McGill Tribune Vol. 34 Issue 13

CURIOSITY DELIVERS

Turning points

Table of Contents NEWS / SSMU & PGSS MIDterm Reviews SSMU Council debates Ad-Hoc Student Engagement Committee, Redpath Library doors McGill to review expenditures in light of budget cuts SEDE hosts workshop on gender identity and sexual orientation SSMU President, Speaker of Council respond to Fall GA J-Board case, deny charges McGill’s discourse on equity expanded through examining social, academic contexts Sexual assault case sparks change in consent awareness on campus

THE Mcgill

6-7 3 3 4 4 5 8

OPINION / EDITORIAL: Sexual harrassment, assault cases

continue to demand action 9 The economic and personal degradation of tipping culture 9 Stephen Harper plays political masterstroke with snub of Putin 10 Supply management milks consumers 10

STUDENT LIVING / The McGill space race

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Editor-in-Chief Jenny Shen editor@mcgilltribune.com Managing Editors Mayaz Alam malam@mcgilltribune.com Jessica Fu jfu@mcgilltribune.com Remi Lu rlu@mcgilltribune.com Production Manager Sam Pinto spinto@mcgilltribune.com Creative Director Hayley Lim hlim@mcgilltribune.com News Editors Shrinkhala Dawadi and Cece Zhang news@mcgilltribune.com Opinion Editor Abraham Moussako opinion@mcgilltribune.com Science & Technology Editor Chloe Nevitt scitech@mcgilltribune.com Student Living Editor Natalie Wong studentliving@mcgilltribune.com Features Editor Caity Hui features@mcgilltribune.com

Developing a taste for student-run food services on campus 12-13 ‘Tis the season to be jolly 14 Campus Spotlight: CASCO 14 Recipes 15

Arts & Entertainment Editors Max Berger and Morgan Alexander arts@mcgilltribune.com

FEATURES / off the blackboard 16-17

Design Editors Domitille Biehlmann and Cassie Lee design@mcgilltribune.com

SCITECH / sustainability, science, and society

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The rise of Hacktivism 23 Welcome to the wizard room 24 This month in student research 25 From the brainstem: Net neutrality 25

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT / New music building

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How Exile Melts Look Back in Anger Pop Rhetoric: Got blues?

The conclusion of Korra Album Reviews & Deep Cuts

18 18 19 20 21

SPORTS / behind the bench: personal transitions in sports

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Cloutier sinks Concordia with career performance 28 McGill keeps calm to blow out Stingers 28 From the cheap seats

29 Holiday wish list 29 Redmen top Rams, Varsity Blues in weekend sweep 31 10 Things: Turning points in Montreal sports

31 The week that was for McGill Athletics

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The McGill Tribune would like to thank all readers and contributors from this semester! Find us back on stands Tuesday, January 13, 2015.

Sports Editors Elie Waitzer and Wyatt Fine-Gagné sports@mcgilltribune.com

Photo Editors Jack Neal and L-A Benoit photo@mcgilltribune.com Copy Editor Adrien Hu copy@mcgilltribune.com Advertising Executives Eliott Demelier, Daniel Kang, and Mingye Chen ads@mcgilltribune.com Publisher Chad Ronalds

TPS Board of Directors

Yael Chapman, Jacqui Galbraith, Adrien Hu, Alycia Noe, Sam Pinto, Jenny Shen, Maryse Thomas, Nicolas Tuech

Staff Writers & Illustrators Cordelia Cho, Philippe Dumais, Keah Hansen, Max Joseph, Evelyn Kaczmarek, Aislinn Kalob, Tiffany Le, Chris Lutes, Claire Lyle, Hailey MacKinnon, Eleanor Milman, Alycia Noë, Laura Plamondon, Aaron Rose, Elli Slavitch, Zikomo Smith, Julie Vanderperre, Lauren Wildgoose

Contributors Justin Hatherly, Sarah Ibrahim, Nick Jasinski, Natalie Jennings, Albert Park, Kia Poulliot, Martin Molpeceres, Joshua Shapiro, Nicole Spadotto, Noah Sutton, Jack Tokarz

Tribune Office Shatner University Centre Suite 110, 3480 McTavish Montreal, QC H3A 0E7 T: 514.398.6789 The McGill Tribune is an editorially autonomous newspaper published by the Société de Publication de la Tribune, a student society of McGill University. The content of this publication is the sole responsibility of The McGill Tribune and the Société de Publication de la Tribune, and does not necessarily represent the views of McGill University. Letters to the editor may be sent to editor@mcgilltribune. com and must include the contributor’s name, program and year and contact information. Letters should be kept under 300 words and submitted only to the Tribune. Submissions judged by the Tribune Publication Society to be libellous, sexist, racist, homophobic or solely promotional in nature will not be published. The Tribune reserves the right to edit all contributions. Editorials are decided upon and written by the editorial board. All other opinions are strictly those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the McGill Tribune, its editors or its staff. Please recycle this newspaper.

Councillors approved the creation of an Ad-Hoc Student Engagement Committee. (L-A Benoit / McGill Tribune)

SSMU Council debates Ad-Hoc Student Engagement Committee, Redpath Library doors Council hears report from funding committee, Deputy Provost talks affordable food on campus Sarah ibrahim Contributor

Motion regarding the creation of an Ad-Hoc Student Engagement Committee

Last Thursday, the Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) Legislative Council passed a motion regarding the creation of an Ad-hoc student engagement committee.

Sponsored by Arts Councillor Alexander Kpeglo-Hennessy, SSMU President Courtney Ayukawa, and Arts Councillor Lola Baraldi, the motion aimed to find innovative ways for SSMU to engage constituents. “[I] believe that there is a continuous need […] for councillors and executives to look for new ways to [promote] student engagement, [and] at the moment, we do not have a mandate to do so,” Kpeglo-Hennessy explained. “I think that starting an adhoc committee would be [necessary] to start and to potentially institutionalize this for the future.”

Although most of the councillors supported the motion, Science Councillor Omar El-Sharawy expressed opposition to the creation of this committee. He explained that while he values reaching out to students, he feels that students need to make more of an effort as well.

“I have six hours of office hours per week [and] not a single member has come in […] to learn about SSMU,” El-Sharawy said.

Councillor Baraldi however, maintained that the lack of traffic during office hours was precisely the reason why this committee must be formed.

Motion regarding the closing of the Redpath Library doors

Council also approved a motion regarding the reopening of the Redpath Library doors, which currently serve only as emergency exits. VP External Affairs Amina MoustaqimBarrette explained that there is cur-

rently a student-run online campaign to reopen them. “[This issue] is something that a lot of students care about; they want those Redpath doors reopened,” Moustaqim-Barrette said. “It’s something that we can help with and publicize.”

In response to concerns that SSMU would be forced to pay for security in order to reopen the Redpath Library doors, VP University Affairs Claire Stewart-Kanigan clarified that the motion would simply mandate her to begin discussions with the McLennan-Redpath library administration and explore what options exist with regards to the reopening of the doors.

“Any decisions [regarding] the use of the Library Improvement Fund, which is where this would come out of if SSMU ever decided to pay for the additional security expenses, would be made by the Library Improvement Fund Committee,” Stewart-Kanigan said. “The motion as it stands right now is [for me to]

prioritize this in my own negotiations with the library. I don’t want SSMU to be paying for this either, so that’s not on the table right now.”

Affordable food on campus

Deputy Provost (Student Life and Living) Ollivier Dyens also spoke with Council about the recent changes to the food options on campus. Arts and Science Senator Chloe Rourke explained that a lot of students’ frustration with the current food options is centred on the replacement of Tim Hortons and Pizza Pizza with Premiére Moisson in the basement of the Redpath library.

In response, Dyens emphasized that the university made its decision to bring in Premiére Moisson based on the criteria of local and healthy foods.

“Over the past few years, we have made a commitment to better quality food and more sustainable [food],” Dyens explained. “Better quality food will cost more […but] our [primary] concern here is the

health of our student body.”

Dyens also explained that Tim Hortons is a large corporation that does not have any fair trade commitments, and that this goes against the values of the university.

When asked about the limitations placed upon student-run food services, Dyens explained that this was for two main reasons.

“Even if [food service] is run by students [and] food poisoning comes in, the university will the one that is going to be sued,” he said. “The second reason is that we have a contract, and these contracts are necessary.

Food and other businesses are also a way for us to generate funds that are directly being invested in the university. These funds allow us to compensate for the budget cuts.”

McGill to review expenditures in light of budget cuts

Senators engage in first of many discussions on out-of-classroom learning aislinn kalob Staff Writer

Senate addresses budget cuts

McGill Principal Suzanne Fortier addressed various concerns regarding the impact of provincial budget cuts on the university’s budget and services at last Wednesday’s Senate meeting. The Quebec government announced in the middle of November that $4.8 million would be cut from McGill’s budget, in addition to the original $15 million cut announced at the end of this summer.

“Obviously it is very hard for us to absorb these cuts, particularly as we’re more than halfway through our financial year,” Fortier said. “The government is also projecting cuts for next year. This is all in trying to achieve a balanced budget in two years from now.”

The Students’ Society of McGill University’s (SSMU) VP University Affairs Claire Stewart-Kanigan and Arts Senator Jacob Greenspon raised a question asking which particular services would be cut or reduced, which was answered by Provost Anthony C. Masi in an official Senate document.

“Austerity is not a strategy for the longer term, but at the present time McGill will have to adopt certain efficiency measures,” Masi wrote.

“While we are exploring our options, the University has not targeted specific student services for elimination as a way of reducing costs. However, some services may have to be offered at a reduced level and all services will have to be studied.”

Masi, whose office is responsible for budget issues, was not present at the meeting to further answer any

of the Senators’ questions during the open discussion period. Fortier answered supplemental questions in his absence.

“There will be consultation with the students on any of the services currently offered that might be affected by the cuts,” Fortier said. “As far as I know, there is no plan to eliminate services. The level of service may be affected, but we’re not yet at this level of detail in our analysis of the impact of these cuts.”

Fortier did not say when these student consultations might take place.

Open discussion on learning outside the classroom

The Senate held a discussion on undergraduate research opportunities as the first of many upcoming ses-

sions on learning opportunities outside of the classroom. The main concern in this discussion was whether or not research should be credited, paid, or given other recognition.

One key issue in the discussion concerned how students can use their undergraduate research to further their goals, whether for graduate school, a career, in a competitive market. “[Students] want credentials to reflect their activities,” Dean of Students André Costopoulos said. “I think in that case, then they are responding to a real-world pressure.”

SSMU President Courtney Ayukawa said she supported undergraduate research to be both credited and paid to increase financial equity.

“I do not want any [...] students [...] to not be able to do research opportunities they may be incredibly

passionate about­—with some of the best professors and researchers in the world—because they cannot afford to,” Ayukawa said.

Not all senators shared Ayukawa’s sentiment that a university should be supporting outside endeavours such as research or internships.

“I think it’s important to realize that maybe not everything, not all learning should be credited by the university,” Faculty of Arts Senator Professor Catherine Lu said. “You get a specific kind of education by coming to a university, and that’s supposed to help give you certain foundational resources for working or doing research outside the university.”

Wednesday, November 26, 2014

SEDE hosts workshop on gender identity and sexual orientation

Seeks to educate attendees on marginalization of LGBTQ, gender non-conforming individuals

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lauren wildgoose Staff Writer

ast Wednesday, the McGill Social Equity and Diversity Education Office (SEDE) organized a Safer Spaces workshop on gender identity and sexual orientation.

The interactive event offered an introduction for participants graduate students, faculty, and staff members to address issues of marginalization in sexual diversity.

The facilitators, Sarah Malik and Tynan Jarrett, both of whom work as Equity Educational Advisors at the SEDE Office, aimed to create a safe space to openly discuss challenging issues.

“Some of the most important things [for people to get out of the workshop] are to be able to distinguish between sexual orientation and gender identity, to understand some of the experiences of gender variant folks and the diversity of sexual orientations […] and how those things become relevant to life at McGill,” Malik said.

The workshop began with a lesson in sex and gender terminology. The discussion investigated the nuances of terms that are often variously interpreted and identified with, such as

“queer” and “passing.” It was followed by an introduction to the frameworks and basics of sex and gender, which explored their definitions and addressed common misconceptions surrounding gender roles, gender identity, and the link between sex and gender.

“We’ve done a lot of work to make the concepts and the terminology [...] relevant and accessible to people from across the university,” Malik said, noting that the workshop has consistently been attended by students and staff from a wide range of departments and faculties.

Attendee Jessica Galinas, a student affairs coordinator at McGill, noted the importance of discussing basic frameworks of gender and sex in communities where members may have different levels of comfort and understanding.

“If you work in a faculty where there’s a big discrepancy in age of the staff, these things may not be discussed or brought up at all,” Galinas said.

Participants then worked in small groups to tackle hypothetical scenarios concerning gender and sex, discussing what action they might take if, for instance, they encountered someone whose gender presentation they were unsure of

entering the women’s public washroom.

Attendee Cora Lee Conway, a residence life manager at McGill, explained the importance of being well-versed in issues of gender identity and sexual orientation to her role in residence and in the McGill community in general.

“I think it’s always really great to refresh, reflect, and check yourself on the things you don’t know and need to know,” Conway said.

“One of the biggest challenges here, I think, is a very human inclination to try and understand everything [….] I think its really important to remember that you’re not going to understand everything, and you don’t have to [...] but you have to allow people to identify and express themselves in the ways they feel most comfortable and the most safe doing.”

The facilitators also aimed to educate participants about the marginalization of LGBTQ and

SSMU President, Speaker of Council respond to Fall GA J-Board case, deny charges

Conventional practices cited as reason against adopting special standing

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Cece zhang News Editor

n Nov. 16, Courtney Ayukawa, president of the Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) and Rachel Simmons, speaker of the legislative council of SSMU, released an official response to a recent Judicial Board (J-Board) petition filed by Zain Ali Syed and Nadir Khan over the practices of the Speaker at the SSMU General Assembly (GA) held on Oct. 22. The response asks the J-Board to dismiss the case.

The petition accused the Speaker of Council of stifling discussion of the Motion Calling on SSMU to Stand in Solidarity with the People of the Occupied Palestinian Territories at the Fall GA by allowing an indefinite postponement to go through.

“By allowing delegates at the General Assembly to take this action, fundamental bylaws and fundamental principles were violated,” the petition filed by Syed and Khan reads. “The violations represent an attack on democracy on campus and this is certainly a weighty issue that must be dealt with by the Judicial Board.”

The respondents denied that such violations occurred in their declaration, stating that the debate in the GA had been triggered when the Speaker of Council asked whether there were any points or motions on the floor.

“According to Robert’s Rules: ‘After the question has been stated by the chair, the motion becomes the property of the assembly,’” the respondents declaration read: “Once debate has been opened, the chair must recognize points and motions on the floor. In conclusion, the claim that Article 5.4 was violated is false.”

The petitioners accused SSMU Council of a failure to adopt special standing rules for the Fall GA, as stated by bylaw 5.2 of bylaw Book I-5.

“Standing rules for the General Assembly which make Robert’s Rules easier for students to understand pro-

News

cedure must be adopted by Council at least one week in advance of the General Assembly,” reads bylaw 5.2.

Ayukawa, representing the SSMU Council as a respondent of the case, denied this claim, saying that the institutional convention of SSMU treated the bylaw as a deadline rather than a requirement, and was therefore not mandatory.

“Convention over the past three years has favoured the ‘deadline’ interpretation of by­law 5.2,” the response read. “Special standing rules were only adopted once during this period, and the reasoning [...] was not given by the movers when adopted in 2012.”

The declaration further stated that the bylaw was likely adopted in order to encourage participation of students at the SSMU GA. As the past Fall GA received widespread attention and students were already motivated to attend, the Speaker of Council and SSMU Council were not required to establish special standing rules.

Ayukawa also asserted that the Speaker of Council usually has the final jurisdiction on how the bylaws were interpreted.

“The bylaws are written, in my opinion, in a pretty vague way, and they allow for interpretation,” she said.

“The way they’ve been interpreted, by conventional ways by myself and the speaker, [is] that [the clause to adopt special standing rules] is a deadline.”

The petitioners have refused a mediation, according to Ayukawa. The next step in the J-Board procedure is to move into a preliminary conference between the parties to the dispute and the J-Board, the date of which has not been determined yet. A date for the hearing will be decided in the meeting.

The petitioners Syed and Khan were not able to be reached for comment at the time of publication.

Wednesday, November 26, 2014

gender non-conforming people and encouraged them to seek out knowledge on how to respond to it. “[It is important] to be equipped with knowledge and strategies to be able to intervene and name transphobia, homophobia, and different forms of marginalization that occur, and be able to respond to them effectively,” Malik said. “All those sorts of things that can help us understand experiences that are different from our own and understand how marginalization occurs, what it looks like, and how it happens in order to be able to recognize it and work against it.”

McGill’s discourse on equity expanded through examining social, academic contexts Students, faculty discuss importance of intersectional perspectives, diverse role models SHRINKHALA DAWADI News Editor

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his past semester has seen a host of initiatives on topics involving equity, such as Mental Health awareness Week, the #ConsentMcGill campaign, and Community Engagement Day. Campus organizations, such as McGill’s Social Equity and Diversity Education office (SEDE) have also been hosting regular workshops on a range of topics on issues from sexual harassment on campus to race and cultural identities.

According to Simrin Desai, U4 Chemical Engineering and Equity Commissioner for the Engineering Undergraduate Society (EUS), conversation about equity on campus has largely been shaped by controversial events on campus. Desai cites the 2011 sexual assault case involving three members of the Redmen football team, a case which has since been dropped by the prosecutors, and an email sent last semester by then Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) VP Internal, Brian Farnan, which apologised for a microagression in a pervious email he had sent.

“In the end, it’s great that conversations started—and are still being continued—on topics raised by such events,” Desai said. “[But] it’d be great to reach a point where more conversations are being ignited on equity, without having to be initially sparked by an event that makes someone feel unsafe or uncomfortable.”

In addition to highlighting the importance of having long-term conversations about equity, Desai also stressed the need to frame these dialogues through intersectional perspectives. Desai explained that the various aspects of people’s

identities—their race, gender, class, sexual orientation, ability, and so on—can result in experiencing oppression based on these identities alone, as well as additional forms of oppression based on the intersection of two or more of their identities. Desai highlighted her own experiences with her intersectional identity.

“I identify as an ethnically Indian female, and I feel I’ve experienced both gender-based oppression being in a STEMbased program, and also racial and ethnicity-based oppression being a visible minority

spectives in both academic and applied engineering.

“I do feel that by not having women playing an equal role [...] the field as a whole does not benefit from having the other gender’s point of view.” Arbel said. “I think male students will [also] benefit from having a female professor in that they would hear a very different set of viewpoints on how to address an engineering problem, or design.”

Although Arbel said that she was supported by her supervisor and colleagues during her graduate studies, she also

example,] having equity commissioners and committees for almost every faculty [...] providing free workshops on social equity [...] increasing the number of courses offered on topics of social equity [... and] the small but important initiatives like [...] improving resource accessibility [...] and initiatives on gender-neutral washrooms.”

Jasmine Okorougo, a first-year representative for the Black Students’ Network (BSN) explained that although McGill had conversations regarding equity, it was crucial

in Montreal,” Desai said. “But I’ve also experienced oppressions as a result of the convergence of these two facets of my identity that [are] different than just gender-based oppression or ethnicity-based oppression.”

Desai then spoke to the importance of considering intersectional perspectives in discourse about equity at McGill.

“The reality [is] that each person’s experience is different,” she said. “For instance, trying to empower someone in a compartmentalized way— like all women should be empowered in the same [way]—is not always empowering because it may only recognize one aspect of someone’s identity experience.”

Tal Arbel, associate professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, also spoke to the value of having diverse per-

stated that female role models in the engineering are essential to inspiring women to study the field.

“Being a minority in general can be quite isolating, and I feel that there are times when being a woman you feel that you have to prove yourself prior to be taken seriously,” Arbel said. “Just having some other females to talk about situations and to provide support can potentially mitigate some issues and tensions [....] Maybe a lack of role models in engineering indicates to women that a job in academia in engineering [...] doesn’t necessarily seem like a career path that would be viable.”

Desai spoke to the current state of equity initiatives on campus, citing the importance of having a diverse range of approaches towards various issues.

“We have come such a long way,” Desai said. “[For

for individuals to examine their own privilege and its effects on others.

“While I have seen positive changes [...] there’s a general unwillingness to talk about these kinds of things from a larger part of the population,” Okorougo said. “It’s understandable when you look at the [demographics]. When you’re white, it’s a lot easier to ignore problems of racism than to acknowledge them, [which] can bring up feelings of guilt [or] force students to look at what they do wrong, which is also uncomfortable [....] But we are in an educational setting, so there should be a stronger push for students to get out of their comfort zones and learn something new.”

