onto something here.

Though correlation does not equal causation, in 2014, the University of Waterloo found that students who studied more got higher grades. The more time you spend on your phone, the less time you spend studying.

Yet there are others who spend their time on different black mirrors, such as laptops or tablets. One person in this study was found to not have a phone — by choice.

A grade twelve student goes about her life without a smartphone. Despite this, she acknowledges that she simply substitutes the time others use on their phones on her laptop. A low estimate for her daily usage was three hours a night. Upon further analysis, it was found that she spends five hours a night on her laptop.

Once we arrive home, the temptation of the laptop is irresistible and within our reach. The student notes that she is “still able to procrastinate without a phone,” and mentions that she is only truly productive in school when given free time, as it is then that she is without devices altogether.

Addiction is the condition of being dependant upon a particular sub-

Figure 2

stance or activity. Have you ever used an app so often that you noticed it, becoming acutely aware of your own obsession? This happened to me with Instagram. Countless hours ticked by as I scrolled endlessly through the ‘Explore’ tab. To try and mend this issue in an attempt to buy myself more time during the day, I deleted the app. Simple. A few months passed, and I took note of of my new pacifier… Twitter. Following from this, unless there are steps taken to ensure that you will not fall back to old habits, you cannot expect to suddenly become a different person. Our generational epidemic is the allure of our phones. We itch for our fix of notifications - the blue-tinged backlit screens - and always find ourselves staring at the black mirror.

Open up your agenda and take a look at those upcoming projects. The contemplation of starting an assignment but instead going to check Snapchat is the easier road to travel, but your destination is closer via another path. Being proactive and beginning to change one’s screenusage habits is vital in reducing screen time. Phones are the newest parasite, attaching to us as their host and taking control of our time.

People are unaware of the degree to which they are wired to their phones and feel helpless in the fight for time.

Consider this: it may be rewarding to stash your phone away once you get down to work. Those texts will still be there when you come back. Your attitude makes all the difference, and results will show only if you are truly committed to bettering your habits.

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NT Hack: Organization Hana Sharifi

We’ve all been there: you run into class late because you misplaced your textbook, plop at your desk with sheets and notebooks spilling out of your hands, and realize with a sinking of your heart that you left your chemistry lab report at home. It’s much easy to lose motivation and productivity when you’re disorganized. Read on to learn a few organizational hacks I’ve picked up throughout my busy years at NT: 1. Dedicate one high quality folder to keep your homework in on one side, and your assignments on the other. This will allow you to take home only the sheets you need in each class, and keep everything together so you’re not scavenging through hundreds of possible places to find one essay.

2. When taking class notes, worry less about how pretty they look and more about whether you’re getting all the information. If your class notes become messy, you can always re-write them or type them up when studying for a test. It’s also helpful to dedicate one notebook solely for tedious practice questions in math and physics so you don’t clutter your other notes.

3. Organize all your notes based on date and topic. It may seem tedious now, and I know the temptation to just shove it all in and worry later. However, you’ll thank yourself during exam season when you need to organize all your notes based on unit. Creating sub-headers for each unit is a bonus, but organizing notes according to a timeline is great as well.

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The New Sifton and Kerr Diana Kagan

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he voting for longawaited awards amongst graduating students in approaching. This year, a group of students were assembled, who, guided by Mr. Zohar, worked together to rewrite the criteria for the graduate awards. Historically, North Toronto has presented the Kerr trophy to young women and the Sifton trophy for young men to highlight their leadership, citizenship, and achievements throughout the four years of school life at NT. As part of the most prestigious awards at North Toronto, the criteria for both were always kept very strict. Nominees were determined by a consultation composed of their teachers, conductors, coaches, and other extracurricular supervisors.

These awards are extremely important to North Toronto’s community, which is why, this year, a change was conducted to elaborate on the criteria for both awards. As the world is moving towards gender equality, so is North Toronto. This

year, the awards will not be dictated by biological sex, as anyone can be eligible for either award. To distinguish the awards from one another, the committee came up with the criteria to make the focus of one award to be leadership and the other to be citizenship.

committee added an award on leadership, but more on citizenship, [as it] frequently goes unappreciated.”

Although it may seem like a simple change, the process of changing the award criteria took over a full year. The change had to be approved by

awards available to all genders, two other possible problems might arise. The first problem is that “boys who are underperforming in both academics and leadership in our culture will lose out on a meaningful motivator,” while the second problem is the possible unfair voting patterns, where girls will suffer loss after a loss.

This is a very common problem, comments Mr. Zohar, “because it often happens that boys vote for boys and girls vote for boys and girls”.

Boys who are underperforming in both academics and leadership in our culture will lose out on a meaningful motivator.

The initial concern that led to this change had to do with the rights of transgender people. As our society is becoming more aware and accepting of a range of gender identities, splitting students into binary categories no longer fit. In addition, the context of the awards has changed, allowing students to be recognized by their peers as a valuable members of NT’s community, regardless of whether they are currently invested in any significant leadership positions.

Annie Doane, a member of the committee, states that, “I think it is very important that the

the administration, student focus groups, the extra-curricular awards committee, the NT Foundation (who funds these awards), and the school leadership team, to make sure that the new criteria wouldn’t negatively affect the reputation of the former Kerr and Sifton awards. A head of the awards committee, Mr. Zohar mentioned that after making both

The Kerr and Sifton awards are fundamental for North Toronto’s society, which only underlines the importance of this change.

Let’s hope that all candidates will be fairly assessed by the student body, and that the true winners will be fairly recognized. For now let’s congratulate NT on its latest step towards gender equality and acceptance.

Behind the Scenes of After Party Sam Howard

1) Why did you decide to run After Party this year?

Gadi: We decided to run ap, as we wanted to make money for our summer. We’re planning on going on a euro trip for a month and a half.

Carmel: My brother ran a similar type of event a couple years ago.

While Gadi and I were brainstorming ideas to fund our euro trip, i remembered his party and the huge success it was. I approached Gadi with the idea and he immediately jumped on board. We actually got The planners of AP: Carmel Sekler (left) the idea to plan Ap in grade 11, but and Gadi Rydlewicz (right). only actually starting planning it 3 North Toronto’s After Party’s repumonths in advance. tation precedes it; it’s a night the school openly condemns but many 2) How much did it cost in total? students, grades nine to twelve, anticipate. However, one aspect of AP Carmel: The venue was obviously the that is commonly overlooked is that most expensive expense we had costof the organizational requirements. ing $3500, but we also decided to get For After Party 2018, Gadi Rydlea DJ, which cost another $500. Furwicz and Carmel Seckler played thermore, making tickets and hiring leadership roles in organizing and tickets sellers were also expenses. The overseeing the infamous event. Atsecurity was provided by the club as tached is a brief interview with the part of the venue expense. pair of Grade 12 students, as well as an infographic which outlines some 3) How many tickets did you sell? of the numbers and costs involved, that the general student body may Gadi: We sold around 500 tickets in not be aware of. total, after the first week of sales we

had already sold 200 tickets and made our money back. We sold around 150 tickets to grade 9, 120 to grade 10, 100 to grade 11 and 130 to grade 12s.

4) Why did you choose “Tequila Jacks” as the venue?

Gadi: We first called almost all the venues downtown, most of them were really expensive so we decided to go with Tequila Jacks as it is a venue we knew and the owner was a sick guy.

Carmel: We called dozens of different venues and sending countless emails.

After managing negotiations with various different venues, we both felt that Tequila Jacks was the best option.

5) How many hours did you spend planning it?

Carmel: While we can’t exactly tell you how many hours we spent planning it, as we didn’t keep track. We can say they were some long nights and long phone calls. The actual planning of the event was pretty easy and didn’t take much time. The stuff that took the most time was all the details about the event. Like who should we pick for ticket sellers? Should we allow other schools to come? Should there be a theme? What was the best management approach to take? Etc.

6) What did you think about the school email? Were you expecting it?

It was something we were expecting as they send it every year. Even so the email was still initially upsetting. We were saddened that the school decided not to support student led entrepreneurship, but we realized that this could potentially be a huge liability for them and they had to cover themselves. So we have no hard feelings towards the school.

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Humans of NT

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“I was 16 years old going on a family trip with my family to Cuba over the winter break. When I got there I met an entertaining staff member at the hotel. We danced together, had drinks and overall had a good time. We were friendly with each other for the majority of the trip. On New Years going into 2017 we talked like we always did and danced until the New Year came in. He got me a drink from the bar and the next thing I remember I woke up in a dark room on the top of a bunk bed with my pants undone. I never saw the guy after that night. When I got back to Toronto I was feeling a bit off and realized I Had not gotten my period and went to the doctor. My doctor told me I was pregnant and I was 3 weeks along. My doctor then prescribed me pills to take for a week to kill the fetus. Throughout the whole process I had didn’t have anyone to really talk to about it or go through it with. While I was taking the pills or going through the emotional and physical pain I couldn’t tell people becuse I was afraid people would judge me for my decision. All in all it was tough and it will always be difficult to talk about but I have to move forward and keep living.”

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Cuba. Photo from CBC.

“This cute guy started messaging me on Instagram. I had just broken up with my boyfriend and was upset and vulnerable so I replied. We talked for about two weeks or so and then he asked if I wanted to go to an amusement park with him. While I was a little nervous, I decided to go anyways. I mean...it’s a public place, what could go wrong? Once I saw him, I noticed that he looked exactly like how he looked like on Instagram so I was relieved. Unfortunately, after a few rides, he grabbed my hand and took me into a small corner of the amusement park that was deserted. He tried to rape me, but luckily, I had the strength to push him off and was able to run away. Although I’ll always be negatively affected by this, I truly believe that this experience made me a better person. My piece of advice? Don’t meet up with someone you met off the internet.”

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Photo from Canada’s Wonderland’s official website.

“I went to visit the country I grew up in last summer. One night, my friend was having a party, so I went to her house and ended up getting very drunk for the first time. There was this guy there that was a lot older than me and he noticed that I was drunk. While I don’t remember much of this, I remember him grabbing me and bringing me into a bedroom. Luckily, while he was undressing himself, my friend noticed I went into the bedroom with him and barged in. I am always going to be thankful for what she did. If she never noticed that I left with him, I wonder what would have happened.”

Photo from CBC.

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I went to my first party about two years ago. While I have had alcohol before, I never experienced what it felt like to be drunk, and as a result, didn’t know what my limit was.

I ended up drinking way past my limit and before I knew it, everything was a blur. While I don’t remember this, my friend ended up finding me outside with a teenager who was much older than me. My top was off and his pants were off and he forced me to sit on my knees. I was clearly not in the right state of mind to object what he made me do. Years later, I was able to forgive him, but, I’ll never forget it.

Photo from The Huffington Post.

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Photo from The Japan Times.

Bombings. Airstrikes. Non-Stop Artillery Fire. Chaos.

Eve Borel

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ombings. Airstrikes. Non-stop Artillery Fire. Chaos.

Over the past few weeks, that’s what life has been for the hundreds of thousands of people living in Eastern Ghouta, an area in Syria’s capital.

Human rights observers have reported that thousands of civilians have been injured in the last few days. It has been estimated that over 580 people have been killed, and, out of that truly sickening number, around 120 children have been killed. 120 innocent children.

Since February 18th, aside from the numerous casualties, 24 health facilities and 3 humanitarian sites have been attacked, 3 health workers were targeted and killed, 76% of private housing has been damaged, and there has been an astounding 2,500% increase in bread prices. All these statistics show how Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s government, and its allies such as Russia and Iran, are attempting to systematically destroy communities controlled by the rebel forces in order to take back power over what is left of the broken country. “Clearly, the government made a judgment that they wanted to stay in power at all costs,” Shanna Kirschner, a Syria expert at Allegheny College said. “Once you go down that road, it’s very unlikely a government reverses that decision.” Assad’s regime leads a ‘siege, starve and surrender’

campaign, which means that, in areas held by the opposition, the regime’s goal is to make life unliveable for the civilian population. They have been ruthless in their attacks by destroying hospitals, mosques, schools, markets, anything that symbolizes normal civilian life. This greatly affects noncombatants by dismantling their society, making it impossible to access food and other basic necessities, inhibiting medical attention, and destroying places of worship. However, it also affects the rebels, those who directly oppose Assad and his government. Hence, for Assad’s regime the violence against areas like Eastern Ghouta are sadly justified as killing off the rebel groups means more power and control for Assad.

Vladimir Putin, Russian President and known ally of Assad, ordered a daily five hour “humanitarian pause”

Council on Wednesday February 27th that aid for 90,000 people carried by a 45-truck convoy has not yet been given permission to enter the besieged areas in Ghouta, leaving stranded civilians without any aid.

We will continue asking until we It has been 7 years since the conflict and over 300,000 are red in the face, inhaveSyriabeenbegan, killed. The violence needs to end as the conflict has led to a huge humanitarian crisis. Many blue in the face. nations are unwilling to stand by

This recent onslaught of terror in February has triggered international attention. Eastern Ghouta is following in Aleppo’s footsteps. The Battle of Aleppo was one of the largest and most devastating military confrontations of the Syrian Civil war, lasting from 2012 to 2016. For this reason, efforts are being made to stop the war from progressing in Eastern Ghouta, as it is already accelerating at such a fast rate. The UN Security Council passed a resolution on Saturday 24th of February which calls for a 30-day ceasefire in Eastern Ghouta.

Yet, the cross fire still continued.

for Eastern Ghouta instead.

Thereby, Russia is playing the confusing and contradictory role of “both arsonist and firefighter” in the Syrian conflict. Putin has received a lot of backlash for the order. The UN and the Red Cross said five hours deem it impossible to deliver the humanitarian aid required. They have reported that it takes a full day just to pass all the checkpoints, and additional time is also needed to unload the goods. Therefore, the five hour pause Putin is recommending is a slap in the face to humanitarian organizations trying to help. Nonetheless, both Putin’s and the UN’s calls were ignored as rebel fighters and government forces continue to wreak havoc on Eastern Ghouta.

The resolution is not the only way that the UN has attempted to aid Syria in the past few weeks. UN Undersecretary for Humanitarian Affairs, Mark Lowcock, told the Security

and allow the war to worsen. The world is trying to fight for the innocent Syrian civilians traumatised by everyday life in their home country. The UN continues to try to implement the 30-day cease fire by asking the rebel groups to comply. As UN Syria envoy Staffan de Mistura has said, “We will continue asking until we are red in the face, blue in the face.”

If you feel compelled to help the people of Eastern Ghouta you can reach out to the following recognized and registered humanitarian organizations, approved by the Syrian Canadian Council: Humanitarian Coalition (Care, Oxfam Canada, Plan, Save the Children), UNICEF(For the children of Syria), UNHCR (Syrian Refugees) and MSF (For medical aid).

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Serial Killer Charged for the Murders of Six Men

Nicolette Kemerer

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ecently, Bruce McArthur was charged for the murders of 6 men, most of whom were of South Asian descent, middle aged, and lived in the gay village area.

McArthur involved himself in the gay community, participating in gay dating apps, which he used in the predatory luring of his victims.

McArthur had even been present amongst children, serving as a Santa Claus at Agincourt Mall in Scarborough. McArthur had a career as a landscaper and the most chilling aspect of this case is that the remains of some of the victims were found on the property of Leslieville residents for whom he worked, in the planters around their home.

When Abdulbasir Faizi, a 44-yearold Iranian and closeted gay resident of Toronto’s Church and Wellesley neighbourhood, disappeared in 2010, Skandaraj Navaratnam, a 40-yearold gay South Asian living just a few blocks away from Faizi disappeared in the same year, and Majeed Kayhan, a 58-year-old gay Afghan of the same area went missing in 2012, The Toronto Police Service created Project Houston: a task force especially dedicated to the search for the three men. Project Houston was concluded in 2014, after 18 months, because the police were unable to find any evidence suggesting a connection between the disappearances. However, when Andrew Kinsman, a Caucasian 49-year-old bartender and superintendent of the Toronto People With Aids foundation disappeared in the summer of 2017, Project Prism was created to

find him and Selim Esen, a 44-yearold gay man from Turkey. McArthur was finally investigated and charged with the murders of the men, mere months afterwards.

Many suspect that it was the death of Andrew Kinsman, a well known man in the gay community, that prompted the successful investigation. The previous victims of McArthur all fit into a specific profile, which ensured his protection from authorities. Most were homosexual men of South Asian descent, around the same age as McArthur himself, who were socially isolated. However, Andrew Kinsman was quite the opposite: an avid spokesperson for the LGBTQ2 community, with a large crowd of friends who even created a website dedicated to finding him, calling him “our brother, our friend, our colleague, our neighbour, an advocate in our communities.” Some even suggest that, in choosing Kinsman as his next victim, it seemed that McArthur wanted to be caught, because Kinsman was so well known in his community.

Marc Kemerer, a friend and neighbour of Andrew Kinsman, recalls pleasant things about Kinsman, describing him as a “super nice guy… always generous, always smiling, always friendly.” Kemerer recounted Andrew Kinsman’s various and notable involvements in his community, saying he often raised money and held garage sales for charity.

Kemerer himself, a happily married gay man said he never felt person-

ally threatened or in danger during the news of the disappearances, in the midst of the rumours of a gay serial killer, because “[McArthur] targeted very vulnerable people… people who were lonely or [people who were] looking for something he was offering.” This something he is referring to is likely sexual company that people would be inclined to search for, usually via dating apps.

Kemerer notes that the targeting of Kinsman, though seemingly strange because of his social status and ethnicity, was not in fact so strange.

This is because Kinsman was single and “[he and McArthur] were involved in some sort of relationship, [which inevitably] went wrong…

They met on a dating app and [were in the] relationship for a number of months… They knew each other pretty well.”

Kemerer doesn’t believe that the murders were homophobic or racist hate crimes, and believes that McArthur was essentially “a crazed man.”

Regarding the fact that four of the six victims were specifically of South Asian descent, he pointed out that McArthur “did target ethnically… but still…one of the other guys he targeted was the homeless [man], who was actually white as well.”

Police say that there are likely many more victims of Bruce McArthur, and that the investigation of his crimes will take years to complete.

Many members of the LGBTQ2 community are criticizing the police for their lack of effort in the inves-

tigation of the murders, especially when they ended Project Houston, despite the undeniable correlation between the three victims’ disappearances they were investigating.

