The McGill Daily - Vol104Iss18

Volume 104, Issue 18 Monday, February 9, 2015

McGill THE

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Voices of Palestine page 12

Editorial

Deregulation harms accessible education Page 23

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News 03

NEWS

Unfair graduate tuition policy SSMU inaugurates compost bins Divest offers cake to governors Black History Month at McGill

February 9, 2015 www.mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

Post-grads decry “unreasonable” retroactive tuition policy Council updated on Royal Victoria Hospital acquisition

MUNACA­and AMUSE merge Suing the city over P-6 Montreal TAs fight austerity SEDE photos against barriers in education Concordia solidarity teach-in AUS and SUS Councils

09 COMMENTARY

When corporate interest trumps social justice Is The Daily’s talk about prisons paradoxical?

Why we don’t need the police

12

FEATURES

15

SCI+TECH

Palestinian students at McGill discuss identity

The relationship between empathy and pain How speaking a second language changes your perception Biomimicry research results in tougher glass New bioengineering program planned for McGill

17

SPORTS

Winning to lose Gaelic sports at Concordia Scoreboard

19

CULTURE

A mental health dialogue through art

June Jang News Writer

A

t its February 4 meeting, the Post-Graduate Students’ Society (PGSS) Council approved Secretary-General Juan Camilo Pinto’s resignation and heard an update on McGill’s acquisition of the Royal Victoria Hospital. Council also passed a motion to advocate for the suspension of tuition policies for students who exceed the time limit for thesis submission, and a motion in support of murdered and disappeared students in Mexico.

Reinstatement fees for de-registered students McGill Graduate Sociology Students’ Association (MGSSA) representative Jason Jensen introduced a motion for PGSS to advocate for the suspension of existing tuition policies for students who exceed the time limit to complete their thesis and are thus de-registered from the university.

Under the current policy, deregistered Masters and PhD students can submit their thesis within two years of de-registration, provided that they pay reinstatement fees equal to a retroactive charge for all semesters between the time limitation and the thesis submission.

“This is patently unreasonable, because it’s asking us to pay for services, i.e. student status, which we do not benefit from. You can’t benefit from student loans, you can’t benefit from bursaries, as well as student services on campus,” said sociology student Leslie Cheung in a presentation to Council on the topic.

“A lot of people are not aware that this policy exists,” added Cheung.

PGSS Health Commissioner

Reading campaign sheds light on Palestinian stories The MMFA’s new exhibit perpetuates racist art The Daily talks to Montreal band Po Lazarus What to check out this week

22 COMPENDIUM!

Dan A. Ray returns to churnalism Fuck this(es)

23 EDITORIAL

Tuition fee deregulation harms accessible education

3

T

Elizabeth Cawley commended Cheung for her presentation to Council. “I think that’s one of the best issues that’s been brought to Council this year,” she said.

In response to a question, Cheung noted that the Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies (GPS) unit has recognized the need to revisit the policy, but is hesitant to take a stance against it for the moment.

“From what I can see, the position is that [GPS is] just willing to revisit it, but it may or may not end in the status quo,” said Cheung.

“They do not take the position that [the policy] is unreasonable.

Although individually as members, [Associate Provost (Graduate Education) and Dean of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies Martin] Kreiswirth, Dean [of Students André] Costopoulos, [Associate Dean of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies Heather] Goad, as well as the ombudsperson [Dimitrios Berk] have all taken personal positions against it.”

The motion, which passed, calls on PGSS to advocate for the immediate suspension of the current policy, to motion for its suspension at Senate, and to “work with McGill on creating new time limitation policies which are fair.”

Secretary-General resignation, solidarity with Mexican students Council accepted Pinto’s letter of resignation, submitted on January 20 following a Board of Directors motion of censure against Pinto on November 13 and a vote of no confidence by the executive on December 10.

The new Secretary-General is to be elected on February 24. Pinto indicated that he will assist the new

Tamim Sujat | The McGill Daily Secretary-General for a week without pay to ensure a smooth transition.

“I’ve been concentrating on organizing all the documents, ensuring that the interim SecretaryGeneral has a smooth transition and there’s no breakdown of communication,” said Pinto.

Council also passed a motion in solidarity with the 43 Mexican students who disappeared in the city of Iguala in September, presented by Association of Postdoctoral Fellows representative Illa Carrillo Rodriguez.

The motion mandates PGSS to write a letter of solidarity with the families of the victims and work to raise awareness of the issue.

Update on the acquisition of the Royal Victoria Hospital Vice-Principal (Communications and External Relations) Olivier Marcil gave a presentation on McGill’s situation in the process of acquiring the Royal Victoria Hospital.

“We are struggling to find some new space [...] to meet our academ-

ic purposes and enhance students’ life on campus. It is clear that on campus right now, we are really landlocked,” said Marcil.

A year ago, McGill officially informed the government of its interest in the hospital site, which is roughly a million square feet in size. Marcil said that, as of April 2015, the site will be empty and “might become an urban ghost.”

Marcil also shared his vision of creating a “green hospital” and converting roughly 50 per cent of the parking lots into a part of the Mount Royal Park.

“Since McGill is a green campus, and our students are walking, our profs do not have cars [...] we don’t need all of those parking lots and we can give them back as green spaces to the mountain, and that will be the biggest enlargement of the Mount Royal Park [... in] a long time.”

If everything goes as planned, McGill will launch work on the site in 2017 and the site will open in 2021.

SSMU promotes composting program

he Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) recently implemented a new composting program, working to reduce resource use and waste production, and generate greater green awareness on campus. The program involves installing compost bins in the SSMU cafeteria and partnering with Compost Montreal, a local collection service that will take the organic waste, cultivate its decomposition into compost, and later redistribute it as soil amendment.

SSMU Environment Commissioner Kristen Perry called the project “part of ongoing efforts to improve the

operational sustainability of SSMU.” Perry highlighted one of the larger problems the program aims to tackle in an interview with The Daily.

“Methane produced by food in landfills is around 24 times stronger than CO­2 as a greenhouse gas,” she said.

SSMU Environment Commissioner Keelin Elwood also noted that the project’s implementation will “reduce the landfill waste created by the SSMU building, while simultaneously educating the McGill community to be more conscious in regards to waste.”

SSMU faced some roadblocks in implementing the program, and con-

tinues to confront difficulties raising awareness. The most persistent problem is compost contamination.

“Often there are non-compostable items, such as styrofoam, plastic, or animal products, thrown in the bins, which usually means that the whole bag has to be thrown out,” Perry explained.

The program is fighting this by developing more targeted signage.

Moreover, Perry told The Daily, “the Environment Committee also held a compost education week when members, wearing a banana suit, got students in the cafeteria to participate in

our composting challenge.” Participants were told to determine which items on their trays were compostable and which were non-compostable.

Commissioners agreed that, ultimately, to fight the issue of contamination, more education is needed.

However, this can pose a challenge, Green Building Coordinator Alex Heim told The Daily. “It’s not only difficult to educate on composting, but also difficult to find students interested and committed to adopting a lifestyle like this on a daily basis.”

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Divest McGill celebrates second anniversary of petition submission Members determined to be heard by Board of Governors

Igor Sadikov The McGill Daily

M

embers of Divest McGill celebrated the second anniversary of the submission of their first petition for divestment from fossil fuels on February 2. In the early afternoon, members met with Board of Governors (BoG) Chair Stuart “Kip” Cobbett to submit a new petition and a 150-page research brief, and, later in the day, attended the BoG meeting to offer the Committee to Advise on Matters of Social Responsibility (CAMSR) a celebratory card and cake.

“Exactly two years ago, we submitted for the first time to the [BoG], so this is a new way of celebrating the anniversary of our long relationship with CAMSR,” explained Divest McGill member Ella Belfer in an interview with The Daily.

Following a recommendation from CAMSR, which is tasked with advising the BoG regarding socially responsible investments, the BoG rejected Divest McGill’s original petition in May 2013.

Since then, following a community consultation, CAMSR has updated

Divest McGill before the Board of Governors meeting. its terms of reference to include grave environmental damage in its definition of social injury.

Divest McGill member Natasha Wey explained that CAMSR’s reasons for rejecting the first petition could have easily been addressed by Divest. In order to avoid a similar situation this time, the new petition is accompanied by a much more comprehensive research brief, and Divest McGill has also requested a follow-up question period to address CAMSR members’ concerns.

“Two years ago, our brief was a little over thirty pages,” Wey told The Daily. “The response we re-

ceived asked a lot of questions that we felt were completely answerable. [...] So this time we submitted a much more comprehensive brief that answered a lot of those questions and went into far more detail about specific injury of the industry [...] and explained what each of those companies has done to harm not only the environment, but also the people.”

CAMSR has recently applied for funding to the Sustainability Projects Fund (SPF) to conduct a study of responsible investment practices in other universities, which could delay the consider-

Sam Quigley | Photographer ation of Divest McGill’s petition.

“Whether CAMSR will decide to go ahead with this petition before we’ve actually gone through the study, or whether they’ll think it’s more useful to wait until we’ve done the study – I just don’t know,” Cobbett said at the meeting with Divest.

For Belfer, using the study as a pretext for a delay would be unacceptable. “Given that the SPF hasn’t even approved the project yet, I think it would be ridiculous for them to delay the review of this petition,” she said. “I think that would be a great excuse for them

to delay reviewing this petition [...] but I think it’s their responsibility as they’re undergoing this process to be transparent and accountable.”

“I’m hoping that we’ll be able to at least present to them before the end of the school year,” added Wey. As for the card and the cake, Belfer explained that they are intended to remind the BoG that Divest McGill is determined to hold the body accountable.

“This showing today is a reminder to the Board that we’re really invested in this process – we’re not going away,” said Belfer.

“We’re not willing to let them lead us along and play games with us for the next several months.”

Governors acknowledged Divest McGill members’ presence at the BoG meeting, and CAMSR Chair Gerald Butts accepted the cake on behalf of the committee.

“We’ve been met with somewhat friendly response so far – a cautiously friendly response, I would say,” said Belfer. “It’s been a long road between us and the Board, so I think this is a humourous reminder of that, but also a more serious reminder that we’re still around after two years.”

Students kick off Black History Month Black Students’ Network events discuss institutionalized racism

Peter Zhi The McGill Daily

F

ebruary is Black History Month, and student organizations, spearheaded by the Black Students’ Network (BSN) at McGill, are organizing a multitude of events to raise awareness of black history and expose the institutionalized systems of racism that, to this day, work to oppress black people.

“We really wanted [the events] to be a celebration of talent in McGill and the black communities,” said BSN Internal Coordinator Richenda Grazette.

Black History Month begins as the BSN’s longstanding efforts to stimulate campus discussion about race continue, especially after the events surrounding Ferguson, and organizers hope the panel will help to stimulate discussion. “We talked a lot about police brutality, specifically last semester, and now we are looking at anti-blackness more generally,” Grazette told The Daily.

Events include “Soul Food Friday!” and “Fro-back Thursday” (an open-mic night), which aim to celebrate black culture and entertainment. Others, such as Children’s Day, are geared toward contextualizing blackness in Canada for Montreal youth.

“There is institutional racism in the fabric of our educational systems.”

Charmaine Nelson, BSN panel speaker Grazette said that Children’s Day is geared toward students from Westmount and James Lyng high schools.

“We are hoping that they will walk away with new ideas about what they can do after high school, and [learn] about black history and black innovations,” Grazette explained.

“The black Canadian historical absence is so stark and so blinding that black children can still go to school in Quebec for an entire lifetime and never hear about themselves in their history texts,” Rachel Zellars, a moderator of one of the upcoming Black History Month panels, told The Daily.

“I am concerned with the psychic violence that this entails, as well as the emotional and physical violence that lands on black children’s bodies within our public schools [...] it is a kind of violence that happens very broadly in this city.”

“One of my greatest hopes is that we can start questioning, as a normative practice, what Canada says about its history and its relation to its black population; that is, who Canada holds itself out to be nationally and internationally,” Zellers added.

On February 16, BSN will host a panel called “Discourses of Race: The United States, Canada, and Transnational Anti-Blackness,”

as part of the David A. Freedman Speaker Series. Renowned scholar and writer Ta-Nehisi Coates will be one of the speakers.

“We are hoping our audience walks away with greater knowledge about the way anti-blackness manifests in North America and new perspectives on the black experience,” said Charmaine Nelson, a professor with McGill’s department of art history and communication studies and a speaker at the event.

Nelson asserted that the “failures of early education” contribute to ignorance by not offering the opportunity to learn about black history. “If you look at Canadian education from kindergarten to university, how many people of colour are actually teaching, are principals, are deans?” Nelson asked.

“There is institutional racism in the fabric of our educational systems in Canada which means […] that our questions aren’t being asked.”

Nelson explained that these discussions are crucial, given the

existence of institutionalized racism in Canada. “Most Euro-Canadians, most white Canadians, do not understand the deep colonial history of the country [...] because they come from a position of white privilege, which means that they don’t have to know that history if they don’t want to.”

She noted that the very existence of Black History Month signifies racism on a deeper level.

“Not even 11 months a year, but 12 months a year, we are always being given what is really white history or Euro-Canadian history in the context of this nation,” Nelson argued. “But the problem is that we don’t really call it that.”

“My wish is, of course, that Black History Month becomes obsolete because black histories are so a part of the narratives that we tell ourselves and a part of the national consciousness that that we don’t need to set aside a month just to do that,” Nelson expressed. “But we are far from that [reality].”

6

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February 9, 2015 The McGill Daily | www.mcgilldaily.com

Campus union merger moves forward AMUSE and MUNACA to maintain distinct bargaining units

Jill Bachelder The McGill Daily

O

n February 2, the Association of McGill University Support Employees (AMUSE) approved a merger with another campus union, the McGill University Non-Academic Certified Association (MUNACA), at its Annual General Meeting. As MUNACA passed a similar approval during a special General Assembly last December, the merger will move forward.

