Medium Magazine 2018

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VEGANISM IDENTITY CULTURE FOOD RELATION SHIPS 2

M E D I U M M AG A Z I N E

We’re all facing our own identity crisis.

CONTENTS Mahnoor Ayub

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FAKE NEWS, OPINIONS AND CHANGE

Alicia Boatto

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THE INTERNET KILLED CRITICAL THINKING

Vanessa Cesario

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FINDING A BALANCE THAT FITS YOUR LIFESTYLE

Florence Cao

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FRIDAYS AT SIHAN’S

Ayesha Tak

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YOUR SEXTS ARE PERMANENT

Kassandra Hangdaan

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ONLINE DATING

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF MAHMOUD SAROUJI CREATIVE DIRECTOR MIRABELLE EZE

PUBLISHED BY MEDIUM II PUBLICATIONS 3359 MISSISSAUGA RD. N., STUDENT CENTRE, RM200 MISSISSAUGA, ON L5L 1C6

PHOTOGRAPHY OLIVIA ADAMCZYK

WWW.THEMEDIUM.CA EDITOR@THEMEDIUM.CA

COPY EDITORS AYESHA TAK MENNA ELNAKA MAHMOUD SAROUJI CONTRIBUTING EDITORS MAHMOUD SAROUJI, MENNA ELNAKA, KASSANDRA HANGDAAN, MAHNOOR AYUB, ALICIA BOATTO, VANESSA CESARIO, AYESHA TAK PRINTING BY MASTER WEB INC

COMMENTS, CONCERNS, OR COMPLAINTS ABOUT MEDIUM MAGAZINE’S CONTENT SHOULD BE DIRECTED TO THE EDITOR-IN-CHIEF WHO CAN BE LOCATED AT THE EMAIL ADDRESS ABOVE. ALL CONTENT PRINTED IN MEDIUM MAGAZINE IS THE SOLE PROPERTY OF ITS CREATORS AND CANNOT BE USED WITHOUT CONSENT. OPINIONS EXPRESSED IN THIS PUBLICATION ARE EXCLUSIVELY OF THE AUTHOR AND DO NOT NECESSARILY REFLECT THOSE OF MEDIUM MAGAZINE. ADDITIONALLY, THE OPINIONS EXPRESSED IN ADVERTISEMENTS APPEARING IN MEDIUM MAGAZINE ARE THOSE OF THE ADVERTISERS AND NOT MEDIUM MAGAZINE. MEDIUM MAGAZINE IS A DIVISION OF MEDIUM II PUBLICATIONS.

D I R EC TO R S : M A H M O U D S A RO UJ I , N O U R A B U -A L I , O SC A R A DA M C Z Y K , M E L A N I E A S S E L I N , AY E S H A H A S S A N , S H R I S H T I P R A S H A R , C O L L I N M C FA R L A N E , FA R A H QA I S E R

EDITOR’S NOTE We’re all facing our own identity crisis.

Though we may refute it, every day we hope to find the true key in the search for who we are as individuals. Our ability to inform ourselves every day in turn informs the kind of person we want to be in the eyes of others. At The Medium, we face the same struggle daily. When trying to put together themes and ideas for this magazine, it took a while to come to a concrete idea. We knew we wanted to tell our readers a story and open their mind to something different, but we did not know at the time what it was.

Months later, we have what you are holding in your hands right now. In an attempt to understand who we are at The Medium, we decided to bring to you a collection of pieces that offer you the chance to understand, debate, and most importantly be informed.

Staying informed is a phrase that gets thrown around in our news room. We have always talked about what that could mean, and have had lengthy debates about what our job really is here at UTM. We could easily be a paper that presents itself as uninformative and aim to simply appeal to a greater public—but we don’t. Our understanding of staying informed is also combined with the ability to understand who we are as UTM students.

Using the information you have learned has, in many ways, shaped your beliefs, your personality, your understanding of the world, and generally who you are. The ability to stay informed goes beyond justhearing information in passing; it also means pursuing knowledge and using it to better yourself, debate, and to push for change.

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Your responsibility as a student at UTM is rooted in the idea that you need to think critically about various concepts. University pushes this idea day in and day out. Though, your responsibility as a student at UTM extends beyond that; you should get involved and be aware of how your money is spent. Blindly passing through the campus while paying little to no attention to the happenings around you will let you graduate with no worries, which is easy to do. However you will also be missing the essential skill of being informed.

Our magazine hopes to ignite that flame inside you to truly invest time in learning about yourself and the environment around you. With knowledge comes criticism and with criticism comes the ability to have a more in-depth understanding of institutions, communities, ideologies, and so much more. There’s always more behind the clean marketing of our institutions, and you have the right to know about that.

Know that our aim with every minute we spent on this magazine was to inform you. To teach you about what it means to create your identity and to pursue knowledge, all while trying to maintain so many other things in yourlife. The future has so much in store for us, but your future is dependent on what you do to better yourself now. Our role for this campus at The Medium will and always has been to pursue knowledge and share it with the UTM community. You deserve to know and you deserve to seek it. My hope is that you will read through these articles and learn something. You will learn and you will take that knowledge to understand who you are.

I cannot promise you that you will find out the answer to the question of identity, but I can promise you that you will finish this magazine with a little more knowledge than you did before. The journalists who wrote the articles certainly hope that you do.

Putting together in a few words what my team has been able to do with this magazine was a difficult thing to do. I cannot even begin to express my gratitude to my team who put this together, in just the words I have written here. Thank you to my team, for the honourable and outstanding work you’ve done this year for this magazine and for our weekly issues. You truly have pushed The Medium into a direction it hasn’t gone before. We have worked tirelessly in hopes that you will enjoy the work you’re about read. Share and be part of the knowledge they have worked to give you. Pass it on to others and understand the importance of being aware of your campus, always.

Without knowledge, you cannot have identity. Without identity, UTM does not have you.

Stay critical and informed UTM. Embrace the information and journey you are about to embark on.

FAKE NEWS OPINIONS AND CHANGE: A STORY OF CONSEQUENCE MAHNOOR AYUB

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At a Time Characterized by Both Change and Regression, The Medium Explores Our Understanding of Identities in Flux.

Hours after the U.S. recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, many of our Facebook feeds may have been hit with a similar spattering of status updates sharing conspiracy theories, something along the following lines: A covert policy was being passed in its shadow, the move expresses support for the U.S. Jewish community, the recognition falls within a larger plan of supporting Hamas, and ultimately avoiding negotiation with what can then be portrayed as a terrorist-run Palestine.

Rebuttal sentiments incited by these ideas sprouted soon after. The decision was a display of commitment to the president’s campaign promise, said some; a blatant disregard for peace in the West Bank, said others. The two narratives ran into the usual stream of chatter, news, and memes.

“These stories were coming in from all over my newsfeed, from a network of almost about 300 to 400 friends, and groups I follow on Facebook,” says Fifth-Year Environmental Science student Kirran Sidiqui. Deciding against participating in an argument in the comments section of a friend’s status, she said, “I felt in cases like these, we aren’t listening to one another. First, because none of us actually know why it happened, and second, because it quickly just becomes a matter of us versus them.”

