The McGill Tribune Vol. 22 Issue 18

T h e re tu rn o f th e cro ssw o rd F e a tu re s E

c G V o l. 2 2 Is s u e 1 8

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M c G ill a n d it s m o v ie m a k e r s 12 ____

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T h e re tu rn o f th e S a u c e Jo c k e y

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SUPER BOWL XXXVII

O n ly t h in g n e w w a s th e c o m m e r c ia ls Andrew S ega l

Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

I claimed last week that the NFL playoffs were full of boring blowouts, bad refereeing, and star players giving less than their best.

However, I was willing to give the Super Bowl a chance, hoping that, just maybe, the pinnacle of the NFL season could redeem the dis­ satisfying playoff match-ups that had preceded it. Not that I consid­ ered it particularly likely: Super Bowls have the reputation for being one of the worst contests of every NFL season, rather than one of the best. This year’s edition, true to form, did not stand out for its | excellence.

Even so, I was still watching at At the McGill Team Challenge, both the McGill men and women finished second behind the teams from the University of Western Ontario. See story on page 20. half-time, despite the stranglehold that Tampa Bay had thrown on Oakland. I was expecting some game analysis, a few highlights and the usual contents of a regular 12minute NFL half-time before the term goal. tact with McGill. corporations.

J a m e s G rohsgal performers took the stage. Instead, McGill now has adequate While the University hopes McGill has made offers on sev­ eral downtown hotels, according to that the residence shortage will be funding to grapple with the hous­ I saw about two minutes of football The University is continuing sources involved with residences, alleviated when the McGill ing talk, and then nothing but Shania problem, said Robert to seek real estate to convert into but senior administrators have been University Hospital Centre is con­ Rabinovitch, the chairman of the Twain, No Doubt and Sting. This residences for first-year students, reluctant to discuss negotiations structed and the Royal Victoria Board of Governors. development prompted two ques­ but efforts to find a suitable loca­ because they fear that speculation Hospital can be converted into res­ tions: Is there any artist you associ­ “[W]e were able to raise $ 150tion have been stymied by the ate less with American football about which hotels are targeted for idences, in the short term they are million with a bond issue in scarcity of properties and the belief purchase will derail the bidding restricted to searching for existing September that gives us the money than Sting? And secondly, if you’re among property owners that process. Hotel representatives have buildings or buying property to to look and to pay for the resi­ sitting down to watch a football McGill can pay more than private also been reticent about their con­ construct another dormitory. dence,” said Rabinovitch. “We have game, wouldn’t you prefer to see McGill has space to build a resi­ solved the funding problem and some actual football, rather than dence in Macdonald Park, but the now we’re looking for a residence or mediocre musicians and shots of IN S ID E Steve Martin in the stands?

Friends of the Mountain, an advo­ space to build.”

H a m ilto n ?

E q u it y w e e k r e c a p ‘ !

Because of the low quality of Were looking at everything,” cacy group for Mount Royal Park, 21 N ew s 6 -7 the game—the final result, a domi­ has opposed any construction that said Rabinovitch. “In the long nating 48-21 Buccaneers’ victory— would obscure the view of the term, we will have space when O v e r Y o u r S h o u ld e r B j and a focus on non-football activi­ mountain.

Royal Victoria Hospital moves to “S a y w h a t y o u w ilim b d u ti OPINION/^mTORTAL ties, this year’s Super Bowl proved Only eligible first-year stu­ the [McGill University Hospital th e s w e e t m ira c le o f u rtq u es -I dents and a limited number of Centre], which would link beauti­ to be anything but super for true J. Roberts tio n in g f a i t h , I c o n sid e r a \ football fans. But then again, could upperclassmen may receive beds in fully with the existing residences.

FEATURES c a p a c ity f o r i t te r r if y in g a n d residence, and although the We’re also looking at various build­ anyone have reasonably anticipated a b s o lu te ly v ile ! ” Spike’s latest joint University is investigating housing ings in the city that make sense. We it to be worthwhile? With few — K u r t V o n n eg u t A&E 1! for graduate students, this is a long­ See SUPER BOWL, page 23 See McGILL, page 2

Adm in quietly seeks new rez hall

Carnival hockey night all over again!

Remember how crazy that sell-out was during Carnival? Well, let's do it again one more time!

Bethere THISSATURDAY, February 1st at 7 p.m. when your McGill Redmen battle the Concordia Stingers in men's hockey.

McGill ATHLETICS

Prove that McConnell Arena is s t ill the best hockey barn in the country by re-living that carnival spirit.

Be loud, be red, be crazy! Prizes for loudest and best "dressed" fans in the house!

Redmen-Stingers, Saturday, February 1st, McConnell Arena, 7 p.m. Tickets only $3.

C o m e o u t t o G e r t 's a f t e r t h e g a m e a n d M E E T T H E M c G I L L R E D M E N H O C K E Y T E A M f o r t h e p o s t - g a m e p a r t y

2 News

The McGill Tribune, Tuesday, January 28, 2003

Munroe-Blum answers to Council Laura Saba During her first month at McGill, Heather Munroe-Blum surprised students by appearing at two Students’ Society events, but students and councillors eager to hear the principal articulate her aca­ demic philosophy and administra­ tive stances still have to wait.

For one hour on Thursday, the principal attended a special SSMU Council meeting to listen to coun­ cillors’ questions and comments on issues like cafeteria take overs and tuition hikes.

SSMU executives and council­ lors asked Munroe-Blum to address concerns she said she could not answer by herself; she promised councillors she would bring their concerns “to the appropriate forums.

“I’m not here to make pro­ nouncements,” she said. “I’m happy to offer views, but I’d like to get a sense of what kind of issues you’re facing, what your experience at McGill is like, and what you’d like the administration to be apprised of.”

While emphasizing McGill's positive attributes, Munroe-Blum also underlined the University's weaknesses, including student-fac­ ulty ratios exceeding 35-to-one in

some departments and an over­ crowded Faculty of Arts.

“Student-to-professor ratios are one of the hallmarks of quality and our hopes are certainly to do better in those areas. The Arts building is certainly a priority. I hear enormous preoccupations on the part of academic administrators for the student experience here at McGill, and I see a lot of dialogue going on; I see strong representa­ tion [for students] in Senate and elsewhere and we’ll have chances to talk over the years ahead,” she said.

Munroe-Blum did not respond to many questions about students’ quality of life.

Engineering representative Alex Ouimet-Storrs asked the prin­ cipal about the University’s plan to seize control of the Engineering Undergraduate Society’s cafeteria.

Other councillors pressed MunroeBlum to respond to their desires to hold Convocation in a different location to accommodate larger numbers of students.

Munroe-Blum said that these issues would be taken into consider­ ation, but that she was unable to comment on behalf of the parties involved in making the relevant decisions.

The principal said that McGill students are not exploited for

R esearch O p p ortu n ity

S e a rc h

M c G ill U n ive rs ity (5 1 4 ) 3 9 8 -3 7 1 7 or em ail: evande@ ego.psych.mcgill.ca

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O rganizations o f all typ es and sizes acknow ledge th a t th e ir m o st valuab le a s s e t is th e ir em p loyees. As a result, th e re ’s a high d em and for pro fession als train ed in th e m a n a g e m e n t o f people. H u m b er can give you th e s k ills you n e e d , and p re p a re you fo r p ro fessio n al d e s ig n a tio n /a c c re d ita tio n by th e H u m an R e s o u rc e P ro fe s s io n als A ssociation o f O ntario (HRPAO).

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Blum's the word: The principal was reticent when Council questioned her.

principals, I hear a strong interest in developing interdisciplinary educa­ tional opportunities,” the principal said.

“We in Canada tend to force decisions upon undergraduate stu­ dents much earlier than American universities do, and I think it’s an issue worth exploring. I hear wide­ spread endorsement [from stu­ dents] for creating interdisciplinary [programs] and for at least looking at the notion of leaving freedom for longer, in terms of determining what your specialty is going to be. I certainly don’t hear any opposition to that.”

Munroe-Blum hopes that

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Continued from page 1

Contact: D r. Z u ro ff’s lab, Psychology D ep artm en t,

the p o w e r

NATHAN ZILBERT

McGill will maintain its tradition of excellence and overcome some of its infrastructure problems.

“I hope we’ll continue to grow in our quality of educational pro­ grams at all levels, and that we ll grow our resource base, grow our capacity to have infrastructure deserving of the quality of life. As I go across campus, the infrastructure overall is not where it should be.’

Munroe-Blum said she plans to engage in more discussions with students, because she said that interaction between students and the principal is essential to under­ standing the issues that will frame her priorities.

M cG ill goes house hunting

We are seeking male volunteers for a two-part study. Fluency in English is required. The first part examines the way people remember events that have happened to them in the past. The second part of the study examines how people think about themselves. The study takes approx­ imately 2 hours to complete. Participants will be compensated $30 for their participation.

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tuition fees; rather, she argued that a McGill education has an excellent value.

“In response to a prior com­ ment that students are being viewed only as a source of revenue: far from it,” said Munroe-Blum. “I don’t think you get a better deal any­ where in North America than you do at McGill. I’d ask you to point out another place in North America where you would get the quality of faculty and education at the level of tuition and ancillary fees that you pay [here],” she said.

Munroe-Blum stressed that during her “early days on the job,” she is trying to gain more support for the University from the provin­ cial and federal governments.

“In the Quebec context and at the federal level, one of the public policy issues that will be of interest is really the federal support for graduate student education. ... I think it’s important that we’re effec­ tively resourced and there’s a gap between where we are and where we should be. As a public university, we look to the Quebec government to provide grants that allow us to operate. We are currendy not fund­ ed sufficiendy for any of our pro­ grams.”

Students also questioned her on core interdisciplinary education requirements like those at US uni­ versities.

“As I’ve been meeting with the deans and some chairs and the vice­

hope to find a building to buy and covert it into residence quite quickly.”

The Delta Hotel on PresidentKennedy Avenue had been consid­ ered by McGill, according to administrators and others involved with residence issues, but accord­ ing to Louise Lapointe, a public relations official for the Delta, McGill is no longer offering to buy it.

“It is another target, another hotel. It’s not us,” said Lapointe.

“Another is targeted for buying by McGill. The rumours in the hotel industry in Montreal are not about the Delta Hotel. McGill a arreté son offre.”

Rabinovitch, who said he did not know one way or another about the Delta Hotel, emphasized that open discussion may compro­ mise McGill’s bargaining position.

“The problem... is that since we are not in the private sector they may expect us to overpay, which is why we are being careful and discreet. We will not overpay.”

Some students are concerned that they will be forced to bear the costs of a new residence. At Solin Hall, which McGill converted into apartments in 1990, students are required to sign 11-and-a-half month leases. McGill Residences remains in debt, and students have contended that they must sign

lia i!

v e ile d

longer leases to bring the building back into the black.

Rabinovitch said that while McGill must pay off its debts, it should not profit from student housing.

“Our intention as I under­ stand it is not that residences should make money but that they break even. That includes servicing

"Since we are not in the private sector they may expect us to over­ pay, which is why we are being careful and discreet. We will not overpay."

— Robert Rabinovitch BOG Chairman debt to buy residences... The $ 150million loan has a low interest rate... with a 40-year payback peri­ od, which gives us a lot of flexibil­ ity when we look at properties.

Payback will not be onerous for students,” he said.

Nick Vikander, Students’ Society vice-president community and government, supports the University’s residence search, but is also considering alternative hous­ ing models that allow student own­

in

s e c re c y

ership and participation.

“We’re obviously in support of McGill creating new residence space, but cooperative housing is a different conception,” said Vikander. “We’re not at the stage where we can make recommenda­ tions as to how McGill should deal with the housing crisis, so ... we’re waiting with baited breath.

Unfortunately, students will be paying the cost of actual buying and structural costs... yet in the end students will neither own nor run the residence.”

Ron McTaggart-Cowan, pres­ ident of the Post-graduate Students’ Society hopes that in the future McGill will be able to pro­ vide graduate residences similar to those at the University of British Columbia, which offers apart­ ments for students and their fami­ lies.

“I’ve talked with the principal and she sounded keen on graduate student space. It sounds like the administration has made it a top priority. [SSMU President] Martin Doe and I are encouraging them every step of the way because we can’t do it ourselves.”

“We’re moving as fast as we can,” said Rabinovitch. A though they are tackling the shortage, he believes the residence shortage won’t be solved immediately. “It will be a continuing problem,” he said.

The McGill Tribune, Tuesday, January 28, 2003

News 5

A d m issio n s to u g h e n w ith d o u b le c o h o rt Kate Rhodes__________________

McGill is raising its admission standards for all applicants applying for fall 2003 enrolment, to respond to a dramatic increase in candidates caused by the graduation of the Ontario double cohort. Applicants compete against one another for admission in regional pools, and while the University may slightly increase the percentage of students accepted from Ontario, competition for Ontario applicants will be intense.

The University must also com­ pensate for a change in yield behav­ iour, meaning that students in the double cohort are applying to more schools than usual to increase their chances of admission. Students accepted into several universities can then choose among them.

“Students may be applying to many mote universities because they’re nervous. Meanwhile, it might be harder to get in at every other uni­ versity,” said Kim Bartlett, acting News A n a lysis

director of admission.

Ontario’s double cohort results from the phasing out of grade 13, or Ontario Academic Credits, in the province’s high schools; students in both grades 12 and 13 will be grad­ uating in 2003.

Bartlett explained that Admissions has already seen the first wave of double cohort applicants last year, when grade 12 students in Ontario were encouraged to “fast track, take extra credits and apply to university early.” There has been a 20 per cent increase in undergraduate applications from Ontario.

For fall 2001 entry, 17,772 stu­ dents applied to McGill, 3,443 of whom were from Ontario. For fall 2002 entry, 18,646 students applied, 4,139 of whom were from Ontario; 2,662 Ontario applicants were accepted, but only 990 of them mutriculated.

Standards have been increasing every year across all applicant pools, said Bartlett, and in this first wave, “minimum GPA was raised for [the]

high-demand programs.” Students in the current freshman class from OAC were admitted with a mini­ mum average of 84.1 per cent.

However, “we are not targeting against students from Ontario,” she

Students in the cur­ rent freshmen class from OAC were admitted with a minimum aver­ age of 84.1 per cent. said.

Bartlett told admissions recruiters that the faculties of Arts, Education (Elementary and Secondary), Management and Science may be more difficult to get into for all applicants.

“We are also seeing an increase in applications from all international students and American students,” she said. “We want the best students from everywhere.”

Programs with limited enrol­ ment will continue to have admis­ sions policies that are as competitive as they have been in the past, includ­ ing those of Architecture, Electrical, Mechanical and Software Engineering, and Physical and Occupational Therapy. The schools of Nursing, Civil, Chemical, Mining, Materials and Metals Engineering, and some Education programs, will maintain their level of entrance difficulty.

“It is impossible to estimate how many more applications we will be receiving,” said Bartlett. The application deadline for undergradu­ ates is February 1.

Because students are applying to more schools, the University must prepare for the possibility that fewer students will accept McGill’s offer of admission.

Although the removal of OAC will align Ontario’s educational sys­ tem with most of the country, Bartlett believes the phase-out of OAC causes many problems.

“We have seen an increase in students applying for college-level and technical schools, as well as entering the work force from high school,” she said. “I’m concerned that those students with weaker aca­ demic records and/or less financial resources will not be able to attend university, given the increased com­ petition.”

Ontario universities are expect­ ed to compensate for the double cohort increase more than schools in other provinces. Carleton University in Ottawa will be accepting 1,500 more students than it normally accepts for September 2003. To add to the growing numbers, they are building a 400-bed residence, con­ structing new lecture halls, improv­ ing the student service centre, increasing laboratory space and hir­ ing 50 new faculty members.

McGill is undertaking similar improvement projects, including exploring the purchase of a new resi­ dence hall.

— with files from Adam Klevinas

N ew Dem ocrats elect Layton as lead er

The Tribune! Brandon Schott reportedfrom the Toronto convention, where he was a delegate supporting jack Layton.

In a surprising first-ballot vic­ tory, Toronto city councillor Jack Layton captured the leadership of the New Democratic Party at its party leadership convention on Saturday.

Despite criticism that Layton was a “flash in the pan” with repeat comparisons to Stockwell Day, members overwhelmingly rejected longstanding member of parlia­ ment Bill Blaikie in favour of what some called a more charismatic and energetic candidate. As Layton’s main competition, Blaikie’s cam­ paign proved no match for the newly elected leader’s smooth tongue, photogenic appearance and superior organization.

The Layton campaign brought in an estimated 8,000 new mem­ bers and raised an unprecedented $800,000. The leadership race, in total, generated excitement within the party, as membership increased by 40 per cent.

One young delegate and Layton supporter remarked, “I think Jack might be too slick, but I can’t imagine Blaikie facing off against Paul Martin, he wouldn’t be close. Perhaps Layton is the choice of style over substance, but there was no candidate who had both style and substance.”

By doing away with the old delegate system, the NDP imple­ mented a complicated procedure in which affiliated organizations (pri­ marily unions) were given 25 per cent of the vote.

Going into Saturday's vote, some observers foresaw a possible union-brokered deal to give votes to Blaikie, calling it an “anything but Jack” movement. However, the vote was not close, and labour unions supported Layton more than any other candidate. Layton, running on the mantra of “New Energy,

New Leadership,” received more than half the union vote (59 per cent) and also the majority of the individual votes (51 per cent).

Candidates Joe Comartin and Pierre Ducasse were sentimental favourites at the convention, received vocal support from mem­ bers who had already voted or com­ mitted to one of the frontrunners.

Comartin urged the party rank and file to place “principles before com­ promise” and noted, along with every other candidate (and almost every delegate), his strong opposi­ tion to a war on Iraq.

Ducasse was also quite popu­ lar among the delegates attending the convention. The lone francoph­ one in the race, Ducasse stressed the need for a strong presence in Quebec, and had what many believed to be the best speech of the convention.

Ducasse had tears in his eyes at the end of his speech.

“We have everything we need, if we have nothing but our hope,” he concluded.

Although Ducasse received only 3 per cent of the vote many were impressed by his campaign and envision a major role for the Quebec activist in the party's future.

“I voted for Jack weeks ago, but Pierre Ducasse has really struck me as a solid politician who will help the party make vital inroads in the province of Quebec,” said one delegate.

Layton’s own ablitity to bring Quebec social democrats into the party either through the PQ or oth­ erwise, could prove to be an impor­ tant development under his leader­ ship.

The Blaikie campaign was counting on a stronger performance from Lome Nystrom, who they hoped would generate second ballot support, but Nystrom could garner only nine per cent of the total vote.