The merger comes more than two years after AMUSE and MUNACA initially began working on the proposal. Since then, they have met over twenty times between themselves and with delegates of the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC), and have hosted seven information sessions downtown and on MacDonald campus.

During the meeting, MUNACA President Kevin Whittaker explained that the merger is intended to unite the administrations of AMUSE and MUNACA, whose em-

ployees share similar work, allowing them to better communicate with one another and more effectively serve their members.

Whittaker said that the merger is also a response to the overall “casualization” of the workforce at McGill, whereby the long-term, higher-paying jobs of MUNACA members have been replaced by casual employees who earn less and don’t receive benefits.

The merger proposal cites a drop in permanent employees from 1,600 workers in 2009 to only 1,300 workers in 2014, as well an increase in casual employees from 1,050 workers in 2009 to 1,400 workers in 2014, as evidence of this.

“It just isn’t fair to the individuals that are doing the work that they’re not getting benefits for,” said Whittaker. “If we are both working on the same team [...] we can act on it immediately.”

The merger will combine the administration of these two unions into a conjoint Union Council while maintaining three separate bar-

gaining units: MUNACA members, casual workers under AMUSE, and floor fellows under AMUSE. In a presentation with Whittaker, AMUSE President Amber Gross explained that the proposed Union Council will have a President, a VP Finance, and a VP Communications and Mobilization voted on by all members; a VP for each of the three bargaining units; and additional seats distributed among the three bargaining units.

Whittaker said that the unions aim to have an assembly for all members to vote on universal bylaws in the spring, and to have a fully functioning merged union by the Fall 2015 semester.

Merger causes concern for some Some present at the meeting expressed concern that MUNACA, a much older and more-established union, would “swallow up” the younger, less grounded AMUSE. Gross noted that this concern had been accounted for in the structure of the Union Council. “Based

on hours worked, MUNACA should have way more representation than what is in this proposal,” she said.

Arne Nelson, a History and International Development Studies major and AMUSE member, told The Daily that he was concerned about the merger, as the needs of MUNACA and AMUSE employees might be very different.

During the meeting, Nelson noted that it had taken months for AMUSE to get in touch with him after his hire, and that it might not be fair to host a merger vote when there are AMUSE employees who might not be informed as to how the change would affect them.

Gross and Whittaker acknowledged that there is often a significant delay between when a person is hired and when the University informs AMUSE or MUNACA of the hire.

“McGill truly does go out of its way to make sure [the unions] don’t get that information, because they don’t want us talking to you,” said Whittaker.

Gross said that the merger might help to combat this problem because MUNACA employees, who are usually at their jobs for longer, are more likely to notice new casual employees and notify AMUSE. Whittaker also noted that problems with McGill often drag on for years, such as the pay equity adjustments issues that have been ongoing for over a decade. He said that because MUNACA members are generally at McGill longer than AMUSE members, they are in a better place to keep tabs on problems that are occurring over a longer time period.

“One of the reasons this really appealed to us is it gave us a chance to have access to this institutional memory to really better support our employees,” said Gross.

Associate Vice-Principal (Human Resources) Lynne Gervais told The Daily in an email that McGill does not think the merger will affect negotiations. “We expect that our relationship with them will not be changed by this event.”

Double Superior Court challenge to bylaw P-6 Charges dropped for eighty protesters, tens of trials still to take place Subhanya Sivajothy The McGill Daily

I

n a statement released on January 28, the activist legal clinic Contempt of Court announced that over eighty people who had been charged and fined under the P-6 bylaw at the March 2012 antipolice brutality demonstrations had their charges withdrawn. The trial, set to begin on January 29, was cancelled by the prosecutor.

Municipal bylaw P-6, which regulates demonstrations, was amended in May 2012 to make it illegal to demonstrate without submitting a planned itinerary to the police. Over 3,400 fines, each usually amounting to $637, have been distributed since 2012, with hundreds of protesters contesting their tickets in court. In some cases, charges have been dropped, while others have accepted plea bargains or have been found guilty.

“The [P-6 bylaw] restricts our rights to peacefully gather and express our opinions in a public place,” Collège de Maisonneuve professor Julien Villeneuve told The Daily.

Villeneuve, who became known as Anarchopanda during the 2012 protests thanks to his panda costume and mask, was arrested five

times under P-6 and is involved in a multitude of legal battles over the bylaw. In addition to contesting his tickets, he is contesting the constitutionality of the bylaw in the Superior Court of Quebec, and is one of eight people spearheading classaction lawsuits against the city over conditions of arrest and detention.

He noted that many of the charges that have been withdrawn have been so due to technicalities such as legal proceedings that have taken too long or erroneously filed paperwork. However, for him, the real argument is over the constitutionality of the bylaw, which might clash with the Quebec Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms.

“It forces us to enforce [the] itinerary, if it’s not enforced then everyone can be held responsible for that, and that has a lot of problems, [one of which is that] it forces us to be our own police.”

Villeneuve is also challenging section 3 of the bylaw, which prohibits protesters from covering their head with a hood or a mask without a reasonable cause. Villeneuve argued that there are several reasons to wear a mask that are in no way related to criminal activities.

“Those that are frightened of work repercussions, or people with

a difficult legal status that might have problems with immigration, one could join a parade for gay rights while staying in the closet,” said Villeneuve. “We think that people have a right to express themselves [anonymously] in a public space – especially these days when everything is filmed.”

The ambiguity of the bylaw is another issue, as section 2 restricts any “assembly, parade or other gathering” without prior disclosure, while section 3 prohibits wearing a mask without a “reasonable motive.” Villeneuve said that the interpretation of those terms is left to the discretion of the police. “[As things stand] the police could give P-6 bylaw tickets to almost everyone that’s not on their own [in] the public domain,” said Villeneuve.

Conditions of detention Last August, the Superior Court authorized eight class-action lawsuits on behalf of 1,600 people arrested under P-6, through which protesters are seeking compensation for their conditions of detention and arrest.

The kettling process used by the Montreal police is a tactic for containing large crowds during gatherings. It involves a large formation

The Municipal Court.

Tamim Sujat | The McGill Daily

of police surrounding the crowd and moving in to contain the protesters so that they can be arrested or given tickets. Kettling was used during the student protests, such as when 518 arrests were made during a single demonstration in May 2012, as well as during the annual marches against police brutality in 2013 and 2014.

“We were detained for many hours without access to water or washrooms,” Perry Bison, the representative for the lawsuit concerning the March 15, 2014 anti-police brutality march, said in French at a press conference on August 26. “Po-

litical profiling occurred, since police let some people go solely based on their age or clothing.”

“Of course, not having access to food, water or toilet for that long is really problematic,” Villeneuve told The Daily.

As for the constitutional challenge of the bylaw itself, Villeneuve said that he remains hopeful of the outcome of the judgement.

“The trial went really well as far as I’m concerned,” said Villeneuve.

“Even an appeal judgement in our favour would be useful legally at this point, and I think we would win on appeal if it has to go that far.”

News

February 9, 2015 www.mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

7

TAs grapple with effects of austerity Many unions considering spring strike action Emmet Livingstone The McGill Daily

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cross Montreal, universities are shifting the burden of provincial austerity measures onto students. While undergraduates at many institutions are facing higher tuition fees and larger class sizes, for teaching assistants (TAs), the cuts have meant a fall in real wages coupled with increased workloads. “[Concordia’s] tried basically cutting every expense they could find […] they’re trying to cut everything,” said Robert Sonin, a Teaching and Research Assistants at Concordia (TRAC) union member.

He explained that the number of Concordia graduate students has climbed, while the TA budget has remained flat.

Quebec funds universities based on their number of weighted FTEs (full-time equivalent students), with graduate students garnering heftier subsidies than undergraduates.

Increasing graduate admissions thus act to counterbalance funding shortfalls elsewhere. However, the result of an enlarged graduate student body is fewer TA contracts with fewer hours, and ultimately a lower rate of compensation.

“They take the money from the easy places where they know there’s less resistance, and there’s less resistance among students because [students] take what [they] can get,” Sonin continued.

He also told The Daily that TRAC is working to combat an unspoken norm under which TAs are expected to work more than their contracted hours. However, graduate students are not in a strong bargaining position; many are glad

just to have a job, and are afraid to jeopardize what is often their only source of income. As Sonin explained, “If that’s how you pay your rent – you’re stuck.”

TAs at McGill are feeling similar repercussions of austerity. Justin Irwin, president of McGill’s TA union, AGSEM, agreed that TAs working well over their contracted hours is an “endemic issue.”

In an email to The Daily, AGSEM Grievance Officer (and former Daily Publications Society Chair) Benjamin Elgie explained that because of unionization, “McGill has not been able to impose a wage decrease or freeze” on TAs in response to provincial austerity. However, he pointed to a “successive and sometimes drastic decrease in TA hours” despite rising undergraduate enrolment, as having a similarly negative impact.

At McGill, departments have offset cuts to teaching hours by employing more course graders, who do the same work as TAs but are not unionized. According to Elgie, graders “have minimal labour protections, as well as significantly lower pay with longer hours.” AGSEM is currently seeking to extend its membership to all teaching support workers, including course graders.

The Daily also spoke to Shanie Morasse, an executive member of Université du Québec à Montréal’s (UQAM) TA union, SÉTUE. So far, UQAM has mostly confined its cuts to professors, lecturers, and staff, who have suffered a 2 per cent wage drop.

SÉTUE is currently in negotiations with UQAM, which will announce its next budget in April.

“We’re anticipating a cut in the number of contracts, a cut in the

AGSEM tabling on November 27. number of hours contained within contracts,” Morasse told The Daily in French.

An actual decrease in TA wages at UQAM is unlikely given their already low pay rate, Morasse explained. UQAM graduate TAs earn $13.31 per hour, far below the $26.81 per hour offered at McGill.

However, she noted that some courses have been cut, which has reduced the number of TAs required. “We’re looking [at] a fall in real wages,” she continued.

Potential for strike action Asked what measures teaching unions were taking to protect their members, Morasse said that SÉTUE is “constantly in contact with the Printemps 2015 committee to keep an

Fateme Mollaei | Photographer

eye on what’s going on.” She candidly told The Daily that a strike at UQAM is almost a certainty at this point, and that SÉTUE will join “to put the pressure on” and “fight austerity.”

Sonin was more reticent about the prospects of a strike at Concordia. However, he echoed Morasse’s sentiment, saying, “It would be nice to see a strike in the spring.”

Elgie confirmed in an email that AGSEM will not have a legal strike mandate until May, when it will finish collective agreement negotiations.

He added that a motion to strike could be proposed by any member, and that the union understands that “a number of other unions have members who are planning to bring strike votes for May 1 as part of a coordinated effort against the provincial cuts.”

In an interview with The Daily, Irwin explained that AGSEM was in contact with unions at other universities, but was unwilling to state which ones.

In 2008, a dispute with the University over standardized workload forms led McGill TAs to call a strike – which was a success. Indeed, with TAs across the city under strain from their universities’ reactions to austerity, several union representatives confirmed to The Daily that they saw value in retaliatory strike action.

Sonin argued that austerity is not, in fact, necessary. “This is the richest humanity has been – ever.

The decision is where are you going to spend the money [...] How are you going to divvy it up? That’s the point of a strike.”

#Edu4All photo contest highlights barriers at McGill

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T

he Social Equity and Diversity Education (SEDE) office is running a photo contest about barriers to inclusion at McGill. The contest, for which members of the McGill community are asked to “submit a captioned photo highlighting barriers, myths, or examples of inclusion at McGill,” is part of SEDE’s Public Education is for Everyone initiative, or #Edu4All. “One of [the contest’s] goals is to provide a platform for the broader McGill community to be able to shape discussions around equity, or lack thereof, at McGill,” SEDE Public Awareness Strategy (Communications and Events) Intern Cadence O’Neil told The Daily in an email.

O’Neil continued, “Everyone’s experience at McGill is unique, and this is determined in part by the barriers and supports in place at McGill, and the space created to discuss these realities.”

The scope of the contest is as broad as the range of barriers that exist at McGill. O’Neil outlined some of the issues centred in the few submissions that SEDE has received so far.

“These submissions have highlighted a broad range of issues already, for example: the accessibility of equipment in offices at McGill, some of the reasons behind the underrepresentation of Indigenous students at McGill, and the lack of abuse and sexual assault support services for all members of

the McGill community.”

Ultimately, O’Neil was hopeful that the contest would spur changes on campus beyond a discussion of barriers and accessibility.

“I [...] hope that the important critiques and barriers being identified by students through this project will be taken seriously by other members of the McGill community, and will result in tangible changes,” said O’Neil.

“There is clearly a long way to go before public education is truly accessible and a positive experience for all, but SEDE is dedicated to helping that process along.”

SEDE will be accepting photo submissions until March 13. ­—Janna Bryson

8

News

February 9, 2015 The McGill Daily | www.mcgilldaily.com

Fighting capitalism intersectionally Jaggi Singh calls for global solidarity in anti-austerity activism

Marina Cupido The McGill Daily

“

I’m here to talk about people who fight for social justice,” said Jaggi Singh, addressing a small but engaged crowd at the Concordia Student Union (CSU) lounge on Wednesday afternoon.

“Meaning a world where we don’t accept injustice, but confront it, and reject this corporate […] vision of the world, which I describe as, ‘It looks like Disney. It tastes like Coke. It smells like shit.’”

Singh, a well-known Montreal-based activist, spoke as part of Solidarity Concordia’s week-long teach-in on the growing movement against austerity in Quebec.

His talk, “Resisting Capitalism and Austerity: From Seattle 1999 to Printemps 2015,” traced the history of the anti-globalization movement up to today’s anti-austerity movements, drawing partially on his own experiences on the front lines of protests across North America.

“The spirit of this presentation

is to […] understand the different policies and measures that have taken place in the past and how they impact where we are today, and to understand the resistance to those policies,” said Singh.

“That’s important: it helps inform how we’re going to resist today.”

