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Volume 106, Issue 23 | Monday, April 3, 2017 | mcgilldaily.com MORE NUANCE since 1911

Activism and resistance This year in review www.vfresh.ca

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CONTENTS 3

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

20

NEWS

Tentative agreement between McGill and floor fellows

Graphic novel

32

Photo essay

‘(Blurry)’ ‘Untitled’

A critical look at the stereotype of “leftover” women

23

Desmond Cole unpacks the language of white supremacy Why Mental Health Services needs improvement Year in review SSMU executive reviews

12

FEATURES

2

Photojournalism

‘The Preacher’ ‘Spanish Narnia: Barcelona, Spain’

Climate change will force people to leave their homes

35

Year in Review

‘Ways of Seeing: Inspired by Remed’

CULTURE

Critiquing idealism in Dutch genre art

The Algonquins of Barriere Lake continue to fight for agency

‘Princess II’

Hacking Robotics

26

14 COMMENTARY

SCI+TECH

Black Theatre Workshop presents Angélique

Art essay

37

Multimedia

38

EDITORIAL

This year’s resistance will grow into next year’s resistance

Critiquing the Journée de Réfléxion

McGill’s Fashion Week highlights

Burnout causes us to accept symbolic gestures in place of real change

McGill University Photography Students’ Society annual photo exhibit review

39 COMPENDIUM!

McGill’s mental health resources are inadequate

A personal narrative of immigration

Crossword

Year in review

Year in Review

Dear McGill: a breakup note

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NEWS

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

3

Floor fellows reach tentative collective agreement with McGill

Breakthrough follows years of frustration and inequitable working conditions Meara Bernadette Kerwin News Writer

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egotiation between representatives of the McGill administration and the Floor Fellows’ unit of the Association of McGill University Support Employees (AMUSE) have finally produced a tentative collective agreement which suits both parties involved.

This agreement would defend Floor Fellows’ collective values, workers’ rights, and guarantee them payment for their work – all of which have been lacking in recent years.

This represents a major achievement for students and union organizers who have been working for more equitable working conditions for nearly three years.

A history of exploitation Floor fellows are upper-year students who live in McGill residences, offering support and guidance to first-year students making the transition to university life. In recent years, the precarity of floor fellows’ position has come to light, as decisions about their working conditions, duties, and rights have repeatedly been made without their input.

The most notable cases of this include the 2008-2009 Director of Residences’ attempt to change the residence alcohol policy from harm-reduction to zero-tolerance, which directly contradicts floor fellows’ collective values. In the 2012 winter semester, two floor fellows were dismissed for taking part in 6party, an occupation of the thenDeputy Provost’s office in opposition to the McGill administration’s attempt to override the student referenda defending the existence of CKUT and the Quebec Public Interest Research Group (QPIRG). In the fall of 2013, the residence leadership structure was reorganized to the detriment of floor fellow support systems, with no input from floor fellows themselves.

Furthermore, while floor fellows receive room and board as part of their position, they are not paid for the extensive and highly taxing work.

Negotiations with McGill Motivated by these factors, and seeking a voice in negotiating their labour and living conditions, floor fellows voted to unionize

in May 2014, forming “Unit B” of AMUSE. Since then, they have been in constant negotiations with McGill’s administration to develop a collective agreement defining their rights and responsibilities as university employees.

In December 2016, the two parties reached a consensus on the terms of the collective agreement, and planned to formalize it after confirming the decision with their respective constituents. However, come January, the McGill administration backed out of the agreement. This was frustrating for floor fellows, who had been working towards a collective agreement for years. Alex Levesque, a floor fellow of two years and the Building Steward at New Rez, described his experience of this incident in an interview with The Daily.

“I was definitely very excited when I heard that something had been agreed upon,” said Levesque, “especially because, normally, when something’s agreed upon at bargaining, it’s pretty set. I was starting to get a little wary in January, when I hadn’t heard anything, but was definitely very disappointed, very frustrated, when we found out in January that they had backed out. It was so ridiculous and unheard of.”

In response to the administration’s actions, the floor fellows filed an injunction against McGill demanding immediate payment for those floor fellows who wished to be involved, in accordance with Quebec labour laws.

For the past three years, many floor fellows have been keeping time sheets of their active work hours, and filing for “back pay” through the Quebec Commission des normes, de l’équité, de la santé et de la sécurité du travail (CNESST). If the injunction were successful, McGill would be required to pay floor fellows for their documented hours of work.

A tentative agreement This month, with the court date approaching, the McGill administration offered to settle the injunction, meaning that the two parties would agree on a compromise rather than bring the case to a judge. Informal negotiations took place last week on March 22 and 23, and resulted in a tentative agreement between representatives of the floor fellow union and McGill.

Marina Djurdjevic | The McGill Daily Isabelle Oke, current Vice President of floor fellows at AMUSE, was part of the recent settlement negotiations. She explained that, according to the tentative agreement, former floor fellows will be partially compensated for the work which they filed for back pay.

This year’s floor fellows would be paid a “lump sum” for their hours this year, and in the new collective agreement, McGill is offering a $13.15/hour wage.

“Floor fellows have a base of 13 hours per week that they’re compensated for without having to provide time sheets,” explained Oke. “Any hour above that, they have a time sheet system.”

The major difference between the collective agreement that was rejected in January and the one currently on the table is that floor fellows will now be required to pay McGill for their food and housing.

However, as Oke explained, “the Quebec Ministry of Labour sets the maximum amount that employees can be asked to pay for these things if they live where they work. So that would be $54.16 a week that Floor Fellows would have to pay back to the university.” Thus, they will be paid more for their work than they pay for food and housing.

Preserving core values However, despite the focus on equitable pay, however, many floor fellows told The Daily that monetary compensation is not the issue at the core of their collective bargaining initiative. Graham Kasper,

a floor fellow at La Citadelle and a member of the Unit B Grievance Committee, explained that “a lot of people I’ve mentioned it to [...] immediately jump to ‘We want money!’ And that’s really not why we unionized. It was to protect our core values, to protect our working space, and the things that floor fellows have, over the years, gradually built into their culture.”

“It was to protect our core values, to protect our working space, and the things that floor fellows have, over the years, gradually built into their culture.”

—Graham Kasper Floor fellow

These values have been further challenged in the bargaining process, as former floorfellow and current Bargaining Committee member Vithushon Thayalan said: “Working with the others to preserve the core ideas that make the job what it is has proven to be surprisingly difficult in the bargaining room [...] It was really disheartening to be told in training and throughout the year the impor-

tance of the work we were doing and how we were doing it, and then to go to bargaining with McGill where that same importance did not carry over, or at least that was the way it felt.”

Moving forward In April, all current floor fellows, as well as former floor fellows who filed back pay claims, will have the opportunity to vote on the official adoption of the collective agreement. This time, the McGill administration will not have the opportunity to vote it down at the last minute. If the agreement is passed, this will certainly be an important step forward for Unit B; however, the implementation of this agreement remains uncertain.

As AMUSE President Claire Michela said, “We don’t know how this is going to work, going forward. What are the problems going to be with the collective agreement? What are the things we like about it, what are the things [...] that we’ll want to see changed next time? So it’s totally new territory [...] but it’s definitely exciting!”

Phoebe Colby, a floorfellow at New Rez and a member of the union’s Grievance Committee, also expressed optimism. She hopes that observing the bargaining process “is encouraging to people - that you can create new structures within communities, and community action has pretty tangible, real effects sometimes.”

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April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

5

On “leftover” women in East Asia Panel discussion dismantles pervasive social stigma

Rahma Wiryomartono The McGill Daily

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n Thursday March 30, around 35 students gathered in the Shatner Building to attend a panel discussion called “The ‘Leftover’ Women in East Asia.” The event, organized by the McGill University Society of China Studies (SCS), centred on ‘leftover’ women, a term that stigmatizes those unmarried by their mid-twenties. The discussion highlighted the origins of the term and the social stigma toward working women who choose to set aside marriage to advance their careers.

The panel featured presentations

by Jeremy Tai, an Assistant Professor in History and Classical Studies specializing in modern China; Wanming Wang, a Ph.D Candidate in East Asian Studies; and Brian Bergstrom, a course lecturer in East Asian Studies.

The talk opened with an introduction by Yolanda Zhang, the Event Coordinator of SCS. The discussion focused on the ways in which social and political institutions in China and Japan perpetuated the stigma.

“We agreed to do this talk because we observed that it was a hot topic on social media in China, and it definitely relates to the direction of feminism today,” Zhang told The Daily in an interview. “The topic of leftover women resonates strongly with women with higher education, so it’s really pressing in an academic setting like McGill.”

Scholarly presentations Jeremy Tai discussed the history of the term ‘leftover women’ and how it became widely used in Chinese society. The term was popularized by Leta Hong Fincher’s 2014 book Leftover Women: The Resurgence of Gender Inequality in China.

According to Tai, the stigma around ‘leftover women’ – or shengnu – has existed in Sinophone communities for over ten years. The term originally applied to women over thirty, though the age limit involved has gradually decreased to 25.

“The Chinese state is currently invested in pressuring women from a certain class and educational background to marry for the sake of so-

cial stability,” Tai explained. China’s existing gender imbalance resulted from the increase in sex-selective abortions following the one-child policy introduced in 1979.

Currently there are twenty million more men than women under thirty which, according to Tai, explains why marriage is a state concern in China.

“The theory is that within the context of a slowing economy, these restless single men will ferment political unrest out of personal dissatisfaction,” Tai said. “I think we all should be very troubled here by the seeming quantification of self-worth.”

Wang’s presentation was centred on the pushback against the misogynistic label of ‘leftover women’ by individual women and activist groups. Wang mentioned the ways in which the ‘ticking biological clock’ concept is entrenched and accepted across different cultures. She displayed viral posts made on Chinese social media expressing anger and indignation against the social pressures to marry out of obligation.

“Leftover women are becoming more and more confident,” she said.

“They choose to be so-called leftover women and this is a gesture, a strong reaction, to the propaganda of the state that has been prevalent for decades in China.”

Brian Bergstrom’s presentation discussed the Japanese context, elaborating on the term ‘makeinu,’ referring to a single woman in her thirties who has not had children. The translation of “makeinu” is “loser dog.”

“When makeinu became a sort of word in the late 90s, it was more about makeinu women who had not succeeded, which meant that they were not married,” Bergstrom said. “In response to makeinu discourse, you had people like Sakai Junko who wrote books that were like, ‘Yeah, I am a makeinu.’”

Student reactions Zhang, an organizer of the event, stressed that the discourse around ‘leftover women’ often excludes the non-middle-class population: “One thing I want to point out [...] was the concern with in-

tersectionality in the context of middle-class women, because the whole topic still speaks to a middleclass audience.”

Thomson Yu, the President of SCS, spoke about the relevance of ‘leftover women’ to North America in an interview with The Daily.

“The topic of leftover women is directly relevant to the experiences of ‘career women’ in North America,” he said. “It’s important to realize that Chinese women in North America have the so-called east-west culture clash they need to deal with. Again, you have an immigrant culture that celebrates and values family life clashing against the North American culture that celebrates individual freedom and liberties.”

Yu mentioned that the issue is a result of competing expectations.“ In my opinion, the issue of “leftover women” emerges due to the frictions between these two cultures.

And for the foreseeable future, will likely to continue to be a hot issue as Chinese communities continue to negotiate and adapt to social changes,” Yu said.

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News

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

Desmond Cole speaks at McGill Lecture focuses on the language of white supremacy in Canada

Nora McCready The McGill Daily

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n Monday, March 27, students and McGill community members gathered for a talk by acclaimed journalist Desmond Cole on the language and logic of white supremacy.

Kiana Saint-Macary, the President of the McGill Debating Union, opened the event by introducing Cole, describing him as “a Toronto-based journalist, activist, and author whose work [...] focuses on issues of race in Canada and abroad – including his much celebrated piece, The Skin I’m In: I’ve been interrogated by police 150 times, all because I am Black.”

The language of white supremacy Cole began his talk with a ‘Be it resolved’ statement, a common format used in debates.

“Be it resolved that white supremacy informs all aspects of Canadian life, particularly our language,” he said. “The way that we use language informs pretty much everything that we do. It describes everything that we do. It influences and phrases our thoughts and our actions in this country.”

Cole explained that, in our society, individuals are conditioned to the language of white supremacy and often use it even when fighting to dismantle oppressive structures.

This enforces the power of white supremacy by implicating its opponents in the very system they are trying to destroy. As Cole put it, “One of our big problems with white supremacy is that [its] power forces those of us who want to destroy it to engage in an endless debate with it.” Cole insisted that eliminating the harmful and insidious language of white supremacy is a necessary step in dismantling the system entirely.

He then discussed James McGill’s enslavement of Black and Indigenous people: “This institution, like so many institutions in Canada, was founded by somebody who [...] actually owned, if you can say that, human beings.”

The way that people talk about influential figures such as James McGill, he explained, illustrates the power of the language of white supremacy; the word ‘slave’ itself is part of this language.

“Nobody is actually born [a slave],” said Cole. “A slave is not an occupation that you can aspire to, a job title that you can hold. The biggest problem with [the word] is that when we say ‘slave,’ [...] we’re describing the condition of somebody who had something done to them rather than describing the condition of the person who’s doing it. [...] That’s not really talking about the issue, that’s talking around it.”

Cole went on to point out that when people say “James McGill [and others like him] was a slaveowner,” they use the passive voice and fail to

assign appropriate blame. In order to dismantle white supremacy, he argued, we need to be specific about these atrocities.

“As a reflex,” Cole explained, “people start saying, ‘Yeah, but that’s not all [insert slaveowner here] did [...] how can you just limit their whole character and their identity?’”

Apologism in Canadian politics He then provided a recent example of this phenomenon: Lynn Beyak of the Conservative Party and her recent remarks to the Canadian Senate about the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

“The Truth and Reconciliation Commission [...] was an incredibly thorough investigation into the residential school system in Canada,” explained Cole, “that system which took untold thousands of Indigenous children away from their parents.

About 6,000 children that we know of died in residential schools, but I would more accurately say they were killed. Those who were not killed [...] were denied the ability to speak their own languages, denied the ability to practice their own spiritual and religious practices. They were denied the ability to have contact anymore with their communities [...] The philosophy behind residential schools was to kill the ‘Indian’ in the child.

That’s white supremacy.

“The way that we use language informs pretty much everything that we do. [...]

It influences and phrases our thoughts and our actions in this country.”

—Desmond Cole Cole went on to quote Beyak’s speech to the Senate: “‘I speak [...] mostly in memory of the kindly and well-intentioned men and women and their descendants, ...] whose remarkable works good deeds and historical tales of the residential schools go unacknowledged for the most part,’ she said. And Bayak went on to say ‘Mistakes were made at residential schools, in many instances horrible mistakes that overshadowed some of the good things that also happened at those schools.’”

“This is how every politician is either taught to speak or learns how

to speak” said Cole. “Its particularly effective as a tool in what I’m calling this language and logic of white supremacy. Who made the mistakes, Lynn? [...] If she’s saying ‘I don’t want to erase that, I’m not trying to paper over that, I realize it’s horrible,’ why do you use this language of passive voice?

Why do you hide the perpetrator if you’re not ashamed of it yourself? [...]

This use of language informs a whole way of thinking and dodging accountability and shifting blame and erasing genocide and huge atrocities that have happened around the world.”

Common arguments in defense of racism Cole continued by outlining a series of defenses and concessions designed to maintain white supremacy.

“Race has nothing to do with it.’

Now this is not a concession. This is actually the starting point for white supremacy,” he said. “This is white supremacy’s sweet spot. 95 per cent of the discussions that I see or am forced to engage in in this country about this issue start with this sentence. […] This is the denial that we always have to overcome with people, particularly people in power, who want to tell us that we somehow do not know what we’re talking about.”

Cole proceeded to share recent stories of police violence and brutality towards Black people. For example, he told the story of Andrew Loku, a Black man with a history of mental illness who was killed by Toronto police in his apartment building in July 2015. Loku had been carrying a hammer and having a conversation with his upstairs neighbours about a noise complaint when a police officer arrived at the scene and shot him.

Following the incident, the head of the Toronto police force’s most powerful lobbyist group wrote an op-ed in the Toronto Star.

Cole quoted the op-ed: “The fact that he was Black had no bearing on the officer’s decision. [...] Those who are promoting baseless accusations of race being a factor in Mr. Loku’s death have no legitimate place in this debate. Collectively, we need to ensure that the mentally ill are provided treatment by continuing to work to improve mental health care accessibility and support.”

This is an example of this logic of white supremacy in action, said Cole. Instead of acknowledging race as an issue in the incident, the lobbyist focused on mental illness. “‘[It’s] not race, look over here, it’s the other thing,’” he said. “And in this case it’s mental health. We’ve heard this time and time again.”

Even when people concede that racism may be a factor in a given act of violence, said Cole, another common argument is “don’t judge until you have all the facts.”

“White supremacy loves this,” Cole explained. “It’s one of its favor-

Laura Brennan | The McGill Daily ites. You can’t know anything for sure as long as white supremacy’s getting fingers pointed at it […] ‘Let’s not jump to the conclusion that it was about race. Let’s wait till all the facts are in.’”

This is a problematic mechanism which aims to run out the clock on an important issue, he explained. In most cases, the public never gets all the information, and denial by those supporting white supremacists can continue indefinitely.

Another part of this logic, Cole continued, is the suggestion that racists are ignorant and can’t help themselves.

“Well, doesn’t somebody have to teach you how to call a Black person a n****r or are you just born that way?” he said. “You don’t accidentally pick this stuff up if you don’t have contact with Black people. [...] It is never a mistake. If you enable racism you are part of the problem. If [...] you say that somebody who wants to come on McGill campus and give a talk who is advancing white supremacy, ‘Well I defend their free speech’, [then] you defend their white supremacist speech. Period. You’re enabling this to happen.”

“What we’re up against is willful ignorance,” Cole continued.

“What we’re up against is the passive voice, ‘mistakes were made.’

We’re up against obtuseness, we’re up against people [feigning ignorance] when they know full well what we’re talking about because that allows them to keep running out the shock clock.”

Cole finished his talk by arguing that white privilege is a construct, and those who have that privilege must exist in a space of discomfort where they are forced to recognize and dismantle white supremacy.