Robert Forestell, U3 Mechanical Engineering and president of the Engineering Undergraduate Society (EUS), echoed Desai’s and Okorougo’s views, adding that a

challenge for equity going forward is to encourage community-generated initiatives for equity, rather than initiatives brought forth by only a small portion of groups on campus.

“We need to think forward and figure out the best way to engrain this mentality within our community,” Forestell said. “This way of thinking needs to come from the community itself and I don’t think it would be nearly as effective to raise awareness and educate our community from a ‘topdown’ approach. It’s a matter of tangibly having that presence on campus.”

Richenda Grazette, BSN internal coordinator, states that the BSN will be spearheading a lot of events next semester.

“We have done a couple of discussions this semester already [about] police brutality and black feminism respectively, that have definitely addressed equity,” he said. “We will also be doing a lot next semester, particularly during February for Black History Month.”

Going forward, Forestell explains that the EUS will continue to provide equity-based initiatives. He also cites student groups such as Promoting Opportunities for Women in Engineering and Queer Engineer as strong and vibrant clubs within engineering that promote equity.

“Our equity committee [...] is continuing to grow,” Forestell stated. “In October, we organized a forum on inclusivity and diversity in Engineering in partnership with our faculty [....] We are also holding regular discussion groups open to all, and we are working closely with many other EUS groups to ensure awareness and understanding of equity-related issues.”

Wednesday, November 26, 2014

SSMU MIDTERM REVIEWS Courtney Ayukawa President

Ayukawa has presided over many accomplishments and drawbacks in her first term. Most notably, the Fall 2014 General Assembly (GA) saw participation of over 800 members of SSMU­­—attributed in part to the controversial motion on solidarity with Palestine. We hope that Ayukawa and the executive team can find a way to continue to engage with the student body and encourage attendance in the Winter 2015 GA. Ayukawa also oversaw a successful approval of the rerun of the University Centre Building Fee, which failed to pass last semester.

Her enthusiasm for sustainability has translated into many efforts to bolster the green aspect of the president’s portfolio through environment commissioners and long-term studies.

This supplements the aspect of her portfolio weakened last year when its mandated coordinator was cut due to budgetary issues.

Ayukawa has fielded a number of unforeseen circumstances this year, including two Judicial Board (J-Board) cases, and a provincial case questioning the validity of the election of her as president, which has since been dropped. With the first J-Board case resolved and the court case dropped, we hope that Ayukawa can continue her job more smoothly in the next term, including overseeing the hiring of a new general manager for SSMU.

Amina Moustaqim-Barrette VP External

Following SSMU’s withdrawal from the Table de Concertation Etudiante du Québec (TaCEQ), Moustaqim-Barrette has attempted to create working relationships with student unions at Concordia, Université Laval, Université de Montréal as well as student federations such as the Fédération Etudiante Universitaire du Québec (FEUQ) and the Association pour une Solidarité Syndicale Etudiante (ASSÉ). However, no official consultation with the student body has taken place and no formal action has been initiated beyond regular meetings with representatives from other student bodies and federations, a troubling concern in the light of a renewed round of budget cuts by the provincial government.

Additionally, it is difficult to hold her accountable for her efforts because no reports have been produced for the student body that

detail her work. While we applaud Moustaqim-Barrette for her lobbying initiatives, these efforts have largely not been publicized or communicated properly to the student body.

With regards to community affairs, she has maintained a positive relationship with the Milton-Parc Citizens’ Community and assisted the Social Equity and Diversity Education (SEDE) office during Community

undergone continuous review by a working group and has been publicized to the student body through an open forum and website.

As an active advocate for students, Stewart-Kanigan has called for more student representation and engagement at the annual joint boardsenate meeting earlier this month, and asking councillors to reach out to their constituents prior to the Town Hall on

construction around McTavish extending into November. As 4Floors ticket prices were increased this year, and because the construction has been ongoing since the summer, this deficit was another example of unsuccessful budget planning, and it is imperative that the VP Finance works to take a more proactive approach to anticipate and consider all expenses, particularly amidst student criticisms of SSMU’s

mented by the end of his term. Fong has also started a pilot testing of myInvolvement, which has become available to 25 clubs. In addition, Fong has begun to lay the groundwork for the 10-Year Development Plan for SSMU, as well as the reorganizing of the fourth floor of the SSMU building.

Last year, Fong faced criticism for being unresponsive, particularly in regards to responding to emails, and failing to be proactive when working with clubs. However, Fong appears to have addressed these issues, responding to emails more readily and increasing his cooperation with clubs.

Club workshops, for example, saw the participation of over 160 clubs.

J. Daniel Chaim VP Internal

Engagement Day. In the coming semester, we would like to see Moustaqim-Barrette take further measures to consult the student body to learn what students want from their student union in regards to external actions.

Claire Stewart-Kanigan

VP University Affairs

With the first ever Mental Health Week wrapping up last week, Stewart-Kanigan has shown initiative for mental health and other portfolios under the VP University Affairs. Even after Mental Health Week ended, she has proven to continue prioritizing mental health, as she is now working on development of a Mental Health Facebook page and listserv.

Stewart-Kanigan also led SSMU’s collaboration with the #ConsentMcGill campaign, with a panel held by the SSMU Equity Commissioner during that week. Beyond that, she has also continued work on the sexual assault policy, which has

6 News Wednesday, November 26, 2014

the library master plan. Furthermore, she conducted consultation for the library improvement fund, which is also a key part of her portfolio.

Kathleen Bradley VP Finance and Operations

Despite the passing of the SSMU Building Fee, Bradley has faced many challenges with the SSMU budget.

The student-run café (SRC), the Nest accumulated a $76,282 deficit this year, which Bradley attributed to startup costs and a discrepancy between what students want in terms of locally sourced ingredients and affordable food. As the Nest is first and foremost a student-run café, it is important for Bradley to continue consultation about how the Nest can be well-received by students, especially in light of its deficit and recent complaints by students about expensive food on campus.

4Floors, the SSMU Halloween party, also ran a $5,281 deficit due to unforeseen security costs due to

money management.

Bradley also presented the 20142015 global budget at a recent Council meeting and with student media outlets on campus, which was an effective way of communicating and clarifying aspects of the budget. She also worked with a graphic designer to present the budget in an accessible manner. Bradley also raised important concerns about the fee consolidation that McGill proposed, advocating for students in her insistence that the consolidation would not be transparent for students.

Stefan Fong VP Clubs and Services

Coming into the position with a year’s worth of experience, there were high expectations for Stefan Fong, vice-president clubs and services, to build upon his past endeavours.

Fong has been more proactive in pursuing long-term goals. He has completed the research stage of the Club Hub, and hopes to have it imple-

This year, Chaim led the planning and development of a frosh that saw a $3,600 deficit in its over $200,000 in operations, compared to last year’s deficit of $21,000, which was a significant improvement in budgeting. With the recent Students’ Society Programming Network (SSPN) event, Chaim also appears to be expanding the events planning section of his portfolio in a positive way.

Another initiative Chaim has taken is for the consideration of a publications fee for the Old McGill yearbook, which has seen drastically declining sales in past years. The fee would help fund the distribution of the yearbook to all students. Although this may standardize the distribution of a university keepsake, students have been wary of extraneous fees recently, and this may be another addition to the tensions between students and SSMU. Chaim should also continuously seek the methods for feedback and concerns of the undergraduate student body as it falls under his communication portfolio. When SSMU-student relations are tenuous, the VP Internal should prioritize methods of communication not just through listservs and mass distribution of information, but through two-way conversations and debates. The recent motion approved by the legislative council to establish an Ad-Hoc Student Engagement Committee will hopefully aid Chaim to these ends.

PGSS REVIEWS Brighita Lungu Members Services Officer

Lungu has been working on several projects, including the #ConsentMcGill campaign and mental health initiatives. She acted as a PGSS representative in the Sexual Assault Working Group, acting actively to recruit graduate students to become involved.

Lungu is also currently engaged with a number of mental health initiatives, including organizing a two-day mental health first-aid training for executive officers, commissioners, and graduate students to take part in. She is also working on a video in collaboration with SSMU and McGill, which will include testimonials from students, that seeks to address and decrease the stigma associated with mental health issues. According to Lungu, the project has fallen behind schedule and the video may not be able to be released in February as originally planned.

Ge Sa

Internal Affairs Officer

According to Ge Sa, officer responsible for organizing events for PGSS members, he has had a busy calendar this year, with events such as the Summer Dodgeball League, the Habs ticket sale, and the PGSS Halloween Party.

Turnouts at events this semester have been larger than before, according to Sa. This year, Sa has been trying to organize more family-friendly events to accommodate PGSS members who are also parents.

“We have had, among others, an outdoor movie night [...] an applepicking trip, special ticket deals to the Botanical Garden, La Ronde, and many music or comedy shows,” he said. “We’ll [also] be having a Holiday Movie Marathon Week in December at Thomson House.”

Sa believes that financial support is an area of improvement that his portfolio could benefit from. He is currently working with Pinto to establish an Intramural Sports Grant, with an aim to encourage members to be more physically active. They are also working on a project to improve Thomson House, but both projects will require significant financial support.”

Jennifer Murray Academics Affairs Officer

Juan Camilo Pinto

Nikki Meadows

Pinto’s push for redesigning PGSS’s internal judiciary is one of the main highlights of his work thus far. The Judicial Board—formerly the Board of Appeals—will be restructured so that it will require a law student to deal with procedural issues, and that judges be nominated and approved by councils rather than appointed.

The biggest challenge for Pinto remains pushing a PGSS referendum to separate from the Canadian Federation of Students (CFS). After 5 years of litigation, the Superior Court of Quebec granted a PGSS member the right to ask for a referendum to leave CFS—a step in the right direction for all of PGSS, according to Pinto. However, the main challenge for Pinto and the rest of PGSS remains the referendum itself, and it remains to be seen how the process will unfold.

In her first semester on the job, PGSS Financial Affairs Officer Nikki Meadows has successfully amended two major funds under her portfolio. According to Meadows, the process of applying for grants is more streamlined and more transparent, with the selection criteria more clear to applicants. The Post-Graduate Student Life fund was also overhauled. The first major change allows Post-Graduate Student Associations to have more control over the Student-Life fees that are collected from their membership. In addition, the Association of Postdoctoral Fellows will receive 25 per cent of the Student-Life fees from each post-doctorate for the first time. According to Meadows, the lease negotiations for Thomson House with McGill are still ongoing.

Secretary-General

Financial Affairs Officer

According to Murray, there has been an increase in student participation on university committees this year.

Murray worked on the amendments to the regulations and guidelines for graduate student supervision, which were passed in Senate in October. The amendments increased accountability for both the supervisors and the supervisees, and is part of the long term push to improve advising for graduate students.

Also, as part of her portfolio on library improvements, Murray recruited graduate students to sit at feasibility study groups for the library master plan.

Murray, also explained that the transition of over 1,200 graduate students, postdoctoral, and clinical fellows to the new Glen superhospital will pose challenges to PGSS members, and she will be working to support students during the move.

Julien Ouellet External Affairs Officer

As a representative of McGill graduate students to student groups and the Quebec government, Ouellet’s largest project this term has been to continue his predecessors’ work lobbying for revenue neutral health insurance for international students, which he has been successful in doing. Smaller successful projects include his organization of a conference with the president of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), a draft of the new Frais Institutionals Obligators (FIO) policy, and the organization of a GU15 conference—an annual conference between 15 research intensive universities as a way to share and collaborate information.

According to Ouellet, the major challenge he has faced has been austerity measures and the difficulty of implementing a subsidized Société de transport de Montreal (STM) pass for students who are older than 25. As the STM is currently operating under a deficit, Ouellet remains optimistic that he will be able to complete this initiative once the STM has balanced their budget.

Wednesday, November 26, 2014

Sexual assault case sparks change in consent awareness on campus he McGill community’s response towards sexual assault and consent awareness has increased drastically in the past year, starting with the two Forums on Consent last February and April, the creation of the Liason Officer (Harm Reduction) position—and the subsequent hiring of Bianca Tétrault for this role—an educational campaign, consent campaign, and a working sexual assault policy.

Following the controversy on campus regarding McGill’s lack of response towards the sexual assault allegations against three McGill Redmen football players last November, the McGill administration vowed to take a more proactive stance on sexual assault and consent awareness this year. “[The consent campaign] was instigated by last year’s issue […] with the football players’ sexual assault [case],” said Deputy Provost (Student Life & Learning) Ollivier Dyens. “We had a press release, and in that press release we made a commitment to the community that we would hire a harms reduction advisor and start an educational campaign.”

VP University Affairs Claire StewartKanigan said there has been a strong increase in discussion around consent and sexualt assault on campus.

“A lot of students were disappointed and angered at the university’s response to the case last year involving the football players, and that led to a spike in criticism from students on the subject of taking consent seriously and […] a response from the administration acknowledging that there was a need to treat this subject more visibly on campus,” she said.

Following Dyens’ statement of McGill’scommitment to increasing proactive measures of addressing sexual assault and consent on campus last November, Harms Reduction Officer Bianca Tétrault was hired.

“We had to do an assessment of the environment on campus services that we had for survivors currently at McGill, so through my assistance, one of the things I realized was that there needs to be one unified platform so that we could have a space to talk about consent as well as sexual assault,” Tétrault said. “Through conversations that I’ve had with students […] many didn’t understand the basic [idea] of consent. The idea behind the campaign was to [...] launch that platform to continue that discussion throughout the year.”

The Forums on Consent were facilitated by the Dean of Students, Andre Costopoulos, and was the first step in the administration’s agenda to create a space for discussion on consent and sexual assault awareness.

Additionally, in response to the commitment for a more active stance on sexual assault and consent on campus, students from groups across campus came together to create a sexual assault policy, which was first presented at the Forum on Consent last February.

“The policy proposal was a demand for the university to take consent more seriously and to make clear spaces for survivors of sexual as-

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sault to clear channels for them to seek support,” Stewart-Kanigan said. “[It] also committed them to taking a more proactive stance on addressing sexual assault.”

Since the policy proposal, the student-led Sexual Assault Working Group has teamed up with Tétrault and Costopoulos to continue working on the draft to present to Senate by the end of the year. SSMU also hosted an information session earlier this month regarding the sexual assault policy to get input from students.

“We saw that there are a large number of students across campus very interested in helping with proactive education measures around consent,” Stewart-Kanigan said. “It’s been a year since [the sexual assault] story broke, and the conversation is still going very strong [….]

It’s really been the student push that’s kept this on the agenda on campus.”

ceived training in a more relaxed setting.

“It was a more intimate setting with more sharing, and the information was catered to raise awareness around consent, sexual assault, drugs facilitated sexual assault, and how to empower frosh leaders to stand up and speak out against these acts and how to support people coming forward appropriately,” Tétrault said. “It seems that with the ever-growing discussion around this important topic, people are looking out for each other [….] That’s really empowering to see that change.”

Frosh leader Emma Tang Yuk, U1 Engineering, commented on the benefits of the interactive nature during frosh training, but also offered suggestions on ways to improve for the upcoming frosh.

“I think they did a great job making it very interactive since we did a lot of situational activi-

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In response to the commitment for a more active stance on sexual assault and consent on campus, students from groups across campus came together to create a sexual assault policy, which was first presented at the Forum on Consent last February.

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Natalie Wong Student Living Editor

Stewart-Kanigan mentioned that there has been a change in environment at McGill that opened up space for more discussion on sexual assault awareness.

“The cultural shift is making its way upwards,” Stewart-Kanigan said. “I don’t think passing a sexual assault policy would have been possible before last year, but I think it speaks a lot to the change in the environment that this university has expressed willingness and openness to incorporating a sexual assault policy into their body of regulation. That speaks strongly to how loud student body speaks to [topic] of consent and sexual assault.”

In terms of the educational campaign on consent and sexual awareness, McGill implemented mandatory training on sexual assault and consent awareness for frosh leaders during Frosh 2014.

“Frosh coordinators took it upon themselves to coordinate with Healthy McGill and McGill Campus Life and Engagement to provide training on anti-oppression, sexual assault, and consent for frosh leaders and orientation staff,” Stewart-Kanigan said. “That’s a massive step. To have every single one of the leaders […] specifically trained on the subject of consent and sexual assault […] speaks strongly to the fact that our student body is taking it seriously that that training was able to happen [….] It would have been somewhat catalyzed by the increasing visibility of conversations of consent on campus.”

Tétrault said that compared to prior years where training was done through a presentation towards a large group of frosh leaders, this year, instead, had group trainings where leaders re-

Wednesday, November 26, 2014

ties, but there were a few points which I thought were brushed over,” she said. “For example, interrupting situations where you believe sexual consent was not given,—I think it’s a hard position to be in. [They should] include tips on speaking to individuals involved after interrupting, as well as the point at which it is okay to interrupt.”

Another addition in the educational campaign was McGill’s first #ConsentMcGill campaign, ran this past Oct. 20 to 24, which included panel discussions, information booths, and poster campaigns. There was a partnership with McGill student athletes to make a video on consent, and screenings of movies to generate conversation on consent and sexual assault as well as to increase understanding of such. “[Instead of] having one definition of […] consent, we wanted to open it up to the community to have people really engage in the conversation, so through the social media campaign we […] wanted to get people thinking about consent not only in relation to sexual activity but day-today life,” Tétrault said.

Tétrault mentioned that the idea behind #ConsentMcGill was to normalize the act of consent in day-to-day life.

“If we can start recognizing consent in all aspects of our lives, it becomes easier to address it in more intimate personal moments,” Tétrault said. “We hear that ‘Consent kills the mood, [it] isn’t sexy, [etc]’ so [our purpose was to] normalize that consent happens all the time—we are just not cognizant of it.”

According to Stewart-Kanigan, conversation around consent has spiked as a result of the educational and consent campaigns.

“It’s been very useful to bringing these con-

versations about what is consent, what is sexual assault more to the forefront,” Stewart-Kanigan said. “If these conversations don’t happen in a public way, then the definition of consent that one holds [… ] may not be pro-survivor without knowing it. The default definition of consent that’s been normalized […] is not the most prosurvivor definition [….] It’s important to challenge our assumptions about what consent is and look critically at ourselves about how our definitions of consent support survivors of sexual assault.”

Tétrault echoed a similar sentiment.

“There was finally a space on campus where people were ready and willing to talk about [sexual assault and consent,]” Tétrault said. “We’re trying to reduce shame and stigma around this conversation, [so] people can feel empowered to come out and talk about it.”

Tétrault will also launch a bystander intervention program in 2015, a curriculum developed to prevent sexual violence in the community. This program is more directed towards sexual assault—as opposed to the campaign, which facilitated a broader discussion towards consent.

It will be offered for and aimed toward students, but is open to anyone at McGill.

“The bystander intervention program is a program highly used across different Canadian universities as well as in the U.S., and it’s [directed] to empower community members to stand up and speak out against sexual violence,” Tétrault said. “[This program focuses on encouraging students to own] the responsibility to say, ‘I have the power to intervene,’ and support [another] person who is targeted and to give them the tools on how to do that [….] It also teaches individuals how to respond afterward, so [they use] appropriate language, breaking down the myths and stigmas of sexual violence and creating awareness around impact sexual violence can have on a community.”

Tétrault plans on creating a website next year to be a central hub for information related to sexual violence, current events at McGill regarding sexual assault and campaign awareness, ways students can get involved, methods to support a friend, as well as the impacts of sexual assault.

Nina Hermes, U1 Arts, said that increasing awareness campaigns on campus are necessary.

“Sexual assault in university is a very real epidemic, and spreading awareness about consent should be a bare minimum to combat that,” she said. “The campaigns also helped raise awareness about a lot of the really great services that we have on campus [....] Ultimately I think they’re a great start to actually creating a campus of consent, but so much more work has to be done.”

Hermes said she wants to see a further increase in campus involvement.

“Fostering a culture of consent at McGill requires that more than just the usual SSMU groups be involved,” Hermes said. “I would like to see the fraternities, sororities, and athletics get [more] involved.”

editorial Sexual harassment, assault cases continue to demand action Last week, the Crown prosecutor dropped charges of sexual assualt against three former McGill students, also previously members of the Redmen football team. Although the Crown has dropped its charges, the complainant in the now-dropped case has stuck to her side of the story, and questioned the grounds upon which the prosecutor decided to drop charges. The week before also saw accusations of sexual harassment against three professors at UQÀM posted anonymously on Facebook, which compelled Quebec’s Minister of Education, Yves Bolduc to say that all complaints of sexual harassment and assault should be directed through internal, official channels.