Intersectionality in activism Singh began his presentation with a survey of the various summits, trade agreements, and organizations that had, in recent decades, become flashpoints for anti-capitalist resistance. Each of these, said Singh, from the 1997 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum in Vancouver, to the 1999 conference of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in Seattle, were “different facets of managing global capitalism in the interests of major corporations.”

The protests sparked by such events have succeeded in mobilizing tens of thousands of people, he explained, and brought the anti-globalization debate into the mainstream. Yet these demonstra-

tions tend to be limited in one crucial respect: intersectionality.

Singh argued that anti-WTO protestors in Seattle were fighting the same oppressive system as the Black Panther Party and Indigenous resistance groups.

“What’s unfortunate […] is that somehow, those movements, [involving] people of colour and their communities […] are seen as separate from the [economic protests],” said Singh. “Talking about abolishing the prison-industrial complex, and talking about police brutality, for a lot of people, is a distraction from the ‘real’ economic issues.”

Singh pushed the audience to keep this at the forefront when mobilizing in the future. “What I’m urging, as we […] look forward to Printemps 2015, is that we not make the same mistake.”

He continued, “If anyone ever tells you [… that] because you’re bringing up issues around feminism, or around race, or Indigenous issues, that that’s a distraction, we’ve got to fight, because

Science undergraduates support ECOLE

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Support for ECOLE project The second motion, put forth

No compromising with capitalism Singh also called attention to the “privileged position” of North American activists who, he said, are protected from the most damaging byproducts of global capitalism – sweatshops, poorly-regulated factories, and toxic waste dumps that are typically established in the developing world. As a result, these activists often lack solidarity with true anti-capitalist movements.

“When you have Western unions or […] social movements

Tamim Sujat | The McGill Daily

by Representative to the Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) Zacheriah Houston, was in support of ECOLE, a living and community space focused on sustainability on campus. The motion would grant ECOLE room-booking privileges with SUS, similar to other independent student organizations under SSMU. “ECOLE already gives us room-booking privileges and they book rooms with some of the student societies on campus, so I just wanted to formalize that process,” said Houston.

The motion also included a clause recognizing the importance of ECOLE, and asked that ECOLE be promoted regularly through the SUS

listserv. SSMU Council will vote on a similar motion at its next meeting.

VP External Emily Boytinck, who is also a facilitator at ECOLE, spoke in favour of the motion.

“ECOLE […] is a great new student space. We have programming, we have skill-sharing workshops, we have film screenings. […] All in all, about 100 to 200 people walk through the space every week and it’s a really exciting project to be a part of.”

Boytinck did not put forth the motion, nor did she vote on it, to avoid a conflict of interest.

After a very brief debate, the motion passed unanimously.

—Ishani Ghosh

who are critiquing [social injustice], they’re often doing it in a way that’s not about opposing capitalism, but accommodating certain […] sectors of society.”

For example, Singh compared the stances taken by different groups in reaction to the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), launched in 1994. Many unions in the U.S. and Canada, he explained, did not actually oppose the agreement, simply advocating for the addition of “social clauses” to protect workers’ rights. The Mexican Zapatista movement, on the other hand, adopted a far more radical approach: to protest NAFTA – which eliminated pre-existing laws protecting Indigenous land in Mexico – they launched a major armed uprising, declaring the agreement “a death sentence on their people,” said Singh.

Singh argued that activists must stop making compromises with capitalism. “My point here is that capitalism inherently is quite barbaric and savage.”

AUS to launch mobile app

T

ast Wednesday, the Science Undergraduate Society (SUS) General Council (GC) voted to approve the amended Winter 2015 budget, and pass a motion supporting the ECOLE project.

Approval of budget The GC voted almost unanimously to approve the budget presented at the previous meeting by VP Finance Eileen Bui. The budget had been revised following the recent passing of two fees in an online referendum: an increase in the base fee, and the introduction of a student space improvement fee.

The majority of the SUS funds are to be distributed to departmental associations, while the income from the fee increase will be set aside in a separate fund for later use.

Notably, the budget set aside funds for a laptop lending program for students. The program will allow students to borrow laptops from SUS should theirs break. “The laptops will be available for students to use around the end of midterms and exams, because that’s usually when laptops tend to break,” said VP Internal Shaun Lampen. Three units have been purchased for the initial implementation of the program, with the option to purchase more if necessary.

it’s going to destroy our movement from within.”

“I think it’s really important to highlight the sweeping nature of the austerity measures,” Mike Finck, an organizer with Solidarity Concordia, told The Daily in an email. “How they touch not just university budgets, but public workers and healthcare, among others, and to take note of the important cross-sectoral bridges being made between students and workers.”

he Arts Undergraduate Society (AUS) Legislative Council met last Wednesday, where its members passed a motion to classify the Computer Science Undergraduate Society (CSUS) as a departmental association under the AUS, and discussed the upcoming launch of a new AUS mobile app.

The motion to recognize CSUS as an AUS departmental association was put forward by AUS President Ava Liu, VP Finance Li Xue, and Political Science Students’ Association (PSSA) VP External Gabriel Gilling. CSUS VP External Ian Karp spoke to the reasoning behind the motion.

“There are many students in the Faculty [of Arts] who are in computer science, a lot of people who are minoring or majoring, so it made sense that we’d become a departmental [association],” Karp said.

Tom Zheng, co-founder of app development company Kreate Solutions, gave a presentation to Council about the new AUS app, which is set to be launched on February 16.

According to Zheng, the app is meant to allow students to access all AUS-related information through one channel, and to give AUS representatives insight into what issues their constituents care about the most. Zheng also highlighted its potential for increasing election turnout, noting that AUS

hit a record of a mere 21 per cent during the strike year.

“To get people to vote, people have to be aware of what’s going on on campus,” said Zheng.

Xue asked for clarification on the legal implications of the marketplace aspect of the app, where students could hypothetically advertise the buying and selling of textbooks. “In our Memorandum of Agreement [with the University], it says that we cannot be a medium for these sorts of activities because that goes through the bookstore.”

Zheng responded that, while no transactions actually take place on the app, AUS should display a disclaimer outlining any activities that the app should not be used for.

Xue also noted that the app was late, as it was originally contracted to be available for Frosh 2014.

A last-minute motion to approve the AUS operating budget was tabled at the request of Councillor Patrick Dunbar-Lavoie to allow Council more time to read the budget, which had been revised since it was last presented to Council, before voting.

Council also unanimously passed a motion to adopt a revised version of the Classics Students’ Association (CSA)’s constitution, which was last updated in 2011.

—Janna Bryson

Commentary 9 When business interest trumps social justice February 9, 2015 www.mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

Speaking about police brutality in corporate hip hop

Tamim Sujat and Alice Shen | The McGill Daily Jonathan Emile Commentary Writer

A

bout two weeks ago, I finally put out my song featuring Kendrick Lamar (yes, I’m a McGill student and I have a song with Kendrick Lamar). The song, titled “Heaven Help Dem,” is a complex ode to social justice, a tribute to victims of police brutality, and an exploration of urban violence. Most of the press coverage I’ve received focused on the lyrics, Lamar’s appearance, the message, and the overarching themes addressed in the song.

I expected a lot to come from the release of this song. Amid the phone calls and emails from press, record labels, supporters, new fans, and marketers from all over the world, something else happened that I never expected – a deliberate attempt to derail the song’s popularity by censoring and suppressing my work. The video was going viral with over 105,000 views on YouTube, and the song generated nearly 20,000 listens on SoundCloud within a week, but it was flagged by Universal Music as violating copyright. This was even though I was the one who created, produced, and paid for the song.

Let me demystify the magic of the music industry for you a little bit. Hip hop artists pay for other artists to feature in their videos, and most of the time they never meet in person to produce the

songs. I paid for a feature with Lamar in 2011 with the plan of releasing the song in 2014. The official release was delayed and scheduled for January 19 – Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. Before posting the video and releasing the song, I extended a courtesy to Lamar’s management team and sent them a copy of the song weeks in advance of the release date. With minimal communication and no objection from Lamar’s team, I proceeded with my release as planned. Their lawyers never got back to me, nor did their public relations department, and their management stalled. I was dealing with a corporate machine so gargantuan and unresponsive that I got a phone call only when my song and video went viral in a way they were not prepared for. I finally managed to contact someone on the phone, but I was shut out of any real dialogue, refused a refund, and told to remove the video I created and invested in, even as plans for the process of releasing the song had already begun. I wasn’t asked – I was told.

During that conversation I straight-up asked the other party, “So if you were representing me, if you were my manager in this situation, what would you advise me to do?” An awkward silence of three seconds broke into an unconvincing, self-serving, and fumbling retort: “I would tell you to remove it, so we can keep good re-

lations. Leaving it up is bad business – we’ll see what we can do for you in few weeks.”

Bad business? Aborting my release plan after it had been in motion for two weeks because you’re backing out of our original deal was good business? Or was using hip hop as a vehicle to address police brutality and urban violence bad business?

The incredible irony of the situation is that the song was uncontroversial. It was very positively received by critics and fans alike. It was written to generate empathy, not hate, and to bring more people into the conversation.

In a Billboard article, Lamar took a nuanced stance about urban violence and police brutality, and I put out a statement in support: “How can we love an artist for being complex and true with their words and then hate them for being complex and true in their words? [...] No matter the colour, we all need a seat at the table of humanity,” I wrote.

So what was the problem? Ego? Corporate control? Did I somehow infringe on Lamar’s artistic expression by using his own words (that I paid for) within a totally appropriate context? Why was I asked to censor myself to suit someone else’s agenda? Was I messing with his new Billboard magazine and mainstream oriented rebranding?

I have my own theory. Government does not hold the monopoly over the censorship of free speech.

Corporations, managers, and their officers have that power too. A department of this specific business may be run by people who have forgotten what hip hop is all about. It seems materialism, misogyny, racism, homophobia, gun culture, drug culture, and violence are perfectly cool to these corporate entities; but they lose their shit when you try to bring people together with a thoughtful and uplifting song.

There was never any disrespect intended on my part – I can’t say I feel the same about the other party.

The true problem with all of this, however, is that I’m forced to talk about the mundane workings of corporate mechanisms, rather than the problems of institutional racism, police brutality, and poverty-related crime, which I fully address in the song. Some people have said that they feel as though I’ve put words in Lamar’s mouth concerning police violence by adding names to the list of victims that was on the original track, and by releasing the song when I did. I find this claim strange seeing as I never hid the date of the song’s recording, nor did I force Lamar to participate in a song about police brutality and urban violence.

I also waited until after the unrest in the U.S. to release the song.

Having respect for Lamar’s work, and having him feature on a song with such an important message, I would like to believe that he still stands behind the content of “Heaven Help Dem.” The sad

reality is that this song is incredibly relevant and current – people are waking up to issues of injustice, and it’s forcing the media to wake up as well.

In the description box beneath the video, I had written, “‘Heaven Help Dem’ means I hope there is a higher power, or that we can find that higher power within to treat each other better […] we have to continue to grow respect for each other in our communities while militantly demanding respect from others. Past oppression, urban violence, and police brutality are deeply linked – they are painfully inseparable.”

Lamar’s management team knew the song was about police brutality. They knew the song was being released. And they knew I had no malicious intentions to diminish Lamar or his brand.

What they did not know was the extent of the song’s impact would be. Now that they do, I hope I can get back to making music before, after, and in between classes. I hope that the censorship imposed via the networks that took down “Heaven Help Dem” will cease, and that the original postings will be reinstated. I hope art will be allowed to challenge the harmful structures in our society.

Jonathan Emile is a U3 Philosophy and Political Science student To contact him, please email commentary@mcgildaily.com.

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Referendum Regarding a Fee Increase for members of the SSMU Referendum Regarding a Fee Increase for members of the PGSS Full text of the motions are available at qpirgmcgill.org/elections-qpirg-mcgill.

Campaign & Polling Periods

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Students can be on one, but not both, campaign committees for a given referendum question. Any member or voter may be on committees for multiple referendum questions.

The Chief Electoral Officer of Elections QPIRG-McGill can be reached at electionsqpirgmcgill@gmail.com

On Wednesday, February 18

The staff of

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Commentary

Paying for social cost in language

Notice of Referendum by the Quebec Public Interest Research Group (QPIRG)-McGill

The Referendum will occur between the 23rd and 28th of February. Campaigning may take place during the entire referendum period.

Polling will take place from 08:00 on February 26th until 17:00 February 28th, 2015.

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February 9, 2015 The McGill Daily | www.mcgilldaily.com

Is The Daily’s talk about prisons paradoxical?

Hera Chan Readers’ Advocate

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n empty birdcage acted as the visual pivot for two articles – one being a News piece and the other a Features piece – concerning the market venture of prisons in last week’s edition of The Daily. Neither took a vehement prison abolitionist standpoint, though that worked in their favour, and neither detailed the systems of bodily control that punitive justice by way of incarceration implies.

Molly Korab’s News article, “University students push for prison divestment” (February 2, page 7) raised a poignant question within the university context. It described groups of students at certain American universities who had become aware about their university’s holdings in private prison systems and were seeking divestment.

The question of nebulous university holdings has been raised at McGill through the ongoing tar sands and oil pipeline divestment campaign lead by Divest McGill, and in the more distant past with campaigns for the University to divest from the South African apartheid regime and tobacco companies. The latter two were successful, though little movement has been made within the administration regarding Divest McGill.

Groups such as Demilitarize McGill have already revealed damning information relating McGill’s investment portfolio with the military industry, and Korab’s article poses the possibility of a university student’s traceable relationship with the prison-industrial complex.

Continuing the theme of prisons, Nadir Khan’s feature “Mandatory minimums, maximum harm” (February 2, Page 13) focused on proving the claim that mandatory minimum sentences are absurd.

The rhetoric imbued in the text juxtaposed the social economic costs paid by the Canadian state with the effectiveness of prison sentences, creating a strange logic of capital whereby the human subjects who are incarcerated are measured by their economic cost to so-called good, tax-paying citizens.