“I’m not saying ‘white privilege’ [...] anymore,” he told his audience.

“Again, it’s not something you were just born with and inherited. It’s something that you have to work everyday to protect and keep away from people.

So I don’t want to talk about privilege.

I want to put you in that uncomfortable place that you’ll be forced [...] to interrogate yourself to turn the mirror back on yourself instead of asking me all the questions.

At the end of the talk Cole opened the conversation up to audience members.

“People are often in media and social commentary these days talking about racism as a disease,” asked one attendee. “What do you think about that in terms of how it shifts or removes responsibility from people for their own racism?”

“We have to be careful with that language,” answered Cole, “because [...] you’re not a victim of racism by perpetuating it. [...] [Racist logics] are also things that we do and introduce into the world as human beings that were not here before us. I think that a good way to deal with that is again to say, who is suffering from this disease and who is benefitting from it? [...] What do the people who benefit do when they realize they’re benefitting from somebody else’s illness?”

News

March 27, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

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Inadequate care prompts petition Campaign calls for more funding and consultation on mental health

Saima Desai The McGill Daily

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n March 31, the McGill Students’ Mental Health Working Group sent an open letter to Deputy Provost (Student Life and Learning) Ollivier Dyens and Executive Director (Student Services) Martine Gauthier, criticizing McGill’s “insufficient and inaccessible mental health services.” The letter was accompanied by a petition circulated via Facebook, which at the time of writing had garnered 81 signatures within 5 hours.

The letter outlines a number of concerns with Counselling and Mental Health Services (CMHS), and makes three demands: address concerns that have arisen over the failings of CMHS; stop diverting Student Services funding away from wellness services; and implement a “comprehensive, campus-wide, evidence-based” plan that would focus on mental health literacy and mental illness prevention.

A short history of inadequate care The beginning of this academic year saw McGill Mental Health Services (MMHS) and McGill Counselling Services combined into Counselling and Mental Health Services (CMHS). While the two services were previously siloed, students are now processed by a single system.

The change came with the introduction of a “stepped care model” whereby a variety of new treatment options – online therapy, group therapy, and referrals to other organizations such as the Peer Support Centre – act as “steps” to one-onone psychotherapy.

The new model aimed to reduce strain on an overloaded mental health care system, but many students have continued to experience long wait times and inadequate care.

“I used to be able to go to MMHS for drop-in [appointments] if I was having waves of panic attacks or side effects I couldn’t deal with [from medications],” explained Marie*, who has been accessing mental health services at McGill for 4 years. “But with their new conditions that’s impossible.”

In December 2016, Nancy Low, the Clinical Director of McGill’s Counselling and Mental Health Services (MCMHS), was suspended from her position on “administrative leave.” According to Erin Sobat, VP Student at the Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU), Low had been advocating for the concerns staff and students regarding the new stepped-care model, though the University re-

fused to disclose the reasons for Low’s suspension.

In January, the former Director of McGill Mental Health Services, Norman Hoffman, told The Daily in an email that “a stepped care system for a Mental Health Service makes no clinical sense.”

Hoffman said he had “been told directly from Mental Health and Counselling staff that the stepped care system is not working well,” but that staff “were told that they are not allowed to object to the stepped care system.”

“While not all of these [changes to CMHS] have been negative, we are appalled by their hasty implementation without due consideration for the impact on students and staff,” the open letter explains. “Communication regarding major changes has been treated as an afterthought, with limited efforts to involve service users and student leaders in the decision-making process despite their repeated requests.”

Students who access services at CMHS are randomly assigned to a counselling or clinical psychologist, without any triage process.The open letter calls for CMHS to hire specialized triage staff and to dedicate more clinical psychologist time to specialized therapy, while also expanding the range of lower-intensity and prevention initiatives.

Other Canadian universities have also implemented steppedcare mental health services, sometimes with greater transparency than McGill. On their website, the University of British Columbia has a clearly outlined stepped-care triage model. It involves a 15-minute online assessment, followed by a 15-to-20-minute consultation with a wellness advisor, at which point the student is directed to one of six levels of care ranging from selfdirected programs and tools to psychiatric care.

Mental Health horror stories “In early November, I had rushed to the [CMHS] office in hopes of getting an emergency appointment as I had been undergoing an anxiety episode that left me sure of my immediate death” explained Leila*.

Leila was told that there were no available appointments for the next month. When she was eventually able to book an evaluative appointment for three weeks later, she was left lacking coping mechanisms or long-term treatment plan. “The waiting room time as well as the apathy towards my condition shocked me at the time, since no one seemed concerned considering my ailment was neither physical nor would it require me to “do something to hurt myself.’”

Mental Health Services office.

“This sort of limit on mental health resources only yields an insufficient resource for a huge undergraduate body that might require immediate care and attention as well as longterm plans for treatment,” Leila continued.

After being sexually assaulted by a male Frosh leader during their first year at McGill, Lucie accessed Mental Health services. Lucie’s first therapist, after repeatedly asking whether they were comfortable talking to a man, abruptly refused to continue therapy and reassigned Lucie to a female therapist. “He referred me to another therapist who was really helpful, but who told me that at the end of 16 sessions I could never access mental health services again,” Lucie told The Daily. For the following year and a half, Lucie was left commuting and paying out-ofpocket to access affordable therapy.

“I used to be able to go to MMHS for dropin [appointments] if I was having waves of panic attacks. [...] But with their new conditions it’s impossible.”

—Marie*

Lucie identifies as non-binary and uses “they” pronouns, and says that they have been repeatedly misgendered by multiple therapists at CMHS,

Conor Nickerson | The McGill Daily despite constantly correcting them. “I also spoke to the director of MMHS, Giuseppe Alfonsi, about the situation, and he addressed them one-on-one.

They still continued to constantly misgender me despite this,” explained Lucie. “I was constantly on edge, hoping they wouldn’t speak about me, only to me, so I wouldn’t have to hear them misgender me again.”

Marie*, who sees a psychiatrist at CMHS for severe depression and anxiety, told The Daily that her doctor had overprescribed her medication.

“I felt that for the most part I was just prescribed medication at random,” explained Marie, “at times at very high doses and switching from one medication to another pretty quickly. A lot of time this ‘pill-pushing’ was justified by my doctor as a way to get me ‘better as soon as possible,’ which for her meant before finals or midterms.”

As a result of switching rapidly between high doses of different antidepressants, Marie experienced severe side effects. “Some of them could have been potentially fatal if it wasn’t for the support of friends,” she explained. “I was pretty much left on my own and unmonitored to deal with those side effects.”

“I often feel like the underlying causes for my mental illnesses are sort of ignored because [my psychiatrist and I] only have 15 to 30 minutes together every two weeks, and so it’s easier to just prescribe meds and numb/sedate/maintain a certain chemical balance than to address anything else. It almost feels like these sessions are for liability reasons than providing actual help.

vices without also addressing structural and environmental conditions that exacerbate mental health issues is short-sighted,” notes the open letter. As such, it demands a “comprehensive, campus-wide, evidencebased Mental Health Strategy that addresses the spectrum of mental health needs” – a strategy that was first promised by Dyens in 2014.

These programs would look like mental health literacy initiatives, and “consistent, fair, and accessible” procedures for requesting academic accommodations.

In October 2016, the process through which students obtain medical notes suddenly changed, provoking student outcry. Now, students can only receive sameday notes if they are in imminent danger of harming themselves or others, or if they have already been assigned a counsellor or a clinical psychologist.

The letter also raised issue with the fact that $650,000 in annual overhead is deducted from the Student Services budget by the central administration – money which is being diverted away from wellness initiatives. Further, over the past seven years, $2.5 million has been pulled from Student Services in the name of “overhead charges” and cancelled university transfers.

“These critical services, which include Counselling & Mental Health Services and the Office for Students with Disabilities, are unable to keep up with dramatic increases in demand due to a lack of resources,” reads the letter.

Underfunded and overexerted “Reconfiguring psychological ser-

*Names have been changed at the wishes of those interviewed.

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April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

News

­­­Sexual assault and gendered violence

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his academic year began with the launch of McGill’s chapter of Silence is Violence (SiV). Si is a nationwide organization that combats the pressure to remain silent placed on individuals who have experienced sexual assault. McGill’s chapter was founded partly in response to growing frustrations regarding the university’s failure to adopt a sexual assault policy.

A couple weeks after SiV launched at McGill, the university released its Draft Policy against Sexual Assault (DPSV). The DPSV was drafted by Associate Provost Angela Campbell, following the university’s withdrawal of support for the Sexual Assault Policy (SAP), an earlier policy drafted by an unpaid student-led group. The DPSV outlines educational initiatives, such as on-campus informational campaigns and training sessions. It requires staff to inform individuals who have experienced sexual assault of appropriate health and counselling services. Additionally the draft policy outlines immediate steps the university could take following a report of sexual assault in order to protect the safety and security of the survivor. The DPSV requires that physical office space be dedicated and qualified staff be hired to handle this issue.

During Consent Week, concerns were raised that the DPSV focuses too much on support for survivors and fails to adequately address how the university will punish perpetrators. Additionally, Consent Week addressed abuses of power within the university that have led to sexual harassment and assault. The Student Society of McGill University (SSMU) VP University Affairs Erin Sobat emphasized that the language of the DPSV does not recognize that these abuses of power take place on campus.

The participation of SSMU Council in this debate about the SVP is deeply troubling given the resignation of SSMU VP External David Aird on February 22. Aird resigned amid allegations of sexual assault which were made public by the Community Disclosure Network (CDN). CDN released a statement containing testimonies of Aird’s history of sexual assault. It surfaced that two groups in which Aird held leadership positions, Jeunes néodémocrates du Québec (JNDQ), the youth wing of the New Democratic Party (NDP), and McGill Against Austerity, had received information about these allegations earlier in the year. These groups were unable to implement punitive measures against Aird because the individuals disclosing the information chose to remain anonymous. CDN revealed that SSMU had also received information concerning Aird’s behavior in Fall 2016 and responded by establishing weekly conversations about consent education, called “check-ins,” between Aird and SSMU President Ben Ger. The SSMU executives were criticized following Aird’s resignation for inaction after learning of his predatory behavior. Ger resigned on March 9, recognizing the inappropriate way he addressed the situation. It later came out that Ger had reportedly committed gendered violence. This demonstrates a pattern of perpetrators of sexual assault exploiting positions of power for harm. CDN demanded that SSMU apologize to the individuals who came forward, and adopt its own stand-alone Sexual Assault Policy that goes beyond informal meetings among SSMU executives. At this moment it is unclear whether SSMU will adopt its own SAP or if the University will step in to prevent further internal policing by SSMU execs.

—Nora McCready

Mental health on campus

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his year, McGill Mental Health (MMH) and Counselling Services introduced reforms to improve capacity and response times. The reforms introduced two major reforms; the adoption of a ‘stepped care model’, and specialized assessment through a Client Care Clinician (CCC).

The stepped care model introduced multiple intermediate treatment options towards one-on-one psychotherapy, the treatment students typically received under the old system. Intermediate treatments included group therapy, online self-help and referrals to other organizations such as the Peer Support Network.

Prior to determining the type of treatment, students are referred to ‘treating professionals’ as a triage to guide students. This model was replicated after a system in Memorial University in St. John’s, Newfoundland.

The implementation of the CCC was designed to give students a point of contact to follow up after therapy sessions and request supporting documents when needed. This changed how medical notes were obtained. Previously, students needed to drop by daily drop-in hours for a same-day appointment to receive a medical note. The reforms divided same-day medical notes into two categories: students in imminent danger of harming themselves or others, or students who have already been assigned CCC. However, SSMU VP University Affairs Erin Sobat raised serious concerns over the medical note process. Students not in need of emergency care but not followed by the CCC do not fall into either category. In order to receive a medical note, students would need to wait for a CCC appointment.

Sobat criticized this, as McGill professors do not accept medical notes that retroactively justify past absences.

Despite efforts for inclusivity and anti-oppressiveness, Counselling and Mental Health Services (CMHS) remained inaccessible to trans students experiencing mental health issues. The lack of knowledge and resources on trans care fostered a sense of distrust of service providers. Students noted discomfort in discussing issues deeply connected to their experience of mental illness, such as queerness and racialization.

Independent from McGill Mental Health, QED Journal hosted a panel around suicide prevention and conflict resolution in the queer community in the fall semester. The event was held in response to the suicide of the trans writer activist Bryn Kelly.

SSMU Mental Health Awareness Week, held during the winter semester, was designed to break down stigma around mental illness. Panel discussions were aimed to promote open discussion and provide a safe space to discuss lived experiences. SSMU also partnered with Life After your Degree (Life AYD) to address the potential mental health issues that could arise from graduation stress.

While the stepped care model is effective in removing the strain on CMHS, the demand for mental health services still outweigh capacity. Changes in the medical note process meant to improve response time, fails to account for students who are not paired with a CCC. Most importantly, trans students still face barriers to adequate mental health services. Improved access and trans specific services must be implemented not only to better serve patients, but to address racism and classicism.

—Rayleigh Lee

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

News Pipelines and environmental concerns

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his year saw many demonstrations in opposition to proposed pipelines. On September 8, a protest was held outside the U.S. consulate in Montreal against the proposed Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL). This proposed pipeline has been approved by the current Trump administration despite prolonged protest in North Dakota, across Canada and the United States.

DAPL would carry crude oil across sacred Sioux territory as well as the Missouri River, an important water source for the indigenous community, among others.

The September 8 protest also took issue with the proposed Energy East pipeline, which would transport crude oil from Alberta’s tar sands to oil refineries in Eastern Canada. This pipeline would cross the Saint Lawrence River, putting a major Eastern Canadian water body in grave danger. There is currently major resistance to this pipeline from both environmental groups and Denis Coderre, the mayor of Montreal. Later, in the fall on November 7 there was another demonstration in solidarity with the Standing Rock Sioux Nation, the indigenous community at the forefront of this conflict. By November thousands had already gathered on Sioux land in North Dakota to protest DAPL in person. There were many reports of human rights violations perpetrated by police against peaceful DAPL protesters. Kenneth Deer, a journalist and educator from Kahnawá:ke addressed these violations saying, “The brutality of the police force out there is unforgivable. There is no need for peaceful protesters who are defending the water and defending their land and their territory, defending their treaty rights, to be tear-gassed, to have rubber bullets being fired at them or bean bag rounds.” This demonstration was also organized to encourage individuals to withdraw their money from Canadian banks that are invested in DAPL, namely, Scotiabank, the Royal Bank of Canada, and TD Bank.

—Nora McCready­­­­

Islamophobia and violent political climates

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his year was the year that the world witnessed the election of President Donald Trump in the United States. Campaigning on divisive, xenophobic, Islamophobic, and generally oppressive policies, Donald Trump succeeded in winning the electoral college in the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election. We witnessed protests against his presidency, with people coming out to protest in record numbers. This did not only happen in the U.S., but throughout Canada and across the world as well. The day after Trump’s election, Montrealers gathered in large crowds to demonstrate their solidarity with Americans who stood in opposition to Trump, as well as demonstrating their opposition to the ideology he represents. Shortly after entering office, President Trump issued a travel ban, targeting Muslims, limiting who can come to the United States. Once again, Montrealers showed solidarity with the protestors in the U.S. as hundreds gathered to protest outside the U.S. Consulate in Montreal.

The largest response to the election of President Trump came in the form of the Women’s March on January 21. In Montreal, nearly 10,000 people gathered at Place des Arts to protest Donald Trump’s inauguration as President of the United States. These protestors joined millions across the world coming together in solidarity to stand against President Trump and the misogyny that both him and his movement represent.

This year also saw the rising trend in Islamophobic rhetoric and violence.

While Islamophobia played a massive role in the U.S. election, here in Canada it was equally relevant. On January 29 a white supremacist walked into a mosque in Quebec City and murdered six people during evening prayer. In response to this tragedy, Montrealers turned out in remarkable numbers: thousands came out to show their solidarity with the victims of the Quebec City attack and the Muslim community. Shortly after, both Concordia and McGill University received bomb threats claiming to be from a white supremacist group, targeting Muslims.

Thought the threat turned out to be a hoax, the threat was a startling reminder of the threat posed by oppressive and hateful groups.

—Ryan Canon

Indigenous rights

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his year Montrealers once again took to the streets in solidarity with Indigenous peoples and called on the Canadian government to take action to protect Canada’s Indigenous population. On October 4, about five hundred people gathered at Place Emilie Gamelin for the eleventh memorial march for missing and murdered Indigenous women. The march, which was organized by the Centre for Gender Advocacy, aimed to raise awareness about murdered and missing Indigenous women, as well as put pressure on the government to “deliver real systemic changes,” in response to the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls. Support for the Indigenous community continued on Monday, September 29, when roughly sixty people gathered for a vigil for missing and murdered Indigenous women. The event was organized collectively by Consent McGill, First Peoples’ House, and Indigenous students, and was held on lower field behind the Hochelaga Rock.

On Monday January 16, several dozen people gathered at New Chancellor Day Hall for a presentation by three administrators of the Mohawk Council of Akwesasne, Canada’s first independent Indigenous court, discussing the structure and nature of the court. The Mohawk community of Akwesasne is located near the St. Lawrence River at the intersection of the Quebec-Ontario and Canada-U.S. borders, causing them to face more challenges to their sovereignty than most Indigenous communities. In the past, judges at the Akwesasne Court were appointed by the federal government under the Indian Act of 1876. However, once that ended in the mid-1990s, the people of the community were expected to transfer to the jurisdiction of the provinces in which they were located, which would involve two different provincial systems. Instead, they set about the process of codifying their legal and cultural traditions into a body of law that would be faithful to the values of the Akwesasne, and make sense to external authorities. Two decades later the process has finally been completed, and the new legal system was officially voted into law by local authorities last summer. This achievement represents significant progress for the autonomy and sovereignty of Indigenous peoples in Canada.

—Ryan Canon

Campus debates over Zionism

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his year saw a number of stories come out of the Israeli occupation of Palestine, Zionism, and BDS. Of note was the launch of the McGill chapter of Independent Jewish Voices Canada (IJV), the first anti-Zionist Jewish group at McGill since 2009. On its website, IJV describes itself as a “national human rights organization whose mandate is to promote a just resolution to the conflict in Israel and Palestine through the application of international law and respect for the human rights of all parties,” and to “motivate critical Jewish students to gain awareness of the Israeli occupation and to bring this awareness to the broader campus community.”