The difference between using such institutional channels, seeking legal recourse, and using social media to re-

port harassment is in both the difficulty and result. On the social media end of the scale, the process is comparatively frictionless as opposed to institutional and especially legal channels, which can at times seemingly stymie survivors by placing deliberate roadblocks and subjecting them to a general sense of skepticism towards their claims. On the other hand, the route of directly publicizing allegations is much easier, but only exacts, at most, a penalty in the supposed ‘court of public opinion.’ Such might have cathartic value, but does not accomplish the task of truly punishing perpetrators, and is more vulnerable to imposing social sanction based on less substantiated claims.

Institutional and legal frameworks are often opaque and harder to navigate, but can exact much higher, legally or

administratively, binding penalties on perpetrators, and as per the fact-finding process behind them, are more credible. The possible ideal is the use of social media channels to highlight the failures of more administrative avenues, which could prompt reforms, or create systems at the university level that dull the harder edges of the legal system, such as trained counsellors assisting students in dealings with police and lawyers..

At the McGill level, a sexual assault policy has been drafted that lays out general guiding principles, but has left the question of channels for recourse at the university level relatively vague. Care must be taken to ensure that whatever is crafted does not result in the problems that have occurred at American universities that have internal tribunals for

sexual assault cases, including issues of simultaneously compromised standards of due process and respect for those bringing their accounts forward.

Even assuming that institutional or legal channels could be fully reformed to provide adequate recourse and punishment of perpetrators to assault survivors, the conversation about those ignores the psychological impact that needs to be healed, regardless of judicial or administrative outcome.

The conversation on campus policies with regards to sexual assault at McGill and other universities needs to make sure that counselling resources are publicized and wide availability for students is ensured. In that respect, the statement the university sent with a recounting of resources for assault victims is a positive step, but

it remains to be seen what outreach and awareness strategies will be used to inform students of where they can turn when there isn’t a headline-grabbing case to spur a response from the administration.

There is no one-size-fitsall approach to crafting policies and providing resources, both at the institutional level and for individuals. As working groups continue to work towards crafting a proposal doe a sexual assault policyat McGill—provisions already exist to address sexual harassment—the need for tailored solutions should remain in mind.

OFF THE BOARD The economic and personal degradation of tipping culture

Chloe Nevitt Science & Technology Editor When I worked in the food industry during high school, I hoped the only heat I felt would come from the grill. Yet cooks and customers pressured me to perform perfectly and even worse, be a perfect person. It wasn’t the heat or pressures of the hard work itself that pushed me too far, but the man who followed me to my car after work one day.

While the restaurant industry is a known hub for sexism against women—90 per cent of women in food industry have reported being harassed—

it was the customers’ control over me that made me wish I had never become a waitress.

What I didn’t anticipate was that I had made myself a victim of the intrinsic flaw of tipbased incomes—the customer is always right.

A sense of entitlement comes from signing a person’s tip, and when more than 60 per cent of those vying for high rewards are women, it becomes commonplace to ignore lewd remarks in order to receive large tips.

This economically-motivated degradation rewarded this behavior on the basis that a woman is there to please.

I found myself surrounded by men who would make aggressive comments to which I could only respond with a tight smile. Management would require a white-shirt-black-pants uniform, and on the odd days where I chose to wear yoga pants, I could feel eyes burning holes into my backside, felt hands brush up against me, and heard threats disguised as com-

pliments. But for risk of losing a payday, I was forced to bite my tongue.

This system allows customers to be rude and unreasonably demanding. It’s not only demeaning—it’s a violation of basic human rights.

Being a waitress means being in a situation where defending yourself could mean not having a stable source of income. The state of New Jersey allows employers to pay workers as low as federal tipped minimum wage—$2.13/ hr—a wage that hasn’t been adjusted in 22 years. This system operates under the assumption that after tips, workers are making just as much as their non-tipped counterparts in the workforce.

However, seasonal and customer fluctuations strip any sort of reliability from having tips as a primary income source. While the idea of living on minimum wage alone has been continuously deemed as laughable, the idea of a living on tipped-minimum wage

seems impossible.

A system where tips—for all service staff—are determined by customers who can chose not to pay for services without reason, is a system that needs to be changed.

The food industry is notorious for cutting corners to maximize profit. By paying their employees minimum amounts or by hiring undocumented immigrants—36 per cent of restaurant workers are illegal according to a government survey—restaurateurs are getting away with compromising the safety, sanity, and integrity of their female employees to save cents.

When the catcalls, inappropriate gestures, comments, and actions from my coworkers, managers, and customers finally pushed me to address the restaurant owner about the actions that could be done to stop it—nothing happened.

“Boys will be boys,” he said. “It’s the culture.”

I was sure he had misheard me. Certainly, if I was feeling

abused and unsafe, to the point where leaving work after dark made me uncomfortable, something would be changed.

But he elaborated—no matter what he could say to his current customers and no matter who he replaced his other employees with, there would be no change. Here lies the problem—change is obviously very necessary. I want to be able to wear what I want to work and not feel like I’m making myself a target for aggressors. I think it’s fair to ask for a safe environment where I’m respected for my integrity and effort in the workplace. I am serving food—I myself am not food.

Until this idea is set into the minds of men who are both employees and customers in the food industry, my boss will be right—there will be no change.

Wednesday, November 26,2014

Opinion

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COMMENTARY Stephen Harper plays political masterstroke with snub of Putin

Stephen Harper made international headlines last week after firing a bold political jab at Vladimir Putin during the G20 summit in Brisbane.

As reported by Harper’s spokesperson, when Putin walked up to him for a handshake on the opening day of the summit, Harper allegedly said, “I guess I’ll shake your hand, but I have only one thing to say to you: You need to get out of Ukraine.”

Since then, many media outlets have praised the prime minister as a hero who passionately stood up to a major imperialistic threat. However,

What is possibly even more sig- been heavily criticized by the media countries regarding Arctic territories nificant is that Harper’s headline grab- and the public if not for his headline- as Russia is gearing up to harvest oil in areas which is claimed by Canada. bing attack took media attention away making aggression towards Putin.

It is also worthwhile to note Ultimately, there was very little damfrom another issue which is important to many Canadians—the environ- that this wasn’t actually a particularly age Harper could have done with his ment. Climate change was a recurring risky stance to take. As it turns out, comment. It seems only natural that presence at the summit. Most notably, Canada has very little to lose from he was the one to lead the political asthe United States made a pledge to scuffing its relationship with Rus- sault on Putin.

While Harper’s recent posturdonate $3 billion to help the world’s sia. Trade between the two nations is poorest countries reduce emissions It goes without saying that this move and adapt has the potential to be a political boon to climate ahead of next year’s federal election. change.

This was followed

by Japan’s $1.5 billion pledge. Following the minimal, and Harper has already im- ing has gained him global admiration, summit, many European countries posed substantial sanctions on Russia Canadians should realize that his act at made similar commitments at a con- without great losses. Canada also does the summit was likely a calculated poference in Berlin. Harper, however, not depend on Russian oil for energy, litical decision aimed at bolstering his merely stated that Canada would con- unlike some parts of Europe. In fact, image on foreign policy in advance of tribute an unspecific sum by the end Canada and Russia’s relationship has the next federal election. of the year. His relative inaction on never been great. Recently, there have fighting climate change would have been some disagreements between the

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Albert park Contributor

recent history demonstrates that impassioned, principled stands are not really what Canada has come to know from its prime minister in the past few years. The political motive behind his verbal attack on Putin is not hard to figure out.

Following its belligerent occupation of Crimea, Russia has broken many international humanitarian laws, one example being its enforcement of Ukrainians to take Russian citizenship. Therefore, it is no surprise that the majority of Canadians are in strong support of the sovereignty of Ukraine. Furthermore, this sentiment is echoed even louder by the Ukrainian-Canadians who make up over 1.2 million of the population, making them the ninth biggest ethnic group in Canada. By taking a solid stance on the issue and bringing it widespread attention, Harper is effectively pandering to the majority of Canadians.

It goes without saying that this move has the potential to be a political boon ahead of next year’s federal election.

Supply management milks consumers

Justin Hatherly Contributor Most Canadians have probably heard of the term ‘supply management,’ though many probably only have a vague idea of what it means.

It is an intricate web of governmentimposed quotas and licenses that limit the number of producers and production of dairy products such as milk and cheese, as well as poultry. The government also levies steep tariffs on foreign agricultural products, ensuring that they can’t provide a low cost alternative. These actions disadvantage consumers at the expense of the farm lobby; consequently, the federal government should abolish supply management.

These actions limit the supply of certain agricultural products, leading to farmers earning much higher incomes and consumers paying much higher prices for these food items than they would in a free market. Supply management redistributes wealth up-

ward, from low and middle-income consumers to affluent farmers, and is an impediment to Canada successfully negotiating free trade agreements.

In a recent study, three University of Manitoba economists argue that supply management raises the prices of such products as milk in Canada by up to 69 per cent relative to the United States.While the economists accept that supply management may not be the only factor contributing to higher prices, they contend that it keeps prices substantially elevated over what they would be in its absence. Though this bolsters the incomes of farmers, often already wealthy, it places an undue burden on low-income Canadians. While high-income Canadian families spend approximately 8.1 per cent of their incomes on food, Statistics Canada reports that low income Canadians spend up to 14.1 per cent of their income on food. The University of Manitoba study states that supply management costs low income Canadians up to 2.3 per cent extra of their income in food bills annually.

Therefore, while supply management leads to higher farm incomes, these higher incomes come at the expense of the poorest members of Canadian society.

If this upward redistribution of wealth is not sufficient reason to abolish supply management, consider the fact that it serves as a significant

10 Opinion Wednesday, November 26,2014

barrier to Canada reaching free trade agreements with foreign nations., Many trading partners—rightly so—regard the quotas and tariffs as an implicit subsidy to the domestic agricultural sector. This is key in trade partners’ reluctance to open their domestic markets to Canadian agricultural goods. In Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations, Australia, which abolished its own supply management system in 2000, has refused to sign unless Canada does the same. After all, why would Australia allow Canadian products preferential market access when their agricultural exports would be subject to taxes of 150 to 300 per cent?

The barriers that supply management places on the ability to negotiate trade agreements could be damaging to Canada’s economic future. For example, joining the Trans-Pacific Partnership would give Canadian exporters access to a market of 2.5 billion consumers, comprised of nations whose total Gross Domestic Product is $35 trillion.

Australia provides a lesson in how to abolish supply management.

For a period of eight years after abol-

ishing supply management, the Australian government used the proceeds from a modest tax on agricultural goods to compensate farmers who owned production quotas. Compensation levels were adjusted for the length of time a farmer had owned a quota. Farmers who only recently purchased quotas received higher payments, while long-term owners of production quotas received less, as they had a longer period of time to benefit from the artificially higher

(Cordelia Cho/ McGill Tribune) prices. Surely a similar system could be implemented in Canada.

Therefore, given the harm supply management does to economic prospects and the regressive burden it places on low income Canadians, this antiquated system should be abolished.

The McGill space race Remi lu Managing Editor

Alan Chen didn’t know it at the time, but one afternoon three years ago in Lev Bukhman marked the start of a multi-year project that would reduce the gap between students and administration, and re-envision the entirety of McGill’s downtown campus. At the time, all he knew was that his decision to join the sustainability case competition had paid off in a big way, with his team placing in the top three of the Students’ Society of McGill University’s (SSMU’s) 2012-2013 competition to redesign McTavish Street.

“My team and I did quite well, and I just fell in love with urban design because of that competition,” Chen said.

As the director of the McGill Spaces Project (MSP), Chen, a U2 Sustainability, Science and Society student, has had plenty of opportunities to pursue his love sustainability in placemaking and urban design. The group is made up of students from a multitude of backgrounds, with the aim of optimizing underused spaces on campus by working collaboratively with different stakeholders in the university.

“Instead of looking outwards, we look inwards in order to see how we may better use the spaces we already have,” Chen said. “By linking different actors across the university and re-imagining the spaces that we have, hopefully we can come together and create a vision of a more connected campus with community hubs—instead of one isolating one that is not supportive of staff and students’ vision.”

Despite the fact that it was created just two years ago, the MSP has progressed tremendously by way of the relationships it has cultivated among the faculty and administration. One of the group’s goals was to provide students with opportunities to have input on spaces around campus, achieved recently when the administration offered the MSP the chance to have input on a possible re-design of the Brown Student Services Building.

“The MSP as an organization is very much pushing to create opportunities for students to create new spaces on campus,” Chen said. “If students are able to give input and have their voices heard by the administration who are redesigning this building, it could become a vibrant student space in that process.”

As an institution, McGill’s student population has exploded in the past 50 years—from an undergraduate population of around 7,000 in the 1960s, according to McGill historian Peter McNally, to almost 23,000 this year, according to the most recent data available from SSMU. While the population has increased, the physical space of McGill’s downtown campus has remained relatively stagnant, with any expansions in space devoted solely to the growth of the university’s academic arm.

The SSMU Building was built in 1965 to house student clubs and offices, and as McGill’s physical size slowly creeped outwards, the

SSMU Building remained the lone holistic student-oriented space on campus.

This continued until 1993, when the Architecture Café was created. A student-run food service, the café was popular amongst students due to its accessibility, cheap food options, and physical space. However, the Café was shut down by the McGill administration in 2010 due to financial concerns. The resulting backlash from the student body was tremendous, with various news outlets picking up on the story— including the Montreal Gazette and Maclean’s Magazine. According to Maclean’s, 300 students protested the closing of the café outside of the Leacock building during the first Senate meeting of the year.

In response, SSMU hosted a number of case competitions to re-design a new studentrun café (SRC). The current VP Finance and Operations of SSMU Kathleen Bradley, was a first-year student when she first got involved with the planning of the new SRC. “After the [Architecture] Café closed, [Shyam Patel, the VP Finance at the time,] realized this was an obvious need on campus,” Bradley said. “It was very clear that the [Architecture] Café was not coming back, so I think SSMU took it upon itself to feed that niche.”

Although the planning committee managed to achieve a stable start to the project—including tentative menu plans and tentative floor plans—the planning quickly plateaued due to a lack of space available for the café.

“We just couldn’t move forward with anything,” Bradley said. “We had a bunch of ideas, but it’s really hard to realize those if you don’t know whether you have a kitchen or not, whether you’re on the ground floor or not, whether you can serve specialty coffee, whether it’s a lunch counter, whether it’s a space, whether it’s a café—there were so many things up in the air that there was only so much we could do.”

Yet by a stroke of luck, a space opened up on the second floor of SSMU when Lola Rosa moved out due to flagging sales last year.The VP finance and operations had trouble convincing external businesses to set up shop in the Shatner building. SSMU decided instead to use the space for the Nest—the new SRC. According to Bradley, the original goal of the Nest was to serve as a student space—an academic hub for students alongside its role as a student-run food provider. However, due to the space constraints of the location, the Nest became a lunch counter, unable to realize its original purpose as a physical space similar to the Architecture Café for students.

Yet according to Bradley, the Nest is by no means restricted to its current space within the Shatner building, and is open to moving if a student-friendly space opens up.

“This is a very long-term project [so] having the counter there was really step one of many,” Bradley continued. “But we figured that it would be better to at least open and have a student-run food option on campus than have an empty space up there [….] It’s still on the table that the SRC could move. It could go into an ac-

tual room or actual space [….] I would say that the main guiding principle is that we are here to serve students. So whatever students want is what we should be giving them.”

At the moment, the Shatner building has reached its full capacity, with a brutal semesterly competition for club office space on the fourth floor of the building. This has been due to a number of factors, with the simplest being the fast growth of the undergraduate student population.

“One building probably would’ve been enough [in the past,]” Bradley said. “But as McGill grows and as student needs grow and diversify, the building doesn’t grow proportionately to our student population. We have reached an obvious limit to what we can provide.”

As a result, a number of other campus initiatives have sprung up in the wake of the loss of the Architecture Café, including the Educational Community Living Environment (ECOLE) model. The building is located on University street, with the living model finally realized in full this past semester after two years of extensive planning and bargaining with McGill.

ECOLE has become another physical space for students—an alternative to the Shatner building. According to Selin Jessa, a facilitator for ECOLE, the building has become a community hub for those interested in sustainability.

“I think ECOLE is a really important student space because it’s one of the few places where you can eat, talk, and work; it’s [also] a place to run into people you know,” Jessa said.

“We want it to be a space where people can not only come and hang out and meet, but [in the context of] the sustainability community. One of the […] big differences between ECOLE and the Shatner building is that the Shatner building is leased by SSMU [for undergraduates,] whereas one of ECOLE’s key values and goals is that it [welcomes] grad students, Macdonald campus students, and the Milton Parc community as well as faculty, staff, and admin.”

Beyond ECOLE, SNAX—the SRC operated by the Arts Undergraduate Society (AUS) out of the Leacock building—is another student space on campus that has struggled to find its footing. Unique to SNAX is the café’s location within the larger Leacock building controlled by the McGill administration. Consequently, the operation has been limited in terms of its physical space—despite its wide client base of students.

“SNAX has a space constraint,” said Hasan Nizami, manager of Snax. “SNAX is primarily a student-run food service; however, it profoundly depicts the potential to be a happening student space. SNAX offers an environment where the students feel comfortable. We have a lot of customers that come to SNAX on a regular basis, partly because they know what to expect.”

Despite the restrictions placed upon its potential to be a student space, the SNAX team has continued to plan for possible ways to turn SNAX into a student space.

“We have a couple goals to address the po-

tential that SNAX shows to be a proper student space,” Nizami said. “We have been considering offering a SNAX-sponsored seating area for the students.”

In addition, the smattering of independent faculty spaces for students have begun to enter the conversation for space-improvement.

The Science Undergraduate Society (SUS) proposed a motion earlier this semester for a $7.00 Student Space Improvement Fee—which was passed by 59.3 per cent—in which the funds would go towards improving the Burnside basement space.

The closing of the Architecture Café in 2010 marked the beginning of a new era in student spaces across campus, sparking movements to create independent student spaces— particularly with the increasing satiation of space in the Shatner building.

SSMU has recognized this, and is laying the groundwork to change their approach to club spaces within the building.

“The space in the building is in a transition phase,” Bradley said. “Stephan [Fong, SSMU VP clubs and services] and I are working on a 10-year space plan for the building […. Fong] is looking into changing around the fourth floor into have more open office meeting space, as opposed to all closed, singular offices [and] revamping the SSMU lounge, [as] the couches are in dire need of replacement […. In] Room 108 we’re looking into putting a whole bunch of mirrors and springboard floors so that we can do dance classes and stuff in there.”

According to Bradley, the SSMU executives are not threatened by the growth of independent student spaces away from the Shatner building—rather, they’re supportive of the different student-led initiatives.

“Our goal is always to support those kinds of projects,” Bradley said. “We never see them as competition [….] A lot of our limitation and service is that we don’t have the space to let every group have an office [….] We are limited, physically limited, in the way we can offer services, and so when we see things like ECOLE sprout up and do awesome things, our reaction is “How can we support them while they’re there and we’re over here?”

As more and more students enter the university with differing areas of interest, having space available to meet student needs is a crucial factor. Yet more important than these accommodations is the recognition of the importance of space itself.

“Without the physical spaces available for people to come together and share company and ideas, serendipitous encounters have no opportunity,” Chen said. “Serendipity is not an accident. [You] have to plan the space for it to blossom.”

Wednesday, November 26,2014

Student Living

11

Developing a taste for student-run food services on campus A look at the importance and challenges of student vendors

The Nest is currently running a financial deficit. (L-A Benoit / McGill Tribune) CECE ZHANG News Editor The role of student-run food services has recently become a point of discussion on campus. Some notable student-run food services include: Frostbite, an ice cream stand operated by the Engineering Undergraduate Society (EUS); the Arts Undergraduate Society’s (AUS) SNAX; the Thompson House restaurant operated by the Post-Graduate Students’ Society (PGSS); and the Student-Run Café (SRC), The Nest, operated by the Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU). The latter was established with the aim of being competitively priced while serving vegetarian and vegan options, and seemed to be a turning point for increased student choices of food when it opened earlier this February.

AUS President Ava Liu emphasized the importance of student run food services for the community.

“When we have a student-run outlet, it really lets students choose what they think is important to them, and it provides students with the options not usually provided elsewhere, because it has such a niche ability to contribute to the market, that a big monolithic corporation like Subway wouldn’t be able to provide,” Liu said. “Food is a political thing in my opinion, because you choose the line of production [....] I think that [SNAX] is a way for people who are really interested in something—sustainability, food management, etc [...] to integrate themselves into the system.”