On this, Kemerer remarks that “from what I understand, I don’t think [the police] did enough, because some of the men were marginalized, so they weren’t that interested in the disappearance [of those men],” referring to the victims who were alone and struggling with substance abuse, and, one of the victims, Dean Lisowick, with homelessness. Kemerer expressed beliefs that “in Andrew’s case it was really his friends and family who pushed [for answers], as opposed to the police… They didn’t really react that quickly and when they were aware about [the disappearances,] they weren’t being very honest about… what was happening.” “[The police] started really looking at it after [Kinsman] disappeared, [since] he had a good social network that was actively searching for him,” Kemerer commented. He thinks that if Kinsman had never been murdered, “it could very well be” that McArthur would still be out there, targeting new victims and killing more people.

Regarding McArthur’s alleged incomprehensibly cold actions, Kemerer said that he thinks “ he was just a deranged man who… killed for sexual pleasure.”

Is Bitcoin Worth It? Sean Proctor

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hat is bitcoin? To put it simply, bitcoin is like a stock.

It is something that is processed, is immaterial and it derives its value based on the amount of bitcoin available. The main difference between stocks and bitcoin is that the latter is a cryptocurrency used to pay for products.

The main issue with bitcoin is its value, which is almost always above 10,000 USD. Although there have been occasions when bitcoin has dropped below 10,000 USD, the overarching trend seems to be that the value consistently remains over 10,000 USD. When bitcoin first started anyone could purchase bitcoin for less than a US dollar, but as people continued to purchase bitcoin, its value rose to being worth thousands of dollars.

So is bitcoin now worth the value? In

the past, bitcoin consistently rose in value, but in more recent times its previous climb stopped and has rather

people from avoiding taxes by using cryptocurrencies, decreasing the value of bitcoin.

Photo from bitcoin.org plateaued. Bitcoin now fluctuates greatly in value with more drops than growth.

Occasionally, bitcoin recovers, but bitcoin has sustained serious wounds that it can’t heal, like the US’s taxation of cryptocurrency. This prevents

Virtual currencies have become a new norm for some, because it allows savings on taxes. Given that the price of buying the currency serves as a barrier to potential investors, it most likely won’t become the new norm for purchasing goods and services. One of the most significant reasons for bitcoin’s

growth was the 2008 mortgage crash, which created an incentive for buyers to secure their money in something other than banks. Since it’s hard to store thousands of dollars under your bed, and gold is expensive, for people who wanted to save their money in a form aside from dollars, cryptocurrencies were a perfect answer, as they essentially encrypted and secured money into stocks. However, now bitcoin has become too expensive for most people to buy, a problem expensive metals used in place of traditional currencies used to pose, causing problems for people who want to secure their wealth. Cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin is an investment worth looking into, but will need to become accessible to the majority of the public before becoming a new standard of currency.

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Evelyn Mang s summer approaches and

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a chatter of tropical vacations and exotic destinations fill our hallways, one thing on many minds might be the popular summer activity of so-called ‘voluntourism.’ Every summer, youth from first-world countries embark to countries — commonly in Africa and Asia, hoping to make a difference in ‘less fortunate’ lives through community service projects.

These projects typically consist of one or two weeks spent in another country doing an array of volunteer work with the most common being participating in the construction of a school, teaching english to locals without wide access to education, or visiting an orphanage.

While altruism and a desire to learn about other cultures usually lies at the heart of voluntourists, the communities that receive their work are

usually left in poorer conditions than their visitors had hoped for. The most common community service projects, unless the group of visitors are trained professionals who can offer expertise otherwise unavailable, usually offer little to no long-term help to the communities visited. This inadvertently puts qualified locals out of work and contributes to a negative portrayal of the countries they visit.

Many who hope to directly interact with people in need while getting an “authentic” experience of their country of choice instead of just handing money to charities, opt for voluntourism trips, frequently with little to no qualifications for the task. While travelling countless kilometres and spending an exorbitant amount of money to volunteer across the globe, voluntourists may psychologically harm children through the common visits to local orphanages. A 2010 study from the

Human Sciences Research Council, a South African research agency, found that this is a result of small children building bonds with temporary caregivers who come and go frequently, often leaving them with attachment disorders.

Other volunteering opportunities also prove to be damaging to the communities they are meant to help. While constructing buildings or providing medical assistance might seem like the best way to help global communities for those who have little experience and skills, spending time doing work meant for professionals will likely only increase competition for jobs for locals who are properly trained in these professions.

Entering developing countries believing that real change can only be enacted by privileged people’s time, portrays these countries’ people as

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inferior and incapable of making real improvements themselves. The people and projects of these countries are not tourist attractions as voluntourism trips frequently advertise, but are rather humans with real needs. These needs can be met through qualified help, and not through the conventional voluntourism trip. These humans and the communities they live in are not something to be worked on for two weeks just as a way to make voluntourists feel like they’re doing something good for the world, only to be abandoned after.

Although those of us in Canada are enormously privileged, being privileged is not a qualification to help others. Ending global poverty and suffering is an incredibly complex task, and being privileged enough to not suffer from it might not equate to having the skills to end it.

Stephen Hawking: Science’s Brightest Star

Chantelle Nejnec

told that he was only going to live until he was 23 years old, he lived until the age of 76 and accomplished more than anyone could have imagined an ALS patient was capable of achieving, not once letting his disability define him or restrict him.

Photo from Stephen Hawking’s official website.

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tephen Hawking, a remarkable physicist who challenged the way the world worked, was given 2 years to live after he was diagnosed with ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis) at the age of 21. As the years progressed, this rare early-onset form of motor neurone disease gradually paralyzed him, leaving him restrained to a wheelchair, and no choice but to communicate via a speech device that worked through a hand-held switch.

As his ALS developed, the device was later on evolved to operate by using the press of a cheek muscle. Despite being

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Although there was delay before beginning to succeed academically in school, he was known as the “Einstein” of his class once he discovered his passion for scientific subjects such as physics.

While pursuing his graduate studies at the University of Cambridge, there was a great deal of debate in the physics community about the Big Bang Theory and Steady State theories; what some believe to be the theories of how the universe was created. Using Roger Penrose’s theorem of a spacetime singularity in the centre of black holes, Hawking wrote his thesis on how the universe worked. His theory was approved in 1966 and won that year’s “Adam’s Prize.” In collaboration with Penrose, they then began evaluating Einstein’s theory of gravity and tried to prove that it predicted a singularity in our distant past: The Big Bang Theory, in 1970. In 1974, he began to challenge the notion that nothing can escape a black hole, a theory that many physicists believed to be true. Hawking was able to use the quantum theory to

demonstrate how black holes should emit heat and then evaporate. While these were only a couple of his awardwinning breakthroughs in physics, he had many more, including the theory of quantum fluctuations, and a “wave function of the universe” that could be used to calculate the properties of the universe. He then published the book A Brief History of Time: From the Big Bang to Black Holes, discussing his theories in easy to understand terms for those with no prior knowledge of scientific theories and science in general. Hawking continued working on new theories and concepts until he passed away on March 14, 2018, while being able to finish developing a theory two weeks prior to his death that he hoped would prove the existence of other universes outside of our own.

Hawking’s story, although not as wellknown as his scientific theories, is also one about love. Before being diagnosed with ALS, he met his first wife, Jane Hawking, through a mutual friend and they began dating a few years after they had met. Jane Hawking writes in her book Travelling to Infinity that despite his quirkiness and “floppy hair”, she fell in love with “his owlish spectacles”, his maturity, and his intelligence. She writes that “clearly [he] was someone, like [her], who tended to stumble

through life and managed to see the funny side of situations. Someone who, like [her], was fairly shy, yet not averse to expressing his opinions; someone who unlike [her] had a developed sense of his own worth and had the effrontery to convey it.” While they were getting closer, she discovered that he had been diagnosed with ALS and was given approximately two years to live.

As a result of the timeline given, they wed before his life would supposedly be taken away from him. As the world now knows, his life fortunately extended past his given timeline, and the couple remained married until 2006.

Hawking’s passing left many people from all walks of life - the religious, atheists, and everyone in between devastated, shocked, and mournful.

While many do not believe in his theories, it is clear that he taught others not only about science, but also about hard work, determination, and to not allow obstacles to impede one on their way to success. A grade 12 NT student shares how “he taught [her] that work gives you purpose and that what you are able to create in life is meaningful.” Despite his limitations and restrictions, he was able to remain driven and motivated in pursuing his passions, and was able to love and be loved.

NT Hack: Course Selection Hodman Abukar

This hack truly applies to the grade 10s at NT, but freshmen: feel free to grab a seat and take some notes. When the frigid chill of February rolls around, there’s something in the air that puts everyone on edge - course selection is around the corner. Not to be dramatic, but course selection in grade 11 only decides the next 5 years of your life or so - no big deal, though. This is the big year: the year that sets you up for your senior year, and your pathway through postsecondary, if you fancy that sort of thing. As a senior who has not (yet) collapsed this year, and has not had (significant) circulation issues due to grade 12 english, I would say I am pretty qualified to advise, so hear me out: do not, under any circumstances, take 6 courses. Even if you did take that summer course, or feel like you’ll do perfectly fine in grade 12 because you have been for the last year and a half, just take 7 courses that you actually like. If it comes down to it, you’ll have the flexibility to drop a course if you end up disliking it. This might help you avoid any online/night school/private course fiascos. Also, let me stress the like part.

Don’t take a course because it looks flashy to check off 10 different maths on your course selection sheet. Keep university prerequisites in mind so you don’t end up being underqualified for a program you are interested in, but under no circumstances should you take courses you have no interest in. It is a waste of your time and effort, and trust me - teachers will notice. Take a course that excites you, makes you want to go to class, and has you more concerned about its content rather than your grades - you’ll thank yourself in the long run.

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Dana Aronowitz

Dr. Michael M Krop Senior High School in Florida. Photo from by Dana Aronowitz.

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n February 14, 2018 a mass shooting occurred at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. This act of terror took the lives of 14 students and 3 teachers. Megan Orlanski, a student at Dr. Michael M Krop Senior High School, not far from where the shooting occurred, reflects on that day. “I entered school on February 14th, 2018, joking with my friends.

My only fear was that someone had bought me a sonnet or a singing gram. I am still processing how just a little over an hour away students and teachers were hiding in classrooms and in closets while they heard gunshots and frantically tried to communicate with their families. On Valentine’s Day, a day of love, those at MSD experienced an act of violence that rippled throughout our nation.”

Students in Florida now feel a sense of fear when entering their schools.

“It’s so easy to get guns in Florida,” said Miami Country Day School student Rachel Thomas. “It’s crazy to think that some people value the right to have a gun over children’s education.” However, despite the fear, students are joining together to form a movement and demand change.

Through social media, these relentless and passionate students have spread awareness about the change that is much needed. On March 14,

one month after the Parkland shooting, over 2,500 school walkouts took place. Students left their classrooms for 17 minutes to honor the lives of the 17 killed in the recent shooting.

allowed high school [students] to realize that they have a say in the world and has sparked so much activism in [youth] is astounding. This isn’t a partisan issue, it’s an issue for

Photo from Dana Aronowitz.

Moreover, they wanted to demand that the congress “ban assault weapons, require universal background checks before gun sales and pass a gun violence order law that would allow courts to disarm people who display warning signs of violent behavior” (CNN).

During these 17 minutes, students were silent to remember the lives of those killed. The rest of the time was used for speeches and time to reflect.

The walkout was concluded with the reading of the names of the victims.

“The fact that this movement has

all people who sit in class everyday and that’s what makes this so special,” said Keren Amkraut a student at Governor Livingston High School in New Jersey.

Many students received positive and encouraging feedback from these walkouts, unfortunately, this was not always the case. “Adults don’t take [the issue] seriously and don’t support us,” said Thomas, “during our walkout one person shouted from his car ‘you kids are making yourselves targets.’” Students are not letting these comments discourage them

and are in the process of planning the next walkout which will take place in April.

Despite all this, the fear about future shootings still remains. After the Parkland shooting, multiple schools across the US received possible threats. Martinez Junior High School in the Bay Area was forced to cancel classes a few days ago due to a recent threat. At Alameda High School, graffiti was found in a bathroom stall that read “2/27/2018 everyone is dead.” Over 300 students did not attend school that day because of the message. “We are terrified to come to school,” said Danny Charney, a student at Alameda.

Although we may not be directly affected by these recent events, it still impacts us all. We all have a personal connection to what happens around us. A student at North Toronto shares that their distant cousin “was shot and killed at a Wesleyan University in Connecticut in 2009. Acts of hatred like these continue to occur and should not be tolerated. We can’t just keep our mouths shut and do nothing.” We should do our part to support our neighbors as they fight towards safety for all and never take our own safety for granted.

WRITE FOR OUR NEXT ISSUE BY ATTENDING OUR SECTION MEETINGS (ROOM 218): Arts & Culture: March 29th, 2018 Internal: March 29th, 2018 Features: April 3rd, 2018 Humour: April 3rd, 2018 Opinion: April 5th, 2018 Sports: April 5th, 2018 External: April 6th, 2018 Photographers: April 9th, 2018 Illustrators: April 9th, 2018

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Follow for Follow?

Jessica Hungate

On that note, Instagram is the preferred social platform of most influencers, many of whom receive money in exchange for sponsored posts that they create for their audiences. Some influencers earn as much as $18,000 per post, proving Instagram to be a lucrative way to earn money. The path to success seems simple enough: grow a large following to make yourself visible to brands with the budget for influencer marketing, then strike up a business deal.

Photo from instafamous.pro

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ver since Instagram changed its algorithm from displaying photos chronologically, to now displaying posts from those that users interact with most, many businesses and influencers have complained about it being significantly harder to gain likes and followers. These two groups of users have a lot at stake whenever Instagram’s algorithm changes, as they both use the platform to generate significant revenue.

Having a large following, however, is not a goal unique to influencers. Businesses also see the value in how large numbers come across to their fans.

Large numbers act as a social endorsement that encourages others to jump on a brand’s fan bandwagon.

Of course, since each algorithm change makes the process of reaching and growing followers just a tad harder to do, Instagram users occasionally resort to dirty tactics to fast-track the process—like buying Instagram likes.

There are two popular methods used to grow a fake following relatively

quickly: paying for sites that sell Instagram likes, or subscribing to a service that provides access to Instagram bots who follow or like photos on related accounts (bots unfollow those accounts later on to maintain a more “ideal” follower/following ratio).

The latter works to grow followers based on the rule of reciprocity, or in the world of social media, “follow for follow”. Of course, in most cases, these new followers don’t realize that the bot will just go back and unfollow their account a few days later when they least suspect it.

Some bot-backed services will go so far as to leave generic one or two-word comments on photos like “Nice!”, “Extraordinary!” or “Great Job!” To the oblivious aspiring social media maven, it seems like a real person is interacting with their posts. Of course, for those that know better, this tactic is easy to see through. In the worst cases, your hired Instagram bots could result in total embarrassment if one of their obviously fake positive comments ends up on a post where the overly enthusiastic comment is inappropriate. No one wants to see,

“Great Job!” on a post documenting their dearly departed Aunt Sally’s funeral procession.

While this is a bit of an extreme example, you’d be surprised how often generic comments find their way onto the wrong posts.

Don’t buy followers or likes in order to fool your audience or establish social proof. Use Instagram to build a genuine relationship with your friends and engage with them. Students at NT seem to feel the same way, and as one grade 10 mentioned, “it’s better to be genuine and have a following composed of real friends and family than to be fake.”

Buying followers may be tempting, but it will do you more harm than good.

So be yourself, and don’t sell yourself short. Grow your following organically and follow Instagram’s Terms of Service to avoid the potential of your account getting shut down for foul play.

Winter Olympics Jessie Strong

Photo by Henrik Fung

Photo from Global News.

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he Winter Olympic Games happen once every 4 years and, this past February, they were held in Pyeongchang, South Korea. Here is a recap of a successful 18 days for Canada at the 2018 Olympics .

Team Canada set a national record of total medals won at any Winter Olympics: 11 gold medals, 8 silver medals, and 10 bronze medals were won, totaling 29 medals overall. They broke the previous record of 26 medals that was set at the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver.

History was made when Alex Gough brought home Canada’s first medal in luge when she won bronze in the women’s luge

at the Alpensia Sliding Centre.

Canada has not won a luge medal sInce 1964, the year that luge was introduced at the Olympics. The Canadian luge team relay won a silver medal after the fourth place finish at the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi.

Four medals were won in figure skating. Kaetlyn Osmond, Gabrielle Daleman, Patrick Chan, Eric Radford, Meagan Duhamel, Tessa Virtue, and Scott Moir won the gold medal in the figure skating team event. Two bronze medals were won in the individual events

by Kaetlyn Osmond and Eric Radford and Meagan Duhamel.

Together, Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir won a gold medal, which became their fifth Olympic medal

Photo from CNN.

in total.

The Pyeongchang Games saw the debut of four new events. In two of the new events, Canada won gold, becoming the first ever champions in mixed doubles curling and big air snowboarding.

Kaitlyn Lawes and John Morris won the Gold medal in mixed doubles curling. In men’s big air snowboarding, Sebastien Toutant won the gold medal.

The two Canadian hockey teams played well at the Olympics. The Canadian men’s hockey team managed to win a bronze medal without any NHL players on the team. For the first time in 20 years, the Canadian women’s hockey team was defeated by the

American team and had to settle for a silver.

Grade 11 student, Una Pasagic says, “the Summer and Winter Olympics are a great way for the Olympians to inspire a new generation of athletes, while also proving that they are the best in their different sporting events.”

Grade 8 student, Gemma Hornsey watched the Olympics as well and thought that, “the Canadians performed very well and [the Olympics] were very exciting to watch.”

The 2018 Pyeongchang Olympics were a success for the Canadian Olympians and they were exciting for Canadians to view at home.

Good luck in Tokyo 2022!

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Arts & Culture

Infinity Mirror Exhibit at the AGO. Photo by Kathleen Foran.

Fashion Should Be For “Everybody” Annie Doane

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alk into almost any clothing store at the mall, and you’ll immediately see the clear gender division in the arrangement of clothes. The store is split down the middle; dresses and skinny jeans await on one side of the divide, while button down shirts and khakis are on the other. If you don’t fit into traditional gender roles, or you don’t identify as a binary gender, the experience of buying new clothes can quickly escalate from treating yourself to hating yourself.