On campus activities were not limited to pro-Palestine groups, as on Wednesday, November 9, an Hillel McGill held an event featuring the group Artists 4 Israel on the Lower Field of campus organized by Chabad McGill.

The event attracted protesters who denounced what they perceived to be the event’s insensitive concept and erasure of Palestinian voices. Members of Hillel McGill erected a wall on Lower Field, decorated it with Canadian and Israeli flags, and the word ‘peace’ in Hebrew and English. The protesters took issue with the statements about Israel beside the art installation, which portrayed the nation as a place of tolerance and equality, as well as the concept of the installation, which they said resembles the wall that runs through the West Bank and limits Palestinian access to medical supplies and water.

On Tuesday, March 14, a panel was held arguing in favour of an academic boycott of Israeli universities, a rarely discussed aspect of the BDS movement.

The panel, which was attended by around twenty students, held small discussion groups to present their own strategies on how to implement this boycott. Internationally, the movement for an academic boycott is led by the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel. This comes in response to Israeli Universities being complicit in actively supporting the Israeli occupation, and in the erasure of Palestinian history and culture.

—Ryan Canon

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April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

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SSMu Executive Reviews

Resignations and allegations of gendered violence

tudents’ faith in the Student Society of McGill University (SSMU) has long been tenuous to say the least, but it has been severely shaken in recent weeks, as two executives resigned amid allegations of gendered and sexual violence.

On February 22, former VP External David Aird resigned from his position. The previous night, a public statement had been released by the Community Disclosure Network (CDN), a collective of survivors and allies, condemning “sexualized and gendered violence committed by Aird both before and during his time as VP External.” The CDN made it clear that they had expressly demanded Aird’s resignation.

In the aftermath of this incident, the remaining executives received intense public criticism. In particular, then-President Ben Ger was sharply criticised for allowing Aird to remain in a position of power for months, despite some level of knowledge of his abusive and misogynistic behaviour. It emerged that, as long ago as September 2016, Ger had been made aware of a complaint against Aird. Instead of implementing formal accountability procedures or demanding his resignation, Ger allegedly set up a system of “check-ins,” whereby the two men

would meet periodically to discuss Aird’s behaviour.

Following Aird’s resignation and the public discovery of his behaviour, this system of “check-ins” was roundly condemned as unacceptably informal, untransparent, and ineffective. However, when, on Marc 9, Ger resigned amid allegations of gendered violence, public outrage intensified.

This latest crisis was complicated by the fact that SSMU did not initially acknowledge this fact publicly, at first releasing a statement which praised Ger’s work for the Society in glowing terms. It was not until SSMU Council that evening that the executive team informed the public that a survivor of gendered violence had come forward with allegations against Ger. Even then, an official statement was not released for another two weeks, leaving the responsibility to campus media to spread this news.

In the wake of this second resignation, the remaining executives faced further anger and scrutiny from SSMU members. Meanwhile, Aird’s responsibilities were largely taken on by VP University Affairs Erin Sobat, while VP Student Life Elaine Patterson stepped into the role of acting President.

Widespread concern about SSMU’s ability to handle disclosures of abuse equitably and effectively was reflected in the election campaign for next year’s executive team, with several candidates promising to prioritize the development of a SSMU policy on sexual violence. Currently, the Society’s equity policy does not cover sexual violence, which is theoretically handled at the McGill level, meaning that a hypothetical abuser within SSMU’s power structures might not face accountability processes appropriate to their SSMU position.

When the 2017-2018 SSMU executive was elected in mid-March, many in the McGill community expressed optimism based on the more diverse makeup of the incoming team. In contrast to this year’s primarily white, male executive, next year’s is entirely composed of women and people of colour. Moreover, as previously stated, many of those elected have committed themselves to developing a SSMU policy on sexual violence.

While these are certainly hopeful developments, it remains to be seen whether next year’s executive will manage to institute adequate accountability mechanisms for handling disclosures, and to restore some measure of trust in SSMU after Aird and Ger’s resignations.

Erin Sobat, VP University Affairs

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n his time as VP UA, Sobat has done excellent work on numerous fronts, both within his own portfolio and external to it. For one thing, he has developed valuable advocacy and research resources such as the Know Your Rights campaign and website, and the SSMU University Affairs website, which contains helpful resources for those interested in effecting institutional change at McGill.

Sobat also worked extensively on SSMU’s policy on unpaid internships and oversaw the creation of a report on the needs and experiences of students from foster care. Moreover, he spearheaded important research on open source textbooks which, if implemented, would markedly improve McGill’s financial accessibility.

In addition to his work on research and policy development within SSMU, Sobat played an important role in strengthening McGill’s sexual violence policy, and in getting it adopted through Senate. He has also made progress toward an intellectual property policy for McGill, which should be adopted shortly, and toward a set of guidelines to make medicines developed at McGill more commercially accessible, particularly in developing nations.

Sobat has also done crucial work to make McGill’s practices regarding medical accommodations more equitable; for example, the Faculty of Management has now centralized its intake of medical documentation, meaning that students aren’t obliged to appeal to individual profs for accommodations.

Most recently, he helped launch an initiative to pressure McGill into improving its woefully inadequate mental health services, and spearheaded the campaign which successfully blocked McGill’s attempt to increase the Athletics ancillary fee.

Leading up to the revelations of sexual violence on the part of Aird, Sobat worked closely with the Community Disclosure Network in attempting to bring about meaningful accountability. While he could arguably have been more proactive in this work, his contribution was unquestionably valuable.

Moreover, in the wake of Aird’s resignation, Sobat has assumed many of the VP External’s key responsibilities, representing SSMU at AVEQ and promoting the Association for the Voice of Education in Quebec’s (AVEQ) campaigns.

This being said, Sobat has occasionally been criticised by campus organizers for taking up an inordinate amount of space in media narratives around institutional change at McGill. This was particularly true during the fall 2016 semester, when some argued that he took too much credit for the development of the McGill sexual violence policy; while Erin was instrumental in improving the policy in cooperation with the administration, last year’s working group and survivors of sexual violence played a crucial role in making the issue a priority for McGill. On this issue, and on the issue of Indigenous education, Sobat should have done more to prioritize consultation, and to centre the voices of those directly impacted.

Overall, however, The Daily commends Sobat for his exceptionally dedicated and thorough efforts over the past year. Despite an escalating series of crises at SSMU in recent months, and the administration’s perennial resistance to meaningful progressive change, he has made valuable progress on numerous fronts, and his work will continue to improve the experience of McGill students for many years to come.

Daniel Lawrie, VP Internal

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uring his term as VP Internal, Lawrie oversaw a number of exceptionally successful events on campus. 4Floors attendance doubled in comparison to last year, and Faculty Olympics also garnered significant interest from students. This being said, 2016’s frosh week, though relatively well-organized, and well-received by attendees, drew criticism from the Milton-Parc community for being significantly more disruptive than in previous years.

Moreover, Lawrie seems to have focused heavily on event planning, to the detriment of other areas of his portfolio. Notably, he should have done more to support and work with First Year Council, which plays a key role in the experience of first-year students.

Then again, communication is another key part of the VP Internal portfolio, and to his credit, Lawrie has markedly increased readership of the SSMU listerv, and has worked on a website redesign which should be operational by September.

Lawrie also oversaw the signing of a Memorandum of Agreement with the administration, which applies the McGill Code of Conduct to all SSMU events. This is certainly an important step forward in protecting students – in particular, from gendered and sexual violence. In his interactions with other SSMU staff and representatives, however, Lawrie has shown himself to be woefully inadequate in dealing with disclosures of gendered violence, and in prioritizing the safety of both survivors and those most at risk of such violence.

Broadly speaking, while Lawrie has had some notable successes with campus events, his performance as a member of the executive has been lacking. He should have been significantly more present in SSMU’s democratic process, taken a more active role on Council and in supporting the team throughout recent crises, and simply shown greater commitment to the pro-survivor and politically progressive values which SSMU nominally holds dear.

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

SSMU Executive Reviews

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Niall Carolan, VP Finance

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arolan has kept a relatively low profile within SSMU this year, rarely participating actively in Council or in other political forums. On the rare occasions that he has made his positions known, they have erred on the side of moderation, rarely embracing SSMU’s more radically progressive values.

To his credit, Carolan has managed the SSMU budget competently, and the Society will be running a surplus this year. However, it should be noted that this was partly accomplished through the use of corporate advertising, which has drawn substantial criticism. Many students took issue with the highly intrusive Tangerine tent at Fall Activities Night, while others noted that prominent advertising space in the SSMU basement was devoted to Uber, a company with noted anti-union practices.

In addition to his valuable work on the overall SSMU budget, Carolan has done his best to have Sadie’s, the student-run cafeteria, break even this year. This seems to have failed, though this is more attributable to structural issues than to a lack of effort on his part.

The same cannot necessarily be said for the sustainable investments fund and the ethical purchasing policy, both of which Carolan promised to create, and both of which have failed to materialize.

Moreover, Carolan has consistently proved unresponsive to emails, both from other SSMU personnel and from the press. As such, it is difficult to accurately assess his performance as a SSMU executive.

Elaine Patterson, VP Student Life

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espite daunting logistical challenges caused by the construction on McTavish, reduced staff due to budget cuts, and the presence of disruptive corporate advertising, Patterson successfully organized both the Fall and Winter Activities Nights at SSMU. Compared to last year, these events were very wellreceived by both those tabling and those who simply attended.

While the moratorium on new SSMU clubs has caused some frustration among students, Patterson took advantage of the opportunity it provided to do valuable work with the Clubs Committee in updating the constitutions of several clubs. She also oversaw important improvements to the process through which club status is granted, ensuring that environmental and social sustainability are now criteria. Finally, with regard to the club-related portion of her portfolio, Patterson made important strides in facilitating storage in the SSMU building and streamlining the room-booking process in various spaces across campus for clubs.

Patterson also made Mental Health Awareness Week a success, and – though sometimes stymied by Student Services’ failure to coordinate effectively with student representatives this year – did important work to review and improve SSMU’s own plan on mental health.

Furthermore, she oversaw two roundtables on mental health, which brought together disparate organizations and groups on campus that are working to improve students’ access to much-needed care. Based on the success of this kind of initiative, Patterson has expressed the intention to encourage her successor to organize more roundtables so as to streamline communication between different SSMU services and the VP Student Life.

While Patterson has not always been particularly vocal in important political debates during Council, she has played a key part in keeping the executive team functional in the context of recent upheavals. In the wake of Ger’s resignation, Patterson assumed the position of acting President, in addition to the duties and responsibilities associated with her own portfolio. In this capacity, she has served as the main spokesperson for the executive, fielding a barrage of questions and criticisms from the public.

In summary, Patterson could have engaged more directly with political debates within SSMU this year, and been more proactive in working with SSMU services. However, she has consistently done thorough and valuable work despite immense challenges, and in the face of virtually unprecedented conflict within the executive team she has risen to the occasion admirably.

­­­Sascha Magder, VP Operations

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ver the past year, Magder has overseen a marked increase in registration for – and profit from – SSMU minicourses, largely attributable to fresh course selections and a new and more accessible website. He has also overseen the successful rebranding of Sadie’s, SSMU’s student-run cafeteria. While still running a substantial deficit, the cafeteria’s sales have improved significantly compared to last year. Indeed, Sadie’s actually turned a profit in February, a small yet noteworthy accomplishment. On the other hand, overhead charges remain distressingly high.

Magder has also done valuable work in the domain of sustainability. Next year, the SSMU building will have larger compost bins, and grants have been obtained to plant a garden behind the building. Furthermore, Magder has worked towards creating the new position of Sustainability Coordinator within SSMU, and to secure more sustainably-sourced products for distribution during the coming year’s frosh week. Both of these initiatives will be financed through the Sustainability Project Fund (SPF).

For much of this year, the SSMU building’s physical accessibility was severely restricted by the ongoing construction projects on McTavish and Dr. Penfield. Magder was unable to do much to improve this situation, though this can hardly be considered his fault, as it’s unclear if the City of Montreal was at all amenable to student input over accessibility concerns. Moreover, Magder successfully lobbied the administration to leave the Brown building’s doors unlocked until 10:30 p.m., increasing physical accessibility to mitigate the impact of construction.

However, despite his valuable work in some areas of the Operations portfolio, Magder neglected to produce a long-term plan for renovations and improvements to the SSMU building. Moreover, while Sadie’s has certainly seen improvement since last year, card readers have yet to be installed which would allow students to pay for food using the myCard system. The Indigenous Art Project, which would have brought the work of Indigenous artists into the SSMU building, also failed to materialize.

In addition to these issues, Magder has demonstrated a lamentable lack of understanding of SSMU’s governance structures through his participation in SSMU Council debates. Moreover, in his political positions, he has tended to lean towards the status quo, at time showing more concern for his public image than for the wellbeing of marginalized communities on campus.

In short, while Magder has certainly overseen valuable improvements to SSMU’s operations this year, his performance has left much to be desired.

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April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

Photojournalism

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A series of photos from this year’s reporting on protests, marches, and vigils in Montreal

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Resistance close to home

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April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

Photojournalism

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An attendee at a vigil after the Quebec City mosque attack on January 30, 2017. During the vigil, which paid tribute to the six men who were killed while praying in a mosque, a variety of speakers addressed the crowd about inclusivity.

(Conor Nickerson)

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Protesters at an anti-Trump march in Phillips Square on January 20, 2017.

The anti-Facist demonstration was one of many protesting the inaguration of Donald Trump. The demonstration featured speeches in from various Montrealers.

(Xavier Richer Vis)

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D emonstrators stand in solidarity with Rojava on September 6, 2016.

They were protesting a new Turkish military offensive in Syria, which the protesters argued targeted only the Kurdish state of Rojiva, established in 2013.

(Ryan Canon)

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Far-right protesters and anti-facists clash at a protest on March 4, 2017. Farright protesters organized in response to motion M103, which would condemn Islamophobia and track incidents of hate crimes against Muslims. A small antiFacist group soon arrived at the rally and began throwing rocks to disrupt it.

(Théophile Vareille)

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Protesters organized by the Industrial Workers of the World Union at a demonstration march in solidarity with striking workers on September 4, 2016. The “Wobblies,” as they many call themselves, were protesting for better wages and working conditions. (Xavier Richer Vis)

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Ojibwa activist Timothy Armstrong speaks at a rally against the Dakota Access Pipeline on November 7, 2016. The pipeline, now approved by the Trump administration, intends to transport over half a million gallons of oil nearly 2,000 kilometers across the U.S. Midwest. (Inori Roy)

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Anti-Trump protesters at the Montreal Women’s March on January 21, 2017.

Protesters stood in solidarity with the Women’s March in Washington, a march which stood against the policies and politics of Donald Trump during his inauguration on January 20. (Marina Cupido)

Photos counterclockwise from top.

Commentary

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

The ways in which we justify settler-colonialism

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Working in solidarity with the Algonquins of Barriere Lake

Sydney Lang Commentary Writer

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On Wednesday, March 23, I had the privilege of visiting Mitchikanibikok Inik, or the Algonquins of Barriere Lake, territory. I left around 6am from Montreal, to arrive at the snowcovered reserve shortly after noon.

I was one of around twenty human rights activists and academics who were invited to the reserve as a part of a delegation to build solidarity with the community. Although I attended specifically on behalf of the Mining Injustice Solidarity Network, delegates had backgrounds working on anything from Indigeneity and climate change to housing and mining justice. We all came with a common goal: to learn from the community and to strategize methods of solidarity and resistance. I engaged in conversations with the community and with delegates, about government control, agreements currently being negotiated in bad faith, and colonial, state-led violence. Members of the community, including the Chief and Band Councillor, told us about about the history of the land, the history of the community, and the current state of affairs on the reserve.

The problems facing the Algonquins of Barriere Lake (ABL) are a result of settler-colonialism and government policy initially created to control and eliminate the ABL population. To start, the community was displaced from their resource-rich land onto a 59-acre reserve in 1961, about 30 kilometers south of the site of Barriere Lake in which the community has historical ties, when the administration of the surrounding land was transferred to the government of Canada. This displacement was engineered by the government to both control them and make an enormous profit. In partnership with extractives corporations, the government has built a hydroelectric dam reservoir, engaged in extensive logging, and attempted to mine copper, all on ABL territory. The community has not received any of the profits from the exploitation of natural resources on their land.

The Canadian government also imposed Third Party Management (TPM) onto the community, insisting that the ABL are unable to manage their own affairs. The community’s traditional government was therefore attacked, and is no longer recognized as legitimate.

The government was able to do this by imposing section 74 of the Indian Act in 2010. Section 74 is an archaic provision that allows the government to control and influ-

ence governance in Indigenous communities; it allows the Minister to order the creation of a band council, “when he deems it advisable for the good government of the band,” although this often diverts from traditional structures of governance. Canada imposed a chief and council election, and although only 10 mailed in ballots were received from the community in opposition, the selected band councilors are often consulted, on behalf of the community, regarding extractive projects. The government also hired external accountants to manage the community’s funds - they are paid hundreds of thousands of dollars a year, although the community suffers from a significant deficit.

Further, the infrastructure on the reserve is insufficient, if not deplorable. The government provided the reserve with diesel generators, even though it is situated right next to a hydro dam. While walking around the reserve, we saw the generators that smelled strongly of gas and were prone to breaking down. Many homes are not fully built or are falling apart, so elders have used their residential school settlement compensation to build small shacks for housing. These tiny wooden shacks have been used to fit families of six or more, although the reserve remains highly overpopulated. Professor Hayden King, a delegate who also visited the reserve that day, referred to these systemic and intentional problems as “federally-imposed poverty.”

The challenges that the community has endured could not be fully recognised or understood within the few short hours that I visited the reserve, nor can they be summarized in a few short paragraphs.

However, the stories that were shared with us spoke volumes; the stories from individual community members, alongside the community’s collective fight to defend their territory and their dignity, were a microcosm of the contemporary manifestations of settler colonialism in Quebec and in Canada, much of which has been established on unceded territory.

The violence towards the Barriere Lake community, although devastating, does not exist in isolation, and is a result of centuries of settler-colonialism.

Settler colonialism manifests itself today in part as historical trauma, notably from experiences of residential schools. It also manifests itself in contemporary political and corporate intrusions such as government services and extraction, which work to control and exploit Indigenous peoples and their land to ensure that resistance is quelled

and that the community and the environment remain under government control.

