McGill Tribune Vol. 34 Issue 7

EDITORIAL

Wednesday, October 15, 2014 Volume No. 34 Issue No. 7

Mental health initiative raises more questions than answers pg. 6

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PGSS COUNCil p. 4

The changing face of space University of Toronto hosts panel on evolution of space science CHLOE NEVITT Science & Technology Editor

(Noah Sutton / McGill Tribune)

PGSS Council endorses AGSEM union drive, creates Sustainability Committee Tariq Khan drops case against SSMU regarding the invalidation of his presidency Khan cites financial costs, ad-hoc committee to review voting bylaws CECE ZHANG News Editor Last Thursday, Tariq Khan withdrew his case against the Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) and Elections SSMU regarding the invalidation of his electoral win as SSMU President in April 2014. Khan won the election on March 21 by 78 votes. On April 1, Elections

SSMU announced the invalidation of Khan’s win, which was due to the bylaw infractions that occurred in his campaign. Runner-up Courtney Ayukawa was then announced as the SSMU president.

Khan had first contested the invalidation via SSMU’s Judicial Board (J-Board), but when the decision was upheld, he then sought to have his claims heard

by the Superior Court of Quebec.

In May, Khan filed an injunction with the Superior Court, seeking for the court to grant a safeguard order that would reinstate him as the SSMU president until a full hearing could be held later in the year. The court ruled against the interim injunction, stating that “there [was] no proof of any procedural irregularities sufficient to support the suspension of

[Khan’s disqualification].”

“The plaintiff, through its undersigned attorneys, withdraws his claim against the defendants, and they, through their attorneys undersigned, accept such discontinuance without costs,“ reads the court document signed by both Khan and SSMU’s lawyers.

Continued on pg. 4

On Oct. 1, space enthusiasts addressed the evolution of the Canadian space program as part of the International Astronautical Congress (IAC) 2014. The IAC theme this year, Our World Needs Space, hosted discussions that explored the way space inventions could be used on Earth.

The panelists—some of the most respected names in Canadian planetary science—highlighted the spectrum of possibilities.

The talk welcomed over a thousand space aficionados to join Bill Nye, the Planetary Society CEO; Elizabeth Howell, senior writer for Universe Today; Gordon “Oz” Osinki, industrial research chair in Planetary Geology from the University of Western Ontario (UWO); and Canadian astronaut, Jeremy Hansen.

The topics focused on Canada and working in space with the Canadian Space Agency (CSA).

The talk highlighted the fact that anyone from British Columbia to Nova Scotia has the opportunity to get involved in space science.

Continued on pg. 12

From the cheap seats: Rebuilding the Bills MORGAN ALEXANDER Arts & Entertainment Editor The Buffalo Bills and the New England Patriots have a rivalry that extends back to the American Football League’s inaugural season in 1960.

The Patriots have nearly always defeated the Bills—both on and off the field. The Patriots’ brand, management, and overall acclaim have always left the Bills begging for a chance to, just once, beat the Patriots at their own game. When I entered Ralph Wilson

Stadium on a breezy Sunday afternoon, I could easily identify among the sea of white and red the different shades of blue—Bills’ royal and Patriots’ navy—as well as the raging animosity that separated their miniscule distinction.

To be clear, Bills fans didn’t shuffle into their seats with real expectations of a victory. But as a heavily inebriated man once screamed into the parking lot years ago at my first Buffalo-New England face-off, “The Bills

suck, but that’s okay.” Besides, this game wasn’t about the score—though I can’t begin to imagine the frenzy had the Bills won. It was the introduction a new era, both figuratively and foundationally.

When Ralph C. Wilson Jr. brought the Bills to life on October 28, 1959, he ignited a passion in the city that was previously dormant. Bills fans continued to mourn following his death this past March, but the real fear lay in the fate of the team. Terry and

Kim Pegula eased the city’s anxiety with their purchase of the team and their subsequent announcement that the Bills still belonged to Buffalo. The annual home game against the Pats is always dramatic, but now it held a new significance as the first official game under their new leadership, which was confirmed midweek.

It was an inauspicious start for Terry. Score aside, the fans weren’t up to their usual passionate antics. Before kick-off, every fan in the sold out

stadium jumped and cheered as Terry gave a rousing opening speech, emphasizing the message of, “One team.

One city. One goal. One Buffalo.”

Free t-shirts with the logo “One Buffalo” were thrown into the crowd as the audience swayed along to Buffalo native and Goo Goo Doll’s frontman John Rzeznik’s rendition of the “Star Spangled Banner.” It couldn’t have been any more Buffalo.

Continued on pg.17

2

NEWS

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

SSMU Council discusses cycling referendum, conflict of interest policies Council also passes motion to acknowledge tradition territory

Conference discusses the future of LGBTQ Human Rights Addresses global challenges with anticolonialist perspectives in mind

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SSMU will now acknowledge McGill’s situation on Mohawk land in future major events. (L-A Benoit / McGill Tribune) NOAH SUTTON Contributor

Traditional Territory Acknowledgement Statement

Last Thursday, the Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) Legislative Council passed the “Motion Regarding the Adoption of a Traditional Territory Acknowledgement Statement,” which requires a statement of acknowledgement over McGill’s physical situation on traditional Kanien’kehá:ka territory be read at all future SSMU Council meetings and major SSMU events.

The motion is similar to a motion of the same name passed by the Arts Undergraduate Society (AUS) Council in late September 2014, and was sponsored by VP University Affairs Claire Stewart-Kanigan, VP External Amina Moustaqim-Barrette, and Arts Senator Kareem Ibrahim.

“It’s a growing practice amongst universities, and McGill has historically been behind in supporting indigenous students,” Stewart-Kanigan said.

“It shows our effort to decolonize education and bring attention to the too often ignored issues facing First Nations communities,” Ibrahim said. “The land McGill occupies is unceded Kanien’kehá:ka traditional territory, also known as the land of the Mohawk First Nation. This is just one step in a very long journey that we have both as an institution and as a larger community here in Montreal to recognize the consequences of colonialism, how we are inherently a part of that process, and how these effects continue today in very prominent ways.”

Cycling referendum

Council also approved a plebiscite question for the second Fall Referendum ballot asking students if cycling should be allowed on lower campus and if SSMU should lobby the McGill administration to allow bikes on campus.

As a plebiscite question, the ballot has no weight beyond gathering data on student preferences, but some councillors expressed concern that the vote would mislead the student body by implying direct change as a result of the referendum.

McGill’s dismount policy, which required bikers to dismount and walk their bikes on campus since May 2010, was met with mixed reactions with the installation of swinging metal gates at the Milton entrance in September 2013. The bike gates were vandalized and faced formal opposition from AUS and SSMU council, leading to their removal in October 2013.

A Cycling Working Group was created to explore possible solutions after this incident. According to the

motion, the working group recommended to McGill a “Shared Space” policy be implemented on campus, instead of the current dismount policy.

“Shared Space is an approach to street design that minimizes the separations between cyclists and pedestrians, forcing all mode users to share the space, and where the pedestrian is considered the primary user of the shared space and has the right of way at all times,” read the motion for the plebiscite question.

Conflict of interest regarding councillors’ employment

The Council also voted to allow special permissions to two councillors employed in SSMU operations, who would otherwise be prohibited from being employed by SSMU while on Council as per Bylaw I-2 Article 3.5.

Councillor Zacheriah Houston and councillor Alexander Kpeglo-Hennessy, working at the Student Run Cafe (SRC) and Gerts Student Bar respectively, were granted permission to continue their employment after heavy debate on the floor.

“I’ve always recommended not adding councillors to be employed by the SSMU, for the reason that there could be potential situations where I have to make an intervention with an employee […] who is also above me,” SSMU General Manager Pauline Gervais said.

Issues of conflict of interest were discussed as well as to whether the councillors had intended to pursue employment at the operations run by SSMU prior to being elected into their position at Council.

Event and services finances

VP Internal J. Daniel Chaim also discussed his work on SSMU’s annual Halloween party, 4Floors. According to Chaim, this year’s ticket prices would have to be increased from $15 to $25 per person in order to gain the necessary funds to improve the event from prior years. He explained that the increased price was necessary in order for the event to break even, which it struggled to do last year.

“We spent a while debating financial accessibility and the success of the event,” Chaim said. “It was financial accessibility that was most in our minds, but we didn’t really didn’t have a choice [....] I’d rather tell people there was a deficit last year and we need to account for that.”

Council also approved the Audited Financial Statements for the 2013-2014 fiscal year. Gerts Bar reported more than $8,000 in profit, which was attributed to increased sales since its renovation two years ago. The SRC reported a $51,000 loss, primarily due to start-up costs such as equipment and training.

CORRINA VALI Contributor

magining the Future of LGBTQ Human Rights, a two-day conference held on Oct. 6 and 7 at Concordia University, sought to analyze a wide range of human rights issues and to discuss the future of the movement.

The seminar addressed a multitude of critical global concerns, with a total of seven discussions on topics including the criminalization of LGBTQ communities, the LGBTQ refugee crisis, realities faced by transgenedered people, and youth activism. About a hundred experts in the fields of law, psychology, anthropology, and sociology, as well as activists from Montreal and around the world, attended.

Organized by the Pierre Elliott Trudeau Foundation in collaboration with Le Centre Jacques Cartier, the conference featured several notable panelists such as Rosemary Thompson, a former CTV and CBC journalist; Louise Charron, former judge of the Supreme Court of Canada; and Danielle Peers, renowned wheelchair athlete and disability studies scholar.

Bruno Selun, an activist and analyst who has been managing the European Parliament’s Intergroup on LGBT Rights, spoke to the difficulties faced by activists in the movement.

“The role of rights is limited,” Selun pointed out. “We can advocate for rights all we want, but that doesn’t mean reality is going to change in and of itself.”

He emphasized that the focus had to change from just rights to ensuring equality before the law, access to resources and important services, and social equity, which are often denied to members of the LGBTQ community.

“Having said that, such discourse on rights is extremely important in the international relations context because it at least brings distinctly opposed countries to the same table,” Selun added. “We have to recognize the value of having a set of ideas that we can all relate to. Whether we agree or disagree with them, at least we’re on the same table with the global South, the Middle East and others that do not share the same point of view.”

Peers further commented on Canada and the West’s role in promoting LGBTQ rights in other countries.

“We don’t realize the ways in which we are exacerbating the problem by a lot of decisions that we make, often locally in our own homes,” Peers said. “Collaborating with the local population in the areas affected is a much more sustainable alternative than imposing uninformed ideas and policies upon people whose culture and beliefs, and thus requirements are substantially different from the West’s.”

“We should work across movements [as] we got where we are because movements and fights found some commonality in what was oppressing them,” Selun advised.

Panelists also discussed the idea of broadening the LGBTQ movement to widen its impact. Extending the realms of the movement to similar struggles, such as the feminist movement and the movement for the rights of people with disabilities, will add momentum and expand its base, according to the panelists.

Selun also voiced his opinion on the roles of institutions such as governmental organizations, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and universities in the LGBTQ movement.

“For the future, my advice for institutions is threefold,” Selun said.

“To NGOs—think more critically about what we do, to governments—listen to people on the ground, and to academics—enable through research and criticism.”

Though the event was hosted by Concordia, McGill helped with the publicization of the event, according to Wilson Blakley, the Director of Communications at the McGill Institute for Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies (IGSF), a participating organizer of the event.

“IGSF is a research institute and our mandate is to support research and teaching activities in gender, sexuality, and feminist studies,” Blakley said. “We organize a number of symposiums [...] and we do as much as we can in collaborating in outreach work with other local associations.”

According to Blakley, students participating in such conferences would increase their sense of theoretical and participatory activism.

“I think it is important that students themselves determine what their role could be,” Blakley said. “The programming that we offer­— the educational programs in gender and sexuality studies—give tools to students to chalk out their own mandates.”

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News

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

McGill begins feasibility study on redesigning libraries Plans to re-evaluate use of space for different methods of studying

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McGill libraries are currently under review. (Jack Neal / McGill Tribune)

AISLINN KALOB Staff Writer

cGill will soon conduct a feasibility study to determine how the university’s libraries and archives can best transform its user spaces and collection storage.

According to the library master plan website, the libraries need to be renovated in order to meet the needs of students and faculty, and evolve to current technologies. The libraries also need to meet increasing demands for space, as the archives are overcrowded and lacking in study areas according to a statement by the library.

Boston-based architecture firm ShepleyBulfinch and the Quebec-based firm EKM Architecture will be surveying library sites on campus and collecting data from now until spring 2015. Architects will seek input from students participating in focus groups this week on the future of all McGill libraries.

“I think that the project is really based on a desire to have library spaces that are more reflective of how students study, and particu-

larly of how undergraduate users interact with library spaces and services,” Library Improvement Fund Coordinator and VP Academic of the AUS Erin Sobat said. “It’s definitely indicative of the library’s desire to be responsive to the needs of its users.”

The Osler library has been inaccessible since April 1 due to renovations to the McIntyre Medical Building’s heating, ventilating, and air conditioning (HVAC) infrastructure. It will reopen this October. Its rare books have been moved temporarily to an environmentally controlled storage area and are available through the catalogue.

VP Communications of the Science Undergraduate Society (SUS) May Yin-Liao serves as the liaison between the Faculty of Science and the Life Sciences Library by sitting in on the task force responsible for making decisions about the library. The Life Sciences library closed and moved its collection to Schulich Library in August 2013. This group met last week for the first time.

“Any type of renovation to the [life sciences] library will still benefit science undergraduate students in the long run,” Yin-Liao

said. “It means more study space will be available in the McIntyre building, which will be great for all those life sciences students who have classes, research, or work in the building.”

Yin-Liao continued to explain how areas of the library would be renovated to accommodate different methods of studying.

“The general consensus seems to be leaning towards converting the available library space on both the third and fourth floor into a multitude of things,” Yin-Liao said. “This includes more quiet study space for students, group study rooms that can be used for both seminar and research teaching—for Medical and graduate students specifically—and actual group study when not in use.”

The consultation plans to complete the feasible study for recommendations for the development of a marketing file.

“It really is a long-term, conceptual project, and we probably won’t see too many concrete results for several years.” Sobat said.

The student focus group sessions will be held the afternoon of Wednesday, October 15, in the McLennan Library Building.

PGSS Council endorses AGSEM union drive, creates Sustainability Committee Aims to unionize teaching support workers, maintain sustainable practices

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LAUREN WILDGOOSE Staff Writer

ast Wednesday, the Post-Graduate Students’ Society (PGSS) Council heard a presentation regarding a motion that would endorse the Association of Graduate Students Employed at McGill’s (AGSEM) drive to increase the scope of teaching support workers that they represented. In addition, Council passed motions concerning the Post-Graduate Student Life Reform Package, the creation of a PGSS Sustainability Committee, and the adoption of the Universal Public Transit Pass for students.

AGSEM union drive endorsement

Justin Irwin, president of AGSEM, presented a plan to expand the membership of AGSEM to include teaching support workers such as tutors, note-takers, graders, course assistants, and undergraduate teaching assistants. PGSS passed a motion to officially endorse the drive. “[Teaching support workers] do very similar work to graduate student TAs, and often identical work, but make very different sums of money,” Irwin said. “A graduate student working as a teaching assistant makes $26.85 per hour including vacation pay, whereas an undergraduate or someone working as a grader or marker is paid basically depending on what the hiring end of the department they’re working for determines is appropriate.”