Nystrom campaigned on his long

federal experience and what he called a lack of financial accounta­ bility among other candidates, especially Layton.

Blakie was also not able to attract the first-ballot support he was expecting.

“I wish we could have done better, but it didn’t turn out that way,” he said. Blakie’s insistence that the party needed a leader with a seat in the House of Commons fell on deaf ears.

One steelworker delegate acknowledged that “policy is not as

high on my agenda as in past years.

I think the party needs to be more vocal, receive more attention and attract many more voters, and I am confident that Jack Layton will be able to do that.” Many said that the increasing likelihood of a Paul Martin-led Liberal government bodes well for both Layton and New Democrats eager to fill what might be a large vacuum on the left.

Speaking to an excited audi­ ence just minutes after his victory, Layton congratulated all his oppo­ nents in the leadership race. He

| News I ! Analysis ]

praised Blaikie’s continual fight for social democracy in Parliament and said he is counting on him to “stand up and roar like a lion for what is right.” Layton also looked to the future of the party: “Our party will always be the party of hope and it is on that basis that we will draw mil­ lions of Canadians to work with us and support us in the next election.

And when you strip away Paul Martin’s rhetoric and look at his record, it is in lockstep witli Alliance dogma on virtually every issue...”

GET INVOLVED WITH SSMU T h e S t u d e n t s ' S o c ie ty o f M c G ill U n iv e r s it y ( S S M U ) is lo o k in g f o r c a n d id a te s f o r t h e f o llo w in g p o s itio n s . I f y o u a r e in t e r e s t e d in a p p ly in g , p le a s e e m a il y o u r r e s u m e a n d a c o v e r l e t t e r t o a e t in v o lv e d @ s s m u .m c a ill.c a o r d r o p o f f c o p ie s a t t h e S S M U O ffic e . F o r m o r e in f o r m a t io n o n t h e s e p o s tio n s , p le a s e c o n t a c t N a e e m D a to o a t 5 1 4 . 3 9 8 . 6 7 9 9 .

SSMU FROSHCHAIRI This position runs from February until midSeptember. The SSMU Frosh Chair is responsible for overseeing all Frosh 2003 activities alongside the SSMU VP Communication 8i Events.

Working with three coordinators, the Frosh Chair will interview, select and train all O-Staff and Frosh leaders, develop and follow budgets, and organize and implement all Frosh activities. All candidates should have some experience in plan­ ning events, and be prepared to spend their sum­ mer in Montreal.

SPONSORSHIP COORDINATOR This position runs from March 2003 until February 2004.

The SSMU Sponsorship Coordinator manages all Sponsorship, cash or product, for all of the SSMU events throughout the year, including Open Air Pub (OAP) CultureFest, SSMU Frosh, and Snow Air Pub (SnowAP).

Moreover, the Sponsorship Coordinator ensures that Sponsors receive a solid post-event report to ensure a strong long-term relationship. Prior experience with event planning and bilingualism is an asset.

WEBMASTER This position runs from February until early May. The SSMU Webmaster is in charge of maintaining and updating the SSMU Website.

They also need to have SSMU office hours so that the executives and coordinators can find them and discuss changes to the site. All can­ didates must be fluent in French and English.

Experience with PHP, Java, HTML and graphic design is an asset.

FINANCECOMMITTEE MEMBERATLARGE The Finance Committee is the group under the SSMU that oversees the long-term financial integrity of the SSMU and oversees funding for over 120 clubs, services and Campus Life Fund applicants.

M em bers-at-large are voting committee members on the committee.

Candidates having some experience in student group/club finances is an asset. This position runs until the end of April.

4 News

The McGill Tribune, Tuesday, January 28, 2003

_________________

The b ila te ra l a p p ro a c h to tra v e llin g so u th G ro u p

o f M c G ill

Jacob Wolpert Six undergraduates participat­ ed in a Canadian trade mission to San José, Costa Rica, to improve trade relations between the two countries. This mission, from January 10 to 17, was the first of its kind since the ratification of the Canada-Costa Rica Free Trade Agreement last November.

The trade mission was organ­ ized by CommEx, a Montreal-based non-profit organization dedicated to improving economic relations between small to medium-sized Canadian companies and “new promising international markets.”

Developed by university students with extensive experience in inter­ national relations, the organization focuses on establishing exports to Central American nations, which have become increasingly valuable markets for Canada since the

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jo u r n e y s

implementation of the North American Free Trade Agreement.

CommEx looked for delegates with the interest and dedication required to undertake a trade mis­ sion for no financial compensation.

Previous trade experience was an asset, as were linguistic skills and experience living abroad. “The team was quite diverse... each par­ ticipant specialized in a particular area of business, and each partici­ pant brought unique skills to the group that complemented the oth­ ers,” explained Nathan Yang, a McGill engineering student and participant.

In Costa Rica, the group took part in close to 50 meetings over five days, representing 11 Canadian companies in the fields of educa­ tion, agriculture, finance, engineer­ ing consulting and governmental services. As Costa Rica has recently opened up its economy to private banking, the monetary sector

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P u b lic A d m in is t r a t io n Public administrators work across all levels of local, provincial, regional and federal governments. Humber College’s program gives university graduates the knowledge and skills necessary to manage the considerable human, physical and financial resources of the public sector.

—v Call (416) 675-6622, ext 3 2 0 6 , HUMBER or e-mail ted.glenn@ hum ber.ca

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INFORMATION SESSION AND SUBSEQUENT INTERVIEWS TO BE HELD ON TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 4TH AT 12:00PM IN FRANK DAWSON ADAMS BLDG. ROOM 232 YOU MUST ATTEND THE INFO SESSION IN ORDER TO QUALIFY FOR AN INTERVIEW FOR MORE INFORMATION, KINDLY CONTACT STEVEN GOTTLIEB EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR 416-658-7059 boundless@on.aibn.com www.boundlessadventures.orq

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played a key role in the presenta­ tions. Educational exchange was an important aspect as well, with Costa Rican engineering programs now being accredited by the Canadian Engineering Association.

In contrast to the CommEx team’s previous trade mission to Mexico, Yang said that the Costa Ricans’ response to the Canadian delegation was extremely positive.

“We found them to be recep­ tive not only on a professional level, but a personal level as well. With all the social gatherings we ended up being invited to, the opportunities for cultural exchange were numer­ ous... At one point, a representative from the Costa Rican Chamber of Commerce asked us to spend the night at his house.”

Yang said he gained a valuable business experience, and the high­ light of the trip for him was the chance to build lasting personal relationships with his Costa Rican counterparts. “In the brief amount of time we spent in Costa Rica, we were able to learn so much about

to

im p r o v e

tra d e

this country and its people, things that you couldn't get from reading a book.”

The consensus among dele­ gates was that the mission was a success. Aside from meeting their financial obligations to the compa­ nies participating in the exchange, CommEx representatives were

r e la tio n s

asked to assist in the organization of a reciprocal trade mission to Canada.

The team plans a return trip to Costa Rica in six to 12 months, and there is talk of establishing a Canadian-Costa Rican Chamber of Commerce in Toronto.

Deputy secretary-general addresses McGill M odel UN Sam Goffman Louise Frechette, deputy secre­ tary-general of the United Nations, addressed 1,500 student delegates from Canadian and American uni­ versities Thursday evening at the thirteenth annual McGill Model United Nations Assembly in the Sheraton Centre.

McMUN allows students to play a part in conferences and com­ mittees that resemble those that take place in the United Nations headquarters in New York City.

“It’s like a role-playing exer­ cise,” explained Frechette in her address. “It’s also a highly educa­ tional experience, letting you wear someone else’s shoes, and to wear, if you will, someone else’s poverty or power.”

Fréchette acknowledged that an organization such as the United Nations could only be effective if countries are willing to work together.

“There’s a real need for multi­ lateral cooperation,” said Fréchette.

“Problems can cross frontiers more easily than people,” she said.

Fréchette admitted that this goal of cooperation is not always easily achievabled.

“The fact is that interests clash.

Issues are complex,” she said. “The mere existence of rules doesn’t mean they will be adhered to...

Multilateralism itself is not free of weaknesses.”

Fréchette did insist, however, that cooperation between nations is possible.

“Nations working together can make a difference,” she said. “[Much] can be achieved if people really listen to each other, and real­

ize that more unites us than divides » us.

Fréchette, a native Montrealer, has worked in the Department of Foreign Affairs and has served as deputy minister of national defence. She became deputy secre­ tary-general of the United Nations in March, after being appointed by Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

“Kofi Annan gets all the pub­ licity, but someone has to manage the UN,” said Geoffrey Pearson, who introduced Fréchette, of her role in the United Nations.

Model UN assemblies, which meet annually at McGill as well as at other universities, give students an idea of what participating in the United Nations can be like.

Delegates to McMUN come from American and Canadian universi­ ties including Harvard, West Point, Princeton and Concordia.

SAM GOFFMAN

Effusion sang “0 Canada”.

“It’s a great experience,” said Andrew Carvajal, a U1 Political Science/Sociology student and co­ chair of the committee on the International Monetary Fund. “I always learn so much here.”

SAM GOFFMAN

Louise Fréchette, deputy secretary-general of the UN, spoke to delegates.

The McGill Tribune, Tuesday, January 28, 2003

News 5

M u s ic b u ild in g e n g in e e re d fo r s ile n c e F a c u lty

o f

M u s ic

Greg McKenna Completed construction plans for a new music building were sub­ mitted to the Faculty of Music yes­ terday, and bidding for the general contractor will begin soon, accord­ ing to Dean of Music Don McLean.

The new building will incor­ porate state-of-the-art soundstage and recording facilities with spe­ cialized research labs for music technology, and will house a new, larger music library at its core.

Despite years of building delays, McLean said the staff working on the project are confident that con­ struction will begin this year.

“It’s hard to imagine how [the project] couldn’t [start] now, short of us lying down in front of the wrecking machine,” said McLean.

Students in the Faculty of Music have been waiting since plans for a new music building were unveiled in 1995.

“Ha! It's not going to hap­ pen,” laughed Marielle Groven, U0 Composition, “At least not until I’m done, and I’m going to be here for a while. It’s a pretty big joke among students in the faculty.”

“I think it's ugly looking, it’s just a big square box,” said Stéphane Ostrander, U1 Composition, “but I’m glad they’re doing it, even if it looks crappy, because it will improve our facilities in the music faculty.”

Preparations for demolition have already begun. The Weston pool has been drained, and offices and classes in the music building have been relocated. A number of the practice rooms and studios are no longer available to students; in

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in the library right now for our col­ lections,” said Music Undergrad­ uate Students’ Association

the first weeks of school, AnneMarie Leblanc, a U3 cello student, had one of her lessons in a wash-

a w a its

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tion requires large transfer beams to bear the weight of the structure on top, as no columns can be erected

JENNY GEORGE

A model of the new music building, which has more practice space and a new library, is on display in Strathcona Hall.

President Anna Frey. “It will be very helpful to have our library in our own building.”

The CIRMMT will have a professional film-scoring stage and associated control rooms and recording facilities in the basement.

The building will be constructed by setting a concrete box inside another concrete box, with no external insulation. An internal structure inside that box will float on neoprene pads without any con­ tact with the structure around it, inhibiting sound vibrations.

“The fundamental challenge [for principal structural engineer François Deslauriers] is that you are building large empty boxes in the basement,” said McLean. “Then on top of this thing you are building a building.” This type of construc­

room.

“We get sick of the school because there’s no room and [cur­ rently] the facilities are very poor,” said Leblanc.

The new music building will have two floors of administrative and staff offices. Offices currently in the east wing will relocate to make room for a few basic studios and practice facilities.

There are two main compo­ nents to the new building: the library and the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Music Media and Technology (CIRMMT, pronounced ‘kermit’). The library is at the core of the building proj­ ect; spanning three floors, it will incorporate innovative library sys­ tems and structures.

“There's just not enough space V IS IO N

in the centre of the building due to the box-style construction of the scoring stage in the basement.

“You can’t have columns in the middle of the orchestra,” said McLean.

Another issue is the mechani­ cal and electrical systems in the buildings. Florescent lighting hums and, although human ears may not be sensitive to it, a microphone tak­ ing a recording will pick up the

d o n o r

noise. Because musicians need complete silence to record, the mechanical systems, air-condition­ ing and heating systems all must possess similar isolation and atten­ uation.

“The mechanical and electrical engineers have had an unbelievable challenge and I think they certainly have found the process educational in the sense that they knew the basic challenges,” said McLean, “but once they started to encounter the complexity of details... it’s been difficult to deal with all the prob­ lems.”

This has not been the only cause of delay for the building.

Over the course of the project, new technology has developed, which has subsequently been incorporated into the design. Structural and aes­ thetic components have also been changed to accommodate the dif­ ferent and changing needs of the building.

Project funding has suffered, with some donors having reduced or withdrawn contributions because of the lack of progress.

Now the University is waiting for a namesake donor to pay $ 10-mil­ lion out of the building's estimated $50-million cost.

“Right now the building is still called the ‘new’ music building,” said McLean. “We're still waiting for Mr. or Mrs. ‘New’.”

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6 News

The McGill Tribune, Tuesday, January 28, 2003

Cam pus E q u i t y

W eek

The inaugural Campus Equity Week, funded by the Students’ Society, the Office o f the Principal, the Office o f the Provost, the Office o f the Dean o f Students and Queer McGill, was held from January 20 to 24. While attendance at most events was low, many students turned out for the workshop with Jaggi Singh and the keynote speech by Leslie Feinberg.

jja m m fa f ,2 3 I

«:

Feinberg calls for unified struggle outside the box

Feinberg made a series of calls to the US State Department and was told that the gender information was a form of identification.

Feinberg retorted that a pho­ tograph is a better way to tell who someone is. “Does every [Immigration and Naturali­ zation Service] agent have to know what someone’s genitals look like, or do they need to know [when looking at a photograph] yup, that’s you?” â •y .

Feinberg asked.

At the passport office, Feinberg filled out all but two boxes. “The woman looked at the form, and then at me, and GEMMA RHODESIDE checked off the male box. ... 1 Leslie Feinberg promoting unity in the fight for queer rights to a full house Thursday night. can go to jail for fraud for pretending to be something that I’m not. I am what I am. You just don’t have a box James Grohsgal to fit me [in]. I’m not male; I’m gender variant.”

Feinberg, who has close-cropped gray hair and The social movements of the left must transcend wore a suit and tie Thursday, does not use gender-iden­ the constructed classifications of gender, race and class tifying terms. in order to present a united front against injustice, “I think of myself as more polygendered—even according to author Leslie Feinberg, whose experience the term ‘masculine’ is relative to being feminine.” as a transgender person has informed a lifetime of Feinberg accused the medical profession of genital activism. mutilation for performing sexual assignment surgery Feinberg’s gender identity is not recognized by the on infants with both male and female attributes to fit government or mainstream society.

“My very existence is not legal,” the transgender the “Dick and Jane, Ozzie and Harriet paradigm of sex and gender.” Instead, Feinberg suggested replacing the activist, socialist and union member from Buffalo, New York, told a cross-section of McGill’s queer and duality of male and female with a spectrum of gender, and asked the audience to imagine a meteorologist who activist community on Thursday evening in Adams must forecast the weather with only the words “hot” Auditorium.

“For a long time, I was unable to travel because of and “cold”.

While the beginning of the speech explained the two boxes [on a passport application]—it has to be one distinction between kinds of gender identification, or the other, male or female.”

Feinberg said, “My goal is not to define but to defend.”

The division of marginalized groups serves the interests of conservatives and reactionaries, argued Feinberg, who said that the struggle for liberation should not wait until “a gay bank vice-president and a transgender Latina on the street” agree on tactics and strategy. “In the trade union tradition, we fight for each other’s [grievances] as if they were our own. That was the spirit of the Stonewall rebellion,” said Feinberg.

Feinberg described the Stonewall Rebellion as the beginning of a second wave of a gay movement that began in 19th-century Germany and was destroyed by the rise of Nazism. In June 1969, police entered the Stonewall Inn, a gay bar in New York City’s Greenwich Village, and threw out all the patrons. Instead of walk­ ing away, as they usually did, the ejected patrons fought off the police. T hé'Stonewall uprising is con­ sidered the beginning of the modern gay rights movemen The speaker argued that mainstream gays who claim that drag queens tarnish the gay rights move­ ment receive no “dispensation from the people who are trying to kill them.” While it is nowhere “written that there must be a coalition between lesbian, gay, bisexu­ al, transgender and two-spirited [dual or multi-gen­ dered First Nations people], it is a tactical question at a time when special’ rights are being stripped from us.

We can lump them together as Queer—a progressive and forward-thinking vision, with a capital and affec­ tionate ‘Q , tike Queer McGill.”

Activists’ strength is in their unity, said Feinberg.

This applies not only to the queer movement, but also to the campaign for abortion rights. At the end of the speech, Feinberg recalled participating in communitywatch programs when the conservative pro-life group the Army of God was in Buffalo, and collected the names of McGill students willing to travel to upstate New York when the Army of God returns.

Food trade has global impact S P A R K

c r itic iz e s

c o rp o ra te

c o n tro l

o f th ir d

w o r ld

“They’ll control everything from the engi­ neering of the seed right to the port city where [the Students considered the social and environmental implications product] is exported,” McEvoy said.

These same corporations often receive most of the global food trade at “Food Politics”, an Equity Weeks work­ of the profits. shop led by members of Students Providing an Alternative Resource “For every dollar that you spend on a banana, for Knowledge, a working group of the Quebec Public JjHeresrj __ Research Group. .. .J i-V i if J&N they get 60 cents,” Will said. The grocery store “[The workshop] looks at the social inequities that are-created reçoives 35 cents, and only 5 cents remains for by the global food system and what students can do to reduifyfnbse l /labourers and others who play a role in the food trade. inequities,” SPARK member Meredith McEvoy said.

During the workshop, students divided into groups to discuss - . •McEvoy and Will presented several alterna­ the many steps required for a banana and a call of corn to travel tives to participating in the corporate food trade, from plant to supermarket. Students also listed issues related to the including community gardening, buying organic process: labour exploitation, energy use and genetic modification, food and buying food from roadside stands and farmers’ markets. among others.

“Every single product we buy has an effect on Despite the number of people and activities involved in food so many people and places all over the world,” said cultivation and trade, all are usually orchestrated by a single organ­ Dominique Henri, U2 French Literature and ization, SPARK member Jared Will said.