The government consistently interferes with the community’s affairs, through governance, child raising and care, healthcare, and policing. These interventions are both paternalistic and contribute to a paradigm of assimilation, wherein the Canadian government operates with the assumption that Indigenous peoples will eventually be assimilated into Canadian settler society, which entails a surrendering of land rights, amongst other things. This currently manifests as the government both intervening to ensure that Indigenous communities remain alive under harsh, state-imposed conditions, while simultaneously expecting them to die. As mentioned above, by attacking the Indigenous family through the removal of children by child services, insufficient housing on the reserve, and a large deficit, the government attempts to “kill the Indian in the child,” repeating Canada’s history of residential schools and forced adoption.

Further, settler colonialism manifests itself by framing the Indigenous community as backwards, non-contemporary, and requiring assistance. This is evidenced in agreements such as the TPM, where the Canadian government mobilizes the paternalistic narrative that Indigenous peoples are unable to manage their own affairs. This logic justifies intrusions into and oversight of the community and is reproduced through colonial legal processes and government agreements, which focuses the blame on the Indigenous community, and often pathologizes the Indigenous family. This narrative is socially constructed and is intentionally mobilized in specific contexts for very specific purposes, as depicted above, often by the government with the goal of domination and community control.

A focus on the inability of Indigenous peoples to govern themselves depoliticizes suffering from environmental destruction and land dispossession; it directs government attention onto the challenges within the community, rather than the external, and state-created, factors that inform these challenges.

As such, it allows the government and subsequent officials and private sector corporations to focus their remedies, or their accountability to the community, in the form of governance and social services, or rather further colonial interventions. This allows them to remain inactive in addressing a key component of historical trauma and settler

Courtesy of Indigenous Peoples Solidarity movement Ottawa colonialism: the dispossession and exploitation of land. The government can thus simultaneously control the reserve, through services that “help” the Indigenous community, while obscuring and distracting from pressing systemic issues that continue to marginalize and dominate Indigenous peoples, such as logging and mining.

Band Councillor, Norman Matchewan, told the group: “We’re not going to negotiate something that’s already ours.” As such, we must think critically about the ways that power and settler colonialism inform how we understand legal processes and negotiations. What does negotiation mean when you are forced to negotiate something that was stolen from you? How do you exist in a society whose institutions were built to eliminate you?

How do you fight for legal recognition, in the form of state-defined “rights,” while simultaneously resisting the nation-state and its continuation of the settler colonial project?

What do state-defined “legal rights” mean under occupation and state violence? These are some of the tensions and contradictions that the Algonquins of Barriere Lake have been negotiating, while fighting for their community’s dignity, wellbeing, and basic survival under the harsh material conditions that have been projected onto them by the settler colonial nation state.

As we drove back to Montreal that evening, one of the organizers in our car told us that the distance we were driving - the land between Barriere Lake and Montreal - belonged to the Algonquins. And we wondered how we, in Montreal, can be accountable to the community whose land we live and work on.

We can look to the material consequences of settler colonialism, and the concrete ways that we, as settlers, benefit from and contribute to the settler colonial project. We can look to ways that McGill, a university both built on Indigenous land and with the slave labour of Black and Indigenous people, perpetuates colonialism.

Indigenous staff and students at McGill, along with other universities, have taken great steps to engage with issues of colonialism: this has taken the form of panel discussions, speakers, events, and academic dialogue. However, I question the ways that McGill as an institution, and the majority of the settler students, administrators, and academics who work inside it, are actually accountable to the Indigenous peoples and their land on which McGill operates.

We must move beyond, or critically engage with, land acknowledgements and inaccessible events within elite academic institutions. We must question the assumptions, logics, and narratives that the government, private sector, and educational institutions perpetuate and are complicit in.

Solidarity requires accountability, and accountability requires an analysis of power, an acknowledgement of material struggles, and continuous action. As McGill students, we must stand in solidarity with, and be accountable to, the Algonquins of Barriere Lake as they continue to fight for their community and their land, and against the paternalistic and assimilationist efforts of the Canadian government.

Sydney Lang is a 1L Law student. To contact the author, please email sydney.lang@mail.mcgill.ca

Commentary

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

Reflections on ‘La Journée de Réflexion’

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Criticizing the mishandling of campus sexual assault forums Connor Spencer Commentary Writer Content warning: gendered and sexualized violence

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n Monday, March 21, the fifth and final ‘Journée de Réflexion’ - a series of formal consultations run by the Minister of PostSecondary Education’s Office on the creation of a new policy concerning sexual violence on campuses - took place at Centre Mont-Royal. This conference was organized as the last formal consultation in a series of five similar ‘Days of Reflection’ to take place across Quebec - the first 4 taking place in Chicoutimi, Sherbrooke, Quebec City, and Gatineau. Although announced in October by the Quebec government after the highly publicized outrage over a series of sexual assaults at Laval University in Quebec City, these initiatives have not adequately consulted students or groups working around these topics on the ground.

There was no doubt that the atmosphere of the conference was not particularly welcoming - in a room of almost two hundred invited participants, I was 1 of maybe 10 student representatives in that space.

There were even less than 10 BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, or people of colour) participants. Instead, the room was a sea of middle-aged white midlevel education administrators being presented information that was collected by other middle-aged white mid-level education administrators.

This leads us to a very important point - the conference was not open to the public. Instead, you could only participate if you were explicitly sent an invitation - and there were multiple stories I heard of student associations being sent an invitation less than a week before the conference, or finding the invite in their junkmail after the RSVP deadline. The only way I was aware of this was as a member of the incoming Executive at SSMU - not as someone who has been doing grassroots work around combatting sexual violence on campus. Although there was regular contact between Québec Contre les Violences Sexuelles (QCVS), a nonpartisan group of organized activists who are working to tackle how sexual violence is received by society, neither QCVS nor other organizations already working around sexual violence were not consulted during the formation of these events - and QCVS was one of the only groups working around sexual violence that was invited. It became very clear that ultimately, if you didn’t have contact with the Minister of Education’s office, you didn’t get an invite, and therefore did not get a chance to have a say about what this new policy should look like.

The first half of the day was organized around a series of presentations by the Minister herself, and others who presented on either the findings of reports that were commissioned by the provincial government on this subject in October (the most interesting of which was ESSIMU – for those who speak French, I highly recommend looking through the findings), or presentations of campaigns that have already have been launched such as Sans Oui C’est Non (which I would argue is a good reflection of the overall approach of the government’s: wellintentioned and great in theory, but in practice very superficial in the change it implements), and Ni Viande Ni Objet. Halfway through, and after these presentations, there was a 15 minute question period for feedback.

Inori Roy | The McGill Daily

During one of the question periods, McGill grad and current AVEQ Coordinator of Mobilization and Associative Development, Kristen Perry, got up to criticize the lack of accessibility in the space, choosing to switch to speaking in English in solidarity with the English-speakers in the room who did not have access to translation of what was being said, or the information that was being presented. This became especially evident during what was undoubtedly the most important part of the day: when three survivors from the McGill chapter of Silence is Violence stood up during the question period and presented their stories, called for their voices to be included in this space, and in one case, publicly called out particular members of the McGill administration for mishandling and/ or dismissing their cases - particular members who were sitting in that room right behind them.

This tactical disruption of proceedings was incredibly important and accomplished two pertinent things. Firstly, it linked the situations and concerns that were being theoretically discussed in these presentations and reports to real experiences, and secondly created a dialogue of accountability that hadn’t been in the space before. The dialogue shifted and was picked up by others in the room – how do we hold ourselves accountable as administrators? How do we hold our peers accountable?

I found myself in the absurd situation of having to translate and summarize what the survivors (who had presented in English) had said to the woman beside me who was a representative from a CÉGEP near Mont-Tremblant, and who only spoke French. I’m sure I was not the only person in the room failing to do justice to the powerful words that the survivors had just spoken. There is no doubt that the room was dominated

by French-speakers, which is to be expected, however little to no accommodation made towards Anglophones in the space, including the Anglophone associations who had been invited.

This proved especially problematic in the case of the survivors’ intervention, as all three of the women spoke mostly in English. Without live or even whisper translations offered, there was no way to ensure that these supremely important voices were able to be understood by everyone sitting in a room in order to decide what would happen to cases like theirs.

AVEQ has been very involved in this process since the beginning, including drafting a statement with

ASSÉ which heavily criticized the lack of student consultation and survivor-centred frameworks within the process of the consultations. I was told later by Perry that AVEQ had also requested several other accommodations which were not met, such as having active listeners in or outside the space, or that there be a way for people to contribute their thoughts or opinions in a way that did not require them to stand up in front of 200 hundred people and present into a microphone. It is clear that the conversation as to how to truly make space accessible to survivors was not one that was had. It is incredibly brave what the survivors from Silence is Violence did - and not something they and other survivors who spoke up during the day should have been forced to have to do. It was incredibly emotional, and because of the lack of supports in the space, the survivors in turn ended up having to comfort each other. Although each of the testimonies was arguably well-received (with Minister Helène David answering each speaker directly - in French - and an encouragement of the dialogue that was brought up made), there is no doubt that in an initiative led by mid to high-level administrators will be lacking in critical understanding.

We have yet to see if they follow-up on the points of accessibility, intersectionality and accountability that was brought up in the room.

There was no doubt that the atmosphere of the conference was not particularly welcoming.

Now that the formal consultations are over, AVEQ and other student organizations’ efforts are going into affecting the actual outcome of these consultations - the creation of legislation at the provincial level about how to deal with sexual violence on campuses. Quite a few student groups and grassroots organizations who were present at at least one of the consultations are now in the process of writing a letter to the minister of education’s office with their reflections after these consultations: what went wrong, what was done right, what their hopes are for the new policy, and - most importantly - that they expect to be consulted

during the drafting. This is crucial, especially as most of the drafting will be happening over the summer (the hope is to have a policy to implement at the beginning of the new school year in September), when many student organizations are their weakest due to the break in the school year and subsequent dispersion of the student body.

Leaving the conference, I felt both invigorated and frustrated. Invigorated because there was a room of 200 people firmly committed that “c’est assez” (“enough”), and “il faut agir” (“we must act”), but frustrated because of who was leading this action process, once again rendering the incredible labour done by survivors and their allies on a day-to-day basis invisible. Good intentions can only go so far. If we want to make lasting, sustainable change on our campuses that directly addresses the gendered violence that happens on a day to day basis, those changes need to be implemented from the bottom-up, suggested and crafted by those who have been most affected by these systemic issues, not by our traditional policy-writers. This is exactly the same situation we are now facing with SSMU as we enter into the consultation processes for the creation of a new Gendered and Sexualized Violence Policy. We need to make sure that we work to prioritize the voices of those who have been working tirelessly on the ground and who against all odds - lack of institutionalized memory, an administration that dismisses student labour and pats itself on the back for a new policy but has a horribly long history of not believing nor supporting survivors etc - have remained resilient.

Connor Spencer is a U3 student in the Faculty of Arts. She can be reached at connor.spencer@mail.mcgill.ca.

The CDN will be running closed focus groups in accessible offcampus spaces for members of the community who have experienced any form of sexualized violence to share their concerns, thoughts, and hopes for the new GSVP. They will be facilitated by trained volunteers who have been working with CDN throughout this process, and this will be a purposefully non-SSMU facilitated space to have a conversation about what next steps should look like. If you would be interested in participating in one or more of these focus groups, please email them at community.disclosure.network@gmail.com.

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Commentary

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

Celebrating stagnation

When burnout drives us to accept symbolic progress Kareem Ibrahim Commentary Writer

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n an age where we are constantly inundated with information about world events and widespread injustices, it is understandable that one of our natural reactions is to eagerly embrace tokenistic events to convince ourselves that progress is taking place. So, Justin Trudeau was the first Prime Minister to wear an Indigenous ceremonial headdress?

Wow, incredible – colonialism is over, progress is happening! Meanwhile, the Liberal government continues break their promises, in approving pipelines and failing spend the money they promised to Indigenous communities in March 2016.

One might argue that the fact that Canadians feel that the government is doing well — thanks to Trudeau’s impeccable PR team and his many “casual and spontaneous” photo-ops appearing shirtless in the woods with a family and helping a man in a wheelchair down a flight of stairs — is an objectively good thing. How could a large population generally feeling more content be a bad thing?

While on the one hand, there’s the argument that the average person would vote for a political leader they find ‘relatable’ and ‘cool’, there is also another crucial component: compassion fatigue. While this term originates largely from care professions (for example, paramedics, therapists, animal welfare workers etc.), it also applies to the way in which we all take in information: there are limits to our capacity to care for every issue that rushes past our eyes and through our ears as we scroll through our news feeds or half-listen to the news on the radio or television. With the amount of information available to us today, it seems nearly inevitable that at a certain point, the emotional burden of investing our time or money in these issues becomes too much. The articles come to feel commonplace, as though it would be more shocking if there wasn’t a mass shooting, or flood, or humanitarian crisis happening every sixty seconds, somewhere in the world.

For many people, the degree to which the suffering of others is broadcasted routinely over social media can seriously impact our mental health. It’s important to be mindful of this when consuming information, and to reach out for help if it’s affecting your everyday life.

All of this is very reasonable, but the issue with compassion fatigue is that as a result, we all-too-eagerly seek to embrace notions of progress, which are nothing more than half-hearted attempts at making ourselves feel better about the state of the world. Let’s consider the case for racism in Canada: for many of us who have lived in Canada, or even heard about it in other parts

of the world, we are taught that Canada is a multicultural utopia and that we should vigorously celebrate this and avoid taking it for granted.

After all, our southern neighbours appear to be far behind us in terms of tackling systemic racism. While aiming to make us feel better about our lives is a noble cause, much like Trudeau’s wonderful public image, they often allow us to overlook harsh realities. For instance, having been spoon-fed the notion that racism does not exist in Canada since we were young makes having authentic conversations about how communities of colour are treated differently in Canada today much more difficult, because it involves rejecting the idea that Canada serves as a utopia for marginalized peoples. While it is certainly important to recognize how Canada can serve as an example for other countries whose anti-racist efforts are much less significant, we cannot allow these brief celebrations to substitute our critical thinking skills when asking ourselves: is this progress worth celebrating, or is it simply virtue signalling or showmanship?

Relying on largely symbolic events to convince ourselves of overly optimistic interpretations of public affairs can be dangerous.

While it is important to remain optimistic throughout this process, we cannot repeat the mistakes of our predecessors. Look at Brexit, or the election of Trump – didn’t we all think that it wasn’t going to happen? “How could this possibly happen in the rosy world of today, where bigotry is no more?” thought many, presumably. For some, this was obvious, like those who were not surprised by Trump’s election.

If we continue to satiate our emotional needs by buying into false notions of progress without thinking critically about their efficacy, we will be feeding into our own stagnation. Oh, so a Black man was elected as President of the United States? This must mean that we have made huge strides regarding anti-racist efforts. Meanwhile, people of colour in the US make up 30 per cent of the population, and 60 per cent of the prison population, and one in three African-American

Conor Nickerson | The McGill Daily men can expect to go to prison in their lifetime.

Although it is important to seek out remedies to our often-disheartened worldviews, including self-care and reaching out to loved ones, relying on largely symbolic events to convince ourselves of overly optimistic interpretations of public affairs can be dangerous, especially when we aren’t being given the truth in its entirety. Who is in newsrooms, deciding that the violent death of a Toronto trans woman of colour, or several death threats faced by a fleeing trans woman, do not deserve to be broadcasted, while we have heard many times over about the pandas our Prime Minister met last March. It is clear that many of our media outlets are forced to choose more “profitable” stories with the potential to go viral, over important stories which remind Canadians of the uncomfortable realities we and many of our neighbours face.

For example, celebrating International Women’s Day is

important, but we can’t forget that the wage gap in Canada between men and women has slightly increased in recent years, despite our efforts to recognize women and the challenges they face.

There are limits to our capacity to care for every issue.

Additionally, we must make our questions heard loud and clear when we ask what is missing from law enforcement training which facilitates the murder of a 37-yearold mentally ill Black man in Ottawa by police officers, or when we ask what needs to change in our prison system when an Indigenous man is held in solitary confinement for 1,560 days, something which is apparently common practice, despite the United Nations

ruling that any longer than 15 days constitutes torture. Or, why do police dismiss one in five sexual assault claims, as was found in a twenty-month-long investigation into how police handle sexual assault allegations?

All this is not to say that feelgood memes and light-hearted articles have no place in our news feeds and in the media; after all, compassion fatigue is very real and we won’t be very helpful when burnt out and disenchanted. Nonetheless, it is important to hold our institutions accountable to values that they claim to stand by: inclusion and transparency. We cannot allow ourselves to be tricked into thinking that these issues have been resolved, with flashy events and symbolic initiatives, when in fact, we have a long way to go. Let’s think more critically.

Kareem is a U3 student studying International Development. He can be reached at kareem.ibrahim@ mail.mcgill.ca

Commentary

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

Waiting in waiting rooms

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Contemplating the efficiency of McGill’s mental health resources Alainah Aamir The Looking Glass

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ccording to the World Health Organisation, one in every four people in the world is affected by mental or neurological illness. Despite the evident commonality of this phenomena, 49 per cent of Canadians have said that they have experienced anxiety or depression at some point in their lives, but they have not seen a doctor for it.

This statistic is haunting, given the concealed realities it brings to the surface – in a country with largely effective healthcare and supposedly progressive politics, half of the population’s illness goes untreated.

Through the course of this year, I have embarked on two journeys.

One has been the experience of being a columnist for the Daily, during which I had the privilege of hearing and often narrating my peers’ experiences with mental illness (with their consent), and attempting to ensure that my preconceived notions do not affect the content of my articles. Another journey has been the harrowing personal experience of struggling with old illnesses and adjusting to new ones. A combination of these two factors have made me reflective of the environment I am in, and the impact of this environment on the people around me.

McGill claims to have several resources on campus to ensure that the mental health of students remains a priority. These include the Mental Health Clinic, the Eating Disorder Program, the Office for Students with Disabilities, Nightline, as well as the supposedly accommodating nature of most faculty members.

However, both the findings of my research and the casual conversations I made in waiting rooms, have made one thing very clear for me – most students who avail themselves of these opportunities are doing so because something in their university environment has triggered them.