Though large portions of the Western world have already grasped the concept of having more than two genders, the fashion industry continues to lag behind. Besides the “androgynous” trend that has been mainstream for a few years, gender-neutral and unisex clothing have been noticeably absent from many large

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What we have in our pants shouldn’t restrict our shopping choices. retail chains--until now.

Abercrombie and Fitch Kids recently released a new clothing line called the “Everybody Collection” which features 25 clothing items and accessories that anyone can rock. The collection is available online and in 70 Abercrombie Kids stores across Canada and the U.S..

It offers an assortment of pants, hoodies, jackets, and tops featuring a white, blue, camouflage, and pale pink colour scheme. The

clothes are also advertised by both male and female models on the company’s website.

This is a giant step for Abercrombie and Fitch, because previously they received backlash for their small clothing sizes that created seemingly impossible body ideals for young girls and boys alike.

This new collection carries the message that everybody deserves to look stylish, regardless of their gender identity, and begs the question: does clothing need to be gendered at all?

Upon searching “gender neutral clothing” on Google, I came across many small online retailers that sell “genderless” clothing. One retailer named Gender-free World Clothing notes in their mission statement that “What we have in our pants shouldn’t restrict our

shopping choices”. The brand strives to make clothing that fits both traditional masculine and feminine body types. While it is terrific that these retailers exist, it seems unfair that those who stray from gender norms aren’t able to find genderless clothing in malls or in large retail chains.

With the concept of genderless clothing gaining momentum, the face of the fashion industry could change drastically. Hopefully Abercrombie and Fitch can continue to expand its “Everybody Collection” so that it can be more inclusive to children and adults alike.

As a result of the expansion of the “Everybody Collection,” other large retailers could follow suit by introducing their own collections.

Everyone, regardless of gender identity, deserves to have a positive shopping experience.

NT Hack: Textbook Rubber Band Flip Ms. Bulgutch

This hack isn’t NT specific, but is by far the best way to set up your math textbook when doing questions. You need two rubber bands that are thin and a little longer than the standard size. Find the page with the work and put a band over it and the cover of the textbook. Find the page with the answers for that work and put the other band over it and the back cover of the text. You can now do a question, easily flip to the answer page, ideally feel good about getting the correct answer, and flip back to the work page. Plus, the textbook can be closed (say after class) and packed up without issue and opened again (maybe at home) ready to go. A similar result can be achieved by putting a single elastic over the question and answer page, but using the covers helps to protect the pages. Others may use traditional bookmarks or stickies, but doing so often requires sifting through pages instead of a single movement flip. Inserting objects between pages might damage the book, makes it hard to close the text to transport, the items can fall out, and sometimes you need to use your eraser or ruler. Two elastic math classic.

Photo by Ms. Bulgutch.

•Make Up With Your Mind Graffiti

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March 27, 2018 • Arts & Cuture

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Charlotte Figura

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s a female that very much enjoys makeup, I’ve heard all of the critiques that come with it.

I’ve heard that makeup’s false advertising (which is really funny because I wasn’t aware that I’m a product that I’m trying to sell to horny teenagers), I’ve heard that I’m “fake” for wearing a lot of makeup and that I hate myself- and just to get something straight, I hate myself with or without makeup, so my self-hatred and love for makeup are completely unrelated.

Fine then, if I’ll get judged for wearing makeup then I just won’t wear it, then people will be happy, right? Nope! If I’m not wearing makeup then I’m not feminine enough, and I look like hell, I look sick and tired. No matter what you do, people will find a way to hate on you. This really made me wonder.

Do people really see me so differently just because of makeup? I decided to put it to the test.

I went to school for 3 consecutive days with 3 different makeup looks, and I basically asked people to judge me. Makeup look number 1 was no makeup at all, look number 2 was a “going out” look, and look number 3 was a “mature” look. With each look, I went up to people I didn’t know and gave them a sheet of paper with 33 different adjectives and 7 different grade averages and asked them to circle 3 to 5 adjectives that would fit me, just based on how I looked, and what they thought my grade average was. For the “no makeup” look, I just

Photos by Charlotte Figura. rolled out of bed and dragged myself to school. I looked and felt like death, and that was exactly what I was going for. My number 1 adjective was tough, my number 2 adjectives were intimidating, moody, grumpy, my number 3 adjectives were bossy, quiet, and the grade average was 80%-90%.

For my “going out” look, I had to wake up at the crack of dawn to put makeup on, which was hell, by the way. For this look I did a soft, yet shimmery pink and purple eyeshadow look, with some pink shimmer in the inner third of my eye and a darker purple in my crease, my contour was not very harsh, and my highlight was sparkly. With this look, my number 1 adjectives were outgoing, confident, my number 2 adjective was kind, my number 3 adjective was friendly, and the grade average was, again, 80%90%. So far, from no makeup to a “going out” look I could already see how people saw my entire persona differently, and I couldn’t wait for my third look.

For my third and final look, I wanted to look like a mature, hardworking boss-lady, so the first thing I did was straighten my hair. It was actually found that straight hair is seen as more professional in the workplace, so I wasted 30 minutes of my life damaging my hair in order to make it straight. Then for the makeup, I stayed away from colours, trying to avoid making it look cute and childlike, I put soft brown in my crease, tight-lined my lash line with some black, my eyebrows a bit more squared, my contour was harsher, and my highlight was matte. With this look my top adjectives were tough, bossy, my number 2 adjective was confident, my number 3 adjective was determined, and the grade average was 90%-100%. I found it really interesting how people fully viewed me as smarter just because my hair was straight and my face a bit more void of fun colours and shimmers. My first reaction to my data was to mentally yell at people for judging a book by its cover, but then it got me

thinking. What if we could use this to our advantage?

From now on, if I’ve got a party to go to, I can just recreate look number 2, and then maybe people will be more inclined to talk to me, since they’ll view me as outgoing and confident, or if I’ve got a job interview I can recreate look number 3, and I’ll be seen as determined and tough.

If I’d ever be able to get a job over a man who hates on women who wear makeup, because of my makeup, then all of my life goals would be achieved.

As saddened that I am that the complexity and beauty of women will be ignored and they’ll be viewed as one thing just because of their makeup, I’m glad that maybe I was able to find a way of turning makeup to our advantage.

The Rising Appeal of Indie Movies Nicolette Kemerer and Claudia Huang

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or those who have somehow not seen the movie Call Me By Your Name yet, it is an indie film directed by Luca Guadagnino, starring Armie Hammer and Timothée Chalamet, and was based off of the novel by Andre Aciman. Set in the beautiful small town of Crema in Northern Italy during the summer of 1983, it follows the blossoming love between Elio (Timothée Chalamet), a 17 year old boy spending his summer at his family villa, and Oliver (Armie Hammer), a doctoral student, in the midst of completing his thesis, who is also working as an intern for Elio’s father.

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Considering the low budget and small scale by which Call Me By Your Name was filmed and produced, it has been receiving an unexpected, yet well deserved amount of recognition with over 190 award nominations and 61 wins. However, this movie doesn’t stand alone; so far in 2018, more and more independent films have seen a significant uprise, permeating the nominations for numerous awards, whether it be for their actors, directors, cinematography, or movies as a whole. Movies such as Ladybird, also starring Timothée Chalamet, have appeared in mainstream award ceremonies such as the Oscars, and the Golden

Globes, despite their independence in production. Their success can be credited to the fact that many people find that indie movies have a refreshing genuineness to them. Since most indie movies aren’t set out to make tons of money, they are often produced out of passion which translates to the finished products. This results in the movie resonating more deeply with viewers.

Indie movies tend to be more original and creative than mainstream movies. Independent filmmakers aren’t trying to please a large audience and already know that they likely won’t make a lot of money from them.

They tell the stories that you may not have wanted to hear about or weren’t searching for, but in the end, left you feeling wonderful. Independent films can tell these stories with such authenticity and simplicity that you won’t be able to find on the big screens. If you’re looking to watch an action movie with a lot of violence and car crashes demonstrating the simple theme of “kill the bad guys,” indie movies are likely not for you.

However, if you are interested in beautiful, intellectual stories told modestly through the vision of one passionate director, buy a ticket to see Call Me By Your Name.

NT Hack: Dealing with NT’s Wifi Joshua Chong

At North Toronto, we can’t really find much to complain about (except for maybe the elephant load of homework we all receive). Our spanking new building, which is not even a decade old, boasts some amazing facilities and services. Unfortunately, the wifi is not one of them. Everybody who has spent a day in the building has probably experienced splotchy wifi, one-bar of connection, or the feeling of seeing the dreaded “Wi-Fi not available” message. If you do not want to experience the effects of wifi withdrawal, remember these two simples hacks: First, never ever sit near the washrooms.

The school probably does not want students inappropriately using wifi in the washrooms, so they decided to block wifi from entering the washrooms.

However, their measurements were pretty off and the entire north hallway is void of any wifi. So, stay away. If it turns out that the entire school wifi is down, which happens a few times a year, come prepared. Unless you have an expensive data plan, download some videos and offline games that will keep your cell phone addiction symptoms at bay. Follow these rules and you can surf away!

• Toronto by Neighbourhood: Gerrard East or “Little India” Graffiti

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March 27, 2018 • Arts & Culture

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Amelia Banville

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lthough Gerrard Street East may not be someone’s first thought when thinking of Toronto’s “foodie” areas, it should be. The area referred to as “Little India”, or sometimes “Little Pakistan” or “Little Lahore”, is an area in Toronto that holds a high density of Indian, Sri Lankan, Bangladeshi, Afghani, and Pakistani cafes, restaurants, clothing, and grocery stores.

Like most of Toronto, Gerrard East or Little India has a rich history. Gerrard street can be separated into two districts: Upper Gerrard (starts 300 metres north of Lower Gerrard’s eastern terminus and runs between Coxwell Avenue and Clonmore Drive) and Lower Gerrard (between University Avenue and Coxwell Avenue), and it travels right through Little India. Originally, the section where Little India now stands was a whole other street called Lakeview Avenue. However, the name was changed to Gerrard Street East when Toronto stretched out its borders to include East Toronto. Before it was named Little India, it was actually referred to as Gerrard Village and had a Bohemian-Greenwich Village feel.

It lasted from the 1920s to the 1970s, until Gian Neez, a businessman, rented a theater in Gerrard East, which was a

secluded part of the city at the time.

The theater only screened Bollywood and Pakistani films, reportedly the first in North America to do so. This attracted a large number of East Asians to the area, which then sparked an abundance of new businesses that catered to the

the many neighbourhoods that make our city diverse. Interestingly enough, contrary to its cultural connection to South Asia, the area has never housed a significant number of South Asians and currently only serves as a commercial center.

Photo by Amelia Banville.

South Asian community. This is when the area began to take off. However, the neighbourhood was mainly comprised of Anglo-Saxons which caused some pushback with racial violence and vandalism during the first 10 years of the area changing. Nevertheless, the area established itself as a cultural landmark in Toronto. Today, it is one of

If you happen to visit Little India, you can’t go wrong with any of the restaurants in the area. There are lots of choices, all featuring culturally diverse and ethnic foods. There are many buffets that line the streets of Little India so finding the best buffet would be like finding a needle in a haystack. However, the most highly recommended

place would have to be New Haandi 2000, an Indian buffet style restaurant.

There are even vegan and vegetarian options available in Little India like Udupi Palace, a vegetarian Indian restaurant famed for its mysore sada dosa (a type of savoury pancake) and kadai bhindi (curried okra). You can also go for Pakistani, Sri Lankan, Bangladeshi, or even Afghani foods. A popular place for Pakistani food is a Halal restaurant called Lahore Tikka House, a loud and crazy place which holds a wide variety of delightful Pakistani cuisines and delicious desserts.

Aside from food, there is also lots to explore in Little India, including the Gerrard India Bazaar. It is the largest South Asian market in North America, and it hosts everything from spas to vibrant textile shops. The Gerrard India Bazaar is best known for its exciting nightlife and festivals, including ones for cultural events like Christmas, Vaisakhi, Eid, and Diwali, and not to mention their annual summer festival which celebrates South Asia. So if you are looking for a change from the Yonge and Eglinton scene, consider a trip to this exciting part of the city for some delicious meals and an interesting shopping experience.

Cheesecake Factory: A Review Hana Sharifi, Sarah Ha, & Connor Colwill

Illustration by Avishai Sol.

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oronto has been buzzing about the grand opening of the famous Cheesecake Factory’s first Canadian location, which opened in Yorkdale last fall.

The hype has travelled long and far.

Despite the dwindling excitement, rumour has it that you can still hear horror stories of people who waited hours just to get a seat in the restaurant, or the steep, steep prices people have paid for lame slices of cheesecake. We know what you’re thinking: it’s just cheesecake. What’s the big deal?

Cheesecake. “Huge” is the key word when describing The Cheesecake Factory – 287 seats, 250 menu items, and over 30 different flavours of cheesecake. There has even been criticism from Canadian customers, slamming the restaurant for its highcalorie menu items, some surpassing 2,600 calories. However, we noticed that these monstrously sized meals seem to have their own appeal. As a group, we debated splitting the cheesecakes between us, but when there are that many options, each sounding equally delicious, you get trapped into the desire to choose a flavour just for yourself.

When we went to the Cheesecake Factory, we were greeted by what seemed to be a very short line.

“Score,” we thought. Our initial plan was to relax at a table inside and share all sorts of different flavours of cheesecake. However, while we took our places in line, that plan backfired quickly when an employee told us

The Cheesecake Factory’s full-service menu (yes, they don’t serve only cheesecake) was made famous for its “encyclopedic” menu that includes a seemingly endless list of cheesecake flavours from mountainous sweet ones like the Toasted Marshmallow S’mores Galore to more subtly flavoured ones like the Tiramisu Photo by Hana Sharifi.

that the expected wait time was more than 3 hours. We disappointedly resorted to take-out instead and waited in line for just over 15 minutes before getting called into the factory.

There, we had to wait in another line until we were called to go wait in yet another line to wait even longer, all for a $12.00 slice of cheesecake.

We were all starting to think about how tedious this was for a single slice of cheesecake, but as we laid our eyes on the menu, we were taken aback by all the various cheesecake flavours. We deliberated over the classic cheesecake, the birthday cake cheesecake, the seasonal peppermint bark cheesecake – deciding on just one seemed impossible.

As we gathered our bagged cheesecakes and took them to the food court (while getting dirty looks from everyone still in line), our expectations started to mount. How could it be receiving all this hype if it tasted like any ordinary, run-of-the-mill cheesecake? Would it be worth it?

In our opinions, each and every bite was completely worth it. As soon as we took that first bite and savoured the creamy deliciousness, we were amazed. The Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup cheesecake one of us bought was one of the best things we’ve ever eaten, and this goes for all the other range of cheesecakes we ordered: the Oreo cheesecake with whole Oreos

stuffed inside it, to just a nice plain Dulce de Leche.

Despite the lengthy lines and immensely expensive prices, going to the Cheesecake Factory was a truly delightful experience. However, we recommend that you don’t go to the Cheesecake Factory if you’re looking to quickly walk in, get some cheesecake, and walk out. Also, don’t go to the Cheesecake factory if cheesecake isn’t a delight to you, or if you don’t

Photo by Hana Sharifi. really appreciate cheesecake that much. You should only go to the Cheesecake Factory if you’re on the search for some really good cheesecake and don’t care how long it takes to get it!

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March 27, 2018 • Arts & Culture

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Infinity Mirror Exhibit at the AGO Kathleen Foran

The AGO is one of four stops on Kusama’s North American tour, but she has been featured in museums all over the world including London, New York, and Singapore. Toronto is extremely fortunate to be one of her stops.

Photo by Kathleen Foran.

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f you have been walking around Toronto during the last few months, and have noticed red wallpaper with white dots, here is the answer to your curiosity. That wallpaper is an advertisement for the Yayoi Kusama: Infinity Mirror exhibit that is being showcased at the AGO from March to May.

Kusama was born in Matsumoto, Nagano in 1929, and moved to New York in 1958 where she became friends with other postmodern artists such as Andy Warhol. Referring to the art she made in the 1960s, Kusama said, “Bring on Picasso, bring on Matisse, bring on anybody! I would stand up to them all with a single polka dot. That was the way I saw it, and I had no ears to listen.”

The exhibit consists of six mirror rooms that explore light and shape.

If going for the culture and experi-

ence isn’t a good enough reason, then maybe the opportunity to take a cute instagram picture will be more enticing. For anyone following Kourtney Kardashian’s instagram, she posted a photo in one of the rooms this past December, which gave a sneak peak into what the exhibit is like.

Overall, Kusama is an extremely interesting character, and her exhibit is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity that everyone in Toronto should be taking advantage of. I just want to warn you, however, that the wait time for each mirror room is excruciating, but definitely worth it in the end.

Not only is Kusama’s art a symbol for society, but it is also extremely personal to her. The pumpkins featured in the sixth mirror room were symbols that were significant to her during her childhood and throughout her battle with mental illness. The first room is also significant to her childhood, because the polka dot penises helped her “heal [her] feelings of disgust towards sex” that had been a by-product of some issues she had growing up.

Photo by Kathleen Foran.

Disney-Fox Merger Cameron Gilliland

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n late 2017, Disney made the bold move of buying 21st Century Fox. This acquisition is the second biggest Hollywood merger of all time, behind the AOL-Time Warner merger, made back in 2001. Disney acquired Fox for $52.4 billion in stocks, picking up most of their assets including Fox’s film companies, movie rights, and networks such as the National Geographic and FX. They will also get Fox’s overseas properties such as Asian Pay-TV Operator Star TV, stakes in Sky, Endemol Shine Group, Hulu, and their regional sports and news networks. Just like the ABC Network (also owned by Disney), Fox will become a subdivision of Disney, with regional sports and news outlets maintaining the Fox brand. Disney will be re-financing Fox’s $13.7 billion net debt by valuingSayani the deal at an Photo

by Daanish incredible $66.1 billion.