Sidiqui’s experience is not alien to the 2018 university student. In an educational experience riddled with movements, marches, and hashtags, many of us are left to find our niche in the labyrinth that is the online world. We question our positions, channel our inclinations, and navigate our identities. Yet another label for the new college student however,

is our evolving flexibility towards said label. Amidst the spectrum of opinions, information and news – both fake and true – we locate our context. Our location may voice itself through opinion, and our opinion may mould into our identity. But how do we locate ourselves? How do we choose between the fake and the real? How do we support, rally and identify?

As audiences, we inadvertently filter content we receive as either true or false.

Cory D. Wright writes in his 2010 book, New Waves in Truth, that when talking about truth, “We ordinarily take ourselves to be talking about one-and-the-same thing.” According to Wright, those who suggest that theorizing about truth ought to begin with the thesis that truth is one and the same thing, are Alethic monists – that the nature of truth is uniform across multiple discourses.

The psychological dynamics that make social media platforms powerful vectors of misinformation and division—as Benedict Carrey writes in The New York Times in “How fiction becomes fact on social media”—often ignite subconscious biases, that make many of us vulnerable, yet receptive, audiences.

“The nature of truth is uniform or invariant across discipline or sector of discourse,” he writes.

According to the invariance principle—the discursive differences in the semantic content, explanatory posits, and other such features make no difference to the underlying nature of truth, for it does not vary. “Statements about elephants and eggshells, if true, are true in the same way that statements about loose morals, the illegality of littering, or the laughability quotient of your-mama jokes,” writes Wright.

Associate professor in the Department of Philosophy at UTM, Gurpreet Rattan, further elaborates on our understanding of what constitutes as truth: “The cognitive value of the concept of truth is to make possible a certain kind and quality of knowledge: the proprietary kind. And quality of knowledge afforded by reflective clarity over the concepts and thoughts already within one’s conceptual resources.”

Rattan’s ideas on the reconciliation between what we conceive as true and our pre-imbued concepts are shared by Hunt Alcott (Professor of Economics, New York University) and Matthew Gentzkow (Professor of Economics, Stanford University), as they discuss the economics of fake

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news in their spring 2017 article in the Journal of Economic Perspectives titled, “Social Media and Fake News in the 2016 Election.” Alcott and Gentzkow present a “model of media markets in which firms gather and sell signals of a true state of the world to consumers who benefit from inferring that state.” They further argue, “Fake news arises in equilibrium because it is cheaper to provide than precise signals, because consumers cannot costlessly infer accuracy, and because consumers may enjoy partisan news.”

Our inclination towards partisan news and ideas that are reciprocally beneficial, is evident not only in our online content preferences, but also in our everyday interactions. As first year students, many of us inch towards clubs and groups that fertilize our pre-existing interests, and as fourthyear students, these experiences help guide budding interests into rooted opinions. “University definitely moulds you and how you think. I think a lot of it does have to do with the people you talk to, for me at least—the company I’ve kept at UTM has been a major influence,” said Siddiqui.

These thoughts on the evolution of opinions in social systems has long been the subject of attention in sociology, political science and physics literature. Petter Holme (Department of Computer Science, University of New Mexico) and Mark Newman (Department of Physics, University of Michigan), write in their 2006 Article “Nonequilibrium phase transition in the coevolution of networks and opinions” in the journal Physical Review E, “Individuals form their beliefs based on the opinions of their neighbors in a social network of personal acquaintances, and those in which, conversely, network connections from between individuals of similar beliefs,” in essence, describing how peer networks can influence inclinations.

Partisan news custom made for your consumerism preferences, or fake news, goes beyond a simple thought influence.

Given the convergence with emerging opinions and cemented identities, reaffirmed ideas hold leverage to sway political affinities.

As post-doctoral researcher in the Department of Political Science at UTM, Dr. Randy Besco, writes in “Rainbow Coalitions or Inter-minority Conflict? Racial Affinity and Diverse Minority Voters,” “There is a considerable amount of research about racial affinity effects, that voters are likely to support a candidate of the same race.” Although race and individual identity may not entirely

overlap, political support can be stimulated by presenting similarities. In Besco’s 2015 study with a panel of racialized respondents, using a web-based survey, respondents evaluated fictional candidates with the ethnicity of the candidates experimentally manipulated. “While respondents show strong affinity for their own ethnocultural group, they also show some affinity for other minority candidates and certainly no inter-minority conflict. Effects are strongly conditional on the degree of ethnic self-identity,” writes Besco. As immigration transforms the electorates of contemporary democracies, ethnic self-identity becomes a primary consideration in analyzing identity politics. After all, most modern democracies contain significant minority groups whose language, religion, or ethnicity differs from those of the majority.

Opinions, identities, and political change—a tripartite description of the aforementioned 2018 university student experience. Combing through a flurry of online information may remain our only (read: preferred) way to analyze public opinion and question our identity within its context. We ponder over the meanings we ascribe to our observed distributions of opinions, and to positions taken by different individuals in our networks. To understand what opinions mean, we must know more than the direction of an individual’s responses or the distribution of responses in our networks.

We need information that will allow us to make some inferences about the characteristics of the observed opinions, such as their intensity, their transparency, and the level of commitment that they imply. We need information about the motivational bases of these opinions; about the functions that they fulfill for the individual and the networks in which they are embedded. We need information about the cognitive recurrences and links of the opinions, the amount and the nature of information that support them, and the expectations and evaluations that surround them.

The need for more detailed information becomes even more apparent, as evident through Besco’s study, when we attempt to use opinion data for the prediction of subsequent behavior.

Associate professor in the UTM biology department, Dr. Fiona Rawle, explains that pausing to drill down and determine the true source of a disputable story can be tricky, but understanding the ideological leanings emerging through our viewing choices is important. She says, “Curiosity is a hallmark of the human experience, and this Is what I always advise students: we must ask questions, question answers, and repeat.”

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VISIT themedium .ca FOR THE VOICE OF THE UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO MISSISSAUGA

THE

INTERNET KILLED Critical THINKING RESTORING THE INTEGRITY OF JOURNALISM ALICIA BOATTO

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Technology has ushered us into a new age—one filled with an abundance of information available at a moment’s notice to billions of people across the world. With the rise of social media and portable devices, sharing information has never been easier and more dangerous.

Sources of information, specifically news outlets, are scrutinized. Reporters have been accused of bias, causing the reliability of news media decreasing sharply. Audiences have been chanting the mantra of “fake news” to discredit information they simply don’t like. With so many outlets of data, both fake and official, people have lost the ability to discern fact from fiction in order to preserve their own ideologies. It doesn’t take a genius to look at current events and realize that information is being catered to two extreme spectrums. It seems that people don’t want to stay aware of the world around them, they only seem concerned with being right over people of a different mindset. The quest for facts has been lost in the attempt to push agendas, and with it, the credibility of modern journalism.