Irwin pointed out the lack of standardized pay for teaching support workers and undergraduate teaching assis-

tants, and noted that these workers have no protection from workplace issues.

“If any issues arise, whether it’s harassment in the workplace—which hopefully doesn’t happen all that often, but is still a problem sometimes—or any issues of getting paid, these people basically have to speak for themselves and represent themselves,” Irwin said.

“They don’t have the protection of the union.”

Creation of the PGSS Sustainability Committee

Post-graduate psychology student Regine Debrosse and PGSS Environment Commissioner Amanda Winegardner presented a motion to create a PGSS Sustainability Committee, which was passed by Council. The motion proposed an amendment to the Student Activities Manual, allowing for the creation of a committee that operated in line with McGill’s existing approach to sustainability.

“This is an important motion because, with the termination [...] of the sustainability coordinator position, we don’t have anyone who’s responsible for these types of issues,” Winegardner said.

“So I think this is a good step.”

Universal public transit pass

External Affairs Officer of the PGSS Julien Ouellet presented the Executive Committee’s motion to support the creation of a Universal Public Transit Pass for McGill students. The motion was passed by Council. It would combine students’ I.D. card, Opus Card, and student rebate card into a single pass.

“It’s basically a Montreal student Mastercard,” Ouellet said. “It will fuse

Councillors endorse AGSEM union drive. (Noah Sutton / McGill Tribune) all the cards you need into a single card.”

The card will be brought forward to Je Vois Montreal, a forum that decides on new products designed to revitalize the city. Ouellet hopes that the project will help with another larger goal to extend student fares to graduate students over 25.

“Students who are 25 years old or older cannot benefit from the reduced student fare in Montreal,” Ouellet said.”

What we want to do is to use that opportunity to push this agenda through. It’s part of our work plan, and we’re really hoping it will be able to put a foot in the door for that particular project.”

PGSLF Reform Package

The Post-Graduate Student Life Fund (PGSLF) funds post-graduate student associations out of a fee levy paid by all PGSS members. PGSS Financial Affairs Officer Danielle Meadows dis-

cussed amendments to the fund during Council.

“The idea behind changing the PGSLF system is to really put [the fund] back in students’ hands, to take it out of our office’s hands and really let the students be the drivers of their own destiny,” said Meadows. “It’s their money—they can use it and do what they’d like.”

The main change made to the PGSLF concerns post-doctorate fellows, whose student association—the Association of Post-Doctorate Fellows (APF)—currently receives no money from post-doctorate student fees. Instead, the funds go towards the student’s corresponding program student department. The proposed amendment would allocate 75 per cent of post-doctorate student fees to student departments and 25 per cent to the APF. “Post-doc fellows are typically

counted for [in] both [the] APF and their [own] department,” Meadows said. “At the moment, they have no funding, and in previous years they’ve come to the [executives] and the Council directly requesting that we take money out of other areas of our budget and allocate it to them [....] But that’s not really fair and it’s not giving them a sustainable mechanism for having funding going forward.”

The 75/25 split was in part influenced by feedback from some of the larger graduate student associations. These associations often must give up greater amounts of their budget to APF .funding through the current funding process due to the higher numbers of post-doctoral fellows, and would therefore support an alternative source of funding for the APF.

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News

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

Seeds of Change seeks community for growth at McGill Crowdfunding initiatives growing in popularity across North America

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MAYAZ ALAM Managing Editor

cGill University Advancement, which promotes the university through fundraising and alumniengaging activities, launched an online crowdfunding initiative named Seeds of Change in May 2014, which has since raised more than $50,000 and funded nine projects.

“We wanted to help students to get the exposure they need to maintain and expand their worthwhile projects,” reads the McGill Seeds of Change program’s website.

Projects currently seeking funding through the website include four varsity athletics teams.

Traditionally, varsity teams receive financial support from McGill Athletics and through alumni booster groups. According to Samantha Rogers, development and alumni relations at McGill Athletics, funding from alumni has significantly decreased for many teams.

“Some of the older, traditional teams like men’s hockey and football already have a huge donor base and support network amongst alumni,” Rogers explained. “It’s the smaller teams that need more immediate assistance because [...] a lot of those [booster] groups have died down.”

For Martlet soccer Head Coach Jose-Luis Valdes, whose squad has created the Warrior Women project, the additional funding will be

primarily for team-building portions of trips. “[We] need the funding for four extra days where we’ll play Division I and Division II schools,” Valdes explained. “These extra few dollars that we are fundraising for [equates to] the possibility of leaving for seven days and [focusing] on team-building and not having to spend it all on buses [...] and coming back home.”

Another of the projects currently seeking funding is the Quartier de l’Innovation (QI) Projects Fund. The campaign is led by the student working group at the QI, whose goals are to promote the concept of the QI, an extensive McGill-backed project in Southwest Montreal.

“We hope that the fund will create resources for professors and students to apply to if they have innovative projects for the [QI] district,” said Chloe Vadot, U3 Arts, a member of the QI student working group. “This crowdfunding campaign is really the preliminary step where we’re hoping to hire an intern to develop a strategy to create the fund.”

McGill is not alone in its university-led crowdfunding initiatives. The University of Alberta and Carleton University have both launched similar programs to promote student projects and scholarships. On a broader scale, companies such as Indiegogo, Kickstarter and Experiment—formerly known as Microryza—have moved into

the crowdfunding market.

Peter Younkin, an assistant professor specializing in strategy and organization at the Desautels Faculty of Management, attributes the rise in crowdfunding to lower capital costs and the proliferation of technology.

“There’s two parallel trends, the first of which is a dramatic growth in entrepreneurship in general [...] driven by lower costs of capital,” Younkin explained.

“Technology has gotten a lot cheaper so it’s easier for people to put together these sites and distribute content internationally in a way that wasn’t really feasible 10 years ago.”

While platforms like Indiegogo and Kickstarter are for consumer-based initiatives, McGill’s platform is primarily for students.

Experiment is for research-based funding—a trend that Younkin stated may be troubling in the light of decreased government funding for research. “I don’t anticipate that taking off across the spectrum,” Younkin said. “It might be useful for people studying pharmaceuticals, biotech products [but...] if people start using it to fund research then the government might say we don’t need to give more money to research.”

According to Vadot, much of the value added by Seeds of Change is its relationship with the university.

“There’s a lot of other crowdfunding platforms that exist but

using one that’s really rooted in McGill gives us access to a huge alumni network,” Vadot said.

For those in Athletics such as Valdes, varsity teams’ partnership with Seeds of Change can have a tremendous impact. He acknowledged that although varsity teams do get funding from McGill Athletics for team-building and off-season activities, additional support is

required. “‘Friends of McGill Soccer’ [was] never a very active group,” Valdes said. “Now, [after collaborating with Seeds of Change,] we’re getting more interest than we’ve ever had before and gotten more funding in the last two weeks than we [had] in the last two or three years.”

(Eleanor Milman / McGill Tribune)

Tariq Khan drops case against SSMU regarding the invalidation of his presidency CECE ZHANG News Editor

(Continued from page 1) Khan said his main reason for dropping the case against SSMU was due to the high expenses.

“Legal things are very expensive,” he said. “[The case] already cost me a lot so far, my finances got a bit tight. That is why I couldn’t af-

ford to go further with the case, even though there were very strong developments with the case itself [....] The most logical decision was to drop the case.”

SSMU VP University Affairs Claire Stewart-Kanigan said the conclusion of the case would mean the Society would not need to reallocate more money into legal fees. She further elaborated that SSMU electoral

MARCH 21 First public censure SSMU presidential win

APRIL 1 Invalidation

bylaws would be revised by the end of the semester, and they would be reviewed to better hold up to legal scrutiny.

“We’ve been looking into the possibility of moving [election ballots] to preferential ballots, so that’s something [we’d] be consulting with students on, how they feel about it,” Stewart-Kanigan said.

The bylaws will be reviewed

APRIL 29 J-Board hearing

APRIL 30 J-Board ruling ratified by BoD

by an ad-hoc committee, composed of the six SSMU executives, four Councillors, and the SSMU General Manager, Pauline Gervais, which will then make recommendations to Council regarding any bylaw changes. Stewart-Kanigan also stated that the revisions will ultimately be reviewed by a lawyer.

Elections SSMU’s Chief Electoral Officer Ben Fung emphasized

the need to have the bylaws reviewed by lawyers.

“Substantial bylaw changes are always reviewed by lawyers so that we confirm we aren’t breaking any laws and that they meet the conventions that are generally practiced by corporations,” he said.

—With additional reporting by Shrinkhala Dawadi

MAY 30 Superior Court hearing Withdraws lawsuit OCTOBER 9

(Cassie Lee / McGill Tribune)

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

News

Forum on diversity and inclusivity in Engineering discusses intersectional perspectives Panelists explore social interactions as drivers of equity

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SHRINKHALA DAWADI News Editor

ast Thursday, the Engineering Undergraduate Society (EUS) and the Faculty of Engineering hosted a forum about diversity and inclusivity in the field. According to the faculty’s website, the forum aimed to allow members of the engineering community to discuss their experiences with the challenges they faced regarding diversity and inclusivity, as well as possible solutions.

McGill’s enrolment report for Fall 2013 states that the Faculty of Engineering had an undergraduate student enrolment ratio of 24.9 per cent female students to 75.1 per cent male students. However, female students constituted a majority 56 per cent of the entire undergraduate student body for Fall 2013 term.

Keynote speaker Dr. Karen Tonso of Wayne State University explained how societal interactions could create a sexist culture that ignored women’s contributions to the field and discouraged women from joining in the first place.

“Female scientists continue to face discrimination, unequal pay, and funding disparities, and these disparities increase [...] relative to rank,” she said. “Engineering has a sexist culture [....] It’s built up via social interactions, through ‘guy talk’ [...] through jokes and language that degrade women. It’s built up through women being thought of as technically incompetent sexual beings.”

Tonso continued her speech by explaining the importance of diversity.

“Engineering creates and produces the technologies of everyday life,” she said. “Without the participation of members of diverse communities, engineers run the risk of losing sight of the world and their role in it, and this affects their technological creations.”

The keynote speech was followed by a panel discussion. Tal Arbel, professor at the department of electrical and computer engineering, spoke about the apparent discrepancy between the provincial government’s investment in engineering—a $1.5 million investment over three years for development of technology startups was announced in the 2014-2015 provincial budget—and women’s involvement in the field. Only 13 per cent of the members of the Ordre des ingénieurs du Québec, a provincial organization of engineers, are female.

“There’s a lot of opportunity for employment [in] fields ranging from aerospace to digital arts,” Arbel said. “All the parts are in place, so you’d think that a balanced proportion of the native population would feel encouraged and excited to participate in these new opportunities [....] Surprisingly that is not the case [....]

By permitting half of the population to opt out, Quebec is losing its chance to emerge as a leader on the global stage in various sectors of engineering.”

Arbel also spoke to the importance of female mentorship for students.

“Once you’re in the program [...] and all your colleagues are male and teachers are male, certainly that will make you question your belonging and feel isolated,” she said. “I do think that having female professors not only affects the way female students feel, but it also affects the way everybody else feels [....] I also think that female professors bring a new perspective to teaching.”

Sara Houshmand, a 3rd year PhD counselling psychology student and a member of the panel, highlighted the effects of the gender-race intersection on students from a psychological perspective. “[When] we tend to segregate race from gender from disability, we miss the intersection of identities [....] These different ‘isms,’ these difference aggres-

5 McGill to launch Wellness Portal to address students’ mental health

Project funded by $500,000 Bell grant, features self-assessment questionnaire CECE ZHANG

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Dr. Karen Tonso discusses inclusivity in Engineering.

(L-A Benoit / McGill Tribune) sions coexist and they’re not additive, they take on a whole new face on their own,” Houshmand said. “Mental health-wise, racial microaggressions are associated with depression [...] feelings of exclusion, and hopelessness [....] Physiologically, racism has generally been attributed to chronic stress, and tends to have the same impact as chronic stress.”

Tanja Beck, access services advisor for the Office of Students with Disabilities, spoke on how the intersection of social identities could be used to address bias.

“One of the most important points when it comes to preventing biases and stereotypes is that you know your own social location,” she said. “You know which privileges you have and [which] you don’t have [...] because we all have learned biases, from our parents, from schools, from peers [...] we have to reflect everyday on our biases; it’s a very self-referential exercise.”

Houshmand added that creating a dialogue regarding the challenges faced by marginalized groups was essential.

“The only thing we can do is help to disseminate this knowledge,” Houshman said. “Sometimes there’s the making things mandatory, but unfortunately, it’s not just something you can shove down someone’s throat [....] I think that the leadership can take [a] stance and can speak to why it’s important and encourage people to go to these kind of things.” Houshmand said.

Robert Forestell, U3 Mechanical Engineering and president of the EUS, discussed the challenges of raising awareness.

“It’s very effective in terms of sharing ideas and strengthening our views and getting on the same platform, but the bottleneck is to actually implement them,” Forestell said. “It’s one thing to tell our faculty top-down ‘this is what inclusivity means,’ but it’s really a whole other thing to have students recognize that about themselves. One of the goals of this forum is to see how we can all get there as a community.”

News Editor

ast Tuesday, McGill University announced the creation of the McGill Wellness Portal, a website that will aim to address students’ mental health. The project was set in motion two years ago, when the university received a $500,000 grant from Bell Canada, as a part of the company’s “Let’s Talk” campaign, to use towards mental health initiatives targeted towards students.

The website, which has not yet launched, will feature a ‘self-assessment tool’ that students can take to screen for common mental health problems, such as depression and anxiety.

L’Université de Montréal (UdeM) also received a grant for $500,000, which they will use towards providing group cognitive behavioural therapy for students.

Elizabeth Cawley, health commissioner of the Post-Graduate Students’ Society (PGSS) and a PhD student in psychiatry, said that the website would provide students with advice with regards to seeking further help for mental health problems.

“Based on the students’ responses, the system will provide a recommendation of further intervention where warranted, including detailed information on where to contact McGill Mental Health Services and counselling service professionals,” Cawley said.

She continued to stress that the project was a collaborative one that included students at both the undergraduate and graduate level. “[The] mental health c oordinator that’s overseeing the project was a former graduate student,” Cawley said. “[There are] undergraduate students researching different aspects of it [….] It’s been presented to some of the [Students’ Society of McGill University] (SSMU) executives and the PGSS executives for feedback.”

“The whole idea is that it’s supposed to be for students,” Cawley added.

Giuseppe Alfonsi, a clinical psychologist at McGill Mental Health Services, echoed the importance of student feedback for the Wellness Portal.

“The goal is to create a very visually attractive website, with content that is student-driven,” Alfonsi said. “We’re still in the process of organizing it, collaborating with different student groups.”

He went on to explain that the website consisted of components including the Patient Health Questionnaire, a commonlyused clinical tool for mental illnesses, for students to self-screen.

