The McGill Tribune Vol. 39 Issue 14

The McGill Tribune TUESDAY, JANUARY 14 2020 | VOL. 39 | ISSUE 14

Published by the SPT, a student society of McGill University

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TRIBUNE EXPLAINS

EDITORIAL

ASK AINSLEY

Waste management at McGill

This is not divestment

How do I recover my GPA?

PG. 2

PG. 5

PG. 11

(Leanne Young / The McGill Tribune)

Finding your place – Photo Feature PG. 8-9

McGill students stand in solidarity with Wet’suwet’en Clans Indigenous students respond to dispute between hereditary chiefs and Coastal GasLink Chloe Merritt & Pascal Hogue Contributors The Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) Indigenous Affairs Committee and the Indigenous Student Alliance of McGill hosted a response to the Wet’suwet’en

call for solidarity against a pipeline project. On Jan. 9, students gathered at the Y-intersection to support hereditary chiefs and the Unis’tot’en and Gidimt’en camps protesting Coastal GasLink’s plans to build a pipeline through their territory in Northern British Columbia (BC).

The Coastal GasLink pipeline project proposed by

TC Energy (formerly TransCanada) will carry natural gas from Dawson Creek to an LNG Canada facility near Kitimat to be turned into liquified natural gas. While construction has already started on parts of the pipeline, protestors are continuing to block access to Wet’suwet’en territory.

PG. 3

Style and the city

Weathering the storm of aerosol emissions

McCord exhibition showcases Montreal fashion designer Jean-Claude Poitras Vanessa Barron Contributor What defines Montreal style?

The typical outfit around campus often features heavy parkas, rolled up beanies, and thrifted sweaters.

Montreal’s climate requires practical outerwear while its social scene requires tasteful dress. While it’s

impossible to pin down a single style for an entire city, Jean-Claude Poitras, one of Montreal’s bestknown fashion designers, has distilled a part of the city’s character in almost all of his garments.

Known for his outerwear and clean cut designs, a collection of Poitras’ ready-to-wear clothes are currently on exhibition at the McCord Museum until

April 26. Jean-Claude Poitras: Fashion and Inspiration showcases the breadth of his life’s work and provides sources for his design inspiration.

Throughout the course of his career, which spans nearly three decades, Poitras has designed everything from simple pant suits to voluminous wedding dresses.

PG. 15

Pollution from Athabasca oil sands impacts local weather processes Caroline Lou Contributor There has long been concern surrounding the environmental impacts of extracting oil from Alberta’s Athabasca oil sands, the world’s third largest oil reserve. According to a McGill-led study published in Environmental

Pollution, pollution from the Athabasca oil sands is impacting the weather patterns of nearby regions. The study was led by Parisa Ariya, a professor in the Departments of Chemistry and Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences. Ariya worked with McGill PhD candidate Rodrigo RangelAlvarado, as well as other col-

laborators from the Université de Montréal, the University of Alberta, and Environment and Climate Change Canada. The atmospheric pollutants near the oil sands were also more efficient at ice nucleation—a process involved in the formation of clouds—than dust particles normally found in the atmosphere.

PG. 14

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TUESDAY, JANUARY 14 2020

NEWS

Education Undergraduate Society misses quorum to strike 29 more people were needed to strike against Bill 21 Tasmin Chu Staff Writer The Education Undergraduate Society of McGill (EdUS) and the Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) held a General Assembly (GA) on Jan. 10 where they condemned Bill 21. During the GA, students in the Faculty of Education voted on the possibility of striking for two days on Jan. 17 and Jan. 20.

Although most of the 89 Education students in attendance voted to strike, a quorum of 118 people was required for the strike to pass.

However, there will be another opportunity to vote for a strike during the week of Jan. 20.

Bill 21, which was introduced by the Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ) government in 2019, bans certain public employees in teaching, healthcare, and other sectors from wearing visible religious symbols at work. The bill passed in June 2019, drawing concerns that it violates individuals’ religious freedoms and right to expression.

The bill includes a grandfather clause that allows current public workers who have worn religious symbols to keep their position. However, as GA organizer and Vice-President (VP) External of EDUS Tatum Arcon explained, these workers still face professional obstacles posed by the law.

“If you’re a teacher, you can never be promoted,” Arcon said. “You can’t get your master’s [degree] and get higher pay or anything like that. You’ll stay at the exact same point

Bill 21 currently faces four different lawsuits. (Tasmin Chu / The McGill Tribune) [....] If you ever want to become principal of your school, that won’t be possible.”

EdUS President Fanny Langin discussed the difficulties faced by Education students wearing religious symbols when applying for internships following the passage of Bill 21.

“There’s nothing about [student teachers] in the law, so you’re supposed to be able to get your field experience, even if you’re wearing a religious [symbol],” Langin said. “But some school boards said they wouldn’t accept student teachers wearing a religious [symbol].”

Although Bill 21 affects religious freedoms, the law invokes Section 33 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. This notwithstanding clause allows a government to temporarily protect a law against being struck

down by the supreme court for violating certain Charter Rights. At the GA, community activist and Board of Governors member Ehab Lotayef argued that the usage of the notwithstanding clause in the case of Bill 21 sets a dangerous precedent.

“Who knows what other items of the Canadian Charter will be overwritten by a law, tomorrow or next year or [under] a future government?” Lotayef said. “That’s what makes this battle really important. It is not only about a kippah or a headscarf or a turban. We cannot accept or take it lying down that one individual is denied a job because [they] decide to abide by what they believe in.”

Guest speaker Jason Lister, an Education course lecturer, pointed out the unequal conse-

quences shouldered by different groups due to Bill 21.

“Quite frankly, it’s white people being scared of brown people,” Lister said. “There’s this idea somehow that if someone is wearing a hijab while teaching, they will end up converting people to Islam [...] which is of course an absolutely absurd notion [....] And I can’t speak for the other professions affected for this bill, but I do believe [that] for the teaching profession, this law targets Muslim women. It’s absolutely discriminatory.”

SSMU VP External Adam Gwiazda-Amsel, who was involved in organizing the event, expressed his frustrations with the CAQ’s poor leadership.

“I think that what frustrates me the most is that the government knows better,” Gwiazda-Amsel said. “The people who are in these government positions, premiers, and members of parliament, take trips around the world.

They’re well-educated people who don’t just live in small communities in rural Quebec that are afraid of immigration they don’t understand [...] For them to be fearmongering and taking advantage of the sorts of insecurities that exist in rural Quebec shows a decided lack of leadership. They should be ashamed of themselves.”

Although the GA failed to reach quorum, the online vote will allow Education students another opportunity to consider striking.

SSMU and EdUS will be holding a demonstration against Bill 21 on Jan. 17 at 12 p.m. on McTavish street.

Tribune Explains: Waste management at McGill How the trash gets taken out

Margaret Askey Contributor Understanding where a coffee cup discarded outside of a lecture hall ends up or what happens after a sandwich wrapper from last week’s lunch is thrown away can be difficult. The inconsistent signage and colour-coding on waste disposal containers across campus certainly does not help make the process any easier. McGill Residence Life and the Environmental Residence Council hosted ‘Demystifying the Dump’ to answer questions students may have about waste at McGill.

What happens to garbage, recycling and compostables thrown in disposal bins at McGill?

Tricentris Terrebonne picks up recycling daily from all residences, while Compost Montreal collects compost weekly from Solin residence and all Food and Dining locations. As for all other campus compost, there is no significant structural transparency for how compost is disposed of. All landfill-bound garbage is also picked up by a private contractor on a daily basis.

How much waste does McGill produce?

The most recent investigation into the volume of waste produced by McGill occurred in 2013, led by Waste Management Canada. Their estimates concluded that McGill University produces 683 tonnes of waste and 349 tonnes of recyclables per year. The most staggering conclusion however was that 86 per cent of disposed waste could be diverted through available recycling streams.

Due to the decentralized nature of waste management at McGill today, there are no more recent statistics available on the total amount of waste that McGill produces.

What are some common recycling and garbage mistakes?

Clean plastic bags, including Ziploc bags, are fully recyclable. The best practice is to knot your plastic bags, or dispose of them packed inside each other, so that they do not get caught up in recycling plant machinery.

Plastics are numbered one through seven, with plastics one through five recyclable, six trash, and seven (‘PLA’) compostable. Number six plastic is so light that it is not financially viable for recycling plants to reduce it down to post-consumer product and resell. It is not accepted for recycling in Montreal, and most coffee retailers use this type of plastic for lids of hot beverage cups. However, all McGill residence cafeterias have compostable lids. Plastic number seven followed by ‘PLA’ (plant), is compostable plastic. For example, most residence cafeteria hot beverage lids are plastic seven PLA, as are some plastic food containers.

Who is spearheading projects to improve waste practices on campus?

Office of Sustainability Zero-Waste Coordinator Kendra Pomerantz is working on the Waste Reduction & Diversion Action Plan. The ultimate goal of this plan is to make McGill a zero-waste institution by 2025, partially through reforming the decentralized and complex waste management systems currently in place. Currently, the main goal of this initiative is to standardize all the signage and bins across campus meant for waste disposal.

What can individual students do to make an impact?

First and foremost, educating yourself about waste practices at McGill and in Montreal is important. McGill

The Office of Sustainability is working to make McGill a zero-waste institution by 2025. ( McGill Tribune / Sabrina Girard-Lamas) Sustainability’s page explains what can and cannot be put into garbage, recycling, and compost bins on campus. Signage in cafeterias should also help explain how to separate your waste. Additionally, the Sustainability Coordinator from Student Housing, Wynn Rederburg, urges students to examine how much waste they produce, especially single-use products. While sorting disposables is important, Rederburg emphasizes that reducing individual waste production will make a more significant impact on creating a more sustainable campus.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 14 2020

NEWS

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DriveSafe extending services to Kahnawake Mohawk territory

Free ride service to be available for Indigenous students outside of the Island of Montreal Pascal Hogue Contributor As of the beginning of the Winter 2020 semester, Students’ Society of McGill University’s (SSMU) DriveSafe has extended its services to the Mohawk territory of Kahnawake, south of the island of Montreal. The initiative, set up in collaboration with SSMU Indigenous Affairs and in consultation with Mohawk students at McGill, allows students to call DriveSafe for a free drive home in the region.

DriveSafe is a student-run volunteer service that offers free rides and shuttles to McGill students between 11 p.m.— 3 a.m. from Thursday to Saturday. Currently, DriveSafe operates in Kahnawake and on the Island of Montreal, with plans to extend services to Laval and Longueuil next year.

DriveSafe President Charles Choi acknowledged that the decision to extend the territory of operation to Kahnawake stemmed in part due to the scant availability of public transport between Montreal and the region.

“Kahnawake [has little] public transport to Montreal, [and] it is very scarce and very difficult to access,” Choi said. “So for McGill students and faculty, we felt that this was the best we could do.”

He added that the extension helps DriveSafe in its mandate to offer a greater equality of service to all its students, irrespective of race or socio-economic status.

“From what I have heard […] from different leaders in our school community [and other] individuals, they have been overwhelmingly supportive and they have been commending SSMU for this ex-

tension to Kahnawake, knowing that it is a marginalized community,” Choi said.