The degradation of the free press is exactly why I’m adamant that journalism still matters, and in fact, has never been more important. As a hopeful journalist graduating from the University of Toronto, the ignorance of so many when it comes to journalism never fails to give me cause for concern. Journalists are not the enemy; we are here to give undiluted facts and knowledge to audiences so that they may arrive at their own independent conclusions and decide their own course of action.

It is the responsibility of journalists and reporters to function as

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the carriers of information. We are the bridge for every citizen to have access to accurate information regarding politics and world affairs.

Reporters cannot afford to lose the faith of their readers. Otherwise, we run the risk of alienating audiences to less reliable means of information. Our purpose is to provide information, not to influence outcomes. Reporters, especially TV anchors that have let their bias blatantly show on national television, influencing the network’s affiliations are detracting from the actual issues. It is my belief that if a reporter becomes the news instead of stating it, then they have lost sight of what their job entails. Individuals like Glenn Thrush, Megyn Kelly, and Anderson Cooper have succeeded in gaining viewers for their networks, but in the process, have failed in their jobs as reporters. We have lost our neutrality in the quest to gain views, and that loss of middle ground has damaged the industry of news reporting.

Good journalism is still vital for today’s society; one where finding the right information can be overwhelming and confusing.

Our age of technology has changed the way we access and read the news. Long gone are the days where newspapers were circulated weekly and awaited eagerly by readers.

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We now live in a world where dozens of stories are being published in an hour, let alone a single day or week. With all this information, it’s easy to just sit back and absorb the myriad of statistics thrown at us, instead of differentiating between fact and bias and different forms of articles. Social media is filled with online critics and supposed-experts in journalism remarking that “This isn’t news,” “This is biased”, “Fake news,” without even understanding the different forms of reporting. As news outlets, as well as readers, it’s important to make clear the different forms of articles, whether that means understanding the difference between a news article, an opinion piece, or the entertainment section of the paper. I find it troublesome when I see Facebook users claiming “poor journalism” on articles, when they are in fact reading editorial and opinion pieces. When audiences are unable to differentiate between a news article and opinion piece is when journalism is needed most in order to inform and to educate.

The trend of crying “fake news” and dismissing vital news stories is furthering the importance of good journalism. We need readers to be able to critically assess stories, observe the facts objectively, and then form their own opinions. Many people, including my classmates and peers, are content with either turning a blind eye to current events or isolating themselves to a single source of in-

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formation. As readers, it is our responsibility to cross-check the stories we’re being told, to take initiative and figure out our own stance within a story, to ask questions about what’s missing in the story, and maybe question how the details have been portrayed. A lot of this misinformation comes from the way social media filters our information. Platforms like Facebook and Twitter have given users the opportunity to select and personalize news sources and topics that they want to see. If we limit ourselves to selective outlets of information that only present one-sided arguments, can we really learn and think critically about current issues?

While at U of T and minoring in the professional writing program, one course I have taken in particular really highlighted tendencies of modern audiences. The course was focused on blog management, and one of the lessons the professor taught us was to tailor our posts for “scanability.” People today aren’t actually interested in fully reading articles. People today just want the gist of an article on one glance and then move on. This tendency is what has propelled companies like Buzzfeed, whose posts are condensing largely into lists and small blurbs, into popularity. The trend of scanning articles results in writers reducing their content at the risk of excluding pertinent information. Quality journalism is important because it reminds readers to read actively, especially in a society where people are too busy to stay aware. Organizations like

Buzzfeed, Narcity, and Vox, which limit stories for convenience, have begun making that style of scanability the norm for news media. Essentially, lazy journalism has created lazy readers. Quality

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journalism needs to take back the world of news media and restore integrity and professionalism to the industry in order to create well-informed readers. However, it is also the consumer’s responsibility to be aware of where their news is coming from, to take the initiative to look into sources of information, and be proactive about asking questions.

When I tell people that I’m the news editor of UTM’s The Me-

dium, reactions vary from intrigue to easy dismissal, such as asking, “So it’s just a student paper?” Well, for just a student paper, I can tell you that The Medium is more unbiased than plenty of major news outlets like FOX news and CNN. For just a student paper, I can tell you that the work we do is the same as famous publications. For just a student paper, I can tell you that the effort we put into each issue, the number of edits we perform on each article, and the level of quality that we invest into our paper stands as a testament that journalism and the news media is not dead, but instead, undervalued.

When I tell people that I want to get into the journalism industry, I’m usually told about the shrinking newsroom and the low demand for reporters. But I’ve learned a lot working for this student paper, especially regarding the role of reporters and journalists. One thing this role has taught me, more than anything, is that the need for quality and unbiased reporting is more desperate than ever, regardless of the shrinking newsroom. The boom in technology and social media has blinded reporters from their main objective of reporting corroborated facts, causing us to lose our notoriety and authenticity. It is that objective of solid reporting that I hope to fulfill after my graduation and encourage my more experienced cohorts to remember.

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Finding a Balance That Fits Your Lifestyle VANESSA CESARIO When individuals, especially women, look at Instagram models, such as Kayla Itsines, Diana and Felicia of basebodybabes, or Jen Selter, it is easy to get captivated by the way the look. With their washboard abs, it is natural to have a desire towards wanting that for yourself. I, too, am guilty of following such accounts in the hopes of one day looking as perfectly sculpted as they do. Even other non-fitness models like Kendall Jenner, Hailey Baldwin, or Gigi Hadid, have a naturally thin frame, and for many women who do not look like them, having their type of body is unattainable. Seeing these models on different social media accounts, predominantly Instagram, can be a reason as to why people turn to fad diets. Essentially, a fad diet is a diet that promises large weight loss results in a short period of time, and is usually attained through an unhealthy and unbalanced diet. However, some diets, although classified as “diets,� are not fad diets and more of a lifestyle change or preference.

Juliana Cavaleri, a Ryerson University graduate with a Bachelor of Science in Nutrition and Food, sat down with me to discuss various diets to help decipher the true definition of a fad diet, as well as its possible effects on both the body and mind.

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One of the largest problems associated with fad diets is weight sustainability. Cavaleri explains that, “A lot of people, when they’re trying to lose weight, they’ll keep it off for a bit but it’s not sustainable. And then they revert backwards and gain even more weight than what they lost before.” This constant battle of back-andforth weight loss and gain is detrimental to not only a person’s physical health, but also emotional wellbeing. It is very discouraging to see yourself put on more weight than you had previously lost. However, it is natural to feel “desperate” to lose weight when comparing yourself to Instagram models. Trying out different fad diets like the egg fast diet, different liquid cleanses, or the raw food diet is all too common amongst people desperate to shed a few pounds.

While she does agree that there are diets out there that work well with certain people and their lifestyles, the overall key is finding a balance. Cavaleri is a huge advocate for finding your own rhythm and balance that works best with your lifestyle.

For example, veganism to a meatlover seems unrealistic, but to someone who has problems digesting meat or does not enjoy eating it, a vegan lifestyle becomes more desirable.