For example, three companies— Dole, Chiquita and Del Anthropology. “Many times we don’t realize what Monte—control 80 per cent of the banana market, he said, and the impact of our consuming habits are, but there’s often manage the cultivation, transportation and distribution of the always an impact.”

RASHIDA PIRBHAI product as well.

Using colour forms, SPARK illustrates the negative effects of trade Jennifer Jett

The McGill Tribune, Tuesday, January 28, 2003

News 7

Sexual assault |a queer minor?

Ja m e s E m p ringham Panthea Lee

The Sexual Assault Centre of the McGill Students’ Society held a workshop on Friday aimed at providing par­ ticipants with a venue to share opinions and thoughts about sexual assault. SACOMSS Outreach facilitators Roxanna Vahed, U2 Theatre and Humanistic Studies, and John Engler, U2 Arts, debunked societal myths about sexual assault and encouraged attendees to reflect on their personal views.

The myths that a “rape only occurs late at night, in dark alleys, by strangers” and that “only young, attractive, straight women are sexually assaulted,” may invalidate victims’ expe­ riences, confusing them and driving them to remain silent for fear that their experience was not actually sexual assault, the facilitators said.

Engler said that the media’s tendency to showcase only sensational and dramatic incidents of sexual assault falsely validates and advances misconceptions about abuse.

“This distracts attention from where the majority of the problem lies,” Engler said. “As a society, we’re most outraged morally against assault when it happens to a pretty girl by a stranger.”

Sexual assault is defined as “any unwanted act of a sex­ ual nature,” including unwanted name-calling and gestur­ ing, as well as physical contact.

JENNY GEORGE SACOMSS endorses the use of the term “survivor” Vahed discussed social stereotypes of sexual assault Friday. rather than “victim”, to describe individuals who have suffered crimes of a sexual nature, because this small change in language can be an instru­ ment for empowerment.

“You’re giving someone a tool when you use [the term ‘survivor’],” said Vahed.

The facilitators raised concerns about the University's system of dealing with sexual assault. Vahed explained that sexual assault offences at McGill are under the principal’s jurisdiction, and she is concerned that there could be biases in situations R ashid a P irbhai concerning staff. Vahed noted, however, that the school is considering revising its policy from a lengthy process of investigation to “a legitimate, timely process” that Students Providing an is more sensitive to victims’ needs.

Alternative Resource for Although Meena Zurmati, U 1 Science, was one of only two attendees, she felt Knowledge member Steve Bard that the workshop was worthwhile. gave McGill students a look at This issue [of sexual assault] really hits home,” she said. “I think we should inequities between developed and put the spotlight on it and make it more visible.” developing nations last Monday

Third World

to kick off Equity Week.

The crash course in the his­ tory of Third World debt was illustrated with colourful card­ board cutouts animating the his­ tory of economic dependence of less-developed countries since the beginning of the 20th century.

SPARK makes similar presenta­ tions to high school students in Montreal.

Armed with statistics and history, Bard observed the parallel between the rise of the West's eco­ nomic power and the increase in the number of bi- and multilater­ al loans to developing countries.

The reforms stipulated stringent conditions that were often to the detriment of the country receiv­ ing assistance, including require­ ments for export-led growth that permit the North to extract from the Third World.

Bard also showed that an increase in the tariffs imposed on imported products discourages the domestic production of man­ ufactured goods. For example, Western governments fought stagflation (stagnating economies coupled with inflation) during the 1970s by increasing interest rates and raising tariffs on pineapple juice by eight per cent, canned juices by 32 per cent, and other juices by 42 per cent.

The discussion made conclu­ sions about the threat of imported products and foreign loans on developing domestic economies.

Singh: Globalization and the migration hypocrisy M olly Kay M arra

Montreal writer and social jus­ tice activist Jaggi Singh spoke of possible connections between worldwide migration and capitalist globalization Wednesday evening.

Countries like Canada and the United States regularly “commend themselves for being open to immi­ grants,” said Singh, but “there is a true racist dimension” to immigra­ tion laws. Singh spoke of hypocrisy

% 'a g s a cN

■ RASHIDA PIRBHAI

Political activist Jaggi Singh

in the Canadian system, discussing a pattern in immigration policy that,

despite current rhetoric on multiculturalism, has not changed from the days of the head tax on Chinese immigrants in the early 20th centu­ ry. Although Canada feels it should praise itself, there are still the reali­ ties of ‘physical control” and the “[criminalization] of certain com­ munities,” he said. * Every year there are 150 miî-1 lion people migrating around the world—a phenomenon Singjjl believes is structural—a result jjjjj] war, colonialism] unemployment, a decrease in population in rural areas and an increase in poverty. This flight of people involves a great deal of risk and couragjf said Singh.

However, even infcourage gets migrants to a “safe” country there is no guarantee they will find refuge, he said.

To be accepted as an immigrant from certain countries one has to be “Superman”, said Singh. “If today’s point system had been applied to many of our parents, they wouldn’t be here now.” Singh called the point system “immigration eugenics” as the systems are “fundamentally cor­ rupt.”

The United States Department of Homeland Security will cause the “militarization and integration of policing at the border,” said Singh.

The “Safe Third Country

The absence of a queer-oriented aca­ demic minor at McGill is a lamentable non-development, according to the panel members who spoke at a talk entided “Sex, Equity and.... an academic Minor?!” on Tuesday.

Queer historian Elise Newman, currently completing a post­ doctorate at McGill, said that the benefit of creating a program geared towards a usually marginalized community is that “you cre­ ate a place where people don’t feel so isolated.”

Greg Blatchford, chair of the Equity Subcommittee on Queer People at McGill, reminded those in attendance that it is a chal­ lenging prospect to set up a related minor.

“You need professors, you need courses, and you need people doing the courses,” explained Blatchford.

There are numerous requirements for creating a minor study program. Together with fellow panelists Jennifer Drouin and Jessica Crewe, representing the graduate and undergraduate com­ munities respectively, Blatchford and Newman agreed that nega­ tive attitudes among some administration members, fiscal realities, and the dearth of applicable courses currently offered at McGill, have made the creation of a queer minor difficult.

Crewe, who is also part of the Queer McGill executive, sought consensus with Drouin in their expressed concern that Queer McGill, as the campus’ most visible lobbying group for queer issues, is only comprised of undergraduates.

“It’s a good group as far as it goes,” said Crewe. “It’s only for undergraduates though, so there isn’t a unified feel to it. Again, Queer McGill only looks at queer social life, it doesn’t focus upon academic life.”

Like-minded audience members responded in accordance with Crewe’s sentiment. Organizers say that, at most, only three or four classes currently offered at McGill could be included as part of a queer minor.

Panelists also addressed the dilemma of what to title a queer related minor in the course calendar. Most agreed that the term “queer” might discourage heterosexual or “still questioning” stu­ dents at McGill to apply to the program, while others felt that if “queer” repelled certain students, then those students should not participate in the program.

O f course, like every other academic program at the University, funding has been the greatest difficulty. “Mr. Bronfman hasn’t called to offer us a $ 10-million dollar grant as of yet,” joked Newman.

The universities of British Columbia, Toronto, York and Concordia have already implemented similar academic programs.

Agreement” between Canada and the United States wifi mean that Canada will eliminate 40 per cent of its refugee claims, thus permitting US regulations to dominate Canada’s immigration system.

According to Singh, the pur­ pose of past and present barriers is not to keep people out, but rather to ( { ■ i j siure that their status is not permanent, making them passive and unable to stand up for their rights to the same extent as legal cit­ izens would in similar situations. »|j|Singh feds that horrible work­ ing conditions and the lacfeof rights for migrant workers represent host countries’ “incredibly unjust [eco­ nomic] systems.”

“We have to acknowledge our racist double standards,” said Singh, who compared the bombing of the Alfred R. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City by Timothy McVeigh to the threats made by sin­ gle members of the Arab communi­ ty living in America. Entire commu­ nities have been “forced to answer for one member,” said Singh.

“Collective punishment is a racist reality.”

Singh’s Montreal-based organi­ zation “No One Is Illegal” is organ­ izing against the Canadian govern­ ment's planned deportation, sched­ uled for January 30, of several non­

status Algerians, and demonstrated in support of the refugees on Saturday.

Many of these non-status Algerians have lived in Montreal “longer than most McGill stu­ dents,” noted Singh.

“They are being treated like immigrants when they came as refugees.”

Singh pointed out that, although 150,000 Algerian lives have been lost in the Algerian con­ flict and the Department of Foreign Affairs has issued a travel advisory warning Canadians not to travel to Algeria “due to the ongoing conflict there,” the government still plans to deport them.

None of the current immigra­ tion policies do “justice to the struc­ tural flaws” in countries like Canada, Australia, the United States, Japan, Israel and Western Europe, said Singh.

“We need to deepen our analy­ sis... in this climate of war... [of the] migration and refugee situa­ tion,” he said. He strongly suggested that people connect and talk more about action that can be taken, and then they “need to do something about it,” he said.

“We must show solidarity with the acts before us, and proceed to confront these very racist laws.”

8 Op/Ed

The McGill Tribune, Tuesday, January 28, 2003

O p i n i o n

E d i t o r i a l

S to p

EDITORIAL — Joseph P u ltiz e r

Trusting the truth Natalie Malo-Flecther and Kate Rhodes

Newspapers are not an objective business. To gather, produce, and deliver facts and information requires a collaborative effort to bring readers the whole story, but the whole story is never without slant.

News is cut to print; we depend on abridged highlights and sound­ bites to form our worldview.

A journalist chooses what truths are relevant; what is omitted says as much as what is included. Word selection commands the assess­ ment of facts. It is thus the responsibility of the reader to be critical of what appears on newsprint, to demystify the authority synonymous with, “oh, I read it somewhere.” Trust is high-maintenance.

At the Canadian University Press annual conference this weekend, student journalists participated in workshops and listened to luminar­ ies in the field speak about the power of the press and the responsibil­ ity of the media. Russ Mills, former publisher of The Ottawa Citizen, explained that, as readers, we rely on privately owned news sources for unbiased reporting, “a public trust in private hands.”

Yet, we are surprised when personal politics, the skew of compe­ tition and the greed of moneymaking tactics taint a newspaper’s con­ tent. Ideally, a newspaper should not be operated as would a conven­ tional business, but the truth is seldom pursued without ends.

Integrity is dependent upon the dual responsibility of reporters and readers: both must acknowledge that their vulnerability stems from a deaf acceptance of their source’s persuasive vocabulary and assumed legitimacy. This is essential to avoid entanglement in a sophistic web.

The pursuit of truth on behalf of readers “demands accurate and fearless journalism,” said Mills, trustworthy “newspapers have an alle­ giance to communities, not to advertisements.”

Still, these communities underestimate their power to choose what and how they know. CBC Chief Executive Officer Robert Rabinovitch said a journalist’s mission is to “find the proof, explain the complex and create an informed society,” but an inquiring society must not rely on single voices to recount worlds of issues. Just as per­ sonal perspectives are analyzed, individual accounts of collective reali­ ties must be similarly questioned if an accurate interpretation of the facts is to ensue.

Newspapers are necessary for the preservation of democracy. The ability of the media to reflect on and respond to the concerns of its readership holds our leaders accountable for their policies. This privi­ lege can manipulate as much as it can defend, hence the need for actively upholding a high standard of information. Macleans editor Anthony Wilson-Smith emphasized, “the danger is in the excess, not the absence of power.” Mills himself was fired because his newspaper's critical view of Prime Minister Jean Chrétien contradicted the politi­ cal agenda of his superiors.

Blame the media? News is, after all, the perception of just a few editors, the paradigm of one reporter, and the absolute truth of cir­ cumstance. It is the media, as an industry, that jeopardizes truths; individual journalists, if passionate about their duty to inform, stay committed to the facts. As Wilson-Smith said, “Journalism is not a profession, it is a craft,” noble in attempt but human in delivery.

“Journalists are observers who stand back and say ‘they’.”

After all, perspective is everything.

Editor-In -C hief James Empringham A ssistant Editor- in -C hiee Raquel Kirsch P roduction M anager Michael Liew

P re s s

SSMU is evil?

“T h e p o w e r o f th e press is th e g re a te st p o w e r o f th e m a ll. ”

the M c G IL L T R IB U N E

th e

My name is Denis Lebel. I’m part of Students’ Society Programming Network (SSPN).

SSPN organizes all the big events on campus, including BFT, 4Floors, and more. You may have seen me with the SSPN Hype Team around campus wearing red puke suits pro­ moting SSMU events.

Anyways, I have an issue with McGill students that place blame on the SSMU for pretty much anything they can think of. It is much harder to recognize what is good about the SSMU. For example, I spoke to a guy after the winter 4Floors party.

He was telling me how bad the SSMU is and how shitty 4Floors was. I asked him to explain his point.

Below is an excerpt from our conversation. For all of you who attended the winter 4Floors party, or even the International 4Floors party,

D

id y o u

fucking party?

DL: You think people will dance with their coat? Can you imagine how many people will lose his or her coat during the night because somebody stole it? Can you imagine how many people will not even remember where their coat is at the end of the night?

UMS: Well, why can’t we have beer for free?

DL: Having beer for free? Are you crazy, man? If we give away beer for free, we’re going to have to hold the 4Floors party at the hospital!

I had quite a lot of other issues with that guy but this is not my point. My point is that parties are one of the good things that the SSMU has been doing this year.

We’ve haven’t lost money on the events and every party has been packed (unlike last year).

SSMU is not evil. I know, it’s hard to believe the reality...

Denis Lebel U2 Computer Science

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read on. It might help you under­ stand why we do what we do!

Here are parts of our conversa­ tion: Unidentified McGill Student-.

The stupid line-up!

Denis Lebel-. There was no line­ up during last winter 4Floors!

There was, however, a COAT CHECK line-up. But, do you prefer to freeze outside or wait inside for the coat check?

UMS: Well, I wasn’t at Winter 4Floors, but last semester the line­ up was just fucking ridiculous.

DL: That was last semester!

This time we solved the problem!

People were inside as soon as possi­ ble. They just had to wait for the coat check which is, in my view, much better than waiting outside in -40 degree weather. At least you were able to hear the music and you knew you were getting into the party.

UMS: Well, what’s the point of a coat check? Why can’t people just go inside with their fucking coat and

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Peace, Partnerships a n d Politics in the M id d le Pash D ir e c tio n s f o r th e l i r a r e

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W R I T E A B O U T IT ?

By

Sari Nusseibeh • President of Al finds University • Former PLO Commissioner of Jerusalem • Author of the June 2002 Palestinian proclamation against violence • A prominent intellectual voice of reason calling for peace between Palestinians and Israelis

The T rib u n e is looking for Sports writers to cover varsity and professional sports

Pick a sport or three and drop us a line m cgilltribunesports @ hotm ail.com

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The McGill Tribune, Tuesday, January 28, 2003 O p i n i o n

Op/Ed 9

E d i t o r i a l

V a le n tin e 's D a y : G u ys, d o n 't m e s s it u p C h o c o la te s , flo w e r s , d in n e r

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but Valentines Day is quick­ ly approaching. I say bad news, not because I’m pulling an Alanis Morissette circa Jagged Little Pill (i.e. man-hater), but because the day isn’t always all it’s cracked up to be— for couples, singles arid swingers alike.

Think about it. You’re living your life, finally getting into the swing of things. Halfway through the semester, you’re hitting your groove, becoming accustomed to whatever situation you find your­ self in. If you’re single, you’ve come to accept, even love, it. If you’re in a relationship, you’re getting used to compromising and, at long last, moving away from the mind games and exhausting courtship.

a n d

Then, all of a sudden, bang, it’s Judgment Day. A day that can bring everything to a terrifying halt as you are forced to examine, deconstruct and evaluate your per­ sonal life, all in order to best deal with a day I believe is only truly anticipated and enjoyed by those sly bastards at Hallmark. How 24 hours can put so much pressure on a relationship, depress women and instill so much fear in men is astounding.

There is just so much that can go wrong on Valentine’s Day. While intended to spread feelings of affinity, warmth and love, it seems as though the day often ends up laden with disappointment, awkwardness and confusion, not to mention a whole lot of misplaced anger towards men. I blame the commercial component of Valentine’s Day for these negative aspects that plague what should, in theory, be a lovely day. While telling someone you care about them is no doubt a good thing, it’s the cheesy gifts and Ralph Wiggum-type cards that tend to bunker up the whole affair.

Valentine’s Day is pushy. It forces people to express feelings

th e

p r e -e m p tiv e

and emotions they may not be ready for or want to expose which, in my opinion, calls into question the legitimacy of the whole deal.

People in relationships are put on the spot to prove their feelings via romance and, in some cases, verbal reassurance (pre-emptive dropping of the L-Bomb), while single folks are forced to either a) frantically scramble around for a date, or b) get swept up in a shame spiral whereby one ponders lost loves and missed opportunities. Yuck. The whole day can just reek of angst and anxiety.

I must, however, recognize the die-hard romantics out there and those of you actually in love. To the people who will be going the whole nine yards for the big day, I must offer my advice in order to ensure things go as smoothly as possible.

Due to the fact that Valentine’s Day rests primarily (and unfairly, I admit) upon guys’ shoulders, these guidelines are directed primarily toward those brave gentlemen up to the challenge.

Gifts— While stuffed animals and chocolates are traditional favourites, their success rate seems to be touch and go. If you are

f t + y — R e d -fla g g e d Æ ;

îm

rm

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josh wilner a n d I’ll admit it. I just can’t bring myself to open a book. Oh, pro­ crastination, how easily not now becomes never. Manana is the busiest day of my week. Lately, getting to school frostbite-free has been work enough. We’re experi­ encing what Canadian meteorolo­ gists call “Siberian Arctic air” and what American ones call “Canada’s fault”. Go figure.

Upon arriving home the other night, and regaining sensation in my hands, I took off my coat and put off my reading. My roommates were about to watch Rules o f Engagement. You know the one: that terribly tired and predictable Hollywood “You-can’t-handle-the truth!”-type military court drama starring Samuel L. Jackson and Tommy Lee Jones. It promised to be easy, grey-matter-killing enter­ tainment—my type of flick. Little did I know it would inspire a col­ umn as well.

O f the third of you still read­ ing this, I assure you that this col­ umn is not an analysis of the deep­ er meaning or plot intricacies of Rules o f Engagement. Actually, it’s about flag etiquette and law. For the one-sixth of you patient, left­ over readers, here’s how I was inspired: Samya L. is a military commander. His mission: evacuate a besieged American embassy in Yemen surrounded by bad guys.

Under heavy machine gun fire, he goes to the flagpole atop the con­

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sulate and retrieves the American flag before tear-assing it out of there.