SSMU Indigenous Affairs Commissioner Tomas Jirousek believes that students living in Kahnawake will greatly benefit from this development. He noted that Indigenous students now have the possibility to partake in activities downtown later in the day, without the stress of having to plan a safe trip home.

“There isn’t this insecurity wondering ‘Is the metro going to be running?’, ‘Is it too cold to get a taxi?’, [or] ‘Am I going to be able to get home?’”

Jirousek said. “And that is something that we can finally offer to our Indigenous students living [in] Kahnawake.”

Jirousek added that although he does not think the extension to Kahnawake will significantly increase the use of DriveSafe, the availability of the service offers students reassurance.

“There aren’t a ton of students who are going to be from Kahnawake in town during those times,” Jirousek said. “But the point is that we can offer this blanket security and [...] the same services that non-Indigenous students [enjoy]. We can offer them that same peace of mind.”

Erin Patton (BSc ‘19), a resident of Kahnawake, is pleased with the change, as it will simplify Indigenous students’ itinerary home and will provide a free alternative to an otherwise expensive trip by taxi or Uber.

“It’s a really good initiative,” Patton said. “[Drivesafe] only [covered] the island of Montreal before and it was hard to get home if you were studying late or going out that night. But now that they

DriveSafe has plans to continue extending its services to Laval and Longueuil next year. (DriveSafe) have [extended it] it is much easier to get home.”

Patton believes that she would have appreciated the extension to Kahnawake if DriveSafe had expanded earlier.

“I was always involved in student life and going out with friends, and doing activities at school, [and] I always found that I had to leave early from things and plan my public transit out or how I was getting home that night,” Patton said. “I would have had more time participating in these things than worrying about getting home.”

Podcasting as a medium for all

A workshop on providing accessible technological communications Hannah Murray Contributor For the 20th event in the Feminist and Accessible Publishing and Communications Technologies Speaker Series, podcaster Anna Sigrithur led a Feminist Podcasting Workshop on Jan. 10 in Wilson Hall.

With about 20 participants, the workshop was an interactive and judgement-free space. Sigrithur began by describing the most common podcast formats, breaking down the elements of each. From there, participants worked in small groups to write a short script that could be edited over with sound effects and background music. Sigrithur demonstrated how to achieve desired effects by using the open-load audio-recording and editing application ‘Audacity’ which is available online. Finally, attendees were given time to discuss their ideas for podcasts and share them with the rest of the group.

The speaker series, organized by Dr. Alex Ketchum, a faculty lecturer at the Institute for Gender, Sexuality and Feminist Studies, is composed of

Oxford University’s Symposium on Food and Cookery.

“I hope that is encouraging to you [and demonstrates how] you can learn how to do some of these things and really [get] yourself [into podcasting],” Sigrithur said.

The speaker series focussed on two main approaches to accessible publishing and communications. The first involves providing a place for theoretical and activist applications of publishing and communications Sigrithur spent two summers in Northern Saamy communities before starting her concepts. The second aims to podcast.ing career. (Feminist and Accessible create a space for workshops Publishing/Communications Technologies Series) and teaching practical communications skills.

Sigrithur’s 25 workshops and discussions, accessible,” Ketchum said. “The workshop fell into this second seeking to bring together schol- kinds of solutions that [can often category, with an overview of ars, creators, and people within seem proper] actually don’t real- the main podcast formats, the the communications industry, in ly change these problems, such tools needed to start your own, order to look at the intersections as open access […] and often- and a number of group activiof digital humanities, computer times we end up [romanticizing ties to encourage comfortability science, feminist studies, dis- and] fetishizing technological with free podcasting technology, ability studies, 2SLGBTQIA+ alternatives [without looking] at as well as brainstorming podcast history and critical race theory. how that could be perpetuated.” ideas.

“One of the reasons I deEntirely self-taught in the Sigrithur believes that podcided to start this series was art of podcasting, Sigrithur has casting is more accessible that the thought about communities, no university degrees or formal many believe it to be. scholars, traditional forms of training, but created the ‘Nor“I don’t have any fancy academic publishing and even dic Food Lab Radio Podcast’ in technology [with me today], I technologies as being sexist, 2008, and also produced ‘Ox- [just] have my smartphone [.…] classist, racially biased and in- Tales,’ a series of podcasts from This is because I really do want

to emphasize that podcasting, like many things, is not about technology,” Sigrithur said. “It’s about how well you understand the form, how clearly you come up with your ideas, and how well you are able to execute the content.”

Sigrithur aimed to demystify the notion that podcasts are difficult to create. Many attendees came in with ideas for podcasts that they had for a number of years and discovered that starting a podcast can be done with readily available technology. Colin Maynard-Rier, U3 Arts, commented on the lack of hands-on training of the event, but he still learned a lot from attending. “[The workshop could have benefitted from] an opportunity to go through editing on [Audacity] itself,” Maynard-Rier said.

“There is really such a low barrier to starting to podcast.”

The workshop’s focus on the use of technology available online makes the daunting prospect of starting a radio show available to all members of society, no matter their gender, sexual orientation, class, or ethnicity.

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TUESDAY, JANUARY 14 2020

NEWS

SSMU plans for affordable student housing enters consultation phase Town hall on Jan. 26 will gather insight on the project

McEan Taylor Staff Writer Since 2015, the partnership between the Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) and L’Unité de travail pour l’implantation de logement étudiant (UTILE) has worked to maintain affordable rent and educated students on real-estate practices and tenants’ rights. A 2018 report by the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation shows that Montreal’s vacancy rate has dropped by 1 percent between 2017 and 2018.

In 2019, SSMU continued its fight for affordable student housing by introducing a project in collaboration with UTILE to look into the potential for constructing affordable housing specifically for McGill students. In October 2019, SSMU created the Affordable Housing Committee dedicated to the issue making progress on this issue. SSMU Vice-President (VP) External Adam Gwiazda-Amsel is on the committee and is organizing a town hall meeting on Jan. 26 to gain insight on students’ priorities.

“We are trying to solicit feedback from students about what their priorities for a living space are,” Gwiazda-Amsel said. “What are the sort of qualities [SSMU] should look for in the building and its residents? Aside from the building project, the Affordable Housing Committee also felt the need to educate students about housing rights because this is also

why rents go up.”

The committee will invite UTILE directors, McGill Legal Information Clinic members, and people from the MiltonParc community to help educate students on rent-control, which will help control rent prices in the long term.

“Different communities have seen success with tenant strikes and information campaigns about exploitative rent practices,” Gwiazda-Amsel said. “For example, a landlord can only raise your rent two per cent a year in Montreal, but a lot of students do not know that.”

Along with teaching students, SSMU is working with UTILE to design housing for McGill students, created by McGill students. UTILE’s General Coordinator Laurent Levesque works in collaboration with SSMU. “We are working towards the biggest possible project,” Levesque said. “Our working target at the moment is to build at least 300 beds [within five years]. In the short term, we are aiming to confirm this and other project parameters in a contract between UTILE and SSMU before the summer so we can get to work looking for land [and] designing the building.”

Even with SSMU and UTILE’s operating budget, space and resources are limited for making affordable student housing.

“We are also in talks with the City of Montreal to make sure they continue to fund affordable student housing,”

Levesque said. “[Montreal] has [done so] for our Woodnote project in collaboration with the Concordia Student Union and our Angus project. That will be the key to taking affordable student housing to an even higher level.”

Levesque also stressed the importance of educating students on housing rights as a long-term tool to fight against rent increases.

“There is a lot of helpful advice on how to find a decent place in Montreal and how to fix problems you might have with your landlord, flatmates, et cetera,” Levesque said. “Montreal is facing a serious housing crisis and one way that affects students’ lives is that it can take much more time and effort than before to find an affordable flat. I recommend budgeting plenty of time when you start looking. If you’re planning on moving, consider looking into apartment swaps, that help keep rents low.”

Members of the Milton-Parc community will also attend the town hall to teach students based on the community’s experience with fighting rent increases. McGill students pay the highest rents in the province.

SSMU Community Affairs coordinator (Taja De Silva / The McGill Tribune) Claire Grenier works with the MiltonParc community. tion from the community’s work and start “Milton-Parc [residents] have al- more co-op student housing, or educate ways been avid organizers,” Grenier themselves about the effects of AirBnb on said. “Right now, [we are] working on neighborhoods like Milton Parc.” campaigns to combat one of the greatest Students can visit UTILE’s website, causes of higher rents, AirBnb. Hope- likehome.info, to gather more informafully McGill students can take inspira- tion about tenant’s rights.

McGill students stand in solidarity with Wet’suwet’en Clans Indigenous students respond to dispute between hereditary chiefs and Coastal GasLink Chloe Merritt & Pascal Hogue Contributors Continued from page 1.

Hereditary chiefs have explicitly opposed all pipeline activity since Sept.

3, 2015. They have been in conflict with TC Energy, Chevron, and Enbridge about pipelines through Wet’suwet’en territory.

The BC Supreme Court issued an injunction against protestors, preventing them from denying Coastal GasLink access to the lands.

In response, the Wet’suwet’en have put out an international call for solidarity to respect Indigenous sovereignty and Indigenous peoples as the rightful title holders of the land. The international call began on Jan. 7, the one year anniversary of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police’s (RCMP) raid on protest camps, and lasted until Jan. 12.

As a large part of the pipeline’s route goes through Wet’suwet’en lands, Coastal GasLink has signed agreements with band councils to authorize construction.

However, protestors deny that agreements made by band councils serve as free, prior, and informed consent on behalf of the Wet’suwet’en clans they represent.

Marlene Hale, a member of the

Hereditary chiefs have been opposed to the pipeline project since 2015. (atpnnews.ca) Wet’suwet’en Frog Clan, spoke about the differences between the authority of hereditary chiefs and band councils, insisting that hereditary chiefs should dictate access to the land. “[A hereditary chief] earns his title,” Marlene Hale said. “A band council chief is only there to do the administration […] they do not tell me what to do on the land”.

BC is the first province to enshrine the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP), and the Supreme Court of Canada has acknowledged the Wet’suwet’en lands are unceded territory. However, the BC Supreme Court granted the injunction on the basis that Coastal GasLink had met the legal require-

ments to begin building on the land.The five hereditary chiefs blocking the pipeline rejected the injunction. Dini’ze Na’moks of the Tsayu clan urged the BC government to respect Indigenous autonomy and their land.

“In this time of reconciliation, with BC being the first province to legislate UNDRIP, this ruling by a court in BC against Indigenous rights and recognition truly proves that industry, not the people, can control the Province and its laws,” Na’moks said. “Ultimately, we are our own government, and we decide who [is allowed] on our territory. We are the hereditary chiefs. British Columbia and Canada only have assumed and presumed authority

on our lands.”

Tomas Jirousek, Indigenous Affairs Commissioner of McGill, explained the importance of Indigenous sovereignty within Canadian politics, noting that the events at Wet’suwet’en were emblematic to reconciliation.