Liu explained that SNAX also provides more students with employment opportunities, as it is an operation entirely run by students.

“SNAX provides salary to students, we pay for student wages, and that’s done out of SNAX’s operation budget,” she said.

“It’s a good way to have student jobs on campus.”

On the other hand, SRCs and studentrun food services have faced mild criticisms, as well.

Deputy Provost (Student Life and Learning) Ollivier Dyens cited liability concerns as one of the two reasons for the McGill administration’s aversiveness towards student run food services on campus

12 Student Living

Wednesday, November 26,2014

in the Nov. 20 SSMU Council.

Liu, however, emphasized that SNAX would not pose a liability to the school as it conducts a separate third-party health inspection.

“SNAX actually goes through an independent health and food inspection not covered by McGill, and we passed it,” Liu said. “There’s literally little to no interaction between SNAX and McGill Food and Dining [Services].”

In regards to student-run food services taking away from the revenue of McGill Food and Dining Services (MFDS), Senior Director of Student Housing and Hospitality Services (SHHS) Mathieu Laperle asserted that he did not see the student-run food services on campus as competition for MFDS. “My goals [are] not [to] manage everything on campus,” he said.

Student-run food services do face challenges, often on the operations’ side of things: The Nest has sustained financial deficits since its opening in the beginning of 2014, as SSMU VP Finance and Operations Kathleen Bradley explained to SSMU Council in presenting the global budget for 2014-2015.

“Thus far, student feedback has indicated that students prioritize cost above all else, putting the mandate of the Nest to be local and sustainably oriented at odds with the lowest possible cost option,” Bradley said. “This discrepancy must be addressed by legislative council, operations management committee, and students interested in the Nest, as it is not achieving its mandate to be financially sustainable at this point in time.”

Bradley also cited the lack of administration support, or limitations, posed

by McGill administration. She gave the recent example of the SNAX sandwich discontinuation warning, but also said the Nest had also faced issues.

“The Nest was also limited in its ability to provide catering services to students on campus,” Bradley said. “These are in many cases stipulated in the MoAs between McGill and SSMU and the faculties, but these MoA contributions represent McGill’s frustration with and eagerness to

limit the ability of student-run food services to function and grow.”

Bradley, who was previously also head chef at the Nest, said the studentrun food services on campus are currently reaching a turning point.

“We’ve realized that we really need each other, because we’re an endangered species,” Bradley said. “I’ve reached out to the people at SNAX, some of the people at the [EUS General Store], and we’ve talked about how student food services can work together and collaborate and be stronger and better, and help with negotiating with the administration.”

“I would love to see student-centric projects coming together and sharing information and ideas and problems and challenges they’ve had,” Bradley continued. “That’s really the best way we can grow.”

Laperle stressed that collaboration could also happen between student-run food services and the SHHS. “We also started to support [studentrun food services]: Sometimes I will get some calls, and we will give them help— not in terms of [telling them] what they need to do, but giving them advice,” he said. “Every year, we also offer the Nest and [Thomson House] rebates. We’re not

(L-A Benoit / McGill Tribune) against PGSS and SSMU offering different kinds of services. We’ve committed to a new way of seeing food services at McGill, it’s not perfect but it’s nice.”

For Bradley, more support from McGill would allow student-run food services to grow and flourish.

“I really hope McGill reassesses its position on student-run food services— we are not liabilities, but students— [who] should be the greatest asset at a university—trying to enrich our academic lives at McGill with entrepreneurship,” Bradley said. “Some students do

lab research, many join sports teams and clubs—student-run food services are no different than these endeavours, and the university should be advocating for their protection and growth.”

Wednesday, November 26, 2014 Student Living 13

’Tis the season to be jolly

Local vendors selling private goods at holiday-themed market cooperative Vendors are the holiday-theme bonanza. (Photo courtesy of The Market Cooperative)

Keah Hansen Staff Writer Last Wednesday, the Students’ Society of McGill’s (SSMU) Ballroom hosted the Market Cooperative’s Holiday Bonanza, one of the four such markets hosted throughout the year. The market created a positive space on campus for students, with vendors selling locally crafted goods and the McGill community able to connect and engage in meaningful shopping leading up to the holidays.

Adding to the experience was the cheerful hum of live music buzzing throughout the room as music serenaded vendors and shoppers alike.

Amelia Brinkerhoff, U3 Science, and Sam Gregory, U3 Arts, cofounded the Market Cooperative three years ago, feeling that such a space

was lacking at McGill. According to Justine Eisenberg, U3 Arts, the public operations coordinator, the Market Cooperative has grown and improved each year.

Vendors are found mainly through word of mouth, but Brinkerhoff said that she also explores the Montreal community to find unique vendors for the market.

“I reach out to local vendors at markets and shops if I think they are a good fit for the market,” she said.

Profits from the market are then reinvested in its operations, with small stipends and promotional material with any extra profit.

The holiday-themed market featured over 30 vendors, each offering unique and local wares. Products included terrariums, stone and custom

jewellery, hand knit accessories, vegan treats and loose leaf tea. Martine, who owns Borea Soins Corporel, a natural skincare company, said she appreciated the networking opportunities of the market and its relaxing setting.

“I loved the entertainment and networking [that] the event provided,” she said.

Local musicians also used the venue to perform, with jazz, rock, indie, a capella and acoustic artists being featured throughout the day.

Students were very receptive to the event and appreciated the cozy space and unique opportunity to buy from local vendors.

“It is a cool space, and it feels good to support small business owners who are given a venue to display

their work,” said Joanna Lui, U2 Science.

Ryan Canuto, U1 Arts, who performed with the Chromatones a cappella group, shared a similar sentiment.

“It’s great because independent artists from all mediums—art, food, and music—have an opportunity to show and distribute their work in a way that they otherwise might not,” he said.

Brinkerhoff stated that the market creates a unique experience to bring students and vendors of the Montreal community together.

“The best thing about the markets was the positive space it has created at McGill,” she said.

It supports a ‘village effect,’ allowing for community building and

rekindled connection, which can sometimes be lost at a big school in an even bigger city.

Eisenberg supported this sentiment, and explained that her involvement has been one of her most positive experiences at McGill. Furthermore, according to Eisenberg, the market allows increased accessibility to the art community, as well as support for local artists. The sight of vendors and students, laughing and mingling together, attested to that.

The Market Cooperative runs markets four times per year. The next one will be during the Winter semester, as a love-themed market in light of Valentine’s Day and general self-care over the winter months.

Campus Spotlight: CASCO

Dance and fashion show raises funds for Montreal Children’s Hospital Foundation TIFFANY LE Staff Writer

Team CASCO. (Photo courtesy of Edmund Chung)

The Commerce and Administration Student Charity Organization (CASCO) celebrated arts, comedy, and philanthropy at its 14th annual dance and fashion show at L’Astral Theatre on Nov. 22. The 1920’sthemed showcase raised funds for the Montreal Children’s Hospital Foundation in a successful night of entertaining performances and community engagement.

Alexandre St-Jean and Tuan Nguyen founded CASCO at the University of Ottawa in 1998 following the passing of their friend from leukemia. In 2000, a group of students started the McGill chapter. Since then, it has collaborated with the Management Undergraduate Society (MUS) to promote social responsibility among the student body by organizing numerous fundraising events, such as apartment crawls and bake sales throughout the year.

“We adopted [CASCO] because it raises money for local hospitals and is supported by business students in both cities,” said Jony Tabuteau, VP Events of MUS. “We have been a part of the organization for a while because it supports charities central to its cause.”

The dance and fashion show

14 Student Living

is CASCO’s most important event, with preparations that began during the summer. This year, co-chairs Bryan Lau and Casey Bryant secured L’Astral Theatre as a venue, which complemented CASCO’s cause and presentation. The smoky environment and dark wooden tables and chairs were reminiscent of the Gaslight Café in New York City and brought the theme’s vision to life. A silent auction was also open to the attendees, with notable items such as WestJet tickets and Prep 101 Packages. There were also raffle prizes to be won, including New City Gas tickets and Cory Vines

Wednesday, November 26,2014

gift cards. This year’s team raised a record amount of money through the auction.

“So much more goes into [an event] like this than you would think,” Bryant explained. “But it is really a great learning experience; it was so fun to recruit all the dancers and see them perform onstage.”

CASCO has traditionally opened their show with an acapella performance. This year, Effusion A Capella group started the show off with an R&B set. The energy then took a spike as the dancers made their way onstage. Rather than host-

ing a conventional fashion show filing down a runway, performers sported pieces from various boutiques in Montreal during their dance acts. Moreover, every single one of McGill’s dance collective was present at the event, from McGill’s new ballet collective Alegria to the popular street dance collective Urban Groove (UG).

“It’s been a very longstanding relationship [between CASCO and UG,]” said Ritika Rai, U3 Arts. “It is really nice to see how smoothly CASCO runs.”

Apart from singing and dancing performances, there was also comedic

relief. McGill’s Zeta Psi fraternity, under the name Brosaica, took the stage with a outrageous choreography to songs like “Anaconda” by Nicki Minaj and “Shake it Off” by Taylor Swift.

Shirts were unceremoniously discarded and roses tossed into the crowd.

The audience was very enthused by the show; the cheers were loud and ongoing. After the event, there was an after-party at Club Blvd44 where guests and performers got to celebrate after a successful night.

“I think it’s phenomenal,” said CASCO emcee Fred Gou. “If it’s not for the silliness, a lot of people wouldn’t come out and support what’s really important. But it’s also a change from the usual MUS concert series; there is a lot of cultural aspect to it.”

CASCO has supported the same cause for over 10 years. In the new children’s hospital currently being built at the Glen site located directly behind the Vendôme metro station, there will be a room named after CASCO McGill.

Gabby Cao, the director of Communications of CASCO described her joy in being a part of CASCO. “Before I joined, I didn’t know what to expect,” said Cao. “But now, after working with really cool people for a good cause, I’ve developed so many feelings for this committee.”

Butterbeer cupcakes

Green tea lava cake

Jer Lin Poh Contributor

Green tea lava cake. (Jer Lin Poh / McGill Tribune)

Delicious butterbeer cupcakes. (Jer Lin Poh /McGill Tribune)

Recipes by Jer Lin Poh Cupcakes:

Ingredients: 1/4 cup butter 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, minus one tablespoon 1 tbsp cornstarch 1/2 tsp baking soda 1/2 tsp baking powder 1/4 tsp salt 1 cup brown sugar 2 tbsp canola oil 1/4 cup sour cream 1 large egg 1 large egg yolk 1 tsp vanilla extract 1 tsp butterscotch extract 1/3 cup oatmeal stout 1 tbsp + 1 tsp milk powder Directions [Makes 12] : 1. Preheat oven to 350째F. Line cupcake tins with liners.

2. In a small saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat until light brown in color.

Transfer brown butter into a bowl and freeze for 20 minutes, or until solidified. Leave the brown butter out for 30 minutes, or microwave for about 15 seconds to soften.

3. Sift together flour, cornstarch, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Add sugar and briefly mix using an electric mixer at low speed until evenly distributed.

4. Add softened brown butter to the flour mix and beat on low for about five minutes, until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs.

5. In a separate bowl, whisk together canola oil, sour cream, egg, yolk, vanilla and butterscotch extract. Add it to the flour mixture and beat on medium-low until just combined. Do not overmix.

6. Add the milk and beat on medium speed until just combined.

7. Divide batter among liners, filling them half full. Bake for 20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean. Transfer cakes to a wire rack to cool completely.

Butterscotch ganache (optional):

1/3 cup butterscotch chips 2 tablespoons milk 1. In a small saucepan, combine the milk and butterscotch chips together. Stir over low heat until melted. Cool the ganache before using.

To assemble, fill a piping bag with the buttercream and pipe over each cupcake. Drizzle on the butterscotch ganache.

Butterscotch extract can be purchased from Le Vrac du Marche at Atwater Market.

Frosting:

1 cup butter 1/2 cup sugar 2 egg whites 3/4 cup butterscotch chips 1/4 tsp butterscotch extract Directions to make the frosting: 1. In a small saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat until light brown in color. Transfer brown butter into a bowl and freeze for 30 minutes, or until solidified.

2. Place the egg whites and sugar into a large metal bowl, and heat over a pot of simmering water. Whisk the whites until all the sugar dissolves into a white and creamy mixture.

The mixture should be hot to touch.

3. Using an electric mixer, whip the mixture on medium-high speed until it doubles in volume.

4. Microwave butterscotch chips in 40 seconds intervals until melted, stirring after each interval.

5. Add the melted butterscotch mixture and whip until combined. Add in half of the brown butter and beat until incorporated. Then, add in the rest of the butter and whip until fluffy for about 1-2 minutes.

Green Tea Lava Cake

Ingredients: 70g white chocolate 3 tbsp unsalted butter 1 large egg Splash of vanilla Pinch of salt 2 tbsp granulated sugar, plus extra to coat ramekins 2 tsp matcha powder (available at Eden on Parc) 3 tbsp all-purpose flour Directions [Makes 1 Lava Cake] : 1. Preheat oven to 425째F. 2. Grease a ramekin with cooking spray. Dust

with granulated sugar and tap out the excess.

2. Place the butter and white chocolate in a small saucepan over low heat, stirring until melted.

3. Whisk in the egg until smooth, then stir in vanilla and salt.

4. Sift the flour into the mixture, add the sugar, then whisk until just combined.

5. Fill the ramekin with the mixture and bake for 11 minutes.

6. Cool the lava cakes for two minutes. Run a knife around the rim of the ramekin, then invert the ramekin onto a plate. If desired, serve with vanilla ice cream.

Green Tea White Chocolate Magic Shell

Green tea magic shell. (Jer Lin Poh /McGill Tribune)

Green Tea White Chocolate Magic Shell Ingredients: 160g white chocolate 80g coconut oil 14g matcha, or as desired

Directions: 1. Melt white chocolate and coconut oil in a bain marie. Alternatively, zap the mixture in the microwave and stir at 45-second intervals.

2. Stir in desired amount of matcha powder.

3. Cool for 15 minutes before using.

Drizzle abundantly on ice cream or anything

Wednesday, November 26,2014

Student Living

15

Off the blackboard Across faculties, professors offer students new opportunities for learning

I

n 1999, McGill’s World of Chemistry professors digitized around 6,000 35 mm slides to implement the lecture recording system (LRS) now employed in over 350 courses for about 50,000 students on campus.

In 2011, the first Lorne Trottier Lecture Symposium was conducted, taking full advantage of the power conferred by webcasting technology to connect a single speaker series with a wide audience beyond the McGill community. And, in 2014, Dr. Samantha Gruenheid, an Associate Professor of Microbiology, revamped her laboratory course to incorporate crowd sourcing as a method to achieve scientific discovery.

New developments impacting departments and faculties at McGill continue to push the boundaries of teaching and learning.

From peace negotiation simulations to crowdsourcing science, these initiatives are not only enhancing students’ learning experiences, but also generating a host of novel ideas and involvement outside the classroom.

Political science Professor Rex Brynen, for instance, has been pioneering a unique approach to teaching peace-building in his course POLI 450. Popularly known as “Sim Week,” the students within the course are exposed to a weeklong civil war simulation within the fictitious land of Brynania. The students take on various roles to explore issues from the civil war associated with peace building.

“The challenge of the simulation is to negotiate and implement a peace agreement without it all falling apart,” Brynen explained. “It’s very intense, in semi-real time, taking place both face-to-face and electronically—by email, chat, or Skype.”

Initially designed for a class of 25 students, Brynen’s simulation has expanded over the years to encompass around 100 undergraduates. While other courses at McGill run simulation negotiations, this weeklong event takes on a significantly larger scale than any other class at the university.

“The class generates up to 15,000 emails during the simulation—all of which I have to read,” said Brynen. “Most students become very engaged with it.”

Beyond breaking up the monotony of a lecture-based course, the purpose of Sim Week is to provide students with the oppor-

tunity to apply their skills acquired in the class to a real-life situation. Brynen explained that for students working in areas like international development or conflict resolution, it is particularly important to have an experiential component integrated into students’ education, whether in the form of internships, field study, or—in the case of POLI 450— simulations.

“One of the challenges in teaching this topic is that it is very easy to read stuff on how you are supposed to negotiate peace agreements,” Brynen said.

“In practice, however, it is highly complex and dynamic, characterized by mixed motives, imperfect information, and many second and third order effects.”

Brynen emphasized that while lectures provide students with the knowledge and foundations to develop peace-building policies, these more passive learning styles do not recreate the complexities that occur in a realistic experience.

“Lectures and text are great and wonderful things,” Brynen said, “But the simulation is really designed to bring home the stuff that lectures don’t bring home well.”

The majority of comments each year following Sim Week echo Brynen’s observations.

“You do so much theorizing and writing [in the course],” said Jake Heller to Tv McGill, a participant in the 2010 rendition of the simulation. “It was really refreshing to sit down at the table with someone and negotiate and apply a lot of the things that I

Natural Disasters (ATOC 185), for example, is harnessing the use of technology to provide students with new channels of applying their learning— albeit through a substantially different approach from Sim Week.

have learned in some of the classes.”

Despite the advantages of this new resource as a teaching tool, Brynen cautions that simulation-based learning is not a onesize-fits-all paradigm. Depending on the course, lectures provide opportunities for professors to quickly cover large volumes of information in a logical fashion.

“It would be challenging to run a simulation for a class of 600 students,” Brynen said. “[POLI 450] has a lot of games because the course focuses on a lot of operational issues, and games give an experiential sense of those. Conversely, my Middle East politics class has no games in it and I don’t plan on introducing them because the lectures serve better at covering the material.”

While POLI 450’s simulation stands as a novel learning tool within the McGill community, teaching styles across faculties are paralleling this cross training through various other avenues.

Following the release of the Massive Open Online Course (MOOC)—run for the first time last summer to the general public—the professors of ATOC 185 sought to integrate various features of the MOOC into their classroom. According to John Stix, a professor from the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences and lecturer in ATOC 185, they transitioned a quarter of the lectures from an in-class talk to an online platform.

“We didn’t know how this was going to work, but we took our MOOC lectures for 25 per cent of the course, and we put them on MyCourses,” Stix explained. “Instead of the students coming to those classes, they would see the lectures and view them online.

[We then used the lecture time] for group assignments.”

By restructuring the course to incorporate an online lecture component, the coordinators of ATOC 185 were able to provide

“[Even though] the purpose of this course was to introduce us students to the microbiology lab, we learned much more than just basic microbiology techniques,” Afeich said. “I found the SWI interesting mostly because it was built around our own research and our own data.”

the 600 students in the course with a learning opportunity that is often challenging in classes of this scale. Rather than take a multiple-choice midterm, the students were instead required to analyze a data set and work in groups to generate a poster presentation.

“There were [several main] drivers [for modifying the course],” Stix said. “Is there a way to make a very large class not simply a lecture class? The other drive was to [find ways to avoid] the ‘passive learning’ [approach of lectures, and allow] students to be more engaged by working in groups.”

Stix acknowledged that in the past, he had employed clicker questions to help spur class participation in a course of such significant size. While this approach provoked a certain degree of participation, the novel changes added to ATOC 185 have since encouraged more substantial active learning among students.

“It was really clear that a great majority of students were really proud of their posters,” Stix said. “It was really interesting to hear the different results and experiences.”

Both POLI 450 and ATOC 185 serve as strong examples for turning points in teaching across campus. Although the professors involved emphasized the necessity of retaining lectures as a critical teaching tool, they are also changing the classroom experience by integrating new technologies into their courses.

These novel approaches, however, hardly stop at the edge of the classroom.

In addition to providing students with enhanced learning experiences, new teaching methods are pushing students to generate ideas outside of their courses to contribute to current research.

McGill’s Microbiology and Immunology Department is pioneering one of the first crowdsourcing initiatives in Canada to uncover new antibiotics deep within the soil. One of the growing problems within the human health care system is the rise of bacteria that have developed defence mechanisms against current antibiotics. As such, companies are in desperate need of new antibiotics—a need that the department is actively responding to through its crowdsourcing approach.

Associate Professor Samantha Gruenheid spearheaded the initiative with the assistance of Claire Trottier, an education specialist and pedagogic advisor for undergraduate MIMM courses. By partnering with a program known as the Small World Initiative (SWI) at Yale, they redesigned the introductory microbiology lab course MIMM 212 to provide students with an opportunity to design their own experiments, while contributing to developing research on new antibiotic compounds.

“I liked that it dealt with a real world problem of antibiotic resistance,” Gruenheid said. “That can make the students really excited [….] It isn’t a cookbook course, but is giving students freedom to develop a project more on their own.”