The existence of triggers in a university environment does not demonstrate that university creates illness, but rather the fact that the environment can exacerbate existing disorders. The question I ask, therefore, is whether the mental health facilities on campus are sufficient to provide for students, considering the fact that the environment of university can be very detrimental or triggering in many ways.

Triggers exist all around us – some may even argue that the most important step towards recovery is learning to identify what triggers you. Triggers are rarely mild - they present themselves in the form of in-

Nora McCready | The McGill Daily tense waves of anxiety, sadness, paranoia or dissociation, to name a few.

Common triggers include the inability to cope with academic pressure, continuous time management issues, adopting and normalizing unhealthy eating and lifestyle choices, as well as implicit and explicit encounters with fat-shaming. First year students, like myself, are also especially vulnerable to toxic relationships and friendships, given how some students may either intend to seek out a quick fix for loneliness, or are simply seeking to check off an imaginary checklist for what is considered socially acceptable and desirable among their immediate and extended peer groups. Triggers inevitably vary among students and generalizations cannot be made about the form in which they may present themselves, or subsequently the way individuals may choose to cope with them.For instance, this can be illustrated by the different reactions people have to medication, as I have explored in one of my previous articles. While some people are able to adjust without difficulty and begin reacting positively to their medication, others may take weeks to adjust to the side effects, or never be able to adjust properly to them at all.

It is important to realize that progress will only come as a result of making the consistent effort to en-

sure that you do not demonize your own mental illness.

It feels to me like the mental health facilities on campus place more of an emphasis on the importance of medication and psychiatric care than they do on psychological care and therapy. Several of the survey responses I received from my peers over the course of research for my articles, for example, expressed dissatisfaction at the fact that their psychiatrists sometimes changed or increased their medication despite their discomfort or hesitance.

My friend told me about how recently, she broke down during a session with her psychiatrist, who was left at a loss for what to do, because although they can prescribe medication, it is neither their job description nor their expertise to be able to provide the emotional support or engage in discussions about improvement and recovery. On the contrary, this is a job only a therapist or psychologist can adequately perform.

Although many students often only see psychiatrists, it is imperative to remember that holistic recovery can only be achieved when all dimensions of the issue are dealt with.

It is important to remember that some mental illnesses are far more normalized than others. These include anxiety, depression, and eating disorders. While all mental ill-

nesses are stigmatized to a great degree, other mental illnesses like bipolar disorder, borderline personality disorder, dissociative disorder, and schizophrenia, to name a few, are far less normalized, in part perhaps due to the fact that people consider them less common. Moreover, because these mental illnesses are not spoken of as much, it is difficult to understand how they might be impacting students in a university environment.

It is important to remember that some mental illnesses are far more normalized than others.

As a result, my column had a comparatively restricted focus, because I could not hope to do justice to the experiences of individuals with certain illnesses without making unjust generalizations. However, four months into the journey and I can safely say that the research this column required enabled me to explore previously uncharted territories, educating me further about the illnesses that I assumed I knew all

about. However, it also brought my attention to the fact that McGill’s mental health facilities still need significant reform and improvement to ensure that the toll that a university environment has on the mental health of students can be addressed. Ultimately, the mere existence of these institutions is not enough to guarantee that the mental health of students will be catered to. If McGill really claims to care for its students, it needs to step up and meet the challenge of supporting all the students across its campus who have mental health needs - until then, its work is insufficient, and its promises hollow.

By working as a columnist for the Daily, I hope I am doing my part (although an insignificant one in the grand scheme of things) towards facilitating a healthy dialogue regarding mental illness and destigmatization. For every friend, acquaintance, or relative I made uncomfortable by vulnerably talking about my mental illness, I can only hope that there is someone out there who has been driven to engage in an honest and unafraid dialogue about their illness.

The Looking Glass is a column based on the author’s reflections on mental health and first-year life on campus. To contact the author, email thelookingglass@mcgilldaily.com.

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April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

Commentary

The Best of Commentary 2016-2017 An open letter to TD bank on their investment in the Dakota Access Pipeline

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n open letter, signed by 68 former recipients of the TD scholarship for Community Leadership, asked TD to withdraw its investments from the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL). TD securities has made one of the largest financial commitments to DAPL, contributing over 360 million dollars towards its construction. Their investment in DAPL represents almost ten per cent of the 3.75 billion dollars in total extended by financial institutions internationally to Energy Transfer partners, the parent corporation constructing DAPL. The letter penalizes TD for completing a call for highschool students from across Canada to apply for the Scholarship for Community Leadership while they are actively undermining the sovereignty of Indigenous communities, and therefore Indigenous youth.

—TD Scholars (November 24, 2016)

Climate governance under Trudeau

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eoliberalism is a system of economic governance that embraces free trade, deregulation and the deconstruction of the welfare state and has become an intrinsic aspect of Euro-American political culture.

This is the definition of neoliberalism the article provides and contextualizes Canadian politics within this framework. Despite that fact that many commentators have chided neoliberalism, and the parties that practice it, for its perpetuation of inequality and violence, the Liberals under Trudeau have been strangely immune to this critique. The Liberal government under Trudeau has made many promises, but failed to actualize any of their plans. For example, the Liberal party was voted in on the dual promise of economic revitalization and confronting the grave reality of climate change.

Despite a false narrative of embracing sustainability, the government has only pledged a measly $200 million annually for developing and adopting renewable energy which, is a drop in the bucket compared to investment industry wide. The article reminds green activists and environmentalists that the Liberal government is not their friend.

—Ryan Shah (February 13, 2017)

Black Media Magic

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acial representation in the media is the locus of this article. The author describes her initial pride in being a Black child. Ihejirika mother was a Women’s Studies professor, so she was introduced to heavy academic terms such as systemic racism, visible minority, and gender politics at a young age. Ihejirika documents the decline of her Black pride which, in this case, began in fourth grade. She had just returned from Nigeria and was reintroduced to an environment where being Black meant being Othered. She recalls an incident when, after mustering all the courage she had, she asked a group of girls if she they could give her a temporary tattoo as well. She says, “I remember my request being politely declined because the tattoos would not show up on my skin. After that, it became difficult to take pride in something that my peers considered strange – so I gave up embracing my identity in order to be accepted by them.” Growing from these experiences, of experiences that lacked representation and visibility, the author concludes the article by emphasizing the importance events like the Montreal Black International Film Festival. Representation matters because there are young Black children out there, searching for their idols.

—Chidera Ihejirika (October 17, 2016)

Commentary

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

The problem with romanticizing vigilantes in the Philippines

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igilantism has become mandated in the Philippines at a governmental level and this transformation was initiated with the inauguration of president Rodrigo Duterte. Within a week of his inauguration, police around the country started to mobilize, taking kids and drunkards off the streets, determined to pledge their allegiance to the president. The Manaloto discusses the president’s lack of regard for the rule of law in dealing with the country’s illegal drug trade. For example he encourages ordinary citizens to “Go ahead and kill them [those accused of criminal activity] yourself.”

The author expresses that the scary thing is that people take him up in his challenge and that the violence has escalated to the point in which neighbours are killing each other. Manaloto provides a deep contextual analysis of President Duterte’s policies and how they affect the people of the Philippines.

How much does a promise cost?

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slamophobia is rampant in McGill classrooms as this article attests to. Shamy, a visible Arab Muslim woman, explains the reason she chose to Major is World Islamic and Middle Eastern studies was to distance herself from the alienation and isolation that she feels as a result of her religion and race. Her assumption was that, since this program is inspired by her religious and cultural identity, she would be able to find acceptance within it. She says, “I​ ​naively​ ​believed​ ​that​​ McGill​​would​​protect​​me​​and​​provide​​me​​with​​safe spaces.​​That​​was​​the​​ first​ ​lie​ ​I​ ​believed.” Her assumptions proved to be inaccurate and this article is narration of that Islamophobic incident.

—Sarah Shamy (February 13, 2017)

—Angelo Manaloto (November 28, 2016)

Reflections on 2016 Enforcing the deadname

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“deadname” refers to the name that a transgender individual no longer identifies with; it is the name they are assigned at birth. Paré navigates the incompetency of McGill’s Administration in accommodating the needs of transgender students. The author describes the excruciating three weeks Paré had to endure reading their deadname in the McGill Outlook title bar every day, multiple times a day. This experience had a draining effect on the author’s mental health because of the constant reminders of their pre-transition life. McGill’s current preferred name policy (when it works) is limited to students’ classlists, McGill emails, and myCourses. Outside of those three platforms, there is nothing. The policy fails to recognise trans people’s lived gender identity as well as failing to meet McGill’s legal obligations to accommodate trans students under the Quebec Charter of Human Rights and Freedom, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of gender identity. These failures harm trans students psychologically and emotionally, and make us vulnerable to discrimination, harassment, and violence. Echoing the author’s voice: trans rights are human rights and the McGill Administration needs to take initiative in assessing their needs and providing sustainable support.

—Florence Paré (October 17, 2016)

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his article, as the title insinuates, is a reflection on 2016, a year which felt like an ambush to most of us. Although we were well aware of economic inequalities, rampant racism, cissexism, misogyny, and the very foundations on which our Western society is based, 2016 managed to glaringly illuminate these issues. The end of the year saw think-pieces, tweets, blog posts, articles, listicles, and memes that all insisted on personalizing 2016 as simply “the worst.” The author points out that 2016 was, after all, the year of realizing things and here’s what we realized: “having a Black man as president of the United States did not, in fact, mean that racism was over; the western world is experiencing a crisis, and the liberal democratic principles it supposedly espouses – those same seeds of democracy that it so generously sewed across the globe, without being asked to do so – are failing; and the fall of neoliberal capitalism seems inevitable at this point, maybe it was never really sustainable after all.”

Favory wraps up by suggesting that the coming of the new year will not put an end to the injustices we came to realize in 2016, but the coming of the new year will hopefully push us to “step outside our ivory towers, behind our liberal smokescreens, away from our comfort zones, and listen to those who have been warning us for years.”

—Anne-Cécile Favory (January 9, 2017)

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April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

A stranger home A comic interpretation of «Hui Xiang Ou Shu»

By Zhi Zhang He

FEATURES

Features

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

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FEATURES

Sci+Tech

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Robohacks and accessible robotics Building robots: from scraps to treasures

Participants at Robohacks.

Marc Cataford The McGill Daily

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ravely ignoring the impending doom of finals season, robotics enthusiasts gathered in the Trottier building on March 25 and 26 for the second installment of Robohacks, a 24-hour long event that attracted students from as far as Cornell University to pursue their homebrew robotics dreams. From Saturday morning to Sunday late afternoon, energy drink-fueled tinkerers wandered the halls of Trottier exchanging ideas, building robots, and experimenting with hard-toobtain hardware.

Sponsored in part by Major League Hacking, the authority in large-scale college hackathon organizing, the event was staged around the theme of space and space-related technology. With a mix of McGill professors, industry delegates, and Canadian Space Agency representatives as judges, motivation to work through the night was easy to find.

A few days after the event, The Daily sat down with Sabrina Zhu, Shammamah Hossain, Molly Shen and Jeremy Mallette, four members of the Robohacks organizing team, to chat about the history of Robohacks and its impact in the community.

An inclusive hackathon Organized for the first time in 2016 with a shoestring budget, Robo-

Marc Cataford | The McGill Daily hacks is the brainchild of a handful of McGill Robotics members who not only had a passion for the projects their design teams were working on, but also eagerly wanted to communicate their love for robotics to others. From less than 150 attendees last year, Robohacks grew into a sizeable event that received around six hundred applications for around three hundred spots. This growth is not solely due to the resounding success of the first iteration of the hackathon, but is also a tribute to the organizing team’s year-round promotional initiatives, which included targeted outreach to a handful of Montreal CEGEPs and schools.

While the Robohacks outreach effort does promote the event, its main objective is not simply to bring people to the competition. Shen explained that the bulk of their work is showing people that “building robots really isn’t that complicated and that anyone can do it.” This philosophy of inclusivity stems from McGill Robotics’ core principles of giving prospective members a chance by working on a “trial project” meant to showcase not their ability to build a functional robot but their determination to see their idea through to completion.

With that in mind, racking up more “hackathon glory” won’t help you get the sought-after acceptance email: Hossain and Zhu explained that Robohacks deliberately priori-

tizes those who are passionate but have had limited exposure rather than those who are most likely to build spectacular machines that will woo the judges. This way, applicants who may have less of a chance in other more competitive events fare better.

Events like Robohacks are a good occasion to experiment without any egregious expense.

While it falls under the broader “hackathon” label, Robohacks is significantly different from other events of the genre. As a roboticscentred competition, participants are tasked with building a robot, however simple it may be. Beginners are not left to their own devices either: the presence of McGill Robotics members, mentors, and industry representatives on site provides invaluable advice and support to those who have questions. “The important part is not to know how to do it, it’s to want to do it,” commented Shen.

A space for experimentation Building robots requires raw materials, from bits of cardboard

and duct tape to electronic components and soldering kits. Cost has always been hobby electronics’ major barrier of entry. However, the Arduino and Raspberry Pi development boards, affordable microcomputers as big as a deck of cards, certainly lowered the bar and made elaborate hobby electronics more accessible, but a significant amount of money is still necessary to get proper projects off the ground.

Events like Robohacks are a good occasion to experiment without any egregious expense. Participants were given anything from ultrasonic sensors to microcontrollers to build their dream machines, which left imagination and time as the only limiting factors to creation.

According to Mallette, the “hardware room,” where participants could borrow components, use power tools and try out 3D printers to produce the custom parts they needed was extensively stocked. “I could probably pay for two years of [tuition] with all of that,” he commented. “That’s my favourite part of the competition: it gives these resources to a bunch of people who would otherwise never get a chance to use things like the Oculus Rift and the Amazon Echo [editor’s note: a virtual reality headset and voice-activated “smart speaker,” respectively] and experiment with them.”

From the exhaustion and hype arose robots that accomplish feats like mimic the way spiders walk, track satellites travelling tens of kilometres above ground, and wander around waving their robot arms at attendees. By the end of the weekend, those who stuck around all had something to show for it, whether it was a semi-functional project for the judges, or a newfound friendship built at 2 a.m. the night before.

Hackathons done right As Sunday afternoon came to an end, the Trottier building was restored to its former state and no trace of what had transpired during the weekend, save for a few stray jumper cables, was left behind. Despite not being the only hackathon in town, Robohacks did something other events often fail to do: it prioritized community and inclusivity, and embodied the spirit of collaboration and education that was originally at the core of most hackathons.

It also didn’t fall for invasive corporate sponsorship that pegs participants against each other in the race for the grand prize.

As the hackathon scene becomes larger and larger, it’s important to highlight events that aren’t about brands or awards, but that prioritize having fun with technology and introducing new people to the club. Robohacks is certainly one of such events.

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Sci+Tech

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

Climate change-induced migration We may be on the verge of a ‘refugee crisis’

Cédric Parages Energy + Enviornment

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s war rages on between Assad’s Syrian armed forces and rebel groups, between Daesh (also known as the Islamic State) and coalitions formed from around the world, and between Boko Haram and Nigeria, forces millions of people are forced out of their homes and their countries to seek refuge. The United Nations High Commissions for Refugees (UNHCR) estimated in 2015 that there are 63 million people forcibly displaced around the world, of which 21 million of these are refugees that have left their country.

Many of these refugees are displaced because of strife and war, but there is a growing amount of them that are forced to flee due to environmental circumstances. Environmental disasters happen every year around the globe, with some being sudden and lethal such as a tsunami, while others are slow and insidious like a drought.

The 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami devastated numerous countries, most notably Indonesia and Sri Lanka, with a total death toll of 225,000 people, and 1.75 million displaced. According to the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the threat of climate change and heating of the planet will most likely have an impact on the intensity of massive weather events such as cyclones and tsunamis as ocean surface temperatures increase.

As the glaciers melt and polar ice caps disintegrate over time, the sea level will also continue to rise. Projections from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 2013 estimate under a business as usual scenario that sea levels will rise between 28 and 98 centimeters by 2100, enough to swamp most of the Eastern coast cities of the United States. Dire estimates where the warming of the planet quickens from lack of action to stop it and the Greenland ice sheet completely melts put the level rise to seven meters, enough to submerge London.

Droughts and wildfires are already increasing both in frequency and intensity in many places around the world. The 2012 droughts of the U.S. were the most expansive in the country’s history per the U.S. Department of Agriculture, with 71 per cent of the entire country under at least ‘Severe Drought’ monitoring measure for more than eight weeks in a row. While drought and wildfire historical records were beaten in 2012, they were again broken in 2015. The number of acres burnt those years were each triple the average from 1985-1995. Other arid areas around the world are experiencing similar trends, such as in Australia,

where wildfires are also beating historical records in area burnt and starting earlier than ever in the year.

Chile, whom in January experienced wildfires of scales they had never experienced before, needed the help of the U.S. to contain and eliminate the devastating blaze. While countries like the U.S. and Australia may be ready to contain these wildfires, and find solutions to droughts, it is hard to imagine other nations being equally prepared.

War, environmental change and low standards of living are likely to be interconnected together to make people choose to take refuge in a different country. A 2015 study from Columbia University and University of California Santa Barbara concluded that increasingly severe droughts in parts of Syria is likely to have contributed to the rebel uprising and public discontent with Assad’s government. According to their research, many farmers lost their jobs when their land was no longer growing crops due to the drought, and moved to the urban areas to compensate. The government’s lack of response to the 2011 Syrian drought crisis was not the only trigger to the original protests but played a substantial part, per another study from 2014 on the topic from the journal Middle Eastern Studies.

Diminishing resources, low standard of living and a changing environment seems to create a common theme as a similar situation took place around the Lake Chad Basin in Nigeria, which also borders Niger, Chad and Cameroon. The Lake provides water supply for thirty million people yet has decreased in size by 95 per cent from 1963 to 1998 and is continuing to shorten due to decrease in rainfall. The Nigerian side of the lake is where the insurgence of Boko Haram terrorists, who pledged allegiance to Daesh, drove millions of people away from the area for the resources provided by the lake.