“The issue at hand is one of Indigenous sovereignty,” Jirousek said. “Regardless of whether you support pipelines and the resource extraction, or not, we all maintain an obligation to recognize and respect the laws and customs of the Indigenous peoples of those territories.”

Event leaders urged the McGill community to hold federal and provincial leaders and RCMP accountable and to respect Indigenous sovereignty.

“Solidarity can take place through a few different forums, and will dictate and change the course of events in a few different ways,” Jirousek said. “Not everyone needs to become an activist, or donate money to show solidarity with the Wet’suwet’en.

[Solidarity shows] that Canadians refuse to accept this incursion and disrespect shown towards the Wet’suwet’en.”

For students interested in the conflict between the Wet’suwet’en and the BC provincial government and Coastal GasLink, speakers and organizers have provided a supporter toolkit, designed to help allies in their own mobilisation efforts.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 14 2020

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OPINION

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EDITORIAL

This is not divestment Climate change devastates human populations, animal species, and entire ecosystems: The fossil fuel industry remains the largest contributor to climate change. Given the circumstances, being complicit in environmental degradation is immoral and investing in fossil fuels is socially injurious. With the urgent threat posed by the climate crisis increasing every day, it is absolutely imperative that McGill divests.

The new year marks the conclusion of the university’s Vision 2020 action plan. In the outline, McGill commits to carbon neutralization by 2040. It also aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 58 per cent by 2025.

Despite these lofty aspirations, the plan lacks information about how these goals will be achieved and its ambiguous language makes it unclear how it would achieve its goals and how they would benefit McGill’s commitment to sustainability. Half of the timeperiod specified for reducing emissions has already expired, yet McGill has not released reports on the plan’s progress since 2015.

Moreover, the plan’s goals fail to address the urgency of climate change. The world does not have two decades to reach carbon neutralization. In fact, top climate scientists assert that 2020 is the last year to prevent irreversible climate damage: 2040 is an unacceptable deadline for carbon neutralization.

Emma Gillies Science & Technology Editor When I was 16, my dream was to play soccer and run track at university, and perhaps even at the professional level. At the time, sports were my social life, my confidence booster, and my joyful escape from the stress of academics. But adolescent dreams die hard. In my third year of high school, I tore my anterior cruciate ligament (ACL), a knee injury that typically requires surgery and nine months of recovery.

Four months after my

In the plan, McGill also cites its Sustainability Projects Fund (SPF) as a program that promotes climate awareness on campus.

The SPF focuses on funding student initiatives that reduce waste and increase sustainability at McGill. While the fund makes excellent small-scale changes, it does not adequately respond to the urgency of the climate crisis. Top climate scientists have repeatedly stated that individual action cannot stop the climate crisis without the support of large scale, institutional change.

McGill must recognize this fact by not only funding student projects, but also by committing itself to serious institutional-level change, starting with divesting from fossil fuels.

On Dec. 5, McGill’s Committee to Advise on Matters of Social Responsibility (CAMSR) met to consider divestment for the third time since students founded Divest McGill in 2012.

The initial Divest McGill petition called for McGill to divest from the 14 companies that extract tar sands and an additional 13 that lobbied for Plan Nord, a natural resource extraction plan that the university invested in.

The CAMSR meeting marked an opportunity for McGill to hear student voices and to recognize the science backing climate change and the social devastation that it causes. Yet, CAMSR voted to not divest, instead opting for decarbonization in a weak

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attempt to placate students and mask its complacency in climate destruction. The refusal to divest comes after years of protests, and most recently a moratorium on auxiliary fee increases by McGill’s undergraduate and postgraduate students’ societies to put financial pressure on McGill.

The committee also chose to meet just before the final exam period began, when students were less available to stay informed, protest the vote, or attend the meetings. McGill’s refusal to divest sends a clear message that McGill’s values are more focused on funding than adhering to the concerns of their students, the surrounding community, or the planet.

McGill’s refusal to divest not only ignores clear student demands but also neglects the extensive scientific research that backs the need for divestment.

McGill prides itself on being a leader in research and indeed, in 2019, McGill employed dozens of staff whose entire careers have been dedicated to climate research. However, McGill has chosen to ignore extremely relevant evidence and continue to work against exactly what its experts would advise.

CAMSR’s report also recommends that McGill reduce its carbon emissions by a certain percentage but does not specify what that percentage is. The fact that McGill could not even specify a clear aim demonstrates

just how inept decarbonization is as an institutional goal. It is pertinent that McGill be explicit with its goals and commitments surrounding decarbonization.

McGill’s students, alumni, and supporters deserve to know how committed the university is to playing its role in preventing further climate devastation.

Adding to the iniquity of CAMSR’s decision is the fact that the former director of retail services for PetroCan currently serves as the chair of CAMSR. Cynthia Price Verreault, worked as the director of retail services for PetroCan for 18 years.

Given that PetroCan is one of the country’s largest fossil fuel producers, this affiliation poses a blatant conflict of interest.

Thus, The McGill Tribune calls for Cynthia Price Verreault’s resignation from CAMSR. While students should continue to support organizations like Divest McGill, C-JAM, and Greenpeace McGill, persuading McGill to take issues of climate justice and sustainability seriously will require more than that. The Tribune asks members of the McGill community to commit to not donating to McGill until they divest from fossil fuels. The wellbeing of countless ecosystems, species, and communities can not be ensured without the reversal of climate damage, and this reversal is not possible without institutional support.

The mental impacts of physical injury surgery, I tore the same ACL in physiotherapy. A year after that, I tore it for a third time, along with cartilage in my knee. In the span of two and a half years, I underwent four surgeries on the same knee, and my dream of being a varsity athlete died.

However, during all the time I spent feeling sorry for myself, I failed to notice my injury’s influence on my mental health. Without sports, I felt lost and dispassionate. I tried to ignore sports and focus solely on academics. I became less confident and was plagued by the trauma of my injuries.

Although mental recuperation can be just as important as physical rehabilitation, my physiotherapists and doctors never mentioned the mental aspect of sports recovery.

Following a traumatic orthopedic injury, between 20 and 50 per cent of patients suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), while others experience emotional responses such as sadness, anxiety, and depression.

Injured athletes must deal with

muscle atrophy, intense pain, and frustration. In my case, I became angry and bitter. I grew jealous of others and lamented the life that I used to have, one where I won races and scored goals. I felt like a nobody, destined to fetch water bottles for my teammates.

It has been three years since my last surgery, yet my knee still gives out when I run to the bus, swells up after standing for a few hours, and grinds and clicks as cartilage wears against bone. My frustration now stems from my inability to participate in physical activity for fun, let alone for competition. I can not kick around a soccer ball with friends, ski with my family, or go on a hike. A seemingly temporary injury developed into a condition that is still pervading many areas of my life, and that, according to my doctor, I just have to live with.

Society places a lot of pressure to bounce back from disappointment but rarely discusses disappointment itself, as well as the failure to recover from it. We hear about athletes

who return from an injury better than ever, but we don’t often hear about the athletes who never return to play their sport.

Excluding the stories of those who have not had a fairytale ending, but who have still battled and grown along the way, overlooks their experiences and creates the unrealistic expectation that everything always works out in the end.

A small part of me will remain bitter and resentful about letting my sport go, but the experience also opened up new opportunities to explore pastimes like yoga, rowing, writing, and science—things that I doubt I would have pursued if I were a collegiate soccer player.

My injuries were a harsh reminder that life does not revolve around me. I learned to be adaptable, accountable, and patient with myself when things did not go as planned. I learned to not take success or recovery for granted, and to try new things. And I learned to accept that it is okay if I do not live out all your dreams; eventually, I made new ones.

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OPINION

TUESDAY, JANUARY 14 2020

POINT-COUNTERPOINT

New Year’s Resolutions

Favour Daka Contributor

Against resolutions: People often see the beginning of a new year as a time for reflection, when they can use the lessons of the past year as an incentive for positive change in the coming months. It is also the time when the excitement for New Year’s resolutions peaks. While people’s intentions for creating New Year’s resolutions may be positive, these resolutions can involve poor goal-setting.

Normally, people view New Year’s resolutions as only being valid for a year, which, in turn, causes people to unrealistically put every goal into a year-long time-frame. As a result, one may not consider ways to motivate and sustain themselves beyond the initial excitement of the New Year.

This failure to conceptualize goals requiring more than a year may be why only two out of 10 Canadians manage to complete their New Year’s resolutions. Society’s obsession with instantaneous results obscures an understanding of progress and how it relates to time. New Year’s resolutions

COMMENTARY Sepideh Afshar Contributor The political turmoil between Iran and the US has created fears for many members of the McGill community. These range from direct impacts on their families in the Middle East to smaller things such as increased surveillance at airports or train stations. McGill meme pages have been posting jokes about the outbreak of a potential war between the two countries, deeming it ‘World War III’ and ignore the implications of such an event. Jokes making light of a potential war between the US and Iran belittle the real fears that come with war. Though not everybody is personally affected by the issues between the countries, everyone should be able to respect the situation and allow those impacted to fully cope.

The Middle East is not unfamiliar with what happens when the US sends troops.

Historically, the US has been extremely brutal in the region —for example during the Iraq war—and chances are that the current conflict will be no exception. The US has a military budget of close to $1 trillion and does not face much of an actual military threat from Iran. In addition, it is important to note that Iran does not have nuclear weapons, has never invaded

James Li Contributor

New Year’s resolutions have become standard practice.

(Amanda Fiore / The McGill Tribune)

often involve the breaking of habits or creating new ones, a process that sometimes requires professional help, but more importantly, requires extensive time.

New Year’s resolutions have become a standard practice in setting unrealistic goals. Life is spontaneous, and this serves as an important argument against the creation of New Year’s resolutions.

Depending on the type of goal, most New Year’s resolutions are

often abrupt decisions which aim towards a social standard, be it fitness, finance, or academics.

If not fulfilled, resolutions can result in personal and financial costs that can be both damaging and demotivating. Therefore, with the overarching reality that a resolution may expire long before it is actualized, the idealistic characteristics of New Year’s resolutions can lead to negative results.

For resolutions: As students hang up their brand-new 2020 calendars, many will also choose to draft a list of accompanying resolutions for the year ahead.

However, there is increasing criticism of the effectiveness of these annual periods for reflection and goal-setting.

While there are limitations to this millenia-old tradition and they are not overly comprehensive, the fact that New Year’s resolutions are so embedded in our culture makes them an accessible gateway into a more deliberate way of life.

Burdened students may find it hard to get into the routine of reflection and planning, which is why they should start with the New Year.

Once a year may not be frequent, but New Year’s resolutions require work to be maintained on a regular basis and any amount of concerted effort adds up. It is easy to blow over or simply forget any other self-mandated regimen,

but the ubiquity of New Year’s resolutions makes them difficult to ignore. Some will argue, though, that these resolutions are far too difficult to keep.

Because there are so many people beginning selfimprovement endeavors at this time of the year, these goals offer a support system. From a friend with the same goal as you to the plentiful online resources available, any goal is more likely to be seen through.

Yes, there is also abundant joking and criticism of New Year’s resolutions, but these also help normalize an essential aspect of goal-making: failure.