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Social media can sometimes influence our decision to turn to a fad diet. In an interview between American stand-up comedian, colour commentator for UFC, and podcast host Joe Rogan, and American journalist, author, and filmmaker Sebastian Junger, the two discuss the implications that social media can have on one’s identity. Junger explains that risk of suicide and Facebook are said to be correlated with one another. He referred to something he read and said, “In other words, people that are on Facebook and social media […] are at an increased risk of depression and thoughts of suicide.” This can also be relevant from a diet standpoint. Individuals can feel a sense of depression over the way they look. In an article by Josée L. Jarry, Amy Kossert, and Karen Ip of the National Eating Disorder Information Centre, the authors wrote, “Body-image dissatisfaction and over-reliance on appearance as a source of self-esteem, impair the quality of life of most women, and are key diagnostic criteria for eating disorders.” Overall self-esteem and confidence often stems from how we perceive ourselves.

It is no surprise that diets such as veganism, vegetarianism, and the ketogenic diet are gaining popularity, which can be hugely attributed to the growth of various social media outlets.

Instagram especially has a wide array of vegan food accounts—such as vegan, veganbowls, and vegan community—that have given people a sense of belonging to an online community.

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They paint veganism as a wildly cool, natural, and

The motives of people following a vegan diet al-

healthy diet, and they have gained millions of

ways seem to have an underlying fogginess to it—

supporters and people transitioning into a fully

you never quite know if they are following it solely

plant-based diet. While veganism, vegetarianism,

because of their beliefs or to feel a sense of com-

and ketogenic are diets, Cavaleri does not believe

munity via social media. People who do follow

them to be fad diets, but instead, more of a life-

veganism are assumed to be setting up this im-

style. People who choose to follow one of these

age that they live a holistic and healthy life that is

diets drastically change their eating habits and

cruelty-free and better for the environment. If the

usually do it for life. Living a vegan or vegetari-

sole reason for becoming a vegan or vegetarian is

an lifestyle are popular diets simply because it’s

for the image, then that automatically takes away

cruelty-free eating, it’s environmentally friendly,

from the noble and righteous lifestyle that many

and for some, it portrays a sense of “coolness.”

vegans follow. One problem that can arise from a

This raises the question—are people opting for a

vegan or vegetarian diet is the intake of too many

vegan lifestyle simply because they care about

carbohydrates. Cavaleri says, “Really learning how

the animals and what they are putting into their

to balance yourself and not just eating carbs all

bodies? Or is it more to feel a sense of community

the time is imperative.” When a food item has the

online? How does being a vegan or vegetarian

word “vegan” in front of it, it does not mean that

affect the way people view you?

it is automatically healthier for you. Vegan pasta,

Cavaleri does mention that eating animal-based products can be very taxing on the digestive system. She states that when our bodies produce phlegm or gas, that is a way of our bodies telling us it is “poison” and that we don’t like it. “So, I think how you’re feeling by not eating animal-based products is another incentive for people to not want to eat animal-based products anymore,” says Cavaleri. She also explains that many vegans often incorporate yoga into their lifestyle. The combination of both a plant-based diet and yoga is said to be a holistic lifestyle because it targets both the mind and body. While veganism is believed to be better for the environment, it is also known to be much costlier—not only in terms of food, but also clothing, and even household cleaning products.

lasagna, or pizza still have a substantial amount of carbs in them, which could lead to weight gain.

This brings us to the ketogenic diet, which is a low carb, high fat, and high protein diet. Most people on this diet will get their fat and protein intake through meat. Thinking back to our ancestry, Cavaleri explains how we used to be hunters and gatherers, which led to having high protein diets.

Keto is based on our diet as cavemen, where our bodies used fat as fuel instead of carbohydrates.

“When you keep eating carbohydrates, your body is in glucogenesis. You are always producing new glycogen and glucose but then if you eat too much of it, it’s just storing it as fat now,” Cavaleri says. Many would agree that most delicious foods are carb-filled, likepasta, pizza, bread, cake, muffins… need I go on? However, as much as we love

An ongoing stereotype about vegans is that

to indulge in these delicious foods, they are also

those who carry out this lifestyle feel the need to

the reason for weight gain and fatigue.

vocalize it. This belief entails that people become vegan because it is the “cool” thing to do.

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The ketogenic diet is not as popular throughout

When you say you can’t have carbs anymore, some

social media like vegan or vegetarian diets are. Of

people are more inclined to eat more carbs,” says

course, there are many people who have adopted

Cavaleri. Therefore, this can allow binge eating to

the keto lifestyle, but it does not have the same

occur because people get upset with themselves

attractive reputation that vegan and vegetarian

for not sticking to their respected diet.

lifestyles have. The lack of fame associated with the keto diet may be because it relies heavily on

The Atkin’s diet and South Beach diet are among

the intake of protein. This protein usually comes

the most popular fad diets that Cavaleri gets

from an abundance of meat which is the com-

asked about. The basic premise of the Atkin’s

plete opposite of a vegan or vegetarian lifestyle.

diet is low carb and unlimited fat and protein. The

Although the overall effects on one’s health may

South Beach diet has three phases that aim to

seem better on a ketogenic diet, it still doesn’t

replace the “bad” carbs with the “good” carbs and

quite have that “vegan class.”

“bad” fats with the “good” fats. “With the South

While at work, Cavaleri admits that she deals with many patients who are interested in starting a fad diet, like the military diet or a juice cleanse.

What she opts to do is teach patients portion control. Instead of telling someone “No, you can’t eat that,” it is better to educate and slowly try to eliminate their problem foods. Cavaleri also states that after they have children, women are most likely the ones wanting to start a fad diet. “It can range between late 30s to 50s when menopause starts,” says Cavaleri. “Weight management is all about hormones and hormones can really affect the way someone is eating, sleeping, and all those things.” She adds that people interested in starting a fad diet almost always fail and end up putting all the weight back on, if not more. Fad diets work as a vicious cyclic decline that Cavaleri explains: “After they see me, they’re motivated to take on the changes. And then a week passes and then two weeks pass, and life happens. They’re upset, there’s emotional stressors, then they eat again and then they lose the momentum. So, it’s very common that something triggers them to revert backwards.” Cavaleri also explains that another big problem associated with fad diets is the

Beach and Atkin’s, those weren’t really doctor encouraged,” Cavaleri says. “The difference with these diets and the ketogenic diet is that [keto is] doctor supported.” Veganism is not supported by doctors, but instead, more of an internal belief system that people have for reasons that have to do with animal cruelty, digestive, and many more.