Like the former design for MIMM 212, the purpose of the course is to teach undergraduate students different laboratory techniques for classifying and testing bacteria. However, unlike the former design—where students knew the predicted outcome of their experiments—the SWI provides undergraduates with the opportunity to explore.

“I hoped that they would have the chance to feel that excitement,” Gruenheid said. “The excitement when you have a discovery in the lab and know you’re the only person that knows that. That experience can be lacking from

“Lectures and text are great and wonderful things,” Brynen said, “But the simulation is really designed to bring home the stuff that lectures don’t bring home well.”

traditional laboratory courses, but it is clearer in this one.”

Naim Afeich, a U1 Microbiology and Immunology student, echoed Gruenheid’s sentiments, explaining that the course pushed students beyond the normal expectations of a laboratory course to actually contributing to research. “[Even though] the purpose of this course was to introduce us students to the microbiology lab, we learned much more than just basic microbiology techniques,” Afeich said. “I found the SWI interesting mostly because it was built around our own research and our own data.”

With the new course design, MIMM 212 students now spend a semester collecting soil samples from their local environments and testing them in the laboratory to determine whether they produce antimicrobial compounds. According to Tyler Cannon, the U2 Microbiology and Immunology student who helped develop the SWI program over the summer within the Gruenheid lab, the approach taken by this course enables students to propel antibiotic research at a significantly faster pace than in the past.

“It’s not new, looking in the soil for antibiotics,” he said. “The really novel thing here is crowdsourcing.

We’re taking techniques that were developed for higher labs and simplifying them into something that anyone from an introductory lab course can do. Now that it is simplified, we don’t have five people working on it, but 104 at McGill and thousands counting the other SWI partnerships.”

Over the summer, Cannon tested 52 different soil isolates and characterized five antibiotic-producing bacteria through his own research. Following the course this past Fall semester, students identified hundreds of additional species, from which Gruenheid saved 100 different bacterial samples that produced particularly interesting and promising antibiotic compounds. She plans to continue this initiative by further characterizing these strains in the future, in addition to running the revamped version of MIMM 212 for subsequent years to come.

“I am really interested and committed to take it further,” Gruenheid said. “I don’t want to stop with things just stored in the freezer.”

Cannon shared Gruenheid’s enthusiasm. He acknowledged that MIMM 212 was a great first step for increasing undergraduate contributions to research through a course, rather than through lab work outside of a program.

“We’re sending the message to students that they can do this, and that they [have the potential] to do anything,” Cannon said.

These recent developments in learning, therefore, push the boundaries of what’s possible not only with technology, but also through student contribution. The innovation of a decade ago has continued to take place on campus through the restructuring of traditionally taught courses.

“Right now, the atmosphere within the Microbiology and Immunology Department is such that individual professors will be inspired to take the plunge, as they see the other professors successfully doing it in their courses,” said Gruenheid.

How Exile Melts

A gem that shines despite rough edges MARTIN MOLPECERES Contributor

Written by McGill alumnus Dane Stewart and directed by Patrick Neilson, How Exile Melts is the latest production by the McGill Department of Drama and Theatre. It follows the story of four siblings as they reunite at their old home in Nova Scotia to visit their ailing father, only to dredge up hidden demons, old and new.

Credit must be given to Neilson, whose presence is felt on stage throughout as characters move with deftly executed synchronization.

The odd directional choice does crop up occasionally though—namely the strange decision to project environments through still images on a screen above the players. These were intrusive and distracted from what would otherwise be deeply emotional moments from the characters, but overall did not take away from otherwise excellent directing.

Unfortunately, the characters constituted the biggest weakness in the show. While the script itself was not lacking in symbolism nor depth, the characters felt stale in comparison. For example, Glenn (Steven Koutsomitopoulos), the gay elder brother who exudes such extreme flamboyance that he becomes less character and more caricature. Over time, Glenn’s outlandish behaviour somehow managed to work to his advantage in order to lend him more depth, but his initial presence was so over the top that it was difficult to become reinvested in his development. An incredibly glaring problem came from the protagonist, Anna (Hannah Siden), who, while generally well preformed, came off as too robotic at times. Despite how gorgeous her voice was, her jarringly over-sentimental singing peppered throughout the show did nothing to make her more endearing.

Even the most interesting

character, the younger brother Dan (Zach Brown), could not escape scriptural problems as his entire backstory and conflict was laid out via repetitive monologue. Fortunately the skeletons in his closet were interesting enough that, along with an effective performance, these issues were hardly noticed. Ultimately, the actors were well cast throughout, and despite some problems inherent with their characters, they were able to make the roles their own, breathing much-appreciated life into otherwise semi-cliché tropes.

It’s important to also acknowledge the stage manager and prop teams for the fantastic set. What it lacks in flashiness and grandiosity it makes up for in attention to detail and care. Everything from the costuming to the mossy wallpaper was clearly put together with a lot of thought, making sure to bring out a particular actor’s personality

(Photo courtesy

of Jess Banner)

or the provinciality of their maritime cottage. All this was accentuated by a deftly utilized lighting scheme that helped add another layer of emotion to the piece.

The unfortunate reality is that How Exile Melts is flawed, often glaringly so: Occasionally one-dimensional characters, awkward script problems, and odd directing choices are all prevalent in the show. However, the play manages to overcome these problems and comes together to form a solid, interesting, and thoroughly entertaining performance. A lot of care and hard work have been put into this production, and going to support that kind of dedication is more than worth the ticket price.

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Look Back in Anger Powerfully emotional production will bring audiences back with pleasure JACK TOKARZ Contributor

Sharing a one-bedroom apartment with four emotional young Brits for two and a half hours as they push through the most difficult part of their lives does not sound like an ideal night out, but the fluid direction and engrossing emotion of TNC’s Look Back in Anger make it a soirée you will not want to walk out of.

For people who feel squeamish watching The Office, Nathan for You, or other shows which capitalize on placing their cast in the most awkward situation imaginable, this play will be too much for your nerves. But if you comfortably absorb vicarious feelings, then look no further.

Opening to the quick, staccato tapping of Jimmy (Harrison Collett)’s foot during a routine, humdrum Sunday evening with his wife Alison (Kay Min) and his friend Cliff (Alex Bankier) in their shared flat, the audience is immersed in the

state of life for these three characters. The first hour of the play is one extended scene between shifting combinations of these three characters as the complexity of their simultaneous interdependency and contempt creeps in and grows.

Even without any “action,” this hour passes easily thanks to the constant motion blocked by director Shanti Gonzales. Although nobody stays completely still for a full minute, the movement around the room never feels forced, but in fact adds to the realism of their agitation.

And agitation is the central theme of the play, embodied perfectly by the constant nervous energy of Collett, who either would not or could not ever stop fidgeting. Whether running his tongue across his teeth, rubbing his palm across his chest, or tapping his foot, Collett fills every word and movement with beautiful unease. Bankier provides a brilliant foil, maintaining a calm outlook to Collett’s extreme neuroticism and equalizing the stage energy for the first half of the show. Playing a Welsh man, Bankier assumes a grumbly speech pattern which feels a bit unnatural, particularly since none of the

18 Arts & Entertainment Wednesday, November 26, 2014

other characters make any inclination towards adopting a British accent, but he never falters, and after the first 10 minutes, it’s hard to imagine him with any other voice. Meanwhile Min plays her role of the stubbornly dispassionate Alison a bit too well, delivering her lines stiffly between long bouts of silence for the majority of the play. When one character leaves, however, and she has to hold a one-on-one conversation, her dryness dissipates and she engages well with the other’s emotion. Still, her character does not contribute any individual energy to the room, creating starkly sweet or uncomfortable scenes while the characters unveil their powerful emotions.

The second scene introduces Alison’s aristocratic friend Helena (Kate Hamilton). She delivers—in exact accordance with her character—the apathy of Alison without the learned helplessness; she stands fully erect and straightfaced throughout Collett’s absurd, abusive rants and retaliates without losing any dignity. Hamilton’s posture and mannerisms as the sophisticated princess skillfully suggest years of etiquette

training and pampered living without uttering a word.

The first act culminates with a rapturous, perfectly executed monologue by Collett, who manages to balance comfortably on the border of derangement and deliver every word as a surprising gift both from and to himself. The only negative from this magnificent performance is that the second act never reaches this high water mark. Min delivers the climax well, effectively using a wide range of volume, but she does not possess the mesmerizing energy Collett exhibits.

A long, slow play of words and emotions, Look Back in Anger exemplifies the phrase displayed front and centre on TNC’s website, “Let’s Get Intimate.”

Look Back In Anger runs from Wednesday, Nov. 26 to Saturday, Nov. 29 in Morrice Hall. Performances at 7:30 p.m., doors at 7:20.

Student tickets are $6, general admission is $10.

Pop Rhetoric:

MAX JOSEPH Staff Writer “I am the worst thing since Elvis Presley/ To do black music so selfishly/ And use it to get myself wealthy” — Eminem In a typically self-aware move, the rapper Eminem uses the above line in his song “Without Me” to preempt charges of appropriation, while also bragging of his proficiency in the style he’s appropriating. The line would come across as insufferable nonsense if it weren’t for the truth of the latter claim—“Without Me” is a good rap song.

Eminem appropriates forms that were cultivated by African American musicians, acknowledges it, and attempts to justify his borrowing through delivering impeccable takes on them.

By contrast, two recent films, Jimi: All Is

by My Side and Whiplash, use African American music to tell their stories, but they approach them without the same understanding. As a result, the use of music in both films comes across as hollow opportunism—an attempt to reap the benefits of audience associations with the music without coming from a place of genuine knowledge or sensitivity.

Even worse, the mediocre presentation of the music presents viewers unfamiliar to it in its original form with a watered-down version that doesn’t allow them to experience its true artistic value.

All Is by My Side is a recent biopic of the legendary guitarist Jimi Hendrix. There’s music heard throughout it, but none of it is actually Hendrix’s.

His estate denied permission for the filmmakers to use any of his music, so the soundtrack is instead saddled with covers of songs covered by Hendrix, other songs deemed to be thematically appropriate, and the occasional piecemeal blues lick. Though it’s challenging to imagine a film doing justice to Hendrix’s legacy without including any of his original music, All Is by My Side fails spectacularly in the ways in which it tries to compensate. Furthermore, its attempts all feel guided towards diluting the African American influence of the music it represents.

Though the choice of covers in the film is limited by the songs Hendrix actually covered, their presence serves to exaggerate the impact of white musicians on his music. Over the course of the film, Hendrix stand-in André Benjamin, known more commonly as André 3000, sings “Wild Thing,” “Sergeant Lonely Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band,” and “Hound Dog.” These three songs all share the distinction of being songs heavily influenced by African American music, but written and originally performed by white artists. The most egregious example of these is “Sergeant Lonely Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band,” which is performed and ludicrously presented as a creative zenith for Hendrix, but the use of all three songs suggests that the guitarist was much more indebted to white musicians than history—and his music— indicates.

The trend continues in the rest of the film’s soundtrack. As with the covers, it’s populated primarily by white musicians appropriating the blues: Namely Bob Dylan’s “Leopard Skin Pill-Box Hat”

Got blues? and The Animals’ “House of the Rising Sun.” Though these songs help illustrate the landscape of the period in which Hendrix was coming up, they serve to make the blues seem like a genre dominated by white people. Outside of T-Bone Burnett, not much is heard from black artists like Muddy Waters and B.B. King, who managed to commodify the music of their culture. All Is by My Side shows the history of Hendrix’s blues as being indebted to whites, while it simultaneously ignores the guitarist’s importance as a black artist.

Things don’t get much better in Whiplash.

The film tells the story of a young jazz drummer named Andrew (Miles Teller) studying in a prestigious music conservatory under the tutelage of the great but abusive conductor, Terence Fletcher (J.K. Simmons). The boy gets mocked, insulted, and physically beaten by his teacher, all in the name of pursuing artistic greatness. The problem lies in just what sort of greatness the two are trying to pursue: The film refers to it as “jazz,” but what’s depicted onscreen shows otherwise.

The film represents jazz as being about physicality rather than musicality. Andrew is shown playing actual music at times—most notably in the film’s final scene—but he’s seen much more frequently bashing away at his drum set, striving to perfect his technique at the expense of working on anything else. Fletcher encourages Andrew’s obsession with technical perfection through his constant goading and demands.

This could make sense in a film about sports, but not in a film about jazz—or really any sort of music. It’s not hard to imagine a young music student with Andrew’s mentality (I once had it myself), but anyone who’s been around the music for a bit longer understands that it can’t be learned strictly through the approach shown on screen. However, Whiplash reveals Andrew’s focus on technique to be an effective way to go about studying jazz.

Writer-director Damien Chazelle ultimately appears to be unconcerned by this, as his primary goal is to tell his story of a teacher-student relationship. In the process of his storytelling, he uses jazz without respecting or understanding the music, thus leading to unconvincing appropriation. As with All Is by My Side, the film uses a form of African American music without accurately depicting it on screen. In providing viewers with these weak and inauthentic representations of the music, both filmmakers discourage audiences from recognizing its beauty.

Wednesday, November 26, 2014 Arts & Entertainment 19

Pop Rhetoric: The Conclusion of Korra REMI LU Managing Editor She looked up at me in the cracked mirror—eyes damp, hair unkempt—a raw expression of unspeakable sadness.

And yet, her eyes were the same eyes I had seen years ago, the ones that had captured my soul and remained with me as I transitioned from adolescence into adulthood. Those eyes will soon leave this world forever.

Korra. A fictional character in a fictional world. A cartoon in a TV era of dark, brooding dramas. Few may care that the world of Avatar is approaching its final episode.

But for those that do, the pending finale marks the closing of a chapter and the loss of a show that is both stark and nuanced in its lessons on life.

On the surface, The Legend of Korra has no place in the conversation for the best show on television. Many may scoff at the very notion:

A Nickelodeon show featuring outlandish, ‘magical’ powers? A children’s show?

Indeed, those statements are all true; and they would define the show if the creators, Bryan Konietzko and Michael Dante DiMartino, settled for those labels.

But they have not. The entire team that has worked on the story of Avatar—from The Last Airbender, to its successor show, The Legend of Korra—has allowed the show to transcend its cartoon format and become a legitimate dialogue for social discord, death, transitions, and friendship.

The pilot episode of The Last Airbender aired when I was 10 years old; Aang, the protagonist of the story, was 12. The story was fantastical and wondrous; characters could ‘bend’ and manipulate the four elements of air, earth, water, and fire. The show appealed to my wild childhood imagination—the storyline was engaging, the artwork spectacular, and the humour genuine and unforced. As that first series neared its end, I reached the age of Aang and his friends. The flaws in the characters, revealed in sync with the storyline, reflected the same teenage emotions I was trying to figure out on my own. It was the first time I had experienced art in that way.

The Legend of Korra once more arrived during a corresponding time period in my life. As with most series, the stories of Avatar have been defined by their protagonists; where Aang focused on fun and happiness, 17-year-old Korra was by turn arrogant, ambitious, and determined. Korra’s story has so far dealt with the trappings of that key transition from adolescence into

adulthood. Konietzko and DiMartino have not been afraid to pause the storyline in order to explore more adult themes; it has reached the point where the plotline serves as spaces between key realizations and emotional explorations.

The scene described at the beginning of this piece is one that introduced the current season—the last one set to take place in the world of Avatar. The episodes released so far have explored the nuances of mental struggle without the customary dismissive attitude common in fictional media. To say that the show has aged gracefully would be a farcical understatement—it has evolved flawlessly with the average age of its audience, and has consequently grown to tackle more personal and pressing issues that only the most lauded of television shows have been able to do.

I grew up alongside General Iroh’s poignant wisdom and the ebbs and flows of friendship displayed by Korra and her friends.

As ridiculous as this may seem to those who did not grow up with the show, I have relied on the world of Avatar for timely lessons on life, delivered through a medium of unparalleled visuals, artwork, and humour. The passing of The Legend of Korra will mark the end of the last concrete link I have to my childhood.

In the meantime, however, I’m going to enjoy the last few episodes of one of the greatest shows on television.

New Music Building gives music school new life MAX BERGER Arts & Entertainment Editor When you walk down Sherbrooke between Aylmer and University, it’s difficult to miss the imposing structures that reside on the north side of the street. One is the Strathcona Music Building, the seasoned home of McGill’s 100year old Faculty of Music, whose historical feel is punctuated by the large statue of Queen Victoria that stands by its front steps;

the

other is a sleek, towering triumph of modern architecture, a $70 million project known simply as the New Music Building.

There’s a walkway connecting the former structure to the latter, one that facilitates the traffic of hundreds of students and faculty members every day. Not only does it physically bridge the buildings, it represents a turning point that began in the early ’90s and came to fruition in 2005, when the faculty was renamed “the Schulich School of Music” and rewarded with a facility that reflected its relatively recent growth as an institution.

“We were doing okay, but we only really came into our leadership role in Canada and North America [….] in the ’80s and ’90s,” says John Grew, an organ and harpsichord specialist who has been with the faculty for 41 years and served as its dean from 1991 to 1996. “[This brought] us up to the level historically of Medicine, and Law, and the other faculties that put McGill on the map.”

Yet, for a program that was on the rise in terms of personnel and educational quality, the facilities for McGill’s Faculty of Music were becoming increasingly inadequate.

“At that time, the music library had been separated [from the Strathcona Building],” explains Grew. “We were renting space in the office building across the street [at] 555 Sherbrooke [….] We were in that office tower from probably 1990 until we opened the new building. So the impetus for the new building was the music library.”

As dean during that period, Grew was an integral player involved with the arduous process of assembling the funding needed for the ambitious project. After years of effort on the school’s part—helped by a $20 million donation from McGill alumni Seymour Schulich—the New Music Building became a reality.

For students outside of the music program, studying in the Marvin Duchow Music Library is often the only link they have to the activity that goes on inside of it. However, as McGill graduate and longtime Early Music professor Hank Knox assures, the library offers far more than the comfortable leather chairs that visitors often gravitate towards.

“If you’ve been in there, you know it’s a wonderful place to work,” begins Knox. “As a musician, you have a very good collection of scores and books about music, and a very, very fine

20 Arts & Entertainment Wednesday, November 26, 2014

collection of CDs and recordings.”

The Duchow Library may have been the catalyst behind the New Music Building’s creation, but it’s hardly the only major attraction that can be found there. Along with several performance and practice spaces, it features the impressive Music Multimedia Room.

“It’s this giant two-storey box which is acoustically isolated from the environment around it,” says Knox. “It can be used for rehearsing with a hundred-voice choir and a hundred and something-piece orchestra. It was designed to be used as a soundstage so they can record things for movies in there.

They’re in the process of installing state-of-the-art recording studios and control studios.”

There’s also a heavy research focus in the added space, much of which takes place on the eighth floor, where the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Music Media and Technology (CIRMMT) is housed.

“The new building has facilities for things that the music faculty has begun to do over the last 20 years or so, with a strong emphasis on sound recording and research into music cognition, music psychology, and music technology,” explains Knox. “The stuff coming out of music tech is really pretty groundbreaking.

There’s a lot of work being done on automatic music classification, which is interested in things like Spotify and Amazon; we’ve got other people doing music recognition, converting printed scores into electronically searchable and recognizable format.

“We have a whole component that’s doing some really interesting things with new devices for controlling electronic instruments. There’s a lot of research going on with the interplay between technology and performance.”

It’s that kind of groundbreaking research that many believe has distinguished McGill as much more than just a prominent school for music performance and theory.

“We’re one of the few places in North America that’s doing [research-based] stuff at that level,” says Knox. “That wouldn’t have happened, I don’t think, without the new building.”

ALBUM REVIEWS

One Direction - Four

Andy Stott - Faith in a stranger

Syco

Modern Love Warmly lugubrious, Faith In Strangers is Manchester electronic producer Andy Stott’s follow-up to 2012’s Luxury Problems. Stott’s characteristic dark noise is clearly present throughout the album, but the airy vocals of Allison Skidmore—who also sang on Luxury Problems—are largely impactful on the tone of the work. The entire album feels like a cohesive contradiction, a partnership of extremes. Ambient music such as Stott’s can sometimes feel too dense for the average listener, but Skidmore’s ethereal vocals serve to broaden the music’s accessibility, acting as a light to guide an unsure listener through Stott’s beautifully dense soundscapes.

Though this album contains its fair share of murky dissonance and abrasion—the menacing drum-and-bass break “Damage” or the eerily glitching electronics of “Missing”—its aggressive moments are always countered by interludes of celestial clarity. This dichotomy is best heard in the album’s standout tracks, “Violence” and “Faith in Strangers.” The former is a slowbuilding tune that lives up to its name, a rusty beat that erupts into a static-enveloped sludge. The title track, on the

other hand, pulses and glows, gently building like an intensifying heartbeat as the steady thud of the bass is enveloped by wavy synths and a skittering drum line.