The positive coverage provides support and the negative helps people realize it is okay to fail and that they should continue regardless.

For centuries, New Year’s resolutions were mostly religious or moral devotions.

Today, they represent an opportunity to reflect and grow. Although the contents of our resolutions have greatly changed, their enduring place in society is their biggest strength.

World War III memes need to stop the United States, has a smaller military budget than Canada, and is surrounded by American military bases. The war would most likely never touch American soil, much less that of Canada, or the context of McGill meme pages. The people who will be affected in Canada are those who will suffer from the probable rise in Islamophobia and xenophobia that would come with a war, just like that after 9/11: This is a scary reality for many members of the McGill community. People everywhere feel the effects of this political tension. Those with Iranian heritage, no matter their citizenship, are being detained at US borders and being questioned for hours. Students who make jokes about “building up the courage to ask their crush out before a war breaks out” undermine these fears.

Being so far removed from any actual danger is a privilege that allows people to make these jokes. The US President is threatening to bomb Iranian historical sites, places filled with civilians who rarely see a military presence. No such threat has been made toward American citizens, and if it had, most people would not make these jokes. Canadians are even more distanced from the situation, but again, if the threat was local then they would not find the possible danger humorous. In addition, the Ukrainian flight accidentally shot

Making jokes about WWIII involves an inherent level of privilege. (Getty Images)

down by Iran had 82 Iranians and 57 Canadians on board, including a McGill student and two alumni, bringing the pain as close to Canada as it will likely ever get.

Because the plane crash directly affeced Canadians and the McGill community, it is no longer seen as fodder for inappropriate jokes. It is a privilege to be able to look at the potential war between Iran and the US and be sure enough about the safety of the people in your life to make memes about it.

There should be enough respect in the McGill community to know that making jokes at the expense

of the safety and wellbeing of other students is unacceptable.

Living in Canada and not seeing the effects of war firsthand means that many do not understand the gravity of the situation. However, in an institution like McGill with a diverse student body and high academic standards, there should be a higher expectation for students. A school that boasts diversity should not allow students to make jokes about the terrifying experiences of their peers.

People have been defending

the insensitive posts by stating that humour is their way of coping, but this is not their trauma to cope with: The fear being felt by Iranians is not the same felt by Canadians. McGill has yet to acknowledge how its community will be affected and their statement about the plane crash in Iran is not enough. There should be a higher standard set for McGill students and McGill should provide an example of this standard by issuing an adequate statement acknowledging this political tension that has a serious impact.

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT 7

TUESDAY, JANUARY 14 2020

Pop Dialectic: ‘Cats’ divides theatre aficionados

The Tribune sizes up Tom Hooper’s over-the-top release Gabe Nisker & Kyle Dewsnap Features & News Editors Every generation has its signature so-bad-it’s-good movie: Before there was The Room, there was Showgirls, then Plan 9 From Outer Space. This week, the The McGill Tribune decided to investigate Cats, the newest addition to this canon.

A real cat-astrophe

One cat takes a couple of attempts to launch Bustopher Jones, performed by top-billed James Corden in one of two fatshaming roles, the other from Rebel Wilson, into a garbage can so he can eat. It doesn’t work: Corden lands on the rim of the garbage can, and squarely on where his human genitals would be. It hurts, obviously, and it is played for laughs, because the film loves focussing the camera on crotches. Director Tom Hooper’s Cats movie is surprisingly and incredibly sexualized, usually to its detriment. The characters give longing looks, sidle up to, and nuzzle each other far too often.

Hooper’s bizarre directorial decision to use the same shaky camerawork he employed in his 2012 adaptation of Les Miserables often makes the work feel like a nature documentary, minus the David Attenborough narration. However, unlike 2019’s The Lion King Cats does not depict anything resembling a feline on screen. The computer-generated fur in Hooper’s film is patchy and incomplete: Dame Judi Dench, whose lazy performance suggests that her check must have cleared prior to shooting the film, wears her wedding ring on her visible human hands. When antagonist cat Macavity (Idris Elba) removes his fur—yes, many cats have fur coats on top of, well, fur coats—to reveal a six-pack, the audience gasped. Sure, Elba is handsome—a key factor for those suggesting he play James Bond—but his furry body is more like Frankenstein’s Monster than a suave British spy.

Ultimately, Cats is an absolute trainwreck. The choosing of the Jellicle Choice—the winning cat of what appears to be a singing competition—is one of

the major plot points of the film.

The winning cat will float up to the Heaviside Layer, which is the film world’s version of Heaven.

Despite these references to paradise, the film presents something more hellish.

Cats is purr-fect

Cats is a movie that, arguably, should never have existed.

However, seeing that Universal and Andrew Lloyd Weber decided to curse Tom Hooper with turning the infamous Broadway show into a feature film, the director did absolutely everything in his power to make sure that his Cats was the best it could possibly be. In the end, he ended up creating one of the most fascinating movies that I have ever seen.

Even when performed onstage, Cats is already a horribly awkward thing to watch: The show is comprised of two and a half hours of spandex-wearing actors introducing themselves to the audience as they all compete to be the next cat to die and be reborn. Hooper’s movie is strongest when it fully embraces this awkwardness. In the best scene

‘Cats’ adapts the bombastic Broadway production into a CGI nightmare. (thewrap.com) of the movie, we see Skimbleshanks, played by Australian ballerino Steven McRae, lead a row of other cats as they tap dance on a railway line towards King’s Cross station, making for an absolutely delightful musical number. However, the movie also has startling moments of self-awareness where it acknowledges how embarrassing the subject matter is. This leads Hooper to make bold creative choices to distract the audience from the singing furries, such as making Jason

Derulo waterboard James Cordon with CGI champagne. These scenes are incredibly disturbing, lending Cats the same horrifying energy reminiscent of a middle school’s theatre production.

As a result, Cats remains engaging throughout its entire 109 minute runtime, which cannot be said of many films. Watching Cats is like being unable to look away from a five-car pileup on the side of the highway. It’s degenerate, ugly to look at, and will haunt me for weeks to come.

McGame Jam highlights video game programming, art, and beavers Up-and-coming developers gather for two days of intense game design

McGame Jam challenged participants to create the video video game of their dreams in just 48 hours.

(Leanne Young / The McGill Tribune)

Joey Caplan Contributor Designing an entire video game would be an impressive feat to accomplish within a matter of years. This past weekend, however, the McGame Jam, a development marathon organized by Game Dev McGill condensed the video game making process into just 48 hours of straight development that took place Jan. 10-12. Teams made up primarily of Mc-

Gill students gathered in the Trottier building to participate in a game jam, an event that hones the skills of artists, programmers, and designers as they endeavour to create an entire video game within the strict time limit.

This year’s theme was “Can’t Go Back,” an abstract idea that teams must incorporate however they like into their game.

Recent Concordia graduate Camilo Ignacio Vides Perez’s take on the theme culminated in an Indiana Jones-style puzzler in

which the player must grab a treasure and get out. The catch: The floor falls away after walking on it, leading to some tricky and creative challenges. Perez led the programming and directing on his team, making sure each aspect of the game is both as functional and as fun as possible. One of the most underappreciated aspects of game design, Perez explained, is the core, fundamental design principles of architecture.

“It is so important for a game to have core mechanics and polish so the game can actually be fun,” Perez said. “If we lose sight of the game’s architecture, we don’t have a fun game.”

While working with a larger, more established team would allow someone like Perez access to more resources and staff, he insists that amateur projects like McGame have their own benefits: “[In a major studio], you don’t have to think about finances. Budgeting isn’t a problem,” Perez said. “But in an independent studio, you have more freedom of creation. You don’t have to abide by what the game studio wants you to do.”

Michelle Samson and Leeza Girolami, 3D and 2D artists, respectively, operate on the opposite end of the game design process.

Their team’s game began as a horror title, inspired by the ominous theme of the Jam, but eventually became a project they describe as being at once more sorrowful and funnier than their original idea.

“We ditched the horror at some point

and it became a meme [….] We joked around and deviated into a sad story,” Samson said.

Their final product focused on a family of beavers forced to relocate due to their habitat being destroyed. When asked about the pros and cons of working at a large studio, Samson and Girolami cited the creative freedom as one of the more enjoyable aspects of independent game design.

“From what we hear about big studios, you get a very specific type of task; maybe you’ll start to design rocks and for three years you’ll be doing rocks,” Samson said.

“Rocks are great, but then you go somewhere else and they say ‘what’s your portfolio?’ and you say 100 rocks.”

When the teams only have 48 hours, creating a game in such a short window of time means that certain design aspects are often overlooked, and Samson and Girolami see sound design as paramount in order to succeed in giving a game a distinct atmosphere. “[Sound] really completes the game,” Girolami says. “A lot of people forget to put in music and that’s always the missing link [….] You don’t want to be stuck in this vacuum.”

Though it may seem like a tech-heavy event, Game Jams offer spaces for every kind of creative mind, from digital artists and sound designers to storytellers. While programming is essential, it barely scratches the surface of all the work that goes into creating the games we play and enjoy.

Finding your place Building community on campus Leanne Young Photo Editor At a large school like McGill, located in the epicentre of an even bigger city like Montreal, it is easy to feel lost and isolated. Many students are stressed by academic pressure, being far from home, and the pressures of living independently. It is normal to feel alone at first, and it may take some effort before you find your community.

However, here is a plethora of opportunities to help find your place on campus. Whether you decide to join a new club, hang out and study in a new place, or talk to new people in class, it all starts with a single step outside of your comfort zone. Here are just some of the many opportunities worth exploring on campus.

1

1 The McGill Sports Complex offers plenty of opportunities to make new friends and hit your daily step count. Take a fitness or yoga class to move your muscles after a sedentary day of studying. Intramural team sports, too, are an excellent way to build teamwork skills.

2 Many departments on campus have a student lounge as well as designated study spaces. Whether you are playing foosball or chatting on the couch, hanging out in departmental spaces is a great way to meet people in your program. Academic communities can help you feel more connected to your program, and can establish a support network for your studies and classes.

3 Stores near campus, such as The Word, attract both students and other members of the Milton-Parc community. Their proximity to school creates a unique off-campus community that still somehow feels connected to McGill, which makes them the perfect place to visit after a busy day of work and class.

4 Soupe CafĂŠ, famous for its grilled cheese sandwiches, brings together lots of students every day. Located in the Burnside Basement, its cozy atmosphere and friendly staff make for a great place to stop in-between classes.

5 Snax, found in the heart of Leacock right by the biggest lecture hall on campus, is a perfect midday pitstop.

Hundreds of students converge here to stay awake and stave off hunger during long school days.

6 There are clubs for every interest: Acapella, fencing, knitting, and different cultural groups are just some examples where students can find their place. Student clubs at McGill are one of the best ways to meet students with whom you have something in common.

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( Sabrina Girard-Lamas / McGill Tribune )

10 ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT

TUESDAY, JANUARY 14 2020

Style and the city

McCord exhibition showcases Montreal fashion designer Jean-Claude Poitras Vanessa Barron Contributor

The Complete Works of Shakespeare (Abridged)

Continued from page 1.