Khan poses the question, “How do we measure the cost of the harm and pain that is caused? Are we prepared to pay it as a society?”

The use of capitalistic terms to describe a movement away from the prison industrial complex is

E.k. Chan | The McGill Daily paradoxical at best, and perhaps inescapable. It suggests that how we understand our society and the people that constitute it is through the language of capitalism.

In describing the “skyrocketing social costs, the economic cost of mandatory minimum sentencing,” “value as a bargaining chip,” “this process [as transferring] huge amounts of power from the hands of judges to Crown prosecutors,” and so forth, Khan mobilizes the words of economics to describe the absurdity of minimum sentencing in Canadian prison systems.

If words are content, and grammar the context in which those words exist, then is defining anticapitalistic tendencies using capitalistic terms not just perpetuating the prison-industrial complex?

When I write “anti-capitalistic tendencies,” I mean that which is against the commodification and control of bodies via prison systems.

I am proposing that The Daily make a movement toward reflecting

on the language it uses in delving into topics that reflect its Statement of Principles (SOP). The most obvious method of upholding the SOP is to seek out topics that showcase the voices of the normatively voiceless.

The second most obvious way to uphold the SOP is in following the standards of a more progressive politically correct language.

An additional and necessary engagement with SOP content can be found in the causal relationship between the structuring of the text and the content itself, whereby the difficulty of discussing the privatization of prisons and systems of bodily control without using controlled capitalist language is interrogated. When we say social cost, what do we mean?

Readers’ Advocate is a twicemonthly column written by Hera Chan addressing the performance, relevance, and quality of The Daily.

You can reach her at readersadvocate@mcgilldaily.com.

Commentary

February 9, 2015 www.mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

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No solidarity for police

Why police use of labour tactics is hypocritical Igor Sadikov The McGill Daily

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n late December, for about three weeks, New York police officers went on a work slowdown, effectively halting the policing of minor infractions that characterizes the New York Police Department’s (NYPD) much-criticized ‘broken windows’ approach. Compared to the previous year, arrests were down by over 60 per cent, while criminal court summonses for offences like public drinking, as well as summonses for traffic violations, were down by over 90 per cent. Although the intended effect was the opposite, this unusual situation served only to demonstrate how inessential police activity really is, as well as to illustrate the fundamental contradiction between police and the broader labour movement.

For the police officers, the slowdown was a means of expressing their frustration with New York’s mayor, Bill de Blasio. Tensions date back to de Blasio’s 2013 election campaign, when he spoke critically of the NYPD’s stop-and-frisk policing practices and allied himself with activist Al Sharpton, who has criticized and protested racialized police violence. After two police officers were shot while sitting in a patrol car on December 20, NYPD union leaders accused de Blasio of encouraging anti-police sentiment and indirectly blamed him for the killings, and police officers began the slowdown.

Ironically, the effects of the slowdown have proven police critics right.

There has been no damage to public safety, and no significant increase in crime – in fact, violent crime rates actually decreased during the first week of the slowdown. Instead, poor neighbourhoods where police harassment is usually at its worst have benefited greatly. “This is how it’s supposed to be,” a 27-year-old student from a historically black Brooklyn neighbourhood was quoted as saying in a Marshall Project piece. “I’m not talking about guys getting away with nothing, I’m talking about feeling safe. The police driving up on us, because of some hearsay, and jumping out, that don’t make us feel safe. The police smelling every drink I drink, looking in my bag every time I come out the store, that don’t make me feel safe.” That a decrease in police activity is perceived as a net social benefit points to the fact that police presence does not make communities safer; to

Anti-austerity protest in Montreal on April 3, 2014. the contrary, it further harms individuals and communities already marginalized along race and class lines.

In fact, the role of forcefully maintaining existing power relations, both formal and informal, is inseparable from the very nature of the police as an institution. In Montreal, as elsewhere, examples abound of racial profiling and racialized police brutality, systematic targeting and brutalization of homeless populations, and sexual violence against women on behalf of the police. Violence also defines the relationship between the police and the capitalist state: not only is the police force tasked with enforcing the property relations that form the basis of the capitalist social order, but it can also serve as a vehicle for ideologically motivated repression in the interests of the state. For example, Montreal municipal bylaw P-6 was amended in 2012 to give police the power to arrest and impose a fine – typically $638 – to protesters who fail to divulge their route to the police. It has been applied very selectively and with clear ideological motivations, as explicitly anti-capitalist demonstrations often ended in violent repression and mass arrests, while other illegal protests saw no

police obstruction.

It is precisely this instrumental relationship between the state and the police that is the source of the irony in the NYPD slowdown, as well as the cause of police officers’ selfcontradictory situation as workers in general. Unlike the work of other state employees, such as firefighters or nurses, which is clearly beneficial to society, police work consists of defending the interests of the state, often at the expense of other workers, students, or marginalized populations. What happens, then, when the government shows disregard for the interests of police as workers? If, in protest, they cease to act as an instrument of the state, police officers only stand to show how inessential, and in fact detrimental, their usual work is – the opposite of a strike’s intended effect. Such situations of crisis bring to light the paradoxical nature of police work, in which the defence of state interests conflicts with their interests as workers.

One may currently observe such a situation in Quebec. As part of the government’s austerity measures, police officers, along with other city employees, are being targeted with disadvantageous pension reforms.

Shane Murphy | The McGill Daily In response, Montreal police have adopted protest tactics similar to the NYPD, with traffic tickets decreasing by 35 per cent for a period in 2014 compared to the previous year. More significantly, there has been a subtle relaxation in the level of repression

“The police smelling every drink I drink, looking in my bag everytime I come out the store, that don’t make me feel safe.”

A 27-year-old student from Brooklyn at demonstrations, and although police presence is still often heavy, P-6 arrests and fines have markedly decreased. Police also did not intervene to stop a disruptive firefighter protest at city hall last August. Yves Francoeur, the president of the police union, has gone as far as to say in an interview in the lead-up to the

illegal October 31 anti-austerity protest, “In the current context, with the government we have, it’s hard to tell people to respect the regulations and laws in effect!”

One can hope that, as the struggle against austerity continues into the spring, we will see a more moderate approach to policing that will ensure peaceful demonstrations free of police provocation and repression. Still, we cannot allow police to play both sides of the field, professing solidarity with workers and demonstrators when it suits them, and violently repressing them when it doesn’t. Consistency not only allows, but requires, that we distinguish between police and other public sector workers, supporting the latter but not the former.

In the course of their regular work, police routinely direct the tremendous power at their disposal against disadvantaged groups; this cannot be justified and cannot be forgotten. We don’t need the police, and they don’t deserve our solidarity.

Igor Sadikov is a News editor at The Daily, but the views expressed here are his own. To contact him, please email igor.sadikov@mail. mcgill.ca.

This week’s web-only Commentary content Arguing against BDS To be legitimate, BDS movement must recognize international law

Features

February 9, 2015 www.mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

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Voices of Palestine

Visual by Alice Shen

Palestinian diaspora at McGill discuss their roots and identity This feature is a compilation of personal statements by five McGill students who are Palestinian and their thoughts on Palestinian identity.

Muhammad Anani — U2 Science The concept of home has been foreign to me all my life. It’s what I’ve heard people talk about when they were going ‘home’ for the break or ‘home’ to see their family, but for me home was a feeling that ran through every vein in my body. I guess I just inherited my parents’ displacement: I inherited their perseverance, determination, and longing for the day we would return ‘home,’ heads high. As a third-generation Palestinian, all I knew of my home were numbers, statistics, and death tolls on the news.

Numbers. Numbers that I couldn’t even fathom until middle school and couldn’t understand until high school, while I was living a privileged life of safety, education, and comfort in Saudi Arabia. Being so distant came with the guilt and self-resentment of having access to all the luxuries that others my age in my homeland would never experience.

And when I finally visited Palestine, I swiftly passed the thousands of Palestinians on the King Hussein Bridge, who had been waiting for days to get past the borders to see their families. While I, the privileged holder of a Canadian passport, was welcomed into ‘Israel’ with open arms. Being able to just briskly cut through the line in my separate air-conditioned bus, sipping my Starbucks and reading Albert Camus, is something that I, to this day, cannot get over. The guilt is overwhelming.

For the first time in my life I saw people behind those numbers. Furthermore, the numbers came to life as apartheid walls and illegal settlements next to my hometown, Hebron, checkpoints, and the displacement

of tens of thousands of people. My people welcomed me into their humble homes, shared their food with me, and let me sleep in their beds when we hadn’t even met before. “We knew your grandfather,” they said. “His grandson is our grandson, and our home is yours.” In that moment, I finally understood how it felt to be home.

Do not be mistaken. My honesty is not a call for sympathy. I write this solely to help you put a name to the faces you see on the news, as a reminder that the occupation of Palestine is not a distant foreign issue – it’s here.

I’ve screamed “Free Palestine” at protests and I’ve always worn a chain of the Palestinian map around my neck, but I’ve never really known ‘home’ until I had actually been home. Seeing the plight of my people, I realized that the only way to overcome my guilt is to use my privilege to help those less fortunate than myself. McGill – although not the most accommodating of places – has opened doors for me in order to achieve this: through the amazing friends I’ve made and through the groups I have been working with to advocate for Palestinian rights. I won’t stop screaming, I won’t stop calling people out, I won’t apologize for my activism until I return home; but with a Palestinian passport, through Palestinian borders, on the same bus as my Palestinian brothers and sisters.

“No matter how hard you hit it, it will stand.”

Features

February 9, 2015 www.mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

Nour Nahhas — U3 Arts “Write down! I am an Arab I have a name without a title Patient in a country Where people are enraged My roots Were entrenched before the birth of time And before the opening of the eras Before the pines, and the olive trees And before the grass grew.”

– Mahmoud Darwish It was a warm Damascene night when my grandfather sat me on his lap and began telling me stories of a place he called “home.” At the time, I was eight years of age and was struck by confusion as I realized he was not talking about Damascus. My grandfather continued to describe his experiences as a little child running around the streets of the Old City, befriending Jews, Muslims, and Christians. He reminisced about the days when he played in the backyard of his house or around the Al-Aqsa Mosque after completing Friday prayers with his father.

As he spoke of 1948, the look on his face dramatically shifted from a sweet nostalgia to that of disappointment and anger, though it never touched on hate. He was driven out of his home during Al-Nakba [which literally means “the catastrophe” and refers to the Palestinian exodus].

From that day forward, I have carried with me the pride of being half Palestinian. I was born and raised in Damascus by a Syrian father and a Palestinian mother. I have cousins who were born and raised in the Occupied Palestinian Territories and further extended family who refuse to ever leave. Growing up I had learned that a cousin of mine had once been shot and wounded during the early 2000s. Soon enough, my nickname at school became “tiflet al-hijara” or “stone-child,” due to the eruption of stone-throwing by Palestinian youths during the second Intifada. Despite the giggles it brought to my closest friends, I could not

have been more proud.

My position had never been contested back home and my stance on Palestine was never challenged due to the homogenization of the Arab mentality regarding the occupation. I was surrounded by people who constantly and collectively pushed me deeper into supporting the Palestinian cause – whether it was family, school, the media, or other members of civil society. After moving to Canada at the age of 17, I became exposed to the other side of the conflict, which without a doubt, I had regarded as fallacy.

However, hiding behind my keffiyeh was not enough to refute an argument made by a Zionist. I became more interested in the history of Palestine; I was eager to read, analyze, and defend my cause, rather than unquestioningly enforcing it on a younger generation of Arabs through Pan-Arab rhetoric.

It troubles me to know that I have yet to discover half of my identity without being able to see, hear, smell, or touch any topographies of its land firsthand. I have to rely on my grandfather’s photographs, my cousins’ storytelling nights, and the daily ruthless images shown on the news to understand what I am fighting for. The quest for this missing portion of my identity will continue to trouble me until the day I walk down the streets my grandfather played in, climb the olive trees planted by my ancestors, and show my own children the boundaries of a wall that once divided the Occupied Palestinian Territories from the rest of its historical land.

From the golden dome of Al-Aqsa to the mosaic walls of Umayyad, my identity stretches across disputed land known for its people’s generosity, religious tolerance, and ethnic pluralism. Today I am a child of conflict, oppression, and occupation; I am a child of persistence, resistance, and struggle. However, in the near future, I shall become a child of tranquility, prosperity, and finally, a child of peace.

Adam Albarghouthi — U3 Science I was born in Kuwait, grew up in Jordan, and now I live in Canada, yet I refer to myself as a Palestinian. An erratic and anchorless introduction to say the least, but that’s how it is. The Palestinian name is somewhat of a self-determined identity today, it’s barely tangible, but as a people full of pride and hope, it is being moulded over the decades into something bigger than itself. Our name is what we have left, that’s what we live for, and that’s what we strug-

gle to keep alive. I could say we’re a people of unfortunate circumstances, but the way I see it, we’re running an endurance test.

With every military checkpoint that must be crossed, every curfew, every bit of humiliation, we pass this test every single day. And as for the Palestinians that live abroad, we carry the Palestinian name wherever we go.

Regardless of the foreign documentation we pull out at customs, our blood flows and our hearts sing, we are Palestinian.

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Features

February 9, 2015 The McGill Daily | www.mcgilldaily.com

Anonymous — U2 Student I remember saying goodbye to the family that I have not seen again to this day, their last words still echoing within me. As I said goodbye to my parents, their words, too, I have not forgotten. As I left each person I had ever known who identifies as a Palestinian, they have all said the same thing: upon facing adversity while at McGill, they told me to stay true to who I was. But it was more than academic hardship that they meant, and I only fully understood this once I arrived in Montreal. They were telling me to never forget where I came from.

Being Palestinian is something I have never hidden. Despite the fact that I was never raised there, it has consistently been my immediate answer, without hesitation, as to what my origin is. I owe this pride in my roots to the resilience that the Palestinians have demonstrated for the past 65 years, to the continued fight for what is rightfully theirs, and to the tenacity in the face of human rights violations that have somehow gone unnoticed, undocumented, and unpaid for.

