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Volume 35, Issue 19
www.mediumonline.ca
New Democrats at UTM GURPINDER SINGH GAHEER WITH NOTES FROM ANDREW HAMILTON SMITH Howard Hampton has initiated a leadership race in the provincial New Democratic Party (NDP) by announcing that he will step down from the position he has held since 1996 when he took over from former Premier Bob Rae. As a result, candidates for the soon-to-be-empty leadership chair of the Ontario New Democrats – Peter Tabuns, Michael Prue, Andrea Horwath, and Gilles Bisson – have been touring the province trying to build support. As part of that campaign, a leadership debate was held at UTM on February 5 in the Kaneff Centre. Organized by the UTM NDP club, three out of four candidates presented their viewpoints on some of the key issues confronting our society today. Tabuns, Horwath, and late-comer Bisson each offered their perspective of where the problems lie and how – should they win the leadership – they would tackle those problems. UTM NDP executive member Steven Zhou, who is the group’s event coordinator, was pleased with the turnout of thirty students and staff, and added that after hearing all the different points of view he is having a hard time deciding who he is going to support. When asked to address Ontario’s current economic crisis and how they would create jobs in the future, Tabuns laid out an all-in-one package which he
Photo/Matthew Filipowich
Three out of four Ontario NDP leadership candidates attended the UTM NDP debate on Thursday, which was moder ated by Sociology professor Dr. Barry Green. Approximately thirty students turned out to hear the candidates’ posi tions on tuition fees, job creation,the York University strike and faith based schools. referred to as the Green Energy Economy. “We’re not dealing with easy times in Ontario today,” Tabuns acknowledged, before adding that creating new employment or manufacturing opportunities that also reduce carbon emissions is a big part of the solution. On the other hand, Tabuns notes that
there isn’t an economic strategy in place at the moment. “Currently over $40 billion is spent on energy in Ontario each year, and to create more jobs here in Ontario, we need to spend some of that money here,” said Tabuns. Andrea Horwath went further and predicted a ”painful recession.” She maintained that, “Although big things
like energy manufacturing are good, we also can’t be losing our good old jobs. Since one out of seven jobs in Ontario depends on auto manufacturing, if we don’t have an auto sector, we don’t have an economy anymore.” She referred to her plan as a Legacy Investment in Public Transportation, noting the long list of communities that
are clamouring for light rail, for example. Many manufacturers in Sudbury want their goods transported by train instead of truck, citing growing fuel costs and environmental concerns. Horwath also anticipated that more public transit will also get people out of cars, and thereby reduce green house gas emissions. The next question was about the York University strike and the back-towork legislation introduced by Dalton McGuinty’s Liberal government last week, and all three candidates noted that they did – and would again, if given the chance – block the legislation from quickly passing. Rather than apologizing for delaying the return of 50,000 students, the candidates turned instead to principle, with Tabuns noting that it was the Liberal government that abandoned the students and chose to side with York, which interferes with the “good faith” aspect of the collective bargaining process. “The only thing workers have is the ability to withdraw their labour,” added Horwath. “Graduate students and TA’s are educational workers, so why shouldn’t they get a decent pay?” Horwath also pointed out that the university had no incentive to bargain with the union (CUPE 3902) because they had already struck a deal with the government to end the strike and therefore could reject whatever CUPE offered.
See Leadership page 3
IAW: Islam in an Age of Reason ANDREW HAMILTON SMITH NEWS EDITOR
In a broad attempt to reach out to UTM students, the Muslim Students Association (MSA) explored the idea of faith and God within a secular and scientific society, holding events for three days all around campus last week. Beginning on February 3, the theme of “Islam in an Age of Reason” featured prominently in Islam Awareness Week (IAW), particularly in the choice of topics for each evening’s lecture: Why God? Why faith? Why
Islam? The Student Centre was transformed into a celebration of Islamic culture and religion, with volunteers handing out thousands of flyers and hundreds of Korans. “Each year, the MSA selects a theme for IAW that is appropriate both to the context of our campus and what we predict to be the interest of our students,” explained MSA president Mohammed Ashour. “We have found that a growing number of students and academicians tend to frown upon the concept of organized religion, believing that religions are either deluding or outright maladaptive – our objective was to address this misconstrued judgment.” This is not an attempt to rationalize religion, Ashour insists, because religion is already rational in itself. Ashour praised his volunteers and coordinators for working towards
making IAW a success, as well as the speakers, Dr. Munir El-Kassem, Imam Shabir Ally, and Dr. Katherine Bullock. “There were many healthy debates with numerous students during the events, as well as during and after the evening lectures that were held on all three days,” Ashour added. “Our goal was to educate the general student population about the complementary nature of religion in general, and Islam in particular with science and reason, and we do feel that we’ve accomplished that.” When asked why he was volunteering for IAW, Ridwan Wadhera, a fourth-year English specialist, said he was offering his time because he believes in Islam and in Islam Awareness Week. See Awareness page 2
Photo/Matthew Filipowich
Imam Shabir Ally discusses the fallacies of Richard Dawkins’ book, The God Delusion, arguing that faith can be a rational way to live one’s life.