It will also include elements of education on mental health statistics and work towards decreasing the stigma surrounding mental illnesses.

“This is really just phase one, but the goal is [to launch] by the end of next year,” Alfonsi said. “We’re just shopping this around with student associations right now before we go university-wide with this, and we really want to fill it up with more content.”

Alfonsi also explained that the $500,000 in funds, which is being distributed to McGill over a five-year period, would also towards reducing long waiting lines for mental health services for students.

“One of the other attached pieces to this is to use some of these funds to kind of make our services more accessible, so that could either be hiring another clinician or [other measures],” Alfonsi said. “So there is that component of thinking behind the website, how do you actually deliver the service, to get people to go?”

Chair of McGill’s Board of Governors Stuart Cobbett said the website would enhance students’ awareness of the importance of mental health.

“This new tool will enable McGill to reach out to even more of its students, to help them get the help they need quickly, privately, and effectively,” Cobbett said. “More than that, [it] will help us send the message to the future leaders that pass through our campuses that mental health issues are common, they are devastating, and they are worth talking about.”

6

Opinion

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

editorial

THE Mcgill

Mental health initiative raises more questions than answers alleviate the problem of over-booked specialists simply by directing more students to an online resource for initial diagnosis that is limited in use by bandwidth rather than office space.

A resource that enables students to initially diagnose their situation on the portal, which the Wellness Portal intends to do, saves that time slot for someone in need of seeing a specialist right away.

Beyond that baseline, what else

“

mation on conditions known to be prevalent among students. Another benefit of this portal could be to direct students to existing resources that are currently under-utilized, perhaps because of an out-of-theway location on campus, or a lack of promotion.

It would be remiss to discuss this without noting that the program is being financed by one of Canada’s telecommunications and media gi-

The existence of this grant, and the attendant media attention, is certainly a net positive in terms of raising awareness of mental health as an issue. However, raising awareness is an act without action.

“

Last week, Bell Canada’s “Let’s Talk” initiative announced a $1 million gift for mental health initiatives, to be split evenly between the Université de Montréal (UdéM)and McGill. The half-million at UdéM will be spent on various peer-support pilot projects. At McGill, a significant portion of the money will be spent on the McGill Wellness Portal, an online resource intended to function as a self-diagnosis and referral tool. While the additional attention to mental health issues is always positive, there is currently a lack of clarity as to how the money will be spent, as well as many other important details of this initiative, such as what kinds of information the site will provide.

The use of the grant to create this portal could add value for students or end up a boondoggle, depending on what the site looks like and how the funds are distributed.

Ideally, this money would be best used to bolster the ranks of mental health counsellors—a service that has shown strain in recent years due to insufficient staff—but the circumstances of this corporate grant might demand the creation of an entirely new program instead of simply putting the money to existing services. If so, the portal could at least partially

would be useful for students? The suggestion that the website is a place for self-diagnosis is currently nebulous. Will it serve as a pipeline to professionals, or recommend treatments? Will will the process work?

In addition, the site should serve as a trusted resource for members of the university community, and should be able to stand on its own. At the same time, the site should strive not to duplicate already accessible resources, and focus most on providing infor-

ants. Apoplectic discourse about the apparent ‘corporatization of campus’ aside, it should be noted that McGill is a partner in an initiative designed at least in part to improve Bell’s ‘brand’ in the eyes of consumers-when a mining company funds a geology program or a scholarship, the quid pro quo might be more obvious to the observer as a way of recruiting future employees. In Bell’s case, there is a mix of genuine charitable intent with the inevitable image man-

agement. The good this donation can provide, as in many cases, almost certainly outweighs any perceived or actual harm created by the corporate funding. McGill needs money to provide the services it should provide, and university funding isn’t exactly in abundant supply at the moment.

Still, the portal should focus on its purpose and not provide an overly “branded” experience.

Finally, there is the question of data and privacy. After a few years, this portal—if it is useful enough to be widely used—will hold an enormous amount of data. This data, perhaps anonymized, will contain information on the stresses and conditions of students. What will happen to this data? Will any be kept? These questions need to be answered for students to feel secure in using this service.

The existence of this grant, and the attendant media attention, is certainly a net positive in terms of raising awareness of mental health as an issue. However, raising awareness is an act without action. To be truly useful to students beyond the flurry of press releases and news stories, the money needs to be put to work for a service that provides assistance for students in need. Anything less is just talk.

COMMENTARY

justin hatherly Contributor Since the global financial crisis in 2008, much of the Western world has been struggling to recover. Even in the nations that have performed relatively well, growth is not as robust and people are insecure about their financial futures. One solution to increase incomes and living standards is to abolish the corporate income tax.

A tax requires that someone’s wallet gets lighter. No matter how wealthy and profitable corporations may be, they don’t bear the burden of the taxes. They may sign the cheque, but they are a mere legal entity, not a person. The burden of the corporate income tax falls instead on those to who have a stake in the corporation— workers and shareholders.

In theory, the burden is split be-

to a large extent, the average productivity of labor is determined by how much capital is added to that labor.

Therefore, in a global economy, the corporate income tax will lead to less capital investment, lower productivity, and thus, lower wages. Lower wages are simply a product of the tax wedge—or lower returns—that reduce investments created by the corporate income tax.

A review of consensus economic literature by Ben Southwood of the Adam Smith Institute, a Londonbased free market think tank, suggests that in open economies—such as Canada’s—workers could bear up to 57.6 per cent of the corporate income tax.

Corporate taxes are also some of the most economically damaging taxes the state can impose. The economic impact of a tax is a deadweight loss, or a loss in output caused by a tax relative to each dollar of revenue raised. However, the deadweight loss of tax varies substantially depending on the type of tax that is utilized to raise revenue. Taxes on property have the lowest deadweight loss per dollar raised in revenue. Consumption taxes have a bit more, income taxes are somewhat higher, while

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 Arts & Entertainment Editors Max Berger and Morgan Alexander arts@mcgilltribune.com Sports Editors Elie Waitzer and Wyatt Fine-Gagné sports@mcgilltribune.com Design Editors Domitille Biehlmann and Cassie Lee design@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

Abolishing corporate income tax a net gain for economy, workers tween consumers (who end up with higher prices), the workers (who get lower wages), and the shareholders (who end up with lower returns).

This is not because the company or the shareholders actively conspire to lower the wages of workers. It’s actually due to the natural rate of return to capital, or the average riskadjusted rate.

Averaged over the economy, a person who invests $100 of capital might get a $10 year return. So when the state introduces a tax on profits, it cuts that return. A 50 per cent tax means that the investor would only get a $5 a year return on the $100.

If everything just happened in one country and capital had nowhere else to go, then shareholders would carry the burden of corporate tax.

But with an international economy, the international average return needs to be considered. The theoretical investor could take $100 out in Canada and receive a higher return in a jurisdiction with a lower corporate rate.

Thus, where capital is mobile, taxing the returns to capital leads to less capital being invested. Additionally, average wages of workers are largely a function of productivity and,

Editor-in-Chief Jenny Shen editor@mcgilltribune.com

capital and corporate taxes impose the greatest loss in output per dollar raised in revenue.

The effects of abolishing the corporate tax as hypothesized by some economists are impressive. As an example, using a model developed at the Tax Analysis Center, Boston University economist Laurence J. Kotlikoff estimated that if the United States were to repeal the corporate tax, the Gross Domestic Product would increase by eight per cent and the wages of skilled and unskilled workers would rise by up to 12 per cent.

Even progressives should support the elimination of the corporate tax. Its abolition would eliminate the double taxation of corporate profits and thus allow for the full taxation of capital gains and dividends as regular income, thus resulting in a more equitable tax scheme than what currently exists.

In the face of all the recent economic uncertainty, Canada should abolish this punitive, and in many ways regressive, levy. It does none of the good many of its proponents suggest; instead, it inhibits the living standards of the workers it claims to speak for.

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

Staff Writers & Illustrators Cordelia Cho, Philippe Dumais, Max Joseph, Evelyn Kaczmarek, Aislinn Kalob, Tiffany Le, Chris Lutes, Claire Lyle, Hailey Mackinnon, Alycia Noë, Laura Plamondon, Aaron Rose, Elli Slavitch, Zikomo Smith, Julie Vanderperre, Wilder Walker-Stewart, Lauren Wildgoose

Contributors Cory Goldstein, Keah Hansen, Justin Hatherly, Nick Jasinski, Tiffaney Le, Hailey Mackinnon, Harry McAlverey, Eleanor Milman, Martin Molpeceres, Eric Noble-Marks, Laura Plamondon, Noah Sutton, Jack Tokarz, Corrina Vali, Clovis Vinant-Tang, Marta Yesgat

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.

7

Opinion

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

Canada blunders into war

The brutal nature of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) became very clear this summer when videos of executions and beheadings were widely disseminated across the globe. In response to the growing threat the group poses to the Middle East and potentially the world, the U.S. is now leading a new coalition to quell yet another crisis in Iraq. In Canada, despite pointed opposition from the New Democratic Party (NDP) and Liberal party, Parliament voted 157-134 on Tuesday in favor of joining the coalition. Conservatives hailed the move and praised the prime minister for the supposedly strong and moral message it sent to the world. Despite the potential sym-

threat to Canadian lives will only increase. ISIS is adept at stealing American military hardware, and the Iraqi military has already reported numerous losses of surface-to-air missiles. Sophisticated American built surface-to-air systems, looted from abandoned Iraqi military installations by ISIS, pose a direct threat to combat air-

“

to be a stringent safeguard, it presents Canada with a tough choice in the future. The situation on the ground in Iraq is a mess, with many declaring that the country is irrevocably divided. Furthermore, the civil war in Syria will only continue as coalition forces are striking a mutual enemy of the Assad regime. There has been

Despite the potential symbolic importance of the mission, the small size of Canada’s military commitment and a lack of a long-term strategy render the engagement pointless.

“

HARRY MCALEVEY Contributor

bolic importance of the mission, the small size of Canada’s military commitment and a lack of a long-term strategy render the engagement pointless.

The force that the Conservative majority argued so vigorously to send, to purportedly defend Canada’s citizens and its reputation, is laughably small.

The contingency includes six CF-18s and 600 soldiers serving in an advisory capacity, as well as some minor surveillance and refuelling planes. In comparison to the rest of the coalition, This force is negligible: The U.S. has committed an entire carrier strike group, hundreds of state-of-theart planes and guided missiles, as well as 1,600 soldiers. Canada is not even one of the largest among the other small commitments sent by allies—Denmark, the Netherlands, France, the United Kingdom, Belgium, and Australia have all committed the same or more resources as Canada has.

The Canadian role in halting the threat will be minimal—the main prerogative for intervention—will be minimal, and the

craft in the region. Make no mistake: Despite the miniscule nature of the force sent by Stephen Harper, Canadian lives are at risk, for a mission with no foreseeable end.

The plan, voted on in the House of Commons, gives the military six months to strike ISIS militants before the plan must be voted on again. While this seems

no suggestion that the situation will be resolved in six months’ time, meaning Canada will have to choose between continuing to engage in a prolonged war or retreating from its role, a reputation-damaging move that Harper is attempting to avoid in the first place with the intervention.

It should also be noted that

Canadian citizens at home face much more danger now than they did prior to Tuesday. Harper sought to mitigate the minimal threat Canada faced by directly provoking the aggressor. It was a boldly symbolic move, but symbols matter little. Furthermore, it’s been reported that more than 6,000 people have joined ISIS since America launched its first strike. Intervention in this case only inspires further continuation of the conflict and bolsters ISIS’s ranks.

If Harper really wanted to alleviate the threat without invoking these risks, he could have supported humanitarian efforts in the region, provided supplies and equipment to Allied forces, and invoked diplomatic efforts to support moderate Sunni groups in the region.

While it can be argued that Canada cannot ignore the threat presented by ISIS, sending a small military force puts lives at risk for a mission that lacks forethought and risks dragging the country into yet another quagmire in Iraq.

OFF THE BOARD The false promise of data journalism

MAYAZ ALAM Managing Editor Journalism, at its heart, is about telling a story. Over the years, journalists have developed different tools to tell these stories. Some, like famed sportswriter Grantland Rice, prefer elaborate and sometimes outlandish prose, while others, such as novelist Hunter S. Thompson, pioneered the field of ‘gonzo journalism’ that aims to discard objectivity.

‘Big data’ has emerged as a buzzword in all walks of professional life. It’s not a surprise that ‘data

journalism,’ the use of statistics to explain news stories, is starting to truly come into its own—a glance at both terms on Google Trends confirms their parallel rise. Legacy media outlets such as The New York Times and The Guardian have both embraced data journalism as a tool to enhance the online experience to varying degrees of success. Standalone publications, such as Nate Silver’s FiveThirtyEight—created after Silver’s success at predicting the 2012 election for The New York Times— have fallen short in the face of lofty expectations.

FiveThirtyEight offered immense promise as a potential news source at the time of its launch as an aggregation of economics, politics, life, science, and sports. Unlike other websites that were attempting to ‘disrupt’ the journalism space, it had the backing of an established media

heavyweight, ESPN. However, seven months on from its conception, its most noteworthy project has been the burrito bracket—a 67,000-restaurant quest to find the U.S.’s best burrito. Although the piece was interesting and mouth-watering, it was hardly the explanatory journalism on serious issues that it was touted to be.

Much has been made of the need for immediate results in an ever shortening news cycle. The strength of data journalism lies in its ability to dissect information and explain current events and trends, not in reporting the news as it happens. Additionally, many articles on FiveThirtyEight often end without a clear and succinct conclusion; an idea is explored and dissected but there are still questions that remain—a shortcoming when using a purportedly analytical method to explain the news.

Data journalism is also plagued by a

catch-22: its complexity. If statistical analysis is too simplified, it loses what made it attractive in the first place—an explanation of current events rooted in statistical evidence.

Data has become a prominent fixture in sports journalism—advanced analytics is commonplace in the discussion of basketball and baseball and is slowly making an appearance in soccer, football, and hockey.

Its value in political and economic journalism is well documented as well—FiveThirtyEight famously predicted the outcome of the 2012 U.S. Presidential Election. Even so, data journalism in a vacuum doesn’t necessarily deliver better results than ‘traditional’ journalism; it’s the blend of the data with the ability to contextualize it that adds value.

The data journalism movement isn’t here yet, nor will it ever truly be—data journalism shouldn’t

write for opinion

Email opinion@mcgilltribune.com for more information

be viewed as a replacement for traditional journalism, but rather as a supplement. A mistake I had initially made was expecting it to be 21st century journalism’s silver bullet.

Although the moment isn’t here, Vox, The Upshot, and FiveThirtyEight offer readers a glimpse of what the future of journalism will look like.

Site layouts are eye-catching, clean, and sophisticated, contributing to reader engagement. In the same vein, a heavy emphasis has been placed on using visual charts, infographics, and other interactive elements to create a more engaging online experience.

However, as it develops, the best practices of ‘data journalism’ may become a major part of mainstream journalism as a whole, helping readers to better contextualize news events.

8

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

Student Living

Student of the Week

By: Hailey Mackinnon

Candice taguibao U1 SCIENCE (L-A Benoit / McGill Tribune)

Candice Taguibao, a U1 physiology student, is an athlete, an aspiring doctor, a teamplayer, and a fundraiser—all of which contribute to her aspiration of a career in medicine.