Cavaleri explains that it is all about portion control. A person can diet all they want, but some people need a serving of fruit or a plate of pasta to keep them on track. When it comes to a person’s diet or lifestyle, it is all about finding a balance. Whether the goal is to lose weight, have more energy, or live a life you feel is morally grounded, finding a nice contrast between eating a regular balanced meal paired with those moments of indulging is key. This is why being fixated on achieving the ultimate body image can be damaging to one’s health. While it can act as a positive motivator, it can also lead to negative emotions if the results are not what you were expecting. Just like with a person’s diet, finding the perfect balance between health and acceptance is just as important for anyone.

reverse psychology effect. “ 25

FRIDAYS

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AT SIHAN’S

Friday at SIHAN’S FLORENCE CAO Shirt off, gut out, and a flashing unicorn horn on his head, Sihan Zheng yells at the top of his lungs, “suck it.” His girlfriend, Kruthika Ramesh, sits on the couch with a slice of Spanish Serrano ham in her hands. She laughs, the half-eaten slab of meat hanging from her lips, because she understands his references. All of them.

Ramesh knows that when Zheng wears the unicorn horn, he’s honouring his favourite World Wrestling Entertainment tag team, The New Day. Ramesh knows that when Zheng yells “suck it,” he’s imagining himself as a member of another wrestling team, D-Generation X. Ramesh knows that the intoxicated 22-year-old in front of her is not the person he appears to be every Friday night, when people from across the GTA—and sometimes further—gather in Zheng’s living room for drinks.

But like everyone else in the Mississauga living room, this is how Zheng was when she first met him. Ramesh met Zheng on the internet through a shitpost, a “mildly amusing but usually unfunny meme, video, or other picture that is completely random or unrelated to any discussion,” according to Urban Dictionary.

28 28 MMEEDDI IUUMM MMAAGGAAZZI INNEE

Since the outbreak of social media, people meet online in the masses. But in a world where the online community gives meaning to everything, we become drawn to internet nonsense.

A 2017 study in Information, Communication & Society by Yuval Katz and Limor Shifman found that the simplicity, ridiculousness, and arbitrariness of internet nonsense is a way for people to cope with the complexity of life. The researchers found that the “obliteration of meaning may enable the creation of inclusive communities […] allowing a variety of participants to express their quirky creativity without being sanctioned.”

Every Friday night, most of the people in Zheng’s living room, often students, are from the internet. For Zheng and his friends, the internet became a new way for them to connect on a deeper level, based upon their common interest in shitposts. In fact, back in her high school days, when Ramesh first struggled with family and school problems, she turned to her online friends for comfort. Zheng would be the first person she meets in real life.

Ramesh was looking for a bottle of gin. She loves gin because of how it smells “earthy, junipery.” In May 2017, Bombay Sapphire accidentally released a batch of gin bottles with 77 percent alcohol instead of their usual 40 percent. Ramesh posted in a Facebook shitposting group, Cirque du Twerque (CDT), asking if anyone got their hands on a bottle. Most group members thought Ramesh was trolling, “The art of deliberately, cleverly, and secretly pissing people off,” according to Urban Dictionary. Zheng, a whisky enthusiast, who loved the malt drink because of its “peaty, smoky” smell, saw another alcohol fanatic and potential friend.

The whisky lover used multiple online sites, before he finally found one where he could meet drinking or dining buddies that weren’t too “weird” for his taste. Zheng tells me about the summer of 2017. He used to browse a Reddit thread called r/r4r, short for “redditor for redditor,” where people commonly look for meet-ups. On the thread, he met a girl who wanted to introduce him to her parents after one meal, and a guy who only ever wanted to go to strip 29

clubs, where he knew every bartender and stripper. Although Zheng met these people in public places, he said he didn’t feel entirely comfortable being with them.

However, on Facebook groups like CDT, safety is hardly a concern. Most members have met at least one other person in real life, whether at a Hackathon or through school. “You start bantering with them […] you get to know them a bit,” says Zheng, “And then you have other people start to vouch for this guy or that guy. Like oh yeah, I dined with this guy when I was at so-and-so hackathon.”

Paul F., Zheng’s roommate, finds meeting people online weird. He doesn’t understand how his roommate feels comfortable inviting random people over every Friday. However, what he feels is far from concern. “I think it’s very unlikely that someone is catfishing a whisky enthusiast. At the end of the day, what’s going to happen? We kick someone out.”

Moshy, a friend Zheng met through CDT, shows up to the living room about once per month.

The bearded compilers developer by day, powerlifter by night, looks to Zheng’s house for booze and banter. “We give each other shit for being fat and I give him shit for being such a WWE fan when MMA is superior,” says Moshy.

Harvard sociologist, Mario Luis Small, found that people are more open with strangers because they’re like blank canvases. People don’t have to worry about strangers passing judgement, giving reassurances, or making suggestions. Strangers just listen. “I’m more open to throwing insults at you and calling you out on things because there’s no repercussions,” says Zheng, “What’s Moshy going to do? Have sex with me? You know he got pretty close that one day.”

All the way from Pittsburgh, Brian Hill, Zheng’s furthest friend from CDT, only graced the living room once so far. The Pittsburgh student drove up to Mississauga after speaking to Zheng for months via a group chat. When he arrived, he finally met his whiskey-loving internet friend and could compare how much his dick burned, in real life, with Moshy, which is a reference to the burning dick meme. Hill says that he hopes to come back up sometime.

Back in the living room, Zheng cuddles on the couch with Ramesh. His rainbow horn slides down the side of his head. Moshy throws a thrash metal CD on and enjoys a red wine straight from the bottle. “Stop being a fat ass,” Zheng yells at the bearded metalhead. Hill isn’t here tonight because he’s back in Pittsburgh. We don’t know who will show up next time and we don’t know who will never show up again. All we do is listen to the guitar shredding and laughter that fills up the room, among the clinks and clanks of alcohol glasses.

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We meet people online that we would never meet otherwise. The internet doesn’t discriminate by location or time. In fact, the shitposting community doesn’t even really care who you are. There are no expectations other than the ability to learn to laugh at anything: laugh at salt bae, laugh at the mocking SpongeBob meme, and most importantly, laugh at yourself. This community of unlikely friends can teach us a lesson about people—we relate over the simplest things. It doesn’t need to be more complicated than a funny image to bring us together.

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YOUR SEXTS ARE PERM 32 M E D I U M M A G A Z I N E

AND OTHER HORRIFYING THOUGHTS

ANENT AYESHA TAK

The adage of “Everything posted online stays there forever,” a once comforting thought, has now become a horrifying technological dystopian reality that many people who grew up with the internet try to circumvent. It is a reality that has been the subject of the critically-acclaimed series Black Mirror, but the fictional world portrayed on the show is not far-fetched. What weconceive of as technological dystopia once limited to science-fiction shows, such as Black Mirror, are now modern fables for this generation to warn of the horrors that occur when technology gets into the hands of evil-doers.

According to an article by Klimstra et al. published in the Journal of Youth and Adolescence, a majority of our identity formation happens during our adolescent years, around ages 12 to 20.

Coincidentally, these are also the years where we are likely to exhibit “rebellious” behaviour, as parents would call it. We lash out, skip class, perhaps take up opportunities that are not good for us in the long run, but most adolescents learn a thing or two and grow out of this stage. Kids are usually free to leave the unwise choices they made in the prime of their youth behind in the past and move on. However, as significant progresses are made in digital storage and record-keeping, the act of forgetting in a technological age is rapidly becoming a luxury.