This made me really angry.

Granted, it was a dramatization, but I am incredulous as to how and why risking your life for a piece of cloth is considered brave.

In my opinion, a flag is simply not worth dying for—a country or cause, maybe, but not a flag. A flag is not a country. It merely embod­ ies a country. But people like sym­ bols. After all, Canada without its maple leaf would be like McDonald’s without its Golden Arches, Pillsbury without its doughboy, or Jaguar without its... you get the point. Nevertheless, what’s more important, I think, is the thing in itself, not the symbol.

Maybe this is something to think about as we approach Canada’s Flag Day, February 15, when our glorious maple leaf will be 38 years old. I’ll be wearing my flag. Will you? Well, not if you want to risk the theoretical (though admittedly impossible) chance of being indicted for copy­ right infringement. Why? Because our flag symbol is a global identifi­ er of the Government of Canada and is protected under the Trademarks Act. Part of the Canadian Intellectual Property Office at Industry Canada, the Canadian Trademarks Office approved and entered the maple leaf as the official mark of the

Government of Canada on September 30, 1987. So Ottawa owns the maple leaf.

Maybe this might anger some of you. It seems, at least, that our national symbol should not be legally owned by anyone, that it should really just be. Shouldn’t the maple leaf be communal and not private property? To me, it makes very little difference. After all, Canada is what’s important and meaningful. The maple leaf has no meaning in and of itself. It is the country that gives the flag its importance. Why respect the maple leaf? It’s just a maple leaf.

You respect it because of what it stands for. So who cares if Ottawa owns the Canadian flag? It does not own Canada.

And what about flag protocol?

In the US, displaying the Starspangled Banner overlaid by any mark or advertisement is technical­ ly a punishable offence (though who would know after 9/11?). It is also illegal to fly a flag upside down unless as a signal of dire dis­ tress, i.e. losing the World Series to Canada.

What is right is not always what is legal, and what is legal is not always just. The law is a coarse device. Burning a flag is not always anarchistic. It can sometimes be the mark of true patriotic belief in one’s country and the values that it represents.

d r o p p in g

o f th e

absolutely certain the object of your affection is the type who appreciates chivalry, go nuts, but please take heed— always go with quality over quantity. I think I speak for all girls when I say I would rather a few decadent truf­ fles and a small token of a guys affection rather than one of those tired, all-the-centres-suck, Pot of Gold boxes of chocolates left over from Christmas and a huge stuffed unicorn that looks like it was found in a carney’s bedroom.

Flowers— I am going to do all ladies a favour here and let you guys in on a little secret: more colours and more varieties do not equal a better bouquet. To clarify: instead of a smorgasbord of wildflowers only the floral department at Provigo could have dreamed up, opt for simplicity and elegance— roses, for example. While red is an old standby, it’s not the only colour of love. To mix it up, try pale pink, or go exotic with orchids or lilies (but not the white ones found at funerals). You don’t need to break the bank or give the Secret Garden in order to get your point across: one beautiful flower always trumps a huge dog’s breakfast mixture of

L -b o m b

baby’s breath, greenery and carna­ tions.

Dinner—As much fun as it is sitting in a restaurant packed with 800 other couples, I suggest stay­ ing in. Cook dinner, order in, or skip the eating part all together and get right to the good stuff. If you feel the urge to recreate your own 9 1/2 Weeks, take the edge off with wine and opt for chocolate-covered strawberries. Simplicity is key. No one needs a hero trying to orches­ trate some 30-step scavenger hunt to dinner or a botched eight-course meal..

While I am more than a little skeptical of the highly commercial­ ized nature of the day, I do think telling the people you love and care about how you feel is important, whether it’s family, friends or that special someone that blows your mind. Maybe Valentine’s Day is a good thing in the sense that it serves as that little push some of us need to think about feelings we tend to ignore— chocolate and stuffed animals be damned.

Whether you say it with flowers, dinner, or a pack of Skittles, you really can’t go wrong if it comes from the heart.

A re y o u p a r t o f a d u b ?

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Features

The McGill Tribune, Tuesday, January 28, 2003

UFO a n d clo n es: Losing to u c h w ith R aelity?

The religion, however, seems to sidestep more difficult issues, such as those relating to wrongdo­ ing and sin. Morality is stripped of its complexity, and it would appear that anything that does not offend the maxim of pleasure or disrupt genetic coding—such as drugs and alcohol—is allowed, as there are no direct policies addressing varying issues.

Panthea Lee

Ahh, the Raelians. Where, oh where to begin? For a group that yearns to be taken seriously, they give detractors plenty of ammuni­ tion to sink their own (space)ship.

Since being catapulted into the media spotlight upon their announcement of the first success­ ful human cloning in December, however, the Raelians haven’t pro­ vided much fodder in the way of credibility.

Behold the Raelian utopia: A world of harmony filled with pleas­ ure and devoid of both labour and violence. Humans are endless beings who continually clone new versions of themselves in order to attain immortality, and merely transfer their past memories into new bodies.

The appeal of the Rael The Raelian religious move­ ment was founded 30 years ago by a former journalist from France named Rael— formerly Claude Vorilhon, the name he forsook, claiming that extraterrestrials had renamed him—and boasts approxi­ mately 60,000 followers worldwide.

The movement— sometimes dubbed “the fun religion”—has gar­ nered global media attention with its sensational antics, from distrib­ uting condoms at a Catholic high school to supporting group sex to constructing a UFO-inspired theme park two hours outside of Montreal. Forget Disneyland, folks.

Who needs Mickey and the gang when there are giant replicas of spaceships and DNA models to tickle your fancy?

At the root of the religion is the belief that the Bible has been misin­ terpreted. Members of the group believe that their leader is the

00

PHYSICS. HI -STATE.EDU

Rael, His Holiness himself, strikin' a pose at the Raelian themepark, UFOIand.

Messiah, chosen by four-foot tall, olive-coloured space aliens to inform mankind of their past and direct their future. Rael claims that these aliens, the Elohim, created life on Earth from their own DNA. He believes that it is man’s duty to build an official embassy in Jerusalem in preparation for the Elohim’s return to Earth in 2035.

“It’s a community that pro­ vides an alternative explanation for where we come from, who we are, and where we are going. It’s a more

modern approach to belief, and people do have a need to believe in something and to answer existential questions,” notes Michael Kropveld, director of the Montrealbased cult information group Infocult. “It has very many ideas but no structure in place, it is sim­ ply trying to provoke. You’re basi­ cally selling a couple of ideas that are very appealing to people.”

And who can say no to prom­ ises of eternal youth filled with mass orgies?

“We have baby clones... raelly!”

Clonaid, the world’s first human cloning company, was founded in 1997 by Rael. It was handed over to the current chief executive, Raelian priest Dr. Brigitte Boisselier, in 2000. On December 27 of last year, Clonaid announced the birth of the world’s first cloned baby, a girl nicknamed Eve, who was born to an American woman the previous day. On January 3, the company announced that a second cloned baby girl had been born.

Boisselier, upon announcing the birth of Eve, promised that an independent body would be allowed to verify whether the baby is actually a clone. Since then, how­ ever, Boisselier has retracted the offer, citing fear that Eve may then be separated from her parents.

“The happiness of Eve and her parents is more important than my reputation,” the doctor said. “If I have to choose between science and love, I will always choose love.”

Journalist Michael Guillen, who was supposed to oversee the testing, has since admitted the pos­ sibility that the entire thing could have been an “elaborate hoax”.

Despite the lack of evidence, Boisselier claims that Clonaid is still going ahead with its planned proce­ dures, with another five babies due or soon to be due by early next month.

The possibility that the baby clone was a public relations scam is a common critique; Kropveld leans towards this view.

“Their principal goal is PR, this is becoming increasingly clear,” he affirms.

Press conference puppets Is the story newsworthy at all?

Has the media played right into Rael’s—or rather “His Holiness” as he insists on being called—hands by giving the group so much cover­ age?

Perhaps it can be chalked up to a slow news week, but that hardly seems to be an adequate excuse. As Boisellier announced the first human clone, newspapers world­ wide scrambled to get the stories to press, some even awarding front­ page coverage. It didn’t matter that there was no scientific proof, nor even much in the way of detail for that matter, it was still deemed newsworthy.

All that was available was the pledge of proof somewhere down the road; and now, as the promise has been withdrawn, the media finds itself hanging its head for hav­ ing been played as the Raelians’ fool. The question of why it was given such extensive coverage has been raised.

“This is a group that has a very close relationship with the media.

The movement is very much into gaining media attention,” observes Kropveld. “It’s never been an issue for [the Raelians] of bioethics, but rather of what they are and how they define themselves. The media can help them do this... The issue of responsibility and ethics is sec­ ondary because their beliefs are so entrenched with cloning.

Irrespective, it is a win-win situa­ tion for them.”

See RAEL UTOPIA, page 11

Spiritual yet superficial fiction reveals the flaws of CanLit 1 'é tra n g e r

/

J .

R o b e rts

“Can a reader reasonably ask for anything more?” gushes the back cover of The Life o f Pi, this season’s most fashionable read.

Well, yes, actually. The reader could ask for a lot more. Though not a bad book, the novel’s most useful quality is as a reference point for what’s wrong with the CanLit scene, and much of North American fiction in general.

Yann Martel’s yarn about a boy adrift on the Pacific with a tiger has scooped several Canadian literary prizes. It didn’t take long before reviewers in this country, smelling a hit, dutifully lined up to pant over the novel and explain how it was “a

highly original look at what it means to be human.” The buzz helped The Life o f Pi hit the big time last fall when it won the Booker prize for the best fiction work in the Commonwealth.

Martel’s book is a quirky, imaginative affair, and the author’s prose dances in nearly every chap­ ter: “Soon the sun was alone in the sky, and the ocean was a smooth skin reflecting the light with a mil­ lion mirrors.” Yet, one cannot help but suspect that, despite its lyri­ cism, the book was a very calculat­ ed affair. At every turn, it smells as though Martel’s primary motiva­ tion was to lure the attention of Canada’s cultural cabal.

Early on, there are lavish refer­ ences to Toronto— Martel is a Montrealer but he is well aware of where the power brokers of Canada’s literary scene reside.

There is also the multicultural component, which obligingly jux­ taposes the protagonist’s experi­ ences of the old country with those

of the new. And for good measure, Martel has thrown in a multi-reli­ gious element: young, hyper-toler­ ant spin; Pi is conveniently a Christian, a Muslim and a Hindu all at once.

Taken together, these elements were sure to tickle the high priests of Canadian publishing. And how.

None other than the Dark Queen herself, Margaret Atwood, gave Martel a front-cover endorsement.

(It continues to be a stupendous injustice that Maggie overshadows Alice Munro in the CanLit pan­ theon.)

The presence of Toronto and multicultural and religious themes does not, of course, preclude The Life o f Pi from being great litera­ ture. All these elements have con­ siderably enriched the country’s lit­ erary experience in recent years.

The problem is that the mere pres­ ence of these elements caused the critics to glorify what is essentially a decent but superficial novel.

It is The Life o f P îs fluffy sanc­

timoniousness that is the most galling feature of the novel. The back cover chimes that the book is “of such rare and wondrous story­ telling that it may, as one character claims, make you believe in God.” Indeed. And if it doesn’t? At the very least, one may amuse one’s self with guessing the identity of the anonymous wretch paid to write such drivel. (Images come to mind of some former English student, clutching the last of his cheap Scotch, wondering when it all went so wrong.)

There are certainly many exal­ tations of faith in the book. Every few pages, we encounter our pro­ tagonist saying something like: “The voice said... I will beat the odds, as great as they are. The amazing will be seen every day. Yes, so long as God is with me, I will not die.”

The above sentence represents precisely what is so frustrating about The Life o f Pi and many other contemporary North

American novels. They abound with smug expressions of faith without taking the time to explain what gave rise to that faith. They fail to respond to the very difficult questions left us by the likes of Dostoevsky and Camus: How does your God account for a world in which children are tortured? How does one reconcile divine interven­ tion with experience that suggests the universe is indifferent or absurd?

The Life o f Pi does not feel the need to answer. Martel truly offers no more than what his marketers hold up: God in a shooter glass.

And he is not alone. Recent best­ sellers like The Alchemist or The Celestine Prophecy were likewise seized upon as spiritual panaceas.

There appears to be an insatiable market for pseudo-mysticism. In light of this, Martel et al. come across more as rascals than visionar­ ies.

Pray that this phenomenon will come to an end.

The McGill Tribune, Tuesday, January 28, 2003

Features 11

TR IB U N E U N D ERCO VER INVESTIGATION

Raelian secrets revealed at m em bers' m eeting Thobey Campion Pete Andwood

Ever since the Boxing Day frenzy concerning the first cloning of a human, two organizations have riddled the pages of perfectly respectable newspapers. Clonaid and the Raelian religion worked in conjunction to complete this mod­ ern-day miracle of pseudo-science. $600-million worth of free advertis­ ing later, scientific claims are still unproven and the Quebec-based religion is gaining more members and more sites across the continents than ever before. Beneath this everexpanding movement lies an intri­ cate system of salesmanship, decep­ tion and blatant trickery.

The contact The Raelians are tougher to get a hold of than soap in a prison.

Dropped through a virtual plinko’ system of theology professors at Laval and Concordia, the phone number of a representative was finally found. Though scientifically 500 years our superiors, the Raelians seem to be inept at operat­ ing telephones.

After calling two numbers and leaving messages, a representative finally called back instructing us to call a pager. A numerical message was left and another woman called, informing us that another member of the Raelian movement would call back in an hour. This informant gave us the site of what would be our first Raelian meeting.

The confusion The combination of Raelian close-mouthedness, as well as our own lackadaisical and disorganized approach to life, made us leave rather late for our interview. We collected our troops, five in num­ ber, and proceeded to hop in the car to head to an obscure location north of St-Joseph and east of StDenis. En route, a preparatory relaxant was administered to calm the eager reporters down.

Upon arrival, we quickly got lost and began pacing up and down the street in search of the magical building number. Finally, it was located and the appropriate buttons pushed, eliciting no response. The button was depressed again and we stood tall in the face of this seeming defeat, suffered in —40°C weather.

After several minutes of standing outside in the temperature where Fahrenheit and Celsius collide, we were finally admitted to the estab­ lishment.

The penetration of a harsh environment Upon stepping into the sec­ ond-floor apartment, our strangersin-a-strange-land status struck like a nunchuk to the shin. A soft-spoken Québécois man with questionably tight jeans greeted us in a kitchen.

Trying to avoid looking at the cou­ ple eating pasta, for the sake of pre­ serving our own conception of the alien-ambience, we followed his

flowing long hair into a sparsely lit living room.

A full-length mirror dominat­ ed one wall next to a table populat­ ed by publications with the name Rael on the covers. Several of the book jackets were festooned with the ambivalent symbol of the Raelians: a Star of David with a cus­ tom swastika implanted in the cen­ tre. We sat down and couldn’t help noticing the incredible collection of home videos the Raelians owned: the second season of Friends, the complete Naked Gun trilogy (col­ lector’s edition) and Blade Runner.

In front of us stood a large plant, which was later determined to be fake by certain botanical techniques such as feeling the leaves with our fingers. Once joined by other Raelian worshippers, our Raelian representative seized his chance to begin delivering his manifesto, which began in a video presentation format.

im m a c u la te conception of Jesus was the result of union between Mary, a Jewish woman, and an extraterrestrial.

The most recent in this string of prophets is, of course, Rael hi msel f.

Apparently the E lo h im — the name designat­ ed by Raelians to the first alien creators of WWW.RAEL.ORG clo n es— have decided that, The Raelians hope to construct an embassy in Jerusalem to welcome our “alien creators”. despite their response to our question as to meetings, which include “sensual massive technological superiority, whether Jewish people are better meditation”, were duly handed out. humankind is now ready to receive than the rest, he paused and replied, For more information stay tuned: their secrets in full. The truth, as Same Raelian time, same Raelian “...maybe a little”. revealed to Rael, is that we are the Our questions concerning channel. genetically engineered creations of Zoroaster’s place among the Raelian these alien beings and that the prophets was met with a blank stare secret to immortal life lies in this of incomprehension. He then pre­ same direction, through the appli­ tended to know who Zoroaster was Continued from page 10 cation of cloning techniques and and replied "... maybe a little”. the transference of one’s knowledge The UFO black sheep? and memories from your aged and Even members of the UFO The sheer folly decrepit body into a shiny brand community have a hard time tak­ Our cover as not out-of-town new vessel that looks remarkably university kids who could speak ing the Raelians seriously. Don like a much younger you. Crazy?

French was blown as soon as we Berliner, chairman of the non-prof­ Probably. Feasible? Perhaps. opened our mouths. To add injury it group Fund for UFO Research, When interviewed (caught off­ to insult, one of our fellow says that he considers the group a guard while sprinting through cam­ nuisance. inductees was allergic to the pus) about these claims, Science “It’s people like [Rael] who Raelians’ pet cat. Any coolness’ we Undergraduate Society President tried to maintain was dashed by the give the UFO field a bad name,” he Josh Vorstenbosch remarked: fact that he kept sneezing all over contends. He believes that the “Never before have I heard such a recent exploits of the Raelians our Raelian leader. blasphemous integration of cre­ Our inability to fit in was detract from the serious research ationism and evolution. The counterbalanced by the embarrass­ that his organization, among oth­ thought that foreign creatures ingly little amount of knowledge ers, are attempting to do. “[Wjith genetically engineered all forms of our Raelian leader possessed con­ nut cases like that running around life on earth in a timed fashion...”. cerning his own religion. We ques­ loose, [credibility for the field] is At this point, Josh was at a loss for tioned the image of the pyramid more difficult.” words and simply turned on his McGill students are no more with the floating eye that reared its heels and stalked off. face throughout the video. It is tra­ convinced about the Raelians’ cred­ ibility than the general consensus. ditionally known as a symbol of the Zoroaster and the Jews “I think that the Raelians are Masonic fraternity and associated Despite the condemnation of with deeper currents of paranoia in clearly out of touch with reality. our scientifically inclined friend, we Considering their claims about kept a straight face and the appear­ contact with extraterrestrials, how ance of open minds. After the video am I supposed to also believe that “The word ‘sucker’ was a brief question period, at managed to clone human is harsh, but as we left they’ve which point we enquired into many beings?” asks Emily Argue, a U1 seemingly obvious flaws in the pres­ the other inductees Sociology student. “I guess I’m just entation, without appearing to be a cynic at heart, but I would need spies or traitors to the Raelian behind to be cloned, to have the DNA proof to believe cause. Upon being questioned as to tortured, forced into them.” the significance of the Raelian Argue believes that the reason embassy in Jerusalem, the represen­ group sex and the like, the Raelians have been given so tative launched off on a speech the expletive seemed much coverage in the media has about the Jewish people. The nothing to do with their credibility, speech was eloquent but had noth­ suiting.” but rather with the general mood ing to do with the question, further of the population as of late. consolidating our fears that he was­ “It’s all sensationalism since the United States of America. Our n’t paying any attention to us. leader’s ignorance lead him to cast there is no real fact to it, so it can’t Apparently, after having been this king of conspiratorial images be regarded as real news,” she rea­ banished from their planet, the off as a “joke or humour” of the sons. “But everyone’s sick of hear­ Elohim came to Earth because it video producers. He was evidently ing of the United States’ threat of was an ideal breeding ground for war so the media picked this up as struggling as much as we were. their cloning experiments. They set a pet story. I mean, who doesn’t like up five laboratories across the plan­ hearing about UFOs and cloning?”