If similar situations of such as ongoing drought and a lack of capabilities from authorities to help continue, many more people will choose to migrate. While the majority of refugees worldwide are hosted in Africa and other Middle Eastern countries, many also attempt the journey to Europe, and unfortunately it is not always legal. In 2016, 170,000 illegal immigrants were recorded to have arrived to Italy by boat from Libya, an enormous increase compared to 42,000 in 2013. Increased periods of drought will surely not slow down illegal immigration, especially since the 1951 U.N. Refugee Convention does not include environmental refugees in its outlined protocols.

With a lack of legal status and support from the U.N., many people trapped in worsening environmental conditions on small islands coastal to Australia and New Zealand cannot apply for refugee status.. The

Rahma Wiryomartono | The McGill Daily UNHCR has stated that it worries opening new discussions on refugee convention reforms with the security council nations could backfire and let countries take the option to back out altogether. A report from the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre in 2015 concludes that 19 million people around the world were obligated to flee their homes from worsening environmental conditions. A World Bank report from 2015 estimates that a hundred million people will go back into poverty from climate change by 2030. While climate change is gradual and people may possibly escape increasingly inhospitable conditions by migrating, there seems to be not many solutions available to efficiently relocate all of these people properly.

Great new initiatives such as the Platform on Disaster Displacement, previously known as the Nansen Initiative, whom are consultants to the U.N. on policy reform to facilitate relocation and cross-border interactions displaced people, are taking root to eventually find a long-term solutions to this problem.

Unlike some previous refugee crises, climates will not simply go back down to their original levels anytime soon, not if we can’t both stabilize carbon dioxide emissions and lower annual temperature average increase. That is of course the longterm goal that would avoid such a crisis, yet it is impossible to know today how much we will be able to curb the world’s greenhouse gas emissions, and how quickly. Some world leaders and military advisors are at least taking note of the potential risks of climate change and its inevitable refugee crisis.

Last year, a U.S. coalition of military and national security experts, which included advisors to Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush, sent a report to the Pentagon under their non-partisan Center for Climate and Security to outline the importance of a changing world climate to national security. The Pentagon adopted the same view and the Department of Defense started seriously considering climate change as a ‘threat multiplier’ which could potentially warrant the need for greater humanitarian aid or additional military intervention.

Former military advisor to the Bangladeshi President Munir Muniruzzaman, now chair to the Global Military Advisory Council on Climate Change, has publicly stated that climate change is the greatest security threat of the 21st century, not terrorism. It is easier to understand that point of view when the reality kicks in that Bangladesh is already trying to plan the relocation of twenty million citizens due to climate change and have asked countries like the U.K. for help doing so. Brigadier General Stephen Cheney, a member of the U.S. Department of Foreign Affairs has publicly supported the notion that climate change increased conflict risks and is an accelerant of instability, citing the Arab Spring, Syrian War and Boko Haram’s previous control over Lake Chad.

Unfortunately, the U.S. President Donald Trump does not believe climate change is real, let alone human caused, as he recently purged the United States Environmental Protection Agency and other federal agencies from even the mere mention of the term, essentially censoring science. It comes as quite ironic when his

own appointed Secretary of Defense James Mattis gave a statement this month describing the potential dangers of climate change as a driver of instability in places with U.S. troops.

While it may not be immediately obvious that a refugee crisis between Northern Africa and Europe would have deep implications on the United States and Canada, we should also step up in taking more refugees, no matter where they are from.

While some would argue that bringing instability into our borders is an unwise decision, as some public backlash from Justin Trudeau’s policy on accepting refugees has iterated, I would argue that Canada has some of the lowest population density in the world, and that we have ample space for refugees. Figuring out how to facilitate cultural, religious and linguistic transition will ultimately be key to not increase tensions and divisions, and admittedly Trudeau’s policies have shown to be lackluster in that department. The U.N. also won’t be able to be everywhere at the same time for humanitarian efforts, and countries who will be certainly affected by climate change should plan to minimize problems in the future, such as commencing dialogues right now with neighboring countries. Nature does not care for human made borders, and we know there have been five previous mass extinction events of life previously — we would be foolish to not attempt to slow down the sixth, which has already begun.

Cédric Parages is a U3 student in Wildlife Biology. To contact the author, please email cedricparages@ gmail.com

Sci+Tech

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

Scientific skepticism

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his year saw two articles highlighting the vital importance of scientific literacy. Lack of scientific knowledge may sometimes lay dormant, but other times, it pops up to rear its ugly head. “Many scientific and technological breakthroughs which altered our perception of the world have had to go through obstacles and time to be commonly accepted.” (“Threatening the future of science,” Cédric Parages, March 27, 2017). For example, even though it was demonstrated that the Earth was known to not be flat as early as 600 B.C., to this day there are still individuals and organizations that deny this claim. Whether we choose to wholeheartedly acknowledge it or not, the climate is in fact rapidly changing, and we are in for the ride.

Thinking about scientific skepticism as a whole is remisicent of the famous quote “First they ignore you. Then they laugh at you. Then they attack you. Then you win”. In particular, the anti-vaccine movement has gathered some steam as of late, which is quite worrying, especially given the concept of heart immunity (“A dose of nonsense,” Lindsay Burns, February 6, 2017). Our only way out of this mess is to continue educating everyone on the necessity of vaccination.

—Igor Zlobine

Climate change

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ver the course of this year the effects of climate change has been undeniable. Cars and fossil fuels are commonly associated with the rise inpollution and global temperature, but it is not this simple – electricity production is tightly linked to our overall greenhouse gas emissions, accounting for approximately one third of emissions in the U.S. in 2014 (“Climate change on the grid,” Louis Warnock, October 3, 2016). The fear of rising temperatures is urgent and significant: “Micheal Mann, a leading figure in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, suggested earlier this year that a global warming of two degrees celcius could be reached as soon as 2036.” If we are to mitigate the projected fifty per cent increase in world energy consumption over the coming 25 years, the smart grid must be taken into account, and utilized properly.

Furthermore, as discussed in the article, climate change puts those of lower socioeconomic status at the most risk – by 2030, 100 million people might be forced back to living in poverty as a result of climate change (“Climate change-induced migration” Cédric Parages, April 3, 2017). We must realize that this is not some far away future that may never actually come to fruition, as Bangladesh alone is currently attempting to relocate 20 million citizens in response to climate change. We are already undergoing the sixth mass extinction event the Earth has witnessed, and it is up to use to slow it down.

—Igor Zlobine

This year was marked by setbacks in the fight against climate change. Following Trump’s electoral promise to bring back coal as a major player in the power industry and his resolute stance on gutting the Environmental Protection Agency, environmentalists feared the worst. What could happen on the American continent as a result of modern-day industry backed up by coal can already be seen in China, where decades of coalreliance had dire consequences (“China’s air pollution crisis,” Cédric Parages, January 16, 2017). From spikes in infant diseases to zones where the life expectancy is significantly shorter, China had a lot of problems to deal with. Temporary solutions like installing air locks and elaborate air filtration systems in buildings were rapidly put in place in affluent areas, but real salvation should come from the new Chinese energy policy goals, which include injecting 350 billion dollars in clean energy technology by 2020 in an effort to replace coal and reduce air pollution.

—Marc Cataford

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Culture

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

26

Why bother with ‘old Dutch art’?

Symposium explores the dialectics of peace in Dutch paintings

A Dutch Man-of-War and Smaller Vessels... by Ludolf Backhuysen Sarah Shahid The McGill Daily

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n March 22 to 23, 2017, Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MBAM) hosted the symposium entitled “Art of Peace” to commemorate its recent acquisition of seventeenth-century Dutch and Flemish art, donated by Michal and Renata Hornstein. The event was organized by Angela Vanhaelen, a McGill professor specializing in seventeenth-century Dutch visual culture; Stephanie Dicky, professor and Bader Chair in Northern Baroque Art at Queen’s University; and Jacquelyn Coutré, an adjunct assistant professor specializing in Dutch and Flemish art at Queen’s University. The symposium mapped the theme of peace prevalent throughout many Dutch genre paintings, an artistic style that depicts everyday scenes which would seem to represent the “ordinary.” However, the peace and prosperity of the Dutch Republic depicted in art, was only made possible by colonial establishments in Asia and the Americas. The scholars presenting in the event primarily investigated the underlying mercantile structures that allowed these images to be produced. Popular Dutch styles of genre painting, landscape, and still life all reflect mercantile ideology that’s dialectical in nature, as themes of peace and conflict often coexist in seventeenth century Dutch paintings.

A popular setting for Dutch genre paintings were domestic spaces wherein women were depicted as devoted to household chores or engaging with traditionally ‘feminine’ hobbies. Many paintings also emphasized the expansive space of domestic homes and its obsession with cleanliness. These domestic scenes often exude a mood of tranquility, like in Johannes Vermeer’s

Lacemaker, which features a woman making bobbin lace. In her lecture “Peaceful Home, Peaceful Society,” Betsy Wieseman – a curator of Dutch and Flemish Painting at the National Gallery in London – problematizes this idea of harmony in genre paintings. Wieseman observes that genre paintings do not depict the scenes of grotesque labour common at the time, such as tanning animal hides or cleaning windows.

Less picturesque household chores are excluded in fear of unsettling the image of the ‘ideal home.’

Themes of peace and conflict often coexist in seventeenth century Dutch paintings.

The home was also a space of political engagement in the Dutch Republic. The Netherlands had recently shifted from monarchical to republican power and was also home to several Christian Reformation ideologies. The Church and the Republic both encouraged a secular idea of moral behaviour. If every household behaved morally, then the entire society was better off as a whole.

Wieseman suggests that within this cultural and political context, a threat to civil peace in the microcosm of the home could be considered a threat to greater peace in the macrocosm of society.

Another popular painting style during this time were Italianate landscapes by Dutch and Flemish artists. Coutré’s talk “Picturing

Peace: Collecting Italianate Landscape Paintings in 17th Century Amsterdam” presented data from the seventeenth-century that showed a high demand for landscapes among rising middle income earners such as inn-keepers and lawyers. Coutré suggests that this demand denotes the mercantile fascination with pastoral settings. Traditionally, pastoral landscapes depict idealized visual forms of rural scenes. Paintings like Jan Both’s Southern Landscape with Travellers illustrate inviting greenery and detailed tree leaves. At a time when unharvested land was considered worthless and people’s relationship with land was transforming from social to economic, pastoral landscapes framed a utilitarian aspect of nature.

Coutré interprets the Dutch demand for Italianate landscapes as a restless expression of an early capitalist society. Italianate landscapes served as an antidote to the unpleasant and stinky sights of court life, functioning as psychological and emotional respites for Dutch city dwellers. Compelling illustrations of fake realism, as seen in Both’s landscape for example, provided avenues for psychological and economic peace amid the exploitation and hardship of city life.

The three paintings mentioned demonstrate a contradictory tension between peace and the taxing conditions of the capitalist society in which they were produced. All three paintings are also embodiments Dutch realism. Realist art depicts objects as close to life as possible, suggesting a sense of unmediated portrayal. However, as Weiseman and Coutré explain, realism can be misleading. Dutch realism lends itself to a set of truth-claims that contradicts historical evidence.

Courtesy of Musée des Beaux-Arts de Montréal Dutch still life paintings exemplify the contradiction that exists between the peace and prosperity expressed in a work of art and its social, historical, and cultural contexts. The viewer is suspended in a moment in time and pushes them to contemplate on the painting’s lifelikeness. Dutch still life paintings have a peaceful radiance signifying broader theme of prosperity, in their depiction of ripe fruits, luxurious banquets, expensive cheese, and antique dishware.

The objects are commonly painted in balanced, pyramidal compositions. Yet, as Julie Hochstrasser, an art history professor at Iowa University investigates in her talk, “Peace over Conflict,” still life paintings present a sense of restlessness for overseas goods plaguing the Dutch Republic.

Still lifes detailing luxury ignore how Dutch power and prosperity was made possible by the exploitation of overseas colonies.

The chaotic abundance of consumer culture is epitomized in paintings such as Frans Synder’s Still Life with Game Suspended on Hooks, a Lobster on a Porcelain Plate and a Basket of Grapes, Apples, Plums and Other Fruit on a Partly Draped Table with Two Monkeys. In

the painting, the table is adorned with a basket of grapes, apples, and plums, but its peace is disrupted by the gory doe carcass right next to it. Banquet pieces like Snyder’s still life eclipse the reality of economic hardship and starvation. As Hochstrasser notes, the social cost of a feast is barely represented in a still life. The maid servant’s hours washing clothes, the butcher’s labour, or the drowned fishermen remain unregistered in the clean lace table mat, precise meat cuts, and fresh lobster. Colonial occupation and extraction of resources involved in accumulating Chinese porcelain, or importing nutmeg and sugar are ignored with smooth brush strokes and pristine compositions. Still lifes detailing luxury ignore how Dutch power and prosperity was made possible by the exploitation of overseas colonies.

The most important takeaway from Hochstrasser’s lecture was the relevance of these seventeenth-century paintings for modern society. Much like Dutch Art, visual culture of a milieu often supplies contradictions. Grim realities of labour outsourcing, warfare, and climate change are presented through the media of glossy fashion magazines, war movies, and viral advertising campaigns. The “Art of Peace” symposium urged individuals to consider the social function and implications of the art and media that they consume.

The global impact of mercantile society is hidden with pleasures of consumption. Critically investigating this period of Dutch art makes us realize that capitalist societies are no different from their seventeenth-century counterparts.

All paintings mentioned, except Vermeer’s Lacemaker, are on view at the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Montréal.

Culture

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

Remembering Angélique

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Black Theatre Workshop flips contemporary representations of slavery

Courtesy of Black Theatre Workshop

Promotional photo for Angélique.

Rosie Long Decter The McGill Daily

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hough Marie Josèphe Angélique’s date of birth is unknown, the date of her death is part of Canadian history: Angélique, a Black woman born in Portugal and brought to New France by slave traders, was hanged on June 21, 1734 for starting a fire that burnt down 45 houses in Montreal.

While her birthday may still remain a mystery, Black Theatre Workshop (BTW)’s Angélique ensures that she is remembered for more than just the day she died. The play was written in the 1990s by the late Lorena Gale, a former artistic director at BTW, and draws heavily on archival material. It’s less a story about the specific circumstances surrounding Angélique’s death and more an exploration of her life as an enslaved Black woman in New France, chronicling her pain and joy amidst the systems of oppression that ultimately sealed her fate. The narrative follows her life in Canada, from her arrival in New France, to the death of the evil, abusive slave owner François (in a truly disturbing portrayal by Karl Graboshas), to her own attempted escape and subsequent death.

Knowing the ending doesn’t make the journey any less compelling.

Directed by Mike Payette, BTW’s Angélique doesn’t shy away from the most horrifying aspects of this journey. On a small, almost claustrophobic stage that makes the horrors all the more intimate, the cast mimes gruesome violence and the audience

is given full access to Angélique’s deep trauma, acted with excellent intensity by Jenny Brizard.

But the play also avoids becoming solely an exercise in watching pain. In one exhilarating scene, Angélique and Manon (Darla Contois), an Indigenous woman who works for François’ neighbours, both play with sheets while doing their boss’ laundry. Their exchange has no dialogue, only giddy laughter and captivating choreography.

The connection it conveys between these two oppressed women needs no words. The scenes where Angélique falls in love with white farmer Claude (Olivier Lamarche) are also charming, providing little snippets of romantic comedy amidst the otherwise tragic tale.

Though Marie Josèphe Angélique’s date of birth is unknown, the date of her death is part of Canadian history.

These moments of happiness, often the strongest in the play, assert that Angélique, while subject to immense oppression, can’t be reduced to it. Far from undermining the horror of her story, they make it feel all the more unjust when these mo-

ments are cut short (as with Manon) or lead to betrayal (as with Claude).

The music in the play – composed and performed live on a ledge above the stage by the SIXTRUM percussion ensemble – adds to its immediacy, aiding the quick and sometimes disorienting vacillations between such intense sorrow and playful joy.

Angélique is, at its core, a story of historical structures told through personal relationships.

Angélique’s relationship with César (Tristan D. Lalla) – a Black man who, when he asks for permission to court a woman, is coerced into partnership with Angélique – exposes how white supremacy structures the relationships between Black men and women, inhibiting sexual agency and dignity. Indeed, the white slave owners watch Angélique and César’s first meeting as if they’re at a zoo. Angélique’s relationship with Thérèse (France Rolland), François’ wife, depicts how white women – though oppressed in their own ways – are active oppressors of Black women.

Through the relationship between Angélique and Manon, the audience sees how the weight of oppression can divide those who, under better circumstances, would likely be good friends.

These relationships, though effective as a microcosm for larger social forces, are sometimes not as fully drawn as they could be. Angélique and Manon in particular could use more scenes together, given that their first is so powerful. In general, the narrative moves between so many stories, time periods, and extreme mo-

ments of emotion, that the play at times could use more moments where the characters pause – allowing the audience to invest in them before moving on to the next plot point.

Angélique is, at its core, a story of historical structures told through personal relationships.

The relationship between Angelique and her environment, however, is wholly realized: the Montreal cold acts as an extra character, reinforcing Angélique’s sense of alienation from her home and nearly killing her when she goes on the run. Where contemporary representations of slavery often position the north – and Canada specifically – as the land of freedom, Angélique flips the script: when the protagonist tries to escape, she heads south to New England. As celebrations of Canada’s 150th birthday ramp up, plays like Angélique are doing the crucial work of calling attention to Canada’s past and present crimes – seeking reflection and atonement rather than celebration.

Though Angélique’s script mostly remains situated in the 1700s, the costume choices link Angélique’s experiences to the present day oppres-

sions of Black people. François, in the scene where he first purchases Angélique and perversely describes her physical characteristics, wears a suit that looks like it belongs on a modern-day Wall Street patron. César, midway through the show, dons a black hoodie in a nod to Trayvon Martin, linking the way slave owner Ignace (Chip Chuika) treats César as an animal to Darren Wilson’s descriptions of Michael Brown. And in the final scene, as she is about to be hanged, Angélique herself wears an orange outfit reminiscent of a prison jumpsuit. The message is clear and crucial: the mass incarceration of Black people today is the direct legacy of stories like Angélique’s.

Angélique opens and closes with dance: the first scene sees the cast circling the small stage in a line together, until Angélique falls out of step, collapsing and writhing onto the floor. It’s an arresting moment that foreshadows the manipulation and contortion her character will soon experience, conveying the sense that Angélique, as an enslaved Black woman in a cold, unfamiliar land, is not fully in control of her body – a notion that history seems to bear out.