What is Digital Permanence?

Digital permanence is a concept studied in computer science, CCIT, and any other field concerned with technology, and it refers to studying the history and technical evolution of digital storage. In retrospect, in 1981, IBM’s first computer released for personal and commercial usecame with storage options ranging from 16 to 256 kilobytes. In the 80s, this was a significant amount of storage ample enough to run computer applications. Nowadays, that wouldn’t be enough to start up a basic web application.

As the years progressed, the need for larger memory got stronger as more people opted to use computers. Now, we seldom think in kilobytes when picking out a personal computer. The norm for today’s computer storage is communicated in gigabytes and terabytes. That is significantly larger than the 1981 IBM computer, as one gigabyte is equivalent to one million kilobytes, and a terabyte is equivalent to one billion kilobytes. Nowadays, progress in digital storage is paving thepath to even larger storage capacities, such as pentabytes.

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Digital permanence is not only concerned with how large our capacity for digital storage has grown, but also how the mainstream forms of digital memory have changed. A form of digital memory most common to us is the hard drive—an internal part of our computers that we seldom see. Portable memory is also popular in the form of external drives, USB sticks, and SD cards. While portable memory is still popular, cloud memory is gaining more favourability due to how the memory is not located in a physical copy, such as on a USB stick. In technical terms, the cloud is a server that stores files. Cloud memory refers to a digital storage that is located on an intangible, non-physical server, which means you can access your storage anywhere, provided you are connected to the internet to access the cloud. Cloud storage is increasingly becoming a more convenient way for many “plugged-in” folks to store their data, popularized by software such as Google Drive and Dropbox.

The reliability of digital storage is borne out of the difficulty, and near impossibility, to delete something intangible. Therefore, people find comfort knowing that years worth of sentiments, memories, and work is secured on an intangible cloud serve that they can access anytime, anywhere, and can be assured it won’t be lost as it will remain in one place. Due to its security, most phones and computers nowadays automatically upload your stored information on to a cloud in addition to storing it on a physical drive. This gives people the peace of mind that there are multiple copies of their storage, reducing the possibility of them losing their information.

But what if there are things on your memory that you want to delete permanently? Information is not always innocuous or work-related— sometimes we store things deeply personal to us or information that might incriminate us in some way. This is just one repercussion of digital permanence. It is getting more difficult, as technology progresses, to permanently wipe out the existence of a piece of information scattered somewhere among our gigabytes of noise on the cloud.

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Sext-education In 2015, the Ontario sex-education curriculum was adjusted to teach teens about the proper use of technology, that is, to not use it for bullying. But one thing that caught the eye of many skeptical parents was the Ontario board’s decision to teach kids about sexting. Sexting is a term describing online intimate communication—in the form of texts, pictures, videos, and even audio recordings—to arouse and convey sexual interest. A focus of the curriculum is to emphasize how everything one puts online, which includes private messaging, stays online forever and cannot be deleted. The guide states that “Once a person sends a sext, they lose control over it.”

The curriculum change came later than needed, when teens everywhere have been sexting for almost a decade now with the advent of cellphones that can also take pictures. However, teaching kids how to sext still espouses controversy because older adults often blame the “kids these days” for being a different kind of rambunctious and irresponsible, different to that of when the adults were once kids. The onus is put on technology for “ruining” the youth, a viewpoint called technological determinism.

However, critics of the “kids these days” approach argue that teens have always been rebellious in their decision-making and risk-taking, but the only change in Generation Y (“millennials”) and onward generations is that they have an involuntary permanent record of their poor decisions and risks made in youth. This permanent record-keeping exaggerates the sexting problem because Generation Y and onward does not have the luxury to leave their mistakes in the past.After all, teens have always had sex. But technology is allowing the youth of today to convey sexual interest in other forms. However, this does not come without its potential consequences. It could come back to haunt them through embarrassment, or even be used against them for extortion and humiliation.

Revenge Porn In 2010, Hunter Moore launched an amateur pornography website titled IsAnyoneUp. This website catered to those who submit their own pornography, with the user sometimes being the subject of the pictures. However, this website became a huge hub for a more sinister action—revenge porn.

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Revenge pornography refers to any pictures, videos, and sometimes even texts of people that are distributed online without their consent. In many cases of revenge porn, the distributor is usually an ex-partner of the individual seeking revenge or vindication. Sometimes, revenge porn cases are also large-scale and involve high-profile individuals, such as the event aptly titled “The Fappening,” which was a massive iCloud leak of celebrity nude photos.

Victims, activists, and lawyers alike have been fighting in the recent years for legislation explicitly banning the non-consensual distribution of sexually explicit materials. According to Carrie Goldberg, a lawyer whose firm is the first of its kind for specializing in revenge porn and harassment cases, states that a victim could only request taking down their photos by arguing for copyright infringement, according to an article in The New Yorker.

However, this is not enough, as evidenced by the case of Chrissy Chambers, a popular YouTuber, whose ex-boyfriend recorded them having sex without her knowledge multiple times and spread the videos on various pornographic websites. Technically, since she didn’t record the videos, that somehow made it okay for the ex-partner to distribute the videos. This type of harassment, and frankly, a type of sexual abuse according to many victims, can have real-life material consequences, despite it being within the borders of a virtual, intangible world. In an interview with

The Guardian in 2018, Chrissy Chambers mentioned that upon the distribution of these videos, her subscriber count dropped and the comments on her videos referred to Chambers and her current partner with sexually explicit gendered slurs. This problem is exacerbated by the fact that a lot of Chrissy’s fanbase is comprised of teens—people under 18.

In order to improve the experiences of victims seeking justice and to avoid their lives hanging on a legislative semantic on copyrights, Carrie Goldberg and the Cyber Civil Rights Initiative advocates for a passage in U.S. law that explicitly caters to non-consensual porn laws.

Not only would such a pass make the court process easier for the victims, it would also open the door for the centuries-old law system to finally be updated according to the needs of an era where nothing can be permanently deleted.

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The Future and the Right to Forget The growth of the technological world means the growth of the amount of persona data being gleaned from our presence online, whether we consent to it or not. Many of the terms and conditions we avoid reading when signing up on a website contain provisions that make us consent to giving up our privacy once we click the “I Agree” button. As the collection of our personal data is predicted to grow with no signs of stopping, the market economy is figuring out ways to meet the increasing demand of services that offer to control your image and reputation online.

In 2006, legislation passed in the European Union that would allow individuals to request taking down any data to be deleted so third parties cannot trace them, which is informally known as the right to be forgotten. Following this legislation, Google and other major search engines released online forms and guides on how to request Google to take down data, provided it is within a European legal context. However, the same companies who collect our personal data, such as Google, are also offering a solution to erase traces of text or posts that you don’t want connected to your name. This contradictory solution reveals more questions and gray areas than there are answered.

