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read the news today, oh boy... well, I just had to laugh... he blew his mind out in a car." Poetic oracles of an age where old orders once again arrived at uncertain crossroads, John and Sir Paul artfully foresaw a world in which the stimulatory atmosphere of the nascent information/consumer age would lead to an environment chronically under duress. Now, in a time when one must inte grate meaning from a multitude of directions at lev els heretofore unknown in our history, time-honoured ways of emotional response ironically find them selves in existential crisis as well. The growing sur realism engendered by the ripple effects of Western society threatens to cross the Rubicon into perma nence, as associations first seen loosened on the canvasses of Dali and Magritte become less like artistic commentary than mirrors reflecting the con fused and overwhelmed state of the societal soul. The perception that economic prosperity is the greatest end towards which to direct one’s life has become so well woven into societal fabric that we no longer notice its harmful presence. Much like mil itaries created to defend ideologies, consumerism has been delegated to guard the paradigm, encouraging citizens to continue buying often superfluous items. The desire to do so is brought about by creating artificial needs, coupling emotion and self-worth with product attainment through
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the mcgill tribune | 23.11.04 | opinion
Deconstructing the facade
increasingly intense advertising. Further, novelty and the encouraging of rapid turnover in consum ables have wreaked havoc on our attention span and commitment. The above appears completely irrelevant to the topic at hand, until w e realize that how we get our information about the world is intimately wrapped up in the same line of thought processing; news has never before been so in touch with its own definition. Opening the BBC News W eb site, we are bombarded with stories about suffering or injustice across the globe more often than not. W e are given paragraphs on Darfur, the HIV pandem ic, beheadings, the heat waves sweeping France, and the melting of the Matterhorn. The next day, the slate of articles has largely changed, from stories of terrorist takeovers of grade schools to Iran’s nuclear desires. The song remains the same, but the lyrics change at incredibly fast rates. And, while we wish to keep up with events as they seem to hold some sort of ramifications for our own lives, there seem to be too many tracks on the CD to really focus and listen. W e are by nature a compassionate people. However, this innate sense can be overloaded, and we can not only become easily blinded to the amount of suffering before us but also rendered immobile by its sheer enormity. W hile the desecra-
tion of four Western contractors prompted a quick reaction that culminated in the first siege of Fallujdh and the beheading of Nicolas Berg provoked an international outcry, the everyday litany of kidnap pings, car bombings, and draconian measures of security forces no longer seem to generate anything more than a shake of the head and a click to the next story. As it stands, vve have access to all kinds of suf fering and not very much time to form meaning from it before we are told of another war that distracts our attention, having been conditioned by the whims of the consumer culture to preferentially seek out and pay attention to the new. Thus, we are forced to put our niptural responses of anger at injus tice and compassion for the hurting on the backburner while we learn about yet another nexus of pain. The danger inherent in all of this is that with out the brake of getting involved, the cycle of suffer ing spins unchecked and threatens permanent psy chological damage to us as a group. Perhaps, then, before our only recourse of dealing with the senseless pain of others is by senseless laughing, we should follow the wisdom of Oscar Romero— "we cannot do everything, and there is a certain liberation in that"—and take the steps to help whom we can while concurrently not falling prey to seeking the news for the sake of the new. ■
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I am C anadian! (N ot th at I know w hat th at m eans)
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kay, I'm not really Canadian, but... I'm currently in the process of filling in appli cation forms for Canadian citizenship, so I've been reflecting a lot on Canadian identi ty. This is probably what motivated me to take a look at Harvard Professor Samuel P. Huntington's new book W h o Are We? The Challenges to America's National Identity. The author explores the question of what it means to be American today. W hile the book's rhetoric tempted me to just dismiss it as anti-immi grant or WASP-chauvinist, it definitely got think ing about what it means to be Canadian. Huntington's big point seems to me to be that one must put being American before anything else, if one is to be American at all. (He delights in the fact that 4 5 per cent of respon dents to a survey said that being American is the most important thing in their lives.) His thesis really puts into relief a substantive idea of patriotism that I find makes much more sense: Canadian patriotism isn't about Canada being the most important thing in life. This is in large part w hy I'm happy to become Canadian: as the child of Indian parents, born and raised in Nigeria, I w ill be proud to be a loyal Canadian, but I'm glad I w on't be expected to make being Canadian the most important thing in my life.