Mere Surface et. The most successful of these was Who knows what’s next? The The word “sucker” is harsh, in Jerusalem. At an unidentified but as we left the other inductees Raelians’ escapade has been a small point, the Elohim selected the stumble for the media, a giant step behind to be cloned, tortured, Jewish people as the most promis­ for the power of a simple press forced into group sex and the like, ing of “races”. The Elohim prompt­ release. the expletive seemed suiting. ly made love to Jewish women. In Formal invitations to the next

R a e l u to p ia

The next chapter in our Raelian story.

The full exposure The Raelian video opens with a shot of the world spinning, musi­ cally accompanied by Québécois techno. Initial thoughts: no, we will not obey your dog. A blonde woman with a thick accent intro­ duces the bread and butter of Raelian beliefs with the aid of dra­ matic graphics. Firstly, Rael, a.k.a.

Claude Vorilhon, encountered a UFO alien ship suspiciously resem­ bling a newspaper clipping of a soup bowl, somewhere in the primeval forests of central France on December 13, 1973. Why was he in the forest? We don’t know.

Upon contacting Rael, the aliens invited him into their ship for a period of seven days. There, they revealed the truth about holy and revered figures of numerous reli­ gions, including the Old Testament prophets, Buddha, Jesus and Mohammed. In point of fact, the

12 Features The McGill Tribune, Tuesday, January 28, 2003

How to outsm art your bank Nathan Lebioda

The way people bank has evolved dramatically in the past decade. The introduction of debit cards, Internet banking and the widespread distribution of ATMs has added a level of convenience to banking previous generations could only dream of.

The convenience of debit cards, Interac and ATMs does not, howev­ er, come without a price.

As Christmas decorations are finally being removed from down­ town buildings, the holiday season is thankfully over. With this comes your bank statement that explicitly lists every transaction you have made over the holidays. If you are like most people these days, you have probably opted to use your debit card for the majority of these

transactions. In the holiday rush, people turn a blind eye to the use of cash, and use debit as a more con­ venient method of payment.

However, once the rush has relented and you take the daring leap of look­ ing at your bank statement, you may be in for a shock. You didn’t really think that the nice people at the chartered banks would give us such a clever little card for free did you?

Most people may find it alarm­ ing that there is a fee charged every time you swipe that delightful debit card. Without the right financial institution and banking plan, fees can quickly add up to $30 or $40 per month. It may not seem like a lot, but for that price you can pay for a cell phone or extended cable TV. Over the course of a year, this can amount to almost $500 in serv­ ice charges.

Don’t fret; there is a way to .^3 RHCj

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maximize your convenience while minimizing your costs. Firsdy, check if your bank offers a student bank­ ing plan. Depending on the institu­ tion, this option will give you a reduced monthly fee, which for a certain number of ‘free’ Interac transactions. Once these free trans­ actions are exhausted, each time you use your debit card, a fee ranging between $0.25 and $0.50 is charged to your account. And no, they don’t tell you when you have used up all the ‘free’ transactions.

Secondly, use cash for as many small purchases as possible. I admit, I am guilty of charging $5.35 on my debit for a sandwich once in a while, but when there is a $0.50 fee added on top of the purchase, the result is a 10 per cent increase in the price.

Imagine if McGill tried to add a 10 per cent service fee when you paid your tuition (I wouldn’t put it past

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them).

Many small stores have mini­ mum amounts that they will allow you to put on debit. Quite often, I see someone going to pay for some­ thing that costs $3.00 at a store with a $5.00 Interac minimum. What an easy up-sell for the retailer; just add a chocolate bar and a bottle of Coke to the purchase and the minimum is met, allowing you to conveniently swipe your card, get charged a $0.50 service fee and spend $2.00 more than you originally wanted to. Some stores have even implemented debit machines that charge you to use them. It is required by law that you be notified on the touchpad prior to OK-ing the purchase, so there is no need to fear being furtively charged for using the machine. However, bear in mind that this fee, usually $0.50, is above and beyond the $0.50 service fee charged by your bank.

Thirdly, when you do take cash out of a bank machine, do so from a machine bearing the name of your

financial institution. If you have a Royal Bank account and you draw money from the ScotiaBank machine in the Shatner Building, be forewarned that you are being charged $1.50 for this transaction.

In addition to that, you will still have to pay the $0.50 service charge for using your debit card. However, if you walk down the street to Sherbrooke and Peel and draw your money from the Royal Bank ATM, you will only be charged the $0.50 service charge.

Bank machines located in many bars charge a withdrawal fee of $1.00 to $2.00 in addition to the banks $1.50 withdrawal fee. If you. do this twice a week, four weeks per month, you can be paying as much as $32.00 in withdrawal fees that could have been avoided by getting cash from the bank earlier on in the day.

With a bit of foresight, you can help reduce that annoying “banking fees” debit that appears on the last line of your monthly statement.

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T W O P E D A L S . N E IT H E R O N E IS A B R A K E . N IC E .

JO SH FREUND,

14 Features The McGill Tribune, Tuesday, January 28, 2003

Laziness mythologized: The slumps aren't our fault M elanie H erscovitch

A few weeks into the semester and it’s getting time to crack open the books. Most of us haven’t done much as of yet, other than hit the slopes, shops or numerous watering holes. There is a good reason why textbooks around the ghetto may still be in their plastic wraps.

Procrastination has most likely gotten the best of us. Sure, it takes some prodding and pushing of the good of conscience, but with some good sense and a French Vanilla

cappuccino from Tim Horton’s, most of us can hit the books for a decent amount of time. But what about those who have trouble doing so? Lazy, lazy, lazy. That’s what most are quick to label them as.

Dr. Mel Levine, professor of pediatrics at the University of North Carolina Medical School, disapproves of such quick judg­ ments.

“When you say someone is lazy, you admit that you don’t understand him,” explains Levine, who has recently published The Myth o f Laziness, in which he attrib­

utes what most of us call lazy behav­ iour to neurodevelopmental dys­ functions. “Some are inborn, some acquired. Some are mainly geneti­ cally caused, some stem principally from environmental conditions.”

These dysfunctions contribute to what Levine likes to describe as output failure, that is, low success and little to no goals for the future.

Most students have been branded as lazy at some point or another, whether it be for forgetting to bring out the trash, sleeping the weekends away or failing a biology quiz. Now we have something to WWW.SLYSKUNK.COM

That lazy roommate who doesn't do the dishes? It may not be his fault.

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THE DIFFERENCE YOU MAKE PROTECTS US ALL

to make an 18-month o launch your career?

E I If this sounds interesting, then the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission’s (CNSC) Career Challenge Program may be for you. The CNSC is Canada’s nuclear watchdog. We are mandated under the Nuclear Safety and Control Act to regulate the use of nuclear energy and materials to protect health, safety, security and the environment, and to respect Canada’s international commitments on the peaceful use of nuclear energy. CNSC Specialists and Recruiters will be on campus soon to talk about our organization and the Career Challenge Program. You’re invited to attend this special event. We’ll also be scheduling on-campus interviews for the following day, so bring your resume.

Come and meet the CNSC team on Tuesday, February 11, 2003 from 5:30 to 7:30 pm at the Frank Dawson Adams Building, Room 20.

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“Almost no one is lazy. Low productivity—whether in school or on the job— is almost always caused by a genuine problem, a neurode­ velopmental dysfunction,” states Levine.

Recognize someone here? Is it that friend who seems to spend countless hours in front of the tele­ vision, can’t transcend the unem­ ployed zone or is always pulling allnighters despite the handful of Cs on his transcript?

Levine offers a more precise definition. “[Lazy individuals] keep prom­ ising and intending to do things, but they seldom come through.”

It’s like those people who have great potential, but never seem to put it into action. Laziness isn’t that you got a C in a supposedly easy class—it’s that you got a C in Basic Western Music and you’re an accomplished musician. Laziness comes into play when you have the potential to do something and don’t use it productively.

“Laziness is all about priori­ ties,” affirms Nick Wilson, a U2 Physical Therapy student, who views himself as a highly motivated individual, but feels that his reluc­ tance to perform some of the more insignificant tasks of life, like wash­ ing dishes and vacuuming, has earned him the label of lazy with his roommates.

“Everyone would like to gener­ ate output that merits a raise or a promotion,” says Levine, who upholds that laziness is nothing more than a myth. “It’s all part of a natural search for both recognition and self-satisfaction.”

Boys vs. girls?

Richard Koestler of McGill’s Psychology department describes people who lack initiative and drive as amotivated. He recently con­ ducted a study on how males differ from females in their pursuit of high school goals. While males fell behind females on the academic side, the two were equal in terms of social and personal goals.

“So the apparent laziness of high school boys was quite domainspecific,” reasons Koestler.

This narrows down the defini­ tion of laziness, while supporting the importance of prioritizing.

“I like to do things my way and if I don’t feel like doing something, I won’t. But I control what I want to do, and if I have something

important to do or something I’ve committed to, I’ll be sure to keep my word,” explains Joe Bakish, a U 1 Biochemistry student who says he is often mistaken as lazy. “I know when I’m being lazy, but when it comes down to crunch time, I also know how to pull myself together.”

Koestler believes there are at least three reasons for lack of moti­ vation. These include feeling help­ less with respect to a task and its outcome.

“Some students in my classes have told me that they feel amoti­ vated because they just can’t take multiple choice tests and it doesn’t matter how hard they study, they just never get a result that matches their effort,” he explains. “They are amotivated because of a perceived lack of contingency between their behaviours and outcomes.”

Other reasons for lack of moti­ vation include incompetence or a perceived lack of competence.

Finally, the pressures of socializa­ tion have turned some ordinary tasks into seemingly daunting ones Overcoming motivation prob­ lems isn’t impossible according to Koestler, who encourages thinking about a related goal accomplished in the past, thinking of someone similar to you who has accom­ plished the same goal, or finding someone to be a supportive coach and setting a string of manageable goals that guarantee mini-successes along the way.

While most individuals proba­ bly don’t have an actual dysfunc­ tion, being lazy is an instinctive ten­ dency: human nature tells us to find the easiest, most effortless way out of things. What it all boils down to is making sure that the tasks you squeeze by with minimal effort aren’t the ones that really count.

“If I’m motivated to do some­ thing, I’ll do it and do it well,” shares Kim Gartshrore, a U2 Biology student. “If not, it’s basical­ ly a lost cause.”

The key is to avoid the rou­ tines and the slumps that leave us frustrated with low grades, with large classes and with early morning lectures after late nights.

Procrastination is the student’s best friend, and we all know the mantra of “put off today what can be done tomorrow” all too well. We all have energy—it’s where we choose to expend it that makes us different.

Dishes, laundry and Arts Computing assignments just don’t merit that kind of attention.

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Danny Chodos Sophie Guité As MC Cain and MC Abel strutted onto the stage of the Centaur Theatre in Old Montreal, draped in their respective black and red Old Navy track suits and match­ ing do-rags, it became clear that this was to be a theatrical performance of biblical proportions. The play Job is a modern-day version of the Old Testament story about a wealthy farmer who is called upon by God to prove the constancy of his faith after He has stripped Job of all that is dear to him. Foqué dans la tête Productions, however, has put a new school spin on this old schul story in their hip hop musical that is nothing short of sensational.

When you think hip hop, you probably don’t generally envision a couple of white Jews from the Montreal suburb of NDG, but Eli Batalion (MC Abel) and Jerome Saibil (MC Cain) aren’t your aver­ age run-of-the-mill rappers. In fact, the two not only wrote and directed

r a p p e r s a ttr a c t the play, but they interchangeably portray all of the characters, from Job Lowe and his wife, to our hero’s belligerent Texan co-worker, William Dodd, all the while using only a plain white hand towel as a prop.

The main character of the play is Job Lowe (pronounced Joe Blow), an ambitious and obedient employ­ ee of the New York-based Hoover Records, who has worked his way up from a janitorial position to that of general manager. Although hard work has earned him well-deserved success in the industry, owner Jonathan Hoover’s envious vicepresident Louis Saphir is convinced Job’s motivation goes no farther than a desire for personal gain. He convinces Hoover to test Job’s loyal­ ty to the company by gradually tak­ ing away everything that he has worked for, until he is left with nothing—at which point they fire his sorry ass. Saphir expects that Job, when pushed to the limit, will curse Hoover Records, thus proving his infidelity.

Pious audience members, how­

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ever, are forced to do a double take towards the end: contrary to 4,000 years of tradition and biblical histo­ ry, Job does end up cursing Hoover Records (to a string of inaudible bleeped out swears). Yet Hoover inexplicably rewards Job with his old job, at double the pay! Shit, Mad Libs retain a higher level of poetic justice!

Even Mozart’s “Eine Kleine Nachtmusik” was sampled, which more than compensated for the pre­ dictability of the occasion­ al P. Diddy reference.

Despite this fairly significant deviation from the original plot, the content of the show can only be described as phenomenal. Batalion’s outstanding acting skills, combined with Saibil’s sensational verbal abili­ ties, have earned the young duo sig­ nificant critical acclaim. The long

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list of accolades includes “Best New Play” at the Montreal English Critics Circle Awards.

Mixing in samples and beats from a vast array of music both past and present, Batalion and Saibil put on a refreshingly unique display of theatrical and lyrical genius. From “Without Me” to “Let it Be”, no genre of music is left untouched.

Even Mozart’s “Eine Kleine Nachtmusik” was sampled, which more than compensated for the pre­ dictability of the occasional P. Diddy reference.

The success of this play can perhaps be accorded to the seamless intertwining of pop culture and his­ torical biblical allusion, creating a story that is both entertaining and socially relevant. The harmonious resolution of this apparent dichoto­ my is characterized in one particular rhyme from the play that preaches, “You’re a sinner, I’ve got the keys to ya beemer.”

Combining clever lyrics with innovative beats, the Bialik High School grads avoid the potentially dreadful monotony of a 60-minute

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rap song by depicting the voices of the different characters to bring the music together. With simple light­ ing schemes, elementary but hyster­ ical choreography and virtually no props, this show’s strengths are raw talent and creativity.

The revamped story of Job leads us to question God’s (Hoover’s) intentions. It calls to mind that old episode of The Simpsons, when Homer makes Bart give blood to a dying Mr. Burns with the false hope that they will receive “lots of riches”. He survives, and when Homer finds nothing but a card from Burns in the mail, he curses him, leading to his sinister boss arranging to have him beat to a bloody pulp. Only Smithers’ gentle pleading changes Burns’ mind and he buys the family an extravagant giant sculpture head named Mr. Extopolotoked. The perhaps unde­ served rewards for Homer and Job lead us to ponder as Lisa Simpson did, “maybe there is no moral...”

This seems the only appropriate conclusion.

The kid s a re a ll rig h t a t S tu d e n t Film N ite M c G ill M o v ie - M a k in g Ric Lambo Resurrected after a year of absence, the McGill Movie-Making Club hosted its first Film Nite of the year. For the over 100 students in attendance Friday in the auditorium of the Cultural Studies building, the event was something of a small film festival.

In just seven films, ranging from 30 seconds to 30 minutes in length, almost every genre of film was shown, from comic spoof to spythriller to romantic drama.

After everyone had found their seats, a series of short animations by McGill students of the 80s were shown, from the good of days when McGill still had a film program.

One, entitled An Englishman in New York, shows an Englishman in a New York diner ogling a pretty waitress before being slammed in the face with a pie. Another presents the adventures of a Plasticine hand that enjoys spinning vinyl and playing the piano. Typical of their times, these cartoons are rather crude and badly drawn, but funny in a light­ hearted way.

However, the evening began proper with the next film, the highly polished The Unfortunate Truth About Life. It opens with a man perched on a rooftop contemplating suicide and, as the story unfolds, it presents a series of depressing tru­ isms, beginning with “Eventually you are going to die”, and ending with “There Is No Truth”. The script is brilliantly written and features

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only the voice of a narrator leading you through the small, playful scenes.

Each scene opens hopefully and closes with a despairing truth. In one, for instance, two friends appear to be enjoying themselves in a bar,

a b str a c t a n d

The next major film was PC, a pastiche of ER, whose initials really stand for Presbyterian College. The film is by Andre Jakubow, president of the movie club, and it features a McGill student in the cafeteria of PC who falls asleep in front of the televi­

COURTESY OF DAVID BARCLAY

A screenshot from David Barclay's film Gogol 13, created from piecedtogether clips from a number of different old-school Nintendo games.

and then one of them lifts up his glass to reveal, to the audience only, truth number five: “Friends are the only thing you can have, but the only thing that can make your life worse.” In the end, the hero doesn’t jump, for the narrator tells him that he’s too cowardly to do so and that he must grimly bear the second to last truth: “Life is inevitable, there is no alternative.”

sion while watching an episode of ER. In his dreams, he is suddenly transformed into the archetypal doc­ tor. Skilled, stressed, overworked and with Clooney-esque affability, he deals with such emergency cases as Severe Bland Soup and Acute Caffeine Insufficiency amongst din­ ers. The film is very funny but, like the dream, short, and the hero awakes with only the stethoscope

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around his neck to remind him of his true calling.

Gogol 13, a five-minute film by David Barclay, followed. Arguably, this film had the most original con­ cept. It was made entirely of scenes from some video game, an old Nintendo judging by the graphics.

The plot is something out of a James Bond movie and involved the kid­ napping of Madonna by skinheads and an unnamed spy who is onto the KGB in search of a vaccine that went down with a helicopter, which crashed into the Statue of Liberty.

Sadly, with just five minutes, the film/case remained unresolved.