Questions arise is legal jurisdiction in regard to where the search engine company is located, where their server is located, where their parent company is located, and exactly which division bears the responsibility for these images to be deleted.

It is likely that many countries would follow Europe’s actions by giving individuals the autonomy to control their presence and data online. This combines both the government’s legislative control and the market economy’s tendency to find solutions in private sector, and thus, would be the most likely option for most of the capitalist economic nations of this planet.

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However, this is merely a band-aid solution to the problem that has existed long before technology—the problem of shame and victim-blaming. Carrie Goldberg stated in her interview with The New Yorker that “Even if you did take a naked picture and send it to somebody, that’s not necessarily reckless behavior. That’s time-honored behavior! G.I.s going off to war used to have pics of their wife or girlfriend in a pinup pose. It’s often part of intimate communication. It can be used as a weapon, but, the fact is, almost anything can be used as a weapon.” This reveals that when a victim gets shamed for having their personal images non-consensually distributed online, they are often blamed for somehow angering their ex-partner or told that if they didn’t simply take the photos or engage in the act, this wouldn’t have happened.

Victim-blaming has existed worldwide even before the circulation of revenge porn.

Victim-blaming in cases of rape and sexual assault still exists, as evidenced by opposing reactions to recent #MeToo movement.

One can argue that revenge porn wouldn’t be such a significant issue if our society didn’t place so much value in tying a person’s moral character to their sexuality. After all, the reason why many victims choose to go to court in revenge porn cases is because such abuse can have detrimental causes in the material world, such as employment prospects and humiliation.

The cohorts preceding Generation Y enjoyed a time where destroying a physical photograph or film negative was enough to erase it completely. Now, it is an oft-forgotten luxury that the preceding cohorts forget when they criticize “the sexting generation.” The challenges faced by today’s youth, when their every good and bad move is permanently recorded, is to be met with a similar solution that could possibly permanently eliminate the stress of having something you once did in high school hanging over your head, forever.

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ONLINE DATING KASSANDRA HANGDAAN 40 M E D I U M M A G A Z I N E

By now, the fact that social media has changed the

notoriety for superficiality. As more and more people

way we interact in our relationships—by adding a

have hopped on the online dating bandwagon, it’s

disembodied online dimension—is nothing new. What

arguable that the wall of stigma surrounding these

is, however, is the use of social media not only in

apps is slowly crumbling. As the stigma dissipates,

facilitating already established relationships, but also

the influence of these online dating apps grows. Its

creating relationships in the first place.

effects on our day-to- day lives are evident.

Take the dating scene, for instance. I’ve been aware of the popularity surge involving the online dating scene since adolescence. As a high school student, I remember cursorily watching commercials on TV advertising sites like eHarmony. At the time, I thought it was an unnatural, and hence, a weird way of meeting potential significant others. My initial opinion of the online dating world reflected the collective sentiment at the time. Generally, the consensus around meeting someone online was unfavourable.

By the time I entered university in 2014, the stigma was pretty much the same. In an introduction to history class that I took, a classmate leaned over and whispered, “Don’t tell anyone, but I’m on Tinder.”

The way she lowered her voice, and the glances she cast over her shoulder as if she were afraid of being overheard, suggested to me that Tinder, and online dating, was still something to be wary of.

Christopher Halim, a University of Toronto Mississauga management student whograduated in 2016, thinks that apps like Tinder have revolutionized the way people approachdating.“I think Tinder and a lot of social media have made people much more selective in choosing our partners,” Halim said, “before social media and dating apps, we weren't exposed to this many potential partners before. With social media, you can sift through a hundred people in a day if you wanted to. This leads to us being more selective in choosing who we want to meet up with.”

At the time of the interview, Halim held a full-time job at Bell. Given the demanding hours of working life, I was surprised to note that for some, Tinder has actually produced meaningful relationships and made it easier to even start relationships in the first place.

“Working full time makes it difficult to meet people outside of your workplace and online apps have

But Tinder was novel in its conception and unique

definitely introduced me to people I would never have

from dating websites compared to eHarmony, which

met,” Halim continued,“I think Tinder is a good way

required users to set up laborious profiles that char-

to meet people. As long as both parties are commu-

acterized an era before it. First of all, it was simpler:

nicative and express what they are looking for in the

simply swipe to the right if you’re piqued by the pro-

beginning, it’s just like meeting a stranger in real life

file presented to you. If the other party also swiped

with less pressure of saying hi or exchanging num-

to the right on your profile, then the opportunity for

bers. My experience withdating apps have been mixed

a conversation opens up between both parties. Due

but I would say that’s also for meeting people in real

to its heavy reliance on a user’s profile pictures to

life. Some people you don’t click with, regardless if

attract potential matches, it’s no wonder—and, in my

you meet them in personfirst or through a dating app.”

opinion, quite deserving—that the app has garnered

MGEA DZI U I NME M A G A Z I N E 42 M E D I U M42M A

Interestingly enough, Halim noticed something that

ter or on Tumblr. It’s like sending a friend request on

has become a typical complaint about our gener-

Facebook,” Estigoy explained. “You can respond to

ation’s infatuation with the online world—that is,

someone else’s tweet or leave a message on some-

the convenience of online dating has come at the

one else’s Tumblr blog. For the most part, no one will

expense of the quality in our real world social in-

think it’s bothersome, because we all enjoy talking

teractions. We’ve become so accustomed to online

about the things we love.”

engagement and interaction that our social skills employed in real-time settings are failing. In a HuffPost

Estigoy’s first time meeting a friend online was during

article, author Katherine Bindley drew from research-

TIFF 2014. “One of the members of my favourite

ers whoseworks predicted the extinction of small talk.

band got casted for his very first acting role. We [the

Though some of us who are averse to small talk may

fandom], along with several other fans, wanted to

rejoice at the thought of this, I think to be devoid of

witness his performance in front of a bigscreen,” she

interactions taking place through small talkis a great

continued, “We even befriended a fan who flew all the

loss. There is some underlying, humanistic value that

way from South Korea. When the movie was over, we

takes place through small talk—and to lose it com-

all got together to grab some dinner.”

pletely, because these online apps encourage conversations through texting, is to forfeit this value.

Estigoy further noted the benefits of fandoms: Not only is it an easy way to meet people, but the people

“While I believe meeting people online opens us up to

you meet already share a commonality that binds a

a much wider pool of friendships and potential part-

friendship together. Even though there may still be a

ners, we have to be careful of being so selective we

stigma around meeting friends online, Estigoy down-

end up rejecting everyoneand not practice our social

plays it.

skills in real life and rely on texting,” Halim stated Besides dating, another interviewee, Jene Estigoy—a fourth-year political science specialist—explained the dynamics of meeting friends off the web. Estigoy joins platforms that align with her interests. She’s currently

“Personally, my online friends have become trustworthy people I can rely on. It’s been years since our love for the same band brought us together, and I’m still friends with those people. I talk to them on Twitter everyday.”

into Korean pop music and has joined fandoms—on-

As our dependence on, and interaction with, the on-

line communities—that center around her favourite

line world increases, it would be unsurprising to me if

boybands.

all relationships of the future were tinged with some sort of online aspect. Whether that be through a

“It’s really easy to build relationships when you’re

dating app, online fandom, video games, the ways in

in the same fandom, because you like the same

which weinteract with one another also has the ability

band, the same songs, the same members. Usually,

to bring us together.

it starts off with a simple follow—whether on Twit-

43

PARTING NOTE Well, that’s it. You’ve reached the end of the magazine then, congratulations!

