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Volume 107, Issue 16 | Monday, February 5, 2018 | mcgilldaily.com Clown school since 1911
Black History Month
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Contents 4 EDITORIAL Canadian legal system has failed Colten Boushie
5 NEWS Black History Month begins International news blurbs
February 5, 2018 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily
11 Features Symbols of Resistance
14 Sports Women in football
16 Art essay
McGiill activists host vigil in memorial of Quebec shooting
17 Culture
University implements smoking ban
Indigenous resistance on screen
9 Commentary
Reviewing ‘Born in Flames’
Anti-LGBTQ+ military impacts on queer youth
19 Compendium!
Remembering Blaze Bernstein
Comics!
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EDITORIAL
Volume 107 Issue 16
February 5, 2018 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily
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Colten Boushie case: the legal system continues to fail Indigenous people
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Content warning: anti-Indigenous racism, colonialism, violence
I
n August 2016, 22-year-old Colten Boushie, a Cree man from the Red Pheasant First Nation reserve, and four of his friends stopped at a farm near Biggar, Saskatchewan to seek help with a flat tire. Boushie was subsequently shot and killed by the owner of the farm, Gerald Stanley, who has since been charged with seconddegree murder. Stanley is scheduled to stand trial on February 5, 2018. This case has intensified long-standing racial tensions between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people, and further exposed the racist foundations of the Canadian legal system. The racial implications of the Colten Boushie trial have been evident from the start. Early on, a Saskatchewan municipal councillor commented, “[Stanley’s] only mistake was leaving witnesses.” Tensions escalated further as a seemingly all-white jury was selected for Stanley’s trial. The lack of Indigenous representation on the jury is not accidental; jury duty is made inaccessible by factors which vary from the cost and distance of travel to systemic exclusion of Indigenous people from jury selection pools. Additionally, during the jury selection process, Stanley’s defense allegedly challenged and dismissed all potential jurors who were visibly Indigenous, preventing them from being on the final jury. The case exemplifies discriminatory law enforcement practices. When the police arrived at the Boushie residence to inform the family of Colten’s death, they searched the Boushie home and surrounding area without permission. Some officers, with guns drawn, demanded that Colten’s distressed mother “get herself together,” and asked her if she was drunk. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police has also been accused of fuelling assumptions founded on racist stereotypes by
attempting to link Boushie’s murder with unrelated cases of theft in the region. Stanley’s defense argued that a fear for his personal safety motivated the shooting. This rationale is rooted in stereotypes that characterize Indigenous people as dangerous and inherently criminal, which in turn influences the treatment and sentencing of cases involving Indigenous people. In fact, Saskatchewan has a long history of failing to deliver adequate justice in cases where Indigenous people were harmed, or in cases that involve racialized violence perpetrated by law enforcement. In the 1995 killing of Pamela George, an Indigenous woman from Regina, the white murderers were granted full parole after only five years in prison. In 2000, Saskatoon police officers were discovered to have been taking part in ‘starlight tours’ for years, in which Indigenous people were picked up for drunkenness, driven to the outskirts of the city, and then abandoned outside to freeze in the extreme cold. Two police officers involved in one such case served eight months in prison, and no other criminal charges were pursued. Stanley’s lawyer insists that the Boushie case, “has nothing to do with race,” but historical and ongoing antiIndigenous violence and the inherent power imbalances in the settler-colonial legal system prove otherwise. Over the course of the trial, and beyond, it is important that support is shown for the families of murdered Indigenous people, and that Indigenous voices are centred in calling for justice and healing. Moreover, it is imperative to advocate for justice in a legal system that is built on the underrepresentation, neglect, and erasure of Indigenous and other racialized people. Other ways to help the Boushie family, like petitions and fundraisers, can be found at: change.org/p/canadiansjustice-for-colten-boushie or gofundme.com/justice4colten. —The McGill Daily Editorial Board
contributors
Hani Abramson, Arvaa Balsara, Ariane Beck, Kayla Holmes, Serene Mitchell, Nora McCready, Felicia Pennant, Eliza Prestley, Rosalind Sweeney-McCabe
The McGill Daily has received many questions and concerns regarding our ‘since line’ in Issue 15, published January 29. The ‘since line’ is a weekly phrase printed on the cover, which references a joke amongst the Editorial Board of The Daily (in this case alluding to Culture article, “Archiving queer histories.”) We recognise that last week’s ‘since line’ was potentially offensive or harmful to some people, and we apologise for any distress we may have caused. The Daily regrets the error.