Time and time again, I have been asked whether I am afraid that the stranger I have just met is a Zionist. I cannot lie, on many occasions the thought has crossed my mind –

but it has never instilled any fear within me.

After encountering countless situations like this, I would like to believe that I have grown beyond the naive ideal that I can change the opinions of those who do not listen, or those who disregard my own experiences and still cite religious texts for validation of murder.

Presenting evidence on a factual basis is the only path toward understanding why the plight of the Palestinian people still exists to this day without meaningful intervention.

Each time I announce my heritage, I usually receive positive responses. Overwhelmed with questions, a flame ignites within my heart because I am asked about Palestine. I am not asked of my fears, but rather about the truth. I am asked about what it is like to visit – the checkpoints, the terrorizing soldiers with guns everywhere you look, the restrictions on which land you can and cannot enter. I am asked about my family, and although those asking are strangers, they are believers in humanity and thus care for the wellbeing of a human, whomever they may be. That is what is important. That is what we overlook so often: that we become lost in the politics of war and forget that we are human first and above all else.

Yasmine Mosimann — ­ U1 Arts I’ve been trying to write this piece for the past three days, but it has launched me into a bit of an existential crisis. If circumstances were a bit different, I may not have ever identified as a Palestinian. If blood were the determining factor, it certainly would not have taken as much of a precedent. I have three other nationalities to call my own, with passports that allow me access to most places without question. I did not grow up around my Palestinian family or other Palestinians. I speak a broken Egyptian Arabic that Palestinians laugh at. The blonde peach fuzz on my forearms isn’t particularly ‘Palestinian-looking’ – whatever that is. And I certainly wasn’t born in Palestine. Yet I don’t feel closer to any other nationality than my Palestinian one.

Palestinians are in the uncomfortable predicament that there once was a Palestine and that there could have been a Palestine. We live knowing that our families once had a deep connection to a land where our ancestors had

lived for generations. Growing up with this knowledge feels like something much greater was stolen away from you besides the land, the olive trees, and the shores of the Mediterranean: a sense of belonging, that minorities may not be able to feel fully in countries out of their origin, without completely ridding themselves of their distinct heritages. This tension between integrating and keeping your culture is still present in societies that claim to value diversity, like Canada.

I grew up in constant envy of everything permanent around me. 15 apartments, ten schools, ten father figures, and four countries later, I am here with very little sense of being grounded. But as selfish as it sounds, in a way, my sense of not belonging has been healed by my people’s displacement. Because in our exile, I feel an affinity with the common feelings of loss, but also hope for the future. A free Palestine, for me, would not only ground an entire people as a collective, but also myself.

Sci+Tech

February 9, 2015 www.mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

15

Speaking of perspective

Research suggests bilingualism increases tolerance Marc Cataford Sci+Tech Writer

W

e often hear that a great deal of what we are as adults is shaped by our younger selves. A new study set to appear in Developmental Science will shed some light on how learning languages might help children understand that certain personality traits come from experience instead of being innate. Krista Byers-Heinlein, assistant professor of psychology at Concordia and lead author of the study, interviewed a total of 48 monolingual, sequential bilingual (individuals who learned languages one after the other), and simultaneous bilingual (individuals who learned languages concurrently) children, and used short stories to gauge their beliefs about what is innate and what is learned.

Some in the comfort of their kindergarten and others at ByersHeinlein’s laboratory, children were shown pictures of fictitious human families and cartoon animals. The pictures were associated with various stories. For instance, some were about children who were brought up in a family of their own heritage,

and others about children brought up by parents of a different heritage – for example, an Italian child raised by parents that don’t speak Italian. There were also stories about animals, for example, a duck raised by dogs. Then, they were asked if the child would adopt the language of its adoptive parents or, in the case of the animal families, if the young duck would behave like its own kind.

The results of the study surprised Byers-Heinlein, who had hypothesized that the children would know the difference between the animals barking and quacking, and children speaking languages, the former being innate behaviour and the latter learned. It was revealed that both the monolingual and bilingual children made mistakes answering the questions. For instance, bilingual children concluded that “a duck raised by dogs would bark and run rather than quack and fly,” and monolingual children assumed that a child would keep their biological parents’ language, despite being raised by people who didn’t speak it. In the first case, the children incorrectly believed that traits were learned, and in the second, they falsely assumed that language

Karen Chiang | Illustrator was inherent.

The implications of these results extend far beyond the thought process of five- and six-year-olds.

The beliefs of children might very well be linked to the ones they hold as they develop into adulthood,

leading Byers-Heinlein to conclude that “early second language education could be used to promote the acceptance of human social and physical diversity,” which could essentially make adults more open to different beliefs. While the present

study wasn’t explicitly designed to analyze adult beliefs, these results suggest that learning additional languages as adults might also have a somewhat similar effect. However, further research is required to prove this.

Are emotions contagious?

The neuroscience behind empathy

Leanne Louie The McGill Daily

E

mpathy is defined as the capacity to understand another person — the ability to place yourself into someone else’s shoes. But research suggests that the human capacity for empathy may extend beyond simple insight into another’s point of view: it could involve actual contagion of perspective.

This may sound extraordinary at first, but it actually is quite intuitive. As another person’s emotional state is empathized with, it is imagined and, in a sense, experienced by the empathizer. Indeed, research has found that when we empathize with a particular emotion, the same brain circuits involved in the actual experience are activated. In a 2003 study using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), a technique that measures brain activity, researchers exposed participants to a foul odourant and video recorded their facial responses.

Afterward, when the participants were shown the clips of their faces, they were found to have similar brain activity as they’d had during

the firsthand experience.

This process of emotional contagion could also be linked to the human tendency for mimicry. People automatically imitate others during social interactions, copying facial expressions, postures, and even vocal intonations. Research has shown that mimicking the physical representations of certain emotions can lead to the adoption of those same emotional states. For example, when we smile, we tend to feel happiness, and when we stand tall with our hands on our hips, we experience more confidence. Thus, mimicking others has the potential to cause transmission of their emotions.

Whether in the form of mirrored brain activity or copied facial expressions, research has confirmed that feelings certainly are contagious. In a 2002 study at Yale investigating transference of emotions among members of a group, a single participant’s mood was found to significantly influence the emotional states of fellow group members. This process has even been shown to occur through social media. In a contro-

versial study conducted through Facebook, researchers reduced either the positive or negative emotional content of people’s news feeds. Those with more positive news feeds were found to post less negative and more positive material, and the opposite occurred for people with negatively weighted news feeds. Thus, in the absence of first hand interaction, emotions seem to be contagious.

Recent research at McGill indicates that the experience of empathy and emotional contagion could depend on the degree of familiarity between people. In an experiment led by McGill neuroscientist Jeffrey Mogil, people were asked to rate their pain levels while soaking their hands in a bucket of cold water. Then, they were paired with either someone they knew or a stranger. When only one person out of the pair was soaking their hand, their pain rating matched their solo report. However, when both were in pain, people familiar with each other reported a higher perception of the pain than when they experienced it alone, whereas paired strangers reported the same

levels as they had individually.

“The reason for this is the stress of exposure to strangers,” Mogil told the Daily. When this stress was blocked through the administration of drugs, strangers were effectively transformed into friends, experiencing the same increase in pain perception as the participants that had known each other. Playing a game of Rock Band together before the experiment was also found to prevent this stress, as the participants familiarized and became susceptible to pain contagion.

In the harsh world of ‘survival of the fittest,’ empathy may seem like a relatively useless ability, especially considering the disadvantageous forms it can take, like pain contagion. However, empathy is likely the evolved product of highly important survival tactics. Within a herd, individuals must be attuned to the emotional states of the animals around them to ensure survival. If an antelope senses a threat, it will panic and run, and the ability of surrounding antelopes to recognize and mimic this action will determine their

ability to escape danger. Empathy is also a vital aspect of teamwork, communication, and parental care abilities that are central to survival in social animals.

From its evolutionary roots as an instinct to nurse wailing newborns and blindly run after panicking herd mates, empathy has grown into one of the most valued qualities in human society. However, as of yet, researchers are still unsure of the exact mechanisms behind it. Understanding the neural circuits behind empathy could significantly increase our insight into not only human psychology, but also the nature of many empathy-related developmental, neurological, and psychiatric conditions, such as autism, schizophrenia, and psychopathy. Already, our increasing understanding of the brain has allowed for experiments in empathy modulation, from administration of hormones to brain stimulation techniques. Many of these techniques seem to be effective and show promise. While the implications of this research are insightful, there is a strong need for further research.

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Sci+Tech

February 9, 2015 The McGill Daily | www.mcgilldaily.com

How seashells inspired ‘unbreakable’ glass McGill researchers taking a page from nature

Rackeb Tesfaye The McGill Daily

T

he days of sweeping up little pieces of a glass cup you accidentally dropped, feeling overwhelming panic when your iPhone hits the floor (yes, the screen is probably cracked), or having to cover that broken window with good ol’ saran wrap and cardboard might be over.

Researchers at McGill’s department of Mechanical Engineering, led by Francois Barthelat, have developed a new technique that increases the toughness of glass by a factor of 200.

The research was inspired by, of all things, seashells. Barthelat explains that they are the “perfect models of nature to mimic, because of their very complex architecture.” Seashells (for example mollusk shells) are composed of mainly brittle ingredients, like chalk, but their inner layer contains mother of pearl (or nacre), a natural material composed of microscopic patterns known to be extremely strong and tough. Barthelat and his team focused their work on how seashells behave and deform, and specifically studied the internal weak boundaries of materials like nacre. Using their understanding of these boundaries, the research team used lasers to engrave jigsaw-like networks of 3D micro-cracks into glass slides, mimicking these weak boundaries.

Their technique amplified the toughness of the glass, overcoming its main downfall of being brittle.

The micro-cracks served as a con-

trol mechanism for stopping other cracks from branching and becoming larger, absorbing energy from the impact in the process. By segmenting the glass material and creating weak interfaces, they were able to guide and localize the damage.

Using nature as a muse for innovative and sustainable solutions, such as synthesizing new material, is referred to as biomimicry, which translates to “imitation of nature,” from the Greek words bios and mimesis. Barthelat emphasizes the importance of drawing inspiration from nature, calling the process as common sense, as it draws upon natural materials that have withstood the test of time.

Mohammad Mirkhalaf, a former PhD student in Barthelat’s Biomimetic Materials Lab, and current postdoctoral researcher, expanded upon this. “Natural materials have evolved for millions of years, they are optimized materials. For instance, seashells are 3,000 times tougher than the materials they are made of… you can learn a lot from how they deform and behave and decide how these mechanisms translate into synthetic materials for your work.” Mirkhalaf went on to highlight the importance of this research, explaining that “synthetic materials are really reaching their limits and engineers can’t do much more, there are ways of improving these materials… our inspiration is optimization of these materials and providing new and better materials to work with.”

So what would happen if you

were to drop this new, tougher glass? Well, according to Barthelat, nothing really. “It would deform a little and absorb the energy from the impact.” Rather than shattering into little pieces, which you somehow manage to find weeks later (even after a thorough clean), the glass just bends or dents upon impact. Although Barthelat does mention there are current height limitations, as the glass would shatter if dropped from great heights, they are trying to improve this through more research, by using “an impact tower, where you drop stuff and see if it breaks.”

There has been some concern expressed over how this glass is produced and if it would cause recycling problems, but Barthelat was quick to dismiss these worries stating that the “glass has the same properties, we don’t change the chemistry, we are just putting in defects, micro-cracks, it’s very environmentally friendly.” He also added that the glass “is actually cheaper to produce” compared to current manufacturing processes.

Though tight-lipped, Barthelat said they “are currently working with companies for specific applications,” giving no specific timelines.

He mentions that the applications are endless, impacting industries that produce “windows, drinking glasses, electronics, and anywhere you see glass.”

The team is now looking to expand their research to other materials like ceramics. Barthelat is very excited to “explore the realm

Jonathan Reid | The McGill Daily of applications,” referring to this research as a “breakthrough,” sentiments Mirkhalaf shares. “The question is, can we do what nature does?” he says. “I’m excited because I think it’s the next generation of materials,” Mirkhalaf adds.

Mirkhalaf described his PhD research as an “amazing experience.”

His advice to future students want-

ing to get into academic research is to “think hard about what you’re doing and don’t get upset too easily.” Research can be a lengthy and difficult process, which is why it is important to remain determined and continue. Who knows what other breakthroughs will occur when your determination is as tough as glass.

Where nature meets machine McGill plans to offer new bioengineering program

Jill Bachelder The McGill Daily

T

his winter semester marked the debut of bioengineering classes at McGill. The new program has been designed as interdisciplinary and aims to broaden the scope of McGill’s Engineering program.

“Bioengineering is a rapidly evolving field that requires highly interdisciplinary training in both engineering and natural/life [sic] sciences that is not provided by traditional Engineering departments,” Georgios Mitsis, assistant professor in the department of Biomedical Engineering, told The Daily in an email. “[This new department] will be one of the very few dedicated departments in Canada to provide an undergraduate degree that will [...] place considerable emphasis

on fundamental biology principles as guides for Engineering design,” he said.

In an email to The Daily, Nancy Nelson, advisor at the department of Biology, said that student representatives from interdisciplinary biology programs helped gather suggestions from their peers. According to Nelson, one benefit of the program will be the availability of bioengineering classes for science students. It also coincides with an “upcoming review and updating of the interdisciplinary programs offered by the Biology department.”

Brandon Xia, associate professor in the department of Biomedical Engineering, told The Daily in an email that the program’s start date will depend on whether or not it is approved by the Bureau de coopération interuniversitaire.

Tamim Sujat | The McGill Daily “If the decision is favourable, we will start the admission process right away. If the decision is unfavourable, we will need to re-

vise and resubmit the proposal,” Xia said. The program has already been approved by internal committees within McGill.

According to Xia, the new program will be taught by professors from a variety of faculties, including Engineering, Medicine, and Science.