The McCord Museum’s exhibit is arranged to show that Poitras’ surroundings greatly influence his stylistic vision, as each room shows how his life experiences affect his work.

Starting with his early life, the rooms transition to explore his travels and his fascination with film stars. Presented in a straightforward fashion, the clothes draw inspiration from period clothing but feel timeless, drawing references from many cultures while still feeling quintessentially Montreal.

Jean-Claude Poitras: Fashion and Inspiration demonstrates how inspiration can appear anywhere, impacting style and identity along the way, as it has for Poitras.

Born in 1949, Poitras grew up in the Cartierville neighbourhood of Montreal. From a young age he was influenced by the elegant dress of churchgoers and clergy at his local parish—a style he termed “monastic chic.” After he earned his diploma in fashion design from the École des métiers commerciaux, he went on to open his own store in Old Montreal in 1975. Since then, he’s created a number of labels, worked with many manufacturers, and won

Four McGill theater majors perform a lightning round of the bard’s entire canon.

Jan. 15-18, 7:30-9:00pm Morrice Hall Free

Free Graphic Design Workshop

The McCord Museum’s latest exhibit centres around the work of Montreal fashion designer Jean-Claude Poitras. (musee-mccord.qc.ca) prestigious awards for his designs, including the Fil d’Or de MonteCarlo. Specializing in ready-towear clothing, his garments are designed for everyday life. Don’t expect avante-garde, sculptural pieces here—Poitras’ clothes are wearable in any situation.

In this exhibition of his life’s work, many of the garments feel timeless. Most of the clothes on display are from the ‘80s and ‘90s, but they certainly aren’t the typical type of clothes from those periods. A sleeveless, salmoncoloured sundress looks like it was from 1950s Italy, but it was made in 1993. A boxy, high-neck fur coat from 1992 looks like it could be worn anywhere from

the 1930s or today. Poitras cites classic Hollywood as a source of inspiration for his work, and his style certainly assumes that classic quality. In contrast to contemporary fast fashion, Poitras’ designs aren’t dated by trends—his clothes last physically and stylistically for years to come.

“For over 30 years, JeanClaude Poitras has influenced Quebec fashion through his signature designs, exceptional know-how and intuitive, very sensitive, artistic approach,” Stephen La Roche, executive director of the Musée de la civilisation, a co-producer of the exhibit said. “For him, fashion is an art form that is part of our lives

and reflects who we are.”

Jean-Claude Poitras: Fashion and Inspiration is an insightful look into a Montreal designer’s sense of style and spirit that is emblematic of Montreal as a whole. His designs make elegance seem effortless, whether the wearer is attending a red carpet event or drudging through a snowstorm. Poitras, still an active member of the fashion scene, will be at the McCord Museum on Jan 30. to present a free screening of the documentary, Jeanne Moreau, l’affranchie.

Jean-Claude Poitras: Fashion and Inspiration runs until April 26, 2020.

McGill’s very own Design Collective offering crash courses on design for, well, everyone!

Jan. 16, 630-8:30pm Trottier Building, 3090.

Free

LRS 07 | Clerel • Stefani Bondari Experience • Donnie Brae

Living Room Sessions makes its debut of the decade with more local artists.

Jan. 16, 8:30-11:00pm Le Cagibi $7 ($10 for two tacos + admission)

Prince and Friends Dance Party Party like it’s 1999.

Jan. 18, 6:00-8:00pm Bar le Ritz P.D.B. $10

Stuff we liked this break

Ringing in the new year with a slew of recommendations Seven Scams,” breaks down the American pastime of swindling suckers for money, stawting with the infamous Fyre Fest and ending with the 2016 American election.

One thing is for sure, folks: We Live In A Society, and Jia’s the gal that will make you take a long hard look at how and why it is the way it is today.

The Arts & Entertainment team spent winter break finding the best content to bring in the new year. (Daria Kiseleva, Contributor)

Jonathan Giammaria, Vanessa Baron, Joey Caplan, Patrick Gilroy, Katia Innes Contributors, Staff Writer, and Editor Winter break is all about recovering from finals, spending time with your family, and updating your Goodreads and Letterboxd accounts. Here are the best from the A&E team’s period of rest and relaxation.

Book: Jia Tolentino, Trick Mirror To those unacquainted with Jia Tolentino’s writing, it might seem like an exaggeration to call her the voice of a generation, but Trick Mirror proves that she has earned the often overused title.

Tolentino sharply analyzes the mess that is modern life from the perspective of a self-aware millennial, covering topics from reality television to drugs and religion with ease and wit. A standout chapter, “The Story of a Generation in

Video Game: Disco Elysium If you have ever wanted to be a badass ace detective, solving crimes and taking names in the big city, Disco Elysium is not the game for you. The player character is a drunken lunatic detective whose years of hard partying have wiped his memory clean. It is up to the player to piece together his identity while trying to solve the murder of a universally despised mercenary. The player can choose to be a communist, a superstar cop, a cop of the apocalypse, an ultraliberal, or can maintain the detective’s cripplingly depressed state if you’re feeling mean. Disco Elysium is the funniest—and most depressingly existential—game of 2019.

Movie: Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker It is a little hard to be a Star Wars fan right now. With the current backlash surrounding Disney’s sequel trilogy at the back of my mind, loving The Rise of Skywalker, despite its glaring flaws, is an anomaly. But, the John Williams score, intergalactic dogfights, and lightsaber theatrics inspired the same awe and excitement as the originals. Maybe having to turn off one’s brain to enjoy the spectacle validates the film’s critical reception but expecting Star Wars to be a bastion of nuanced cinema isn’t the only way to enjoy the franchise’s spectacle. Sometimes enjoying the ride aboard the Millennium Falcon is more important than endlessly critiquing its shoddy construction.

Movie: Uncut Gems Director duo Josh and Benny Safdie have followed up their 2017 cult hit Good Time with the equally exhilarating Uncut Gems.

The film follows jeweller and pathological liar Howard Ratner, played to perfection by Adam

Sandler, who constantly has to weasel his way out of trouble as he attempts to navigate a world of illegal debt collectors, high-profile clients, and secret girlfriends.

The film’s relentless energy and frenetic sound mixing, along with Sandler’s anxiety-inducing performance, make for a searingly tense viewing experience. The film even features a scene where The Weeknd punches Sandler in the face—enough said.

TV: Cheer on Netflix If there’s one major takeaway from Cheer, a six-part docuseries on Netflix, it’s that competitive cheerleading is very, very difficult. Following the 13time national champion cheerleading squad at Navarro College in the tiny town of Corsicana, Texas, Cheer touts itself as an inspiring narrative about the uplifting power of sports, but soon turns that very notion on its head.

Cheer is a bittersweet examination of the sacrifices that college athletes endure for the marginal successes and recognition they earn, all the while treating its subjects with genuine care.

STUDENT LIFE

TUESDAY, JANUARY 14 2020

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Ask Ainsley: How do I recover my GPA? Dear Ainsley,

I’m a third-year Arts student returning to McGill after a terrible Fall semester. In addition to struggling with the class material, I was coping with personal issues and my grades took a hit. I feel like the drop in my GPA erased all the hard work and progress I made in my first two years at McGill.

I’m worried that potential employers will now write me off for internships and job offers. I don’t want one bad semester to impact my transcript so badly. How can I bring up my GPA? Sincerely, Gradually Perishing Academically (GPA)

Dear GPA,

Sorry to hear about your troubles last semester. Firstly, it is important to remember that life happens to us all, and one bad semester does not define you. Although it is significantly harder to boost your GPA than to lower it, it can be done, and McGill has several resources to help guide you on a path to success. Stop by the Arts Office of Advising and Student Information Services (OASIS) to set up an appointment with your advisor; this will reassure you that you are on track for graduation. Once there, a counselor can also direct you to your department’s office where you can talk to an advisor for your major and see how much flexibility you have in your schedule. Maybe you have room for

electives, which would allow you to choose classes that cater more to your strengths and therefore help your GPA. Taking electives you enjoy will automatically make studying a simpler task. Additionally, seeing a counselor will help put you back on a steady, organized path and calm your worries in the process. When choosing electives, it is also a good idea to take the professor and structure of the course into consideration. If you liked a specific professor’s teaching style in the past, see what other courses they are teaching. If you struggle with final exams, look for courses with essay-based finals or vice versa.

When it comes to courses required for a specified program, raising your overall average can be a little tougher. Luckily, McGill students are always creating online Facebook pages and arranging study groups so make sure to seek them out and see what works for you. Your peers at McGill can be your best assets for help; they’re going through the same struggles as you, and solidarity is key.

In addition to strategies within classes, it is also important to organize your life outside of coursework. Get out your calendar and see where you can make cuts. Is there an extracurricular activity that you no longer find fulfilling? Is there a social engagement that is eating into your study time? Make this new year a time to focus on yourself. It also might be beneficial to make a study schedule

There are many ways to work towards success after a bad semester.

(Sabrina Girard-Lamas / The McGill Tribune) as studies suggest that being organized can ease stress and anxiety. So plan ahead, because if your mind isn’t at ease, your grades will suffer. Write down what needs to be done and allocate specific times for each task so that your workload will be less daunting and ensure you stay on track for a better semester.

Lastly, make time in your schedule for pleasure. Worrying about grades is a common part of university, but it should not be the only part. Future employers may look at

your GPA, but they also look at other things like your resume, recommendations, and extracurriculars, so remember that grades are not the only thing you should be focusing on.

Keep working toward success and don’t be too hard on yourself!

Wishing you all the best,

Ainsley

Courses of action for course materials

A quick guide for some of the ways students can get textbooks possible and advocating for the growing trend of open educational resources (OERs).

OERs are free alternative teaching resources for students that are within the public domain rather than in the hands of private institutions. In the classroom, students can champion the trending move toward free resources such as non-reserve books and online resources rather than packaging them into expensive course packs.

“Philosophically, we plan to continue offering [course reserves],” Robin Canuel, Head of Liaison Services at the McGill Library, said. “We’re just hoping practices [such as] more OERs, [more] open textbooks, and [more] linking to our existing [online] materials [... means] less stuff in course reserves that [the library] has to buy.”

Miguel Principe Student Life Editor A new semester means new classes— and expensive textbooks. For many students, the first place that comes to mind for new textbooks is Le James at the corner of Sherbrooke and University, which gets jampacked with students during the first few weeks of September and January. However, outside of the campus bookstore, there are other ways to get the necessary materials for any McGill course.

The Word

A staple bookstore in the Milton-Parc community is The Word. Owned by Adrian King-Edwards, this quaint shop on Milton between Aylmer and Durocher has been in the business of selling a wide assortment of second-hand books for 44 years. At the beginning of every term, they compile a list of course textbooks that students can sell to the store, with some worth $100 or more. They only accept course materials that are of high quality, which means that they do not sell textbooks that are highlighted or have a broken spine. The process of buying back books and selling them to other students is no simple feat, since The Word spends a considerable amount of time before the rush of every September and January curating them.