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Nouédyn Baspin, Yves Boju, Marc Cataford (Chair), Mahaut Engérant, Ikram Mecheri, Taylor Mitchell, Inori Roy, Boris Shedov, Rahma Wiryomartono, Xavier Richer Vis All contents © 2018 Daily Publications Society. All rights reserved. The content of this newspaper is the responsibility of The McGill Daily and does not necessarily represent the views of McGill University. Products or companies advertised in this newspaper are not necessarily endorsed by Daily staff. Printed by Imprimerie Transcontinental Transmag. Anjou, Quebec. ISSN 1192-4608.
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News
February 5, 2018 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily
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Black History Month begins at McGill Black History Month opening ceremony begins month-long programming around the theme of Resistance
Inori Roy The McGill Daily
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he opening ceremony of Black History Month (BHM) took place on Thursday February 1, kicking off a month-long series of events celebrating Black history and identities. BHM 2018 is coorganised by the Black Students’ Network (BSN) and the Social Equity and Diversity Education office (SEDE) in partnership with the McGill administration. Last year’s BHM centered around the theme of Black excellence, marking the first institutionalised BHM at McGill. This year’s BHM, featuring twelve events throughout the month, is aimed to honour the theme of Resistance. “Resistance, to the BSN, represents the ongoing efforts taken by Black people while living in oppressive spaces,” said Christelle Tessono, V.P. Political Coordinator of BSN, in an interview with The Daily.
“Resistance is powerful and present in the daily lives of Black students, faculty, and staff here on campus. Resistance can be practiced in a wide range of diverse ways, from [...] speaking up in class when a Professor or a fellow student is saying something oppressive, [to] teaching a whole class on the legacies of colonialism here on campus to name a few.”
This year’s Black History Month [...] is aimed to honour the theme of Resistance. The keynote address at the opening ceremony was delivered by Black activist and post-doctoral scholar Rachel Zellars. Zellars is a course lecturer for the Faculty
of Education at McGill, and a prominent member of the activist community. Zellars’ speech revolved around the relationships between Black history, antiBlackness, enslavement, and disability. She discussed the historical experiences of enslaved Black people who also had disabilities. Her speech was followed by a question period, and a performance by the dance group UpLift. Over the course of the month of February, a variety of events will take place across the University. The programming includes, but is not limited to, art shows and open mics, discussion panels and public lectures, and the highly anticipated early screening of Marvel’s Black Panther, set to release February 16. The diversity in programming has been curated to reflect the multifaceted ways in which Black history is understood and celebrated by Black communities at McGill.
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“During this specific time, it’s about creating and taking up space, to honour and to center and to question and to celebrate Blackness. To me, the subjectiveness is that you can do those things in so many different ways,” said Shanice Yarde, SEDE’s Equity Educational Advisor (AntiRacism & Cultural Diversity). Yarde, along with many other Black women in the McGill community, is one of the central organisers of BHM. Yarde emphasised, in her conversation with The Daily, that BHM had been celebrated at McGill for years before being officially recognised by the institution. BHM has historically been spearheaded on campus by the mobilisation of student associations, and continues to grow in scope. “Blackness is expansive: people often have a very monolithic view of what Blackness is, or what Black people are, even what Black history is. We don’t have enough time, let alone one month, to really explore that. So to me, resistance is also
about resisting this idea of what Blackness is supposed to be,” Yarde adds. “What’s important to me is that Black people are centered in this celebration.”
“During this specific time, it’s about creating and taking up space, to honour, to center and to question and to celebrate Blackness.” —Shanice Yarde SEDE’s Equity Educational Advisor
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February 5 2018 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily
NEws
International News
North and South Korean athletes to compete together Arvaa Balsara | The McGill Daily
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Serene Mitchell | Illustrator
elations between North Korea and South Korea remain fragile despite their recent agreement to march under one flag for the opening ceremony of the 2018 Winter Olympics taking place in South Korea from February 9-25. The two Koreas have agreed to compete together in women’s ice hockey in Pyeongchang, announced by the South Korean Unification Ministry. This is not the first time North and South Korean athletes have marched together. In 2000, the two Koreas marched under the Unification Flag at the Olympic Games in Sydney, Australia, but competed separately. The administration of Moon Jae-in, the incumbent South Korean president, has long supported Korean unification, and hopes to move in that direction by defusing the nuclear threat posed by North Korea. In his New Year’s press conference, Moon said that his goal was to “resolve the North Korean nuclear problem and solidify peace during [his] term.” However, Moon’s goal of reunification faces challenges. Recently, North Korea cancelled a joint cultural performance event, planned for February 4 in Pyeongchang, after blaming South Korean media for encouraging offensive messages regarding the