Taguibao attributes her diligence to her background in sports. She was the captain of her volleyball team in high school and is currently on a co-ed volleyball team called Get Spiked. In addition to playing regular intramural matches, she goes to drop-in volleyball at the Athletics Centre, where she can regroup and practice with the rest of her teammates. Taguibao has also played tennis from a young age, which contributes to her strong sense of sportsmanship and determination.

“I trained [...] a lot, and it’s really fun,” Taguibao said. “You learn a lot of discipline, which I’m really thankful for. But it’s also really fun and beneficial when you play a sport with a team [like volleyball] where you get to celebrate together and encourage each other.”

Taguibao also works with other students as a member of the MedLife fundraising committee, a McGill club that promotes medicine, education, and development for low-income families. Taguibao knew that she wanted to join a club in her first year, and decided on MedLife because she strongly agreed with its mandate.

“I like how it emphasizes medicine, education, and development—all which I think are necessary to improving someone’s standard of living,” she said.

In particular, Taguibao enjoys being a part of the fundraising committee because by organizing

events, she gets a tangible demonstration of her hard work and success.

“Last year, we did a coffee house event where we got a lot of cultural clubs and musical groups to come,” she said. “Bringing the community together that way was really cool, and it was nice to be a part of something [where] you work together, create an event, and actually get to see it through.”

Taguibao’s passion for medicine and helping others have inspired her to pursue a career as an Obstetrician/Gynecologist (OBGYN).

“As a woman, I’ve always had a passion to work with other women,” Taguibao said. “As a doctor, I want to be able to have a personal relationship with my patients.”

This past summer, in addition to being a tennis coach at two different locations, Taguibao volunteered with an OBGYN at Markham Stouffville Hospital. Taguibao said that what struck her most about her experience was the busy and demanding lifestyle that OBGYNs lead, which is one she realized she would like to follow. “[Since] I only interacted with [the OBGYN] personally and not with any of the patients, I mostly got to learn from his personality,” she said. “He was [busy and] hard working, and he always cared about his patient, which I found really inspiring. It’s definitely [a lifestyle] that I can see myself leading.”

Taguibao hopes to foster a safe medical environment where others receive the same sense of community support that she herself has benefitted from in all of her endeavours.

McGill Tribune (MT): What would be on your ideal pizza?

Candice Taguibao (CT): Broccoli, bacon, a lot of cheese, and a winky face drawn in barbecue sauce.

MT: Favourite and least favourite celebrity couple?

CT: Least favourite would be Kim Kardashian and Kanye West. Favourite would be Chris Pratt and Anna Faris.

MT: What’s your go-to TV show?

CT: 30 Rock and Parks and Recreation.

MT: Your biggest pet peeve?

CT: When people chew gum very loudly.

MT: You have to hear one song on repeat for the rest of you life. Which one do you choose?

CT: Hey Jude by the Beatles.

nominate a

student of the week!

Email us at studentliving@ mcgilltribune.com

Escape from reality with Echappe-Toi

First real-life simulation game launched in Montreal REMI LU Managing Editor Echappe-Toi, a real-life simulation experience based on Montreal’s Parthenais Prison, launched in Montreal on Tuesday, Oct. 7. Created by Montreal entrepreneurial lab Les Entrepreneurs Associés, the game offers participants 60 minutes to escape from a room using teamwork and a variety of clues.

Popularized by Japanese roleplaying video games in which players are locked inside a room and must use their environment to escape, the experiences known as ‘Real Escape Games’ have been implemented worldwide to incredible success. Seventeen countries have established escape games so far, with Montreal being the third city in Canada to implement the simulation.

Located on the same street as the historical location of the Parthenais Prison, Echappe-Toi places participants in a room imitating a real cell from the prison. According to Emmanuel de Gouvello, one of the founders of Echappe-toi, a great impetus for introducing the game to Montreal was the unique cultural history of the location.

“Historically, [this] is a jail street,” de Gouvello said. “What we

like is that [the game] is related to the part of the city where we are, because Montreal has such an incredibly rich story.”

Setting up the game proved to be difficult in Montreal, where the creators had to consider a number of complex factors, including the bilingual nature of the participants. To add to the difficulty, Echappe- Toi chose not to engage in standard industry practice and visit other escape games for inspiration, opting instead to build the game from the ground up. De Gouvello stated that to do otherwise would render Echappe-toi a copycat experience.

“I know it’s not traditional, because normally you would go see your competition, see how they work, and try and take their idea,” he said. “But I love the idea of being truly original with an idea that has been developed by others in the world.”

Escape games have had an astonishingly low success rate internationally, with only three per cent of participants completing a successful escape, according to de Gouvello. As such, the Echappe-toi team views the game as a means to an end in order to create team chemistry—with escaping the room being just one of the desired goals. With two to six players allowed

in each room, the game offers a variety of different clues and activities that appeal to a number of different skillsets, including more tactile-based clues and cryptographic puzzles.

After each session, the Echappetoi team offers participants a debrief of their activities. According to co-founder Jérémie Abbou, the game appeals to a variety of clients who are intent on improving group dynamics.

“We build packages for schools, friends, families, and companies,”

Escape from a prison cell at Echappe-Toi. (Courtesy of A/Maze Montreal Game) Abbou said. “[Packages include] back or if we have leaks, [so] there’s group coaching, how to emphasize still value for everyone [….] We alteam building, [and] how to improve ready have a few ideas in stock.”

However, the team’s primary your efficiency.”

Although Echappe-toi has just focus has stayed steady throughout the launched, the founders are already process: Making sure that people enjoy thinking of new scenarios and rooms their experience at Echappe-toi.

“It’s fun,” said Philippe Prevost, in anticipation of repeat customers— despite the fact that the game is almost head of marketing for Echappe-toi. fully booked for the next three months. “And that’s what people are looking “We will make sure the game for, the pursuit of happiness [...] That’s evolves,” de Gouvello said. “We’ll the objective of the team operating this change the puzzles inside if you come event—that people leave happy.”

9

Student Living

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

Restaurant Review: Kyozon New cuisine on Crescent creates an intermingling of tastes

TIFFANY LE Staff Writer Although known for its lavish bars and clubs, Crescent Street also offers a plethora of restaurants. Sept. 8 marked the opening of Kyozon, a new Asian fusion restaurant and bar, which aims to bring authentic Asian flavours into an urban setting.

According to general manager Phil Chang, the idea behind Kyozon has been in the works for over a decade.

“This concept has been in the making since the ’90s, and has finally been realized by a group of [six] owners this year,” he said. The restaurant was finally established after the owners had a chance to travel the world to gain a better understanding of both the culture and finesse of Asian cusine.

Upon stepping inside, patrons are greeted with a large, dimly lit space that is divided in the middle by a uniquely staged bar. Both the tables and booths leave guests sitting in close proximity to one another.

Wooden beams provide structure to the open venue, genuine hardened brick is left exposed, and the furnish-

ings are reminiscent of early 1920s steampunk. Even the accommodating unisex washrooms convey the easygoing, yet tasteful feel that is evident throughout the restaurant.

The tables are made from the wood of repurposed bowling alleys, and a grand sunroof directly overlooks the bar. To complement the setting, a mix of different electronic instrumentals play in the background, creating a relaxed and comfortable ambiance.

Kyozon’s menu is far from conventional; the owners wanted to feature the communal eating of traditional Asian cultures by creating dishes in shareable sizes. Upstairs, there is also a kaiten-zushi, where guests sit at a conveyor belt that carries plates of food. The prices are generally all student-friendly, ranging from $3.50$9.00 for small plates and $10.00$19.00 for larger plates, with a few exceptions.

Kyozon boasts an assortment of small, à-la-carte dishes: Crab and chicken Sui Mai, Tom Kha soup, and Japanese noodle lobster rolls. The Sui Mai’s filling is light and balanced, while the soup is laden with delicious

vegetables and squid. With the savoury rolls, the meal is a perfect combination of tastes. Also highly recommended are the baby back ribs in the house sticky black bean sauce and the exotic green papaya and mango salad.

The restaurant’s cocktail menu is composed of bold Kyozon offers a new experience with its Asian fusion dishes. (Courtesy of Kyozon Asian Bar) twists on classic drinks, including notable names such as Monkey servers appear to genuinely enjoy their an interesting experience, and the food Juice and 6 MAI 2014. The Leche de work, and are enthusiastic advocates is exceptional for the price. Weekly Geisha, a fruity alchoholic beverage for Kyozon. They are friendly without specials such as Tuesday’s Open infused with black tea, is decorated being intruding, extremely helpful, Deck––where guests can choose the music––and Thursday’s 5 à 7 are great and knowledgeable about the menu. similar to a geisha’s hairstyle.

However, the waiting time for opportunities to visit Kyozon.

The salmon teriyaki main dish According to Chang, the fundaincludes a green pea purée, combined the food is quite long. Kyozon is betwith a surprisingly tangy sauce that of- ter suited for a date or a small group mental idea behind the style of dining fers a unique palate with the salmon. of friends who are planning on sitting at Kyozon is to bring an innovative fuThe dish is further complemented by down and having a long meal. If that sion of flavours together.

“The Japanese word Kyozon eringi mushrooms. Another notewor- is not the plan for the night, the bar and thy suggestion is the Korean beef its adventurous concoctions offer a ca- means to coexist,” Chang said. “[Patrons have the opportunity to] sual alternative. flank with homemade kimchi.

Kyozon will entice a younger throw everything together, [and] The overall service of the restaurant is remarkable. The bartenders and and livelier clientele to Crescent. It is everyone can have a bite.”

WORDSEARCH

Autumnal snacks

Thanksgiving

Created by Cory Goldstein

By Keah Hansen and Laura Plamondon

Pumpkin Spice Oats Makes 1 serving

Ingredients

1/2 cup rolled oats 2 tbsp chia 2 tbsp raisins 1 tbsp nut butter 1 mashed banana 1/4 cup canned pumpkin pureé 1 cup milk (opt: almond or soy milk) 1 tsp cinnamon

Peanut Butter Cookies Makes 30 cookies

Ingredients

1 cup peanut butter 1 cup sugar 1 large egg 1 tsp baking soda Opt: 1 or 2 tbsp of flour, a dash of vanilla, or chocolate chips

Directions:

Directions:

1. Mix all ingredients together in a sealable container and place in fridge overnight.

1. Preheat oven to 350°F. 2. Beat Peanut butter and sugar in a bowl untill smooth.

3. Beat egg and baking soda into the mixture, along with any other optional ingredients.

4. Roll dough into small balls, and arrange on a greased baking sheet.

5. Bake for 10 minutes until golden.

2. Remove and enjoy the next morning.

Find the answer key at: www.mcgilltribune.com Autumn Bread Cake Corn Cranberry

Family Feast Gathering Gourds Gravy

Ham Harvest Holiday Pie Potatoes

Pudding Pumpkin Relatives Salad Squash

Stuffing Thanksgiving Turkey Vegetables Yams

A PRECIPITOUS BAL ANCING ACT Today’s female scientists face both challenges and support in their decisions to raise a family and develop their academic career

Caity Hui

T

oday’s academic landscape has drastically evolved from that of the past. As universities pump out an increasing number of graduate students each year, the grant money and academic positions once available to incoming researchers are now spread thin. This phenomenon has resulted in more efforts and minds contributing to the pool of scientific discovery—a state that, while beneficial for research progress, has led to greater job competition within the sciences. As such, women in science today must not only consider whether they want to start a family, but also how their rising career will fit into this equation.

One byproduct of this situation is that graduate students are now pursuing lengthier educations. Lauren Segall, the research facilitator for Natural and Health Sciences at Concordia University, explained that today’s competition in science has led to both women and men undertaking more extensive degrees. As a result, they are achieving financial security and job stability—two factors often considered before having children—significantly later on in their lives.

“Now, people are doing six years [for a] post-doctorate,” Segall said. “You’re graduating with your PhD when you’re 30 […] and then hopefully, you’ll find a tenure track position, meaning for six more years you’re working towards tenure furiously. So it takes until you’re 40 to have job security—is that when you’re going to have a family?”

This situation poses new challenges for both men and women; however, female scientists also face a biological clock that starts to tick quite rapidly years before reaching job security. As a result, they are, by virtue of nature, more pressured to make the decision earlier on in their careers as to whether they want to raise a family.

“In retrospect, it seems really crazy [to have decided] to have a child towards the end of my husband’s [and my own] PhD,” said Alanna Watt, assistant professor at McGill’s Department of Biology.

She emphasized that this decision should be made personally, depending more on mental preparedness than an exact point in one’s career. “It was kind of [an] unusual decision to have children so early in our careers. The challenges were mostly financial, but we kind of figured we could make it work, and we did manage.”

Karine Auclair, associate professor of chemistry at McGill,

echoed Watt’s sentiments that, while financial security is a factor, starting a family is not restricted to certain stages of one’s work.

“I wanted to make sure I had a secure revenue to provide an unchanging environment for my future children,” Auclair said. “[But] I have heard of people doing it at any stage—undergraduate degree, graduate, post-doc, the very beginning of their job, or sort of like myself, semi-early in [their career.] I think it’s possible at all [...] stages—it just depends on when the person is ready.”

Like any career, the demands of parenting and balancing one’s work outside of the home is far from a simple task. A career in research adds one more layer to this challenge, as many scientists are expected to take a more 24-hour approach to their research.

“In the hard sciences, there seems to be an expectation that you’re giving up one aspect of your life for another,” Segall said. “There’s no question that you’re in the lab. [If you’re not,] there is the sentiment that ‘you don’t take it seriously.’”

Auclair added that while pregnant, female researchers are expected to dedicate more time to their careers compared to women in other fields. Unlike many of her friends outside of science, she was unable to fully take a break during her maternity leave.

“I had to work and keep in touch with my research group,” Auclair said. “Despite the flexibility [science] offers, it was a difficult balance.”

Having a supportive partner, mirrored in one’s friends, family, and university department, is often the key to success for most women managing the balancing act between a developing career in academia and raising a family.

“My department is exceptional,” Auclair said. “We are very family oriented and there are lots of females in our department.”

Despite this support, Auclair noted that she and some of her colleagues have received negative comments for taking maternity leave. As labs often become a dangerous environment for women following conception—due to chemicals and other experimental techniques—they are unable to directly continue working on their research after a certain point in pregnancy.

“I can tell you that I have had [negative] comments made

towards me and other colleagues regarding taking maternity leave, so I can’t even imagine the way it might be in other, [less supportive] departments,” Auclair said.

Segall also emphasized that one of the main barriers women face in science is taking a maternity leave. While women are no longer at risk of losing their jobs during pregnancy due to workplace policies now in place, many receive the distinct impression that both male and female colleagues interpret this decision as a lack of dedication to one’s research, consequently feeling pressure to return to the workforce as quickly as possible.

“I was TA-ing for someone who [decided to have a child and] was finishing up her PhD […] and two of her female colleagues in biology came up to her and said: ‘We’re disappointed in you; we thought you were more dedicated to your career than that,’” Segall recalled.