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Within Hollywood, there are a group

of studios known as the the “Big Six Studios,” which include Warner Bros. Pictures, 20th/21st Century Fox, Paramount Pictures, Universal Pictures, Sony Pictures, and Walt Disney Studios. If the government approves the full deal, it would give signifi-

service to compete with Netflix. If Disney gains the rights to Fox’s TV and movie assets, they would have a huge amount of content for their new streaming service to compete with Netflix head on. With so much potential to dominate the box office, it

Illustration by Avishai Sol. cant power over the box-office and film industry to Disney. This merger is ground-breaking, because Disney announced its new digital streaming

might be quite worrisome for smaller independent studios like AS4 or STX Entertainment that won’t be able to compete with the copious number of

new movies Disney-Fox will release.

If the smaller studios keep losing money to these big studios, they will either be bought out or go bankrupt.

Marvel fans rejoice! With the new merger, we will see the X-Men and The Fantastic Four finally come home to Marvel. However, before the merger is approved by the government, the current Fox-Marvel movies slated for release have been moved around to compete with the Disney-Marvel films coming out. Deadpool 2 was originally supposed to be released in June, but Fox has now moved its release date to May 18th, to compete with Marvel’s May release of The Avengers: Infinity War. This mega merger could bring major changes to Hollywood and the way the film industry works forever.

NT Hack: Working Out at School Mika Schwartz

One of the best things that NT has to offer is our amazing phys ed department. The department has developed a program where there are many different ways to workout at school. For example: participating in sports teams or intramurals, taking a PE course and working out in the weight room before/after school. Unfortunately, we cannot go to school only to take part in these fitness opportunities, we also have to attend other classes. Here are three easy tips on how to workout at school and still be able to carry on with the rest of your day: 1) Take your clothes and equipment to and from school each day.

Please don’t leave your sweaty clothes in your locker. They get moldy and gross and then you have to wear them again. If you carry everything in a small bag, it makes it really easy to transport your stuff take to and from school.

2) Keep a bag in your backpack with hair ties, makeup and deodorant.

These basic supplies help you continue the rest of your day as if you didn’t just turn beet red from doing the 12 minute run. Honestly, this is a general life tip as well.

3) Bring layers to change into after your workout.

After you workout, your sweat evaporates and decreases your body’s overall temperature. Having layers to change into after a workout allows you to have more control over your body’s temperature. For example, changing into a t-shirt and bringing a hoodie to put on once your sweat evaporates.

It’s also no secret that the temperature in NT changes from room to room, so I would bring layers to school even if you aren’t exercising.

Take advantage of the school’s exercise facilities and phys ed programs, it’s easy to do!

Graffiti

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March 27, 2018 • Arts & Culture

What Went Down at the Grammy’s?

Megan Christofordis

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Illustration by Avishai Sol.

s with all major award shows, the Grammys are always filled with controversial and dramatic moments, entertaining performances, and humorous skits. With nearly 10 million viewers, the show also has the power to raise awareness and support for current issues and adversities faced around the world.

This year, it was all about the “Time’s Up” movement and protesting against violence towards women. If you didn’t catch the Grammys, you’re in luck, because here you’ll find everything you need to know about this year’s “biggest night in music.”

While the Golden Globes this year was a sea of black dresses and suits, celebrities attending the Grammys demonstrated their support for the Time’s Up movement in a more subtle fashion; they donned white roses and pins. The white rose was chosen by those that were a part of the Time’s Up campaign. They tweeted that “a white rose symbolizes respect, pays homage to new beginnings, and expresses hope for the future” shortly before the award show. The white roses were showcased on the lapels of many men and women, and the movement was a predominant factor throughout the show, as some artists used their platform and performance time to touch on the issue, including Kesha.

Kesha took to the stage to present “Praying” in an emotional and triumphant performance joined by a small ensemble of other female singers, which consisted of Camila Cabello, Cyndi Lauper, Julia Michaels, Bebe Rexha, and Andra Day. The group, dressed in all white to compliment the roses worn throughout the audience, was introduced by Janelle Monae who gave a moving speech that served as a prelude to the powerful performance. This was a particularly significant moment for Kesha who allegedly endured abuse for years at the hands of her ex-producer.

Kesha’s performance was one of the many notable performances that took place throughout the evening, many of which seemed to conform to a slightly more sombre tone. The show kicked off with an energetic performance

from Kendrick Lamar, but the rest of the night’s acts seemed to be monotonous which suited the mood of the country and even world at large due to the serious issues being dealt with around the world. This theme was prominent throughout many of the show’s performances, including the performance by Lady Gaga, P!nk, Childish Gambino, Logic, and Sam Smith. However, one duo strayed far from this norm and brought some colour to the show through their performance of their hit single collaboration, “Finesse.” Bruno Mars and Cardi B livened up the evening quite effectively with a performance that seemed to be enjoyed by everyone, from the upbeat tune to their ebullient dancing. Another memorable performance and perhaps unlikely duet was that of Elton John and Miley Cyrus.’ The two took to the stage to deliver a unique rendition of Elton John’s timeless hit, “Tiny Dancer,” with a white rose adorning the black piano to signify support for the Times Up movement. This was a memorable and important performance since Elton John recently announced that he will be launching his final, 3-year world tour in September, before retiring from the road for good.

The show would not have been complete without some skits and humour thrown in, and while some were more successful than others, they all contributed to an entertaining evening. One occasion that raised some eyebrows, was the “consolation puppies.”

Throughout the show, pug puppies were handed out to nominees (specifically those in the Best Comedy Album category) that fell short of a Grammy, to make up for their losses. While some were overjoyed at the appearance of the adorable squirming puppies, others were not so happy with the dishing out of animals in such a careless manner, and took to Twitter to express their disappointment. PETA, an animal rights organization, tweeted in response, expressing how “animals are not toys”, and then continued to shame the Grammys for condoning this behaviour. However, the puppies were apparently never meant to be permanent gifts to the celebrities, and were returned to their “licensed and experienced animal handling and training agency” shortly after the ceremony.

Another skit featured artists Shaggy and Sting, as well as host James Corden. The three took to the New York subway system to film a special edition of James Corden’s Carpool Karaoke, dubbed “Subway Karaoke”, however, it wasn’t met with much enthusiasm. Shaggy and Sting have also paired up to release an

album together this year, and performed their single, “Don’t Make Me Wait”, on the Grammy stage.

The most controversial and entertaining skit of them all was likely the Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House audiobook audition tapes for the Best Spoken Word category.

Among the “auditionees” were John Legend, Cher, Snoop Dogg, DJ Khaled, and Cardi B, with a surprise appearance, from none other than Hillary Clinton.

Clinton was shown reading with the book covering her face to mask her identity, then slowly lowering it to reveal herself at the end of her audition. Cardi B in particular found her excerpt ridiculous, and couldn’t help but exclaim, “I can’t believe this… this is how he lives his life?”

While many enjoyed this comedy spoof and relished the mocking of Trump, others including the President’s son, Trump Jr., attacked the Grammys for including this skit and ostracized Clinton for taking part in it.

Another cause for controversy, was the fact that Alessia Cara was the only woman to win a major solo award, the Breakout Artist of the Year award. Out of the 86 total awards given out, only 17 of them went to female recipients. This was a significant aspect of the award show because of the prominence of the Times Up movement and female empowerment being encouraged, especially in the workplace. It seemed like the Grammys completely snubbed the female artists because of the lack of female award winners.

The hashtag #GrammysSoMale even began trending on Twitter.

When questioned about this, the Recording Academy president Neil Portnow simply said that “[female artists] need to step up because [he thinks] they would be welcome.” Hmm… sounds vaguely familiar, almost as if women “stepping up” has been the most talked about topic for the past 5 months...where have you been, Neil?

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NT’s Photography Contest: Landscapes and Nature Follow @ntciphotos on instagram for more photos!

1st Place: Golden State Bridge, San Francisco by Helen Tang

2nd Place: Lake Ontario, Toronto by Alison Keith

The Grammys did not disappoint this year. Not only was it full of entertainment, but it was also able to raise more awareness about the Times Up movement, and in doing so, hopefully rallied more support for the cause. All in all, it proved to be an eventful evening as always, and provided us with some quality entertainment that will probably be talked about and debated over for some time.

3rd Place: Chimei Museum, Tainan, Taiwan by Chloe Hung

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March 27, 2018 • Features

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Features

North Toronto Collegiate’s old building. Photo Photo from Public Library. byToronto Sammy Chien

NT: Past and Present

Sofia Platnick

orse and buggy, carrier pigeons, churning milk into butter? Well, it wasn’t all that bad when Gerald Glass went to North Toronto 65 years ago. Yes, you read that correctly, 65 years ago!

Some of you weren’t even born yet.

I recently had the opportunity to sit down and hear his stories about life at NT from a time long before ours.

type to tolerate misbehaving students, and one student in particular was testing his patience. The class was told to line up and listen to the lesson, but Dave McGuiness didn’t seem to hear this and went on talking to his classmate. Mr. Gladish asked him to quiet down, but soon Dave started up again. This brought down on him ‘the wrath of Gladish’, the ex-army cadet. Gladish stepped forward rigidly, brought his arm back, and then in a quick downward movement, slapped the student right across his face. At the same time, he raised his voice and screamed at him madly. The following day, after he had cooled off, he apologized to Dave, and he never again lost his temper again.

Not all of Jerry’s teachers were quite as memorable as Mr. Gladish, but the teachers at North Toronto did have one thing in common: many of them had fought in World War II.

Gerald, or Jerry as he prefers, attended North Toronto from 1951 to 1953 for grades 9 and 10. Back then the rules around teachers reprimanding delinquent students were undefined, though one thing was as clear as it is today—you had to do your homework and attend class.

During his short stay at our school, Jerry described crossing paths with a very colourful gym teacher, one Mr. Gladish. Mr. Gladish wasn’t the

Jerry’s run-in with his gym teacher wasn’t the only time he’s seen an authority figure act out of character.

Jerry wrote his first set of exams while in the 9th grade, and he recalls that the North Toronto principal at the time, Bill Houston, paid his class a visit. While the students were busy writing their exam, a previously suspended student ‘popped’ into the class. The teacher was surprised, and told him to leave. The

Gerald Glass. Photo from Sofia Platnick.

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uninvited student sat in an empty seat and spit out a few swear words at her. She swiftly left the room, returning minutes later with none other than Mr. Houston—or, as he was notoriously called, ‘Wild Bill’.

Wild Bill ordered the student out in a loud voice, as he was disrupting the exam, and the student thought it best to retort back with “go eff yourself”. At this point, Wild Bill was fuming. His face flushed, and a vein in his temple began to pulse as he yelled back, “I didn’t hear you!”

The agitator then told him to “clean the s*** out of your ears!”, so Wild Bill pinched him by the ear and dragged him out of the room. Fortunately, the teachers at NT no longer interact with the students this way, or at least mine don’t.

Students in the early 1950’s, of course, didn’t have the internet to give them constant access to the shared media, pictures, and a stream of texting. So how exactly did people bond and communicate? Television was just becoming common, and many teenagers were going to movie theaters with friends to enjoy a night out. Jerry explained that one of the most popular places to go to socialize was the Imperial Theater located in downtown Toronto, which was the largest theater in Canada at the time. It also happened to be the only cinema with reliable air-condi-

tioning. Getting there was not that easy, as the Yonge subway was not up and running until 1956.

The Yonge and Eglinton we know today may be decked out with more restaurants and high-rise condos than we know what to do with, but it hasn’t always been so hectic. In fact, there used to not be any eateries at all—2-storey shops lined Yonge street north of Eglinton, and southwardly there were low-rise walkup apartments. A few years later, these same stores became offices. And once you got passed the shops, there were houses as far as the eye could see, and beyond that, farmer’s fields.

If you went far enough west or east along Eglinton, you might even run into the odd cow. Yonge and Eglinton has been completely transformed since Jerry attended NT, along with the school building itself.

I really appreciated the opportunity I had to sit and talk with Jerry about our school all those years ago, and I know I’ve learned a little bit about NT’s intriguing past.

NT Hack: NT’s Best and Worst Washrooms Emily Sakaguchi

Have you ever walked into an NT washroom only to find there was no toilet paper? Or soap? Or maybe the hand dryers weren’t working. Of course you have. School washrooms are notorious for their shortcomings, and NT is no exception. So, what should you do? The best women’s washrooms are the ones on the first floor, which usually have all necessary toiletries, even at the end of the day. It is definitely a better choice than the third floor lavatory, which is usually missing some important bathroom commodities. Conversely, the general opinion is that if you’re looking for the men’s washroom, the third floor is the place to go, as it is far better maintained than those on the first floor and in the basement.

For those of you who have stumbled into the nearest restrooms in vain, instead of trekking to the other side of the school, head to the all-gender bathroom, which is likely to be stockpiled with clean toiletries, and should smell generally decent. It’s true, smelling school washrooms is never going to be fun, but at least you can avoid the most unsavoury ones with the right strategy.

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What Are You Laughing At? Anastasia Zaritovskaya

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icture this: It’s 9 p.m. You’re sitting at home, studying for that math test you have tomorrow.

Your phone dings with the familiar sound of a message arriving, and you check it. It’s your friend, who you have math with, and who is just as scared of the test as you. “Fuck my life,” reads the message, “I literally want to shoot myself right now.” You chuckle and type back: “Me too. Kill me so I don’t have to write it lol?”. Let’s pause. Of course, in saying that, you don’t actually imply that you want to die. Your claim to want to end your life over a math test is as improbable as the likelihood that you actually laughed out loud when you typed “lol”. But if you think about it, perhaps you will start to wonder what it is that you are laughing at.

The Instagram feeds, Facebook timeline, and Snapchat streaks of today’s youth (that is, to say, anyone who has never thought “you kids and your damn phones”) are filled with what could easily be regarded as signs of depression or suicidal thoughts if examined seriously.

Take some of the examples I have come across in the past week: A collage of an image of someone loading spaghetti into a gun and an image of an Italian chef holding a gun to his head while whispering “mamma mia”.

A picture of a surfer accompanied by the caption, “why surf on water when you can surf on depression?”.

“Doctor: I’m sorry, but you have only 3 months to live. Me: [slides a $5 bill across the table] Make it 1 month.”

An image of a middle-aged woman eating toast with the words “filled with bread, filled with dread” accompanying it.

If you found any of these funny, con-

gratulations — you’re “hip with the youth”. However, if we erase the humour from memes, we see a side that is remarkably existential for the intended audience, especially for high school students. “They spilled their latte, so, naturally, they now want to ‘kill themselves’; they didn’t study for a test, so they claim that they ‘hate their lives’; or — and this is my personal favourite — they’re ‘so depressed and single’,” says a Grade 12 student, critical of death-related humour. Obviously, you would not end your life over a lost pencil (even a mechanical one) — but you would go online and type that you “literally” want to kill yourself instead.

The explanation for this lies in the Terror Management Theory — the idea that the existential realization of our mortality boosts our creative abilities in other areas of life, such as self-esteem, love, and humour. A study conducted

by Christopher Long and Dana Greenwood shows that “death reminders may sometimes facilitate creativity and open-mindedness”. The realization that we are not, in fact, immortal, occurs in late adolescence, when we are able to grasp more complex concepts, but not able to comprehend them yet.

The crushing weight of this realization expresses itself in all other forms due to our inability to talk about it seriously.

Any subject that we can’t cope with — depression, suicide, and anything else that is deemed “unpleasant” by society somehow finds its way into our everyday communication while retaining the taboo aura that still makes it difficult to talk about.

Stigmatized topics creep up in our casual conversation a lot more than we

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realize; a fairly obvious example of this phenomenon is swearing. Let’s com-

pare, for instance, swear words used in Quebec and in Ontario.

The swear words of Quebec have mostly religious connotations, while those of Ontario - sexual. This can be easily explained by taking a look at the taboo subjects in the respective communities; in Quebec, these swear words sprung up as a backlash against the strict control of Catholic clergy, while in Ontario — where we’re comfortable with the subject of religion — sex is taboo, with more conservative influences on how we think about the act.

To find out if the presentation of a taboo subject in communication affected its perception, I conducted an experiment. I sent around 10 people a message that indicated that I had a panic attack in two different forms.To the first 5, I sent the message, “I had a panic attack today”, and to the next 5, “lmao I hate myself I had a panic attack lol”. The results were not surprising; the people who got the straightforward first message were more likely to take it seriously, asking if I was alright or if I needed help. The second group was faster at responding, but the responses themselves were not serious; one

person even sent a monkey emoji as a response. This experiment shows that we are do not empathize well with messages framed in a less serious (or more self-deprecating) way — but unfortunately, this is the most common kind of approach to taboo subjects in our society.

So why is it a big deal if taboo subjects appear in our communication?

Why should we care if someone posts a meme saying “I am prepared to die” with an image of a smiling pear nearby?

What does it matter if your friends joke about wanting to kill themselves on the regular? The answer is simple: stigmatization helps nothing. These subjects creep into our casual conversations as a result of our avoidance of serious discussion; as a result, these subjects become ridiculed, which does not help solve whatever problem they present.

This devalues the issues of suicide, mental health, and even sex education, and undermines the progress we have made in dealing with them. For every teenager that gets a bad mark on a test and posts “lmao kill me”, there are thousands of others that do not know how to deal with actual feelings of negativity due to, according to an NT student, our “love of self-hatred”.

So let me ask you: what are you laughing at?

A Solution for a Sleep Deprived Male Lucy Ma

*I

BEEP BEEP* t’s 8:30 AM and you woke up with your face planted on your laptop, only to find a half-page of English paper written. In fact, your desk has become your bed ever since September. Wouldn’t we all love to know a way to achieve better sleep quality within the limited number of hours?

Most of us have nodded off to a relaxing tune before, but what if you purposefully listened to music when you went to bed? This self-experiment served to explore the connection between music and sleep. Since I have realized that falling asleep can be challenging for me sometimes, I decided to conduct this short study to gain a better understanding of how I sleep in order to improve my well-being. But how does listening to relaxing music while sleeping affect my sleeping patterns?

According to WebMD, a recent metaanalysis of music-sleep studies focusing on 10 high-quality studies found that music helps people with both short-term and chronic sleep problems.

And one study found that 45 minutes of music at bedtime for three weeks resulted in longer sleep duration, shorter time to fall asleep, higher perceived sleep quality, and less daytime dysfunction. Although researchers aren’t quite sure why music has these effects, music is known to act upon the central nervous system and has anti-anxiety and relaxing effects. It also may impact the production of compounds like opioids, which have pain-relieving and sedative qualities, as well as oxytocin, which is implicated in improving sleep as well.