However, pop culture was not to have the last laugh, and the evening closed with Jonathan Rafman’s 32-minute film, The Artist and the Lieutenant. The film is based on Gogol’s Nevsky Prospect, and Rafman adapted the 19th-century classic Russian story to a Montreal setting. An artist and lieutenant are standing on the street Nevsky Prospect when the artist becomes enchanted by a beautiful woman who strolls by. He follows her home, with honourable intentions, only to discover that she is a whore. He pur­ sues her in his dreams, begins taking opium to induce sleep, before com­ ing to the conclusion that, despite her sin, he must marry her.

Meanwhile, on the other side of town, the lieutenant has become involved with a married woman whose angered husband challenges him and promptly beats him to a pulp.

The film has several clever touches. For instance, the woman the lieutenant follows and her hus­ band are Germans in the original story, but because we are in Montreal, they appear in the movie as Québécois. Also, in the story, the artist buys opium from an Arab but in the movie he goes to Montreal’s Chinatown to buy it from a Chinese art dealer. There is also a punk ele­ ment in the story, the appearance of neon lighting and punk hair styles, giving an interesting dimension to such a period piece.

Speaking to Rafman after the movie, he said that he had chosen that particular story because, “I liked it and it was possible for me to make.” The movie had taken three months to complete and he submit­ ted it in place of a final paper for his course in Russian Literature. He also plans to make a film adaptation of a text in his Italian literature class, The Ragazzi, a story of slum life by Pier Pasolino, which should be ready for the upcoming Film Nite in April.

Although the directors of the movies had to deal with limited resources, such as the absence of a boom mic, the pleasure of watching these movies far outweigh their drawbacks. Unlike like most movies made at McGill, they don’t involve the hijacking of the campus or the hostile take-over of the library (Katie Holmes et al.), and display the prop­ er spirit of McGill events, with movies made by the students, for the students. m* 9 mm»

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Have you ever been to a confer­ ence on humans held by alien anthropologists? Well I have, and the word bizzare doesn’t quite sum it upOpening January 24 and play­ ing until February 1, the Alternate Theatre is performing Tales of the Lost Formicans at the McCord Museum theatre. It is a funny and bizarre portrait of what our lives would be like from the perspective of extraterrestrials.

At times, this play is a com­ mentary on the ups and downs of our lives, and some of the idiosyn­ crasies that would (apparently) make us a fun species to study. But some­ times the audience forgets that it is watching and is drawn into the life of Cathy, the woman being studied, played by Susan Evans.

She got pregnant when she was 18 and is now raising a rebellious teenager by herself in the turbulent 1960s. She also has to be a shoulder for her mother to lean on when her fathers mind starts to deteriorate from the effects of Alzheimer’s dis­ ease, something that at that time did not yet have a name.

At the same time, Cathy tries to reach out to her conspiracy theorist neighbour Jerry, played by a nervous and hilarious David Baker. Baker was probably the highlight of the

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show. He so badly wants to let Cathy in, but can’t.

When aliens finally do abduct him, it’s like a dream come true.

Another highlight was a character called Actor #7. He played the alien master of cere­ monies at the conference, as well as Hank, Jack and the paperboy. The a u d i e n c e ’s laughter was kept well-lubri­ cated by his in a p p ro p ria te Alien abduction... worst nightmare or a dream come true? uses of colloqui­ with Cathy’s father, Jim. You may alisms like “way ouf “dude”, and find yourself asking: “Why does no “give me some skin”. one say the word Alzheimer’s?” Also, The play, which was written by we’re so used to the alien motif that Constance Congdon in the 1960s, this play seems a little unoriginal was adapted slightly to resemble the today, while in the 60s, it was prob­ present day. However, this proved to ably quite a fresh and funny way to be a bit of a problem. Since it was approach a serious issue. written before many of the events That, however, did not put a that affect us today occured, some of damper on the prevailing oddness of its themes and issues are less applica­ this particular play. There were small ble now than they once were. If the reminders all over the stage and in audience is unaware of the time set­ the costumes that we were watching ting, it may be confusing that no a reproduction of the original play. one seems to know what is wrong

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Every set piece and prop had a tag with an alien symbol on it. Each character, while wearing totally appropriate costumes, would just have a random green pocket with the same symbol on it, in which to put their alien glasses. The sunglass­ es were used somewhat like masks, to indicate the change between alien actor and human character. Tatiana Bauk’s set design was simplistic and clear, just as it should have been. Ah Rum Lee’s costumes were perfectly nuanced to indicate the roles and

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ages of the various actors if their age itself did not betray it.

The casting, however, posed something of a problem in this respect. The teenager, Eric, played

by Thomas Farrugia, is in fact still a teenager. The actor that played his grandmother also looked like a grandmother. However, the actresses that played the two middle-aged women, Cathy and her neighbour Judy (played by Lisa Torjman), were both in their 20s, and the grandfa­ ther, who is supposed to be ailing from Alzheimer’s, looked about 30.

Whether or not casting is true to life, or age, it should at least be con­ sistent.

Director Kareem Fahmy put together a funny, sad and very unusual production with the Alternate Theatre. The mood shifts from funny to serious were well done and, even in the serious parts, a lighter side was always present.

This play will afford you a few laughs if you go, and perhaps touch your heart if you know someone with Alzheimer’s. Maybe it doesn’t matter that Cathy does not know what’s wrong with her father, because for anyone with a loved one with Alzheimer’s, giving it a name doesn’t make it any less confusing.

The best way to deal with pain is through humour, however, and Jerry and Actor #7 supply it in abun­ dance.

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On Thursday night at Le Swimming, Stomp Records put on the first of four concerts to pro­ mote their newest compilation release, All Skanadian: Volume 4.

The concert series features an allCanadian line-up of the various bands that appear on the album.

The first night of the concert series had Montreal-based Trip The Off opening for Bedouin Soundclash from Kingston, Ontario.

Trip The Off played nearly an hour set and built up the intensity throughout; they really knew how to work the crowd. With a rock­ steady, punk-reggae style, they filled the pool hall with the sounds of old reggae classics and new upbeat songs of their own.

As Bedouin Soundclash took the stage, the dance floor was quickly filled with Queen’s University students who had fol­ lowed the band here from Kingston. Having met three years ago in their first year at the univer­ sity, the three-piece group with a Marley/the Police/the Clash type sound, is about to start recording their second album.

“We start with reggae music and then go on to break a lot of barriers,” explained guitarist and singer Jay Malinowski. “We explore lots of other forms of music, every­ thing from UK garage, to two-step, to soul and jazz. Anything with soul... that’s the heart of our music.” With an incredibly laid back feel, Eon Sinclair captivated

the crowd with a melodious, slowwalking bass line, and Pat Pengelly, on the drums, kept the beat simple but interesting.

For the fans of the band from Kingston and the Thursday night Le Swimming regulars, the show was entertaining. But this concert was supposed to be part of a series of ska concerts, promoting a ska CD. In amongst the regulars at the bar, rudies, dressed in their black slacks, checkered suspenders and straight black ties waited for a ska show that never happened.

“It was weird that [Stomp Records] wanted us on that compi­ lation,” said Malinowski. We don’t consider ourselves reggae and we’re definitely not ska.” This was obvious to those in attendance.

After a night of anticipation, the rudies left, noticeably dissatisfied.

But this was not the fault of the band. Even given these situations, they played a great set, exploring their repertoire and mesmerizing the crowd with a smooth, cool beat.

Upon reflection, having these two bands play to kick off the con­ cert series somewhat makes sense.

Ska originated in Jamaica and the reggae and rock-steady styles were both offshoots of this form of music, characterized by an empha­ sis on the upstroke of the guitar.

The next show in the series features General ' Rudie, a Montreal-based ska band, again at Le Swimming this Thursday. And yes, General Rudie really are a ska band.

The McGill Tribune, Tuesday, January 28, 2003 So you want to know about...

A&E 17

Britpop: Rock a in 't w h a t it used to be

By Spencer Ross

o m e p e o p le w o u ld s ay th a t B ritish P o p - a k a B r it p o p - is t h e " S e c o n d B ritish In v a s io n ". W e all r e m e m b e r b a c k to 1 9 6 4 - e v e n t h o u g h n o n e o f us w e r e a c tu a lly a r o u n d b a c k t h e n — w h e n th o s e f o u r lo v e a b le m o p - t o p p e d kid s fr o m L iv e rp o o l c a m e o v e r w ith th e ir k its c h y ro c k 'n ' ro ll-d e r iv e d b r a n d o f p o p u la r m u s ic th a t w o u ld f o r e v e r e s ta b lis h th e U K as a fo r c e o n th e g lo b a l m u s ic s c e n e .

British mainstream in the 1990s.

The eruption of the second British invasion as a counter to Story) grunge and alternative became analogous to the Beatles’ counter Glory? to the rock ‘n roll of the 50s. However, this time the raw emo­ Skelter tion of the pop song was enough to constitute a bands motiva­ 1995 tion, not necessarily the 1960s teenage rebellious angst, l’he idea o f ‘pop’ as an abbreviation of the word “popular” started to The first song thay.j become prominent once again and British bands started to comes to mind foM M llt revive the idea of the pop single or ‘pop star’. The new revolu­ people whena^^Bj^tKw tion sratted and it was purely British. the name Oasis, is their Beatlesesque' ode, It is important to note that pop music itself is itor genre spe­ “Wondcrwall”. But perhaps the most famous cific, therefore almost each band started to form a sound that thing about Oasis, other rhan there blatant was uniquely its own. Bands of the Britpop genre were each attempts to bring mod culture back to the main­ influenced by a variety of earlier artists, from The Beatles to Pink stream, was the simmering sibling rivalry between Floyd to The Sex Pistols. As the Britpop movement started to singer and lead guitarist Liam and Noel Gallagher. progress, more and more bands started to crop up on the map, Morning Glory was the album that officially broke though reaching large-scale commercial success was difficult in Britpop into the American mainstream. Though England, let alone overseas. Album sales of bands like Suede and not their first album, the brothers Gallagher Pulp barely dented the UK charts, while the anthems of Nirvana employed a litany of simple rock and roll-driven and Pearl Jam were enough to nearly eliminate them completely songs on Morning Glory, from the anthemic from the North American psyche. Only in the last couple of “Champagne Supernova” to the “Let it Be”-like years has Britpop managed to create an impression on the rhythms of “Don’t Look Back in Anger”.

American market.

Ironically, the record label that pushed Britpop through to the American airwaves is the same one that got.The Beatles’ Pulp career rolling in the 1960s: Capitol Records. Capitol Jus found Different Class successes with bands like the Doves, Coldplay and Statsailot in Polygram Records/Island recent years, ami has been able to seize the concept of the popu­ Records lar music market. Their catchy guitar hooks and classic anthems MMlife, 1995 are a drawback to the days when pop music ruled the airwaves.

In addition to the upcoming Coldplay concert at the Bell Pulp started making Centre on February 25, here is a list and music tn the early 1980 s. description of some recommended albums to but it wasn’t until Different Coldplay introduce you to the Britpop g enj^gtijililliiïi Cfitss that they started to jj^iam ote recognition on . 1 H ush o f B lood to the H e a d the Britpop scene. If ever there was a careti launch CapitoI/EM! ing album, this was the one. Their sound is a Radiohead 2002 throwback to that of bands like Joy Division and The Bends The Clash, creating a great glam rock presence with Capitol/EMI O f all the Britpop albums, I think this is probably my favourite, evén if i s the songs like “Common People” and “Mis-Shapes”.

1995 newest one on this list. Coldplay first hit the pop scene overseas with their happy-goPulp’s latest album, We Love Life, came out last year lucky ballad, “Yellow”. Their sophomore release on Capitol Records topped all “Best and is also a must-have, inspiring other glam rock Prior to of 2002 lists” by various other music-oriented media publications and was truly one bands like Americas Interpol to bring back that the shift in of the best albums of last year. Chris Martin’s brooding vocals on songs such as the subgenre.

T h o m drippy ballad, “The Scientist” and the slamming chords of the finale, “Amsterdam” Yorke’s exis­ destine to do for Coldplay’s career what The Bends did for Radiohead. Even if Britpop tential avant-gardism on 2000’s Kid doesn’t catch on in the States, AROBTTHhas topped the charts around the world and Blur A, Radiohead became the antithesis musically far surpasses their debut, Parachutes. Be sure not to miss them when they Parklife to the kitschy-ness of Oasis. With play the Bell Centre in February.

Capitol/Food Records Yorke’s vast whiny voice on songs like 1994 “Bones” and “High and Dry”, Yorke was able to apply grunge to punk Despite the fact that most with a little rock ‘ri roll. The chorus people know Blur as the band in “Just” was a jarring distorted gui­ that does the “W OO-HOO!” tar, tempered by the acoustic song from the album 13 melodies during the verse. Prior to (“Song 2”), Blur was a household name in England The Bends, Radiohead might have well before it became one overseas. “Girls and Boys” been placed in a category along with starts off the album with the psychedelic fusion of the many of the other British indie bands 60s, inflamed with grunge, and the tide track mixes of the time, but as the release of The some Sex Pistols with Syd Barrett. An intriguing note Bends reveals, each Radiohead album about Blur is that frontman Damon Albarn later goes drew them further and further apart on to “lead” 2001 sensation, Gorillaz (a pseudo-band from what might be defined as ‘pop’ that is represented by cartoons and is the exact opposite of Blur).

Sure, there were some great bands that emerged in the 1960s— the Rolling Stones, the Animals, the Kinks, etc,., but once the 1970s hit, it seemed like British Pop was all but for­ gotten. During the 1980s, there was a rush of New Wave music coming out of England. Bands like Soft CeH or Duran Duran were precursors to today’s “modern rock” scene, but certainly didn’t compare with the great bands of the 60s.

On the whole, British rock music seemed to be hanging by the thin strands of punk music. One of 2002 s least publicized independent films, 24 Hour Part)' People, was an excellent mockumentary of the Mancurian scene and its evolution into the now infamous English rave culture. The techno and independent scenes were very much contained within the underground (not the Tube), and subverted in comparison to the American domi­ nance of the rock charts. Poised as an alternative to the fringe scene, rock bands started to emerge from the woodwork, com­ posing a style of music that synthesized NewWave and Punk with the mod rock and roll culture of the 1960s. Bands like U2, The Police and Echo and the Bunnymen started to create a form of textured rock music that was the antithesis of everything relat­ ed to popular music in the 1980s.

While the Americans were exporting bands like Van Halen, Poison or Warrant, complete with hair-metal and speed guitar, British rock ‘ri roll would return to its roots. The music slowed down and the simple drum tempos were paired with spacey gui­ tar riffs. Thus, a new phase of Britpop was evolving. Sometimes, even the electric guitars were substituted for acoustic guitars to create a lighter sound. The lyrics were like poems, and were less politically motivated or anti-establishment in nature. Bands like The Stone Roses were the harbingers of the new sound of guitar music. These types of bands slowly paved thy way into the

Travis The Man Who Sony/Epic 2000 Travis was one of the first major non-English exports in the Britpop phenomenon, hailing from Glasgow, Scodand. Some may remember their last Montreal appearance in 2001 at Spectrum, when singer Fran Healy came out sporting a fauxhawk and crooned crowd favourites such as “Drifiwood” and the ever-popular “Why Does it Always Rain on Me”. Travis has created a postBritpop subgenre of music that is heavily based on guitar hooks and simple drum beats, creating a melancholic mood.

18 A&E

The McGill Tribune, Tuesday, January 28, 2003

merely for the honour of it and again for the justifiably good reason of solid movie entertainment.

There are about 10 films in the Kurosawa series, made between the subsequent trial; but what really 1948 and 1968, all featuring Japan’s imagery.

Mark Maby When I worked as an English happened? The accused tells us one greatest movie star, Toshiro Mifune. teacher in Japan, people would ask story, the woman another, and even He was one of those rare actors pos­ Even if you’ve never heard of me when I first arrived if I knew the murdered man, through a medi- - sessed with the good looks of a Tom Japanese director Akira Kurosawa much about their country. In um, tells us his own version from Cruise or a Ben Affleck, but suffi­ before, you’ve certainly seen films response I’d say, “No, but I’ve beyond the grave. ciently talented to play a variety of made under his influence. Clint watched a lot of samurai movies,” His most famous movie, The challenging roles. Easy comparisons Eastwood rose to stardom in which was a pretty dumb answer, Seven Samurai, takes on the wellT h e T h ro n e o f B lo o d (PG) Kurosawa remakes. Hans Solo, even if it was true. It was also, how­ known story of a bunch of misfits Princess Leia and the two droids ever, an undeniable comment on the with no purpose worthy of their Directed by Akira Kurosawa. were inspired by Kurosawa’s Hidden impact Kurosawa has made on west­ great talents. “What are we to do Fortress, and Francis Ford Coppola ern audiences by exposing images of with our deft powers of swordmanStarring Toshiro Mifune, Isuzo called him better than Shakespeare. life in Japan.

Yamada, Minuro Chiaki, and ship?” they ask? Working together to Though even without an interest in Takashi Shimura.

Kurosawa is most famous for save a village of oppressed peasants cowboys, dead poets or the Force, his period dramas of the feudal era sounds like a good reason for three ★ ★ ★ 1/2 out of ★ ★ ★ ★ his films, now being shown at and came to international recogni­ hours of action and adventure. In Cinéma du Parc for the next few tion in 1950 with the period drama Yojimbo, when there is no one worth months, are worth seeing for their Rashomon. It tells the story of a fighting for, the masterless samurai can be made to De Niro, Depardieu wonderful plots and beautiful woman’s rape, a man’s murder and plays one side against the other, and Brando for his power and range.

In these films, he plays gangsters and detectives, samurai and salary men.

His talent is enough to make any F r e e P a s s e s t o V .I.P . S c r e e n in g F e b r u a r y 1 2 t h would-be actor bite his lip in envy.

P a s s e s a v a ila b le in Tribune O ffice Room 1 1 0 Sh atn er, lim ited num ber In the movie I Live in Fear, the 35-year-old actor becomes a 70year-old man without resorting to the hokey make up that actors usu­ ally oblige us to indulge. In his films with Kurosawa, above all, Mifune’s characters bring an emotional con­ nection to a strange and foreign past and a heroic context to the mun­ dane present.

The drama in High and Low, for example, is just as pertinent today as it would have been 40 years ago. In the film, a big business man is thrown into a moral dilemma when he has to decide between sav­ ing his business or paying the ran­

Kurosawa's indelible im pact

J a p a n e s e d ire c to r su b je c t o f c u rre n t Parc sh o w c a se

som for an employee’s child, mistak­ enly kidnapped as his own.