Watt added that the competitive nature of science might contribute to the pressure mothers feel when taking time away from their research. However, she noted that despite this competition, science’s meritocracy also means that starting a family ultimately shouldn’t impact a researcher’s career.

“I think there are very few people that would have a bias against you if you have children, if you are doing good science.”

Watt said. “Science is merit based, and you are primarily evaluated by the quality of your work.”

However, a definitive stigma has existed within the sciences regarding maternity leave., according to Yvonne Myal, professor of pathology at the University of Manitoba. She explained that during her experience as a graduate student, this attitude discouraged many women in science from starting a family.

“When I was a young graduate student in the [1980s’] a number of my female colleagues chose not to have children.”

Myal said. “I think male colleagues did not take you seriously [….] I even heard one of my older respected colleagues comment—upon hearing that one of the post-doctoral fellows was pregnant—that she could not possibly be a serious researcher.

Those female colleagues who ‘dared’ to have babies always returned to work in a very short period of time.”

She notes that while this attitude has existed for decades, female researchers today are starting to see a change in the extent to which they are supported in raising a family.

“I certainly felt that women having babies was frowned upon [back then,] but that is definitely not the case these days,” Myal said.

One of the contributing factors to this shift in perspective

is the more concerted effort made by funding agencies such as the National Sciences Engineering and Research Council (NSERC) towards offering solutions to female researchers to continue their research, unabated, following their pregnancy.

“Now, the agencies have this program where if you go on maternity leave you can extend your grant. So they will suspend your grant and [restart] it up, and even give you an extra year to spend your funds,” Segall explained. “Since the agencies themselves are making it easier for the researchers to start a family and support a family, the universities have also gotten on board.”

With progress, however, comes a reaction to the change.

Segall acknowledged that some of her colleagues felt resentment within their departments for receiving an extension on their grants. There are also still many flaws within the system that continue to make the task of balancing academia and motherhood challenging. Auclair explains that even at McGill, where the system is normally supportive of women, loopholes exist that manage to fuel the stigma against women taking maternity leave.

She described an experience where, as an assistant professor, one of her research associates went on maternity leave.

Auclair was under the impression that the Commission de la santé et de la sécurité du travail (CCST) would pay her associate’s salary during the leave. While the CCST did pay McGill, McGill used this money to cover alternate fees instead of her associate’s salary.

“If you think about that, it cost me thousands of dollars out of my pocket as an assistant professor [to pay my research associate,] so it would discourage anyone from hiring a female after that because [she might decide to have another child,]” Auclair said. “McGill is normally really good; you see [that] one of the best institutions that is trying to favour equality is still having problems, so I can only imagine those that are not trying their best.”

In the face of these challenges, these scientists emphasized the importance of women remaining resilient within the field of science. They stressed that while science may be tough and competitive, it is possible for women to balance academia and motherhood, especially when supported by their university, department, and family.

“Having a family while trying to establish oneself in an academic career is challenging but not unattainable or undoable,” Myal said. “It is a game-changer and involves re-strategizing and multitasking. I now see many of my female colleagues having [...] families with much ease and grace.”

12

Science & Technology

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

The changing face of space University of Toronto hosts panel on evolution of space science Chloe Nevitt Science & Technology Editor

(Continued from page 1) Hailing from Ottawa, Howell stated that her love for space dates back to the Apollo 13 movie she watched as a teenager. It was then when she decided she wanted to become an astronaut.

Unfortunately, she realized that her strengths were geared more towards being a writer than astronaut, but she didn’t let that stop her from her love of space. Following a string of dead ends, she decided to pursue a masters in space studies at the University of North Dakota.

“A person with any sort of [previous] degree can do this,” she said. “I came in on the journalism side, which was definitely interesting, but I learned some technical things like engineering principles and how commercial launches work.”

Using this knowledge, Howell made some risky choices—including spending money to attend expensive shuttle launches and leaving other careers—but ended

JENNY SHEN Editor-in-Chief

Seeing is believing

In a preliminary UCLA study led by eye specialist Steven Schwartz, 18 legally blind patients were given embryonic stem cells; 10 showed substantial improvements in their vision.

Although the research is in its initial steps, Schwartz and other scientists believe that the embryonic stem cell treatment shows promise for future cures for other medical conditions.

The stem cells used, known as human embryonic stem cells (hESCs), are able to become any type of cell in the body by using differentiating factors. In this study, they were differentiated into retinal pigment epithelium cells, which were then transplanted into patients with visual diseases known as Stargadt’s macular dystrophy and dry atrophic age-related macular degeneration. Neither disease currently has a viable cure, but this study shows promise for potential solutions.

A few of the patients exhibited minor side effects, which were attributed to the transplantation itself and the drugs that were taken to aid the process, not the hESCs. According to Schwartz, this study has the potential for paving the way for research.

up where she wanted. Today, because of her position, Howell is able to learn and write about all of the cutting-edge events in the space world.

Osinki’s research focuses on meteor impacts, and he is also interested in developing technologies and techniques for human and robotic surface operations on the moon and Mars. His work is interdisciplinary and reflects the multifaceted nature of working in planetary science.

“The space program exists [to] show us how Earth works,” Howell said. “[It] can measure environmental changes or even how ships move across the ocean.”

It’s results like these that make it that much more important to continue studying space. While immediate uses for instruments on Earth that were initially invented for space-only use are sometimes unclear, developments have always been made as a result of demands in planetary science.

“It’s just like any sort of high-level technology—you can’t predict what the payoff will be,” Howell said.

“[It marks] an exciting step towards using hESC-derived stem cells as a safe source of cells for the treatment of various medical disorders requiring tissue repair or replacement,” he said.

Such great heights

A robotic airship featuring a ‘stabilizing fin’ designed at Greentown Labs in Somerville, Massachusetts has been developed in order to mimic a wind turbine—the most noticeable difference being the airship’s staggering height. While wind turbines are typically around 200 feet tall, this airship stands at 2,000 feet, features blade tips 720 feet long, and is surprisingly inflatable. This turbine, known as a buoyant airborne turbine (BAT), is one of Altaeros Energies’ most significant projects.

One of the most significant differences between ordinary wind turbines and the BAT is in installation.

While wind turbines typically require a full crew and an extended period of time to put together, the BAT can be used right away.

According to Altaeros, the BAT will be most useful in areas where non-renewable energy sources are not economically feasible and solar panels are not practical, particularly in regions plagued with snow and frost.

Bill Nye entertained and educated space enthusiasts. (Photo courtesy of The Varsity) For example, computers were miniaturized to enable them to be brought onto aircrafts. Today, mechanical arms used to collect samples from planets are being used in medical studies to search for tumours. Studies done by Professor Richard Hughson from the University of Waterloo on astronauts recently returned from space are showing connections between anti-gravity and aging by observing muscle atrophy and the effects of balance.

Howell also stated that humans one day landing on Mars is a very real possibility.

“There are projects like Mars 2025 that are already planning on sending people [to Mars,]” Howell said. “NASA has always had plans to put men on Mars as a long-term goal. [But] there’s always an issue of money and how friendly it would be for humans.”

Modern day rovers such as Curiosity, which NASA sent up in 2011, detect radiation and deter-

mine specific Martian climate and geology. Opportunity, which was sent to Mars in 2004, has been taking readings for 10 years, 40 times its designated lifespan. Regardless of whether or not these environments are conducive to life, the research to find out is quickly progressing.

As companies like SpaceX, Boeing, and Sierra Nevada privatize space travel, it will be interesting to see how progress shifts.

The Alaska Energy Authority has already given Altaeros a $740,000 grant to begin working with the BAT. “We’re not trying to replace wind turbines,” said Altaeros cofounder and lead director Adam Rein. “We’re trying to expand wind energy to places where it doesn’t work today.”

Sydney, emphasized that the makeup of the galaxy has perplexed scientists for years.

“Dr. Kafle’s work has shown that

it might not be as bad as everyone thought, although there are still problems to overcome,” he said.

In the dark

Dr. Prajwal Kafle, an astrophysicist from the University of Western Australia, worked with other astronomers to use an age-old method developed in 1915 to study the Milky Way—except their discoveries were far from ancient. In fact, they discovered that the galaxy is only half the size that scientists were previously led to believe.

According to Kafle, the reason for this discrepancy lies in the distribution of matter versus dark matter.

Because four per cent of the galaxy is visible and 25 per cent is composed of dark matter, the remainder is considered to be ‘dark energy.’ Kafle’s study was unique in that it focused on the speed of stars all the way to the edges of the galaxy in order to measure the mass of the dark matter that exists in the Milky Way. Professor Geraint Lewis, an astrophysicist from the University of

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2014-10-02 11:08 AM

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

13

Science & Technology

Experts discuss life in outer space The Lorne Trottier Symposium addresses age-old question

This month in student research: Alex Coutin, U2 Pharmacology Chloe NEVITT Science & Technology Editor

Alex Coutin, who worked at UBC this summer, studied recombinant H3, a protein histone involved in maintaining the structure of DNA in a single haploid yeast cell.

He looked at the diverse associations of the ASF1 histone chaperone, another protein responsible for the coiling and folding of these DNA strands into chromsomes.

What advice would you give to someone applying for a lab?

(L-A Benoit / McGill Tribune)

What lab did you work in?

Joe Schwarcz organized the annual Lorne Trottier Symposium. (L-A Benoit / McGill Tribune) Clare Lyle & Clovis Vinant-Tang Staff Writer & Contributor

Spanning two days, the Annual Trottier Public Science Symposium “Are We Alone?” took the audience to the moon, Mars, and beyond. Focusing on the origin of life in our solar system, the series explored the where and how of alien life.

Monday

Monday’s first speaker, Planetary Society President Jim Bell, discussed the journeys of Spirit, Opportunity, and Curiosity—three Mars rovers—as they furthered the search for microbial life in our solar system. Following him was Jill Tarter, director of the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI) Institute, explaining the possibility of sentient life and our current methods of finding it.

Bell started by presenting the idea that if we can prove that life evolved on another planet, then we know that it is not a cosmic coincidence—all of the universe should be full of life. Mars, due to the presence of water on its surface, is a prime target for this. Rovers have been sent to ancient lakes and bodies of water in order to study potential traces of life.

By observing soil and air samples, or by taking photographs of the Martian surface to investigate the different layers of rock, scientists can extrapolate the conditions and determine how habitable they may be.

One of the major goals for NASA’s next mission is to set up a sample-return capsule, which could be brought back to Earth and analyzed.

Tarter pointed to the hundreds of thousands of confirmed extrasolar planets that have been discovered within a ‘habitable zone’—regions with sufficient atmospheric pressure to support liquid water—as necessary to study. She believes that there are more habitable planets than we are testing for because our definition of what makes planets livable is too narrow.

The goal of Tarter’s and SETI’s efforts is to detect a signal from an alien species, in order to answer two major questions: How close are other intelligent civilizations, and how far away are we?

Tuesday

Professor Sarah Seger began Tuesday’s talks by addressing some common questions about the search for another Earth. Called the ‘Indiana Jones of astronomy,’ Seger researches the edges of exoplanets—planets that do not orbit Earth’s sun— and their identification.

To set the stage for her talk, Seger gave the audience a glimpse of the vastness of the universe and the diversity of star systems. However, the detection of exoplanets is only the first step in the search for life. After astronomers find a planet, they still need to determine whether it contains any signs of biological activity.

So far, the search has produced an impressive list of exoplanets, but no sign of extraterrestrials. Even if scientists do find life markers, interstellar distances mean that a trip to visit any celestial neighbours would take millennia.

So why bother? Why search for something so far away when humans won’t be able to visit it for thousands of years?

The answer, according to Seger, is because one day, humans will make the trip.

“The desire to explore is so huge, so amazing, that one of our legacies of finding exoplanets is the thought that hundreds, thousands of years from now, people going on this trip [to other star systems] will look back at all of us here and they’ll say, ‘Wow, those were the first people who went out and tried to find those other worlds,’” she said.

Skeptic Joe Nickell shifted the audience’s focus away from the stars and back to Earth. As the world’s only full-time, professional paranormal investigator, Nickell touches upon tales of Earth’s more mythological inhabitants. The two mythologies represent different aspects of humanity’s relationship with the planet.

“Bigfoot is the symbol for [the world’s] endangered species,” he said.

As Nickell put it, humanity’s fascination with the infamous Sasquatch reflects the curiosity about our own origins in the natural world.

“We’re looking away from this planet,” Nickell said. “We’re looking to the moon, the stars, and so forth, and we’re imagining that there may be life out there.”

The speakers’ descriptions of the search for life beyond Earth revealed more about humans than about aliens. Even if life is not universal, the desire to find it is.

I worked in the Howe lab as part of the Molecular Epigenetics group at the Life Science Centre at the University of British Columbia.

What was your favourite job at the lab?

Interacting with the graduate students [and] trying to come up with an idea on what detection [to use] for a procedure.

What was a difficulty you encountered when working?

Quantifying the H3 took a lot of effort. I had to test a few models to see which antibodies would connect and how to come up with the right controls. I was just coming out of first year, so I didn’t have a lot of biochemical background. I didn’t know how to do a Western [blot]—I was just learning that. I thought it was going to be easy when I started but it involved a lot of critical thinking and I was way out of my depth coming out of first year. The most difficult part was not seeing results right away and having to be patient. Because I’m the type of person that needs results at the end of the day, and most PhD’s don’t see results for weeks sometimes, it was frustrating.

Look for something you like. Don’t just do it because it’s a lab job. If you can’t find something, and your excuse is that you can’t find lab work, you’re not trying hard enough. You need to show passion and determination if you want a specific job. But don’t be deluded into thinking you need a lab job in science. It’s not necessary.

Do you want to go into research after graduation?

I don’t plan on doing basic science research, [but] I might [do] clinical research in the future. My goal is to probably become a surgeon or work in healthcare for marginalized groups.

Specifically LGBTQ groups, particularly in [transgender] care.

What was surprisingly easy?

The actual procedures weren’t difficult to complete. Getting publish-worthy or grantworthy results was easy too because once the procedures [and] optimizing [are] done, it’s easy to just pump out results, results, and results.

If you were a mad scientist, what would you do in your lab?

I would probably look at pediatric endocrinology and look for easing transitions in young children.

If you could choose a super power, what would it be?

Transportation to anywhere in the world.

That’d be cool.

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14

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

The return of Twin Peaks

and the “cult” TV phenomenon

Last week, TV show Twin Peaks’ cult following created an enormous internet buzz when it was announced that the show would be returning in 2016 for a nineepisode season after an unprecedented 25-year cancellation period. Two of our writers weigh in on the potential benefits and consequences of bringing a dormant show back to life.

Approach with caution Chris Lutes Staff Writer First and foremost, let me say that I couldn’t be more excited that Twin Peaks is coming back. But I come to this happy news from a place of cautious optimism. Shows aren’t ‘un-cancelled’ very often—let alone after 25 years of being off the air, and looking at other shows that have come back after periods of cancellation, it’s hard not to be a little apprehensive about Twin Peaks’ prospects.