But the play, in its final moments, suggests otherwise. As Angélique prepares to die, she breaks out once again into dance, but this time the movement is liberating. These last seconds are simply magnificent, a revelatory moment in Payette’s direction and Brizard’s acting. Against all odds, Angélique breaks free – perhaps not in the narrative, but certainly on the stage, and history, though not rewritten, has hope.

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April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

Culture

Sequin dresses for a good cause Art gallery chic meets industrial glam at McGill Fashion Week Octavia M. Dancu The McGill Daily

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he fact that McGill is perpetually under construction seems to have little effect on students’ street style: it’s not uncommon to see a bold fur coat, on-trend mermaid hair, or an effortlessly styled edgy outfit amidst and despite the debris. However, it seems that fashion exists on the periphery of McGill’s artistic scene, with more oncampus clubs and groups devoted to creative writing, visual art, and music. McGill’s fashion week (McFW), however, is the perfect occasion to get to know the well-dressed people whose aesthetic you admire in the hallway through a series of shows that celebrate local designers and fundraise for important causes. This year, McFW featured three fashion shows: SYNESTH/ASIA’s “Legends,” Med/Dent’s ANEB “Unmask,” and P[H]ASSION’s “Spectrum,” with each event showcasing different facets of Montreal’s fashion scene. Both “Legends” and “Unmask” placed an emphasis on local designers, even displaying the creations of several McGill students.

“Unmask”

Conor Nickerson | The McGill Daily

“Legends” On March 24, SYNESTH/ASIA took over the minimalist gallery space at Le Livart. The event’s charitable focus was made clear at the outset: the showcase began with a silent auction, with all proceeds from the art sales – all items were made by Montreal and McGill artists – going towards the organizations Pencils of Promise and the Canadian Red Cross. When asked about the primary goal of SYNESTH/ASIA, Josh Marchesini, the group’s Communications Exec, answered “raising money for alleviating poverty and sustainable development in Asia.”

Some of the pieces featured a nostalgia for the past, but were paired with an energy that was undeniably contemporary.

“Legends”

nathan drezner | Photographer

“Legends” is based on the myth of the red string of fate. According to this Asian legend, people are linked together across time and space by the gods who bind those who are destined to meet each other by an invisible red string. “You are con-

nected to someone in the world, no matter what. That string will never break,” explained Marchesini, adding that the theme also served as an invitation to the audience to “find your connection with [SYNESTH/ASIA].”

This theme was reflected throughout the event, whether in the red strings tied around the pinkies of the models and volunteers, or the incorporation of red string into the event’s décor. As SYNESTH/ASIA Director Sophie Buu put it, the motif aimed to“engage the guests rather than just watching a clothing line.”

“The mask is easily put on.

It’s easy to hide who you actually are [...]

The idea was to unmask that and also to unmask the stigma behind talking about these issues.”

–David-Dan Nguyen

When asked to describe the aesthetic of the show, Buu referred to it as “definitely chic.” The event’s polished aesthetic was seen in their contemporary take on the signature little black dress, showing off skillful yet playful tailoring, and ubiquitous cut-outs. Some of the fashion highlights of “Legends” were the glamorous sequined mini-dresses, lingerieinspired satin eveningwear featuring embroidered sides, and eye-catching statement accessories like spiked ear-cuffs and chokers.

“Legends” was not simply a fashion show; the event also incorporated various forms of art, combining the traditional runway walk with elements of dance. As SYNESTH/ASIA director Emily Bremner noted, the models’ choreographies were “poses and intricate movement rather than complete dancing […] hip-hoppy, pop.” Dance performances were also weaved in between segments of the fashion show, including a intricately choreographed number from the Mosaica Dance Company, and an energy-filled dance from 2KSquad.

“Unmask” The Med/Dent fashion show, held on March 25, chose the edgy

Entrepot Dominion for their venue: a building that used to be a historic textile factory, but has been remade into an industrial-chic event space.

Like SYNESTH/ASIA, “Unmask” centred their show around their cause. A series of speakers, such as representatives from Anorexia and Bulimia Quebec (ANEB), presented on the topic of eating disorders; there were also touching and powerful testimonial from those who had struggled with eating disorders.

When asked to elaborate on the show’s title, David-Dan Nguyen said “our event has a double meaning behind it,” and that they aimed “to make people feel confident” within a society that fosters eating disorders through impossible standards about “beauty.” Nguyen went on to say that “the mask is easily put on. It’s easy to hide who you actually are and conform to what other people want. The idea was to unmask that and also to unmask the stigma behind talking about these issues.”

According to this Asian legend, people are linked together across time and space by the gods who bind those who are destined to meet each other by an invisible red string.

With a ‘streets meets classic’ aesthetic, one of the show’s directors, the style of “Unmask” was an apt reflection of the current fashion trends. Urban athleisure mingled with 90s revival components and the occasional nod to 70s fashion.

Some of the pieces featured a nostalgia for the past, but were paired with an energy that was undeniably contemporary. Some standouts were WTFash’s modern reinterpretation of the 70s crochet dress, Kantine’s playful homages to Montreal’s foodie culture and Velvet Couture’s experimentation with unique textures and unexpected tailoring. Monsieur Phoenix’s dapper ties (whose profits go towards ANEB) were the favourite pieces of show directors Nguyen and Sarkis.

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

Culture

29

Good vibes and kodak moments Reflection on the McGill Photography Students’ Society’s exhibit

[Chabel] reflected on the factor of luck and the photographer’s ability to capture a fleeting moment.

The photography collection included portraits, natural landscapes, city-life, and an array of other subjects. One attention-grabbing print was entitled “Miner,” captured by Jordan Kasarjian. “Miner” depicts a bright man with smiling teeth and smiling eyes, wearing a yellow jersey with a contrasting green collar while sitting against a rocky backdrop. In the description of this photograph, taken at the

Kawah Ijen sulfur mine in Indonesia, it reads that “these miners have an expected lifespan of no more than fifty years, as they work around highly toxic sulfuric gases. If you look closely, you can see the sulfur in their eyelashes.” The eeriness of the image stems from the stark contrast between the almost exaggerated but seemingly authentic smile of the man and the photograph’s darker context.

“Diesel” and “Gaz Bar,” a pair of black and white silver gelatin prints taken by Jessica Hobbs, depict old, seemingly abandoned gas stations found along the sides of the desert-like Autoroute 20. In their artist statement, Hobbs notes that “… these relics of the past now stand vacant as prophets to an eventual and inevitable reality. Just as our dependence on fossil fuels has pushed the need for the mega service stations that replaced these once thriving family businesses, it also foretells of the day when the wells run dry.” The print’s black and white gradient, matched with the desolate, faded state of the gasstations, evoked feelings of weariness and of something that seems passé – but continues to haunt the present.

I got the chance to talk to Nina Chabel, who exhibited a digital print titled “Looking (away),” “Looking (away)” features a girl caressing her pug while looking off into the vacant distance; the pug seems to be doing the same as she mindlessly goes about in her own little world. Chabel explained that the photo was taken by chance. She reflected on the factor of luck and the photographer’s ability to capture a fleeting moment.

Other pieces like “Metro Man,” snapped

“Miner” by Jordan Kasarjian

“Metro Man” by Welton Jones

“Gaz Bar” by Jessica Hobbs

“Looking (away)” by Nina Chabel

Chabel at the exhibit

Shape Gallery

Christopher Junn Culture Writer

O

n March 30, the McGill University Photography Students’ Society (MUPSS) hosted their annual photo exhibit, showing works from both members of the club and the larger McGill community. The photos ranged from digital to silver gelatin to chromogenic prints, and captured bright landscapes in saturated colour and minimalistic black-and-white pieces.

The MUPSS exhibit took place at Shape Gallery: a cozy venue located behind an unassuming door at the lower end of the Saint-Laurent, at the top of a seemingly unending staircase. Shape Gallery is well-loved by the MUPSS and Montreal’s artistic community. Known to “curate and promote art and music from around the world,” the company’s statement suggests that “by immersing our followers in carefully constructed space, both virtual and physical, we aim to bridge the gap between the two primary walks of artistic expression.”

The laid-back atmosphere of Shape Gallery made it a good venue to look at art while listening to live music and conversing over wine and cheese. With white brick walls, exposed but painted wires, a mix of artificial and natural lighting, and ambient tunes in the background, the gallery exuded an industrial yet clean feel.

The eeriness [...] stems from the stark contrast between the almost exaggerated but seemingly authentic smile of the man and the photograph’s darker context.

by Welton Jones, capture similarly transitory moments. The piece features an elderly man sitting on the opposite side of a metro station, frozen in the window frame of a passing train. The man’s crisp figure is contrasted to the blurred dark body of the moving train, presenting a candid yet poetic instant.

“Diesel” by Jessica Hobbs

The selected photographs explored a wide range of themes and mediums, with many revealing the complex layers embedded within the idea of ‘the moment.’’

The selected photographs explored a wide range of themes and mediums, with many revealing the complex layers embedded within the idea of ‘the moment.’’ A person can both experience a reaction to their present environment while simultaneously reflecting on the more general, overarching aspects of their life. Our reactions can extend beyond and before the ‘moment’ captured in the photograph.

Christopher Junn | Photographer

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Culture

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

How we belong The story of a child who grew up across oceans and mountains

A short story lived outside Canada. I was never able to accept being part of what some may call the ‘New World.’

Junyi Chen Culture Writer

F

or children who grew up in between transient spans of cultures, we hold our experiences in suspension, in wonderment of pure nostalgia. However, only having been exposed to bits and pieces of them, we are left scrapping for reconnections that would tie us back to what we’ve known and imagined. To anchor us in a deeply moving ocean. Despite my dismissals for such overindulgences of nonsense and spectacles of childhood experiences, I have still come to the end, having returned to my earlier recollections.

I am an Immigrant. Even though the whole parent-child generation gap idea set me apart from them, classifying me as a second generation, my dreams and memories are still lucid enough to consider a life

My Story: I am Chinese. Born in Nanjing, China. However, I moved away right after I was legal to board a plane. My new home was Singapore, but this place didn’t feel much like home. During those five years, especially the later years, my mind was fixed on one specific moment: a toddler stumbling around the streets of my hometown. This felt was a moment of distress. A crying out to be reunited with my grandmother who played a peek-a-boo play amongst the busy

streets. Since then, what must have been a memory that any typical one-year-old would have forgotten, stayed with me ever since: the dirt and the dusty road, chickens, loud salespeople yelling across an open market, the scents of the cooking I pictured when I thought of my hometown. It was a memory buried deep inside.

This memory resurfaced when my parents told my sister and I that we were returning home.

Having lived in Canada for a few years by then, I was ecstatic, and mentally prepared for the event.

However, the more I anticipated this visit, the more I was set up for another unfortunate round of peek-a-boo. While I was leading this relatively peaceful life in

Canada, things were rapidly shifting in China. For everything that I missed living the slow-paced lifestyle of Canada, I got to experience in full shellshock when I went back to my hometown.

It was midnight when our family finally arrived by car.

Weary and sleep-deprived from the long flight, I was awakened by my mother. What hit me was an unrecognizable scene that still felt familiar in a sentimental, yet eerie, way. What used to be a dusty road was now smooth, and the dust I remembered was replaced by a blackened paste blanketing the entire road. The markets that used to be here were replaced by cars and machines. Silence.

Nothing was left of the home I remembered. Distress called and abandonment set in, again – this time, a whole culture seemed to have left me behind.

The more I searched, the less I found. And as time created distance between my childhood and I, the more the memories felt disconnected: cut away from the Canadian life that had been handed down to me. I made attempts to connect with my Chinese peers. They, however, seemed to have moved on, morphed and reshaped by a different reality – one that I was unable to follow, nor understand.

What I tried to draw upon were only bits and pieces of memory, of yearned connections, barely coherent enough to be pieced together as a whole. Have I become an outsider to my own people, culture?

It wasn’t until just a few weeks ago that I was caught off guard by a mere miracle.

I watched this movie called “Lion.” It was a native Indian boy’s journey to find home after having lost it for 25 years whilst living an adopted life in Australia. To so many, this was indeed an experience, filled with heartaches. To me, it was one that reopened an old wound.

The chickens, the cows and the livestock treading along a dusted road filling the streets of an open, smoky marketplace. Then there, my own imagery came flooding back to me in excruciating livid details.

After more than twenty years spent, deprived, I knew right then, what my life meant to me. “Lion” showed me this old, living, breathing life in India. And I was bridged

to my past. Shakened up, this thought that had never crossed my mind. What I saw in the end, was absolutely stunning. Such a drastically different culture. And yet, I felt this connection. The idea of ‘belonging,’ so central to an immigrant’s life yet so universally touching, transcends even the logical of human conception, and of bounds bordering our own culture. It is an unsolvable mystery.

Thus, I’ve come to understand a part of how it feels to be selfidentified as a multinational citizen by heart, for it’s a mindset that becomes more and more a part of my own Canadian heritage. And I know for a fact, from the innermost depths, that my new citizenship and I will never part. That this new citizenry will never leave me behind, nor will it ever abandon me unjustly.

Illustrations by Taylor Mitchell

Culture

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

Representing race in art

T

his year, artists and creators across disciplines employed representations of race to varying degrees of success. In true orientalist fashion, Opera McGill’s mythic Alcina had its actors don costumes and makeup inspired by various East Asian cultural artifacts, under the direction of Patrick Hansen (“Orientalism is no magic,” Carly Gordon, November 21). Likewise, Opera de Montreal makes an unfortunate mistake in letting white actors dress up to play Egyptian characters in Aida – the 1871 opera by Giuseppe Verdi that was born of a colonial legacy (“Get in loser, we’re going to Aida,” Carly Gordon, September 26).

When people of colour take control over their own representation, the result is often empowering and meaningful for those of us in the diaspora. A local screening of Deepa Mehta’s 2005 Water brought to light the traumatic memories of a generational of women in India, bearing witness to painful and complex cultural traditions (“The Goddess is half alive,” Inori Roy, January 30). Local gallery Never Apart opened its winter season with a collection of artworks from Black and Indigenous artists, their themes ranging from queerness to police brutality (“An exploration of resilience,” Sarah Shahid, February 13). Though Park Chan-wook’s The Handmaiden received negative attention for its apparent oversexualization of the female protagonists, much of the analysis was filtered through a white saviour complex that saw the film as inherently anti-feminist (“Cold revenge and sweet love,” Coco Zhou, September 19).

Montreal activists smash the state

W

hile the rest of the world is all chaos and turmoil, our local communities can be a source of comfort and inspiration. Student strikes took centre stage in What the Fuck Am I Doing Here? – An Anti-Folk Opera, co-produced by Fishbowl collective and Tuesday Night Cafe Theatre (“Songs to smash the state,” Saima Desai, November 22). In an emotionally striking on-campus performance, local artist Kama La Mackerel put her own body on the line in protest against institutional disempowerment (“Crawling through wires,” Sabrine Maaz, November 28). Kai Cheng Thom spoke about the need to love and fight for our communities in an interview with The Daily (“Trans girl dangerous,” Coco Zhou, November 28), elaborating on the resilience and success of women of colour in media and art related work.

Internet activism, specifically in the form of memes, was widely discussed and critiqued. Local feminist meme-maker gothshakira spoke to The Daily about having a platform on Instagram, emphasizing the complexities of capitalizing on the viral power of memes (“Married to the game, devoted to the memes,” Coco Zhou and Taylor Mitchell, October 31). Her words were echoed by those of us who participate in meme culture as way to reclaim our identities, as exemplified by the ironic popularity of a certain aesthetic among queer youths (“on edgy,” Arno Pedram, January 16).

—Coco Zhou

—Coco Zhou

Local and political festivals

T

his year, Montreal saw the success of many arts festivals, a number of which had a distinctly political focus. The Montreal International Black Film Festival held a variety of thought-provoking screenings and panels, welcoming filmmakers like Laurens Grant to share their thoughts on representations of Blackness in media and the current state of anti-racist movements (“Change does not come quietly,” Rosie Long Decter, October 17). The South Asian Film Festival showcased films from various parts of the subcontinent, providing opportunities for bonding among diasporic communities (“Comfort food for the diaspora,” Sarah Shahid, November 21).

The highly anticipated Montreal Biennale attracted a great number of local and international viewers and featured an impressive line of artists, though some found it thematically ambiguous and uncritical (“The grand balcony of capitalism,” Josephine Bird, October 31). The locally produced Art Matters Festival had much more of a clearer focus, choosing to emphasize accessibility to art in the staging of their exhibits (“Accessibility in artistic spaces,” Taylor Mitchell, March 13).

—Coco Zhou

31

Women in arts

W

hile many cultural spaces in Montreal are male-dominated, we saw this year an intentional effort to centre women’s voices and stories through organized events. The second edition of Ladyfest showcased a range of talents from improv to burlesque, bringing gender diversity to the often alienating local comedy scene (“Break a confident post,” Caroline Macari, September 26). Made of stacked crates and twinkling lights, the stage was illuminated for those participating in SistersInMotion, a poetry event for racialized women and femmes which was as successful as it was emotional (“The storm was needed,” Anne-Cécile Favory and Zahra Habib, September 12). Local company Imago Theatre stayed true to their mandate with a string of feminist productions this season, including Intractable Woman, based on the life of Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya (“To entertain is to consider,” Rahma Wiryomartono, February 13).

However, mainstream arts companies may have a long way to go in terms of gender inclusivity. For instance, Opera de Montreal put on the classic Don Giovanni yet refused to critically address the play’s misogynistic content (“Opera, you can do better,” Carly Gordon and Taylor Mitchell, November 14). Similarly, Montreal Symphony Orchestra heavily advertised their collaboration with Vasily Petrenko despite his previous contentious claims about how women aren’t suited to be conductors, which is symptomatic of larger trends of exclusion in the music world (“Orchestrating equality,” Carly Gordon, March 20).

—Coco Zhou

32

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

‘(Blurry),’ Nina Chabelnik

‘Untitled,’ Yanqiu Chen

Photo essay

Photo essay

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

33

‘Princess II,’ Arno Pedram

‘The Preacher,’ Mert Kimyaci

34

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

Photo Essay

‘Spanish Narnia: Barcelona, Spain,’ Tessa Battistin

Art essay

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

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‘Ways of Seeing: Inspired by Remed,’ Céline Kerriou

Multimedia

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

@gothshakira

I

n October, we spoke to the esteemed Montreal meme artist gothshakira; her Instagram account with over 56.2k followers describes its life course as: “tough double aquarian latinx learns to love herself through memecraft.”