Shooting in Calais leaves four teenage migrants in critical condition Xavier Richer Vis | The McGill Daily
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t least 18 migrants have been left injured following violent clashes in a migrant camp near the port city of Calais, in northern France, on Friday February 3. Four of the migrants, aged 16 to 18, are in critical condition. This week’s brawl represents ostensibly the worst violence in migrant camps since clashes in July 2017, which wounded 16 migrants. Clashes from the previous year, in June 2016, injured at least 40 people. Police reinforcements have been sent in response to the heightened tensions, a decision many local and international observers say will do little to solve such tensions. Human rights workers in the country have asserted that the French government has imposed
tougher attitudes towards migrants. Meanwhile, migrants’ chances of reaching Britain, the final destination for most asylum seekers in Calais, are reaching new lows. Four days prior to the attack, Theresa May pledged an extra £44.5 million to strengthen border security in the area. Calais notably gained international repute in October 2016 with the French police’s dismantling of an area known dimunitively as “The Jungle,” a refugee encampment in the city which was once home to between 6,000 and 10,000 people before the dismantlement. “Under no circumstances will we allow the Jungle to come back,” President Macron said in early January of 2018. Since his acced-
ing the presidency, Macron has ramped up expulsions, put pressure on economic migrants, and allowed for divisive ID checks in emergency shelters. Now a mere 500 to 800 migrants remain in Calais. Reports by Human Rights Watch denounced the scope of police brutality in the encampments, where there is frequent use of pepper sprays, daily identity checks, confiscation of items, and harassment with provocation. The conditions in Calais have been described as “inhumane living conditions” for asylum seekers, due to degrading treatment and disruption of humanitarian aid. Written with material from the NY Times, BBC, ABC, and The Telegraph.
north. South Koreans’ concerns regarding such challenges are reflected in the 2017 Unification Perception Survey conducted by Seoul National University’s Institute for Peace and Unification Studies; while 53.9 per cent of South Koreans believe reunification is necessary, only 24.7 per cent believe unification is possible. In addition to the animosity from North Korea, the unified inter-Korean women’s hockey team at the Pyeongchang Olympics has sparked controversy, with over 47,000 signatures signed in a petition against the team to the Blue House. Meanwhile, President Moon Jae-In’s approval rating is below 60 per cent for the first time since he took office in 2017. Issues such as the joint hockey team, and mandatory military enlistments have proven to be a sensitive issue among the younger generation, which may reflect on the survey results.
February 5, 2018 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily
News
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McGill to be smoke-free by 2023
Students concerned that stress, not smoking is the root of the issue Yasmeen Safaie The McGill Daily
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n January 24, the McGill student body received an email on behalf of Robert Couvrette, Vice-Principal, Facilities Management and Ancillary Services, informing students that McGill campuses would be “largely smokefree as of May 1st, 2018.” The policy was adopted by McGill’s Board of Governors on December 12, 2017 and explicitly states that “its objective is to promote and preserve the health and well-being of all members of the University community.” Prior to the adoption of the policy, the Health and Safety Committee at McGill held consultations concerning the policy which involved students, faculty, and staff from both campuses, which, according to McGill, “indicated that a significant majority of the McGill community [ … ] support the creation of smokefree campuses.” Such a policy was put into place in compliance with the Tobacco Control Act of Quebec, which requires college- or university-level educational institutions to “adopt a tobacco control policy geared to establishing a smoke-free environment.” Under McGill’s definition of smoking, i.e. “the usage and consumption of any product whether or not it contains or otherwise utilizes tobacco or tobacco-derived substances, and emits a vapor or smoke,” e-cigarettes would be banned on campus. Furthermore, Section 1.1 of the Tobacco Control Act states that “tobacco” also includes accessories such as “cigarette tubes, rolling paper and filters, pipes [...] and cigarette holders,” which will also be prohibited. It remains unclear whether McGill will comply with this extension of the definition of tobacco. In an interview with the Daily, Isabelle Oke, SSMU VP University Affairs, explained how McGill’s smoking policy was originally brought forward by a medicine senator a couple years ago, who subsequently passed around a plebiscite asking how people felt about banning smoking on campus.
Oke explains there were some concerns about the effectiveness of implementing the policy due to McGill’s campus not being a “contiguous space.” Oke further states that, “there is a limit to what a ban can accomplish or how functional [it is and] how it can be implemented.” “Implementing a ban on campus is tricky, so there were a lot of logistical questions that came up because, for example, McTavish isn’t […] campus property, so if you’re going to ban campus areas, it doesn’t mean no one on campus is going to be exposed to smoke anymore because there are a lot of spaces that are still city property”. The line between campus property and city property on streets such as McTavish, Doctor-Penfield, Peel, and University, remains unclear, leaving many wondering how bans on smoking around certain buildings could be enforced.