Shows that have been resurrected from cancellation have generally not lived up to the standards set by their original runs. Futurama started off strong when it came back for its seventh season, but quickly devolved into a pandering shadow of its former self. The fourth season of Arrested Development was intricately mapped out, but ultimately didn’t amount to anything—and limited cast availability constrained the show from being what made it so great in the first place. Community’s sixth season on Yahoo’s new streaming service hasn’t begun filming yet, but it’s lost so much of its original cast that at this point, it’s hard to still be hopeful.

Most of this isn’t the fault of the shows or their creators. They were beholden to impossible standards that they couldn’t live up to, even if the quality of the new season surpassed the previous ones. It will always be different from the show that people were once familiar with. Actors age, sets are broken down and rebuilt, and writing staffs retool. It’s impossible for a show’s voice to stay the same, especially when it has been away as long as 25 years.

Part of the problem is that in the years between cancellation and renewal, there’s nothing new coming from the show, so fan communities have nothing to do but endlessly trade quotes and memes from previous seasons or pick apart any new details about its return.

They work themselves up into a fervor and build an echo chamber of how they perceive the show and what their expectations are for the future. If the finished product deviates from what they have in their head, they become disappointed. This kind of build-up puts shows in an impossible double-bind: if they deviate too much from the tone and plot of the original series, then they’re not making the show that fans fell in love with anymore, as in the case of Arrested Development. If they stay too close to the original story, then they aren’t breaking any new ground and there was really no reason for the show to come back in the first place, as with Futurama.

The common denominator with these shows is their cult following, and showrunners are tempted to pander to this demographic, because ultimately, without these fans, the show wouldn’t be coming back at all. The problem is that fans often don’t know what’s best for a show, but show-runners feel a certain obligation to give the people what they want. This can result in a returning show resting on its laurels by cheaply calling back its most popular moments from previous seasons (again, Arrested Development) or devolving into plots that have no purpose beyond fan service.

I’m confident that this won’t be the case with Twin Peaks. This seems vital: It ended on one of the biggest television cliffhangers of all time, and one of the main characters even says, “See you in 25 years,” while looking directly at the camera. Co-creators David Lynch and Mark Frost have learned from the mistakes of the show’s uneven second season, and neither of them seems like the type of showrunner who would be pressured into fan service—Lynch especially. A nine-episode limited series gives them exactly enough room to build a new story without any room for filler. On top of that, this will be the first time Lynch has directed anything substantive since the mid-2000s. With prospects like these, it’ll be a long wait until 2016. Until then, see you at the black lodge.

Give the fans what they want ERIC NOBLE-MARKS Contributor Campy, dark, and deeply weird, Twin Peaks was wildly successful in its first season before declining ratings prompted its early and polarizing demise in 1991. However, this was far from the end of the Twin Peaks story. The show has proven to be one of the most enduring programs of the period. The more time that passed following the show’s cancellation, the more fans clamoured for another chapter—even in the face of writerdirector David Lynch’s frequent and persistent refusals. After nearly 25 years, the fans have finally gotten their wish. On Monday, Twin Peaks was confirmed to be returning to the small screen in 2016 for an nine-episode mini-series. Each episode will be directed by Lynch and written by both him and original co-writer Mark Frost.

As I’m a fan, I’m obviously ecstatic about the return of Twin Peaks, but I don’t share the reservations that some fans have expressed about its continuation. Twin Peaks isn’t the first show to rise from the grave, and in his half of the Pop Dialectic, Chris Lutes touched on a variety of resurrected TV shows from Arrested Development to Futurama to Community. What’s interesting is that none of these shows were incredibly successful to begin with during their original television run. Also common to nearly every one of the returning shows is the presence of a cult following: A relatively small but incredibly loyal fan group. It’s important to note that none of the ‘big’ shows of the ’90s, shows like Friends, Seinfeld, or Frasier, have been resurrected since their endings. By in large the extensive fan bases of these shows have been seemingly content to settle with their impressive legacies—although many Seinfeld fans would prefer a do-over on the polarizing trial that closed out the series—lest they be tarnished by ill-advised revivals.

It’s the ‘little shows that could’ that are not allowed to die, for better or for worse.

There are multiple reasons for this. For one, popular shows are generally given ample time to exhaust their writers’ creative drive. Seinfeld had nine seasons to entertain its viewers, Friends had 10. In contrast, due to their limited followings cult shows are prone to untimely and unsatisfying cancellations. Twin Peaks notoriously ended on what Chris described as “one of the greatest cliffhangers in TV history.” With this in mind, who can fault the fans of Twin Peaks and countless other shows for longing for closure?

In addition, the issue with mainstream TV shows is that their fans are generally drawn from a wide demographic and are subsequently difficult to mobilize. People from every walk of life watched Seinfeld—some religiously, others casually. This made it hard to concentrate fans around a particular movement. However, cult followings are by definition devoted and obsessive. The inclusion of Twin Peaks’ first two seasons on Netflix also aided the growth and mutation of this cult movement. Though comparatively small, the fan base is more likely to voice concerns on the internet and other social forums—and, ultimately, campaign harder for the return of beloved shows. So why deny them the opportunity to extend the lifespan of the prematurely perished shows they’ve fought for?

Whatever the reason, the return of Twin Peaks—and shows like it—has broad implications for the future of television. Never before has a TV show that has been dead for so long risen from the ashes. Its return makes one question if any show is really dead, if we’re blessed (or doomed) to live in a world where the story of our beloved TV heroes never ends. What the return of Twin Peaks does tell us is that anything is possible, even when a show’s been off the air for nearly 25 years. Twin Peaks’ following never stopped growing and in the end, Lynch and Frost delivered. As for the show itself, it will most likely be like everything David Lynch has ever made: Genius, a trainwreck, or some combination of the two. It will undeniably be interesting. Your move, Firefly.

15

Wednesday, October 15 2014

Gangs of Tokyo: Not your typical mobster movie Hip-hop singing hoodlums meet campy crime in Tokyo Tribe JACK TOKARZ Contributor The threshold for widespread shock or novelty has increased exponentially due to the sheer breadth of available internet content. That being said, Tokyo Tribe is a film unlike anything anybody has ever seen before. Hilarious, gross, sexist, confusing, and silly, it’s not the easiest film to boil down to a one sentence description, but here’s an attempt: It is a farcical, tongue-in-cheek, low-budget Japanese-language film centred on a cannibalistic gang that declares war on the other gangs ruling a dystopian Tokyo—and it’s a hiphop musical.

‘Musical’ may be a misleading word for this film; although there is a generic beat spinning and shifting throughout the 118-minute film, and characters break into rap in lieu of conversing, insulting, introducing, explaining, or talking for any other reason, it feels strange to refer to the results as ‘songs.’ There were a couple of moments when a chorus emerged and the rap had structure, but typically, characters would arbitrarily switch between rapping or speaking without other characters acknowledging anything abnormal. During the rap sequences, the extras would sometimes nod along with the beat, which never quite defined itself as diegetic or not. Sometimes there was a DJ present, sometimes somebody would start beatboxing and it would grow, and sometimes the bass just erupted from nowhere as one of the characters began to rap.

Because half of the dialogue was in rap form, a lot of connotation and wordplay seemed to be lost in translation. The English subtitles rhymed, which added to the mise en scène, but most likely involved some language tweaking and modification of the original script.

The pacing and overall structure of the plot perfectly mirrored the aesthetic of the sets: Cheap, creative, and incomprehensible—but a lot of fun.

Every scene of the film’s first half hour centres

Homesick Harmonies MAX BERGER Arts & Entertainment Editor

Steel Rail Blues

Director Sion Sono bring J-rap to the big screen (moviemezzanine.com) on new characters, expanding the ensemble cast while introducing the mythos of this dystopian city. But without an identifiable protagonist, the viewer is lost and more or less indifferent to all parties. It was an hour and a half into the film— immediately prior the climax—before those fragments pieced together and the plot of the film properly explained. The film progresses as if the writers changed the focus of the film several times mid-story but forgot to rewrite the beginning.

Those familiar with Jason Eisener’s Hobo with a Shotgun (2011) will be reminded of its set in Tokyo Tribe: A film lot barely pretending to be anything else, inexplicably bathed in primary color lights. Despite being noticeably fabricated, all of the sets are well-detailed, coated in relevant graffiti and an appropriate amount of grime. Impressively, every set contained a dozen or more extras constantly interacting, fighting, dancing, or just talking around the main characters, making the convincing part of the set the people—not the physical structure.

Although the film is a blatant farce and goes well beyond the boundaries of normality, the sexism goes too far and becomes viscerally disturbing. The first half of the film takes place mostly

in a brothel, and even outside of this setting, the women are treated as objects or worse. While this film is not attempting to give any serious opinion on social issues—it features a man getting punched over a building while wailing, “But it’s my birthday,” consistent in its extravagance—the amount of subjugation of all female characters is disgusting.

With a creative director making long, beautiful multi-minute shots that follow a rap from one actor to another, a set and a script that makes up for its poor pacing, and hilarity in its actions and dialogue, this film could have been a great success; however, its low-budget, nonsensical appearance sets it on a path to be a B movie cult classic at best. If you are interested in a film where a man dressed as Elvis shoots a miniature gun haphazardly across a room,while bikini-clad women cheer, or where a secret button reveals a massive fan that sucks people in and chops them up, or where these happen simultaneously during a mediocre rap song, then check out Tokyo Tribe.

Tokyo Tribe premiered in Canada at the Toronto International Film Festival on Sept. 4, and was recently shown at the Montreal Festival du Nouveau Cinema on Oct. 9 and 10.

I like it better when we’re not wasted

Novelty wears off quickly as sloppiness reigns at The Drunken Show MARTIN MOLPECERES Contributor

The Drunken Show is exactly what it sounds like: A group of comedians who get inebriated and go on stage to perform their acts, with the audience heavily encouraged to get drunk as well. So naturally, with the aim of getting the ‘full’ experience, that’s exactly what I did—for artistic purposes, of course.

One Caipirinha, two vodka shots, and half a bottle of white wine later, I arrived at Theatre St. Catherine in the proper condition for a night of inebriated comedy. At 9:30 p.m., the MC took to the stage and one thing became readily apparent: Everyone was just too drunk.

Ultimately, the very gimmick designed to draw in crowds was the show’s fatal flaw—formatting a stand-up show around such a premise is at odds with the very nature of stand-up. For the most part, such comedy requires a very rigorously structured format: Every joke is carefully crafted to provide the biggest effect, which is why hecklers can be so infuriating—they break

that structure and cause the comedian to improvise. However, in this case, the alcohol served the role as heckler, crippling the performers and destroying all coherence.

Throughout the entire show, there was an underlying feeling that the drunken format would be better suited for an improv, or even traditional theatre. Stand-up can be far less forgiving since the entire performance depends on a single person on stage trying to make an audience laugh. One-by-one, the comedians stumbled on stage and proceeded to ramble and yell at us for fifteen minutes at a time, losing all sense of consistency and structure to their act beyond, “Damn, I’m fucked up, whoooo!” While momentarily endearing, it quickly lost its charm as the realization that this was going to be the whole show set in—a whole show with a $20 admission, I should mention.

This would be less problematic if it wasn’t maddeningly obvious that all these comedians were genuinely funny people.

The few—and I should stress few—times they would focus on their acts and enter into a practiced ‘bit’ were some of the funniest moments of the night, with clear talent behind those jokes. Unfortunately, these

quickly fell by the wayside to more shots and slurs. It was very reminiscent of open mics, with groups of amateurs going on stage with good material only to struggle under the pressure as they stutter and forget their acts. For a group of professional comedians—some of whom claimed to have performed at Just For Laughs—this was less than amusing.

That isn’t to say that there weren’t a few standouts among the performers: One comedian with a gavel and another being pushed hectically about in a wheelchair offered consistent chuckles, but this was more due to their props than anything else, and still left me with the feeling that they would have been much funnier had they been sober.

Ultimately, if you’re ever considering going to a future Drunken Show, my advice is to save yourself 20 bucks, grab a group of friends to share a bottle of whiskey with, and go to an open mic at Burritoville or McLean’s—you’ll probably get a better experience out of it.

Information on future instalments of The Drunken Show can be found at theatresaintecatherine.com.

Artist: Gordon Lightfoot Album: Lightfoot!

Released: January 1966 Gordon Lightfoot is Canada’s preeminent folk musician, and he demonstrates it on this song from his first album, crafting a melodious chord progression that hums along like a relaxing first-class train ride while the lyrics carry the weight of freight cargo. The first four verses set the listener up for a happy ending where the lonesome, beaten-up rambler gets to reunite with his girl back home who has, “Sent me a railroad ticket too/ To take me to her lovin’ arms.” But then—since it is a blues song—we find out that he gambled his ticket away and won’t be coming home on that big steel rail after all.

On The Road

Artist: Max Webster Album: High Class in Borrowed Shoes Released: March 1, 1977

The acoustic “On the Road” is a rare departure from the hard rock that dominates Max Webster’s catalogue, but a welcome one. Kim Mitchell’s lush guitar strumming whisks us along as he reflects on the touring lifestyle. Straightforward observations like “On the road/ The heart is slow/ The mind is not clocked/ The feet are sore,” account for most of the lyrics. However, Mitchell saves his most insightful commentary for the chorus, acknowledging that the road offers freedom, but: “Freedom some say is when you get back home.”

Where U Goin

Artist: Arkells Album: Michigan Left Released: October 18, 2011

Everybody studying at an out-of-town school gets hit by a bit of homesickness at some point, even if they don’t care to admit it. There’s no hiding from it on this track, which culminates in a dorm-room conversation—taking place at McMaster University, where the Arkells formed—that shows us how those insecurities can easily bubble to the surface when we try to hide them: “And you know in your bones/ This may never feel like home/ Tonight (tonight, tonight).”

Carry Me Home

Artist: Hey Rosetta!

Album: Hey Rosetta!

Released: November 19, 2012

Nothing breeds homesickness quite like staying in a cheap hotel with stinky pillows on Christmas Eve, which is exactly what Tim Baker opens this track by singing about. Once the bells kick in after the first verse, the juxtaposition between the cheerful music and depressing lyrics is about as glaring as it gets. It’s cliché to talk about not taking things like home and family for granted, but this song reinforces why we should keep doing it anyways.

16

ALBUM REVIEWS SHAKEY GRAVES

HOZIER

FLYING LOTUS

AND THE WAR CAME

Hozier

YOU'RE DEAD!

Dualtone

Columbia

warp

Quirky one-man band Shakey Graves (Alejandro Rose Garcia) made headlines throughout 2012 and 2013 in the Austin, Texas alt-country scene. His impressive act—complete with a hand-made suitcase kick drum and a slide guitar—made an impression with its angsty, bouncing, lo-fi Americana vibe.

He attracted waves of online attention with his 2012 single, “Late July,” an amateurish, finger-picked, soul-wrenching masterpiece.

In his newly released sophomore LP, And the War Came, Shakey’s sound has certainly matured: He’s fined-tuned his restless spirit, but thankfully, without ever pulling on the reins.