Sports

February 9, 2015 www.mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

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The Gaelic revival in Canada Irish sports come to Concordia

Emmet Livingstone The McGill Daily

I

rish national sports are ancient, with a history that dates back over a thousand years. The Gaelic games – Gaelic football and hurling – are fast and violent, and they remain Ireland’s most popular sports. Yet few in North America are aware they even exist. This might change with the creation of the Concordia Warriors-Óglaigh Ollscoile club, the first university Gaelic games club in Canada.

The Daily spoke to Daithí Mac Fhlaithimh, a visiting Irish language scholar at Concordia and the club’s founder. “I just wanted to share the experience,” he said, referring to a childhood steeped in hurling culture. “It’s an overall cultural thing I wanted to bring.”

Mac Fhlaithimh’s motivation seems to be paying off. The club already has a small but dedicated membership. Those involved

range from the expected Irish Canadians and Irish Quebecers, to people who have no previous cultural connection with Ireland. All the members The Daily spoke to, however, stressed that it was not an exclusively Irish project, and that their motivation for joining was largely the allure of the sports themselves. As one of the members said, “We’re not playing just because it’s Irish, we’re playing because we want to play.”

“I like the fact that [Gaelic football is] fast-paced. You’re always on your feet, there’s no breather […] I’m used to playing curling, in which you have more than a breather,” explained U1 Canadian Irish Studies student Roxane Jarvis-Patenaude.

“I find it really cool to see how similar it is to games that we actually know. And then see how this game is actually older than all of them.”

The link between Irish culture and the Gaelic games is there, however. Mac Fhlaithimh told

The Daily of his admiration for the history of hurling and how “you’re linked to your past through hurling as an Irishman.” Gaelic sports crosses borders, he added, and for many Highland Scots, shinty (a sport related to hurling) is also a sign of identity. An interesting fact of Concordia’s club, and perhaps an indication of the new progressiveness of Gaelic games, is that players are free to identify with them however they like.

The name of the club too, Óglaigh Ollscoile, is culturally and politically significant. ‘Óglaigh’ is Irish word for ‘young warrior,’ and appears frequently in Irish myths.

It was also a word used by revolutionaries to describe themselves in 1916 in the Easter Rising, an uprising against British rule. The club is named in honour of the uprising’s centenary celebrations next year.

When the political connotation was brought up, members were still at pains to stress that the intention

was inclusive rather than divisive.

“The team is named after the Irish volunteers, [so] there is that aspect of nationalism. [But] it’s not political or positional – it’s respectful,” said Jarvis-Patenaude.

“Friendship, fun, and coming home with a few black eyes every now and again.”

Daithí Mac Fhlaithimh, club co-founder Mac Fhlaithimh also admitted that the name of the club has political connotations, but he argued that Ireland had moved on. An inspiration, he said, was a former president of Ireland’s Gaelic Athletic Association who went out his way to include people from the opposing political tradition in the sport.

“It’s a mad mix […] it’s all about people getting together and having fun. That’s the main reason [for getting involved],” he continued. Other members all agreed, saying that their experience so far had been overwhelmingly positive and welcoming.

The club already has plans to participate in the North American university championships (the U.S. has nine university Gaelic games clubs), and members were enthusiastic about the prospect of meeting people through the sport.

Their hope is that they attract enough players to form the basis for lasting Gaelic football and hurling teams, and stated the club is open to anyone interested – not just Concordia students.

“That’s the name of the game,” said Mac Fhlaithimh, speaking about the inclusivity of the sport.

“Friendship, fun, and coming home with a few black eyes every now and again.”

Scoreboard Redmen

Martlets

Men’s Basketball

Women’s Basketball

vs Concordia at UQAM vs UQAM

Men’s Ice Hockey at UQTR vs UOIT

Men’s Soccer

vs UQAM (indoor) vs Montreal (indoor)

W 65 – 60 vs UQAM L 59 – 65 at UQAM W 71 – 65 vs Concordia

Women’s Volleyball

W 5 – 2 vs Montreal W 4 – 1 vs Laval

Women’s Ice Hockey

L 0 – 4 at Montreal L 1 – 4 vs Carleton

L 71 – 76 W 57 – 55 W 65 – 54 L0–3 W3–2 L0–5 W7–2

You could be the next Bob McKenzie. Write for Sports. sports@mcgilldaily.com

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Sports

February 9, 2015 The McGill Daily | www.mcgilldaily.com

Race to the bottom

Tanking has become the new winning Madison Smith The McGill Daily

W

hat are sports? Why do people watch them, or care about them? Why do I care about them?

These are vexing questions.

Sports can be seen (and are seen by quite a few people) as an egregious waste of time and resources, of no benefit to anyone apart from Budweiser and the kleptocrats who own teams. They feature, on a grand scale, people performing feats of extreme difficulty for no reason other than to demonstrate physical prowess and to entertain. They seem like a colossal waste of everyone’s time.

While I am in some ways sympathetic to this view of sports, I believe it to be an oversimplification. A life without entertainment is a quite dull one and, to my mind, not one worth living.

Athletics, at least as practiced by those in its upper echelons, is an activity glorious to behold, a demonstration of skill and grace as beautiful and mesmerizing as the best art. The viewer gets to share in the glories and disappointments of their uniformed champions, to feel the joys of victory and the sorrows of bitter defeat. Sports, at least in some way, combine the visual splendour of fine art with the heightened drama of fictional narratives. They thrill and chill and divert us from the often humdrum experiences of our day to day lives.

At least, this is what professional sports do when they are working as they should. When they feature players working at the top of their game, trying their hardest to win the match, to top the standings, to make the playoffs, to win the championship. in other words, when they are true competitions.

However, in certain professional sports, this is not always the case.

There are times when baseball, basketball, and hockey, in a very real way, fail to be sports. They fail to accomplish the basic premise of sports: that two opposing sides attempt to achieve victory over each other. Now teams are losing on purpose in order to secure a better draft pick; this phenomenon is called tanking. The National Basketball Association (NBA), National Hockey League (NHL), and Major League Baseball (MLB) all, in one way or another, incentivize tanking, and they are murdering the very concept of sports right before our eyes.

I have skin in this game right now because my home basket-

Nadia Boachie | The McGill Daily ball team, the Philadelphia 76ers (the Sixers to any local) are in the midst of making a mockery

The NBA has been home to tanking teams since time immemorial. of basketball in a historic way. In basketball, there is a lottery system to determine which teams get the top picks in the draft, and the worst teams from the previous year have a higher chance of receiving better draft spots, giving them a better chance of signing the premium talent entering the league from college. The NBA has been a home to tanking teams since time immemorial, but until recently there has always seemed to be an unspoken agreement that teams shouldn’t be too flagrantly obvious about it. The Sixers decided to flout this precedent last year by ditching almost anyone on their team with talent halfway through the season and embarking on a historic 26-game losing streak. This year, they dismantled themselves further, employing an

entire roster of no-name non-talent, losing the first 17 games of the season (which almost broke the record for worst start ever). There was talk that they would break the record for worst NBA season ever, a record which coincidentally belongs to a previous Sixers team.

‘Disappointingly,’ they now have won 11 games, and are no longer in the running for that record (at least they could have been the best at something!).

The 2014-15 Sixers feel like a piece of anti-basketball performance art designed to highlight the hypocrisies of the NBA. There’s something surreal about watching professional basketball players try their hardest to win games and just be completely incapable of doing so because they are all so bad. Deadspin has pointed out that this year’s Sixers are so bad that their opponents get to use Sixers games as an opportunity to let their star players rest; on average, the three best players on teams that played the Sixers played two minutes less against the Sixers than against other opponents. And they don’t even have the worst record in their division; that crown goes to the New York

Knicks, who have just recently gotten into double-digits in the win column. Tanking has become so widespread in basketball that the team doing it the most shamelessly isn’t even the best at it this year. This does not bode well for the future of the sport, and one

There’s something surreal about watching professional basketball players try their hardest to win games and just be completely incapable of doing so because they are all so bad. fears that if the Sixers’ gamble pays off, NHL owners will take note, as the leauge has a similar draft System that gives the teams with the worst records the greatest chance of a high draft pick. It

can even be argued that certain NHL teams are already tanking in order to have a chance at drafting one of two generational players, Connor McDavid and Jack Eichel.

Sports are supposed to provide entertainment. The Sixers are putatively an entertainment organization. They are manifestly failing to fulfill their purpose for existing.

Defenders of the tanking strategy say that tanking is just a necessary step in the process of building up a championship team. I say: I don’t care! Firstly, there is no guarantee that a terrible team’s high place in the draft will get them a franchise player who will lift them from their terribleness. Take the Edmonton Oilers, for example, who have had three first overall picks in four years and are still god-awful. Second, I would much rather watch a mediocre but competitive team fight it out every night over a manifestation of long-term business planning lose by design.

That’s really what’s at stake here.

This year’s Sixers, and all teams that intentionally tank, aren’t sports teams so much as regrettable side effects of a long-term investment scheme. And nobody wants to watch that on TV.

Culture

February 9, 2015 www.mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

19

A kaleidoscopic view of mental health Film festival opens dialogue on difficult issues

Kateryna Gordiychuk The McGill Daily

M

ental health issues are often thought of as the neighbour’s headache – if you’re not experiencing them, they’re not your problem. On January 29, members of the McGill community gathered for the Kaleidoscope Mental Health Film Festival, an evening of art and discussion that presented an alternative attitude: mental health issues as a collective problem. Presented by McGill Residences and the McGill Students’ Chapter of jack.org, a mental health organization, the festival aimed to “dispel the stigmas [around] mental health,” as stated by Simrin Desai, one of the festival’s organizers.

The evening featured short films about people experiencing depression, anxiety, and other problems, and how they were able to deal with those issues. The films were intertwined with spoken-word performances, followed by a discussion between attendees and panelists, three of whom were McGill students.

The emotionally moving films set the tone for the evening, indicating that this was not a night for abstract discussion. Designed to make the viewers relate to characters’ life stories, the short screenings impressed with their frankness and accessibility, depicting mental health from a variety of perspectives. The Pamplemousse, an adaptation of the award-winning Canadian play

7 Stories, told the story of a young artist and a lonely man who meet at a Quebec City museum, showing the power of expression in their silent communication. Like Minds followed the life of a homeless man who deals with schizophrenia by establishing friendships with those who have similarly creative minds.

In different ways, they all conveyed the same message: human communication matters, and that what everyone needs is understanding.

While many films emphasized the connections individuals use to find consolation during difficult times, the two spoken word artists at the event demonstrated what to do if seeking help from others fails, as it sometimes does. For them, poetry is a way of expression, a dark casket that can keep the secrets humans can’t make sense of. “Art functions as a refuge, as we are usually taught to be silent about what’s going on in our heads,” explained Logan Peaker, a panelist and one of the organizers of the festival.

Two paintings created by McGill students were also featured, demonstrating yet another path one can take for self-expression in times of struggle. The attendees were free to leave their comments or thoughts on a sheet of paper, which created a sense of belonging in this diverse community of artists and attendees.

Taking the evening in a different direction, Kai Cheng Thom, a writer and Master’s Student in Social Work, and former columnist at The

Lia Elbaz | Illustrator Daily, initiated a discussion on mental health in today’s society. In their spoken word presentation, the artist read out formal diagnoses of mental health patients with stupefying bluntness, exposing how the medical treatment of mental illness often carelessly puts people into boxes.

Desai later addressed the positives and negatives of these diagnoses in the panel discussion, explaining that they allow those with mental health

issues to search for resources they need, while at the same time labeling them and referring to them as categories, not individuals.

Thom’s performance pointed to the arbitrary definition of normality, revealing the flaws in a system where people have to be dehumanized to receive help. “The reason why there’s so much stigma is the idea that people with mental illness are somehow not human or not

totally normal, there is something wrong and contagious about them, they should be shut away from the rest of society,” they explained to The Daily. “Hopefully, it is starting to change.” In highlighting the intersection of art and mental health and by opening up this discourse on mental health in a university setting, events like the Kaleidoscope Mental Health Film Festival are part of making that change a reality.

Reading in solidarity

International campaign raises awarenes of Palestinian experiences Laila Omar Culture Writer

A

s Amal Abulheja flees from Ein Hod village in 1948 to Jenin, then to Jerusalem, to Beirut, and to Philadelphia, she never forgets how her missing father used to read to her at dawn. Written by Palestinian-American activist Susan Abulhawa, Mornings in Jenin follows the Abulheja family as they face countless hardships and displacements. On January 29, the McGill Institute of Islamic Studies hosted a public discussion about the novel as a follow-up to a discussion held earlier last month. This was part of the “One Book, Many Communities” international reading campaign organized

by Librarians and Archivists with Palestine (LAP), a network of information workers that aims to protect Palestinian cultural property and to raise awareness about the Palestinian struggle for self-determination.

Mornings in Jenin vividly depicts one family’s tragedy, while also reflecting on the struggle of an entire nation. When asked why this novel was featured in the reading campaign, Andrea Miller-Nesbitt, a McGill librarian and LAP member, told The Daily, “It’s a fairly accessible book, not really an academic one [...] With or without understanding of the Palestinian question, readers learn more about the history and get a picture of the experiences of Palestinians.” Through moments filled with love, fear, and loss, the novel forces the reader to look at this complicated political conflict through a deeply personal lens.

At McGill, participants in “One Book, Many Communities” came together to delve into the novel’s painful depths and discuss broader themes – everything from historical events to the role of gender and queer politics in the novel and in the Palestinian struggle. Participants

approached the novel from varying angles, some with a more literary focus, others taking on the sociopolitical issues at the novel’s core. Many focused on the novel’s portrayal of Palestinian women and how it challenges stereotypes. Some pointed to Amal, for example, who decides to move to Jerusalem to pursue her education instead of following what’s considered a more ‘traditional’ path.