Stott has shown continual growth as an artist, and Faith in Strangers is simply the next stage in his musical evolution. His unique rough edges have not been smoothed over—rather, they now surround a more expanded soundscape and refined musical aesthetic. If you enjoy music that envelops and enthralls in exciting ways, Faith in Strangers is most definitely a rewarding listen.

- Kia Pouliot Artist: Da Brat Album: Funkdafied Released: June 28, 1994

He’s Gonna Step On You Morgan Alexander Arts & Entertainment Editor

Again (aka Step On)

Artist: John Kongos Album: He’s Gonna Step On You Again Released: 1971 Sampling is such a staple of modern music that it has become almost an overused nuance—unless, of course, you’re Kanye West. While the origins of sampling are blurry, largely because of the intensive legal confusion that arose during their early use, the Guinness Book of World Records recognizes “Step On” as the first song to ever use sampling. While that fact is hotly debated—and has incidentally been denied by the artists—the introduction of sampling to popular music allowed for a blossoming of creativity through the rejuvenation of past beats and lyrics.

Fa All Y’all

Da Brat proved that Hip hop wasn’t just a man’s game when her solo album, Funkdafied, went platinum. Following in the footsteps of hip-hop duo Salt-N-Pepa, Da Brat proved that girl power was more than enough to make it to the big leagues. As for “Fa All Y’all,” it perfectly encapsulated Da Brat’s style: Fun, funky, and fierce.

“Believe”

Artist: Cher Album: Believe Released: October 19, 1998 Cher is a queen. She also just happened to be the woman that brought auto-tune into pop music. “Believe” was a groundbreaking song for the music industry and remains one of the best-selling singles of all time.

Now autotune is getting constant facelifts, and depending on how it’s used it can either make (Kanye West: God) or break (T-Pain: Failure) careers.

Maggie’s Farm Artist: Bob Dylan

It’s hard to review a One Direction album without acknowledging the ever-familiar boy-band that created it. One Direction remain one of the largest, most successful and widely recognized groups in the world, primarily due to their looks—their past three albums prove that it’s not because of top-notch quality music.

But still, their existence is still as relevant as it has always been, and with the release of their fourth album, originally titled, Four, it looks like this unevolving presence is here to stay.

One Direction is seemingly defiant on remaining 100 per cent true to its name. Providing limited—if absolutely zero—music, vocal, or lyrical progression, the group’s fourth album simply marks an extension of its first.

But it sells, so why not, right?

Crooning about love and heartbreak, the album crawls on like it’s simply checking off a list of required qualities. Every single song has to do with either falling in love, going after it, or being rejected by it. Vocally as generic as ever whilst providing lines such as, “I wanna escape from the city and follow the sun,” and, “I wanna be free / I wanna be yours,” it seems the group is intent on leaving behind all they know, but that couldn’t be further from the truth.

An annoying aspect of One Direction is that the members sing from the point of view of

Album: Bringing It All Back Home Released: March 22, 1965 Even though Dylan had released the semielectric Bringing It All Back Home four months prior to the 1965 Newport Folk Festival, those in attendance were hardly ready to accept the folk icon’s new stylistic choices with open arms. The opening licks of “Maggie’s Farm” marked the first time that Dylan had performed publicly with an electric guitar across his chest, and many fans took it as an act of unimaginable betrayal. The refrain, “I ain’t gonna work on Maggie’s farm no more,” is just right for a song whose legacy is tied to an act of defiance towards the close-minded members of his fanbase.

Walk This Way

Artist: Run-DMC ft. Steven Tyler Album: Raising Hell Released: May 15, 1986 Hip hop had been around for a while, but during the mid-’80s it was increasingly looked at as a fad as opposed to a serious musical genre. That viewpoint changed when Run-DMC’s third album, Raising Hell, went triple-platinum and proved that Hip

guys who have terrible times with love: They are consistently being heartbroken and “there’s a future of [their] life [they] cannot see,” as the boys sing on “Ready to Run.” Uhm, I’m pretty sure you can: It’s comfortable, easy, and full of girls who would give up anything to be yours.

While the album has some nuance— opening track, “Steal My Girl” draws on rock influences, something the band should take with them in future endeavours, and the three songs towards the albums’ end—“Fireproof,” “Spaces,” and “Stockholm Syndrome”—are actually not that bad, and the production is essentially gleaming on every single one of the tracks. Still, One Direction desperately need a new direction.

—

-Jack NeAL hop was here to stay. Beyond solidifying rap as a true form of popular music, “Walk This Way” also introduced the new genre of rock-rap to the music industry by successfully covering an Aerosmith classic.

Heebie Jeebies

Performed by: Louis Armstrong and his Hot Five Album: Heebie Jeebies Recorded: February 26, 1926 If you google “Heebie Jeebies,” one of the first options that will come up is a discussion on whether the song is racist and representative of the oppression black artists faced in the early 20th century. Yet, putting aside the murky history of America’s treatment of black professionals, “Heebie Jeebies” is representative of a much larger achievement on behalf of jazz musicians.

Louis Armstrong became jazz’s first dominating soloist, and he transformed the genre by introducing scat for the first time in this 3-minute recording.

Wednesday, November 26, 2014

Arts & Entertainment

21

Caity Hui Features Editor

For the past two weeks, Alan Chen has been camping out in Burnside watching students interact with objects he has strategically placed around the basement. As the director for the McGill Spaces Project, Chen is researching how students respond to the presence and absence of simple objects in campus spaces, like a colourful chair or chalkboard tower, and whether these objects can shift the social context of the space into a more vibrant and lively place. His goal: To design a study area that optimizes productivity and well-being within McGill’s current underused student hangouts.

Chen’s degree is unique amongst his peers. One of 34 students completing a Sustainability, Science, and Society (SSS) major, his degree allows him to reflect his space-making interests in a comprehensive, inter-disciplinary approach.

“It’s really kind of à la carte,” explained Clara Payro, a U3 SSS student and the President of the SSS Student Society. “One of the core aspects of sustainability is that it touches on every kind of subject.”

Implemented in 2010 in response to a lack of interdisciplinary majors, the SSS program, offered by the Department of Geography and the McGill School of Environment, is still in its initial phases at McGill. Regardless, the response of students within the degree has been tremendously positive, acknowledging the unique opportunity and interdisciplinary perspective permitted by this program.

“The SSS prescribes a very holistic picture of what the challenge of sustainability offers,” explained Victor Lam, a recent graduate of the degree currently working as a research assistant in the Department of Geography at Hong Kong Baptist University. “It almost feels like we’re just a bunch of friends trying to learn from and grow [with] each other.”

According to Madhav Badami, a professor within the School of Urban Planning, the program aims to equip students with a key set of tools to think and respond critically to the grand challenge of the 21st century: Sustainable well-being.

“Sustainable well-being [involves] achieving human well-being while maintaining the Earth’s life support systems,” Badami said. “This program provides the inter-disciplinary

[…] knowledge and skills required to effectively understand and address this challenge [in different perspectives,] to discuss why we need change, and the issues of equity and justice associated with taking action.”

An overwhelming majority of students within this program aim to do just

points.”

Brian Robinson, an Assistant Professor in the Department of Geography and Undergraduate Advisor for the SSS Program, echoed Payro’s sentiments.

He explained that the mission of the program is to develop a rigorous analytical tool set amongst the students in order to

convey scientific information in an easy to understand way [and addressing] integrating scientific messages into the policy process.”

With the course almost doubling each year, Robinson’s plans for the future may soon reach a wider range of students involved in this degree. Despite

(Eleanor Milman / McGill Tribune) that—change the world. Payro explains that by taking classes from different faculties, students not only acquire the tools to incite change, but can also become experts on the topic they are passionate about.

“Most people in the SSS program have the dream to make the world a better place,” Payro said. “[The program allows] you to be an expert on a specific subject. If you are really interested in water management, then you can take classes that will focus on that—not only water management systems, but also you can learn about the ethics related to that.”

Payro adds that through her diverse coursework, she is exposed to a variety of different perspectives—similar to the real world.

“The fact that [you] have to take [management] classes allows you to [work] with people who think different from you,” Payro said. “I think it’s definitely a strength of the program that you are exposed to so many different view

22 Science and Technology

establish core competencies to address current sustainability challenges .

“We have three broad core pillars,” Robinson said. “One is on science and technology, then we have policy and methods, and [finally] we have ethics and justice.”

In the future, Robinson hopes to push the program towards further instilling these core competencies within its students. Initiatives, such as integrating a speaker series or an internship program, would help students learn how to better apply their skills acquired from the SSS program to enact change in real world situations. Despite being new to McGill, these techinques are showing promise.

“I’d like to try to develop opportunities for further honing these core competencies,” Robinson explained.

“One idea […] would be trying to bring in people from around Montreal that are working in this sustainability sphere [or implementing] a course on leadership and communication skills—how to

Wednesday, November 26, 2014

the rising interest and awareness of the SSS program, however, both Robinson and Payro allude to the challenges of undertaking interdisciplinary studies.

The more flexibility students have in course selection, the more opportunity there is to get lost.

“It’s easy to come into these programs that have lots of flexibility and come out as a jack-of-all-trades but a master of none,” Robinson said. “As the program advisor, I really try to make sure [students] have an idea of what they want to do with it and what perspective they want to have with this degree.”

Robinson explained that one method students can complement this broad learning approach with is focusing their minors on issues related to their interests. With a minor, students can acquire a more in-depth perspective on a topic they are strongly passionate about.

Mary Cascadden and Jane Zhang, recent graduates of the program, both acknowledged that the SSS degree allowed them to plan their studies around

a particular topic, graduating with a comprehensive perspective on the nuances and complexities of sustainabilityrelated issues.

Zhang, now working as an assistant curator at the Montreal-based NGO Cities for the People that focuses on improving cities, is expanding her interest in urban sustainability. Following this experience, she hopes to pursue graduate studies in community and regional planning. She explained that the SSS program provided her with a set of skills to tackle such interests.

“For me, the SSS program is a toolkit for understanding today’s most challenging global issues,” Zhang said. “I took a rather meandering path through the program. [By] minoring in English Literature, the humanities element added another layer of critical thinking and analysis on my sustainability studies.”

While many of the graduates have gone on to apply their skills within the workforce, both Robinson and Payro highlighted the opportunity for graduate school following the SSS program.

“Students are passionate and want to go out and make a difference in the world,” Robinson said. “Most of them finish their undergraduate degree and want to apply themselves to things, and I think a lot of them will end up back in graduate school over the course of a few years.”

Considering the infancy of the degree, both students and professors involved anticipate that awareness of the SSS will continue to grow within the student body.

While the flexibility of the SSS is not well-suited for all students’ needs, the ability to harness skills across faculties and develop a unique set of tools to approach sustainability from multifaceted perspectives forms a well-suited program for certain students at McGill.

Robinson hopes that with an increased awareness, more students for whom the course is the right fit will have the information and resources to get involved.

“Students are coming to McGill […] and want to do something about the wrongs and injustices they see in the world,” Robinson said. “[The] SSS gives them an avenue to channel and focus some of that energy.”

Th e r i s e o f H a c k t i v i s m Clare Lyle Staff Writer

a weekend working on a project. Typically funded by software companies, they serve as both a chance to meet other people who build cool things and as motivation and support for creating projects that might have otherwise been put off.

“The whole concept of a hackathon is, ‘Don’t tell yourself you’re going to do this over the weekend, because you won’t,’” Jaber explained.

This lighthearted coding culture is in clear contrast with Anonymous’ often-heated Internet Relay Chat (IRC) chatrooms and radical actions. The communities’ divergence stems from their different motivations: Hacking for personal enjoyment on the one hand, and hacking to make a statement on behalf of a community on the other.

“You do stuff for the group, and not for the individual,” Coleman explained. “That anti-celebrity ethic translates well to political action.”

So how is it that a group that has come to be almost synonymous with hacking differs so much in its ideals from other hacking communities?

Part of this apparent contradiction stems from the public’s misconception of who Anonymous actually is.

“Definitely the hackers command a lot of power and are very important,” Coleman said. “Anonymous wouldn’t be what it is without the hackers. But because hackers work with others, you can have domains like Anonymous where a lot of the people aren’t hackers [….] The hackers are doing the technical work and then others are engaging in supporting roles.”

The non-technically skilled contingent is largely responsible for the group’s public image.

It contributes through its physical presence in real-world protests, as well as through crafting press releases and engaging in debate over the group’s future projects.

Outside of Anonymous, non-hackers are increasingly becoming familiar with the internet as a platform through which their message can reach an unprecedented number of people.

As Molly Sauter, author of The Coming Swarm: DDoS Actions, Hacktivism, and Civil Disobedience on the Internet, explained, the web is a congregating place in modern society, like a town square in past centuries.

“In the [17th and 18th centuries] there were physical spaces where you were forced to encounter dissenting opinions,” Sauter said. “Today, we don’t have town squares [....]

Instead, we have the internet. So the DDoS is a way for activists to be heard.”

The increasing utility of the Internet in

Wednesday, November 26, 2014

expressing a message leads to overlap between the tech-savvy activist and the politically-aware hacker. The media’s eagerness to label anything related to the internet as hacking also contributes to the relation between the two groups.

Some techniques that the layman would call ‘hacking’ don’t require particular expertise in computer security. They occupy a middle ground between high-skill actions like breaking into corporate or government servers and traditional publicity of an issue.

“There are some grey areas like DDoSing which has come to be identified with hacktivism,” Coleman said. “But you don’t have to be technically skilled to participate in a DDoS.” It’s easier to launch a DDoS attack than to hack into a CIA database, and the relative accessibility of DDoSing makes it attractive to activists. Ultimately, though, it’s just one technique.

“Off the bat, [activists] have to engage in certain tactics that belong online if they want their issues to have any popular recognition at all,” Sauter said. “But there has to be a panoply of tactics being used, sometimes online and

“

Thousands of masked protesters gathered outside Church headquarters in major cities across the world. It marked the first time that Anonymous gathered en masse in the real world, united by a common cause.

“

It was in 2010, however, that Anonymous’ status was cemented as a hacktivist group, with the commencement of “Operation Payback.” The operation started as a series of DDoS attacks on media companies whose copyright litigations had gone against the group’s anti-censorship beliefs.

It quickly grew to something much greater. Anonymous rallied in response to major companies like Amazon, Paypal, and Visa withdrawing supI) sI ey port from Wikileaks, The websites of r f ef both Visa and MasterCard were taken down rJ o t

by DDoS attacks. PayPal and Amazon were ic fV o also targeted. y es i n g t r “It felt historic,” Coleman said. “The ou c w e b si t e number of people in the chat rooms was unoto h P 4Chan.

But precedented there was a real anger [about the ( n. a when a video censorship of Wikileaks,] and Operation Paym ole interview of Sci- back helped people channel that anger.”

C a ell In the years that followed, Anonymous bri entologist Tom Cruise a G was released in February of continued to ally itself with politically mor so that year, everything changed. tivated causes, including notably the Arab s fe Pro The interview had depicted Spring and the Occupy Wall Street Movethe Church of Scientology in a nega- ment. Most recently, the group compromised tive light, and in response, the church the Klu Klux Klan’s Twitter account. moved to have it removed or changed.

This trend in the politicalization of hackAnonymous viewed this as an act of internet ing is not unique to Anonymous. Technolcensorship and responded by declaring war. ogy is increasingly being used as a tool by Their goal was simple: They were going to whistleblowers like Edward Snowden and expel the Church of Scientology from the in- Wikileaks informants. ternet.

The stereotypical image of a computer Up until that day, Anonymous’ cam- whiz hacker breaking into corporate websites paign had taken place from the comfort of to steal millions of dollars is slowly disapits members’ homes. Previously, the group pearing. Instead, the goals of hacktivists are had used a combination of trolling—internet becoming clearer. slang for any activity that’s designed to frus“It’s interesting because sometimes trate or provoke a person or group—and de- hackers get portrayed as being malicious and nial-of-service attacks (DDoS) to oppose sci- without ethics, but really it’s a domain where entology. They’d ordered massive quantities the question of ethics is deeply discussed,” of pizza to Church of Scientology addresses, Coleman said. “Many hackers are committed faxed pages upon pages of black sheets, and to free speech and privacy [....] Certain hackeven took the organization’s website off-line ers are really against computer intrusion, and for several hours. they’ll call those who do that ‘crackers’ [….]

Feb. 10 was different. Thousands of It’s really frowned upon to intrude and gain masked protesters gathered outside Church financially from that intrusion, so there’s that headquarters in major cities across the world. code of ethics.”

It marked the first time that Anonymous gathToday’s Anonymous marks a fascinatered en masse in the real world, united by a ing microcosm of the intersection between common cause. hackers and activists. Its politicalization dif“The experience of protesting on the ferentiates it from other hacking communistreet awakened a kind of activist sensibility ties, where value is placed on creation and in people,” explained McGill professor Ga- innovation, but not necessarily on changing briella Coleman, whose academic career has the world or defending human rights. revolved around the study of Anonymous.

“Hackers are people with technical skills “The media validation that [Anonymous] got who build things for fun,” said Sami Jaber, a helped to establish it as an activist entity.” co-founder of HackMcGill. “Some people The intersection of hacking and activ- have [social change] as a goal, but a lot of the ism—often called hacktivism—had already time […] you kind of end up helping people existed, but Anonymous’ scale and interna- as a byproduct.” tional base meant that it was able to draw an Much of hacking culture on university unprecedented amount of attention to the is- campuses revolves around hackathons— sue. marathon coding-sessions where teams spend Before 2008, hackers by the name of Anonymous were just a group of regulars on the imageshar-

sometimes in the real world, or activism runs the risk of becoming incredibly siloed and myopic.”

Feb. 10 wasn’t the first time that a group had used strategies spanning over both real and virtual worlds to make a statement, but it was notable for its scale. It marked a shift in the nature of Anonymous, and this shift would have profound effects on how society would come to view hacktivism.

The story of Anonymous is one of the merging of the hacker and the activist. It’s a case study in the convergence of technology and politics, and how the relationship between the two—for better or for worse—is changing the world.

Science and Technology

23

(Photos courtesy of Joe Schwarcz and Davd Harpp.)

Welcome to the wizard room

Montreal science muskateers separate the sense from the nonsense Chloe Nevitt Science & Technology Editor It’s no wonder people easily confuse magic and chemistry—both involve delightful colour-changing reactions, explosions, fire, and above all, curiosity.

“When I was in Grade 6, I was at a birthday party and there was a magician there,” said Joe Schwarcz, founder and director of the Office of Science and Society (OSS). “He did a trick where he linked three ropes together, and he pretended to do it with what he called a ‘magic chemical.’”

Schwarcz, who, at the time, had never heard of magic, or chemistry, went to the public library and checked out books on both subjects.

What he learned from those pages were topics he hoped would be reflected in his schoolings. Unfortunately, he soon realized that he was wrong.

“It was dreadful,” he explained.

“We had one […] chemistry [course] in high school and it was terrible. It was basically memorizing formulas and doing diagrams of experiments that we never [even] did.”

For Schwarcz, this was the moment he realized that there was a gap that needed to be filled. Students weren’t interested in science because it simply wasn’t interesting.

He then promised himself that when he would be given the opportunity, he would set out to change this.

After graduating from McGill in 1974 with a PhD in chemistry, Schwarcz found himself a position teaching at Dawson College, where he soon met Ariel Fenster, who would become another founding member of the OSS. At this point, Schwarcz was already fulfilling his childhood promise by teaching the course “Chemistry in the Modern World,” something entirely unique to its time. He was showing students real-life applications of chemistry—the light at the end of the tunnel.

When Fenster arrived at Dawson, he was immediately interested in Schwarcz’s course, and the two then sought to expand.

“We started giving lectures and shows to high schools,” Fenster said.

“It was exciting and there was certainly a need to present chemistry as it really is.”

In response to this need, Fenster and Schwarcz gave a magic show at an open house at Dawson College in March 1976. However, the magicians weren’t performing regular magic tricks. Their show, called the Magic of Chemistry, used chemical reactions in a series of funny, impressive, and occasionally dangerous, tricks to impress and educate audiences. “[In] one demonstration, [Schwarcz would fire] a canon, and I [would hold] a piece of paper imprinted with phosphorous and carbon disulfide in my hand, and he was supposed to [shoot] the paper,” Fenster said. “When the carbon disulfide evaporated, the phosphorous catches fire.”

This trick, and many others, was so fascinating that the pair began to draw the attention of people around Montreal. The professors would soon turn to newer and bigger tricks.