Corporate culpability is questioned in many of today’s economic disas­ ters (Exxon, Union Carbide, RJ Reynolds), though one could only hope that their executives are held as accountable as Mifune’s character.

The movie presently playing at Cinéma du Parc is Throne o f Blood, Kurosawa’s retelling of Macbeth, with Mifune in the title role. Like in most of Kurosawa’s movies, the viewer is staggered by the beauty of his images: the light and shadows of the forest, the thick fog that rolls in and out like the tide and the natural light of the sun and moon. The movie concentrates upon a tension between the fast editing of the battle scenes and the slow scenes of Lady Macbeth, instilling madness into her husband’s heart. These well-paced scenes are influenced by the Noh theatre of Japan, a very formal and old tradition which, in western cul­ ture, is probably closest to ancient Greek drama. Noh uses masks and stylized movements to tell stories of gods interfering in human h isto ry forming a nice connection to the Macbeth plot.

Kurosawa employs the conven­ tion to reveal the madness building inside the empty castles as the Macbeth character quickly murders his way into the great lord’s position of power. The film is somewhat of a departure from Kurosawa’s usual aesthetic and, if you’re not a Shakespeare or Noh-theatre buff, you might want to wait for one o f his other films—there are a lot o f them, and all are bound to intrigue.

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The McGill Tribune, Tuesday, January 28, 2003

A&E 19

The Yellow Door brings poetry to the McGill Ghetto Scott Sameroff After walking up and down Alymer Street for what seemed like hours in the brutally cold weather, I finally stumbled upon The Yellow Door. I walked through the infa­ mous doorway and was quickly transported worlds away from the freezing streets of the ghetto. Once in the basement, where the poetry reading was to take place, I poured myself a cup of coffee to warm my thawing body and took one of the few seats left in the cramped quar­

ters. I was surrounded by about 40 others who had also chosen to forgo a Thursday night on the town for a relaxing evening of poetry and prose.

The first poet to take the stage was Jason Selman, a founding member of the jazz poetry ensemble The Rhythmic Missionaries, as well as a member of the 10-plus member Montreal-based music group Beached Whale. Taking the stage with nothing but his trumpet, Selman announced the title of his first poem, “Black Noise”, before easing his way into the piece with a

series of soothing notes. When the music stopped, his words retained the tone of jazz, fluctuating in tempo similar to musical scales.

Stories of dreamers, hope and human expression filled his lyrics, which were elegantly and smoothly delivered. He noted that many of his poems were written to favourite jazz pieces of his.

Emily Schultz followed Selman with an excerpt from her short story “The Value of X”, which took sec­ ond place in This Magazines most recent annual Great Canadian Literature Hunt. “The Value of X”

Dealing drugs on judgement day 2 5 th

H o u r

ran k s a m o n g

Matthew Shogilev Spike Lee is the archetypal New Yorker—cocky, quick-witted, inde­ fatigable, a rabid Knicks fan and, above all, intensely proud of his habitat. With this in mind, it is delightfully appropriate that 25th Hour is one of the first motion pic­ tures to openly portray New York in the aftermath of September 11.

2 5 th Hour (G) Directed by Spike Lee. S tarring Edward N orton, Brian Cox, Philip Seym our Hoffman, Rosario Dawson.

★ ★ ★ out of ★ ★ ★ ★ 25th Hour parlays Lee’s patent­ ly New York temperament into a film that is at once tactful—not overstepping any of the boundaries of its tender subject matter—and poignant. The overall message that emerges seems to be that, while the tragedy of the World Trade Centre may have shaken the foundations of New York, it did not destroy the city’s fabric.

The film begins with a chilling panoramic portrayal of New York’s scarred skyline, with particular focus put on the two columns of light that now stand in the place of the World Trade Centres. After the opening scene, the spectre of 9/11 retreats to the periphery, but still looms in the consciousness of Lee’s characters.

Edward Norton plays angst-rid­ den Montgomery Brogan, who is faced with a prison sentence for drug dealing. Monty spends his last night as a free man with his closest friends and family. He visits his father (Brian Cox), a retired fire­

S p ik e

L e e 's b e s t j o in t s

man, his two best friends growing up, Jacob (Philip Seymour Hoffman), a high school teacher, and Francis (Barry Pepper), who works on Wall Street, and finally his girlfriend, Naturelle (Rosario Dawson).

Jacob and Francis adopt differ­ ent ways of coping with Monty’s impending incarceration. In a con­ versation between the two, Jacob placates his own desire to escape reality by trying to convince himself that his friend will emerge from prison unscathed and able to start anew. Francis, by contrast, accepts, with listless ease, that Monty will never be the same—that he’s in for “seven years of hell.” His willingness to assume the worst is in part a product of his desire to justify for­ getting about Monty and resuming his life.

The conversation between the two occurs in an apartment over­ looking the plot of land where the World Trade Centre stood, and is alluding to the conflict between clinging to the past and moving on.

Jacob’s and Francis’ respective approaches to Monty’s plight are, at bottom, self-serving. Initially, Monty, like his two best friends, is in bad faith. Positioned in front of a bathroom mirror in his father’s restaurant, he launches into an emo­ tionally charged monologue which blames his fall from grace on nearly every recognizable ethnic, religious and other group, ranging from Jews and Blacks to Osama Bin Laden. It is only at the end of his monologue that Monty finally realizes that the locus of blame lies in the reflection he faces in the mirror. His epiphany is expressed in an almost triumphal tone by saying, “Fuck you, Monty Brogan.”

If 25th Hour has a major weak­

ness, it lies in the ambiguity of Monty’s relationship with Naturelle.

She seems, at times, to be Monty’s only source of support. However, Lee is unclear about how his protag­ onist feels about Naturelle. Monty confides in others that he loves Naturelle, but is aloof and indiffer­ ent when around her.

That said, Lee does capture the fabric of New York in his film—so much so that he can get away with being excessively patriotic. Monty’s drive through New York en route to prison at the conclusion of the film serves as an exultation of the city’s

was filled with twisted humour and sarcasm, which Schultz used to challenge many widespread gay and lesbian stereotypes. Schultz recited the poem in a very quick and mon­ otone fashion that helped to show­ case much of the humour of the piece.

Other highlights from the night included poems from Montreal filmmaker Harry Jacobs, who came to the stage accompanied by his laptop. Jacobs was raised as an Orthodox Jew, and his poems humourously juxtaposed the values with which he was raised against the values of modern society. His pieces were imaginative and witty, while at the same time socially aware. His tales ranged from a tragedy involving the Queen of England’s royal tasters, in which all of the tasters come down with the flu, aptly titled “The Taste for the Queen”, to an ode to American civil rights icon Rosa Parks, simply titled

“Rosa”.

Stan Rogel closed the evening with a hilarious short story involv­ ing a husband and wife trying to get some sleep in a noisy apartment building. Rogel has published numerous books of poetry as well as two novels, entitled Bafflegab and The Long Drive Home. His story was extremely well read, perfectly mimicking the thoughts and con­ versations of a couple who were try­ ing to figure out what the hell was going on in the apartment below them. Rogel read with a great deal of passion and energy, keeping the audience on their toes throughout the poem. Like any good storyteller, Rogel concluded his tale with one of life’s important lessons: there are different strokes for different folks.

This reading echoed the sentiment of the evening, as short stories, excerpts from longer works and poetry were performed side by side.

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C o m e beautiful diversity. It is fittingly accompanied by his father’s pastoral narration of the life that his son might be able to still live if he skips parole and journeys westward, remi­ niscent of so many American vagabonds beforehand.

However, while his father still clings to the American dream as part of his son’s birthright, Monty seems to be at peace with himself, and ready to accept the repercussions of his actions. Although Lee lets the viewer decide whether he flees or goes to jail, it seems clear that, in either scenario, Monty is poised to confront, and one day overcome, his past.

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SCOREBOARD BADMINTON (W & M) QSSF Meet #2 at UQAM January 26 1. Montreal 2. lavai 3. Sherbrooke 4. McGill 5. UQAM 6. UQTR Chloe 1-enoox won all 5 of her singles matches.

Aaron Kreadon won 4 of his 5 matches.

BASKETBALL (W) January 24 Bishops 60 McGill 33 January 25 Laval 55 McGill 38 BASKETBALL. (M) January 24 McGill 61 Bishop's 58 January 25 McGill lost 64 Laval 84 HOCKEY (M) January 24 McGill 4 Concordia 1 January 26 UQTR 6 McGill 3 HOCKEY (W) January 25 McGill 3 Yale 1 January 26 Princeton 3 McGill I SKIING - NORDIC (W) Quebec Cup Meet #2 (at Mom-Orford) Sonja Ostertag finished second in the 5 km Skating technique and the 10 km Classic tech­ nique Nicole Portley finished third in the 5 km Skating technique and the 10 km Classic tech­ nique

M E N ’S HOCKEY

UQTR 6, M cG ILL 3

Redmen fight th eir w ay into playoffs Raymond says his team will respond as the rivals meet Friday C a th erin e K ra m a rcz u k

There is no denying the rival­ ry that rages between the men’s hockey teams of l’Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières and McGill. Both teams left nothing on the ice in a game that ended in a massive bench brawl Sunday afternoon at McConnell Arena.

While the Red ‘ri White dropped the contest to the Patriotes 6-3, the score is not indicative of what tran­ spired over the 60 minutes.

The game was a critical duel, as only five games remain for McGill before the playoffs com­ mence. Bodies were flying all over the ice, as aggressive and vicious hits were delivered throughout the game, particularly by the rear­ guards of each team.

“We wanted to be emotional,” said McGill’s Bruno Lemire, who extended his point-scoring streak to six games with a second period goal. “We play really well under emotional stress. We are a fast team and sparks were flying.”

The Redmen's speed showed in the penalty killing units, as the Pats scored only one goal on nine extra-man chances. Going into the game, the Redmen ranked second in the 16-team conference in penalty-killing with a success rate of 89.6 per cent.

McGill, however, could not

score on its power-play chances, as the team was stymied on all of its eight chances. McGill's power-play struggles were surprising consider­ ing that the team was fourth in the league entering the contest.

McGill evened the score at 11 early in the second period. Left

State of Grace

SOCCER (M) QSSF Indoor Tournament #1 (at Trois-Rivières) January 25 UQTR 6 McGill 5 McGill 3 UQAR 2 McGill 5 College Outaouais 1 VOLLEYBALL (W) Quality Inn Tournament in Ottawa ROUND ROBIN McGill 3 Toronto 2 McGill 3 Ottawa 1 Saturday, January 25 McGill 3 Ryerson 0 SEMIFINAL Toronto 3 McGill 1 BRONZE MEDAL GAME Queens 3 McGill 0

NATHAN LEBIODA

QUA leading scorer Alexandre Tremblay (14) busts around a McGill defender Sunday, at McConnell Arena.

Hockey is a game quintessentially Canadian. It is a game embedded so deep in our culture that, if uprooted, we would cease to be Canadian.

I, like many young Canadians, spent much of my childhood play­ ing hockey. Growing up in Saskatchewan, summer was for baseball, fall for football and the long, cold winter was for hockey.

At times, during these frigid winter months, it seemed like noth­ ing else mattered. At the risk of

pounding a cliché to death, I still echo the statement that hockey is a religion in small-town Canada.

From the time we ate able to walk, the blades are strapped on our trun­ cated feet. Instructions from pas­ sion-fueled coaches are barked at us through our tiny iron cages as we prepare for battle at the age of six.

Parents cheer, yell, growl and howl... and players play. We play for the love of the game, unable to comprehend at such a young age how much hockey impacts our cul­ ture.

A little known fact is that McGill participated in the world’s first organized game of hockey in 1877- From the Original Six to the 1972 Summit Series, Canada has been linked to hockey for more than a century. Even in the business that hockey has become, we some­ times forget that over 50 per cent of the players on NHL rosters are Canadian. But when Canada lost at the Nagano Olympics, “it stabbed like a driven nail” (I enjoy Robert Service). The hearts of a nation were broken and widespread disSee PARENTS, page 23

winger Joel Bergeron moved Patriote goaltender Danny Dallaire out of position, allowing Lemire to knock the puck into the open net.

The two other Redmen goals were scored by left wing Paul Theriault in the second period and Alexandre Pagé in the third. Both

were tying goals, as UQTR gave up one-goal leads twice in the match.

The real story of the game, however, came in the dying sec­ onds.

Philippe Deblois snapped a 33 tie at 17:32 in the third period to See EMOTIONAL, page 22

TRACK AND FIELD

Men and women place second at home N ich o la s LePan

“Sometime they’ll give ■a war and nobody will come.”

With apologies to Carl Sandburg, the old maxim simply does not apply to McGill track and field team members. As 12 univer­ sities converged on the city of Montreal to compete in the eighth annual McGill Team Challenge track and field meet, under the ster­ ile glow of the Tomlinson Fieldhouse’s ' spotlights, the unranked McGill men won five gold medals to finish second on Saturday.

On the women’s side of the competition, the University of Western Ontario won four events to secure first in the standings.

McGill trailed the powerful Mustangs by 7.5 points, coming in second place overall.

McGill’s strong showing was a result of being prepared going into the Team Challenge, according to veteran Dawn Creighton.

“There was better competition at this meet,” said Creighton. “It definitely motivated us to work harder.”

A special part of the day, how­ ever, came when former McGill track team member Nicolas Macrozonaris challenged anyone and everyone in a 60 m invitation­ al dash. Macrozonaris, now a mem­ ber of the Canadian national track team, won the race in a time of 6.58 seconds, just .02 seconds shy of a personal best he set at Tomlinson Fieldhouse last year.

The medal count McGill’s Ryan Beaton and York University’s Tasha Monroe were named male and female athSee TRACK, page 22

The McGill Tribune, Tuesday, January 28, 2003

Sports 21

INJURY TIME MENTAL TIME?

Reconciling the physical pain with mental anguish Sarah Wright

It’s a Cinderella story. Your team makes it to the playoffs for the first time in years. Coaches and captains trade motivational speeches. Mom and Dad are perched on the edge of their bleacher seats, with the video camera at attention. And you—a young, invincible soccer player— cannot wait to get on the field.

Laces tied—check. Shirt tucked in—check. Everything is where it should be. Everyone is in position.

Let the game begin.

This Cinderella story, one rich with Pelé-like aspirations, comes to a crashing end as you break your ankle in the first minute of the game.

From tykes to professionals, this scenario is a fairly common tale— even more so today, as there is a greater emphasis on athletes to be bigger, faster and stronger.

For people who compete for a living, the possibility of their career ending in an instant is a gamble every athlete has to take.

“Injuries are going to happen; you just have to be prepared,” says Martlets basketball head coach and intercollegiate coordinator Lisen Moore.

From pulled muscles to torn lig­ aments to broken bones, injuries are as much a part of sport as drills and games. But how much does injury

affect the athlete in question, as well as teammates and coaches? The uncontrollable variables are often the most debilitating.

Gordon Bloom, a sport psy­ chologist at McGill’s Department of Kinesiology and Physical Education, believes that injuries can affect an athletes psyche significantly.

“A lot of times the player who gets an injury feels isolated [from the team] because the non-injured play­ ers don’t know how to relate,” says Bloom, who is a former psychologist for the Montreal Canadiens. “When you don’t practice or travel with the team, you start to question your own value with the team.”

Beyond inflicting physical pain, injuries can also alter relationships between team members. Injured ath­ letes can also feel like a bystander.

Cindy-Anne Carufel, a member of the Martlets hockey team, has broken the same hand twice while at McGill.

“I didn’t feel like I was a part of the team,” says Carufel of being unable to participate in actual drills and games. “I felt like nobody need­ ed me because they were doing so well without me.”

Team cohesion and together­ ness can also be upset by individual injuries.

“Mental toughness sometimes does waver,” says Moore, referring to

a team’s reaction to injury. “It absolutely affects the team emotion­ ally. It is mentally fatiguing.”

While the loss of players can bring down a team and alter the

dynamic, it is not an undaunting task that is new to the world of sports and its athletes. It’s just anoth­ er part of the game.

“The more mature you are as a

team, the better,” says Moore. “You have to have the attitude that ‘we have dealt with [injuries] before, we can deal with it again.’”

Bloom concurs that it is most difficult on the injured athlete to deal with the team separation.

“No research suggests that [individual injuries] will debilitate a team dramatically. With more seri­ ous injuries where someone has to leave the field or the ice on a stretch­ er, both teams are affected in the same way—it’s shocking.”

Laura Abbatiello, head therapist for the Redmen football team, deals with over 100 injuries a season, everything from turf burns to frac­ tures. She says that the clinic is always full and requires four full­ time therapists and five or six parttime therapists to properly treat the number of injuries resulting from varsity and intramural sports.

The number of athletes suffer­ ing from injuries in both amateur and professional sports only increas­ es as more become involved. Moore believes that much of the onus falls on the athlete.

“Hopefully people will do their homework in the off-season [to avoid getting injured],” says Moore.

Maybe then less Cinderella sto­ ries will end with a devastating injury.

Steelworker's dream is a Senator's nightmare

Ja m e s S ca rfo n e

Being from Hamilton isn’t easy.

Each citizen has heard at least one sour joke about his/her beloved Steel City: the Big Stink, the armpit of Canada, the Pittsburgh of the north, and so on.

Though my home town may only be known for smokestacks, donuts and the ever-so-loveable Sheila Copps, it has been in the spot­ light of late regarding the destination for two troubled NHL teams. The Buffalo Sabres and Ottawa Senators are in dire straits and have been involved in on-again, off-again talks about relocation or contraction.

Since baseball screwed up royally two years ago, it seems that contrac­ tion will not be an option for the NHL in the near future, which leaves us with relocation.

Hamilton has been mentioned the most by Canadian outlets as the new spot for the Sabres, though very few people outside this country have even heard of the Tim Horton's haven.

Here are the positives: Hamilton and Buffalo are less than an hour apart; a good chunk of

Canadian Sabres fans already cross the border to watch games already, and those pesky territorial rights fees won’t take effect because the Sabres are within their bounds to move anywhere within an 80 km radius if they deem necessary.

These factors essentially rule out the Senators’ chances of moving to Hamilton. This scenario does at least eliminate the possibility of Canada losing yet another franchise

forums on notable sports websites have caused many stirs in Steeltown.

And on Friday, The Globe and Mail said that an interested buyer wants to move the Sens into Hamilton’s Copps Coliseum. The reality, how­ ever, is that the attention we crave as a city is being worn out fast, and the reality of Steeltown gaining either team is as dim as the Leafs’ chances of winning the Cup. The Hammer has been lobby­

standards; our city is one of the fastest growing in Canada, and our love for hockey still stands as the best in Canada according to Don Cherry.