“We usually spend six weeks before January getting ready for [the new term],” KingEdwards said. “We check on what books are being used [in courses] and make sure we have them, so that when the students come

The McGill Library has course materials placed all throughout campus and online. (cac.mcgill.com) at the beginning of January, we have all the McGill textbooks at the [store] [...], and we know [down to] which editions are used.”

The McGill Library

The campus library is an often overlooked resource for all types of course materials. With a mandate of creating a vast collection of information from all disciplines that is both legal and freely accessible, the library organizes materials into various categories. One major system is the course reserves system, which is where materials dictated by professors or frequently requested books are placed. As this method is free for all students, it comes with the caveat of shorter due dates

for return.

“We have one-day loans and three-hour loans.” Katherine Hanz, head of the Lending and Access Service of the McGill Library, said. “Three-hour loans [are more difficult to acquire so] the only things that are threehour loans are items that are getting stolen [and] items that someone is asking for [...] every hour. As much as possible, we try to keep reserves [...] to [more convenient oneday loans], where you can ask for card access to the self-serve room [where they are].”

Course reserves also add a huge cost burden on the library, meaning there is incentive for them to use other strategies such as buying electronic copies of textbooks when

File-sharing websites

A seedier avenue are sites that have unauthorized files of many popular course materials. This underground network of links, sharing sites, and pirated copies is dependent on word-of-mouth and extensive google searching. Legally dubious due to its role in copyright infringement, many of these sites share a philosophy of decommercializing educational materials. An issue with getting textbooks through this method is that it yields mixed results since there is no centralized quality control.

With all these options available in the community and on the web, looking for textbooks doesn’t have to be a stressful task. The resources are out there; it is just a matter of knowing where to look.

12 STUDENT LIFE

TUESDAY, JANUARY 14 2020

Winter on two wheels

In the know on cycling in the snow Janine Xu Contributor

The removal of BIXI bikes every November can only mean one thing: Winter is coming. For some, this spells the end of biking season, but many Montrealers continue to bike even during the long, cold months. In fact, the number of winter cyclists in Montreal rose by 14 per cent in 2017, according to Velo-Quebec.

Among them is Tommy O’Neill Sanger, U3 Science and volunteer at The Flat Bike Collective. He is not deterred by the harsh conditions of the winter months.

“I [bike to school] everyday,” O’Neill Sanger said. “It’s quite common, a lot of my friends do [it, too]. There are definitely less people [biking] on the road in the winter, but every year, I’m seeing more and more people.”

In order to prepare their bikes for the winter, many cyclists switch to snow tires. Studded tires, a type of snow tire with metal studs embedded in the treads, provide good traction on icy roads, but are also heavier, which makes for a slower ride. According to Vélo Québec, a common tip for slippery roads is to let a bit of air out of the tires for better grip, but to not go below the minimum pressure recommended by the specific

manufacturer. Moreover, salt on roads can cause friction for bikes and can wear out the chains. But, as O’Neill Sanger assured, as long as bikes are cleaned frequently, once or twice a week, salt corrosion should not be too much of a problem.

“In the winter, […] I put tires on that have more tread [than my normal tires...] [but they are not] specifically meant for snow,” O’Neill Sanger said. “Although some good winter tires have metal in them, [some, like mine, don’t].

[Bike parts], such as derailleurs or brakes, [can freeze] in the winter.

One of the solutions is to have a single-speed or fix-gear bike so [there is no derailleur and] it’s a lot simpler and [requires] less maintenance.”

A common issue in the winter is that many of Montreal’s bike lanes lack a physical divider between bikes and vehicles, which, when combined with ice patches or thick snow, can create dangerous conditions for cyclists.

“The main thing is to be aware of the conditions [on the road],” O’Neill Sanger said. “You have to watch out for patches of ice or thick snow. Roads get thinner because snow doesn’t get cleared perfectly, and you bike more towards the middle of the road, which can be dangerous.”

O’Neill Sanger suggests plan-

People often think that biking is reserved for warmer weather, but winter biking is not as bad as you might think.

(Leanne Young / McGill Tribune) ning your journey beforehand to stay safe on the roads. Some cyclists prefer to switch to smaller roads where there are fewer cars, but often these roads are not plowed as well. However, he believes that Montreal’s bike infrastructure has seen improvement in recent years, allowing for safer cycling in the winter.

“We’ve seen a lot of progress

in recent years in the maintenance of biking routes,” O’Neill Sanger said. “Often, [some] bike paths are the first to get cleared. Sometimes you find a bunch of pedestrians on the bike paths just because the sidewalks aren’t cleared. [But] there is [definitely] still room for improvement, and it’s not perfect.”

Still, O’ Neill Sanger maintains that the fear behind winter

biking is definitely unfounded.

“It’s definitely good to do some research to figure out how to [bike] safely, but I definitely recommend it to [all cyclers], even beginners,” O’Neill Sanger said, “Most days throughout the winter, the streets are clear and quite safe [.…] For the most part, you can often ride on the same bike [as you would] ride in the summer.”

Fostering cats as an introspective exercise The joys and lessons of non-committal pet ownership

Michelle Chen Contributor The process of fostering a cat begins with reading a description: A female rescued from a kitten mill, vet work in process; a friendly grey female cat of two months—not yet vaccinated but treated for fleas.

When you make the decision to foster a cat, you go in with no expectations of commitment; the rescue organization may have already found a permanent home for it. The process of your local shelter is equally simple, requiring some paperwork and a meeting. Once a cat has been assigned to you, the only thing left to do next is to wait, and before long, a majestic creature will come swishing its tail through your door and into your heart.

I chose to foster rather than adopt due to career and financial instability. As my time as an undergraduate student at McGill comes to an end, I am still uncertain of whether I will return home to the West Coast, remain in Montreal, or move overseas in my next step of life. I would be devastated if I had to give up a cat because I could not take it with me.

I also have limited financial resources as a student and would not be able to afford treatment if the cat became sick. Fostering takes the stress off of permanence, but, as with all

Fostering cats is a great way of learning important life lessons, such as letting go.

(Michelle Chen / The McGill Tribune) temporary things, it also teaches the importance of letting go.

I once took in a green-eyed tortoiseshell cat named Sophia who would creep out of hiding on cautious paws then bolt back beneath the bed as soon as I turned my gaze in her direction. We tangoed in this manner for eight months—a slow, wary step forward followed by a fast, frantic scramble back, then

a tense and dramatic pause before the dance repeated. My frustration mounted as the days inched by without any show of affection from her. It was like living with a roommate who actively avoided me and, worse, was also scared of me. I missed the affection of my previous foster cats who set about exploring and even snuggling in my lap within minutes of opening the carrier door.

Sophia embodied all the qualities that anti-cat people find fault in. She was aloof, indifferent, even impertinent. She recoiled from my attempts to befriend her and her only response to my gentle coos was a frightened stare with her cavernous black pupils. For god’s sake, I just want to love you, I wanted to shout. It took months of gentle cajoling before Sophia eventually warmed up to me.

I cannot adequately describe the whirlwind of emotions that churned in my heart the first time she leapt into my lap, purring and butting her head into my hands. It was a mix of relief, joy, and validation.

Our period of unfettered friendship was short-lived. Sophia was adopted a year after she came to me, just weeks after she first opened up to the idea of snuggles. I was sad to let her go, but I like to think I played a part in showing her the better side of human nature. She entered her new home with more trust than she arrived with at mine.

The fostering process ends with letting go. It’s the last and essential step, and the one that I hate the most. It teaches you that it is impossible to force a good thing to last forever, momentous tides of change, such as moving away after graduation, means both the humans and furry friends in our life, may go in separate paths. It teaches you that it will be alright; the love and memories were worth it.

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

TUESDAY, JANUARY 14 2020

13

Alexa, tell me what you’re thinking

Exploring the inner workings of Amazon’s home assistant device

Doris Tian Contributor Amazon announced its vision for home assistant device Alexa to play a more active role as a personal assistant in November. In interviews with The McGill Tribune, Will Hamilton and Jackie Cheung, professors in McGill’s Department of Computer Science, outlined the basics of the technology behind voice-controlled home assistants like the Amazon Alexa and Google Home.

Alexa’s algorithm first transcribes sound waves. Known as raw speech processing, this procedure employs supervised machine learning, whereby computers are trained to recognize and interpret speech through labelled input data.

An artificial neural network with neurons takes in the speech waves and outputs the matching textual transcript.

The transcript is then translated into a language that the computer can understand, so that the speech input becomes an instruction for the home assistant algorithm to follow. Compared to raw speech processing, this step involves little artificial intelligence (AI). Instead, the workload falls

The lack of restrictions on the data that tech companies can collect has raised privacy concerns among consumers and legal experts. (flickr.com) onto computer engineers, who must provide the home assistant algorithm with a response for all possible voice commands given by the human user.

“There is a lot of manually curated, manually specified knowledge [involved in this step],” Cheung said.

As with other voice-controlled devices, the issue of reliability significantly influences design. “[Tech companies] really don’t want the model to do weird things,” Hamilton said.

To avoid giving responses that are unexpected or would make the user uncomfortable, Alexa is designed to provide clear answers for every command it is given. As a result, the programming behind Alexa’s responses is considerably less advanced than raw language processing. Alexa’s recent upgrade, which allows it to provide better predictions, operates on the same cautious principle.

Training the computer to match verbal commands to specific responses is not fundamentally different from programming

traditional dialogue. For example, if a user were to make a dinner reservation for two on a Friday night, Alexa’s algorithm would be prompted to ask if the user wants to make a movie reservation after the meal.

Regarding the privacy implications of home assistants, both Hamilton and Cheung noted that a great part of users’ fears concerning their data security may stem from common misconceptions about the home assistant industry.

For companies like Amazon and Google, collecting data is not an outrageous deed. After all, they need these data to train algorithms and improve their model.

Both Hamilton and Cheung agreed that concerns over user privacy also depend on the user’s own risk tolerance.

“Privacy is not a universally held value,” Cheung said. “Generally, people are aware that these companies are collecting data. If they accept this, they will buy and use these devices of their own volition.”

Once customers give access to their information by purchasing these devices, however, Canadian law stipulates very few restrictions on what type of data companies can collect. In an email to the Tri-

bune, Ignacio Cofone, a professor in the McGill Faculty of Law, discussed the issue of giving consumers the responsibility of protecting their own privacy.

“The idea that, if we rely on consumer consent, consumers will [...] manage their privacy risks by consenting only to those things that are beneficial to them has proven, at minimum, ineffective, and at maximum, harmful [to consumer interests],” Cofone wrote.

Cofone’s comments echo statements made by other legal scholars on the role of personal consent in the use of data mining technology. Such scholars maintain that the concept of ‘privacy self-management’ is not enough to protect users from exploitation.

Neither the technology behind Alexa’s upgrade nor its accompanying privacy issues are particularly revolutionary. Perhaps more groundbreaking are their implications. As these devices become more intimately involved in the private lives of users, the data they collect will construct an increasingly detailed picture of users’ identities and behaviours.

While Amazon continues to profit off of user data, the long term consequences of this degree of data collection are not yet understood.