Replete with the same foot-stomping madness and expert musicianship he introduced in his earlier work, the new album fits right into the lo-fi Americana, folk-blues niche that Garcia cozily inhabits. However, this time around, he doesn’t hesitate to experiment with some dissonant electronic sounds and a slightly heavier of a rock vibe. What sets him apart from other alt-country and freak folk artists is his shameless, affective omnipresence, which translates into a profound rawness on each song. It is like he has tapped into some kind of deep reservoir of human truth; his tracks can be dark, but never fail to resolve and uplift— it’s a delightful dance between hopeless angst and abundant joy.

This LP takes listeners through a deliberate narrative, absent from his early compilations. The opener amounts to seven seconds of spoken words: “This is the beginning. Hello.

1, 2, 3.” He then brings us through childhood in his second number, “Only Son,” and progresses through the stages of life with each subsequent track. Garcia also collaborates with Paper Bird’s Esmé Patterson for three duets on the album. Patterson’s velvety vocals contrast with his raspy whispers as they both showcase their far-reaching ranges in consummating harmonies.

Austin has bred a true gem in this calculated madman and there is no question he will continue to shake up the folk-rock scene for years to come.

- EVIE KACZMARCK

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

Ella Henderson

Chapter One SYCO

Twenty-four-year-old Irish singer-songwriter Hozier arguably could have dug himself into a premature one-hit wonder grave long before his eponymous first album came out on Oct. 7. His single “Take Me to Church” was released Sept. 13, 2013 and its accompanying music video came out less than two weeks later, quickly going viral. Shot in grayscale, the video follows the romance of two men until one gets brutally attacked by homophobic assailants as the haunting lyrics, “Only then I am human/ Only then I am clean,” come echoing in from the background.

With the sudden widespread success of the single, anticipation for Hozier’s newest album was high—almost as high as expectations were for the artist to bring something new to the table. In this latest release, Hozier exceeded expectations. Despite the heavyhanded romantic metaphors and simplistic guitar chords, Hozier’s talent as a singer and the overall synchronization of each individual track allow for a strong release that can stand apart from “Take Me to Church.”

The clear highlight is “Jackie and Wilson,” a classic electro-blues song that takes full advantage of Hozier’s vocals, particularly in the chorus—the catchiest on the album. Other standouts are “Someone New” and “Like Real People Do,” both of which are tracks that, on the surface, seem like superficial folksy love ballads, until a closer examination of the lyrics reveals the darker themes of heartache and trust issues that permeate through the album.

The disappointment of the album is Hozier’s unwillingness to take full advantage of his vocal potential. Half of what made “Take Me to Church” so popular was its powerhouse chorus, with Hozier belting out lines with a strong rock feeling that carried the song as a whole. Overall, this album’s true strength is in moving beyond the potential post-viral artistic collapse and showing that Hozier has lasting talent. Hopefully in the future, he steps out of his comfort zone to show us all what he’s truly capable of.

You’re Dead , the latest album from musician-producer Flying Lotus, is one that stubbornly refuses to adhere to the limitations of genre. Whether it’s the walking bass at the end of “Tesla,” the distorted guitar riffs that open “Cold Dead,” or the 8-bit sounds on “Dead Man’s Tetris,” Flying Lotus is not afraid to mix and match various effects and styles for the purpose of realizing his dementedly brilliant vision.

It doesn’t always sound deranged though, and the album’s most accessible moments are some of its most thrilling.

On “Never Catch Me,” rapper Kendrick Lamar lends his virtuosic lines to a neosoul cut that sounds a bit like a B-side from Robert Glasper’s Black Radio . But unlike many of the tunes from that record, “Never Catch Me” lacks a big, catchy hook that defines the song. It’s Flying Lotus at his most radio-friendly, but he still refuses to compromise his vision in the interest of accessibility.

On “Moment of Hesitation,” he references straight-ahead jazz similarly to how he cribs from neo-soul on “Never Catch Me.” The genre is a blueprint, not a mandate. In “Moment,” the legendary jazz pianist Herbie Hancock echoes amorphous, wandering saxophone lines with floating keyboard chords that respond to the horn without being beholden to it, all while double-time percussion drives the rhythm underneath them. Like “Never Catch Me,” the song references its influences while breaking free enough to sound wholly original.

Sometimes the album gets outright bizarre, as in the case of the playful, schoolyard-like rhythm juxtaposed with trance-like synthesizer lines on “Ready Err Not,” but it all sounds like the pure self-expression of a challenging genius.

You’re Dead is pastiche of the highest order.

After gaining worldwide attention during the 2012 season of X Factor UK, 16-yearold Ella Henderson rose to prominence due to her incredibly mature vocals, songwriting ability, and lovable personality. It is upon this supremely elevated platform that Henderson releases her debut album, Chapter One. Despite lofty expectations, it does not fail in the slightest.

Kicking off with hit single “Ghost,” the album comes right out of the gate with a series of catchy choruses, strong vocals, and complex instrumental arrangements, which are maintained throughout the entirety of the album. Perhaps its most uplifting song is “Rockets,” which has summer anthem written all over it. “The First Time” features gritty guitars with Henderson singing primarily in the lower end of her vocal register, resulting in a fascinating track that’s like nothing on the radio.

But it’s not all fun and games. Sprinkled amongst the more pop-oriented songs are slower, much more personal reflections.

“Hard Work” sees Henderson confess that she’s ready to look past the troubles of a relationship in order to experience the good.

Although touching at first, the sheer number of these piano-based tracks becomes tiring, eventually crossing over into skippable territory.

The biggest downfall to this album is, frankly, its lyrical content. Essentially every song consists of love-torn lyrics in some form or another, which does, unfortunately, wear thin at 13 tracks long—18 on the deluxe edition. But love sells, and Henderson isn’t the first artist to wear out the theme for a monotonous product.

Ultimately, Chapter One is a great debut album for an artist destined to sing universally applicable love songs. It’s not necessarily deep or groundbreaking, and there are too many ballads that slow down the album’s exciting motion, but as far as love albums go, Chapter One is a good piece of work from an artist that has yet to take a wrong step.

— -MORGAN ALEXANDER

-MAX JOSEPH

—- Jack Neal

sports

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

17

Behind the bench: The end of the enforcer MARTA YESGAT Contributor

For the first time in 43 years, the Philadelphia Flyers’ opening-day roster did not include an enforcer. The Toronto Maple Leafs followed suit by sending both of their tough guys, Colton Orr and Frazer McLaren, to the minor leagues.

These moves prompted conversations across the NHL as many started to question whether this marked the beginning of the end for hockey enforcers.

Until recently, the enforcer was seen as the insurance policy for a team.

The opponent would be scared to take liberties with a team’s star players, knowing that a six-foot-three, 250pound bruiser was on the bench, waiting to retaliate. This scenario, however, is not always the case. Superstar forward Sidney Crosby was the victim of a targeted hit to the head during the 2011 Winter Classic, regardless of the fact that Michael Rupp, Pittsburgh Penguins

enforcer and Crosby’s teammate, was on the roster that day. In 2010, Boston Bruins forward Marc Savard suffered a career-ending blow to the head at the hands of Matt Cooke, even though Bruins’ tough guy Shawn Thornton was playing that night. Evidently, the presence of enforcers no longer guarantees protection from the hits and cheap shots that are a part of hockey. Most hockey fights are staged and rarely intimidate the opponent. This begs the following question: If an enforcer cannot protect his teammates, what value does he bring to his team?

The rise of analytics has taken the hockey world by storm. The efficiency of a player is no longer based solely on goal scoring, point production, or even blocked shots. Advanced statistics like Corsi and Fenwick quantify a player’s proficiency based on the quality of possession that he creates. Everything from shot attempts to scoring chances is taken

The value of sending a once-agame ‘message’ to your opponent is rapidly diminishing in a landscape that requires depth across the roster. Skill and speed are what win games in today’s NHL. After their second-round exit against the Montreal Canadiens, Bruins General Manager Peter Chiarelli put emphasis on acquiring faster players. He let Thornton leave via free agency, possibly ushering in a new era for Bruins hockey. As offence becomes more scarce, clubs will prioritize players who can help them on the scoreboard as opposed to those who spend most of their night on the bench, (Elli Slavitch / McGill Tribune) only to hit the ice for a

into consideration when determining player performance. As analytically inclined front offices rush to sign players who will hold onto the puck longer, offensively challenged enforcers are finding themselves out of jobs.

minute-long fight before retreating to the dressing room.

The beauty of the role that enforcers play does not come from watching two men beat each other to the ice, it comes from the spontaneity of it. Fans see a situation escalate to the point where both anger and pride lead to gloves dropping. We have probably seen the last of the prototypical enforcers that brought fame to nicknames like the ‘Broad Street Bullies;’ however, ‘hybrid enforcers’ such as Wayne Simmonds are beginning to emerge. They are power forwards who can drop their gloves when need be, but possess the right set of skills to stay employed at the highest level of hockey.

It is not easy to make it to the NHL, and it is even harder to stay. Tough guys have their place in the NHL, it’s just a matter of whether they are capable of contributing to the team’s success when their gloves are kept on.

MLB awards Aaron rose Staff Writer

American League MVP: Mike Trout If winning in baseball is based on scoring more runs than the other team, then there’s nobody better than Mike Trout.

At 23 years old, he’s already the best player in the world, and there’s no telling how high his ceiling will be. Both sabermetricians and old-school thinkers love Trout—deservingly so, considering he has led the league in Wins Above Replacement (WAR) every year since debuting in 2012, and finished first in both RBIs and runs scored this year. He’s unquestionably the best player on the league’s best team, and is a no-brainer for this year’s regular season AL MVP. Runners-up: Felix Hernandez, Michael Brantley, and Victor Martinez AL Cy Young: Felix Hernandez For years, Hernandez’s Cy Young chances have been hampered by a sub-par Mariners offence. This year was no exception, as Seattle’s bats once again ranked in the bottom half in runs scored. Hernandez’s 2.14 earned run average (ERA) is the best of his career, and he gave up more than three runs just three times this year. His win-loss record won’t blow you away, but he nearly always gave his team a chance to win this year. Corey Kluber’s breakout season with the Indians was impressive, but playing with a lead is always easier than playing from behind, a position that Hernandez seems to be stuck in—and thrives.

Runners-up: Corey Kluber, Chris Sale, and Max Scherzer Rookie-of-the-Year: Jose Abreu The 27-year-old Cuban phenom burst onto the scene in April, winning both AL Player- and Rookie-of-the Month honours. Abreu finished in the top 10 in all major offensive categories, completely dominating the rest of his rookie class. While his rookie season may have an asterisk beside it after spending five seasons in the Cuban League, Abreu is already drawing comparisons to slugger Ryan Howard, and will certainly compete for the MVP award in the coming years.

Runners-up: Collin McHugh, Matthew Shoemaker, and Marcus Stroman

National League MVP: Clayton Kershaw It has been 46 years since the NL MVP award went to a pitcher. It takes an exceptionally talented pitcher to equal the production of an everyday player when you’re only starting once every five days. But, as any Dodger fan can tell you, Kershaw’s season was nothing short of exceptional. His year was reminiscent to that of Pedro Martinez’s historically dominant 2000 campaign. Kershaw led pitchers in essentially all advanced and traditional statistics and finished second in the MLB in WAR, behind only Mike Trout.

Runners-up: Andrew McCutchen, Jonathan Lucroy, and Giancarlo Stanton Cy Young: Clayton Kershaw Clayton Kershaw is a freak of nature. He’s the best pitcher in the league and probably the best pitcher of his generation.

Not only did he lead the league with 21 wins, but his 1.77 ERA ranks 13th lowest in the last five decades. He was completely lights out in all but one of his starts, posting a 1.46 ERA in 26 of his 27 starts. Expect Kershaw to take home his third—and likely not his last—Cy Young award this year.

Runners Up: Johnny Cueto, Adam Wainwright, and Jordan Zimmerman Rookie-of-the-Year: Jacob DeGrom Entering the season, Billy Hamilton was the consensus favourite for this award, but while the rookie speedster flashed potential, it was by no means spectacular. His 56 stolen bases was bested only by the Dodgers’ Dee Gordon, but he was also thrown out a league-leading 26 times. His stolen base success rate of 74 per cent ranked 208th in baseball, hardly elite. DeGrom, on the other hand, was consistently impressive. His 2.62 ERA ranks in the top 15, above the likes of Madison Bumgarner, Zack Greinke, and Jeff Samardzija. While he may not be a household name yet, the league should be on notice because DeGrom will soon be a force to be reckoned with.

Runners-up: Ender Inciarte, Billy Hamilton, and Ken Giles

(espn.com) MORGAN ALEXANDER Arts & Entertainment Editor

(Continued from page 1) Things went sour quickly: Cheering turned into jeering, which turned into personal attacks as the Patriots scored field goal after field goal. This wasn’t the city full of hope for the impossible; these were people taking each field goal as a personal offense. Perhaps it was all part of the nature of competition, but things turned ugly as a fan in front of me attempted to hit a man for wearing a Patriots jersey following the visitors’ second touchdown. Behind me, drunk Patriots fans were screaming obscenities at the Bills fans surrounding me, who responded with profanities of their own. Sure, the Bills were losing, but the fans were losing it.

Bills fans have long been known for going to the extreme in their celebration. You have to be committed to be willing to sit through white-out games—where the snow gets so thick you can’t see espn.go.com the field—multiple times a year,

only to have your team lose each time. But even with the changing ownership and the news that the Bills would stay, the atmosphere wasn’t one of expected exuberance, but rather an underwhelming disappointment.

I know I’m not the only Bills fan who hoped—perhaps against hope—that we would see that spark that kept the Bills alive throughout the golden era of the early ’90s. We got rid of quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick and found a new owner, and a win against the Patriots would vault the Bills to sole possession of the AFC East lead. But the fans were weak, and our team was weaker, soundly losing 37-22. Hopefully next game, the fans will rally to their usual manic selves, but for one of the biggest games of the season, the passion just wasn’t there.

Clearly, the fans are getting tired of decades of being let down. Ideally, Terry will fill the leadership void and help make this team greater than fans could ever dream—it is his “one goal,” after all.

18

Sports

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

Know your McGill Athlete

elliott ariganello Senior, pitcher economics (Photo courtesy of Benjamin Gordon)

As the McGill Redmen baseball team’s season nears its end, so too does the career of senior starting pitcher Elliott Ariganello. With the Canadian Collegiate Baseball Assocation (CCBA) Northern Conference Championship this weekend, and the CCBA National Championship the following weekend–which McGill will host–Ariganello has an opportunity to go out on a high note.

This season has been one of the strongest in recent memory for the Redmen. The team finished 14-6, placing first in the conference, and swept Carleton in the opening round of the playoffs. Following an injury-plagued 2013 campaign, Ariganello has been a key cog in a starting rotation that has dominated opponents all season as well as a leader both on and off the field. The fact that Ariganello’s time with the Redmen is coming to a close is not lost on him.

“It’s somewhat of a bittersweet feeling for me going into Nationals this year.” Ariganello said. “Getting an opportunity to compete for the National Championship is obviously unbelievable, but knowing I’ll have to leave my great teammates and this game behind at the end of the year is definitely something that’s weighing on me. I’ve been with this team for a long time now, and I’m thankful for everything it has given me over the years. All I can do now is give it everything I’ve got left to help us win a National Championship.”