“There is a limit to what a ban can accomplish or how functional [it is and] how it can be implemented.” —Isabelle Oke SSMU VP University Affairs Nonetheless, the new policy mandates that smoking will be “prohibited outside of designated smoking areas” on the downtown and Macdonald campuses and at the Gault Reserve; the designated smoking areas are marked on a map provided on McGill’s Environmental Health and Safety webpage describing the policy. The policy specifically outlines that “smoking will no longer be permitted on the west side of the Redpath Library Building.” In the Procedure Concerning Smoking at McGill University, sec-
tion 4.2 states that the “University is not attempting to stigmatize those who smoke, nor create conflict within the campus community,” however this statement, under the Compliance heading of the procedure document, is not present in the policy provided on McGill’s website outlining smoking on campus. Oke expressed her thought to the Daily that the university integrated this statement in the procedure in order to signal to students that “this policy doesn’t allow for discrimination,” in regards to concerns brought up around the overrepresentation of “queer, trans, [and] people of colour in the population of smokers.” Queer populations, ethnic minorities, and those with a lower socioeconomic status are oftentimes targeted and overrepresented within the smoking population. Section 4.1 of the policy states that it will provide “educational campaigns, outreach, communication and the promotion of tobacco cessation treatment options” as the “primary means to promote compliance.” Additionally, the university reiterated its commitment to providing “referrals for cessation,” and has delineated resources available which include counselling from McGill Counselling & Mental Health Services.
Oke also explains that there is a “peer-policing-peer” model to be put in place which would involve students regulating the smoking habits of their peers on campus. According to the procedure, the policy will be self-endorsed by community members which includes “trained McGill security agents”, “student outreach teams [...] activated every September,” as well as “University directors and managers.” A U2 student in Gender, Sexuality, Feminism, Social Justice (GSFS) at McGill, who wished to remain anonymous; who has smoked regularly for three years and still occasionally smokes, offered their thoughts on the policy. “I think you have to look at […] why people are smoking, and it’s because they’re really stressed,” they began, explaining their concern that McGill needs to be aware of how one of the largest contingent of student smokers belong to marginalized communities. “It’s kind of […] another way that McGill gets to control those bodies instead of actually addressing the root cause,” they continued. “I think if they actually were worried about the welfare of students, then they would [...] put more resources into for example the mental health.” They further stated that they think that “students are coming out
of classes not feeling supported, […] not feeling [...] included in the community, [...] feeling like they don’t belong, and all those things contribute to stress which could lead someone to smoke.”
“It’s kind of [...] another way that McGill gets to control those [marginalized] bodies instead of actually addressing the root cause” —U2 student in Gender, Sexuality, Feminism, Social Justice studies According to the document, the goal of the policy is for the campus to become completely smoke-free by the next five years (i.e. by May 1, 2023) from the effective date of the policy. The “designated smoking areas” on campus are referred to as transitory measures.
Jenna Yanke | The McGill Daily
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February 5, 2018 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily
NEws
McGill Anti-Racist holds a vigil commemorating Quebec shooting One year later, few preventative measures have been taken
Victor Dépois The McGill Daily
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n Monday, January 29, approximately thirty students stood on the stairs of the Arts Building as part of a city-wide anniversary vigil to commemorate last year’s attack on the Grande Mosquée de Québec. The event, organized by the recently founded McGill Anti-Racist committee, was also intended as a means of explicitly denouncing Islamophobia in the province, with signs reading “Combat Islamophobia” and “Commemorating the first anniversary of the January 29th Massacre at the Centre of Quebec City.” One year later: a rise in hate crime for Quebec and Montreal The mass shooting, which occurred last January at a mosque in Quebec City, left six people dead and nineteen injured. In Montreal, a ceremony was held in City Hall on Monday, followed by community rallies titled “We Refuse to Forget,” which were attended by more than 1, 000 people in at least seven contingents. The vigil’s speaker read the name of the victims, and a moment of silence was held for Azzedine Soufiane, Khaled Belkacemi, Aboubaker Thabti, Abdelkrim Hassane, Mamadou Tanou Barry, and Ibrahima Barry. Philippe Bombito, the founder of McGill Anti-Racist, spoke with The Daily about standing in solidarity with Quebec’s Muslim community and “mobili[zing] people against the rise of racism.” “There has been a normalization of violence since last year against people identified as being Muslim,” said Bombito. In early December 2017, the number of hate crimes directed towards Muslims in Quebec City had already doubled from 21 attacks in 2016 to 42 in the first 11 months of 2017. Montreal has also seen a rise in hate crime after the mosque attack; a mosque was vandalized in the Montreal Pointe Saint Charles neighbourhood less than a week after the attack on January 29. A McGill alumnus participating in the vigil, who wished to remain anonymous elaborated more on such a normalised violence. “The election of Donald Trump to the American presidency has played a role in validating racism in the U.S., but also in Canada, Quebec, and elsewhere,” so it is important to “stand up against Islamophobia, and any form of prejudice.” “Quebec city happened a year
ago [and] it’s a toxic context that we have right now,” said Mary Ellen, one of the co-organizers of the Plateau Mont Royal contingent, in an interview with The Daily. “We’ve seen the rise of the extreme-right groups [...] in Quebec. These discourses expressed by the extreme right, [...] and these groups are now coming out with more determination.” “This kind of context,” they continued, “causes [...] the politicians to then fall behind. They say to themselves, ‘We don’t need to protect the Muslim citizens of Canada, we’re going to do law Bill C-62, we will cancel the inquiry commission on systemic racism.’ Now more recently, when the Muslim communities requested [...] the fight against islamophobia, most of the political parties and politicians deserted that idea. [...] It’s problematic. [...] We will not forget. Six people were killed. These were peaceful citizens.”