In 1978, the city of Montreal asked McGill professor David Harpp to organize a science display for the summer season at UNESCO’s “Man and His World” exhibition at the site of the 1967 World’s Fair.

“It was at that very moment I thought of Fenster and Schwarcz,” Harpp said. “I had gotten to know them because they were good teachers and we had [even met] a couple of times, so I asked them to do it, and they said yes.”

The three then hired a team of seven undergraduate students to present exciting and interesting demos on chemistry. However, as the trio began to prepare for these presentations, they realized they were short

24 Science and Technology

on space.

“Originally, in the Otto Maass building, there was a cloakroom [with] a woman [who] sat in there all day to hang student’s coats,” Harpp said. “She retired just about the time when we needed that room, and we got it.”

The room, Otto Maass 110, would soon hold more than just props—it would become the place to find science expertise at McGill. This was where the magic happened. The “Wizard Room,” as Harpp, Fenster, and Schwarcz called it, was where they would create the presentations that would be given at the Expo. “[The organizers had] built five or six stations and the animator would stand there and do about a sixminute demo set on food, combustion, colours, polymers­ —stuff that makes [it] fun for the audiences,” Harpp said.

Over two summers, the demonstrations were presented to over 80,000 people.

The trio then began a series of lectures on food chemistry on the West Island, and by the time it ended, the three were left with a colossal quantity of information that they couldn’t throw away.

As such, and in response to the success of their family-friendly chemistry, the threesome were motivated to begin a series of evening lectures hosted at McGill in 1982 to meet public demands. The team soon became a hit.

That same Fall, they started a course open to all students at McGill.

In the first year, the class hosted 240 students; the second, 440 students; after the third year, Leacock 132 filled up entirely.

“It kept growing and [expanded] to become the World of Chemistry enterprise,” Schwarcz explained.

As a result of these courses, the three have won over 30 local, provincial, and internally-based teaching awards.

Four World of Chemistry

Wednesday, November 26, 2014

courses are offered at McGill; they cover food, drugs, technology, and environment, and are co-taught by Schwarcz, Fenster, and Harpp. The courses offer insight on the chemistry behind everything from artificial sweeteners to wine, cancer, and cars.

In 1995, the city approached the trio to once again give demonstrations on chemistry, similar to their “Man and His World” exposé.

This time, however, their dazzling performances drew in a crowd of over 300,000 over the summer.

But something was still missing.

In October 1999, while attending the annual Leacock Luncheon, two past McGill students approached Harpp. Both had taken a World of Chemistry course and both had described it as “the most useful course [taken] took at McGill.” To Harpp, this was an unusual phrase of praise.

“We often get people telling us the course was great, or one of the best they’ve ever taken at McGill, or boring even, but useful wasn’t usually the word used,” Harpp said.

After having these conversations with students, Harpp realized that if students were actually using the course, why stop there?

“I called up Schwarcz, who was at Vanier [College] at that time, and [asked] ‘Why don’t you come to McGill [so] we can start an office’ and in 10 seconds, he said yes,” Harpp said. Fenster, who was also at Vanier College, would join later on.

However, before Harpp could proceed, he needed the green light from former McGill principal Bernard Shapiro. With the support of the vice-principal academic and the dean of science, Harpp pitched the idea to Shapiro, who agreed.

“We [now] had a focal place where people could address their questions,” Schwarcz said. “The public has all kinds of questions about foods and drugs, and there were obviously people at McGill

who were capable of answering them, but no one knew who to call.”

The office’s mission is simple: To separate sense from nonsense.

Collectively, the team has given hundreds of lectures on TV, on the radio, and even at other universities.

Fenster, who is French, has played a key role in ensuring that they can provide this science in both French and English.

In order to fund these ventures, the team has relied on the money they made from teaching the World of Chemistry courses, as well as help from outside sources. In the Fall of 2011, Lorne Trottier donated $5.5 million to the OSS, a gift that would help ensure they would remain operational in perpetuity.

The result of this gift was the annual Lorne Trottier Public Symposium, an event meant to raise public awareness on contemporary issues confronting society today. Past symposiums have covered topics that ranged from extraterrestrial life to alternative medicines.

Schwarcz has fought against homeopaths, pseudo-science believers, anti-GMO people, and psychics—people he not so fondly refers to as “quacks”—to minimize the collateral damage their lies can do.

His Dr. Joe show— aimed at demystifying science—is the longest ‘callin’ science radio show in Canadian history. He’s also written 15 books on popular science to date.

Today, the OSS continues their fight against science perpetrators.

In this ongoing battle for the truth, Schwarcz is confident that the OSS team is on the winning side.

“We’re on the side of science, and that’s all there is to it.”

Remi Lu Managing Editor Kieran Steer’s lab supervisor, Dr. Gulzhakan Sadvakassova, had left him in the lab with a row of cell cultures. Earlier, she had asked him if he knew how to use a pipette. Fresh out of high school—and on his first day on the job—he answered yes, picturing the eyedroppers he had used in chemistry class.

That was three years ago. Today, Steer is no longer that fresh-faced first-year, just happy to have been given a volunteer lab job. Steer, now a third year pharmacology major, is on the verge of publishing his first research paper alongside Dr. Svetlana Komarova—a researcher from the Faculty of Dentistry.

The study itself, which focuses on explaining the bone loss common in diseases marked by excessive blood production in the bone marrow, has been in development for the past three years. With a number of diseases directly related to excessive production of blood cells within the bone marrow—including sickle cell anemia and cancers of the blood cells—this research area has become

This month in

Student Research

dense with studies and hypotheses— none fully conclusive.

“We went to the literature to see what other people were saying, and we saw that […] everyone had all these hypotheses, like iron levels [as] the culprit for bone loss,” Steer said. “Another says it’s inflammation, [and] another says it’s erythropoietin [a protein related to blood cell production.]”

Steer’s research began with his first day on the job, when he was tasked with cell counting and doing Western blots—a technique to detect specific proteins in cells—the grunt work normally associated with lab volunteers. He persevered, and impressed Sadvakassova such that she invited him to take a larger role in the project.

The team began with experiments on cell cultures, testing the effect of specific blood components on bone-destroying cell activities. The experiments proved inconclusive, forcing the team to broaden their experiment to work on mice. Yet these experiments also failed to yield any

novel results. As such, the team was once more faced with their original research question.

The researchers never lost sight of their original goal: To improve understanding of osteoclasts and osteoblasts—bone-destroying cells and bone-forming cells respectively.

“This is a very important issue—understanding why there’s bone loss with different disorders,” Steer said. “What I really hope that this [study] will help with is directing research, and being able to point people in the right direction about what kinds of things to be testing for this.”

Furthermore, as with many studies, this one will be essential in improving the knowledge base in order to combat bone-related complications of difficult diseases—in this case different forms of cancers and blood disorders.

“A lot of what you discover you don’t necessarily know the direct impacts,” Steer said. “It’s just increasing the knowledge field. I think that’s a good thing for a lot of researchers to acknowledge. As much as we know

the direct positive impacts the research will have, there’s also a huge potential for things that we don’t expect it to do.”

With such extensive knowledge in the field of hematology, Steer hopes to use his experience to contribute something tangible to society.

“Part of me [is] thinking very strongly about business in the pharmaceutical industry,” Steer said.

“Being able to tie knowledge of pharmaceuticals with finance—I’m doing business courses right now as well— would be really interesting [….] I could see myself as a doctor as well.

I love working with people. I want to be in a field where things are changing—be it surgery or some kind of internal diagnostic medicine.”

While most undergraduate students move from lab to lab in order to fill up their CV, Steer recommends

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committing to a single lab, in order for other students to benefit from continuity the same way he has.

“People will jump around different labs […] and that has its benefits,” Steer said. “But for me personally, I wouldn’t change the fact that I’ve been in the same lab for so long.

I’ve had this project that I understand very deeply, and I’ve been able to have a very good role in [it] as well.”

Net Neutrality Abraham Moussako Opinion Editor For the past few years, Network neutrality has been one of the more under-the-radar issues in the American national debate. This partly changed at the start of this month, when U.S. President Barack Obama, barely a week after his party’s drubbing in the midterms, took a public stance in favour of the Federal Communication Commission (FCC) establishing rules prohibiting internet service providers (ISPs) from privileging any kind of online traffic over another. Net neutrality has become something of a cause célèbre for both activists on the left and a large community of technology publications, as concerns arise over continued consolidation amongst ISPs and mergers between ISPs and content companies.

However, while the goals of advocates for an ‘open internet’ might require government regulation at this point, much of the blame for the current state of affairs might lie with earlier, short-sighted government regulation.

The term ‘network neutrality’ can be traced to Columbia University professor Tim Wu, who suggested the concept of controlling the ability

of internet network operators to limit access to specific websites or slow down specific types of traffic. The distinction between network operators controlling the usage of total bandwidth and the use of specific applications is critical. To advocates, this is the difference between preserving the ‘open internet’ as we know it today, and creating a semi-dystopic world in which the internet functions almost like pay television, and access to some websites would be significantly more costly than others.

This vision is one that rightly strikes fear into the hearts of the net’s denizens. The controversy here harks back to the fear over the Stop Online Piracy Act, a 2012 bill in the U.S. Congress that sparked protest blackouts of major sites like reddit and Wikipedia. The legislation was cited by critics as opening up the internet to government censorship for corporate

band access, the U.S. was middle of the pack on internet affordability, with Canada ranking 23rd out of the 30 countries examined.

This price disparity is a direct result of a lack of competition in the ISP area, and net neutrality is at best treating the symptoms of a much larger, deeper-seated problem—one (Elli Slavitch / McGill Tribune) that governments helped to create. interests, based on grounds of alleged intellectual property theft. Here, the While ISPs in a net-neutrality-free supposed threat is corporate censor- world could engage in abusive practices, in a world where there is true ship by traffic throttling.

The situation with net neutrality consumer choice and competition, is complicated by the relatively static this ability would be checked by conmarket in telecom providers. In both sumers actually being able to switch the U.S. and Canada, consumers have to another service provider.

The entrenched positions of little choice for cable, phone, and television providers in their particular ISPs like Comcast and Time Warner area, and thus little competition on Cable are also the result of governprice, bandwidth, and­­­—perhaps most ment action—but at the local level.

Unlike the app development field, infamously—customer service.

In a 2009 FCC study on broad- where low barriers to entry have al-

Wednesday, November 26, 2014

lowed almost comical levels of development, providing internet service is a task that requires substantial legal overhead, high startup costs, upfront infrastructure investments, and other barriers that entrench the big companies. Local governments compound the problem by charging companies exorbitant rates for the ability to place their wires on public property and attach them to utility poles. The widely praised Google Fiber deployments in several midsize cities in the U.S. were largely facilitated through a loosening of these regulations. On the other end, lobbying by telecom companies has resulted in several states passing laws that make it harder for municipalities to offer their own broadband services, heading off another source of competition.

It is clear that the net neutrality debate will not end soon. As the FCC continues to grapple with how to ensure the internet retains its best qualities, a larger issue remains. No matter how the government reclassifies the internet, there will still be a complete lack of competition.

Science and Technology

25

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Email photo@mcgilltribune.com or come to SSMU Room 110 on Wednesdays at 6:00PM

FROM THE CHEAP SEATS: The changing landscape of Ohio sports Aaron rose Staff Writer

martlets 65, Stingers 55

Cloutier sinks Concordia with career performance Martlets move to first place, remain sole undefeated team in RSEQ Carolann Cloutier elevates towards the rim. (Remi Lu / McGill Tribune) Elie Waitzer Sports Editor With one second left on the shot clock, Carolann Cloutier let it fly from beyond the arc and drained a three to widen an early lead for McGill.

In a flash, she sprinted to intercept the inbounds pass, dribbled into open space, and pulled up for another two points.

It was that kind of night Saturday for Cloutier and the Martlets (3-0). McGill defeated the Concordia Stingers (1-2) 65-55 to move into first place in the RSEQ standings. McGill is now the only undefeated team left in the conference, and the win snapped a three-game losing streak against the Stingers dating back to Nov. 21, 2013.

For a team built around its dominant forwards, the Martlets struggled to score in the paint early on. Fortunately, the team’s young guards were able to take care of business on the perimeter.

“They played us with a zone [defence], which took away some of our inside game but freed up some outside shots,” Head Coach Ryan Thorne said. “We haven’t been shooting well over the past couple of games, so for Cloutier to come out and do that was well needed.”

Cloutier–a sophomore guard from Montreal–was relentless over 31 minutes of courttime, shooting 11-for-15 from the field for a career-high 27 points. Fifteen of those points came on threepointers, as she nailed shot after shot—including a dagger with 4:10 remaining in the fourth quarter to put the game out of reach. She finished with five three-pointers on six attempts. The performance proved contagious, as the entire Martlet squad caught fire from three-point range in the first half, finishing the game with 11 triples.

“We shot 60 per cent from three in the first half,” Thorne said. “I think everybody felt com-

28 Sports

fortable and confident. When you see one [teammate] going, you feel good and start hitting shots.”

The win was a complete effort for the Martlets. Coach Thorne utilized his deep bench to give significant minutes to 10 different players, keeping his starters fresh throughout the game. While the Stingers managed to hold star junior forward Mariam Sylla to just six points, she bullied her opponents on the glass, pulling down a gamehigh 14 rebounds. Senior point guard Dianna Ros added an efficient 11 points and six assists, and sophomore forward Jen Silver and freshman guard Marika Guerin each finished with six points.

In contrast, all five Stingers starters played the full 40 minutes—a reflection of Concordia’s lack of depth. Still, it was a five-point game at the end of the third quarter, at which point Thorne outlined a new game plan at the break.

“We wanted to push the tempo and make them run,” Thorne said. “They had five players, so we wanted to make it a lot more of a fast-paced game.”

The strategy worked, as the fatigued Stingers hit a wall partway through the final frame. The Martlets outscored Concordia 12-7 in the final quarter, closing out the win with an energetic defensive display.

The Martlets will look to stay undefeated in their last game of the semester against secondplace Laval (2-1) on Friday, Nov. 28.

Despite the impressive all-around showing from his team, Coach Thorne said that he needed to see more hustle before the Martlets could take their game to the next level.

“We need that hunger–right now we’re not hungry,” Thorne said. “[I] give a lot of credit to Concordia–they played well and attacked us. But we have to […] go out there and dive after loose balls [and] play physical.”

Wednesday, November 26, 2014

It’s not easy to be a loser. Trust me, I’ve been an Ohio State Buckeye fan for as long as I can remember and while the Buckeyes have been a powerhouse in the NCAA, professional sports in Ohio haven’t shared the same fate. As for the Blue Jackets, I relinquished any sort of affiliation for the Toronto Maple Leafs after another devastating playoff loss in 2004 and jumped on the Blue Jackets’ bandwagon­—if any sort of bandwagon even exists for a perennial basement dweller.

For the three major professional teams located in Cleveland, it’s been a combined 156 seasons without a championship, a record that’s spanned over 50 years. Frank Ryan’s Cleveland Browns were the last team to bring home a championship way back in 1964. Since then, Cleveland has had 50 years of heartbreak. They gave up ‘The Drive’ to John Elway, ‘The Shot’ to Michael Jordan, and saw their hometown hero LeBron James leave in ‘The Decision’. Perhaps the highlight of those years was the Cleveland Indians’ 10cent beer night on June 4, 1974.

In Cincinnati and Columbus, the story has been almost equally devastating. The Bengals have never won a Super Bowl; while enjoying just one winning season from 1991-2008, the once ferocious Bengals became known as the hapless “Bungals.” The Reds have been Ohio’s only somewhat successful professional team. They’ve won three World Series pennants in the last 50 years, but from 1996 to 2009, the Reds had just two winning seasons. In Columbus, The Ohio State University dominates sports culture. Only recently did the city add the franchise, but the Jackets have been the laughingstock of the NHL for almost the entirety of their 14-year history. Collegiately, the Buckeyes have dominated the NCAA since the late ’60s, but a 2010 NCAA investigation exposed NCAA violations, leading to the resignation of famed Buckeye Head Coach Jim Tressel. The Buckeyes received a two-year bowl ban and watched their 2010 season go down the gutter.

On Friday night, I went to ‘The House that Sergei Bobrovsky Built’—if I can call it that. It was my first pilgrimage to Ohio, the heartland of American sporting despair. The Blue Jackets were playing host to the Boston Bruins, a city and team that seems to know nothing but winning. During my lifetime,

Massachusetts’ sports teams have been the pinnacle of success; between the Patriots, Red Sox, Celtics, and Bruins, the state has won eight championships since 2001. In the same time span, Ohio sports fans have only seen one championship series that ended in typical Ohio fashion—with the San Antonio Spurs sweeping the Cleveland Cavaliers. On game night, The Blue Jackets jumped out to an early 2-0 lead but, as always seems to be the case in Ohio, an unlucky bounce put their opponents on the board. The Bruins pulled ahead in the third but a Jack Johnson goal tied it up for the Blue Jackets, who held on to force overtime. Following a scoreless overtime period, 13 shooters solved nothing before Bruins centreman Alex Khokhlachev beat Bobrovsky to seal the deal for the Bruins. At the end of the day, at least we got one point.

The following night I took my seat at Ohio Stadium to watch the 10-1 Ohio State Buckeyes take on a horrid Indiana Hoosiers squad. The spread going into the game was 38.5 for the Buckeyes but the Hoosiers wouldn’t go away, eventually pulling ahead early in the third on a 90-yard touchdown rush. The Buckeyes clawed back in the second half on the strength of Jalin Marshall’s four touchdown game to seal a 42-27 victory.

While the win looked good on paper, the College Football Playoff committee will not be impressed by the Buckeyes this weekend. Four years after the Buckeyes were mired with scandal, Ohio State has once again returned to the top of the Big Ten. Maybe, as Bob Dylan once said, “The times they are a-changin.” A weekend in Columbus showed me there might be a light at the end of the tunnel, and a bright future for sports in Ohio.

The 2014 off-season brought hope back to Cleveland when LeBron James took his talents back to ‘North Beach,’ pairing up with Kevin Love and Kyrie Irving to creating one of the league’s few super teams. After a revamping of the front office his past year, the once abysmal Browns have found their way back to relevancy, led by a lethal running attack and a ferocious defence. In Cincinnati, the Bengals have strung together three consecutive playoff appearances and currently sit atop the AFC North.

Maybe, just maybe, I wont be a loser for much longer.

redmen 68, Stingers 38

McGill keeps calm to blow out Stingers Redmen use strong second half to bury Concordia ZIkomo smith Staff Writer Despite going punch for punch with the Redmen (2-1) through two hard-fought quarters, the final score read 69-38 in an embarrassing road loss for the Concordia Stingers (2-1). What was a four-point game at halftime become a blowout in a lopsided second half.

“I think we imposed our will on them at the end,” Head Coach David DeAveiro said. “They got a little tired and we kept on going at them. They got a little tired and we got stronger.”

McGill’s ball movement was superior throughout the game. The Redmen created great looks off of pick and rolls, and their stout defence almost forced the Stingers into several shot clock violations. However, the Stingers’ full-court press forced McGill’s guards into some sloppy turnovers. Concordia dominated the paint early on, forcing McGill to take low-percentage perimeter shots.

McGill shot more effectively in the second quarter, but miscommunications on defence left their opponents open for easy shots.

Concordia pressed energetically and finished the half just four points back of the Redmen.

DeAveiro acknowledged McGill’s struggle in the first half.

“I thought we played hard [and] we competed tonight,” DeAveiro said. “I mean we struggled offensively in the first half, and Concordia played good defense and pressured us.”

McGill responded to the coach’s call, especially Rodrigo Imperador—a senior forward from Bauru, Brazil. Impactful on both sides of the ball, he battled for rebounds in the paint, moved the ball well, and screened effectively. He provided the stability down low that McGill missed in the first half.

McGill extended their lead to 11 points I wish that the Knicks master the triangle offense and the Zen Master brings in a competent partner for over-used Melo; for the Red Bulls to convince superman Thierry Henry to stay on board until he’s 50; and for the Giants to stop being associated with the terms “losing streak” or “downward spiral.”

—Nick Jasinski I wish for rumours of beef between Marshawn Lynch and the Seahawks team to be put to rest. I wish the beautiful, doe-eyed Russell Wilson improvement in his passing game. I wish Seattle the best of luck in San Francisco this Thursday and send Doug Baldwin Jr. my love and best wishes this holiday season.

—Jess Fu

by the end of the third quarter, as their shots finally started to fall. Sophomore wing Michael Peterkin went on a seven-point tear in the span of two minutes, while starting point guard Ave Bross showcased a tight handle and controlled the tempo through the final quarter.