Reason and the art of neuroscience

A discussion of science’s ability to answer the great questions of life George Perlman Contributor One of the major attractions of academia is the ability to make a career out of learning, where one can pursue a life reminiscent of ancient Greek philosophers or Renaissance polymaths. Of course, following one’s research passions depends on funding. Grant applications and email correspondence shape the everyday life of academics, draining time and energy that would be more enjoyably spent pondering lofty ideas.

McGill professors David Ragsdale and Ian Gold took time off from such drudgery on Nov. 19 at the event ‘Synapses and Skepticism’ to discuss their favourite topics at the intersection of neuroscience and philosophy. The two started their academic careers on parallel paths that eventually converged. Ragsdale, a neuroscientist, studied psychology in his undergrad before happening upon the budding field of neuroscience.

Today, he contributes to the field through his work on ion channels, proteins that control the movement of electrical signals in the brain. Gold, a philosopher, tackles the puzzle of delusions and the social determinants of psychosis, how human minds make educated guesses about reality, and how these guesses can go awry.

Research on brain function has yielded insight into philosophical questions.

Ragsdale cited a famous neuroscience experiment from 1983 that many lauded as definitive evidence that free will does not exist. The researchers measured participants’ brain waves using electrodes on their scalps and asked them to press a button whenever they felt inclined to do so. Using a fast-spinning clock in the participant’s view, they could determine both when the participant felt the conscious intention to press the button, as well as when they actually pressed it.

As expected, the conscious experience of the will to act preceded the act itself. Unexpectedly, though, the brainwave measurements showed a boost in neural activity before the thought arose on a conscious level, indicating that the brain prepared for the action before the participant was even aware of it.

“While the implications of this study are still heavily debated, its results suggest that our feeling of agency in making decisions is an illusion produced by the brain,” Ragsdale said.

Gold’s research on delusions sheds light on another basic philosophical conundrum informed by neuroscience: How to determine what is real and what is not.

In response to a student’s question on the relationship between hallucinations and reality, Gold spoke of a now commonly accepted model of the brain’s role link-

Optical illusions such as the famous grey bar illustrate how our brains construct an altered picture of the world. (pixabay.com) ing sensation to conscious perception.

“Rather than simply projecting the raw sensory data coming in, our brains process these inputs and construct an altered picture of the world,” Gold said.

“This model suggests that our brains make these educated guesses about incoming sensory information that enable us to act more efficiently.”

Optical illusions, such as the famous grey bar, are an example of this process.

An objective eye seeing the bar will determine that the bar is the same shade

throughout its length. But our brains, primed to detect contrast, produce an image that gets darker from left to right.

This process stems from evolutionary pressures that have pushed our nervous systems to produce a useful, rather than accurate, perception of the world.

After two hours of discussion, the event concluded with many questions still circling. Left with a hefty dose of head-scratchers, everyone got back on with their lives, neurons firing all cylinders.

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TUESDAY, JANUARY 14 2020

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

Weathering the storm of aerosol emissions

Pollution from Athabasca oil sands impacts local weather processes

Alberta’s Athabasca oil sands is the world’s third largest oil reserve. (Maclean’s)

Caroline Lou Contributor Continued from page 1.

This is because snow-borne particles from the Athabasca oil sands region have a higher mean freezing temperature than mineral dust.

Snow from areas surrounding the Athabasca oil sands also had a high concentration of particles greater than 100 nanometres in size, two orders of magnitude higher than snow from

Montreal. Additionally, most concentrations of metals, including chromium, nickel, copper, arsenic, selenium, cadmium, and lead, were higher in snow samples taken near the oil sands.

Ariya mentioned that there are feedbacks between air pollution, weather, and climate, which affect how pollution-induced changes to weather patterns can interact with other climate change impacts. Aerosols affect cloud properties such as the initiation, frequency, intensity, and quantity of precipitation, and can alter natural pro-

cesses, such as floods and droughts.

“Climate change is known to affect urban pollution, which is the main source of climate change driving factors,” Ariya wrote in an email to The McGill Tribune. “Similarly, the weather conditions impact air pollution, and weather, as we show[ed] in this study, is also impacted by air pollution. In short, these three processes are linked.”

Moreover, the ability of aerosols from the oil sands to be captured in clouds means that these pollutants can be spread to other areas through precipitation, causing damage to ecosystems, wildlife, and public health. Ariya cited reports by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and World Health Organization (WHO), although she noted that these intergovernmental organizations recognize the need for further research. She described how the impacts of air pollutants are not completely understood, as scientists still have to do further research into the physicochemical characteristics of aerosols, such as size and composition, to understand how they interact with clouds.

“The [IPCC and WHO] concurred that particulate air pollutants are their utmost knowledge gap,” Ariya wrote.

“Air pollution is linked to eight million premature deaths worldwide every year.”

Despite the lack of knowledge on health impacts of particulate air pollutants, emissions from the Athabasca oil sands operations have been linked to health risks, such as increased likelihood of developing cancer and respiratory problems.

“I think that we opened up a closed door to show that anthropogenic airborne nanoparticles can play [a] key role in weather processes, which [has] not [been] considered before,” Ariya wrote. “It builds [...] on our leading contributions on air and snow nanoemerging compounds in urban centres or other polluted sites, such as oil sands covered in this study, and their importance in both health and climate research.”

In the meantime, Ariya’s lab is conducting further research to explore the effects of other major industrial pollutants. The lab is also developing novel sustainable technology for air and water pollution remediation, as well as for the detection of gaseous and particulate matter, which will play an important role in tackling the mounting problems associated with anthropogenic pollution.

The Internet bands together to save Earth’s forests YouTubers campaign to plant 20 million trees

Margaret Wdowiak Contributor Many consider online influencers and the YouTube community to be a toxic cesspool of negativity. However, YouTubers Jimmy Donaldson, known by his online name MrBeast, and Mark Rober are challenging this view by bringing internet celebrities together to make the world a better place through their TeamTrees campaign.

Donaldson and Rober created the campaign after fans challenged them to plant 20 million trees to celebrate the MrBeast Youtube channel hitting 20 million subscribers. The aim of the project was to plant 20 million trees globally by 2020. In order to make their dream a reality, the YouTubers partnered with the Arbor Day Foundation, a US-based tree-planting organization. For every dollar donated, the Arbor Day Foundation would plant one tree in a forest in need. The campaign garnered massive attention, with important players in the online and technology communities such as Elon Musk and celebrity YouTuber Jeffree Star donating thousands of dollars to the cause.

The environmental benefits of planting 20 million trees could be enormous.

“In urban areas, trees act like natural air conditioners while they photosynthesize,” Anna Hargreaves, assistant professor in the Department of Biology at McGill, wrote in an email to The McGill Tribune. “They mitigate heat waves, provide shade, increase property values, and make people happier. Reforesting […] can eventually provide more forest habitat and, depending on where you plant them, help connect patches of existing for-

est.”

Planting trees is also a cheap and easy solution for reducing carbon dioxide levels.

“Trees sequester carbon out of the atmosphere, so [they] can counteract the carbon dioxide we emit from burning fossil fuels,” Hargreaves said.

Trees have other restorative abilities. For instance, by removing pollutant gases, they aid in air purification. They also reduce evaporation from the ground and produce 200–450 gallons of water each day through photosynthesis, thus contributing to water preservation. In terms of soil properties, trees help to reduce ground erosion, increase fertility, and help soil retain its moisture content.

Planting 20 million trees could amplify such effects worldwide.

Despite the potential benefits of the TeamTrees campaign, planting 20 million trees presents serious logistical issues and some unexpected consequences.

“Coordination and cost are obvious ones,” Hargreaves said. “Survival of those trees is another.”

The timing of tree planting could also have important consequences on the ecosystems that the TeamTrees campaign is attempting to protect.

“Planting trees in grasslands is very controversial,” Hargreaves said. “When you start reducing grassland habitat, it can change water balances [in the ground]. Recent evidence suggests natural grasslands can be more stable carbon sinks than forests.”

Planting trees in the wrong places can damage ecosystems, increase wildfire intensity, and

Tree planting is a go-to mitigation strategy for climate change, but it also brings potential consequences. (Emma Gillies / The McGill Tribune)

actually worsen global warming. Some scientists believe that placing too much emphasis on tree planting can also distract people from cutting down on fossil fuels, the most important step in combating climate change. As such, the cultural emphasis on the TeamTrees initiative could have negative effects on the environment by diverting people’s attention from the many issues associated with the fossil fuel industry.

Still, by the end of 2019, MrBeast and his collaborators had achieved their goal. The trees

will be planted between January of this year, continuing until December 2022.

In a recent video, MrBeast urged his fans and fellow YouTubers to continue fighting climate change and join forces to raise awareness of climate-related issues, hoping to carry the spirit of the TeamTrees campaign into the new decade.

Following this new medium of outreach, humanity may have a chance to reverse some of the damaging environmental abuses of the past two centuries.

SPORTS

TUESDAY, JANUARY 14 2020

15

NHL 2019-20 midseason awards

Pastrnak, Carlson, and Binnington prove impressive in first half of season while posting a league leading 22 goalie wins. Though his save percentage of 0.917 and his 2.47 goals against average are not numbers that immediately jump out, Binnington has simply done what it takes to win; it is undeniable that in the last year, Binnington has been the most valuable player on the league’s best team. A Vezina Trophy would etch Binnington’s name in hockey history.

Adam Menikefs Contributor The NHL has passed the halfway point of the 2019-20 season and is steadily moving toward the postseason. Although there are many months of hockey still left to play, the top skaters and goaltenders have already elevated their franchises and are separating themselves from the field for the annual NHL awards.

Hart Memorial Trophy (Most Valuable Player): David Pastrnak Through the first half of the season, Boston Bruins forward David Pastrnak has narrowly etched out other Hart contenders such as Nathan MacKinnon and Connor McDavid. The Czech product has led the Bruins to the top of the Atlantic Division and tied for the most team points.

Pastrnak currently leads the league with an astounding 35 goals and sits fourth in points with 65. Pastrnak is known for strong postseason performances, and if he continues on his tear throughout this campaign, he could bring home both the Hart and the Stanley Cup. Norris Memorial Trophy (Top Defencemen): John Carlson The Washington Capitals sit atop the Metropolitan Division with a leaguebest 30 wins, led defensively by 11-year veteran John Carlson. Carlson currently leads all defencemen with 55 points, nine more than any other blue-liner. The Stanley Cup Champion will look to continue

Boston Bruins forward David Pastrnak is playing like an MVP, currently leading the league in goals and helping the Bruins to first in the Atlantic Division. (NHL.com) his dominant start and add to an already fantastic career, while helping the Capitals go on another deep playoff run and avoid yet another early postseason exit.

Calder Trophy (Rookie of the Year): Cole Makar Many first-year players have been instrumental parts of their teams throughout this year, but the most impressive rookie thus far has certainly been Colorado Avalanche defenceman Cole Makar. Makar, the fourth overall pick from 2017, has exhibited tremendous poise on the back end and excellent skating, creating an abundance of chances for Colorado. The 21-year-old Calagrian’s valuable contribution to the Avalanche is demonstrated further by his 33 points, only

two behind the lead for all rookies, and 0.89 points per game. Makar appears to be the star defenceman Colorado needs, and with Hart candidate Nathan MacKinnon leading on offence, the future looks bright in Denver with these young playmakers.