“There has been
a normalization of violence since last year against people identified as being Muslim,” —Philippe Bombito McGill AntiRacist founder
Reluctance from the Prime Minister’s Office On January 5, 2018, the National Council of Canadian Muslims (NCCM) sent a letter to Prime Minister Trudeau’s office calling for the designation of January 29 as the National Day of Remembrance and Action on Islamophobia. Quebec politicians on both the left and the right, including members of the Coalition Avenir Quebec (CAQ) party, and the Parti Quebecois (PQ), and Phillipe Couillard, leader of the Liberal Party of Quebec and the province’s current Premier, have voiced their opposition to a province-wide Day against Islamophobia, finding the language to be too “controversial.” Prime Minister Trudeau, while recognizing Islamophobia as the reason for the massacre, has not adopted a formal position vis-avis the letter.
People at the vigil.
Victor Dépois | The McGill Daily
“Many politicians appeared in front of cameras following the shooting, but they are not ready to take any concrete action for real change to happen. They do not understand the gravity of the situation when they dodge the question or outright say no to this idea,” said Ehab Lotayef, an IT manager at McGill. Lotayef ’s blog post, which calls people to voice their support in favor of the National Day of Remembrance and Action on Islamophobia, states that “establishing commemorative days or months are a tool to assert the need for action and solidify support for the downtrodden.” “What will make Trudeau, Couillard, Mayor of Quebec City Régis Labeaume, or Mayor of Montreal Valérie Plante declare January 29, or any other day, a day against Islamophobia is not the killing of six, sixty or even six hundred people in cold blood in one incident,” insists Lotayef. “What will make them act is when they see 60,000 people marching in the streets of Quebec City, Montreal, and other cities across the province and the country on January 29, commemorating the Quebec City massacre, year after year.”
ince’s electoral context might be playing a larger role in politicians’ response to the NCCM’s letter than many are willing to admit, what with provincial elections to the National Assembly looming in October 2018.
Politicizing anti-Islamophobia In response to the letter, the PQ has pointed out that there already exists an international day for the elimination of racial discrimination, but some claim that the prov-
—Ehab Lotayef Vigil organizer
“[Politicians] will act when [...] they see 60,000 people marching in the streets of [...] cities across the province and the country on January 29, commemorating the Quebec City massacre, year after year.”
“Politicians just want to win far-right voters, and are afraid to
lose some [votes],” said Lotayef. “Bill 62, which passed at the Quebec National Assembly in October 2017, is one example of this trend. The bill prevents any person with clear religious attire to be provided public service. This means that Muslim women who wear the niqab would not be allowed in public transport. It is simply not applicable.” More to be done at McGill The McGill’s administration has, in cooperation with the Institute for Islamic Studies, the Muslim Students Association, the SEDE Office, and the Joint BoardSenate Committee on Equity, organized a commemorative ceremony to remember last year’s events, but speaking with The Daily, Bombito feels there is “a lot still to be done on campus.” “McGill should do whatever it can to prevent islamophobic, racist, or xenophobic thought to foster within its communities and [...] be supportive and inclusive of groups facing difficulties,” stressed Lotayef. “The situation is getting more and more complicated for Muslims in Quebec. It is dangerous in rare cases, [and] difficult in many cases. [...] Actions such as this one [the vigil] show that people do not accept these acts and want Quebec, as well as Canada, to become more inclusive. We should do all that we can as citizens of Quebec and Canada to ensure equality and peace for everyone.”