If you’ve skimmed through the magazine, then alright, good for you, I hope you liked the layout.

If you’ve read an article at least, then also good for you and I hope you liked it. If you’ve read a headline, and didn’t read the content, then that’s fine, hopefully you liked the headline. But, if you’ve read a headline and assumed the content, then let me pause for a minute.

Journalists tend to, of course, have catchy and informative—to some extent at least—headlines.

However, headlines don’t tell you the story. They are never enough for you to understand what the article or story really contains. Generally speaking, aside from the articles in this magazine, as a journalist myself, here is some sincere advice: Don’t assume details of an article based on the headlines alone. From personal experience, whenever I wrote controversial topics, such as on dictatorships in the Middle East (where I’m originally from) or any other sensitive topic, I’d get random comments bashing and slandering me. But what’s funny is that those comments address points that are not even in my piece. They’d automatically assume, because of my controversial headline, that I belonged to a certain party with a certain stance. They’d also automatically assume my article was opposing one particular stance, when really, if they actually read it, gave it a chance, they’d find that I wasn’t siding with any.

Similar situations have happened at The Medium. In my experience, we received numerous comments over different articles that assume what we’re reporting on without giving the article a chance. Maybe you’ll think it’s the fault of a headline, when it’s most likely the keywords in a M E D I U M M AG A Z I N E 44 44 M E D I U M M A G A Z I N E

headline that made you decide your stance on the article itself, without properly reading it first.

It’s a defensive mechanism that you release, without necessarily noticing, when you see a word that might not side with your views on a certain someone or issue. This can be called “selective exposure,” when you select what’s a pro-attitudinal message,while avoiding what’s counter-attitudinal. One of the famous effects taught in some media and politics courses is the “hostile media effect,” which is how when people with a pre-set stance on an issue read news that doesn’t support their stance, they view it as hostile to their side, and think it’s biased.

Nonetheless, my questions are: Is this really what you want? Is this how you want to understand something? Are you checking different sides, deciding for yourself what to believe exactly? Does this tendency to check the articles that side with you, give you enough right to blame the media and call them wrong for simply reporting on things you don’t believe in? These are all questions that I personally think are crucial. It’s easier to read what you agree on, but this doesn’t mean you’ll stay informed. Even if media organizations do have an agenda and particularly lean towards covering certain issues over others, it doesn’t mean their articles are biased. By the rules of journalism, journalists are obligated to present all perspectives in their articles. Judging a newspaper by its topic coverage, naming it sided and biased only because you don’t approve of their coverage, doesn’t make it fair. You don’t like it? Then you have a right not to read it. However, you don’t have a right in calling it biased or fake, because both are much bigger terms that what they seem.

I’m sure that my colleague Alicia Boatto expanded well on this topic in her article a few pages back.

What I’m saying is, give a chance to inform yourself of a situation before rushing to judge it from its headline. It isn’t a joke when they say “Don’t judge a book by its cover,” just like you shouldn’t judge a story by its cover—or by its headline, for that matter. And always ask yourself, do you want to be informed more or to judge more? Because nothing would be easier than judging. Whereas, if you’re looking to be informed, you’re going to have to take your time, read through different organizations, and understand it all first, before you makeyou make up your mind and feelings towards it.

As the managing editor of The Medium this year, it has been an absolute pleasure to work with a team of wonderful, dedicated, and passionate writers who worked hard to bring this magazine to light. When we were in the early stages of whether or not to launch this magazine, we had some doubts on how it will all turn out, but we thought more about the importance of the topics it will discuss and that’s where we drew our motivation from. You may have noticed that all articles, in spite of their differences, share one thing, which is social media. Social media has not only just changes us, it was a revolution in itself. With its influence growing each day, our team felt the need to compile articles that each revolves around different aspects affected by social media, whether that’s news, social relationships, dating apps, stigmas, sports. Personally, I was able to relate to the articles in a way that resonated with me. I found something in each of them to touched me, made me think, or made me agree with.

If you’ve reached this far in my article, I’m very glad. But I’ll stop here anyway, enough with the part about the importance of reading beyond just the headline. Now, please bear with me just a bit more, as I get back to the magazine topic for my final remarks. As the managing editor of The Medium this year, it has been an absolute pleasure to work with a team of wonderful, dedicated, and passionate writers who worked hard to bring this magazine to light. When we were in the early stages of whether or not to launch this magazine, we had some doubts on how it will all turn out, but the amount of work I’ve witnessed the writers put in this magazine was great. The days, weeks, and months it took to agree on topics, then write, then edit, and edit, and edit some more, were all incredible and memories to be made. I’d like to thank all the writers, editors, and the photographer and graphic designer involved here for their work and for coming together to bring this magazine back after over two years. I personally was very excited to read the topics each writer and editor came up with, all within the context of being informed and how we shape ourselves with that information. Social media has been a revolution in itself and has changed our lives in every aspect.The amount of work I’ve witnessed the writers put in this magazine was great. The days, weeks, and months it took to agree on topics, then write, then edit, and edit, and edit some more were all incredible and memories to be made. That being said, if you’ve picked up this magazine and read the pieces, I sincerely hope you came out of it with some positivity, whether by relating to a topic, laughing, by being informed, or being challenged to try something new.

46 M E D I U M M A G A Z I N E

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Burkeman, Oliver. (2015, January 30). Why we tell strangers our secrets. Retrieved from https:// www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/jan/30/ oliver-burkeman-confiding-in-strangers.

Chief Cutting Ham. (2016, August 25). Shit Posting. Retrieved from https://www.urbandictionary. com/define.php?term=Shit+Posting.

F., P. (2017, November 28). Personal Interview.

Katz, Y. & Shifman, L. (2017). Making sense?

The structure and meanings of digital memetic nonsense. Information, Communication & Society. 20(6), 825-842. Doi: 10.1080/1369118X.2017.1291702.

Hill, B. (2017, November 15). Email Interview.

Moshy. (2017, November 22). Facebook Messenger Interview.

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48 M E D I U M M A G A Z I N E

Credits Editor Mahmoud Sarouji Creative Director Mirabelle Eze Photography Olivia Adamczyk Contributing Editors Mahmoud Sarouji Menna Elnaka Kassandra Hangdaan Mahnoor Ayub Alicia Boatto Vanessa Cesario Ayesha Tak Printing by Masterweb Inc Directors Mahmoud Sarouji Nour Abu-Ali Oscar Adamczyk Melanie Asselin Ayesha Hassan Srishti Prashar Colin McFarlane Farah Qaiser