Vezina Trophy (Top Goalie): Jordan Binnington Amidst several contenders for the Vezina Trophy, one goalie has taken the league by storm: Jordan Binnington. The St. Louis netminder, who has yet to play a full season, has already led the Blues to their first Stanley Cup in franchise history, proving yet again that goaltending in postseason hockey is absolutely essential.

This season, the Canadian has led St. Louis to first place in the Western Conference,

Jack Adams Award (Coach of the Year): Mike Sullivan When first glancing at the standings, the Pittsburgh Penguins’ second position in the Metropolitan Division and third in the Eastern Conference is not particularly impressive. Yet, this is a huge accomplishment, as a majority of Pittsburgh’s best players have missed extended time on the ice this season. Future Hall of Famers Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin have dealt with injuries, and many other important players like Kris Letang, Jake Guentzel, and Patric Hornqvist have also been sidelined this season. To make matters worse, their Stanley Cup winning goaltender Matt Murray has played poorly. Mike Sullivan’s decision to start Tristan Jarry was an excellent move and an example of his superb decision making in this difficult time. With all these difficult situations, the man who has led the Penguins to two Stanley Cup victories in the last half decade is proving to be effective yet again and looks good to lead his team another playoff run when his entire core returns.

NBA midseason awards >

Doncić, Howard, and James highlight exciting start to season Adam Burton Staff Writer

guard holds up under the strains of the playoffs.

With the 2019-20 NBA season halfway done, The McGill Tribune presents its midseason awards, highlighting some of the most notable individual and team performances so far.

Best Individual Player: Luka Dončić Following an already historic rookie of the year campaign, Luka Dončić has put on a brain-melting masterstroke of a season. As a 20-year-old sophmore, he’s managed to put up an incredible average of 29.4 points, 9.7 rebounds, and 8.9 assists without sacrificing the team’s success. Dončić has led the Dallas Mavericks to a 23–15 record without a clear number two player or all-star on his team. If he manages to keep up this performance, he could be the youngest MVP of all time. His dominance from such a young age has other franchises worried about their own prospects, and Mark Cuban basking in the success of yet another European superstar.

Unexpected Breakout Team: The Miami Heat Since the end of the reign of the “Three Kings” in 2014, the Miami Heat have endured a run of mediocre seasons, never managing to scrape their way past the first round of the playoffs. Remarkably, it was the offseason $142 million acquisition of Jimmy Butler that’s turned the team around, clinching the second seed in the Eastern Conference. Many pundits doubted this move at the time, questioning Butler’s ability to lead a franchise after his flame-outs in Minnesota and Philadelphia. This has made the emergence and success of Miami’s positionless, unselfish style of play all the more surprising and exhilarating. We’re excited to see if the Heat can keep this up, and whether an offence without a point

Worst Franchise: The New York Knicks Although the New York Knicks bungling the off-season once again is not surprising, how they did it this year was certainly creative. With the prospects of signing Kevin Durant

and Kemba Walker and drafting Zion Williamson, the team somehow wound up with a starting lineup of no-names playing in what has become a veritable dumpster-fire of a season. At this rate, the Knicks will most likely finish as the worst team in the league.

Unexpected Breakout Player: Dwight Howard In anticipation of Dwight Howard’s return to the Los Angeles Lakers, basketball media outlets had a field day poking fun at Howard’s reinvention of his game and body.

Having spent the last decade as a basketball nomad on five different teams, Howard was all but written off as a relic from the 2000s: Outdated in today’s faster, spaced out game.

Nobody expected Howard to turn his career around, but here he is, 40 pounds lighter, draining threes and actually contributing to a winning team for the first time in nearly a decade. Howard’s transformation is reflective of a changing NBA and has fans waiting to see if he can continue to contribute to a team that has the potential to be the NBA champion.

Luka Dončić is only in his sophomore year in the NBA, but he is already playing like an MVP, averaging a near triple double per game.

(Gary A. Vasquez / USA TODAY Sports)

Best Team: The Los Angeles Lakers Halfway through the season, the Lakers have resoundingly established themselves as the best team in the West, a full five games ahead of the number two seed Denver Nuggets. The re-emergence of the purple and gold can be attributed to the dominating performances of Anthony Davis and LeBron James, with a fantastic accompanying cast

of Kyle Kuzma, Danny Green, Alex Caruso, and Dwight Howard. Even at 35, James has managed to extend his reign as King of the NBA. He leads the league in assists and has accompanied Davis’s dominant season with his own flurry of tripledoubles. After last season, many had written James off as a no-longerdominant force in the NBA, but he’s proved them wrong and could even add a ring to his collection come June.

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SPORTS

TUESDAY, JANUARY 14 2020

Inside Montreal’s ultimate scene From parking lots to the Olympics via Jeanne-Mance Adam Burton Staff Writer We’ve all spent a warm summer day lazily throwing a frisbee around with our friends. But if one were to go to Parc Jeanne-Mance on a sunny Sunday afternoon, they would find a group of adults throwing a disc in ways you would not think were possible. With full uniforms, cleats, and players barking directions at each other, this looks more like a game of football or basketball than the friendly, carefree context that usually accompanies the graceful toss of a frisbee. This is ultimate, and it’s been growing, quietly, since its founding in 1968.

The first ultimate team was forged in a high school parking lot in the heart of suburban New Jersey by high schooler Joel Silver, later known for producing The Matrix.

The teams were separated into student government versus school-newspaper kids and were first coached by a janitor who had some spare time. Silver had invented a new sport with soaring discs, endless possibilities for creative growth, and most importantly, ‘spirit of the game’: A loose concept that emphasizes the burden of sportsmanship and the responsibility of governance on the player. Thus, ultimate is the only sport that operates without referees at every level.

The “win first” mentality that is so heavily encouraged in other sports is regarded with disdain in ultimate.

Ultimate has grown from a borderline joke in a parking lot into a professional sport with paid contracts and touring teams. Its development can be attributed to growth throughout the ‘70s and ‘80s, with the initial founders bringing ultimate to their colleges and laying the foundation for what would evolve into a competitive international sport.

Today, ultimate has grown to the professional level, but those who play know that the real basis for the sport lies in the intense, tight-knit club and intramural scene that exists in almost every major urban area in North America. Every week, communities of eccentric and competitive players of all backgrounds, ages, and skill levels gather for a few hours of unadulterated, exhilarating fun.

Everybody has a different story for how they got involved in ultimate. Gwany Patenaude had been a lifelong athlete when she picked up ultimate as her primary sport in secondary school. Previously, she was a swimmer, but found herself without a sport, and so she decided to reestablish her CEGEP ultimate team.

“I thought the combination of the team aspect of the sport [and] how much you

could improve individually is what really drew me in,” Patenaude said in an interview with The McGill Tribune.

Within three months, she joined Team Quebec and, later, Team Montreal as well. As a CEGEP student, she balances playing on two high-level teams, on top of coaching the McGill Men’s B ultimate team.

For Kevin Quinlan, a professional player for the Montreal Royal, ultimate started as a more casual activity.

“It started more [...] like a social event than [as] a competitive thing for us,” Quinlan said in an interview with the Tribune. “We were just hanging out. Frisbee was just complementing the goofy people we were. It was when I got to college that I realized that this was more of a competitive sport, and [...] people take it really seriously.”

For those who play it, ultimate is a lot more than a sport; everybody has their own reasons for loving the game.

“At first, it was really just a way to hang out with [...] a really cool group of people,” Quinlan said. “But then it became the creativity you can use within the sport. There’s a lot of different ways to win. You’re always learning [and] adapting to different situations.

That’s what I really love about the game.”

For Patenaude, it is the sense of community that lies at the core of the game that she believes makes ultimate so appealing.

“When you’re playing the game, it doesn’t matter [if you are] advanced or [a] beginner, you are all together,” Patenaud said. “I started out as a beginner, surrounded by people on national teams, and felt accepted.”

The level of acceptance and fair style of play speaks to the sense of community that runs deep and is integral to the sport itself. The “spirit of the game” concept has been ingrained in ultimate since its founding in 1968 and is still taken very seriously. The American Ultimate Disc League (AUDL) maintains the player-officiated structure of the game, only recently implementing the use of “observers” who help mediate disagreements between teams. On the more local pick-up scene, the ‘spirit of the game’ translates to more than just sportsmanship and a self-officiated game: Players take pride in creating a competitive yet accepting and fun environment that prioritizes a sense of inclusivity and fun, which is lacking in most other competitive sports.

“I’ve very rarely seen anyone intentionally try to abuse the rules or be unsportsmanlike,” secondyear computer science student Adrien PhilardeauPlanche of the McGill Men’s B team said. “There is always a high level of respect between opponents, and games essentially always remain fair, even though there are no referees in the sport. People play hard, but they don’t play dirty [....] The same can be said about Montreal’s Frisbee community.

It’s very Québécois, very friendly, and quite competitive. It’s a lot of fun.”

In Montreal, ultimate flourishes every week through rain, sleet, and snow. Montrealers meet up in self- or club-organized groups to compete and have fun. Ultimate Grand Montreal, a volunteer based group, has been facilitating the growth of the community since 1993 with a mission of “encouraging the practice and development of recreational and competitive ultimate in the Montreal metropolitan area, by promoting and upholding the Spirit of

the Game.” Today, UGM organizes dozens of leagues all throughout Montreal in addition to facilitating outreach programs to teach children, encourage development, and reinforce the values of hard work and the spirit of the game.

Ultimate also exists in open pickup groups, a more casual and less organized form of the game. Every week, groups of university students, tourists, Mile-End tech professionals, and even middle-aged doctors talk on Facebook and schedule meeting times. People from across the city toss their bikes and work bags into a haphazard pile on the side of a field, and don light or dark shirt in accordance with a

Ultimate Frisbee is a growing sport in Montreal, with athletes of all backgrounds and skill levels making up a vibrant playing community. (vectorstock.com) loosely adhered-to lights and darks policy. Then the frisbee takes flight and everything else is left behind.

“What’s unique about Montreal is that there [are] so many ways to get involved in ultimate, and to learn ultimate, and that’s really what’s unique about the city,” Quinlan said.

“In smaller towns, it’s really hard to find that community.

[Here,] you can start and work your way up from any level.”

Ultimate’s popularity is growing in Montreal, with kids, for the first time, picking it up at a young age. Pathenaude, who co-captains the McGill Men’s B Team, was especially surprised by her experience coaching youth outreach ultimate programs.

“I had never met so many kids who were only playing ultimate [...] as their primary sport,” Pathenaud said. “They were nailing throws I didn’t learn until I was 17.”

Kids picking up the sport at younger and younger ages speaks wonders for the growth of ultimate in future years.

The graceful, floating nature of the disc, the intricate strategic positioning and cuts, and the free flowing nature of the game, along with the endless possibilities for creativity, truly make for the ultimate sport.