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However, apart from this one substantive insight, the rest of my insights had more to do with the lack of substance in modern Canadian identity. For Huntington, national identity is articulat ed by a "creed." The American creed—the prod uct of the distinct Anglo-Protestant culture of the founding settlers o f America — is apparently exemplified by the Declaration of Independence. W h a t is the Canadian creed? In the minds of the Fathers of Confederation, the creed seems to be centred on loyalty to institutions, the equal ity of the provinces, and being British. Not English, but British—Sir John A. M acdonald, for example, was of Scottish stock and proud of it— because the Fathers believed that the Scottish, French, and all Canadians were just as British as the English were. The British North America Act exemplifies this creed, which is why it's worrying to see Canada's sense of the BNA Act's impor tance wither, even as our historical emblems are rendered irrelevant. I'm not saying w e have to think of the creed as being completely static, but I think that it's absolutely necessary that w e not lose sight of its importance in order to get a sense of who w e are. Pierre Trudeau, probably the last prime minister with a strong vision for Canada, had a tremendous sense of this creed—he rooted
his vision of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms in the foundation of the BNA Act. Today on the other hand, it's much too easy to be "Not-America." Sure, Paul Martin says things like "Canadians are not anti-American. W e are pro-Canadian," in response to questions from Conservatives about American-hating and former Liberal MP Carolyn Parrish, but Martin has notoriously failed to articulate any part of what he thinks it means to be Canadian. Being "N ot-Am erican" was around _ at Confederation too, but it was secondary to the substantive ideas of the Fathers of Confederation; it certainly wasn't conceived merely in the sarcas tic, superior w ay that is so popular today. O f course, there's a whole subset of Canada that takes pride in the notion that not being able to articulate what being Canadian means is pre cisely what it means to be Canadian; as ridicu lous as it is to even entertain this sort of reason ing, it's apparently what defines Canada. Ultimately, I don't pretend to know exactly what Canadian identity is; perhaps I'll have the seeds of an answer by the time I take my oath of citizenship. But even if I don't, I'm sure as hell not going to settle for, "I don't know what it is, but there's got to be something valuable about it." And nobody should. ■
C ollaborators
Courtenay Adams, Rachel Bâcher, M ike Bick, Dave Brodkey, Narvan Bouzari, Susan Cooke, Kira Costanza, Simone Cruickshank, Kim D'Souza, Charlton R. Dwight, Natalie Earl,Hilary Elkins, Vladimir Eremin, Jospeh Gilgoff, James G otowiec, Xiang Gu, Ricki Gurwitz, Emily Harris, Cleve Higgins, Dany Horovitz, G racia Jalea, Seema Jethalal, Cristina Markham, Judy Murphy, Danny Nguyen , Jay Paleja, Thomas Pajliarulo, Brett Schrewe, Clara Schwarz, Julia Shonfield, Elisha Siegel, Sepand Tehrani
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Throw pie guy in jail The events that transpired Thursday night at the SSMU Council meeting were absolutely abominable. Upon hearing that Vice-President (Community and Government) Daniel Friedlaender was assaulted by being pied in the face and that nobody responded quickly against the situation, my arms went up in the air. This is not about the ideas espoused by the VP, nor is this about your agreement or disagreement with such ideas. This is about respect and I have none to give these days. I hope that, like Christopher Peter Geoghegan or Evan W a d e Brown, some one will be slapped with a 3 0 d a y jail senfence. I once was very proud about being a member of this diverse student body. Yet after reading letters that associate M cG ill IDaily contributors to the likes of the KKK and the Nazis, and after hearing com
plaints about electoral acclamations from cowards like pie throwers who choose not to step up to the plate of being a SSMU executive, I am mortified by the narrow minded actions by some of "McGill's finest." Undoubtedly, the (shaving) cream of the pie was too much. M cG ill Daily, you were right about one thing: I am angry and bitter, not because of what I have done dur ing my time here, but because I held too much respect for students who refrain from according each other with a fundamental level of courtesy and respect. —Vivian K. Choy, U3 Environment/Sociology Let them stump I completely disagree with Noah Scheinman in his bashing of Curt Schilling for stumping for George W . Bush (Shilling for Busn less than heroic—09.1 1.04). Countless actors, musicians, and athletes
have not only endorsed, but gone on the | | stump to promote politicians. Bruce Springsteen brought John Kerry his biggest audience during the campaign with a con cert held in his honour Does this make the | | Boss less of a man because he used his popularity to gain favour for his preferred candidate? Kerry tried to play the Red Sox card |j too, with references to the team during | | speeches and in the debates. The Republicans just did a better job. I think the Republicans play the political game with | | genius. They're strong both on the offensive | | and on the defensive. I'm not a Republican and I'm not even a Red Sox fan, but I think it's shortsighted and another example of lib eral whining to criticize an admirable athlete for using his popularity for political sway. —M M Caldwell, U2 Political Science/Cultural Studies | |
collaboration with the Tribune Publication Society. All submissions, including letters, Dispatch Box, Parry The M cG ill Tribune is an editorially autonomous newspaper published by the Students' Society of McGill University, in i