To observe the sleeping pattern, I used a Fitbit to track my sleeping patterns and determine the quality of the sleep.

The tracker records nearly all movements as time spent restless or awake.

My sleep quality is based on whether I was asleep, restless, or awake. I conducted this experiment on myself and recorded the data over the course of 8 days and chose to listen to familiar and relaxing lyrical music while sleeping.

In order to eliminate external factors that may alter the collected data, I experimented on days where I sleep around 12-1:00 AM (my usual bed-

time), and avoid experimenting on days where I am especially tired compared to typical days. This way, I avoided any bias such as how tired I feel before going to bed and inconsistent times I go to bed at. When I woke up in the morning, I re-synced the FitBit and checked the result. Then, I collected qualitative data by asking myself how well rested I feel and recorded the result along with the quantitative data collected by the Fitbit.

Throughout the 8 days of experimentation, I compared and contrasted the control and experimental conditions, sleeping without music versus sleeping with music. Quantitatively, I learned that bedtime listening improved my sleeping efficiency by almost 20%.

Qualitatively, I found myself feeling more well rested the morning after listening to music while I sleep. Combining the quantitative and qualitative data, the documentation demonstrated correlation between music and sleep.

Thusly, supporting the hypothesis that putting on music while sleeping can help an individual wake up less during the night, and feel more rested in

the morning. Overall, this experiment has strong reliability and validity.

The study can be easily repeated and improved with better measuring instruments (in comparison to the Fitbit used). The data yielded demonstrated consistency, therefore, suggesting this experiment is valid.

This short study suggested merit for more accurate data that can be applied to medicine and cure diseases. It can be concluded that with more research, sleeping with music can perhaps help people with sleep disorders by boosting sleep quality and quantity. Many sleep disorders such as insomnia can be caused by stress, and relaxing music can have physical effects such as lowering heart rate and slowing breathing, helping an individual feel more at ease and fall asleep faster.

While all of the possible findings could take us one step further in our understanding of the perplexing human brain, this particular experiment provides one more solution for the sleep deprived nation of NT to achieve better sleep quality.

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Your Beloved Double Double Wen Bo

W

Photo by Vicky Ye.

e’ve all been there, struggling to finish (or even start) that essay late at night while panicking because the teacher didn’t reply to that email pleading for help.

The next morning, we wake up bleary eyed and unwashed, with hair like Albert Einstein’s, and we drag ourselves to school with shirt buttons in wrong holes and steps so heavy that it is reminiscent of The Incredible Hulk.

In dire times like these, there is only one friend we can turn to, that one friend so accessible we can find it sold for only a few dollars at almost every street corner. Yes, I am talking about coffee.

Coffee has long been a reliable friend of the ones who have early mornings, the ones who have late nights, and the ones who are unfortunate enough to have both late nights and early mornings. We have always been told that coffee would keep us awake and alert throughout the day, which is why it is ubiquitous among high school students. In fact, according to a survey I

conducted last year involving 176 North Toronto students, just under half (46%) of the respondents reported drinking specifically coffee and a staggering two thirds of the 176 students drank some sort of caffeinated drink to keep them awake. With such a substantial percentage of students who drink coffee, it begs the question: does coffee really help you stay awake?

The Setup: To test this, I asked 10 N.T. students to meet me at school at 8:00 a.m., an hour earlier in the morning than typical so they arrive relatively sleepy and unfocused. I asked them to play a short concentration game on my phone before handing them a cup of “coffee” to drink, which would supposedly help their alertness. Upon finishing the “coffee”, participants were told to wait a few minutes for its effects to settle in before playing the concentration game once again. After both rounds of the game, I recorded their scores and compared the results.

What I told the participants about the experiment was, of course, as with any psychological experiment, a deception.

In reality, the coffee was decaffeinated, and nothing would have chemically affected their concentration. So how did the participants do in the second round, after drinking the decaf coffee?

The Results: Every single one of the participants performed better in the second round, when they believed they were under the influence of coffee. But if the coffee had zero physical effects on the participants, then what was going on?

Why did they all do better? This is the power of the Placebo Effect, a psycho-

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logical phenomenon that has been used for centuries. In simple terms, the Placebo Effect is being told (usually by someone who knows what there are doing) that something is true, like an improvement, and as a result we we end up believing there has been an improvement, when in reality there hasn’t. To help clarify, picture this scenario: Imagine yourself driving your car to the mechanic for a checkup and some improvements. After a while, the mechanic returns with your car and explains he has installed a new type of fluid that makes your engine a lot quieter and allows for a much smoother drive. You thank the mechanic and drive your car home, and along the way, you notice that the engine is truly quieter and the car drives much smoother! In reality, there was no such fluid, but you only feel this way because he told you to feel a particular way, and you fell for it. This is the exact same case with coffee. Yes, your beloved double double is lying!

We have always been told that coffee would help us stay awake and be focused, and we believed it, so we felt more awake and alert. Yet, according to the results of the experiment, it is not the actual coffee itself that affects our concentration, but rather the feeling behind it. You didn’t buy a coffee that keeps you awake, you bought the idea that coffee keeps you awake. This has a massive impact in reality, as we spend so much money buying the coffee, yet arguably all that money is being wasted on the Placebo Effect.

I wanted to figure out the extent to which we are buying coffee in Toronto, and to do this, I asked a local Starbucks the number of cups of coffee they had

sold that day. They reported 315 cups.

This number does not include any of the glamorous, often overcomplicated, variations of coffee like lattes or cappuccinos because they refused to tell me the total amount including those, even after several attempts. Now, if there are 160 Starbucks locations around Toronto and each location sells roughly the same amount, then that amounts to 50 400 cups of coffee everyday. And that was only Starbucks. If we say that Tim Hortons and McDonalds each sell that many cups of coffee per day, combined with the quantity sold from all the other privately owned coffee shops and homemade coffee in Toronto added together amounts to that many in one day, then you’re looking at over 200 000 cups of coffee per day. With already such a big number, I could not possibly imagine how much larger it would be had we taken into account the fancy variations of coffee.

So what can we conclude from this experiment? How is this relevant on a grander scale? Psychological phenomena like the Placebo Effect are in widespread use, and they are often used against us to drain money out of us, which has become a significant problem in society. We often spend, spend, spend and believe everything we are told without really taking a step back and thinking about the amount of money we put into these things.

People and objects that we once thought were only there to help us can turn out to be cruel, useless, and a waste of money. And yes, that includes your beloved double double!

Mind the Undermined Catherine Qui and Wen Bo

T

ell me, what do you think of when I say “Rwanda”? I asked a few NT students this question.

Some knew about Rwanda’s infamous genocide, others thought of it as a meager and insignificant country in Africa, while others hadn’t a clue as to what it was. So, let me inform you: Rwanda is a small, landlocked country in central Africa that is situated beside the Democratic Republic of Congo, Burundi, Tanzania, and Uganda (how many of those did you know?)

Yes, it is arguably both economically and politically pitiful on a global scale, and yes, it did suffer a horrifying genocide in 1994. And even I have to admit that I knew next to nothing about Rwanda, thinking it was a country to look down upon, a country small and irrelevant compared to Canada,

a country that I could learn nothing from. It seems as if the only things we know about Rwanda are negative, which only demonstrates how our ignorance and naïvity restricts our willingness to even bother notice what we can learn from them.

A prime example is a program known as Car Free Day, that runs across its entire capital city, Kigali. The name suggests exactly what it is, a day every month of the year where cars and buses are banned from the streets to promote walking, jogging, cycling, and other healthy exercises. Citizens get a day off from work to participate in wellness activities organized by city authorities such as stretching and mass jogging right on the streets and city squares. On that same day, people

also gathercourtesy at the country’s largest Photo of Sam SpodekRwanda are constantly buried unstadium for free eye tests and medical der negative stereotypes; however, check-ups. Residents of the city often despite this, cities around the world, look forward to this special recreincluding Toronto, can find much ational day, where they can gather to learn from this often overlooked with friends and family to train and country. Similarly, on an individual become fit together. This is part of the scale, the issue of underestimating country’s mass effort to cut carbon others is relevant even within the emissions and allow for healthier walls of NT. Take a moment to reflect: lifestyles, greener transportation, and have you ever made a presumption overall, a more sustainable nation. For that falsely belittled someone before example, work ends early on Fridays you really got to know them? Alfor Rwandans, who are advised to use though this may be a natural tendency this additional time to go out and for us, it is one that we should be exercise. Kigali has also undertaken more cautious of. We must promote the bid to become Africa’s cleanest open-mindedness and avoid that air city, and they have taken measures of superiority. Learn to never undersuch as banning plastic bags in order mine others, as oftentimes we look to achieve this. down upon the ones that, in fact, should be better regarded.

These positive implementations in

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March 27, 2018 • Features

Policy, Equality, and the TDSB Matthew Ferguson

T

he TDSB is a cesspool for the growth of progressive policies; Afrocentric courses and programmes are available, whole schools — albeit alternative schools — such as Ursula Franklin Academy are focused solely on social justice, and there are entire committees devoted to ensuring that equity exists throughout the board. As a result of its progressive nature, investigating the prospective implications that the introduction of a new, equalising policy may have across the board is unbelievably simple.

The Equity Dichotomy, Bleeding Red (and Grey), and The Conservative Conundrum:

Located in the heart of midtown Toronto, North Toronto Collegiate Institute is the optimal location for investigating the concept of fairness and its various perceptions in the context of the TDSB. If one had to describe NT’s demographics using minimalistic terms, two could be used to sum up the school population perfectly: privileged and liberal. Now, that’s not to say that every student attending the school aligns with these denominations, but — for the most part — if you were to stop a random student in the halls and ask them about both their most recent vacation and their opinion on Trudeau, you’d likely receive positive, affirmative responses. The extent of student privilege is made obvious by NT’s 2017 student survey as two thirds of respondents identified as white and had household incomes exceeding $100,000 per annum.

Despite the fact that NT is predominantly liberal, there is, undoubtedly, an assortment of Conservative outliers. Like the oatmeal raisin cookies at the local charity bake sale, they’re the ones nobody wants to touch, let alone listen to. In a school in which an entire twelfth grade course, Global Education, is centred around social justice and last year an entire section of the school newspaper, Graffiti, is devoted to writing about human rights, Tory students

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are likely to face immense difficulty when it comes to getting people to hear them out. Former NT student Maddie Skain claims that ‘’[she] often had trouble reading [the school paper] because it...offended her beliefs’’ and that many of the clubs available at NT didn’t spark her interest as ‘’they [didn’t] reflect [Skain’s] values.’’ As Skain ‘’[took] a lot of humanities courses where [they] often discussed politics’’, she found that she was often outnumbered given that - in classes consisting of approximately 25 students - she was usually only accompanied by ‘’one or two other conservatives.’’

After I uploaded the petition on the North Toronto Collegiate Institute group and the Graffiti Article Ideas group, a number of disdainful responses — in the span of only a few minutes — flooded in; the posts reached a combined total of nearly eighty comments and I began to receive messages from people I hadn’t talked to in years. In fact, one of the students who commented on the post threatened ‘’the bitch [who created the post]’’ with the prospect of ‘’chocking on a stick’’ if she didn’t ‘’get into business because of [the policy]’’.

This political alienation creates a great deal of tension when it comes to the discussion of progressive policies, but, after conducting an experiment to test the political beliefs of NT students in practice, it’s painstakingly clear that left-wing students at NT are likely to find more in common with their right-wing counterparts than they’d like to think.

Within the various responses and messages I received, a few recurring motifs were evident: students claimed they worked incredibly hard and that the expectations placed upon them were higher than any other school. NT students — with great consistency — claimed that they ‘’work their butts off’’, ‘’work day and night’’, and that they shouldn’t be ‘’punished [for being] hardworking students.’’ Contrary to these complaints, if you were to walk into any NT classroom at any given moment - and I mean any to the fullest extent - you’re likely to find students ‘’arranging their business meetings, contacting their secretaries, and coordinating their schedules’’ through no other media than Snapchat. Clearly everyone with a busy life, working day and night, uses Snapchat.

Nabilla Dullapi and the Implementable Policy:

To test how devoted North Toronto students truly are to the practice of diversity and equality, I decided to create a petition — with no actual plan of implementing it — under the name Nabilla Dullapi. The premise of the petition was simple: if you go to a wealthier school, 1.5% of your top six marks, the marks you use to get in the academic portion of your university applications, will be deducted and redistributed to students going to schools in less affluent neighbourhoods. This plan would, theoretically, equalise university admittance opportunities for students of all class backgrounds.

Although I anticipated a total of zero signatures, a handful of people from the North Toronto community actually ended up adding their names to the petition. On Facebook, however, the reaction was immensely different.

No Percent Shall Be Lent:

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is going to be bothered enough to tone their egos down.

Delving more into the extensiveness of the comments received, one could hardly recognise the tone and attitude of the typical NT student. People who are otherwise extremely progressive and supportive of equality and human rights turned into anti-equality tyrants and people who were beyond enraged by the prospect of having to redistribute their marks went through the effort of creating entire essays regarding the topic.

Considering the issue in its entirety, this is a prime example of the hypocrisy inherent within our collective beliefs.

When it comes to equal policies that have negative implications upon them, NT students aren’t necessarily proponents; instead, they’re quick to demonise the very policies they would otherwise support. Their privilege supersedes their morals and their commitment to equality fades into oblivion. Well, I suppose that’s fair enough.

In addition to the way NT students perceive their working lives as extremely difficult, they often reference the supposed fact that they ‘’have more work’’ and ‘’tougher criteria.’’ Mandated by the province, the Ontario Secondary School Curriculum universalises the standards set for any high school student within the confines of the province, but — despite the fact that this document exists and is meant to be followed — NT students are adamant that the bar is set significantly higher for them. It’s a classic case of blinded arrogance and, like every other case of blind arrogance, nobody

NT Hack: Ritual App Annie Doane

You are sitting in your second period English class, desperately waiting for the 11:40 bell to ring so you can book it to your favourite Yonge and Eglinton lunch spot, in the hopes of beating the inevitable long lines. What if I told you that there is an app that allows me to walk into almost any restaurant in the Yonge and Eglinton area, skip the lines, and pick up my food? The Ritual app allows you to order food on your phone, and charge it to your credit, debit or Paypal. Some of the restaurants available include Banh Mi Boys, Rollation, Aroma, Freshii, and South Street Burger. Once you order, the app will send you text when your food is ready so you can simply stroll into the restaurant, show your Ritual profile, grab your food and give the people waiting in line a smug look as you walk out the door. Another plus? When you use Ritual, you gather points that can be used towards free food. They also have weekly promos where you can get $1 off a coffee or a sandwich if you have X amount of points. This app kills two birds with one stone, saving money and feeding hungry teens. So the next time you forget your lunch, take 2 minutes, order your meal, and enjoy a stress-free dining experience.

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AND EXPERIENCE THE POWER OF NETWORKING

Photo by Vicky Ye

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Opinion

Photo from The Detroit Times.

This is a School, Not a Shooting Range Jacob Olegnowicz

University of Central Michigan.

Illustration by Avishai Sol.

S

chool is a place meant for learning. However, the recent developments in the United States suggest that more and more individuals view this institution as a shooting range, rather than a school.

For far too long, the National Rifle Association (NRA) has not been held accountable for what has been going on in the United States. It is March and 12 shootings in schools and universities across the United States have occurred since the beginning of the year, the most recent being in the

According to the NRA and President Donald Trump, the U.S. should be arming teachers in their schools.

Some schools already do that, and there have been some serious repercussions. On February 28, one of those schools with armed teachers learned that teachers are just as capable as anybody else to lash out unexpectedly. Jesse Randall Davidson, a teacher at Dalton High school in Northwest Georgia, shot his concealed firearm at his classroom window because students wanted to go into his room to study before class.

While it does not appear that Davidson had the intention of harming students, it brings us back to the solution proposed by the NRA and Mr. Trump.

What good would arming teachers do if they end up using their firearm against the very students they are meant to protect? Mr. Trump proposes arming 20 percent of school teach-

ers with concealed weapons, a plan that the NRA stands behind. This plan aims to arm approximately 640,000 school teachers. At a minimum cost of $250 USD per firearm, that puts roughly $160 million in the pocket of the NRA. Figures like this make you question whether the NRA is putting students or their finances first.

When it comes to money, the NRA “donates” a lot of it to politicians’ campaigns. One example of this would be Senator Marco Rubio, who received $3.3 million in funding from the NRA. In a town hall meeting, Rubio was asked by the parent of a victim of the Parkland shooting to “look at me and tell me that you will accept [that guns are a problem] and [will] work with us to do something about it”. His response was that “gun laws alone cannot solve this”. He later shifted the subject to the proposed ban on the AR-15 assault rifle. He stated that “if he believed that this ban would have stopped the shooting then he would

stand by it”, implying that he does not in fact believe that assault rifles, the weapon of choice in most mass shootings, are responsible for the 17 lives lost in Parkland, the Las Vegas shooting that killed 59 and injured over 500, and many other mass shootings. With a campaign donation of 3.3 million dollars, it’s easy to see why Mr. Rubio and other politicians on the NRA’s payroll just accept mental illness as the cause of mass shootings.

As a student in Canada I am grateful that we have strict gun laws. But I fear that members of my family, who have already survived a shooting that occurred at UCLA, might not survive the next one. I know I speak for not just them, but for every student, teacher, and school worker, when I say that guns are the problem and should be treated not as a right, but as a privilege.

Sexual Assault Protocols at Universities

Amelia Banville

A

ccording to Statistics Canada, women self-reported 553 000 sexual assaults in 2014. It’s estimated that less than one percent of all sexual assaults that occur in Canada end up with the offender being convicted, and it’s worse if the women is disabled, indigenous, unemployed, or institutionalized. In fact, it’s one of the only crime statistics that has remained relatively stable since 1990. There are many reasons why a person wouldn’t report sexual assault such as fear of the disbelieving public eye, harsh cross-examination, or myths about the way a survivor “should” react. How universities deal with sexual assault and violence on their campus is being held up to public scrutiny, with many survivors feeling that their universities did not help them the way in which they needed.