Dele Ogundokun, a sophomore guard, was relentless in creating looks for his team and in hounding opposing guards into turnovers and blocked shots.

By the end of the third, the Stingers were tired and frustrated, unable to match the energy and physicality of their rivals. McGill’s prowess was on full display in the third and they proved their killer instinct by closing out the final quarter in emphatic style.

“I think we wore them down,” DeAveiro said. “We were physical and went to the glass.

We tried to put pressure on them.”

Concordia’s frustration reached a breaking point in the fourth when a brief tussle broke out midway through the quarter. Sophomore forward François Borque and three Concordia players were ejected, but McGill kept calm. Ogundokun and sophomore point guard Jenning Leung finished tied for the game-high in points with 14 apiece.

The Redmen now sit in second place behind Bishop’s in the conference standings.

There are still question marks concerning their free throw shooting after going a dismal 13-25 from the line on the game. However, their offensive performance was seamless at times, and they got locked into a defensive rhythm as the game progressed.

Next week, McGill travels to Laval for what should make for an exciting contest.

“Laval is a very talented team,” DeAveiro explained. “We are going to have to be very good defensively because they can put up a lot of points. We will have to defend and rebound the ball and do a better job of running the offense.”

I wish for Adam Lind to be bullied by Ryan Braun and the rest of his new teammates on the Milwuakee Brewers until he comes running home to his real fans in Toronto. Sorry Jonathan Lucroy, I know you’re a nice guy deep down.

—Elie Waitzer

I wish for the Buffalo to beat the Patriots during their last face-off of the season. But I’m not a little girl anymore. I know not all dreams come true, so instead all I want is for them to lose by 10 points or less.

—Morgan Alexander

My rather lofty wish is for my beloved Toronto Maple Leafs make the playoffs on the back of stellar goaltending from Jonathan Bernier, moulding him into dark horse contender for the Vezina. And if that’s not possible, I want the Leafs to draft Connor McDavid and develop him properly (because the Leafs have a horrible track record of ruining decent prospects or trading them away before they get good—Tuukka Rask anyone?)

—Nicole Spadotto

For as long as I can remember, it has been very little fun to cheer for Toronto sports teams. My wish for 2015 is simple: That Drake–the obvious key to the Raptors’ recent success–is named Global Ambassador for all of Toronto’s franchises, immediately putting each team on the path to glory. ­ —Wyatt Fine-Gagné

Holiday Wishlist Wednesday, November 26, 2014

Sports

29

The Fan Elie Waitzer Sports Editor The first sporting event I remember attending was, quite frankly, boring. It was a Sunday afternoon Blue Jays game at the Sky Dome. The roof was open, and I could feel the sticky July heat from the plastic blue chairs in the 500’s through my shorts. I had no idea what was going on below me, or why 20,000 people would turn up to watch three hours of it—three of the 486 hours that are played over the course of baseball’s regular season. Vernon Wells captured my heart that day with a gamewinning grand slam, but even to this day, the Blue Jays—the object of my fandom—haven’t won much of anything. The game dragged on slowly, I was even thirstier after drinking a Slurpee, I knew I couldn’t have any of the ice-cold beer, and I wondered when the game would finally be over.

Today when I describe myself as a sports fan, it’s difficult to trace the path from then to now—to

pick out that one moment that keyed the transformation. This feeling pops up when I catch myself checking the score of the Raptors game on my phone under the table at dinner with my family, or flipping past the news section in the morning to read up on the latest trade rumours. What caused me to be so highly invested in these teams—and in these players’ lives—when I would rather have been cleaning my room on that Sunday afternoon?

There are many scientific theories that attempt to explain the biological origins of sports fandom. One study found that watching sports activated regions in the brain that correlate with personal success, implying that the vicarious rush is what hooks fans. Another popular theory is that sports provide a venue for social togetherness for families and friends, and that the rivalries that separate teams from one another create a sense of tribalism that bond fans together. For some, including myself, the numbers are a draw. It may seem strange to get worked up over a player reaching an arbitrary

statistical plateau (3,000 hits, the 30/30 club, batting over .300, etc.) in a sandbox where the rules are made up and the stakes are ultimately meaningless, but there’s a certain natural joy in pulling a narrative thread out of a players’ statistics.

Those reasons all play an important role, but for me, it’s the imperceptible passing of time that is responsible both for my fandom and my inability to pinpoint its origin. It’s not quite nostalgia (although history-steeped sports like baseball are best served with a side of Ken Burns’Baseball), but a sense that your fandom is rooted in something so abstract and long forgotten that it can never really be questioned.

There was never that ‘one moment.’ Unless you’re the kid who actually caught Vernon Wells’ walk-off grand-slam ball, it’s something that creeps up on you and burns brighter every season. Fandom is built on unfulfilled hopes and unexpected triumphs–and on the familiarity bred over the years with the athletes who devoted themselves to the sport. Yes, their success is partly personal—they

are playing for a fat free-agency paycheck to support their families, and to cement their legacies.

Being a professional athlete is a job, but at the fundamental level, the whole artifice is balanced on the two-way street between athletes and fans. Even the highest-paid star needs to be met at the field by a crowd of fans, because you have to play for something–like the cheers from your fans. The strength of this relationship is why you see fans shivering in their ponchos at rain-delayed games, and why–for better or for worse–fans will always stay loyal to their team.

I can still recite from memory many of the forgotten heroes who took the field on that summer day: Lyle Overbay, John MacDonald, Aaron Hill, Gustavo Chacin, and my favourite—Adam Lind.

I remember the way Frank Catalanotto pointed his bat at the pitcher, wagging it in little circles high above his head, and the animated flames on the jumbotron when B..J. Ryan trotted out of the pen to close out the ninth.

whether all of the hours spent playing and practicing had been time wasted.

Giving up the dream came with an adjustment period. For a while it was unclear to me what I was playing for—I began to wonder if I loved baseball itself or simply the idea of playing it as a profession. Over time, however, I began to feel as though a weight had been lifted off of my shoulders. Moving past the dream of playing professionally meant no longer needing to live and die with every success or failure. Mistakes in games were now inconsequential once I stepped off of the field. With the long-term results no longer of great concern, I was able to simply enjoy each moment on its own, rather than as part of any sort of journey.

My baseball career is now over. I spent my first two years at McGill as a member of the varsity baseball team before injuries and the time com-

mitment became too much to handle. Every athlete has their turning point, when the commitment and effort required to compete begins to outweigh their love for their sport. For many athletes, it’s a difficult transition to make. It means accepting that what was once a lifelong pursuit is no longer worth chasing. While it was certainly a bittersweet transition for me, it was hardly an unhappy one.

Baseball no longer rules my life as it once did. I still love the game, but perhaps not enough to head to the diamond more than once a week or so. That love manifests itself in other ways. When I play now, I’m playing for the ‘me’ in that moment and nobody else. And that’s exactly how it should be.

beyond, I never had to give up a realistic dream. I was blessed in many senses because I wasn’t good enough to have real hoop dreams in the first place. I understood in high school that I wouldn’t be a highlevel basketball player, enabling me to shift my focus on becoming a sports writer. My basketball IQ, which was always my defining trait as player, would be my most useful asset in my transition to being more than just an athlete.

My turning point during my athletic career came as a result of failure. It was that failure, however, that enabled me to stay within the sports community. It’s hard to remember in a city fuelled by an undying loyalty to the Habs—and in a society that idolizes its athletes as demi-gods—that sports is a form of entertainment. Consequently, the sports media is neither the entertainer nor the entertained,

but rather a tertiary actor tasked with taking a game that children play and turning it into a larger than life cultural phenomenon.

I no longer consider myself an athlete, a label which I proudly branded myself during my childhood. In a similar sense, I’m no longer much of a basketball fan—the more I watched, learned, and absorbed, the less I enjoyed the sport for what it was–a form of entertainment. I can rarely watch basketball, something that I claim to love doing, just for the entertainment; rather, each play is spent dissecting and analyzing, while each game is contextualized into some footnote within a larger narrative.

The Athlete WYATT FINE-GAGNÉ Sports Editor Among those who grow up playing sports, many dream of one day playing professionally. It is only a small percentage, however, who are ever able to do so. Those who do not fall into that select group must, sooner or later, reshape their relationship with sport.

For the majority of collegiate athletes–within both Canada and the United States–professional sports are no longer a consideration. Student-athletes dedicate huge swaths of their time to sports, often with the knowledge that the end of their degree will likely also mark the end of their competitive careers.

From a very young age I was convinced that I was destined to play sports for a living. At first, I believed I would one day lace up my skates as

a member of an NHL club, but eventually my focus switched to baseball. I began playing baseball competitively around the age of seven and have done so each year since then. Despite not even always being the best player on my team, I held an undying belief that I would be one of the fortunate few who ended up playing in the big leagues. It was not until I was 16 that I began to accept that perhaps I had no future in baseball as a player. I was still playing competitively—pitching for a team in one of the better leagues in Ontario—but it was quickly becoming clear that my dream was unlikely to become a reality.

Like so many other athletes at my level, I was being forced to reconsider what sports meant to me. When you grow up believing that you have a future in the game, it inevitably has an impact on your relationship with it. I began to question

The Writer MAYAZ ALAM Managing Editor For almost the entirety of my childhood, basketball was my third favourite sport behind soccer and baseball. I fell in love with basketball in many respects because I fell out of love with the idea of becoming a high-level athlete and immersed myself instead in the world of basketball journalism.

The first-hand knowledge that I learned on the court was supplemented with hours of devouring basketball journalism online—to this day I don’t procrastinate by going on social media, but rather by going to ESPN, Grantland, or Sports Illustrated.

It’s funny to think about now, but there was a point in my life when I realistically thought that I would grow to be 6’ 8” and play college basketball

30 Sports

for four years before making the jump to the NBA. I had been growing two inches a year throughout middle school and naturally thought that I would continue to ascend skywards at the same pace well into high school. After my bold self-proclamation, I grew only a few more inches, topping out at a shade under 6’1”, which effectively ended my dream of ever playing high-level basketball.

Of the many young Canadian athletes that play high school sports, only a handful find their ways into the college ranks; the others, like me, often have a fleeting relationship with sports for the rest of their lives. Some go on to play recreational sports in university, while others only care for athletics when they have children of their own, renewing the cycle anew.

Unlike athletes who do play in college or

Wednesday, November 26, 2014

10 THINGS: Turning points in montreal sports history

By Nick Jasinski

(Photo courtesy of Francis Roy / McGill News)

March 3, 1875: The first organized game of indoor ice hockey was played at the Victoria Skating Rink on René-Lévesque between Drummond and Stanley, where the Sheraton Hotel now stands. Civil engineering student James Creighton organized the game, and many of the players were McGill students. The current standard dimensions for a hockey rink are still the same as those of Victoria Rink.

1995, 1996: The Winnipeg Jets and the Quebec Nordiques moved from Canadian cities to cities in the United States, exemplifying a gradual league-wide shift in the NHL to the American market. The Montreal Canadiens are the last Canadian team to win the Stanley Cup, having done so a record 24 times up until the 1992-1993 season. This accounts for a whopping 25.3 per cent of all championships contested since the founding of the NHL.

1891: A McGill alumnus had a hand in the creation of another major sport: Basketball.

James Naismith was working at a Massachusetts YMCA in 1891, and was instructed to invent an “athletic distraction for rowdy kids trapped indoors by the harsh winter.” The rules of basketball have changed significantly since Naismith’s original game, but it is now one of the most popular professional sports around the world.

1996: The Baltimore Stallions CFL expansion team moved to Montreal to re-establish the Montreal Alouettes. Montreal had been without a CFL team since the 1987 season and had not had much success on the field since the 1970s. In more recent years, the Alouettes have been a dominant force in the CFL with seven Grey Cup appearances between 2002 and 2010, as well as four titles.

1929: The name “Redmen” was used for the first time to describe McGill sports teams. The origin of the name is a topic of debate. Regardless, the name stuck and has since been an integral part of McGill’s sports identity. McGill women’s teams adopted the “Martlets” moniker in 1976.

2005: Marty the Martlet is chosen as the official kilt-wearing mascot of both the McGill Redmen and Martlet teams by a student vote. He was officially unveiled at the 2005 Redmen football homecoming game.

1978: The Formula One Canadian Grand Prix moved to Île Notre-Dame in Montreal, where it has been held every year since. In 2005, the Canadian Grand Prix was the third most-watched sporting event worldwide, behind only Super Bowl XXXIX and the 2005 UEFA Champions League Final. The race attracts over 300,000 spectators each year, 25 per cent of whom are from outside of Quebec.

August 12, 1994: The 1994 Montreal Expos held a Major League Baseball-leading 74-40 record when a players union strike cut the season short, cancelling the playoffs and World Series. This hurt the Expos’ campaign for a new stadium, and the team owners decided not to invest in retaining star players such as Larry Walker and Moisés Alou.

Attendance declined over the next decade and financial troubles compounded, prompting the team to move to Washington D.C. in 2005 to become the Nationals.

2005-2006: The McGill administration cancelled the last two games of the Redmen football season following public revelations of inappropriate hazing that younger members of the team had been subjected to. The team struggled in the seasons following their suspension, winning a total of only three games from 2007 until 2011, including four winless seasons.

2012: The Montreal Impact joins Major League Soccer and become Montreal’s first toptier soccer franchise. The Impact has won two CONCACAF Champions League-qualifying Canadian Championships in the last two seasons, representing Canada in both competitions. The squad has been key in growing the sport both within Québec and Canada as a whole.

redmen 4, Varsity Blues 1

Redmen top Rams, Varsity Blues in weekend sweep Delisle-Houde shines bright in stellar weekend MAYAZ ALAM Managing Editor It’s been three seasons since the McGill Redmen (11-3-0) won its only CIS University Cup. With the way that the squad is currently playing, winning nine of its past 10 games following a 4-1 victory against the Toronto Varsity Blues (4-8-1), a second consecutive trip to the National Championships and a second title aren’t out of the realm of possibilities.

On Saturday night, McGill outclassed the visiting Varsity Blues, jumping out to an early lead in the first period, and never relinquishing.

Junior forward Jonathan Brunelle started the scoring midway through the period before left winger Patrick Delisle-Houde notched the gamewinning goal on the man advantage with five minutes remaining in the first. Cedric McNicoll tapped in a rebound and winger Max Le Sieur notched an empty net goal to round out the scoring.

Goaltender Karel St. Laurent was stout in net for the Redmen, saving 20 of 21 shots en route to improv-

ing his season record to 5-1. Jacob Gervais-Chouinard, the regular starter, owns a 6-2 record, but is playing marginally worse than his backup.

St. Laurent leads the OUA in save percentage and goals against average (GAA). Head Coach Kelly Nobes downplayed any goaltending controversies and highlighted the benefits of excellent depth.

“I think it’s a great situation to have your two goalies at the top of the league in terms of save percentage and goals against,” Nobes explained.

“The past few weekends they’ve been splitting the duties and pushing each other to be better in giving us a chance to win every night.”

This year’s squad has a few similarities to that title-winning team.

Both are defensive juggernauts— McGill finished second in the CIS in GAA and first in save percentage in the 2011-2012 season, while this year’s squad ranks second and third, respectively, at the national level.

Nobes pointed out that although this year’s team has been stout, it still has a long way to go to.

“[The] team that won was a high-scoring, highoffensive output team and was able to dominate a lot of games offensively,” Nobes said. “ [For us] we look at our structure and try to be as structured as possible, and that’s probably why you see some pretty good defensive Guilliaume Langelier-Parent snaps a shot on net. (Noah Sutton / McGill Tribune) ing to come down to us being healthy season game of 2014. numbers from our The team, which sits ninth in for one, and clicking at the right time, group.”

The victory against University the CIS nationwide rankings, still has and being at our best at the right time of Toronto was the team’s second 4-1 plenty of obstacles in its way—the of the year,” Nobes said. “The focus victory of the weekend—the team Redmen are currently tied with Car- is just on getting better every day here topped the Ryerson Rams (8-4-1) on leton for second in the treacherous at practice staying in the moment [to] Friday. McGill continues its season at OUA East, and is one point behind just make sure that we’re continually home on Thursday, Nov. 27 against division-leading UQTR (11-2-1). As improving as a group.” the Concordia Stingers (5-11-0) in a result, Nobes’ squad knows that the annual “Score with School” game there is still much to be done to secure sponsored by the English Montreal a playoff berth in arguably the toughSchool Board, before setting its sights est division in the CIS. “It’ll be like last year where it’ll on a showdown with rivals Carleton (11-3-0) on Nov. 29, the last regular come down to the playoffs, and it’s go-

Wednesday, November 26, 2014

Sports

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Athletes of the Week MARTLET HOCKEY

Patrick Delisle-Houde

Catherine Amyot

Delisle-Houde racked up five points over the weekend and the Redmen pulled in two wins, as they defeated the University of Toronto and Ryerson 4-1 each for the weekend sweep. Delisle-Houde scored what would eventually become the game winner in both Friday’s and Saturday’s contests, contributing three assists as well. He was named the first star Friday and the second star Saturday for his efforts, and now has 16 points in just 13 games this season for the third-place Redmen squad.

(Photos courtesy of McGill Athletics)

Amyot was nothing short of sensational in all three of McGill’s victories this week. The third-year power hitter–and two-time recipient of Athlete of the Week–led the Martlets in points in each of the three games, with 19.5 against UNB, 23.5 against Memorial, and 16.5 against Moncton. The majority of Amyot’s points came on kills, as she topped her previous season high for this year with 18 against Memorial. She also managed to mix in 16 digs.

Thanks to Amyot’s strong play, McGill sits just one game back of the RSEQ Conference lead, and should climb at least a spot or two in the nationwide rankings.

Ice Hockey—Left Wing Junior, Education

Years since the Redmen rugby team was last defeated in the RSEQ Finals prior to Sunday’s loss to Concordia.

The team had won eight consecutive championships before being dethroned by the Stingers over the weekend.

Volleyball—Power Hitter Junior, Engineering

Martlet basketball’s three-point shooting percentage in Saturday’s victory against Concordia.

The team scored 11 baskets from beyond the arc.

Number of kills tallied by the Martlet volleyball team in the its decisive win against Memorial University on Saturday.

A 5-2 loss against the No. 2-ranked Montreal Carabins last Friday will likely push the Martlets out of the top spot in the CIS Rankings. Despite following up the loss with a 5-1 road win against the Ottawa Gee-Gees, it appears McGill is destined to continue see-sawing with the Carabins in the nationwide rankings. Third-year forward Gabrielle Davidson continued to put forth stellar performances, racking up three goals and an assist over the two games. The strong showing pushed her season total to 14 points in just eight games. Sophomore goaltender Brittany Smrke was uncharacteristically shaky in the loss to Montreal, giving up four goals on just 18 shots, saddling her with her first defeat of the season. Third-year Taylor Hough replaced Smrke partway through the second period of the loss to Montreal, and got the nod against the Gee-Gees Saturday. Hough picked up her third win of the season against Ottawa, turning away 19 of 20 shots she faced.

REDMEN RUGBY

As the clock woundd down in overtime of McGill’s 28-21 loss to the Concordia Stingers, a sense of disbelief washed over the crowd. It has been nine years since a team other than the Redmen has captured the RSEQ Championship, but the Stingers did just that in Sunday’s RSEQ Final. The game was as exciting as they come, requiring overtime to decide a winner. Down 21-16 at the beginning of the second half of overtime, McGill responded as Usman Naqvi scored a try on a turnover that knotted the game at 21 apiece. A missed convert by fourth-year Quentin Pradere, however, prevented McGill from taking the lead. With just six minutes left in overtime, Stingers’ winger Phillipe Bibeau capitalized on a Redmen turnover, scoring a try to give Concordia the lead. Despite a late push, the Redmen were unable to break through the Concordia defence. The title is Concordia’s first since 2005, when they beat McGill 20-18.

MARTLET VOLLEYBALL

The No. 9 ranked Martlets (9-3) climbed closer to conference leaders Laval and Montreal with a perfect week, winning all three games against the east coast teams. McGill defeated the University of New Brunswick, Memorial University, and Moncton, dropping just three sets total over the course of the three matches. Junior power hitter Catherine Amyot led the way with nearly 60 points over the course of the three matches, while third-year Ashley Norfleet contributed another 43.5 points from the weak side. McGill has dominated Atlantic foes for the past several seasons, and shows no signs of letting up. The team rounds out its season with a key match at home against the Montreal Carabins on Nov. 27 at 7 p.m. The game is also McGill’s third annual “Dig for the Cure” event, with the Martlets donning pink uniforms and collecting donations to support the Quebec Breast Cancer Foundation.