Commentary
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February 5, 2018 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily
Don’t Speak, Don’t Exist
The danger of anti-LGBTQ+ military policies for queer youth
nelly wat | The McGill Daily Eliza Prestley The McGill Daily Content warning: homophobia
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on’t touch me at night,” my summer camp cabin-mate hissed at me, just as we were about to go to sleep. I was 11, visibly lesbian (I may or may not have worn baseball jerseys seven days a week), and living in suburban Pennsylvania. Comments like this were nothing new. My childhood was a long exercise in policing my interactions with and distancing myself from female peers. That a gay person would make aggressive, unsolicited advances toward any and every member of the same gender was a common fear of the time, imparted upon children by their parents, coming-of-age romcoms, and — oh, the U.S. government. The U.S. Government’s History of Homophobia The Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell Policy (DADT) was in effect for years before I was born, from 1994 until 2011, when it was repealed under the Obama administration. DADT prohibited any person who had engaged in or attempted to engage in “homosexual acts” — defined in the policy as “any bodily contact, actively undertaken or passively permitted, between members of the same gender for the purpose of satisfying sexual desires” — from serving in the United States military. The ostensible reasoning behind DADT was that the open presence of gay people in the military “would create an unacceptable risk to the high standards of morale, good order and discipline, and unit cohesion that are the essence of military capability.” The homophobic subtext of the policy was that gay people cannot possibly coexist with straight people without making sexual advances towards their straight peers. In 1993, at a meeting held between President Bill Clinton and six military representa-
tives at the White House, Commander Craig Quigley argued for the passage of DADT, declaring that “homosexuals are notoriously promiscuous.” He went on to claim that if gay people were to serve openly in the military, straight servicemembers would feel unsafe showering due to an, “uncomfortable feeling of someone watching.” This wrongful justification for DADT, like many other policies, rested upon the presumption that gay people are always watching — that they cannot safely or peacefully exist among straight people because they are constantly in search of sexual contact. It propagated the ignorant, homophobic notion that gay people are so sexually driven that they are incapable of following regulations on sexual relationships that govern all servicemembers. However, the effect of this message was not confined to the U.S. military. Growing up gay, I felt the reverberations of DADT at camp, on the playground, and in classroom halls. Throughout grade school, I never hugged female friends for fear that they would think I was “making a move” on them. Later, in middle school gym class, the fears only grew — I kept my eyes glued to the ground in the changing room to dispel any notion that I was staring at other girls. It is clear to me now that the widespread homophobic rhetoric promoted during debates around DADT reinforced both in my classmates and myself the idea that all gay people are guilty of sexual harassment by virtue of existing in a predominantly heterosexual society. Even though I had done nothing wrong, I constantly felt wrong, and according to the American government, I was. I was the homosexual lurking among us, a threat to “normal” society. I was the monster inside my own closet. Even though children are not generally associated with military policy, the harm of anti-LGBTQ+ military policies directly affects queer youth. These youth, who are a ready at a significantly higher risk of suf-
fering from bullying and mental illness, are especially vulnerable to internalizing political rhetoric. Therefore, they are especially vulnerable to internalising political rhetoric. They grow up without having yet developed a critical lens through which to view politics, which makes them more vulnerable to internalizing dangerous political messages. Making Space for Myself in a History of Half-Truths As a child enrolled in the U.S. public school system, I was taught that the president is a hero, regardless of his identity; that all laws are justified; and that the military is a noble organization that defends our freedom and safety. It was common practice for children to salute service members in uniform. In honor of Veterans Day, we wrote cards to soldiers deployed overseas. The U.S. military and its endeavors were valorized as the incarnations of bravery and heroism. Growing up, I believed military members were the most honorable figures in society, and that it was my gayness that either made me too gross or too wrong to be one of them. I did not once think to question these ideas. Instead, I regurgitated them. In order to prove to myself and my peers that I couldn’t possibly be the homosexual monster denounced by the U.S. military, I told my friends I found the idea of two women kissing “disgusting.” The implicit homophobia of DADT, paired with the indubitable heroisation of the military, made me loathe, and thus violently resist, my own sexuality. In turn, my internal struggle with my sexuality was only amplified and broadcasted publicly. When a government makes a statement on LGBTQ+ people in the military, it is speaking directly to queer youth, and these youths are listening. When U.S. politicians offered up homophobic justification for DADT, they were speaking to me. And when Donald Trump promotes transphobia and exclusion in the name of military efficiency, he is speaking to trans youth.