That the novel counters misrepresentations of Palestinians and their experiences is also evident in tweets from those participating in the reading campaign around the world. A twitter hashtag (#lap1book) was used to allow for interaction between international communities participating in similar discussions – from Sweden, the U.S., Italy, Ramallah, and Tel Aviv. LAP (@Librarians2Palestine) tweeted, “Some #lap1book attendees ‘were shocked, dismayed, saddened by the level of their ignorance of the events of the

Nakba + subsequent history.’” Another participant in New York City wrote, “I cannot think of a book that has changed my reading of the news more than MORNINGS IN JENIN.” The discussion at McGill drew to a close with a simple, yet perhaps the most pressing, question: is there hope in the Palestinian struggle? Simone Fillon-Raff, a U0 Arts student, answered by explaining that Abulhawa was “writing this novel to give voices to narratives that have been lost in history.” She added, “I feel like there is, to a certain extent, hope, because if people keep taking these stories that are written or acknowledged, eventually something has to happen. You can’t read that and not think there is something we can do.”

The event itself was a hopeful gathering. Michelle Hartman, a professor of Arabic Literature at the Institute of Islamic Studies at McGill, told The Daily, “It’s inspiring to have so many people focus on a work of

literature, and one about Palestine in particular.” When asked about the importance of the event, Sofia Enault de Cambra, a U1 student majoring in International Development and minoring in Middle East Studies, noted “These meetings helped me break away from [an exclusively political reading] and be able to enjoy the more poetic, quest of identity, message aspect of Abulhawa’s work.”

When a major conflict such as the Israeli-Palestinian one does not appear to have a tranquil future, campaigns like “One Book, Many Communities” can humanize the conflict and the atrocities faced by these populations for over sixty years. A powerful book like Mornings in Jenin can draw communities into awareness of the overlooked and silenced struggles of Palestinians. In featuring this book, the reading campaign marked an important step in giving lived experiences the attention they deserve.

20

Culture

February 9, 2015 The McGill Daily | www.mcgilldaily.com

Orientalism on display New exhibit, same old colonial tradition

Sonia Larbi-Aissa Culture Writer

“

Marvels and Mirages of Orientalism: From Spain to Morocco, Benjamin-Constant in His Time” is Canada’s first large exhibit dedicated to Orientalism. Without a doubt, the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA) has spent sizable amounts of time, effort, and money in reuniting the life works of French orientalist painter, JeanJoseph Benjamin-Constant. More doubtful is whether similar resources were employed to ensure that such problematic subject matter would be displayed in a not-so -problematic way.

The sound of Andalusian music guides visitors up the escalators and into Bourgie Hall, where a cringe-worthy scene awaits.

Montrealers relax in dim lighting, standing underneath tacky Bedouin-esque tents as servers circle around to take drink orders.

L’Orchestre arabo-andalou de Fès, subsidized by the Consulate General of the Kingdom of Morocco, are relegated to a shadowy corner to play ‘authentic’ music for the guests’ enjoyment. The scene mirrors Benjamin-Constant’s Interior of a Harem in Morocco, the giant painting hanging upstairs.

The walls in the first room of the exhibit are painted a sumptuously dark red, enveloping the paintings on display with more esteem than should be accorded to them. Quotes from BenjaminConstant appear on the walls: “See what I have to spend in pigments and canvases and for models and studio hire when the picture is too big for my own atelier.

And when, after months of work, I have finished one of these big paintings, what does it sell for?”

These comments are inscribed with gold lettering, in stunning contrast with the burgundy, a royal treatment for BenjaminConstant’s commodification of the cultures he painted.

And then there is room after room of paintings collected from places as disparate as Toulouse and Philadelphia, each putting the artist’s commodifying words into practice. There’s no denying that the paintings are visually stunning. But they are also stunningly objectifying. Each exquisite odalisque – a slave or concubine in a harem – lying supine on a bed, tile ledge, or blanketed floor, baring all under the Western male gaze, is an ode to colonial exoticization. Lest the museum fool us into thinking this dehumanizing practice is a thing

Andy Wei | The McGill Daily of the past, we should seriously consider the implications of such a shameless celebration of colonial misogyny in the 21st century.

The main argument for the existence of “Marvels and Mirages” is ‘art for art’s sake’; but when that art is inherently racist and misogynistic, it does not have a place in modern art institutions.

Orientalism as an art movement is deeply embedded in the racist attitudes of the European empires and their dehumanizing depictions of colonial subjects.

Artists were sent by the French elite as emissaries to ‘the Orient’ – i.e., Moorish Spain and North Africa – to document and illustrate how the people of those far-away colonial holdings looked and acted. Others like Benjamin-

Constant journeyed east on their own accord to search for romanticized and ‘exotic’ inspiration.

The result was a breathtakingly one-dimensional and unashamedly racist portrayal of a culture that, a depiction that, arguably, persists today. There are serious questions to be asked about why such works of art are still considered appropriate for and worthy of display.

As Edward Said writes in his critical work Orientalism, women in the works of orientalists “are usually the creatures of a male power-fantasy. They express unlimited sensuality, they are more or less stupid, and above all they are willing.” The MMFA’s noncommittal attempt to briefly address this issue with a few modern pieces by female Moroccan artists Yasmina Bouziane, Lalla Essaydi, and Majida Khattari in the last room of the exhibit is not enough.

Bouziane’s self-portrait Untitled no. 6, alias “The Signature,” which the MMFA claims “uses humour” to subvert colonial photographic practices, is anything but funny. Bouziane’s piece defiantly subverts the orientalist’s voyeuristic gaze by pointing a camera toward the viewer. The fake greenery and shabby backdrop mock the sumptuous surroundings of the female subjects in the next room. This photograph is a direct

and powerful response to the underlying assumptions of the entire exhibit, but one relatively small photo is not enough to mitigate the institutional enshrinement of those assumptions.

The inclusion of the contemporary artists seems shallow and tokenizing in the context of the exhibit. The inclusion of all of two of Essaydi’s pieces, among at least twenty from Benjamin-Constant, is not a dialogue between the artists, no matter what the MMFA claims. Granted, the exhibit is centred on the French artist, but the question remains: should it be? Wouldn’t a true dialogue on orientalism look less like a 10:1 ratio and more like an Essaydi for every Benjamin-Constant? Affording the dissenting voice as much physical space as the antiquated point of view would at least present a sincere acknowledgement of the cultural violence committed

by Benjamin-Constant’s paintings.

The main argument for the existence of “Marvels and Mirages” is ‘art for art’s sake;’ but when that art is inherently racist and misogynistic, it does not have a place in modern art institutions. Sure, Benjamin-Constant was a masterful painter who utilized a daring pallette and travelled a bit farther than the average Toulousian, but that does not warrant such an outpouring of academic study and

funds to showcase it. It was the conscious choice of the MMFA curatorial team to enshrine orientalism in a Canadian institution of art for the first time, with only token regard to the pain and indignation it could cause those who still face the material consequences of the works produced by the likes of Benjamin-Constant.

“Marvels and Mirages” features a style and era of painting many would rather forget. Still, the museum’s attempts to create a “dialogue” concerning the problematic nature of the exhibit should not go unacknowledged – in fact, particularly careful attention should be paid to the hardhitting contemporary responses to orientalism. However, we must also acknowledge that this attempt at a conversation was not effective. In a city that accounts for 37.2 per cent of the Arab population of Canada, the notable lack of attendance from individuals of Middle Eastern or North African heritage is a stronger comment on the problematic nature of “Marvels and Mirages” than the contemporary responses exhibited in the last room.

“Marvels and Mirages of Orientalism: From Spain to Morocco, Benjamin-Constant in His Time” is on at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts until May 31.

Culture

February 9, 2015 www.mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

21

Getting personal with Po Lazarus The up-and-coming Montreal band talks performing and poutine

Jasmine Lee Culture Writer

P

o Lazarus is a local four-piece band with a unique sound and a lot of charisma. Their music blends traditional genres in a 21st century setting, such as folk, rock, garage folk, and indie, just to name a few. The group has been cultivating their style and their fanbase for a few years now in Montreal, and in 2014 they released their debut EP. Now, they’re fundraising to record their first LP. The Daily sat down with three members of Po to get the details on the upcoming album, as well as the story behind their name, and their poutine preferences.

MD: Tell me about yourselves!

How did you guys get together?

Josh (vocals, guitar, ukelele): We all met in CEGEP on the South Shore of Montreal, and we swiftly exchanged musical tastes and picked up guitars, Paul and I specifically, and started writing songs immediately as we learnt the chords.

MD: Why did you choose the name Po Lazarus?

Josh: There’s a famous old song called “Po Lazarus” that is a chant or a chain gang song made famous by the O Brother Where Art Thou soundtrack. Great movie. It’s just a song about a criminal named Lazarus who hides up in the mountains while he’s wanted, and eventually the deputies slay him and bring him down the mountain, much like our ultimate demise…

MD: On your Facebook page it says [that you produce] “anthemic love dirges meant for the Spitbucket.”

What does that mean?

Paul (bass, rhythm guitar): The Spitbucket is actually a location where we create a lot of our music, that’s our jam space on St. Antoine just down the street over here, and I guess we do play some sort of anthemic sort of music. At least in our

spirit, we feel as if they are anthems of our lives in a way, and love is a big part of our lives I guess… You know how it is, we’re young men, drinking and loving… and playing music in dirty, dirty places.

M.O. (drums): I think what could be mundane in life is brought to a more magical level through the lyrics that Josh and Paul write, and that’s part of how we describe ourselves.

MD: What have you guys been working on?

Josh: We’re constantly working on the songs, constantly working on our instruments, and very shortly we’re going to be going into the studio and recording our debut album. We’re just practicing to try and have it down perfectly so that we can get into a little trouble in the studio... and I’m sure we will get into trouble!

MD: Do you guys already know what direction the debut album is going in? Do you guys have a good solid outline? [Right now] you’re kind of a mix of blues, garage, rock...

Paul: Sometimes it’s really hard to put things into words about the band because there are so many varied genres that we incorporate, it’s all very instinct[ive] and innate for us.

M.O.: I think this album is going to be the birth of that, and then you’ll be able to classify us. But don’t do [it] until then.

MD: Any major differences between the EP and the debut album?

Josh: Well I mean the EP is classically what you’re working on, and then you put out an album. It’s going to definitely have many of those elements, it’s sort of eclectic, that EP. We think there’s some triumphs on it, we think there’s some losses, but now we’re very much planning out this album so that it’s gonna be the best it can be for us.

M.O.: Just recently we were talking about the styles. So there’s one umbrella term that’s “roots rock” and everything is in there – country rock,

plain simple rock, heartland rock, folkrock. […] So everything American and in a way Canadian also; tradition[al] rock music I guess – just everything.

Paul: I don’t think we really know what kind of style that we play ourselves, but we like to play songs that we would like to hear, which are various in genres, and as band members we all listen to different kinds of things, so it results in us not even knowing where to classify ourselves.

We kind of do play different genres of songs, so in one show you might see us play a folk country song and also a hard rock song, maybe like an alternative creepy genre that doesn’t even exist yet – ghost rock ‘n’ roll perhaps.

Josh: Also, we’re glamourous.

MD: What is it like trying to make it in Montreal?

Josh: We’re just trying to make the good songs so that they’re there.

They’re gonna be there no matter if they’re shit, good – they’re gonna be there, so we’re just trying to make good songs that people relate to and like, and listen to nonstop while they jog, or eat their cereal.

M.O.: You can have good songs, you can have good musicians, but [...] it seems like a lot of the early fans keep coming, and I’m surprised. Because usually you start a band and people come because they’re your friends and then they’re like, oh alright I can stop going now. But they keep coming, and that’s important. So shout out to the fans, to the Po Lazarites.

MD: In light of poutine week, which is this week: if you could have your own poutine – as a band or individually – what would you name it?

Josh: Not even gonna make my own special one, it’s all about the Poutineville pogo poutine!

Paul: Chef Guru curry poutine all the way.

Josh: We would call it the Potine though. There’s vodka on Potine as well.

M.O.: Well I have this recipe and

someone can do it at home. Sweet potatoes, it’s beer-battered so you fry that up, and you use the cheese and the gravy but you add some tao chicken in there, with a little bit of soya sauce – that’s gonna be good.

Paul: I think that question [incited] the most response from us. The one not related to music at all.

MD: What kind of impact do you want your music to have on your fans?

Paul: One of sexual excitement.

MD: Do you want to elaborate?

Josh: Yes, I’ll elaborate. That’s something just, yes, we’ve achieved that already so – check. But I believe somebody relates to it and listens to it and thinks, maybe they felt the same way if they hear the lyrics and play the piano or play the guitar because they heard a song and they wanna play music too.

MD: What’s your favourite or most memorable live experience?

M.O.: Well I usually think we always suck but that’s what makes us good. But we have a few good moments, but that’s when we expect it

the least – or maybe that’s just me.

Paul: I think the favourite stage I’ve ever played on was probably just Josh and I, we played at Burning Man festival like three years ago, that was maybe the greatest place. But as a four-piece band, this bar right here where we’re speaking is maybe one of our best venues. We get nice and sloppy here, we’re comfortable with the bartenders, so it’s always very fun to play here at Grumpy’s. And we put on the best shows I think because we’re so comfortable and just get nice and jammy.

MD: What motivates you guys to create?

Paul: Mainly Bob Dylan...we just want to hear more of what we want to listen to. [...] an intensity that’s relevant to the emotions we feel: the sadness, the anger, and the happiness.

Po Lazarus is playing La Sala Rossa Friday, February 20. Head to indiegogo.com/projects/po-lazarusdebut-album to help fund their upcoming LP.

ShortStanding Festival of Short Performances & Lord of the Rings Marathon Niyousha’s Pick: Lord of the Rings Marathon If you’re not in the mood for expressing love with roses and candles and chocolate this week, you can spend the day expressing your love for The Lord of the Rings (LOTR) instead – though there is no reason this can’t involve chocolate too. The Concordia Student Union is hosting a LOTR marathon on Saturday – all three movies will be screened, and costumes are encouraged. Whether

this is your first or tenth LOTR marathon, the event will be a magical alternative to the Valentine’s Day cliches. The full-day event is free and the only ring you need is the one to rule them all. The marathon also marks a monumental first: never before have all three extended editions been brought together on a big screen for the Montreal public.