Knowing that, it’s not hard to understand why some Canadian universities have recently been introducing more sexual assault guidelines and poli-

cies. In Toronto, these policies came after the introduction of Bill 132 in the spring of 2016, which has a section that issues guidelines for Ontario universities and colleges to create a stand-alone sexual assault policy and update it every three years with student input. The bill asks universities to create a sexual assault protocol that outlines how to make a complaint, the process of the investigation, and what the decision making process looks like.

Currently, universities are working on getting them in place, with Ryerson University at the forefront. Ryerson has had a policy regarding student support services since 2015, but altered it following the release of the new legislation. Though they do still have a strong education and support program, with training days like #consentcomesfirst and the be BRAVE campaign, as well as a relatively easy reporting system.

In British Columbia and Manitoba, similar legislation has taken place, and the Quebec government is working on a bill addressing sexual assault on

campuses as well.

Though this marks a large step in the right direction, ending sexual violence against women in Canada still has a long way to go. Most survivors want resources and help, without going through a long, complicated process.

Critics say that many of the new guidelines fall short and that the investigation piece is a job better left to the police.

Some think that although the bill is a good start, survivors of sexual assault will continue to not be taken seriously and offenders will still get off the hook.

What’s missing is the assurance that each case will be investigated. If the student does not wish to get police involved, the university will honour that request unless there is a special circumstance in which there is an imminent safety issue because of it. This means that universities will handle the investigation, and students may not be afforded the same legal rights as

they would in court, even though some would equate serious academic punishments such as expulsion with legal charges.

Others believe that universities have a legal and ethical responsibility to report all allegations of sexual assault to the police to prevent further infractions of the law as well as to bring the offender to justice. Another issue is about what constitutes an imminent safety concern, and how universities would be able to tell without proper training. Thus, the only part a university should play is through education and prevention, as well as resources to help with the aftermath.

Overall, the legislation may be controversial, but it is still opening the minds of young people and helping to remove public stigma about sexual assault.

Even if not everyone agrees with the bill, it is a step in the right direction.

Photo Courtesy of Mike Chan

• Work Hard No Play Graffiti

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Katarina Makivic and Hannah Argiloff

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or a school with the mantra “Work hard play hard” plastered upon one of its staircases, there is little play to be found within its grey walls.

Music Retreat activities • Photo While NT boasts an academic average far higher than many in the city, there is a significant imbalance in many students’ lives. Between all-nighters and extracurriculars, the hard work that many students put in goes seemingly unrewarded; sometimes it feels as though the staff have a vendetta against fun.

Although school, grades and a proper education are very important, the overall “high school experience” that many marvelled over and looked forward to while growing up is often neglected at North Toronto. Within the four or five years spent at NT, the number of school events that occur can be counted on one hand. On top of this, other than Red and Grey Day and Charity Week, most school

Photo from North Toronto’s website. events are exclusive to individual grades (i.e. Grade 9 Welcome Day and Prom).

A very simple solution to this

by Genevieve Crispin-Frei problem would be to organize more

school events such as a semi-formal or a fashion show; NT has not had either in years. As a result, the school has earned a reputation as “a school full of pencil pushers” in the minds of its counterparts and rivals (Northern, Leaside, Lawrence Park, Forest Hill). Left with no in-school option, NT students end up going to other schools’ semi-formals and events, hosting their own events, or missing out on them altogether.

While we are not discrediting such parties, these alternatives are often accompanied by safety concerns.

This should not be the only party option for students.

One such example is a recent event called “After Party”, commonly

dubbed “AP”. The party has always been student run and disavowed by the school, but was originally an event that followed Fashion Show, which has since been discontinued.

While we’re not bashing the party, we do believe that being a drunken, mini-skirt-clad fifteen year old in the club district at 1:00 am is not everyone’s ideal. Students can do this if they please, however, alternatives should exist for those whose parents reside on the stricter “I’ll ground you till you’re 30” end of the spectrum. School sanctioned events would give more students the chance to have a real “high school experience” without breaking the trust of their parents.

Additionally, by this point in the school year, everyone is exhausted and is counting down the days until summer break. With the entire school being in a state of winter blues and the temperatures out-

side falling faster than our grades, students all need a pick-me-up this time of year. If our school provided a fun spirit event (i.e. a fashion show or semi-formal) then perhaps students would no longer trudge through the halls looking like someone just kicked their puppy.

NT students should not rely on one Red and Grey day and two lawn parties to get them through the otherwise monotonous school year.

It seems that we are not the only ones bearing this opinion. In nearly every issue of Graffiti, you’ll find at least one article that’s a cry for less homework or a plea for a break from the constant academia. Maybe this article is just one of many that are petitioning for change, however, we’re hoping that our words can help NT students’ voices to finally be heard.

The Fallacy of Political Correctness

Joe Zhang

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knows not to blackface. How in the world is a four year old child able to comprehend the political and historical connotations of blackfacing?”

“See, y’all, if a child knows not to blackface, you can too. A child knows not to blackface. A CHILD

Then, a question dawned on me. Did I, myself, even know the connotations of blackfacing? Why did I start preaching for the banishment of blackfacing if I had never understood why it was ohso-wrong? The truth was, I had begun to adopt an entire set of beliefs simply because I had been tacitly told by my left-winged entourage that opposing these beliefs would be inherently wrong. Many of these often labelled “liberal” beliefs have truly allowed our society to progress. Putting forward a legislation against discrimination towards people based on their race, sexual orientation, or sexual identity, and setting up communities of support organizations for women facing domestic violence and abuse, are only two of the many things the left has advocated for. However, despite the good intentions behind it, the new phenomena of shutting down anyone who shares a diverging opinion, deeming them to be politically incorrect, has become a greater evil than that which it is trying to defeat.

t was around the peak selling season for candy when I realized the extent to which “political correctness” is destroying our society’s ability to advance towards a better and more equitable future. It was nearing Halloween - or perhaps it was on the day of Halloween - a holiday that matters little when you’re in your mid teenage years, too old to trick, and too financially unfortunate to treat. Scrolling through Instagram, I saw a picture of a child dressed as Martin Luther King.

The child was about four; his eyes were gleaming with innocent joy, and he was white. The caption read: “See y’all if a child knows not to blackface you can too #staywoke [sic]”. As I read through the caption, my mind automatically conjured a semi-impressed, admirative appreciation for the child’s thoughtfulness. I left the matter at that and continued with my somewhat entertaining nightly scrolling through Instagram. But later on, I couldn’t help but think back to the child dressed as Martin Luther King and the caption attached to his picture.

The consequences of political correctness have never been embodied better than by the election of the United States president, Donald Trump, on November 8th, 2016. In the months before the election, it seemed that everywhere I looked, everyone was in agreement that the obvious winner would be Hillary Clinton. Anyone who voiced their support for Donald Trump were assumed to be bad, racist, xenophobic, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, and warped beyond saving. Their voices were immediately shut down. After all, their opinions were politically incorrect. The result of this approach speaks for itself; Donald Trump was elected.

Yet, it is not because half of the population of America wished havoc for Muslims and gays. It is because their concerns were not heard and the left was unable to communicate their fear for their safety under a president like Donald Trump to the right. Ultimately, it is because the lines of communication were severed, consequently segregating the population into two groups, both angry and confused, with their bridge to a common ground broken. If we are unable to approach someone from a perspective of empathy rather

than demonization, how can we expect them to keep an open-mind towards our own opinions? How can we expect to come together to build up a society of equality and harmony?

Political correctness disguises itself as safety; it disguises itself as tolerance; and it disguises itself as justice. It is, however, nothing more than a pretty veneer for intolerance, self-righteousness, and a dangerous lack of communication. The solution is simple: We must dare to venture out of our social circle and look to understand, empathize, and communicate openmindedly with those who think differently. If we want to change the world for the better and create communities based on sympathy, equity, and peace, we must stop watching movies of clean words, told in black and white. Meanwhile, the rest of the world, is genuinely searching for common ground with strangers sharing different opinions.

Outside the windows that we have covered with a thick curtain, they are trying their best to come together as one to find solutions to greater problems.

The Dragon’s Den participants • Photo by Mr. Gorenkoff

Graffiti

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March 27, 2018 • Opinion

Who Should We Blame? Logan Paul or YouTube?

Subin Park

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Illustration by Avishai Sol.

n just a little over a decade since YouTube’s launch in 2005, the platform has become one of the most popular social media outlets and a booming business for millions of brands, celebrities, and content creators. The key aspect of YouTube that makes it so appealing to today’s socialmedia-fueled generation is that anyone with a camera, mic, and computer can become famous. Without strict rules and policies, users are also able to push the envelope and share refreshing opinions on issues that may otherwise be censored on other platforms. However, a lawless platform is a doubleedged sword; for every educational, innovative, and brilliant video posted on YouTube, there is an equal number of offensive and unethical videos that slide past YouTube’s community guidelines and garner millions of views from around the world. The most recent example of this was Logan Paul’s video titled “We found a dead body in the Japanese Suicide Forest…”.

In late December, Logan Paul, one bybiggest Daanish Sayani of Photo YouTube’s stars with over 16 million subscribers, was hit with a huge wave of public backlash and criticism when he posted a vlog from his trip to Aokigahara forest in Japan, often dubbed the “suicide forest.” In the horrifying 15-minute video, Paul

encounters a dead body, moments after entering the forest, and instead of turning off the camera, he continues to record his friends and himself making distasteful jokes and approaches the victim to get extreme close-ups. “What, you’ve never stood next to a dead guy?”

Paul says to his friend while laughing.

Naturally, this caused an uproar from outraged, sad, and disturbed viewers who flocked to their Twitter accounts to criticize Paul on his insincere and humorous mood.

However, while this may have been a slight speed bump for Paul and his career, for YouTube, this video marked the beginning of a reckoning of an even more controversial issue. Just within a day after the video was posted, the video accumulated more than 6.3 million views and was left on YouTube’s trending page for three days before it was eventually deleted by Paul himself on January 2nd. YouTube, which released an official statement regarding the issue eight days after the deletion of the video, found itself at the centre of a bigger debate over its enforcement of community guidelines and responsibilities both as an employer and as a social media platform.

YouTube culture has changed significantly since the early days of the internet. As more and more content creators sign up to become full-time YouTubers, the YouTube community has become increasingly competitive and cold. All of the latest trends on YouTube have been around drama, controversy, and “exposing” other YouTubers, and current guidelines are not enforced heavily enough to prevent these behaviours.

In fact, YouTube encourages creators like Paul to film outrageous content to attract as much attention and views as possible. If successful, they are rewarded with money and sponsorships. Mia

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Petrovic, an avid YouTube viewer, says, “I feel like YouTube has a certain bias or favouritism towards certain creators, which I think was the case with Logan Paul. YouTube never took his video down because he is a creator that generates a lot of attraction to [the] platform.”

Currently, content is managed through flagging, age restrictions, review teams, and automatic detection algorithms.

However, these tools have been proven to be ineffective in the past, as seen in their scandal last year involving their lack of supervision around content aimed at children. Choosing what content to remove gets even more tricky because YouTube has no official standard for content moderation, and its vague community guidelines leave most of the censoring to the personal judgements of the YouTube staff. YouTube’s policy around violent or graphic content states that, “It’s not okay to post violent, gory content that’s primarily intended to be shocking, sensational, or gratuitous. If a video is particularly graphic or disturbing, it should be balanced with additional context and information.” This murky policy alone may be the reason why YouTube allowed Paul’s video to stay up for so long.

meet to monetize its videos. But it still needs to set better standards on what is considered appropriate YouTube content and clarify its policy statements to make its censoring process more transparent and effective.

All social media platforms, including YouTube, need to have strong, clear rules and constantly remind their users about ethics, morals, and values in order to function safely. Simply teaching YouTubers when to turn off their cameras would be a compelling start towards a culture change.

However, Paul and YouTube aren’t the only ones who we can blame; society ultimately let the video go viral and produced people like Paul. As a society, we spend most of our days with our faces glued to our phones and computers. Paul’s video is a perfect example of how our need for likes, approval, fame, money, and influence has shaped our generation. It’s like we’ve all been exposed to a virus that goes around creating idiots like Paul. It has already affected the youth population and doesn’t seem like it will be gone any time soon. All we can do is wait for the next idiot to come and go, and hope that someone else will take responsibility for the cause.

There is no doubt that Paul acted irresponsibly and that despite all the “explaining” he did in his video about the suicide victim and mental illness, his careless actions remain offensive to the victim, the victim’s family, and those suffering with mental illness. Petrovic agrees that, “Sick pranks and videos like these are posted all the time and some people still seem to think it’s ok.”

Since Paul’s incident, YouTube has started to tighten its rules by changing the requirements a channel must

Illustration by Danielle Depencier.

Posting underneath a virtual invisibility cloak: Sarahah Maya Sternthal

Zain al-Abidin Tawfiq, says that Sarahah “helps you in discovering [sic] your strengths and areas for improvement by receiving honest feedback from your employees and your friends in a private manner.” This is utterly shocking because today’s teens are using it for a completely different purpose.

Photo by Alice Liang Photo by Maya Sternthal.

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f you are like many teenagers today, you probably begin your regular social media checks by opening Instagram and watching stories. Many people post snapshots or videos of the exciting events or daily occurrences in their lives, from their dog playing in the snow, to a Drake concert, to a reunion with an old friend. Over the past few months, I have seen a new trend invade Instagram stories. It is a link to a new world, a new social media platform: Sarahah.

Many people are unaware of the original intent behind this internet sensation. The app’s developer,

Photo by Daanish Sayani

It goes something like this.

Step one: A young person creates a Sarahah account and posts the link on their Instagram or Snapchat account. Step two: Online “friends” anonymously ask questions or leave comments. Step three: The account holder screenshots the questions/ comments and uses an editing app to write their responses on the screenshot. Step four: The account holder reposts this edited screenshot on their Instagram story or Snapchat account for all to see.

These questions and comments are generally not lighthearted. Common posts often resemble something like, “Hook up or pass *insert list of names of people*”, “Why are you so fake?”, and “You were really mean to me in

middle school.” The list goes on and on. The responses to these questions and comments can be just as blunt and aggressive. People actually name who they do or do not find attractive and their opinions on their peers. Often, they include a snarky response such as “Maybe you are the fake one...” or one that resembles something like “I am so sorry if I ever made you feel badly. Please dm (direct message) me and we can be friends! *insert heart emoji*”.

It’s hard to see the appeal of this confusing network of relationships brought together by anonymity. Yet, so many of us still read the posts on our peer’s Instagram stories. It is fascinating that social media has the power to motivate people to express their true feelings when they know that their identities are concealed by a virtual invisibility cloak. People behave differently online than they do in person.

I think that the most intriguing part of Sarahah is the mentality of the account holders who welcome the comments, critiques, and questions.

What motivates these individuals?

This social media platform is a mechanism which “helps” young people show that they do not care what others think, and that they are proud of who they are. These are important qualities, especially for high schoolers who live in a society that constantly pulls them into a sea of carbon copied teenagers. What we need to understand is that we can experience the empowering feelings of independence and confidence without posting online and without external confirmation. Sarahah makes you feel important; You are the topic of people’s conversations and thoughts.

Perhaps our use of Sarahah, as well as other social media platforms, stems from our need to feel appreciated and cared for by those around us, our need to feel valued and included in something greater than ourselves. Perhaps we need to find more authentic ways to nurture our individuality and confidence.

• Teen Alcohol Usage Graffiti

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March 27, 2018 • Opinion

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Sophie Cohen and Ensi Cullhaj

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lcohol. A term often found in the stereotypical teenage dictionary. A word used interchangeably with “fun”, “exciting” and “harmless.” Is it really though?

What are the true effects of alcohol on the teenage mind and body?

People, especially teenagers, are influenced by society, media, and their peers. Many teens often see their friends consuming various substances and having a good time at parties and gatherings, and this pressures them to join in. For these teens, alcohol seems harmless and is readily available. All of the people around them enjoy it, so what harm could there be?

The answer is yes. Alcohol is a depressant that slows the nervous system, and once it is absorbed into the bloodstream, it spreads through the body rapidly. Drinking alcoholic beverages starts a series of reactions, mostly taking place in the brain. As consumption continues, these reactions become increasingly dangerous as more areas of the brain are

often resulting in death if there is no early intervention. Even before alcohol attacks the brain stem, major organs in ours bodies have already been altered. This can cause liver inflammation and lower blood pressure which, in turn, increases a person’s chances of getting heart disease, strokes, and high blood pressure.

There are also other ways in which teenagers are introduced to alcohol.

For some, it is simply a way to cope with stress, whether it’s academic, social, or emotional. It can also be a way to bond with others or act rebellious. In most teen’s minds, alcohol is really just a part of the teenage experience.

However, the law that enforces the legal drinking age has been created for a reason. The 2015 Youth Risk Behavior Survey by CDC in the U.S. on high school students during a period of 30 days showed that “33% drank some alcohol, 18% binge drank, 8% drove after drinking alcohol, [and] 20% rode with a driver who had been drinking alcohol.”

This shows the extent of underage drinking that continues to take place today.

But what really is alcohol? There is all this talk about how it can stunt brain development and destroy nerve cells, but is it really true?

driver was the one who had been drinking, not the other drivers. By the time a driver reaches a blood alcohol content of 10%, he or she is 51 times more likely to be involved in a fatal car crash than someone who has not been drinking.

Not only is alcohol used in the teenage world, but drugs are as well, and when the two are combined, the result instantly becomes deadlier. This is because it is impossible to know how two or more unknown substances will react once consumed. Combining depressants can lower heart and breathing rates. Combining alcohol with stimulants can cause heart inflammation and other bodily stresses. In addition, when they are used together, the effects of either substance is not felt as immediately compared to just consuming alcohol alone. This can increase the risk of an overdose.

If these indicators aren’t enough to show that teen drinking is illogical, even people from our own student body are against it. “You’re subjecting yourself to intoxication and bad decision making that you could have easily avoided had you not decided to drink. Completely idiotic and uncool if you ask me,” said a North Toronto student.

Graphic made by Sophie Cohen and Ensi Cullhaj. affected. As alcohol rapidly spreads throughout the brain, early intoxication is a predictable result. The final area of the brain that alcohol affects is the brain stem (medulla oblongata) which controls involuntary reflexes such as telling your lungs to breathe and your heart to pump. At toxic levels, alcohol slows or stops these essential brain stem functions,

For teenagers, this can be even more deadly as our brains are still developing and our bodies are still growing.