A Patterned History Currently, trans youth in the United States stand at a particularly difficult juncture regarding military policy. On July 26, 2017, President Donald Trump tweeted that “the United States Government will not accept or allow [t]ransgender individuals to serve in any capacity in the U.S. Military. Our military must be focused on decisive and overwhelming victory and cannot be burdened with the tremendous medical costs and disruption that transgender in the military would entail.” On July 26, trans children in America were told by the president that they are a burden, that they do not belong in the mainstream workforce, and that their medical needs are invalid and too expensive — despite the whopping $1.5 trillion USD the U.S. government is predicted to spend on military expenses in the 2018 fiscal year. For the moment, Trump’s attempted ban of trans service members has been stalled by Federal Judge Colleen KollarKotelly, who ruled in October that the policy is possibly unconstitutional. But this ruling only provides a temporary hold on the ban, and though Trump has lessened pressure on enforcing the prohibition of trans service members, many conservatives in the military plan to push forward. The prevailing message that the U.S. government and military will send to trans youth hangs in the balance. Trump’s attempt to ban trans individuals from the U.S. military is a haunting echo of the era of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, as well as the internalized homophobia and self-hatred DADT arose in me as I was coming to realize my identity. The ban demonstrates one of the many threats the U.S. government poses to queer individuals, and serves as a stark reminder that queerphobia is a repeating history in the United States and North America at large.
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February 5, 2018 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily
Commentary
Remembering Blaze Bernstein Murder by anti-Semitism and homophobia
Nelly Wat | The McGill Daily Hani Abramson Commentary Writer Content warning: graphic descriptions of antiSemitism, Nazism, homophobia, violence
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riting gives me my voice, which is why my stories are in a constant state of flux. Even if I don’t change a word or a single letter, they move with me down corridors of memory, through seas of emotion, and into worlds both real and imaginary. As I change, they change, but even after days or months or years I can still find a version of myself (a time traveler from the past, present, or future) sitting there in the text and waiting to speak to me,” — an excerpt from Blaze Bernstein’s university admission essay. Blaze Bernstein, a 19-year-old student at the University of Pennsylvania, was Jewish and queer. He was an artist, a scientist, and a writer. He used his voice to call out injustice, criticising his university for setting up empty task forces to avoid expending resources on tackling (let alone acknowledging) sexual assault on campus. His mother, in response to Bernstein’s relentless pursuit of justice on campus, was quoted saying, “Culturally for us, as Jewish people, I feel, it’s thought [that] you do things like that, you stand up for what you believe in. [...] He was kind of raised to be an activist.” He was just as proudly gay as he was Jewish, embracing both identities wholeheartedly. I cannot do his legacy justice, and neither can any letter I write bring light to his corridors of memory, through my own seas of emotion. As someone who, like Bernstein, embodies similar identities and values of Jewishness, queerness, and a compulsion to speak out, I feel that I must try, if not to honour his name, then to call for justice.
Blaze Bernstein was Jewish and queer. And Blaze Bernstein was murdered because he was Jewish and queer. However, such phrasing makes his Jewishness and queerness seem responsible for his murder, rather than ascribing blame to the white supremacist revival of Nazism in America, or even more broadly, the very values that America was built on. Supremacy of a white, Christian, male, straight, land-owning class — these are America’s roots. The U.S. often positions itself as the antithesis to the core tenets of Nazism, and many of its patriots define themselves as combatants against Nazi ideology. However, the Manifest Destiny of settler colonialism in Christian, white-supremacist hegemony, especially one that is still obvious in the United States today, allows for young, white, cishet, non-Jewish men to embrace ideas of Nazism. Neo-Nazism is viewed as a way to enhance America’s structural integrity, and (to quote Donald Trump), “make America great again,” in hopes of returning
As someone who, like Bernstein, embodies similar identities and values of Jewishness, querness, and a compulsion to speak out, I feel that I must try, if not to honour his name, then to call for justice.
to a white America which never existed, one free of Indigenous peoples and home to puritanical cleansing. Samuel Woodward, may his name be smeared, is the prime suspect for Bernstein’s cold-blooded murder. He publicly identified as a Neo-Nazi, and a ‘national socialist,’ and according to three of his friends, was part of Atomwaffen Division. Atomwaffen Division, which means ‘atomic weapons division’ in German, is an American neo-Nazi group that espouses violence against those who are queer, Jewish, Muslim, Black, Indigenous, and/or People of Colour. The group draws from a pool of “alt-right” white supremacist young men, but considers the mainstream “alt-right” to not be ‘militant enough’ to achieve the goal of spreading white-identity politics to establish a “Fourth Reich,” or second coming of Nazi German government. It is believed that Woodward participated in Atomwaffen’s violent, race-war military training camps, and learned to employ violence to target minority groups. Atomwaffen believes that non-white people pose an existential threat to the purity of the white race, and that Jewish people are carefully orchestrating the infiltration and subsequent downfall of white people. They regard Charles Manson and Hitler as heroes, stating that “[t] he failure of democracy and capitalism has given way to the Jewish oligarchies and the globalist bankers resulting the cultural and racial displacement of the white race.” Police still haven’t labelled Bernstein’s murder a hate crime. His murderer was a Neo-Nazi. Bernstein was queer and Jewish. We have to call this what it is: a murder motivated by white supremacy, homophobia, and anti-Semitism. By refusing to ascribe blame, we are only making it easier for white supremacists to pursue their terrorist agendas without consequence.