So pull out that dusty Gollum mask, and get ready to spend your day in Tolkien’s fantastical realm.

Rosie’s Pick: ShortStanding Festival of Short Performances Take a night off from midterms and take in a world of performances – or five different worlds, each presented in thirty minutes or less. The second annual ShortStanding Festival of Short Performances takes place this week, featuring two separate evenings of programming, each with their own lineup of innovative works. In one night you can

meet a man who thinks he’s a fish (You Were a Fish in a Former Life), experience the Klondike Gold Rush (The Passage), and engage in experimental improv (This Show Is Broken). The ShortStanding Festival is presented by the Freestanding Room, a creators’ collective, where artists with their own projects and companies come to collaborate and develop their work. From puppetry to low-fi film, this festival pushes

the limits of performance. So step outside the bubble and into the Freestanding Room for an evening of adventure.

The ShortStanding Festival runs until February 15. Head to freestandingroom.com for the full schedule and ticket prices.

CSU’s Lord of the Rings Marathon is Saturday February 14. Doors open at 10:30 a.m. and the screening begins at 11 a.m..

Compendium!

February 9, 2015 www.mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

22

Lies, half-truths, and we’re off to Never-Never land!

McGall set to strike in alternate utopian universe It would almost be funny if it wasn’t so real

Heaven Sent The McGall Weekly

D

an A. Ray, last seen in the pages of The McGall Weekly conversing with Satan himself, recently returned to The Weekly newsroom, having just visited an alternate universe in which McGall students were set to strike in response to austerity measures recently implemented by the Quebec government. The Weekly managed to get a copy of Ray’s report.

The students of this alternate McGall seem set to strike, joining with many other Quebec universities in an effort to repel the Quebec government’s austerity program.

McGall organizers had no problem conversing with representatives from other universities, as McGall students apparently make an effort to learn and speak French whenever possible in this universe.

Student representatives I spoke to in this universe were straightforward in their support for a strike. “Ever since the last strike – over tuition hikes, which we readily joined – this movement seemed like a no-brainer,” claimed SHMU

councillor Ihavean Opinion.

“Our council took a strong stance on the events, despite the fact that some of our constituents may have disagreed. We figured that that was our job, and set out to properly organize, such that the entire student body could vote on the matter. I’m nearly certain that we’ll strike. Those who vote ‘no’ are sure to respect the decision.”

Opinion’s confidence was backed up by the voices of other students I spoke to on campus.

“Listen, I don’t see my education as merely a means to an economic end. I’m not getting my degree just to get a job. Besides valuing the inherent worth of my education, I’m also very cognizant of my place within Quebec society, and feel that this movement supersedes the capital importance of getting my degree at exactly the time I planned,” said Ui student Mountain Dew Wolfman Bull. His opinion echoed many of the ones I heard during my trip through the alternate universe. There was clearly a strong, well-defined political left at this McGall campus.

\(T.T|||)/ | The McGill Daily Other things were strange about this place; Bull continued to tell me that the McGall Actually Daily is “well respected around campus. Not everyone agrees with it, but they make sure to make their disagreement part of a wellreasoned discussion as opposed to hating the entire paper regardless of the content.”

I asked him what the discussion

was like on a site like reddit, specifically r/McGall. “Reddit? I, um, haven’t heard of that website.”

Stunned, I spoke to another student. “The McGall administration has been super supportive of us through all this,” said U6 Biological Economical Political Theory student Neputinius “Big Al” Batiboy.

“They really listen to our concerns, and have worked hard to

continue to cater to the students’ needs. I feel like they could’ve stopped after successfully divesting from fossil fuel and military research, but they’ve gone the extra mile. My advisor, who’s always available to talk, was just remarking how well the school has responded to the stress of a strike.

She even mentioned how the TAs would continue to be paid nearly as well as the professors themselves once the strike started.”

I continued to walk around this campus, strangely diverse and politically active. The campus bar was not jammed full of assholes, rather, there were a bunch of not-too-loud people enjoying a drink. I sat down at a table of people who greeted me warmly. As I took my first sip of beer, Satan’s voice beckoned me. “You must return to my fallen world,” he said. At that instant I traveled through a wormhole back to our own universe, back in Gerts.

It was loud, and a bro was screaming at me to “chug or go the fuck home.” I walked back to The Weekly’s office. No one at this campus – in this universe – would ever strike.

Fuck this(es)!

Fuck femininity Fuck femininity. Fuck being a woman. I’m a cisgender, heterosexual, white woman, and I can’t think of a time in my life I wouldn’t have preferred to be a man. There are no fucking drawbacks! The social pressures are fucking incomparable – why do I have to look fucking pretty before I can be respected for any intelligence I may possess? Fuck that.

And yet, pretty women can’t be intelligent, and the really smart ones are all trolls? What about those of us who are fucking average? Just a piece of ass? Men of below-average intelligence have been and always will be in positions of power over me. Because men are fucking

right until proven wrong.

I know I’m fucking privileged.

In Canada, men at least tolerate my presence, my opinions – provided my makeup is careful and my hair is neat. Fuck modesty, anyway. I didn’t ask to be a member of the fucking ‘weaker sex’ – I’d be perfectly happy providing for myself and not having my reproductive system tear itself to bloody pieces once a month.

And ‘not being a woman’ isn’t the same as being a man – it’s not an issue of gender. What I want is the power, the self-assurance that men wield effortlessly, automatically, like their fathers are proud of them – like respect is a right. I want the same fucking right. I’m tired of having to fight for it.

Fuck speed Fuck it, fuck it, fuck it. Slow the fuck down when you’re near a highvolume intersection. In case this wasn’t tremendously clear: when you approach an area that has many people moving their fucking twoton vehicles from point A to point who-gives-a-fuck, you should move your fucking foot off the fucking accelerator toward the fucking break so that you can give yourself and everyone around you room to move your two-ton deathtraps.

Especially when there is snow on the ground, you selfish little fucks.

I work in a building near a fucking six-way (yes, SIX-way) intersection, and we have an accident roughly every three months be-

cause someone doesn’t look both ways when they’re pulling out onto the main street, or someone else speeds through and doesn’t bother to give people some breathing room. Usually it’s a combination of the two. And every fucking accident is preventable.

I don’t give a fuck how important your delivery or groceries or meeting or what-the-fuck-ever is, you can be two fucking minutes late if it means slowing down from 45 mph (or 72 km/h for our Canadian friends) to avoid a preventable collision.

Last week I watched from our office window in that sort of rubberneck horror where you can’t look away even though you want to, as one car slammed into another car, and another car, and another car,

leaving a fucking four-car pile-up in which paramedics had to use the fucking Jaws of Life to CLEAVE THROUGH THE TWISTED METAL OF THE DOORS to get an unresponsive old man out of his car.

According to the news, he died on arrival at the hospital.

All of it was completely fucking preventable.

When you’re in a situation where speed could mean harm, SLOW THE FUCK DOWN. Give people space to maneuver out of the way in case some weird shit goes down. This goes for pedestrians, bicycles, automobiles, horses, chariots, dogsleds, skis, whatever-the-fuck, just slow the fuck down and realize that it is WAY fucking better to arrive late to your meeting than to arrive dead to the hospital.

Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu R’lyeh wgah-nagl fhtagn.

compendium@mcgilldaily.com

Editorial

volume 104 number 18

editorial board 3480 McTavish St., Rm. B-24 Montreal, QC H3A 1X9

February 9, 2015 www.mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

Deregulation harms accessible education

phone 514.398.6784 fax 514.398.8318 mcgilldaily.com coordinating editor

Dana Wray

coordinating@mcgilldaily.com coordinating news editor

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Alice Shen | The McGill Daily

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cover design Tamim Sujat contributors Adam Albarghouthi, Muhammad Anani, Nadia Boachie, Marc Cataford, E.k. Chan, Hera Chan, Karen Chiang, Ellen Cools, Marina Cupido, Lia Elbas, Jonathan Emile, Ishani Ghosh, Kateryna Gordiychuk, Fiona Higgins, June Jang, Jasmine Lee, Leanne Louie, Fateme Mollaei, Yasmine Mosimann, Shane Murphy, Nour Nahhas, Laila Omar, Sam Quigley, Jonathan Reid, Subhanya Sivajothy, Madison Smith, Andy Wei, Peter Zhi

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ISSN 1192-4608.

O

n several occasions in the past weeks, members of the McGill administration have reiterated the University’s commitment to international student tuition fee deregulation. Effectively, tuition deregulation means that McGill will become less financially accessible to international students, who constitute over 25 per cent of the student population. Previous deregulation has seen annual tuition rise by $17,000 for some programs. This is completely unacceptable if McGill at all claims to be acting in the best interests of students.

While McGill is advocating for tuition deregulation, the policy is ultimately decided on by the provincial government. Tuition for international students in Quebec is partially comprised of a supplemental fee, most of which is given to the government and redistributed among the province’s universities. Though the administration claims it would not want to raise tuition to levels that would prohibit international students from attending McGill, the increase that occurred after tuition was deregulated for six programs in 2008 indicates otherwise. By continuing to advocate for tuition deregulation, the administration proves itself to be an institution that views education as a commodity to be sold to students for maximum profit rather than a public good.

Currently, McGill is one of the more affordable options for English-language education available to international students. Opening the door to tuition increases has a direct impact on the accessibility of a McGill education, not only by shutting out students who cannot pay higher tuition but also by leaving those who can barely scrape by with massive amounts of debt. McGill has deflected the issue by emphasizing improve-

ments to its bursary program; however, most bursaries prioritize Canadian students, and are only available to a very limited subset of applicants. The notion that bursaries are within reach of every international student who cannot afford tuition is a delusion that in no way addresses the underlying problem of rising rates.

By considering students as sources of income to offset deficits, the University betrays its increasingly neoliberal nature. An example of this is McGill’s push to increase the number of graduate students, who attract higher government subsidies. McGill claims this is to increase the quality of undergraduate education, but has not matched the growing enrolment numbers with teaching assistant positions or workloads. In addition, having said absolutely nothing against the Liberal government’s budget cuts and austerity measures, the University has instead successfully lobbied the government for tuition increases for French students. This shows that it is all too willing to allow the weight of budget cuts to fall on students.

If the past is any indication, students cannot idly sit by and naively expect the government and administration to stop putting the burden of ‘fiscal responsibility’ on them. International tuition deregulation is a direct result of Quebec’s austerity regime, which McGill fully supports. We must actively pressure the administration to change its stance on tuition deregulation through whatever means we have at our disposal, whether it be letters, protests, or other forms of direct action, and join the Quebec-wide struggle against austerity. Fight for your interests, because the University has shown that it won’t.

—The McGill Daily Editorial Board

Errata

The article “Quebec students set to strike” (News, February 2, page 6) suggested that the choice of student strike start date had led Quebec’s public sector workers to join the strike. In fact, the sentence should have read, “The choice of date was also made to inspire Quebec’s public sector workers [...] to join the strike.”

The article “University students push for prison divestment” (News, February 2, page 7) stated that the Responsible Endowments Coalition (REC) was a university divestment campaign. In fact, REC is an organization that supports several campaigns.

The article “Mandatory minimums, maximum harm” (Features, February 2, page 14) incorrectly stated that the cost of mandatory minimum sentences in 2008-09 was $156 million; however, this only represents a small part of the cost. The article also incorrectly attributes the quote “nothing encourages guilty pleas more than the potential for a mandatory minimum sentence” to Dianne L. Martin, instead of the legal report. The same article incorrectly states that only one form of mandatory minimum sentencing is used in Canada, whereas in fact, three are used.

The photo for the article “Same old news” (Culture, February 2, page 21) was incorrectly attributed to Tamim Sujat. In fact, the photo should have been attributed to Marc Cataford.

The Daily regrets the errors.

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Daily Publications Society’s

Student Journalism Week February 16-19

The annual DPS Journalism Week is here! Join us February 16-19 for workshops, panels, speakers and discussions about the skills you need to be a successful interviewer, writer, and reporter!

Monday

Wednesday

Learn about science journalism, current issues and the importance of effectively communicating science research to the public.

We all have to start somewhere. Navigating this industry can be a hard and frustrating process. This panel will discuss their experiences starting off as journalists and how you can make the transition and establish yourself as a working journalist.

Science Communication

Photojournalism

Listen to expert photojournalists talk about their experiences telling narratives through images. If photography is your thing, this is a must see (literally, there will be photos!!)

Tuesday

Quebec documentary presentation

Listen to filmmaker Karina Garcia Cassanova talk about her autobiographical documentary that follows a family struggling with rootlessness and mental illness. This presentation will also give insight for those aspiring to get into filmmaking and documentaries.

Montreal Magazines: What do they want? (Bilingual)

This is your chance to gain insight into the world of Montreal Magazines. Our panellist will discuss what the industry is looking for and how you can get your foot in the door.

Freelancing: How to get started?

Reporting in Quebec (Bilingual)

Our panel of Quebec journalists will be discussing current issues in the province and our Montreal community. If you want to learn more about how to effectively communicate stories or what’s going on in Quebec, this is the place to be!

Thursday

Listen up! Radio Storytelling

Obsessed with all things audio? Join us for a panel dedicated to radio storytelling, where our panel will discuss the nitty gritty of getting heard.

Advocacy Journalism

All journalism may be political, but there are those who’ve made a career out of writing about issues close to their hearts.

Come learn how to merge your inner activist with journalism.

Wine and Cheese

To end off Journalism Week we will be hosting a wine and cheese cocktail party. Yeah, you heard right! So come on by and get your schmooze on with journalists and other students. Free wine and cheese, enough said!

Locations and times to be announced on our Facebook event DPS Student Journalism Week. If you have any questions, feel free to email us at community@mcgilldaily.com