This problem becomes even more dangerous when youth drink and drive. Statistics have shown that in almost two thirds of alcohol-related vehicle crashes, the fatally injured

And so with all that said, what really is so fun and great about alcohol?

Why is it so popular among teenagers if it is so harmful to them? Some may argue that it is what adds to the fun at parties, but there are many other things that could produce the same amount of joy that aren’t completely illegal and extremely dangerous. And that my friends is some brain food for you to chew on.

Now or Never Carleigh Pace-Tonna

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magine you are a part of a human pyramid with 3 strangers on a small plank, floating on a sea of lava. Every action you perform has a direct impact on everyone else, and communication is of the utmost importance. You all need to get down from the pyramid and stand upright in order to be rescued. One person feels as if they are invincible to the lava’s heat, another person is mad at everyone in the group, and the other is too quiet to make any big decisions.

How would they coordinate getting safely to their feet? Everyone has different views and ideas, and no one can decide how to get down. What would you do? How would you help everyone get to safety?

Photo by Alice Liang

Climate change is caused by the unnecessary burning of fossil fuels to produce energy used for powering our cities. The ever rising concentrations of CO2 in the atmosphere are responsible for temperature increases around the globe. Although it might not be evident in our everyday lives, climate change is becoming a serious problem, and we can’t fix it by ourselves. It is responsible for extreme weather occurrences (such as flooding and storms), accelerated extinction of species, decreased air quality, melting glaciers, and rising sea levels, just to name a few. How will this affect you? In 2013, Toronto underwent two extreme weather incidents, and, according to the

Toronto Environmental Alliance, the cost to the city was over $1.3 billion.

However, despite the grim outlook, it is not too late to make a difference; even making one lifestyle change can significantly reduce the amount of harmful chemicals released into our atmosphere. Fossil fuels are a nonrenewable resource, which means it will not last forever. Thankfully, many environmentally friendly alternatives have been invented: wind, solar and hydroelectric power for example, have little to no effect on the surrounding air and provide sustainable clean energy for cities all around the world. If we don’t act soon, and fix things before it’s too late, then we will reach a point of no return, and

there will be severe consequences.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t like floods, hurricanes, and suffering wildlife. I prefer to live in a world in which we live in harmony with one another, and preserve the gifts given to us by the Earth.

Imagine you are back in that human pyramid, and two solutions are proposed. One person doesn’t want to do a thing because they don’t think that the lava can hurt them, and the other person thinks that someone else will save them. What do you propose?

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March 27, 2018 • Humour

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Humour

Photo from The Huffington Post.

Weird Things We Thought Were True As Kids

The Humour Team

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thought that in order to put music on CD’s you just had to take an empty CD and get a singer or band to sing or play music really loudly towards it and it would somehow absorb the music. This theory didn’t sit too well with me because even I didn’t think that it was realistic for Demi Lovato to sit in some factory all day singing Camp Rock songs really loudly over and over again. It also didn’t explain how movies got into CD’s and VHS’s, but I clearly wasn’t too concerned about that. I still don’t actually know exactly how CD’s and stuff work, but it doesn’t really matter because no one uses them anymore anyways.

Claudia Huang

many people needed to cross and and how heavy traffic was. I clearly had no idea how many intersections exist in the GTA, because I thought this was perfectly reasonable.

- Hana Sharifi

When I was little, I was very demanding and asked a lot of questions. Eventually, my mom had had enough, or she was just looking for an easy way out and whenever I questioned her parenting at all, like when I asked “why do I have to eat my vegetables?” she would say it said so in the mommy manual. For all those years, the reason I listened to my mom so intently was because of this magical all knowing book called the mommy manual. The most embarrassing part is that I did not clue

When I was little, I was fasci- in to it being fake until a few years Photoago.

by Daanish Sayani nated by how every intersection each stop light and pedestrian walk light - Alex Lindell-Lindblom seemed to change at the perfect time.

This led me to believe that a video My parents are from Iran. Almost all camera was watching each intersecof my relatives live there. Whenever tion in Toronto, and the intersecwe visited Iran I thought it was a tions were all monitored by a team of literal dream. I thought that everystoplight workers at a headquarters one there didn’t exist and that they somewhere in Toronto. Their job was were only figments of my imaginato change the lights based on how tion. When I was a kid, I had a small

globe. My parents would point to Iran on the globe and tell me that that’s where my grandparents lived.

I didn’t believe they existed, so that was strange to me. They also pointed to Canada and told me that we live there. And I thought, no, I don’t live on this plastic round thing, I live in this apartment! They would say, “look at how far Iran is from Canada!” And I would think, no, I can literally point my finger to both of these arbitrary points on this plastic sphere at the same time, why is everyone so insane?

- Nikoo Aleyasin

Whenever my family went bowling, I always believed that when I threw the ball and it hit the pins, the ball fell into a deep dark tunnel and it never came back. I thought that all bowling alleys had bowling ball factories underneath the lanes, so when the new ball appeared a few seconds later, I assumed it was from the factory underneath the bowling alley, because obviously.

- Annie Doane

When I was a child, I believed that the only way you can

make a baby is if you eat chicken nuggets and Sprite for dinner. I was over at my friends house one night and we were eating chicken nuggets and Sprite. The next morning my friend comes to school and tells me that she’s going to have a baby brother, and I made up a conspiracy theory that the chicken nuggets and the Sprite were behind this.

- Alyssa Forbes When I was 5 or 6 I had no idea how radios or speakers worked. So I legitimately thought that a little person was inside the speaker singing all the songs and talking on the radio. At some points I would get really sad, because I thought the little person was trapped inside the speaker, and I would always try to break open the speaker and free him. My mom explained to me how radios worked when I almost broke open the speaker beside my car seat trying to set the little singing man free.

- Grace Van Alstyne *Edited for length and clarity

• Confessions of a Camp Counsellor Graffiti

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March 27, 2018 • Humour

Alex Lindell-Lindblom

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his past summer, I had the privilege of working as a camp counsellor at a Toronto-based day camp. Honestly, it was the toughest struggle I have ever had to face, yet somehow, it was also the most rewarding thing I have ever done.

With summer around the corner, I’ve been thinking about how different being a camp counsellor is compared to what I expected. So here is some useful advice to anyone applying to be a counsellor.

1. At camp, things don’t always go as planned… Correction, they almost never go as planned. Hence, us counsellors are almost always thinking on our feet. Besides having emergency and first-aid training, along with knowing a basic outline of the weekly schedule, it is crucial that we also have a few fun songs and games up our sleeves in case of desperate

times.

2. Most of us don’t know all of our campers’ names, as much as we would like to say we do. We are introduced to 40 new faces every week, and unless a camper gives me reason to constantly be saying their name, I definitely won’t know it. The best advice I can give is to use nicknames.

I’ve learned that the trick of calling the kids “sweetie” and “buddy” is incredibly effective. I mean, the kids whose names I do remember from last summer included the kid who would attempt to have political debates with me, the kid who refused to lose any game, and the kid who resolved a disagreement by throwing a basket of tennis balls across the court. It’s safe to say that if I don’t remember the child’s name, it means that they were well-behaved which is a counsellor’s dream.

3. I think that every counsellor reaches the point of complete exhaustion. You are on your feet for 8 hours a day, and five days a week being active and leading children.

Please note, there are no coffee breaks, and no lunch breaks. The only place where you can get a moment to yourself is the bathroom, and even those are brief because who knows what can happen in your 5 minutes of absence. The only way to beat the exhaustion is drink tons of coffee in the morning, and take a 2 hour nap when you get home.

4. Transferable skills. I wasn’t a believer when I first learned about them in grade 10 career studies.

They are actually real, and working has made me believe in them. You learn endless things that have to be applied instantly in many ways, and you end up learning life hacks along the way that make life a little easier

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to handle.

5. Don’t piss off your fellow counsellors, you will be stuck with them for weeks on end. Becoming friends with your fellow staff, whether it is bonding over a troublesome child or lip syncing to a PG family friendly song to pass the time will make life a lot easier. You might end up growing very close, and the job will become a million times easier and a lot more fun.

These five things provide almost everything you need to know about working at a day camp. The struggle is real, but so are the friendships you form and the lessons you learn that last you a lifetime. Even after all of this, I will be back for another jam packed summer at camp, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Photo by Daanish Sayani

Photo by Alyssa Forbes.

Photo by Sarah McPherson.

Photo by Sarah McPherson.

The Ten Worst Things that Parents Do Amelia Banville

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Photo by Chloe Hung.

’m sure we can all agree that parents can be aggravating at times, and being trapped with them in your house for umpteen hours at a time doesn’t help. Here is a top list of things that parents do that are the absolute worst.

1. Not give a straight answer for anything.

You ask on Friday to go out to a movie with your friends on a busy weekend, and your parent gives the most ambiguous of answers. “We’ll see, we’re pretty busy this weekend” or a vague answer like “Maybe.” This is a problem for a number of reasons. Do you keep asking and risk a lecture? Do you say yes and risk flaking? Do you say no and risk missing out when you could actu-

ally go? We’ll never know, because no one ever gives a solid answer.

2. They never answer their phones.

My mother has probably picked up the phone when I called maybe once in her life. I get it, they’re busy, working people, but somehow, it’s an atrocity if my phone dies at school and I can’t answer the phone?

3. Getting upset at you for not enjoying yourself at a place you didn’t want to go to in the first place.

I don’t even need further explanation for this.

4. A personal life? What’s that?

Did you want something kept on the DL? Welp, that sucks because now everyone your parent works with and all of your extended family knows about it! Isn’t that great?

5. Asking why you are in a bad mood ALL THE TIME. It’s 7:36 in the morning, you’ve been rudely woken by your alarm clock exactly 6 minutes ago, but you lay in bed for a while, contemplating if you really needed to go to

English class this morning. You go downstairs to get a piece of toast, and as your parent walks out the door, they give you that look and you know exactly what’s coming.

“Honey, what’s got you in such a bad mood this morning?” Honestly, I wasn’t even in a bad mood until you said that, but okay I guess.

6. Grades If I have to hear one more speech about how they “want me to try my best, but they know my best is at least a 90% and it’s upsetting that I wouldn’t even bother trying…”

I might spontaneously combust.

Grades matter, but I would also like to enjoy being alive.

7. Using your friends as an example of what you should be but simultaneously saying they “don’t care what other kids are doing”.

How come other people only matter when they’re doing stuff your parents approve of?

8. Ignoring your explanations.

There is a perfectly reasonable explanation, and they did just ask why something happened, but now that you are about to explain, they

“don’t want hear it” or they’ve “had enough”. How does that make sense? They just asked? And now?

They don’t want an explanation?

9. Similar to previous, but just not listening to you at all.

You have a perfectly valid argument, or your parent has done something to upset you, but you can’t express it in any way without them telling you that you are being disrespectful or something similar.

10. Somehow, certain words are disrespectful.

This may just be in my household, and I’m not even just talking about swear words, I’m talking about perfectly innocent words like “what?”, because you DON’T SAY “WHAT” YOU SAY “PARDON”, for a reason I don’t particularly understand.

So when, or if, your parents do any of the aforementioned list, take a deep breath and remember that (most of the time) they have your best interest at heart, no matter how misguided it seems at times.

And if you really can’t stand it, chin up, ‘cause it’s only a few years until university’!

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March 27, 2018 • Humour

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North Toronto: The Movie Annie Doane

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e have all seen them. The movies and TV shows that the kids born in the 90s and early 2000s will never forget: High School Musical, Camp Rock, Degrassi, Glee, the list goes on. While all of these are iconic, most of us have realised that they are unrealistic. Most high school students can agree that their experience isn’t filled with giant choreographed dance numbers, game-winning goals, or “classmates” that look 10 years older than their teenage characters. How would a seemingly ordinary high school like North Toronto fair in a teen movie or TV show? Let’s take a look at some of the classic scenarios and see how they would’ve played out at NT. High School Musical:

Being able to win a basketball game, a scholastic decathlon, and get the lead in a school musical all in one day is a feat for anyone, if someone at NT did that, we would all be incredibly impressed, and not tell that person to stick to the status quo.

Also, NT students would never judge a basketball player who simply wants

to perfect their creme brulee; think of how useful they’d be at NTAA bake sales. While East High could definitely pull off an amazing Red and Grey Day, their school spirit may be a little too extravagent. On top of that, they had massive posters of Troy Bolton’s face plastered throughout the school which can also be seen as excessive.

Friday Night Lights: If NT had the massive football bleachers and spotlights that Dillon High School had, I’m sure this storyline could be more plausible. When you live in the town of Dillon,Texas that lives and breathes high school football, it only makes sense that the main plotline is to win the state championships.

Of course, every high school has a rival; in the case of our Norsemen, it’s always a competition to beat Northern to be the champions. When we win, the players are showered with the utmost admiration from all of NT, right?

Maybe stories like this only happen in small towns.

Glee: Though there is resemblance between

the choir room in Glee and our vocal room, the similarities pretty much end there. Learning 3-4 songs for Maytime is a challenge, so how can the New Directions possibly pull together a winning nationals routine in a few weeks? Impossible. It is also shocking how much these kids can get away with: musical numbers in the cafeteria, blackmailing teachers, and throwing slushies left and right. How do they do it? At NT, we can’t even get away with sitting in the hallways during spares.

Mean Girls:

“On Wednesdays we wear pink”. Replace the word pink with Adidas, or Lululemon leggings, and you would get NT’s version of this iconic line. While we may know now that asking people why they’re white isn’t socially acceptable, many of us do use the Yonge and Eglinton mall as a hangout spot, just like “The Plastics”.

Speaking of similarities, NT already has a Burn Book; it’s called Sarahah. It is probably better that Mean Girls took place before the rise of social media, because we all know Regina George would’ve spammed all of our Insta-

gram feeds with her selfies.

Lemonade Mouth: Five misfit teens trapped in detention decide to form a band and name it after the vending machine in the hallway: a classic storyline. I’m not sure about other schools, but the simple fact that NT doesn’t have vending machines is a travesty. How else will we create a school-wide campaign about equality and respect? Unless NT students decide to form a band called “Tim Hortons” and sing about school issues like the lack of toilet paper, the rebellious and social justice warrior teens of Lemonade Mouth will never be matched.

While North Toronto may not be as interesting as classic teenage media, hopefully we can seek comfort in the fact that our lives will never be that interesting. Drama is exhausting.

Shopping for Products “For Her” Evelyn Mang

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hopping for basic necessities at your local drug store might be a task that seems simple at first glance, but it frequently introduces a rather common dilemma of having to decipher which of the binary genders for whom every product is made.

Lucky for you, this problem has been dealt with by the garnishing of every product deemed as “feminine” with equally “feminine” decor.

While you may find yourself overwhelmed by a brazen display of machismo while hurriedly pacing through the intimidating men’s section of products, you’ll be able to breathe a sigh of relief upon discovering a plethora of pastel colors wrapped around all your lady products, perfect for protecting your frail woman eyes!

You may also notice that your choices of products are all draped in various shades of pink, which we all know as the one designated colour for women.

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While it might initially enrage you that men practically assume the privilege of owning adventurous and tough colors like orange, green and blue, just be glad you have the privilege of sporting the same colour Kanye (a man) proudly wore way back in 2004.

ly surprised to find that the product of your choice is marketed as “simple” and “easy to use,” as us women don’t have the time to do unnecessarily convoluted tasks, we have more rewarding challenges to pass our days with say, doing our man’s laundry.

If the infantilization of women in our modern society just wasn’t enough for you, your local corporation has taken to the act of sprinkling your products with little feminine sparkles I can only describe as reminiscent of a 2002 design of My Little Pony characters, thoughtfully reminding us women of our tender and long-missed childhood.

Once you’ve made the tough choice between pastel pink and hot pink packaging, you might advance onto reading the instructions for your product, that is, if your brain hasn’t already crashed from trying to decode complex jargon like “the” or “and” on the packaging. You might be pleasant-

written in dainty script fonts, perfectly resembling your own handwriting while you might be writing a grocery list, or even being so revolutionary as to transcribe notes for your male boss!

Lastly, while you’re checking out you might notice the number that pops up on the cash registry is significantly more expensive than the exact same product when marketed to men. We all know women make $0.74 for every $1.00 a man makes, but who knew women were charged more for their basic necessities? Clearly, by charging women more than men for the exact same thing, toiletry brands are making a political statement that women should be paid more to finally be able to afford C-grade razors and deodorants. Isn’t that what feminism is all about?

Photo from Walmart.

These easy instructions are likely

NT Hack: Remembering Your Timetable Joshua Chong

If you are like most NT students, you probably still do not know your timetable. What makes our timetable over complicated is that it is a four day timetable that fits in a five day week. In addition, the afternoon classes alternate every other day. If you hate fumbling through your agenda to find out what day it is, fear no more! A simple hack to resolve this problem is taking a photo of your timetable and using it as your phone’s lock screen. Your phone is usually with you at all times, unlike your agenda, which is whoknows-where at this time of the year. With this practical solution, you will always know what class you have after lunch and will never be the kid that walks into a classroom full of strangers thinking, “uh-oh, wrong class.”

• Tide Pods and Other Forbidden Snacks Graffiti

• March 27, 2018 • Humour

Connor Colwill

hate their life and making memes to deal with it… an extremely relatable message.

Photo by Anna Sum.

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he snack that smiles back! Tide Pods. 2018 started off with the entire internet fantasizing over those lovely, scrumptious laundry detergent pods. Memes on memes Photo of MLB.com were sent, Courtesy reaching every corner of the web. These “forbidden fruits” fit the theme for 2017/2018: Every single young adult and teenager saying they

Tide Pods also inspired another trend: Forbidden Snacks. These treats are basically things that aren’t edible that people remember eating when they were little. One of my personal favourites is forbidden gum which are rubber bracelets with messages/symbols on them which were extremely popular in the 2000’s. Call me weird but I remember chewing on those like no tomorrow, and I’m sure I’m not the only one… well hopefully I’m not the only one or else that would be super awkward and I’ve just exposed my weird past.