As the world of memes continues to build cultural and artistic legitimacy, gothshakira speaks about how her gendered and racialized identities play into the ways in which her work is perceived by the public. More importantly, she reflects on how these identities inform how she relates to her own work. As a Latinx woman, gothshakira conceptualizes meme art as a way in which people whose experiences have been historically invisibilized can seek connection with online communities. Therefore, it undoubtedly bears a politicized potential for marginalized communities. “I do it for us,” she says, “We deserve to be heard, right? We deserve to feel welcome in creative spaces as artists; women, people of colour, non-gender conforming individuals.” However, she also speaks about her privilege in positions of power, which complicates how she relates to larger artistic communities. gothshakira is passionate about allowing these nuances and complexities to show through her meme art.

36

Invisibilized disabilities

E

arlier this month, we held a workshop-based panel at CKUT regarding invisibilized disabilities and the various stigmas that culturally surround them. Eight students from the McGill community talked to each other about their personal experiences of disability. Their accounts demonstrate that many experiences are excluded from mainstream narratives and representations.

The discussion, which covers topics such as contemporary disability narratives, experiences of medical institutions, and relationships with intimate partners, is based on a variety of understandings of disability, health, illness, and healing.

Through navigating these understandings collectively, the students also touch upon how gendered and racialized identities have fundamentally informed their experiences of disabilities, institutions, and diagnoses. For example, these subject positions are proven to directly affect which official diagnosis is more likely to be given to an individual. For understandings of disability to offer genuine spaces of support and healing, the recognition of heterogeneous experiences must be recognized. The students notably express a commitment to conceptualizing healing as a non-linear reality; instead, disability is discussed as an accepted and reclaimed way of life.

Reclaiming queer Arab stories

T

he first segment of this episode featured an interview with Saleem Haddad, the author of Guapa, a political and personal coming of age story of a young gay man living through the Arab revolutions in 2011. The novel, published in 2016, was awarded Stonewall Honour and received critical acclaim from the New Yorker and the Guardian. Haddad was selected as one of the top 100 Global thinkers of 2016 by Foreign Policy Magazine. The interview highlights Haddad’s inspiration for the novel, and the struggle to reclaim the narrative around Queer Arab stories. Haddad draws on the works of queer Arab activists and his own personal experience to discuss the struggle for freedom and equality in the Arab queer movement. Haddad was a speaker of the event, “Reclaiming Queer Arab Stories” hosted by the McGill Students in Solidarity for Palestinian Human rights.

The second segment featured excerpts of Jenny Jeanes’ presentation on the gaps of Immigration and Refugee law in Canada. The presentation was a part of “The Future of Refugee law in Canada”, an event hosted by The Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers (CARL) McGill. Jeanes discusses gaps and policy loopholes affecting refugees and those with non-legal status. She problematizes the lack of accountability in detention laws, given the amount of discretion given to immigration officers. Jeanes draws on recent cases of removal, where immigration policies failed to protect those seeking protection in Canada. These cases highlight enforcement measures that leave refugees at risk of a limbo, with no legal protection. Jeanes is currently the program coordinator of Action Réfugiés Montréal detention program. She has visited the Canada Border Services Agency in Laval, Quebec on a weekly basis since 2005.

Islamophobia in Canada

T

he first segment featured Dolores Chew, a founding member of Montreal’s South Asian Women’s Community Centre (SAWCC).

Chew is a history and humanities instructor at Marianopolis College and a Research Associate at the Simone de Beauvoir Institute of Concordia University. Chew was a speaker for “Gendered Racializing in Quebec and Canada”, a discussion highlighting the history of othering in Quebec and Canada, and the role of Canadian politicians and the media in exacerbating fear and insecurity. Chew’s presentation draws on the experiences of Montreal’s South Asian Women’s Community Centre challenging racist discourse and gendering of racializing, often framed as a rights and equality discourse.

The second segment featured an interview with Teri Phillips, an Office for Students With Disabilities director. Phillips discusses a ‘gap period’, where students are self-diagnosed with mental health issues, but lack a formal diagnoses, which can prevent students from accessing certain services.

She describes mental health issues as one of the most prominent factors affecting academic life among McGill students. Phillips discusses the role of the institutions in bridging the gap, as well as recommendations for McGill students in need of support.

On

the staff of

April 5 & 6, 2017

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EDITORIAL

Volume 106 Issue 23

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

38

editorial board

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phone 514.398.6784 fax 514.398.8318 mcgilldaily.com

The McGill Daily is located on unceded Kanien’kehá:ka territory. coordinating editor

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managing editor

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Vacant

This year’s resistance will grow into next year’s movement

news editor

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contributors Alainah Aamir, Tessa Battistin, Laura Brennan, Marc Cataford, Nina Chabelnik, Junyi Chen, Yanqui Chen, Octavia Dancu, Rosie Long Decter, Nathan Drezner, Kareem Ibrahim, Christopher Junn, Celine Kerriou, Mert Kimyaci, Meara Bernadette Kirwin, Sydney Lang, Nora McCready, Cedric Parages, Arno Pedram, Sarah Shahid, Alice Shen, Connor Spencer

T

here is no denying that the 2016-17 school year was fucking rough: it was rife with political and social turmoil on every level, and our campus was no exception. There is actually a circle of hell where we relive this year over and over again, for the rest of eternity.

Despite it all, we have seen inspiring forms of resistance manifest in our campus communities and beyond.

These displays of resilience and solidarity should be acknowledged, celebrated and sustained as we enter the summer months and face the coming years. However, if these instances of resilience are to grow into movements, we will have to be self-critical, fiercely courageous, and willing to set new standards for ourselves.

The movements and organizing efforts that took place this year – whether at McGill or in the broader Montreal community – have been important in advancing issues and causes that, contrary to popular belief, have not suddenly sprung up this past year, but have been years in the making. We can look back on 2016-2017 and note the concerted anti-Islamophobia efforts in the face of the ongoing anti-Muslim policies and violence in both North America and Europe; the Montreal contingent of the women’s march, which came in response to Trump’s global abortion gag order, as well as the anti-fascist organizing efforts that aimed to counter hate speech and actions on behalf of fascist groups mobilizing in Montreal.

Furthermore, one of the highlights of organizing efforts this year at McGill has been the AMUSE strike, and ensuing Floor Fellow actions, which demanded and successfully negotiated greater access to job security and adequate compensation for student and casual employees, as well as floor fellows, at the University.

Activism and the resistance to these entrenched systems of oppression is exhausting, confusing, and complicated.

While we’re well-meaning, we often lose sight of what it is we’re working towards and why. As a result, the way we approach our social justice work can perpetuate the very conditions we’re striving to dismantle. Many activist movements, whether driven by feminist, anti-racist, or classresisting sentiments, have historically been exclusive and inaccessible to marginalized groups. This is an issue within activism, including anti-Islamophobia work, which centres light-skinned Muslim people while ignoring Black and darkskinned Muslim people. There is a growing awareness of the failings of our activism – for example, the widespread critiques of the women’s marches and strike that centred wealthy cis white women – but these critiques must manifest as concrete change at our marches, meetings, and demos.

Organizing can feel difficult and hopeless, but our activism is not in vain. The well-being and survival of our society depends on collective action and continued support of one another in the face of adversity. Advocacy works by speaking up, and more importantly showing up and putting your body on the line for others if your are privileged and able. It’s not necessarily about direct results – it’s about trying. It’s about the small ways in which people feel supported by what we’re doing - that is worth it in itself. In writing our last editorial of the year, we call for continued resistance in the face of systemic oppressions – resistance against Islamophobia, racism, sexism, ableism, homophobia and transphobia. Furthermore, we call for inclusive resistances that are able to grow, and hopefully be carried into the future.

—The McGill Daily editorial board

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Zapaer Alip, Janna Bryson (Chair), Marc Cataford, Julia Denis, Cem Ertekin, Sonia Ionescu, Ikram Mecheri, Boris Shedov, Alice Shen, Théophile Vareille All contents © 2017 Daily Publications Society. All rights reserved. The content of this newspaper is the responsibility of The McGill Daily and does not necessarily represent the views of McGill University. Products or companies advertised in this newspaper are not necessarily endorsed by Daily staff.

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Compendium!

April 3, 2017 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily

Lies, half-truths, and a river of tears.

Crossword

“Portmanteau de toilette”

Jay van Put Official Crossword Wizard

Across 1. Actress in La La Land, Stone 5. Egyptian snakes 9. Mexican drug lord El ____ 14. Get ready for, with up 15. “How do I love ___?”

16. Primate from Madagascar 17. ___ von Bismarck 18. Maize 19. Cupcake topper 20. Place to wash your hair on a ship?

23. Lou Gehrig’s disease, abbr 24. __ dude, (stoner’s greeting) 25. Things a player might slide into?

28. “Much ___ About Nothing” 31. Time atomic clocks keep, abbr.

33. Microwave some leftovers 35. Truth ___ 37. Mexican money 40. Plot of land 41. Painting style for a barber?

44. Poems notably written by 71 across 45. Castaway’s home 46. Milk dispenser 47. First name of a past U.S. president or clown 49. Mar. follower 51. Hosp. areas 52. Tolkien creature 53. Actor Tommy __ Jones 55. Japanese sash 57. The Young and the Spotless?

63.Poppy product 66. Chicken Soup for the ___ 67. Iditarod vehicle 68. Main artery 69. Lead singer of Vampire Weekend, Koenig 70. Utilized 71. He wrote poems to grecian urns and nightingales 72. Burn 73. Drugs, briefly

Dear McGill: a break up note Hannah Chubb The McGall Weekly

D

ear McGill, You may not know it, but we have been in a rollercoaster relationship for about four years now. If we were Facebook official, there’s not a doubt in my mind that we would be “Complicated”. We’ve had our ups and downs: we’ve gone from A’s to C‘s; from classes in Leacock to McMed; and of course there was the time that we took a break during the second semester of third year, and yes, I’ll admit I did cheat on you during that time.

A part of me still believes I left my heart at the University of Amsterdam, but you were my first true love, and we all know that that’s something you never forget.

As you may already know, we certainly have not always agreed, McGill. When it comes to politics, we don’t always see eye to eye, and sometimes I have a problem with the way you treat certain people. You have a lot to work on, and a lot to learn, there’s no doubt about it. But as much as I have loathed you, I know that no matter how hard I try, and who holds my affection next, I’ll always have you on the tip of my tongue, and in the back of my mind. We belonged together, if only for a fleeting moment, and I’ll never regret you.

You were wildly ephemeral, but you were

purposive. 20 years down the road you may not know my face in a crowd, but I hope you know that I’ll never forget the times we’ve shared, and that I appreciate everything you have done to make me the person that I am.

I’m writing to let you know that I’m moving on and adding you to my list of ex’s, but I’ll always cherish our four years together.

Our relationship began like many others.

I fell for you before you even knew I existed.

I lusted after you from afar for so long that I was overwhelmed when I found out you wanted anything to do with me. You were my high school crush, after all. You just seemed so damn perfect. Even my parents loved you from the start.

You fell for me February 20 th , 2013 and we became “official” on September 3 rd , 2013 (I know, we took it slow). We moved in together soon after that. Remember our first place at 3625 Parc Avenue? The shower never drained and the neighbors had horrible taste in music, but it was my first home away from home, and because of that it was magic. You were my first taste of freedom, and, at that time, nothing had ever tasted sweeter than you.

You showed me the playground that is the city of Montreal, and introduced me to the vibrant megalopolis using all of my senses. If it weren’t for you, I never would have felt my skates hit the slick ice in Old Port; I

never would have seen the street art splashed over the Plateau in early September; I never would have heard the persistent pounding of steel drums at Tam Tams on sunny Sunday mornings; I never would have smelt what a fresh Fairmount bagel smells like coming out of a wood oven; and I never would have tasted how good Two Chow tastes on those blurry kind of St. Laurent nights that I hope everyone gets to experience at least once. So, thank you. Thank you for bringing me to a city that stole my heart.

Now, I don’t want to give you a big ego or anything, but what they say is true: you are absolutely stunning. And I don’t want to appear shallow, but your beauty definitely drew me in the first time I laid eyes on you. And after all these years there are still moments where the sight of you takes my breath away.

You get to me.

Whether on those brisk late night walks when the streetlights and stars shine on you simultaneously, or the mornings when the first snow of the season sparkles atop your sturdy structure. You are traditional yet modern, vintage yet cosmopolitan, and you pull off the contrast with ease. Your beauty is dazzling, and I don’t think there will ever be a time when I stop believing that is true, because you age more gracefully than most could even dream of.

39

Down 1. Freudian topics 2. Drug in Breaking Bad 3. ___ Hari (spy) 4. Scent from baking or flowers 5. Selling without profit (words) 6. “Go away!”

7. Criminal, abbr.

8. Mails a package 9. Stale saying 10. “Darn it!”

11. Bon ___ 12. No __ intended 13. Web address ending 21. __ bob 22. Coins across the sea 25. Purpose of the Enigma machine 26. Writing utensil 27. Drives 28. On dry land 29. Got a bull’s eye (2 words) 30. Get situated 32. Main parts of a computer 34. Difficult 36. ___ Major 38. Immigrant’s course: Abbr.

39. Type of butter 42. Equestrian 43. DreamWorks movie about snails (2013) 48. Andean spitter 50. Type of tree 54. Twisty turns 56. Lorem ____ 57. Back end of a cigarette 58. Seep 59. Heavenly glow 60. If/___ statement in computer programming 61. Piece of a clarinet 62. Puts in 63. Poison ___ 64. “The Murders in the Rue Morgue” writer 65. 401(k) alternative

McGill, you taught me love and loss and lore, and introduced me to the sort of lifelong friends people spend their whole existence trying to find (they’re taking my side in this breakup, sorry not sorry). You taught me how to speak my mind, even when my voice shook, and how to know what’s worth screaming for.

You made me a better person, McGill. I am more gracious, more open, and more empathetic, and I will think of you when I share these values with my own children, down the road. I cannot thank you enough for the person I have become, but I know there is more out there for me, and I’m going after it now.

I hope you know that it’s not you, it’s me. I’m just ready to move on. Four years is a long time, and it’s going to be hard to go our separate ways, it really is. But you’re just not right for me anymore. I know you’ll be so great to whoever comes after me, and they’ll be so lucky to become a part of your world. I hope there are no hard feelings, but I’m putting myself first and following my own path, and it just doesn’t include you anymore. But I hope we can still remain friends, and I’m sure I’ll hear from you soon, even if it’s just because you need a little financial support.

If you need me, I’ll be in New York City.

Hopefully their lights shine as bright as yours.

With love, Hannah

The McGill Daily would like to thank everyone who contributed this year!

Abby Couture

Emily McIntosh

Lindsay Burns

Panayot Gaidov

Ada McVean

Erin Sobat

Lizzie Grieco

Phoebe Colby

Aidan Gilchrist-Blackwood

Eva Morel

Louis Sanger

Praise Feng

Alainah Aamir

Fernanda Perez Gay Juarez

Louis Warnock

Priscilla Wang

Alejandra Morales

Fiona Glen

Lucas Snaije

Quita Seon

Alexandra Yiannoustos

Florence Paré

Lucie Couderc

Rachel Harrison

Alice Rougeaux

Gabriel Rincon

Lucie Lastiger

Rahul Datta

Alice Shen

Gelila Bedada

Luke Robitaille

Rosie Long-Decter

Alicia Lapena Barry

George Ghabrial

Lynsey Grosfield

Rushell Rousseau

Amanda Fiore

Gregoire Beaune

Maaran Michael Rajah

Ryan Canon

Ambre Battistella

Gwyn Peters

Maddie Gnam

Ryan Jamula

Amy Currie

Haley O’Halloran

Madison Duenkler

Ryan Shah

Ana Petrenko

Hana E. Geadah

Manuela Galindo-Carvajal

Sabrine Maaz

Angelo Manaloto

Hanna Bee

Marcelle Partouche Gutierrez

Saishree Badrinarayanan

Anna O’Driscoll

Hannah Kaya

Maria Lotfi

Sarah Meghan Mah

Annie Rubin

Hannah Rapaglia

Mariam Salaymeh

Sarah Shahid

Anya Kowalchuk

Hayley Mortin

Mariya Voloshyn

Sarah-Shin Wong

Arda Eskigil

Heather Lawson

Mars Zaslavsky

Sean Miyaji

Arno Pedram

Heloise Chapuis

Matthew He

Sebastian Pazdan

Astha Agarwal

Hugo Tartaglia

Matthew Sanza

Sereena Pigeon

Ayesha Talreja

Isabelle Shi

Matthew Wolf

Sevrenne Shepperd

Becca Zhuang

Islay Cannon

Max Binks-Collier

Shane Weibe

Benjamin Oldham

J. Laraqi

Max Honigmann

Shanell Fan,

Bingzhang Wu

James Ward

Maxine Dannatt

Shilei Zhang

Brittany Orav-Lakaski

Jay Van Put

Maya Keshav

Sinthusha Kandiah

Carly Gordon

Jed Lenetsky

Maya Schade

Siobhan Milner

Caroline Macari

Jennifer Guan

McGill Chapter -

Siting Ni

Cassandra Ryan

Jessica Goldson

Independent Jewish Voices

Sophia Kopyna

Catharina O’Donnell

Josephine Bird

Meara Bernadete Kirwin

Sophia Seward

Catherine Jeffrey

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Mert Kimyaci

Sophie Panzer

Cédric Parages

Junyi Chen

Mia-Kate Salinger-Messer

Sydney Lang

Céline Kerriou

Justin Mai

Micah Flavin

T-Kay Tran

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Michael Cressaty

Tala Abdullah

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Kareem Ibrahim

Michelle Takamori

Tessa Battistin

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Moizza Ul Haq

Théophile Vareille

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Molly Lu

Tony Feng

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Khando Langri

Mona Luxion

Ty Cary

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Vaishnavi Kapil

Connor Spencer

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Muhan Zhang

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Kismet Bandeen

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Lana Saleh Bacha

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Lanya Feng

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Laura Brennan

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Elroy Lee

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Zahra Habib