It seems like a perfect fit. But please, stop getting our hopes up. It just ain’t gonna happen.

The Toronto Maple Leafs is the only organization in this country that is comfortable financially. That includes all Canadian sports teams.

Hamilton would be no better than Calgary or Quebec City, and we

WWW.ANGELFIRE.COM/ONAUXURVSLOFT/HAMILTON ANGELFIRE.C0M/MT/W00DMTN/INSIGHTARCH2.HTML

to the US. For the Sens, Hamilton would be a fitting new location, seeing as how it should have been the team’s home in the first place. In 1990, the NHL felt it had to expand above the 49th parallel and the two finalists were Ottawa, the nation’s capital and Hamilton, the nation’s crapital.

Ottawa won the bid because it was more willing to ante up the league’s hefty expansion fee right away.

Nevermind that the franchise didn’t have solid financial backing or, ahem, anywhere suitable to play. The long and short of it is that the city is paying for its misjudgment now, lit­ erally.

The recent talks and countless

ing for a big-league hockey team since the early 1980s, when the attendance-lagging and money-los­ ing Pittsburgh Penguins were ready to move north.

Then along came some guy named Mario Lemieux and spoiled everything. Hamilton got shafted in 1990, then again in 1996 when the NHL granted a team to Nashville, Tennessee of all places. The bitter­ ness was flowing right down King and James. Those were some pretty bleak times for the once ambitious city, and the Tiger-Cats weren’t exactly a cure for our hockey blues.

Today everyone is saying Hamilton’s in line for an NHL team.

Our white elephant of an arena can be renovated to meet today’s NHL

would suffer much more if we had a team that was going to move as opposed to not having a team at all.

Just ask anyone from Winnipeg.

Besides, the people of Hamilton have plenty of reasons to engage in

civic pride these days. This year alone, we are getting two huge sport­ ing events, plus the opportunity to host the 2010 Commonwealth Games will be decided as well.

From national figure skating championships to the Juno Awards, this city can play with the best of the city bunch. The plaguing problem is that Hamilton is located smack in between several large, loyal hockey markets. Potential owners of the team would be hard pressed to find a significant number of pure fans when the market already eyes some of the league’s most storied squads in the Red Wings, Sabres, Canadiens and Leafs.

The bottom line is that this once proud city is gradually recover­ ing, and we don’t need some hockey team messing it all up again. Give us the odd Leafs-Sabres tilt every September and we’ll be happy.

Hamiltonians are not about to become poor saps losing sleep every night wondering if their adored hockey team will split town the next day. That’s what Sens fans are for.

22 Sports

The McGill Tribune, Tuesday, January 28, 2003

Track and field prepares for Boston, QSSF final Continued from page 20

letes of the meet. Beaton, a native of St-Bruno, Quebec, won the 1500 m in 3:55.05 and anchored the goldmedal winning 4x800 relay squad, who crossed the line in a photo-fin­ ish time of 7:55.51.

For McGill coach Dennis Barrett, Beaton’s work was the high­ light of the day.

“It’s good to see a performace like that," said Barrett. “It’s always fun to see that.”

Joining Beaton on the 4x800 relay team were senior Ben Brisbois of Carrying Place, Ontario, fresh­ man Martin Fox of Toronto and Daniel Lennox, a senior from Oakville, Ontario. Lennox also won the 1000 m, (2:30.19).

Despite McGill’s strong show­ ing at the most recent event, Barrett believes that there is still work to be done in the relay races.

“We expect to be stronger in the relays, but they have been mediocre this year,” said Barrett. “We haven’t got to where we want to be yet.”

York’s Monroe, a U2 from Calgary, Alberta, qualified for the Canadian Interuniversity Sport Championships in the high jump (1.75 m) and long jump (5.82 m), to establish meet and Fieldhouse records in both events.

NATHAN LEBIODA

Timothy Woo vaults over the bar, helping the men’s team to second place.

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won silver in the 60 m hurdles and the triple jump. Dawn Creighton won gold in the triple jump and bronze in the long jump, while Véronique Foley staked claim to the bronze in the high jump.

McGill travels to Laval this weekend for the Rouge-et-Or Invitational. The following week­ end, the Red ‘n White make the trip to Boston.

For Creighton, the travel should help bring the team closer together.

“Team cohesion is always hard­ er to come by in track and field," said Creighton. “There is a lot of support within specific groups. It helps the more we travel together, to increase team spirit, which motivates us to do better.”

Following the meet in Boston is the Quebec Student Sports Federation championship February 21 at Sherbrooke. Coach Barrett looks forward to the conference finals.

“We want to win a conference championship, and I think that we have a good shot at it,” said Barrett.

“We were very close last year in both the male and female divisions. We are trying to reclaim that title. And we are aiming for a top-five finish at the national championships [March 15 at Windsor].”

Emotional w in for UQTR Continued from page 20

1

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A new meet record was also set

by University of Waterloo runner Danielle Carrington, with a time of 7.60 s in the 60 m dash.

“We have one of the fastest tracks in the country,” said Barrett.

“We had 26 personal bests this weekend.”

Senior Timothy Woo of Montreal and freshman Ismail Kassam struck gold in the 60m (7.22) and 3000 m (9:03.07), respectively.

Senior Sarah Ali-Khan of Baie d’Urfé, Quebec, was McGill’s top medal-winner of the event. Her impressive precious metal reserves grew further with one gold and three silvers. The 27-year-old graduate student in Pharmacology anchored the 4x400 relay team to a first place finish in 4:10.43, and was second in the 1500 m, 3000 m and the 4x800 relay. Ali-Khan recorded a personal best in the 3000m race.

Also on the winning 4x400 relay team were sophomores Ashley Loftus and Leslie Marcotte, plus Lindsay Lessard, a Chemical Engineering U2 who won silver in both the 1000m and the 4x800 relay.

Other McGill podium finishes included freshman Hannah Moffat, who took home silver in the pole vault, and U3 Ashley Shumate, who

put the Patriotes ahead for good.

McGill head coach Martin Raymond opted to pull goalie Luc Vaillancourt in hopes of sending the game to overtime. UQTR silenced any hope of extra time, scoring two empty-net goals to round out the scoring.

The last few seconds of play were some of the nastiest. The trou­ ble started as Theriault tried to make a pass next to the Patriotes' bench. UQTR's Marc-Étienne Hubert reached out for Theriault and pulled him into the bench. A pile up quickly ensued. It took the referees several minutes to break up the brawl.

In a game that saw 98 penalty minutes assessed, 26 were attributa­ ble to this one incident. McGill’s Sébastian Langois, Chad Blundy, Jocelyn Perreault and PierreAntoine Paquet were all given two minutes for roughing.

Three Patriotes players received equivocal penalties.

Hubert was the most penalized player, as he initiated the skirmish.

He received penalties for interfer­ ence from the bench, a game mis­ conduct, and most likely faces a lengthy suspension.

Bergeron, who looked solid throughout the game and was named third star, commented on the next face off that comes this Friday when McGill travels to the

unfriendly confines of TroisRivières.

“We played a good game and it was definitely an emotional one.

The game this Friday will be one where we pull up the chin straps,” said Bergeron. “The emotions are definitely going to carry over, and 1 think there are going to be some grudges. I do not really know what to expect, but it is going to be real­ ly intense.”

Raymond was proud of his team but also weary of what is to come Friday. He reflected with dis­ appointment on UQTR’s unsports­ manlike play.

“The real question is how the other team will respond, said Raymond. “[UQTR’s] behaviour was, unfortunately, very disgraceful.

UQTR started everything, and we have it on the tapes to prove it. I am not afraid to say that they were very disgraceful, as even the coach at the end of the game wouldn’t even shake my hand.”

The Patriotes demonstrated their feelings for the Red ‘n’ White by leaving their mark on McConnell Arena. UQTR broke the door to the penalty box. The bill is apparently already in the mail. So how does Raymond feel now?

“I feel sad that they acted like that. They have such a beautiful club... I just feel sad about the whole thing,” he said.

The McGill Tribune, Tuesday, January 28, 2003

Martlets stung at home McGill met the league-leading Bishop’s Gaiters Friday and lost 6033. Low shooting percentages and rebound totals hurt the Martlets as they tried to create some momen­ tum in a season that has seen very little. The Gaiters out-rebounded the Martlets 44 per cent to 32 per cent. Maude Vallières was the top scorer for McGill with nine points.

On Saturday, McGill was again shut down, this time by Laval, los­ ing 55-38. McGill was only down by five at the half, but the team was unable to overcome the deficit.

Vallières was McGills top scorer for the second day in a row with 10, while rookie Anne-Marie Scherrer had eight points with six rebounds.

Men’s basketball on the way up The Redmen created some ten­ sion for McGill fans Friday night.

Despite leading Bishops 26-17 at the half, McGill allowed the Gaiters to creep up and close the gap. The game ended happily for the homeside as the Redmen squeaked out a 61-58 victory. Frederick Bernard was McGill’s top scorer on the day

with 20 points, followed by Dominico Marcario and Kird Reid with 13 points apiece.

Denburk Reid was all over the court, shooting 5-17 from the field and bringing down eight rebounds.

As a team, McGill scored 15 points off turnovers, made 11 steals and blocked two shots.

In a disappointing showing, McGill was unable to carry the momentum from the win over the Gaiters, falling 84-64 to Laval.

With nine minutes to go in the game, McGill trailed by only four points. The fate-sealer for McGill came from being out-rebounded 38-21. Kirk Reid took top-scoring honours with 18 points.

Both McGill basketball teams will face cross-town rival Concordia Stingers this Friday. Martlets play at 6 pm and the Redmen follow at 8 pm.

Martlets taste the Ivey

The McGill hockey Martlets travelled to the US this weekend for a pair of exhibition games against Yale and Princeton. Starting goaltender Kim St-Pierre made 36 saves as McGill defeated Yale 3-1 Friday despite being outshot 37-17.

Véronique Lapierre, Audrey Hadd and Paula Mailloux scored for the No. 2-ranked Martlets.

McGill followed that game up with a 3-1 loss to the Princeton Tigers. St-Pierre was in net and Lapierre scored McGill’s lone goal.

McGill improved to 20-4-2 overall.

Martlet volleyball shines in Ontario While the Quebec Student Sports Federation hands the young McGill volleyball Martlets some fierce competition, the Ontario league is much more tame. At the Quality' Inn Tournament in Ottawa over the weekend, the Martlets won three matches and lost rwo, finish­ ing fourth overall.

In the first game versus University of Toronto, Anne Robitaille had 15 kills. Rookie Vania Gamache had 13 kills and three stuffed blocks, leading the Martlets to a 3-2 win over the Varsity Blues.

McGill won matches against Ottawa and Ryerson, which put the team into the semi-finals against Toronto. Looking for a little revenge, the Varsity Blues won a berth in the finals by beating McGill 3-1.

The Martlets played in the bronze medal game against the Queen’s Golden Gaels where they lost in three close sets (25-27, 1725, 22-25).

McGills Julie Heroux was named to the all-tournament team after racking up 60 kills, 65 digs, five stuffed blocks and a 2.48 pass­ ing ratio in five games. Heroux was also named McGill’s female athlete of the week.

Sports 23

Parents reminded: "It's just a game" Continued from page 20

cussion of how we were losing “our” game ensued. Canada’s hockey elite tried to downplay the loss, but Canadian hockey was relentlessly attacked and dissected in the media.

Luckily, the boys brought home the gold from Salt Lake City and dissec­ tions and discussions were turned into whispers and murmurs.

To what lengths would young and old hockey addicts go in the name of this game we cherish so much? You might be surprised what some do.

The majority of Canadian hockey players come from modest backgrounds. Shiners and toothless

his seventies raced from his seat in the stands toward ice level. He pro­ ceeded to scale the boards, clinging to the top of the plexiglass, bellow­ ing at the top of his lungs: “Dirty bastard, you speared him, you dirty bastard.”

This man, who was the injured players grandfather, was decked out in a lumberjack coat with sideburns spilling out of an oil-soaked John Deere hat, no less. His comments were directed toward one of my fel­ low teammates. We were 10.

Anytime a game reaches the cult-level status that hockey has achieved in Canada, there are reper­ cussions. Normal, law-abiding citi­ zens can turn into vehement

Super Bowl a super bore Continued from page 1

exceptions, the Super Bowl is never the first-rate sporting event it’s made out to be. And all the hype and hoopla surrounding it are bad for the game, the fans, the NFL and the players.

What happened in the Super Bowl reaffirmed my disappoint­ ment with this year’s playoffs. The stars didn’t come out to shine, espe­ cially on offence, which— sorry, Bucs— is what football fans want to see. NFL MVP Rich Gannon hard­ ly looked the part while throwing a Super Bowl-record five intercep­ tions. There was also poor referee­ ing, with the zebras blowing what could have been a crucial call on a two-point conversion attempt.

Fortunately for them, though, it didn’t matter, because the game was a blowout mid way through the third quarter.

However, I would have been able to put my displeasure aside far more easily if the NFL hadn’t hyped the game so much. While a lopsided regular season contest can be easily ignored, this poor match­ up was the only gridiron battle available this Sunday, so all the build-up left fans feeling unful­ filled.

Take a look at this laundry list of events from the five-hour pre­ game show: Game breakdowns delivered live from a US Navy ship; an “exclusive interview” with the pregnant wife of Raiders receiver Tim Brown; “all access” concerts; and a “countdown to kickoff”

clock that started earlier than the one before New Year’s Eve. Even great Super Bowls can seem disap­ pointing when compared to the festivities that surround them and the media scrum that precedes them.

T hat’s problematic for the fans, as it causes them to perceive the game itself as lacking. It’s also grounds for concern for the NFL, since fans tune boring games out.

And the flashy half time shows and

Falcons cornerback Eugene Robinson was caught soliciting a pros­ titute in Miami just before the big game. expensive new commercials don’t help matters. Instead, they just fur­ ther the belief among football fans that Super Bowl Sunday isn’t about the football, but is actually about the money, a view that will make them more likely to disregard the action.

The hype also eliminates a lot of the drama from the game. As fans, we love the underdog, the Anaheim Angels and Gonzagas of the sports world: the unheralded, scrappy team that comes out of nowhere and captures everyone’s hearts. With the possible exception of last year’s New England Patriots— whom, it could be argued, did get noticed because of Tom Brady’s emergence— every

Super Bowl team in recent memo­ ry has been presented as larger than life. Because of that, no team can truly appeal to fans on an emotion­ al level, thereby lessening their interest in the game.

As well, even the smallest Super Bowl story is blown out of proportion, such as the dismissal of Barett Robbins, the Raiders All-Pro centre, prior to the game. A matter that should have been internal quickly became fodder for reporters, simply because it hap­ pened during the Super Bowl.

That brings up the final prob­ lem: The players get caught up in the excitement. It is likely that the Robbins issue weighed heavily on the Raiders’ minds, and may have affected their concentration on the field. O f course, that is far more innocuous than some of the other ways players get mired in the preSuper Bowl build-up. Atlanta Falcons cornerback Eugene Robinson, for example, was caught soliciting a prostitute in Miami just days before the big game four years ago.

But who knows, maybe the NFL and the TV networks will learn their lesson from what may well be the lowest-rated Super Bowl of all time. Maybe next year’s game will have less glitz and glam­ our, and focus more on what mat­ ters: the action. Then again, I could always bet on the Cincinnati Bengals to win next year’s title; it probably has a better chance of actually happening.

CANADIANHOCKEY.CA

Young son reminds his dad of the perils of pressure in this campaign ad.

grins are favoured over country clubs and trust funds. I have played on teams with players whose parents work average 9 to 5 jobs and spend every penny on their offsprings’ dreams of hockey greatness. I have worked bingo halls, sold poinsettias, chocolate almonds, calendars and Christmas wrapping paper to help finance the enormous financial bur­ dens of playing organized hockey. I have seen parents take second jobs and search for alternate sources of income in order to bear the burden of hockey expenses.

I once played with a gentleman whose mother’s enthusiasm for her son’s team was felt by everyone on the bench. This was no ordinary hockey mom. She possessed the voice of a dinosaur and demeanour of a Roman Gladiator. She owned a pair of black mittens the size of my torso and sported a mullet that looked eerily reminiscent of a beaver draped over her head. When she yelled and clapped those mitts together, the ice cracked. I swear she altered the course of our games.

As a young child, I saw things better suited for Slapshot-type clips.

One particular event stands out. I remember a game in which a player from the opposing team fell to the ice, obviously injured. No more than five seconds elapsed before a man in

lunatics. The line has to be drawn somewhere. Until parents and wellwishers understand that in the end, it is still a game, this line will remain blurred.

However, Hockey Canada’s attempt to bring this problem into the limelight is much obliged. The classic advertisements aired during the World Junior Championships, in which the roles of the parents as the aggressors and children are reversed were an excellent start. The “it’s just a game” campaign will, at the very least, bring greater aware­ ness to the enigma that crazed hock­ ey parents have become. I say kudos to Hockey Canada for bringing the increasing problem of extreme parental involvement and pressure to the national stage through savvy marketing.

That being said, would I have changed anything I experienced playing hockey as a child if I could have? Not a chance. I dealt with and saw things that will stay with me for­ ever. I am a firm believer in taking something away from every experi­ ence you have in life. Whether it be learning how to tackle adversity or learning how not to act, hockey has the ability to teach life lessons. I just hope other hockey-playing Canadians have learned as many things as I have from experiencing this glorious sport.

One W eekend...

Four G am es...

Three D ays...

One Rivalry

Friday, Jan 3 1 : H oops double-header, 6 & 8 p.m. a t Love Hall in th e S p o rts Com plex.

M a rtle ts a n d R ed m en fa c e the S tingers in two key b a s k etb all gam es with p la y o ff im plications.

Satu rd ay, Feb 1: The b e st rivalry in th e city liv e s on!

R ed m en V s. S tin g e rs, m en ’s hockey, 7 p.m.

Re-live the carnival night a n d prove M cC onnell A rena is th e lo udest a n d b est stadium in th e country!

PARTY WITH THE TEAM AT GERT’S AFTERWARDS DURING THE POST-GAME BASH!

M cGill v s. Concordia This is what it's all about!

On three consecutive days, your McGill basketball and hockey teams will face their rivals, the Concordia Stingers Sunday, Feb 2: The fin a le - M a rtlets v s. S tin g e rs in w o m en’s hockey, 1 :3 0 p.m.

Vour # 2 ra n k e d M cG ill M a rtle ts look fo r th e co m p lete season sw eep over C oncordia!

McGill ATHLETICS