Some people decided to push the joke to the limits by actually biting into one of these extremely toxic pods. At

that point however, should we really be blaming the internet for harming today’s youth? Or should we praise it for creating a new form of natural selection? I don’t think the scientists who cure cancer in the future, or the person who will end world hunger chomped on Tide Pods when they were 15 just for a few reposts.

Doctors and police precincts have actually warned people not to eat Tide Pods. Yes, I know, we’ve gotten to a point in history where people must be warned to not eat dangerous chemicals. News stations have also spread stories of people getting sick and even dying from this trend, which led to an increase in baby boomers favourite pastime: making fun of Millennials. Not only do they call us lazy and phone-crazy, but because of the countless videos of young people

The Common Cold Nikoo Aleyasin

eating Tide Pods, they can also call us stupid. I really can’t blame them. If I was 50, I would roast all the 13 year olds eating Tide Pods too.

Who knows what the future of Tide Pods or other 2018 memes will hold.

Why stop at pods when Tide also sells liquid detergent, powder detergent, and stain removing markers? We could have a full buffet for the entirety of 2018, which sounds delicious.

We could be looking at even crazier foods. Why not try dryer sheets, baby powder, or watermelon scented highlighters? (I think that one would be pretty good, hope it catches on).

I would like to end all of this by saying that I’m completely joking, please don’t eat tide pods.

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• March 27, 2018 • Sports

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Sports

Photo from Danielle Im.

Interview with Danielle Im: NT Alumni and Olympic Athlete Mika Schwartz

from other grades. It was a really welcoming team, and I loved how we needed every player and everyone contributed in their own way.

I don’t remember much of the games at all, but I just remember it was a fun team.”

4) When did you know that going to the olympics would be a possibility?

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“I was first invited to train with the national team in the summer of 2013 because they were looking to develop a team to possibly compete in the 2018 Pyeongchang Olympics. However, the possibility of going to the olympics did not become real to me until in 2017 when I became naturalized as a dual citizen and was, therefore, eligible to play in international competition.”

1) How long have you been playing hockey?

5) Was there a difference playing for teams in Canada vs playing in Korea?

Photo from Danielle Im. anielle Im is an NT alumna and an Olympic Athlete. She competed at Pyeongchang this past February for the Korean Women’s Hockey Team. Danielle graduated from North Toronto in the class of 2011.

“I have been playing hockey for about eighteen years.”

2) Was it difficult playing at such a high level of sport while going to NT? “It wasn’t that difficult because I liked playing hockey. It was a big time commitment though, so I didn’t have much time to do other things like social events.”

3) Did you ever play for the NT team? If so, what resonated most about that experience?

“It is different playing in Korea because hockey is still at its pioneering stage. There is only one women’s hockey team, and that is the national team, so we don’t play many games.

We play against middle school and highschool boys teams when they can schedule one. Canada is a hockey nation. Growing up playing hockey is normal. There are so many leagues, teams and games to play, and so many ice rinks.”

6) How did it feel to play for the Korean hockey team while the olympics were held in Korea?

Photo by Kathleen Campbell “I played for the NT hockey team for all four years if I remember correctly. It was fun to play with other students and that was one way I got to know more people at school even

“It was an honour to play for the Korean hockey team in the host country. I was very moved by the support from the Korean people, many

of whom have never watched hockey before. I hope it has sparked interest in ice hockey and that the game can continue to grow in Korea. I felt so grateful for the opportunity I had been given to go to the olympics and play hockey for the country of my family roots. The whole journey has impacted my life in ways that I have still yet to reflect on. I feel that it has built a stronger connection to my Korean heritage and added more to the meaning of my identity as a Korean Canadian.”

7) Did you watch any other sports during the olympics?

“I went to watch short track, speed skating, and other hockey games, both mens and womens. The ice/skating events were held in Gangneung, where I stayed, and all the slope events were held in Pyeongchang.”

8) What are your future aspirations related to hockey?

“I want to keep playing hockey, but more just for fun because I don’t think I can continue to play with the same time commitment and intensity, unfortunately. It would be great if I can join a recreational team or men’s league and keep playing in that way.

In terms of more long-term, if I can apply my interests and skills in some way to be involved with sports or be of service to athletes, then that would be exciting.”

9) What advice do you have for current NT students about achieving their dreams?

It’s good to set goals and everything, but also be open to whatever may come your way. Life is full of uncertainty. You can never plan out everything to the tee because things happen and different interruptions

may present themselves. That’s the beauty of life. For me, it was a true gift to have the experience of going to the Olympics. The journey that led me there was not a conventional one compared to all of the Olympians who got there based on their own merit. I was never the top player on any team and never the most skilled.

I never thought I would end up going to the Olympics, and I figured that out quickly playing in Canada amongst all of the amazing and talented women hockey players. So I am convinced this is what grace is – getting something you don’t deserve. The amazing truth is that it happens. For me, it started five years ago when I was invited to come to Korea and practice with the national team and I said yes. When you are open to whatever comes your way and when you welcome opportunity, be grateful, work hard at it, and sweat.

Also, find enjoyment in what you are doing and whatever you want to pursue. What I enjoyed about hockey was being part of a team. One of the most memorable times in my hockey career that shaped me a lot was in university. I was fortunate enough to play on the varsity team and experience being a student-athlete. But hockey was not always easy, fair, or good, in my opinion. There were times when I didn’t get to play much and actually had a pretty warm spot on the bench.

But that’s all apart of the game and, sometimes, there is no need to fight it or anyone. To me, what I valued were my teammates and that’s what kept me working hard and that’s what I remember the most about my hockey experience, which was one of the best times I had.

On behalf of NTCI, Congratulations Danielle!

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The Fallen China Wall: A Tribute to Johnny Bower Justin Saks

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icture a boy — eight years old — who is beyond excited. He is with his dad, his older cousin, and a hockey card from the 1969-70 NHL season. This was not the first time this eight year old boy had met a hockey player, or even a member of the Hockey Hall of Fame; but it was the first Toronto Maple Leaf he ever met.

This is a story that many Toronto Maple Leafs fans can tell to anyone who asks. Johnny Bower has been one of the most important members of the community in the Greater Toronto Area since joining the Leafs organization for the 195859 season. Whether it was on the ice leading the Leafs to four Stanley Cup championships in the 1960s, to being a gentleman off the ice, to doing more autograph signings than the rest of the 1960s Leafs combined, Johnny Bower made a huge impact on the city of Toronto.

Bower’s climb to legend status wasn’t so easy. Before making the Leafs as their starting goaltender for the 1958-59 season, Bower was having a long career in the American Hockey League, only making the NHL for one season — 1953-54 with the New York Rangers. By the time Bower made the Leafs he was already their

oldest player at 34, past the prime age of playing a professional sport.

Yet, Bower proved to be a

hockey since Bower’s time with the Leafs. In addition to using the poke check, Bower was fierce on the ice, as he refused to use a mask throughout

Photo from Justin Saks. dominant goaltender throughout the decade that followed — the 1960s, demonstrating why his nickname was the “China Wall”. The Leafs won the Stanley cup four times that decade: 1962, 1963, 1964, and 1967.

Bower also won the Vezina Trophy for best goalie in 1961 and 1965.

He also was the first goaltender to successfully use the poke check, a goaltending move commonly seen in

his whole career, even though other goaltenders such as Terry Sawchuk and Jacques Plante were frequently.

Despite being known for his illustrious career, Bower’s true impact on the city of Toronto has been in his post-NHL career. Unlike other Leafs who left the team in poor terms, Bower cherished both his playing career and post career as a member

and representative of the organization. He held scouting and coaching positions with the Leafs until retiring from the organization in 1990, but still made regular public appearances at Leafs events. He also made constant public appearances throughout the city of Toronto, doing signings at stores such as Frameworth, Frozen Pond, and A.J Sports, and being at the 2014 Toronto Sport Card and Memorabilia Expo in celebration of his ninetieth birthday.

As sad as Johnny Bower’s death is, his life will always be cherished by the city of Toronto. His impact both on and off the ice will be remembered — a relic of the past and a legend of the present. His life really makes his nickname — the “China Wall” — all the more appropriate. He was around for a long time, whether it be as the oldest player on the Leafs or living until ninety-three; he was always tough, willing to take a puck to face; and he was always there for the city of Toronto. And for one Leafs fan, who got to meet him several more times additionally to when he was eight years old, he manifested what it means to represent the blue and white.

Shohei Ohtani: The Japanese Babe Ruth Cole Burnstein

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f you haven’t heard the name Shohei Ohtani, you’ve either been living under a rock, or don’t like baseball. Ohtani, unlike many other players, has achieved the impossible; he’s made spring training interesting! Ever since his days at Hanamaki Higashi High School in Northern Japan, Shohei Ohtani has been labelled as a superstar. He broke the Japanese high-school record for fastest pitch, when he hit ninety-nine miles per hour. Unsurprisingly, he had expressed an interest in pursuing a career in Major League Baseball, to the dismay of the 12 Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB for short) clubs who would have begged to have him. But the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters––heard of them?––decided to draft Ohtani regardless of his Major League intentions. They sure did make the right choice. In

2013 Ohtani decided he would remain in Japan for at least a couple years before pursuing the MLB. In divine fashion, Ohtani was granted jersey number 11; the same number that current MLB phenom Yu Darvish wore when he graced the mound for the Fighters many years prior.

Ohtani made his NPB debut at age 18––what are you doing with your life?––starting in right field… Oh right, he plays outfield too! Well, the three time NPB all-star pitcher––who has also hit a ball through the roof of the Tokyo Dome––quite literally can do it all. Though he had tremendous success in Japan, it wasn’t until 2016 when the hot topic become fiery.

When will Ohtani make the move to Major League Baseball? Most thought he would make the move after he won the

Pacific League MVP (equivalent to the American League in the MLB) in 2016. But no, Ohtani felt the need to make an even stronger case in 2017, a decision that did not work for the best.

Ohtani suffered a right-ankle injury which forced him off the mound for a portion of the season, and caused problems even when he was cleared to play.

Nonetheless, upon the conclusion of the 2017 season, all eyes were still on Ohtani. The Shohei Ohtani sweepstakes took place in the offseason, where teams practically begged the Japanese superstar to play for their clubs. Ohtani ended up signing with the Angels in a surprising acquisition.

But, some fans, and baseball critics don’t believe the hype.

Ohtani has been labelled as a bust by many––mostly salty Yankees fans––who think that

he will suffer against the superior MLB talent. Though there is support for this argument, it should be noted that Japanese phenoms, like Ohtani, have experienced Major League success. Yu Darvish, mentioned above, was one of the heavily recruited players to come out of Japan. Darvish, who signed with the Rangers in 2012, has been to 4 all-star games and is regarded as one of the nastiest pitchers in baseball. Masahiro Tanaka, now in his fourth year with the Yankees, has been a reliable starter, and also allstar. Injuries aside, Tanaka has great ability, and pitch command. But, Ohtani isnt Yu Darvish or Masahiro Tanaka.

Shohei Ohtani is labelled as the “Japanese Babe Ruth”, and the best prospect since the hall-offame caliber Ichiro. Some label him as even better. So, Ohtani should do just fine.

• Student-Athlete Spotlight: Lucas Crawford-Holland Graffiti

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March 27, 2018 • Sports

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Alexandra Lindell Lindbloom What sports do you play and for who?

lar commitments that you balance along with sports and school?

“[I play] school varsity hockey, school senior rugby, school senior football [and] North Toronto AA hockey (out of school)”

“I work at a restaurant called Scaramouche and also play piano.”

How long have you been playing these sports? “[I have been playing] hockey [for] 12 years, rugby [for] 4 years [and] football [for] 4 years.”

“[I] plan ahead [for] specific assignments and prioritize the stuff I have to get done. Mostly [I] just suck it up and get things done.”

“Winning.”

What is the main motivating factor that has led you to continue participating in competitive sports despite the challenging workload this may pose?

Are there any other extracurricu-

“The main factor is that sports are

What do you enjoy most about playing sports?

Photo from Lucas Crawford-Holland.

How do you balance your commitments?

fun. They reduce my stress and [bring] me a lot of satisfaction. Playing sports helps me get through the other work.”

What are your future aspirations regarding sports? Short term as well as long term.

“I aspire to play my part in recruiting and committing to N.T. Rugby, [in order to] continue to field a team, and take home the city champs banner.”

What advice do you have for other students thriving to balance school and sports along with their other commitments?

“Don’t be lazy. Suck it up and just grind.”

Winter Sports: A Photo Journal Mika Schwartz

NT swimmer Katherine Lidtke focusing before her heat.

NT OFSAA swimmers having fun in Windsor, Ontario.

NT boys hockey team charging down the rink against Northern.

NT skier Cam Gardiner making friends with the competition.

NT boys hockey team posing for a team photo.

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SUDOKU

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March 27, 2018

Cameron Cawston

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Horoscopes

Aries (March 21 – April 20)

It’s birthday season Aries! While this will be an exciting time for you, it is important to keep your commitments, whether that is with friends, family or yourself. You have struggled in the past with following through, so make sure to think before you commit to something or someone.

Celebrate your birthday in style by treating yourself Aries, you deserve all opportunities that will soon present themselves.

Taurus (April 21 – May 20)

Oh Taurus. It’s only March, but you’ve been working at full steam since the new year.

While you’ve been putting in 110% into everything you do (school work + relationships), you may not feel like it is being reciprocated by others. You not only hold such high expectations for yourself, but for others too, this can easily lead to disappointment which is extremely frustrating for your taurus brain. Remember to take a bit of a “chill pill” this month and keep your chin up because 2018 is far from over. Don’t forget to get some good karma out there Taurus!

Gemini (May 21 — June 20)

Good news Gemini, you’ve got a secret admirer. While you’ve had your eyes on someone for awhile, now you’re the one being admired.

It may take time before you figure out who it is if at all, but know they are there. It’s been a crazy start to the year, and there’s no sign of that stopping anytime soon, so don’t forget to take care of yourself this month. Buckle up Gemini because 2018 is just starting.

Libra (September 23 — October 22)

Sorry Libra, bad news is headed your way.

This is going to be a tough one to deal with because it will be revolving your performance in the classroom. While you are usually working hard in class and playing outside of school, the balance has been thrown off a bit. You may be feeling a bit frazzled lately but know that it will clear up swiftly. Remember that you wouldn’t be faced with something that you couldn’t handle.

Scorpio (October 23 — November 22)

New relationships are heading your way Scorpio! Unfortunately (or fortunately) these will be new friends and primarily non-romantic.

You may already know these people but this month will help strengthen the new bonds.

Keep an open mind because you tend to close off when it comes to new and scary changes. But don’t worry because positive vibes are flowing this month scorpio so relax and have fun!

Sagittarius (Nov 22- Dec 21)

Time to switch it up Sagittarius! After the excitement of the new year boiled down you began to live by your routine. While this helps you stay organized (and sane) it’s time to add some more flavour to it. You’ve been feeling bored and tired so start by doing something that scares you everyday! Take a couple of risks (within reason) and try something new!

Cancer (June 21 — July 22)

A month of adventure awaits you Cancer!

While this thought may run a shiver down your spine, just know that whatever the future holds will be positive. The stars are aligning for you Cancer so embrace all that is to come. Work hard and play hard this month because it will for sure be one for the books. Since all these positive vibes are heading your way, try to pass some on to those around you even if that means doing something small for someone else; it’s all about spreading the love this month.

Capricorn (Dec 22- Jan 19)

Dream big Capricorn because this is your lucky month! Try living by the motto “if you can dream it, you can do it”. Get ready to bet big, but more importantly, get ready to accept the rewards that will follow. The stars are working in your favour this month so take full advantage and get ready for some greatness to be heading your way. Use this opportunity to test your luck but most importantly never forget to spread the winnings with friends and family.

Leo (July 23 — August 22)

This month is going to be pretty lowkey for you Leo. It’s exactly what the doctor prescribed, you need some down time. While the 2nd week of the month will be a busy one, the rest of the month will allow you to chill and recharge your batteries. Make sure to find some time to treat yo’ self! Even if it’s something small, it’s still a drop in the bucket. You may be feeling a bit drained this month, but don’t let that change the way you present yourself.

Virgo (August 23 — September 22)

For a while you’ve been holding onto the thought of a “perfect relationship” with a certain someone, Virgo. The sad truth is that it isn’t going anywhere fast. While you’ve put in enough energy into the situation, it is not being returned which should have been flag number 1. Take time to reflect and if it comes to it, leave a certain someone on read, it may sound harsh but it must be done. Be patient virgo, 2018 has so much more in store for you.

Aquarius (Jan 20- Feb 18)

While birthday season feels impossible to remember, the celebration will soon continue. This month will present you with a problem that only you can solve. Treat it like a project and try to develop some more skills when it comes to dealing with casual bumps in the road. This will definitely not be the last issue you will face this month, let alone this year, so make sure to keep that smile and power through it Aquarius!

Pisces (Feb 19- March 20)

Birthday season came and went, now the fun is slowing down and more work is coming in again. This month will challenge a relationship in your life, this could either be inside or outside the red and grey hallways but it will be someone close to you. While you will be able to mend the relationship, it is important to realize that not every relationship is forever. This sad fact should not upset you Pisces because it is simply a fact of life!

Illustrations by Anastasia Zaritovskaya.

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Graffiti Editorial Board: Editors-In-Chief: Chantelle Nejnec William Lloyd

Section Editors: Humour: Fletcher McLaughlin Annie Doane

Arts and Culture: Hodman Abukar Subin Park

Photography Editors: Maya Sternthal Chloe Hung

Illustration Editors:

Opinion: Joshua Chong Liam Gerry

Sports: Mika Schwartz Justin Saks

External: Evelyn Mang Amelia Wolff

Features: Anastasia Zaritovskaya Lucy Ma

Internal: Hana Sharifi Maddy Wesely

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Angela Miljanovic Nikoo Aleyasin

Copy Editors: Elizabeth Tse Adam Annosantini Dana Abou Zaki Sara Abdelrahman Isabella Bianchi Emily Sakaguchi Diana Chung Carleigh Pace-Tonna Marc Macaulay

Advisors: Jessica Hungate Sam Howard Lina Rguig Diana Kagan

Wild Card: Phillip Ko

Business Manager: Marc Macaulay

Digital Editors: Bailey Weber Dana Aronowitz

Teacher Advisors: Mr. Zohar Ms. Bulgutch

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