Unlike the majority of McGill varsity teams, the baseball team plays its home games off-campus. Weekend doubleheaders regularly turn into nine-hour days at Gary Carter Field in Côte Saint-Luc. The nature of a short Fall

10

by WYATT FINE-GAGNÉ

season means that McGill often plays two games each Saturday and Sunday from early September until mid-October.

Ariganello has learned how to manage his time wisely, but admits that it does not really get much easier over the years.

“It’s definitely a grind during midterm season,” he explained. “Four to six games a week plus practices doesn’t really leave you with much time for the library. It certainly doesn’t help that we don’t have a diamond on or even near campus. I’ve been fortunate to have had success balancing athletics and academics during my time at McGill, and as a senior, I’ve tried to help the younger guys figure out how to do it as well.”

Ariganello is a mentor for the younger Redmen, which he hardly could have predicted four years ago when he was in their place. In fact, Ariganello came close to not attending McGill at all. Following high school, he took a year off to travel, but had made no plans about his future prior to embarking on his trip.

“I was in Barcelona when I received an email from my high school guidance counsellor reminding me that I needed to apply to universities or [I’d] miss the deadline,” Ariganello explained. “I decided on McGill while in Morocco a couple months later, and haven’t looked back since.”

Had he not taken a year off, Ariganello may have been part of the Redmen squad that won the 2010 National Championship. Instead, he’s had the chance to carve out his own legacy, and if things break right, he’ll be able to add a National Championship to that list of accomplishments.

McGill Tribune (MT): Which TV shows have you been watching lately?

Elliott Ariganello (EA): I’ve been getting into Seinfeld actually.

(MT): Favourite spot for food on campus?

(EA): I know it’s across the street, but I have to say Super Sandwich.

(MT): Favourite meal of the day?

(EA): Breakfast.

(MT): What’s your walk-up song right now?

(EA): Work by Gangstarr.

(MT): Favourite baseball player of all time?

(EA): Roy Halladay.

(MT): Tim Horton’s or Première Moisson?

(EA): Bring back Timmy’s.

things

you didn’t

know about

lumberjack world championships

By Nick Jasinski

(sawdustmedia.com)

The Lumberjack World Championships has been held at the Lumberjack Bowl in Hayward, Wisconsin every year since 1960. Over 100 participants compete in 21 events for $50,000 in prize money. The competition is split up into men (lumberjacks), women (lumberjills), and team events.

The boom run is a race between two opponents running simultaneously across two parallel chains of floating logs tied end to end from one dock to another. The logs tip and slope perilously depending on which side the contestant’s weight is, leaving many competitors in the water.

In addition to the Lumberjack World Championships, other lumberjacking competitions around the world include ESPN’s Great Outdoor Games, The World Logging Championship, The Stihl Timbersports Series, and various interscholastic competitions, including the Southern Forestry Conclave and the European Championship in Forestry Skills.

Logrolling—or ‘birling’—is an event in which two contestants stand on either ends of a floating log in a body of water and compete to see who can stay on longest. They wear special spiked ‘birling’ shoes, allowing them to grip the log better. The aim is to spin the log rapidly by running quickly in place, forcing the other contestant to keep up or fall off. Competitors also often dig a heel into the log to stop the rotation quickly, and try to make their opponent fall off. The cardinal rule of logrolling is to never take your eyes off your opponent’s feet.

In the block chop event, competitors use a five-pound axe to chop all the way through a standing aspen log 12 inches (300 mm) in diameter and 28 inches (710 mm) tall as fast as they can. The current world record is a blistering 15.94 seconds, set by New Zealand’s Jason Wynyard in 2006.

In the hot saw, competitors use a customized chain saw with a modified engine, usually taken from a personal watercraft or snowmobile. When the judge yells start, competitors make three horizontal cuts in a 20-inch (510mm) diameter white pine log. All three cuts must be made in a six-inch span, and must go cleanly through the entire log. Matt Bush of the United States set the world record in the event at 5.085 seconds in 2003.

There are various speed climbing events at the World Championships, in which competitors race up and down 60-foot (18m) or 90-foot (27m) tall cedar poles. Contestants wear specialized climbing cleats and hold on to a special harness that loops around the other side of the pole to hoist themselves up step-by-step. Brian Bartow holds both the 60-foot and 90-foot pole climb records at 12.33 seconds and 19.87 seconds respectively.

Jack and Jill is a team event composed of one male and one female competitor per team. Using a two-person bucksaw, the teams must cut through an entire 20-inch (510mm) diameter white pine log, alternating pulling and pushing cuts from each side. The world record time for the Jack and Jill is 6.17 seconds, set in 2005 by Jason and Karmyn Wynyard.

The team relay consists of teams racing through a selection of lumberjack sports including a 60-foot climb, a hot saw, a block chop, and more. In one format, the team to complete all of the events the fastest wins. In an alternative format, teams earn points for finishing in the top three in each event, and the team with the most points walks away victorious.

At the end of the competition, the Tony Wise All-Around Champion–named for the founder of the original Lumberjack World Championships–is awarded to the lumberjack who scores the most points across all the events. Wynyard is the current champion with a total of 11 Tony Wise awards to his name.

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

19

Sports

Football — bishops 17, Redmen 13

Winless streak continues as Redmen fall to Gaiters New coaching staff unable to turn the tide Elie Waitzer Sports Editor In an exciting battle between the two remaining winless teams in the RSEQ conference, the Bishop’s Gaiters (1-4) came out on top, beating the Redmen (0-5) by a score of 17-13 on Thursday night at Molson Stadium. Both teams tapped freshman quarterbacks to start the game, a rare occurrence in the wildly competitive RSEQ. On the Redmen side, a lingering concussion to senior quarterback Dallon Kuprowski meant rookie Joel Houle, from Chateauguay, QC, would get a shot to start for the third consecutive week. For Bishop’s, the promising Travis Eman, from Brampton, ON, made his first start of the season.

There were new faces on the sidelines for the Redmen, too, following Head Coach Clint Uttley’s resignation over the McGill administration’s stance on the charges leveled against star running back Luis-Andres Guimont-Mota. In his public statement, Uttley cited a conflict in moral values as his main reason for stepping down.

“If providing young men with a second opportunity has effec-

tively cost me my position as head football coach at McGill, then I accept that consequence in order to maintain a higher moral standard than what’s been dictated,” Uttley said.

Newly appointed Co-Coaches Patrick Boies and Ronald Hilaire, formerly the respective offensive and defensive coordinators, were eager to turn the season around in their first game at the helm.

“The mindset was good [going into the game],” Boies said. “We had our best week [...] all year, and we saw [the team] rally around the adversity really well.”

With both teams saddled with injuries to key offensive players, the defences dominated the game, resulting in a low-scoring affair.

The effect was especially pronounced for McGill, who, without its top running back and receiver, featured a 48-man roster including a school record 23 freshmen. The lack of experience was on display early, as neither team was able to secure red-zone position through the first frame. The scoring finally began early in the second quarter, with the Redmen drawing first

Jonathan Mack reaches out for the one-handed grab. (L-A Benoit / McGill Tribune) blood. Following two outstanding runs from sophomore receiver Raphael Casey, Houle completed a 13-yard pass to 6-foot-1 wide receiver Jonathan Mack to set up a 37-yard field goal from senior place-kicker Nils Jonkmans.

Defensively, yet another freshman led the way for McGill. Linebacker Karl Forgues, from Repentigny, QC, registered a game-high 10 tackles. Forgues has quietly put together an impressive rookie season, capably filling the defensive void left by the loss of linebacker

Jesse Briggs to the CFL. The Redmen defensive line was aggressive all night, slicing through the Gaiters’ offensive line and pressuring the opposing quarterback to the tune of seven sacks and two interceptions. However, while they were able to limit Eman’s passing game to a paltry nine yards, they could not contain him on the ground, as his two rushing touchdowns proved to be the difference in the tightly contested match.

With three games left in the

regular season, McGill will look to get in the win column next Saturday at 1 p.m. against Sherbrooke (2-3) in the McGill Homecoming game.

The Redmen have not put together a winning season since 2006, but Boies isn’t ready to throw in the towel.

“Right now, we can only control getting the guys prepared for their next game,” he said. “We never stop recruiting for the future [...] even with the issues we’ve had [this season.]”

Rugby — redmen 17, stingers 17

No quarter given in attritional draw between McGill and Concordia Redmen fail to hold lead in weak second half performance Zikomo Smith Staff Writer The Redmen (2-1-2) were clearly frustrated at the final whistle of Friday’s game against Concordia (3-1-1). It was their second consecutive draw in RSEQ competition, and concluded a hard fought, yet somewhat error-prone performance, with many scoring opportunities prevented by knock-ons and penalties.

In the 70th minute, Concordia’s Yannick Fortin made a longrange penalty kick that drew the score level. The last 10 minutes of the match was marked by hard tackling–as neither team managed to make any substantial attacking inroads.

“Neither […team] really deserved to lose,” Assistant Coach Ian Baillie said. “Both worked hard [….] You never like a draw, but that is sometimes the way it comes [out].”

Both squads were committed to attacking central channels and gaining territory in the midfield.

As such, both teams relied on their forwards to slow the game down at the rucks and also to serve as runners off the fly half.

Both McGill’s and Concor-

dia’s first tries came from relentless pressure on the opposition goal line. Concordia started the match vigorously, while McGill appeared slightly shell-shocked early on–the Redmen could not keep the Stingers off the scoreboard for longer than five minutes.

After a frenetic first portion of the game, McGill settled in to the contest on defence. With calm partially restored, fullback Thomas Stokes scored a penalty kick in the 14th minute and, after waves of pressure, back row Kylan Gibbs scored McGill’s first try in the 25th minute.

In the first half, McGill seemed to win in the midfield battle. Their defence was organized and they frequently broke the gain line on offence. However, the finishing was inconsistent. Many promising Redmen attacks were blighted by knock-ons and offside penalties. The physical nature of this contest disrupted the attacking rhythms of both sides. “[The] midfields [of…] both these clubs are the strongest in the competition,” Baillie said.

“You saw them definitely fighting through one another. The support play of the forwards was crucial

here. Both teams were able to get on the front foot at times [and this…] gave each side an opportunity [to score].”

McGill deservedly finished the half leading 10-8 after proving themselves to be the more effective attacking team. If not for conceded penalties, the lead would have been greater.

In the second half, Concordia adjusted and committed to their kicking game. Fortin was excellent all game. His three converted penalty kicks kept the McGill defence off-balance and pulled Con-

The Redmen push the ball up the field. (Luke Orlando / McGill Tribune) those first contacts.”

The eight-time consecutive RSEQ Champions should not be perturbed by this underwhelming performance. They have already played the toughest portion of their matches in the regular season, and have not dropped a game to either of the teams at the top of the RSEQ standings. “[In this competition] you need to [...] build [up] to the cup round, if we continue to progress through the competition as we are, we will be happy,” Baillie said.

cordia in front 14-10 in the 55th minute.

Stokes scored a try five minutes later to pull McGill into a lead that they failed to maintain in the last 20 minutes of the match.

Baillie acknowledged the weaker second-half defensive performance.

“I thought our tackling was shoddy,” he said. “We made body contact a bit [too] high. Concordia ran hard at us and […] a number of times, we failed to take away their space [….] They managed to make the gain line because of

20 Sports Athletes of the Week

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

MARTLET GOLF: The Martlets began the finals of the Quebec University Golf Circuit in second place, only a few points ahead of Laval. Montreal had won all four previous rounds and had a firm grasp on first place.

With McGill placing ahead of Laval in round five on Sunday, and Laval bettering McGill in round six on Monday, round seven on the last day would decide which team would punch a ticket to Nationals. Laval has qualified every year since the CIS National Championships started in 2005. Led by the trio of Alice Hwang, Juliette Pollet, and Valentine Bougaud, the Martlets secured their first ever entry to the championships. McGill finished first on the final day, beating Montreal by nine strokes and Laval by 13–another first for the Martlets. In the individual standings, three Martlets placed in the top seven, with Pollet finishing second overall en route to taking home the RSEQ Rookie-of-the-Year award.

Ryan Kramer

Redmen baseball—Starting Pitcher Freshman, Undeclared Kramer was unhittable in his first playoff appearance for the Redmen baseball team, striking out 12 batters in a complete 3-0 game win over the Carleton Ravens. Kramer was both dominant and efficient–he scattered three hits over seven innings, and needed only 100 pitches to go the distance. The NCAA transfer has been stellar for McGill all season, and his clutch performance set up a clean sweep of the Ravens in the best-of-three semifinal series. The Redmen will face either Université de Montréal or Concordia in the North Division final series, which begins next weekend.

(Photos courtesy of McGill Athletics )

Juliette Pollet Martlet golf Freshman, Undeclared

In her first year on the Martlet golf team, Pollet has succeeded in capturing glory and accolades not just for herself, but also for her team. The rookie from Brussels, Belgium, was named RSEQ Rookie-of-theYear after leading the Martlets to their firstever berth at the National Championships.

Never faltering on the big stage, Pollet shot rounds of 77, 82, and 77 to lead the Martlets to an unprecedented second-place finish in the RSEQ Championship. The Martlets will rely on Pollet to lead them to greatness in the National Championships next May in Guelph, ON.

REDMEN GOLF: After a topsy-turvy season, the Redmen approached the finals with a positive attitude.

Entering the finals as the eighth seed, team members and the coaching staff were confident that solid play in the finals could see their standing improve a few positions. A fourth place finish in Sunday’s round was McGill’s best during the finals. Benoit Miquel’s 77 and Will Eberlee’s 78 led the McGill squad. With the exception of a fine 74 by Justin Smith, Monday’s round was subpar, and the Redmen ended with a fifth-place finish. The final round was not much better, salvaged only by Eberlee’s score of 77. The team was sixth on Tuesday, and ended the season in fifth–a jump up three spots from the start of the finals. A reasonable ending to the season after a disastrous ninth and 11th place results in the first two rounds of the circuit.

MARTLET RUGBY: Reigning Athlete of the Week Caroline Suchorski delivered once again for the Martlets (4-3), scoring a game-high 13 points in a playoff spot-clinching victory on Friday against Sherbrooke (1-6).

Rookie fullback Carla Massaro was another bright spot on the day, scoring two tries as McGill poured it on from beginning to end, winning by a score of 43-0. With 91 points on the season, Suchorski currently holds an 18-point lead over Laval’s Anne-Charlotte Beaulieu in the race for the RSEQ scoring title. With one game left on Laval’s schedule, it seems likely that Suchorski will take home the hardware, marking the fourth consecutive year that a Martlet player has captured the crown. McGill will begin its playoff run with a sudden-death game against the division champions, University of Ottawa, at Matt Anthony Field next Sunday, Oct. 18 at 6 p.m.

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First pitch strikes recorded by Redmen pitcher Ryan Kramer against Carleton as McGill won the opening game of the Canadian Collegiate Baseball Association Northern Division playoffs

Penalty kicks hit by Concordia’s Yannick Fortin as the Redmen rugby squad battled the Stingers to a draw on Friday at Molson Stadium

McGill golfers who have been awarded a major RSEQ award, including the recently minted Rookie-of-theYear Juliette Pollet

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