We also cannot be tempted to distance Blaze Bernstein’s murder from the systems in which we exist, and from which many of us benefit. It is easy to write Bernstein’s killer off as a lone wolf, or as a radical from a nigh-nonexistent group. It is true that the Atomwaffen Division is small, and it is fringe, even for the “alt-right.” But minorities are being targeted and murdered regularly. Thirty-eight unarmed Black men were shot in the U.S. in 2015. Indigenous women in Canada are seven times more likely than other women to be victims of a homicide.
We have to call this what it is: a murder motivated by white supremacy, homophobia, and anti-Semitism. While it’s disconcerting to know that murderous neo-Nazi groups are still active in America, it’s even harder to look at the systems we take for granted and examine their responsibility in the deaths of marginalized individuals on Turtle Island (North America). Blaze Bernstein’s murder proves that bigotry is rampant, and that anti-Semitism and homophobia are pervasive tools of white supremacy. His murder compels us to look at other murders, especially those of non-white, non-wealthy folks; to fight against Nazism, punch back, and combat white supremacy driven hate crimes in all of their forms. This article was written in honour of Hannah Mae Weiss, zichronah lebrachah.
January 29, 2018 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily
Features
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Symbols of resistance An exhibition centred on Black identity Tai Jacob, Vita Azaro, Lydia Bhattacharya The McGill Daily
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There is clearly no lack of important artistry coming out of Montreal’s Black communities, but rather a lack of resourced spaces and opportunities.” [Excerpt from the project statement] “Symbols of Resistance: an Exhibition Celebrating the Convergence of Black Artists and their Stories” opened on the first day of Black History Month, and will be on display at Galerie Mile-End until February 28. The exhibition is the culmination of the Montreal Black Artists-in-Community Residency, a twelve week residency created in response to the lack of spaces and opportunities for Black artists to make and showcase their work. The residency provided space for eight Black artists to develop work centred on Black identity, to engage with, and to create for and with their communities. The artists interweave their own personal stories with the histories of their communities and ancestors. The theme of resistance was common to all of the artists: resistance expressed through the everyday and ordinary aspects of Black life, self-
care, hair-care, textiles, and head wraps. These artists centered their work around Black identity by reclaiming history from erasure and (re)creating their own archives. At the vernissage on February 1, we heard from Annick MF — one of the organizers — and from all of the artists about their work. We welcome you into the magic of the evening through their words below. Annick: For those of you that don’t know, this was an exhibition that came out of a 12 week residency, and the goal is to also take this artwork on tour for a year. One of the things that we felt is that often these conversations are only held around Black History Month, like “Oh, this is the nice time to talk about Black folks,” and then it’s like, “Oh, they just don’t exist anymore.” So we want to make sure that this conversation goes on further, and that Black artists have opportunities long term, so we’re trying to take this artwork on tour. If you know anyone who wants some art and has money [laughter], they can holla at us. Also, we invite you to come to the Finissage which is
going to be on Monday the 26th. Come back to the space to close the ceremony with us! I also want to mention that a lot of the artists in the space decided to use new mediums. And that was one of the most interesting experiences for us as organizers of the residency — to know how much work goes behind these artworks that we see. I think sometimes we come into an exhibition and think, “Oh wow, this is really beautiful!” But we miss the amount of hours and hours of conceptual and literal physical work prior that comes into that. How much work goes into the process of even just picking a medium, like is wood the best medium, is canvas the best medium? A lot of care and attention was put into that. All of these artists worked together and in parallel to make this project come together and we’re really proud of them and really excited for you to be here experiencing this, and you’re going to meet the artists right now!
One of the things that we felt is that often these conversations are only held around Black History Month, like “Oh, this is the nice time to talk about Black folks,” and then it’s like, “Oh, they just don’t exist anymore.” —Annick MF
Reclaiming my time space: G L O W Z I
G L O W Z I : My piece is called Reclaiming my time space, and what I wanted to represent is the idea that even though we’re not Beyonce, or people who are victims of police brutality directly, such as Trayvon Martin, we’re still important, our
experiences are still important. So the idea with my piece was to reclaim the space of ordinary Black folks, because I feel like when we look at the media we have this pressure to be like, “Okay, so now I see Beyonce and Kendrick so now I have to do something.” And you’re in your room, which is all messed up, and you’re like, “I’m not going to be Beyonce, but I’m not quite like other people I see in the media, so where am I?” So the idea was just to remind Black people while they look at the piece that no matter what they’re doing, they’re symbols of resistance. Because just going to school, just having a job, just following your dream is something that is pretty hard to do here in a system that doesn’t necessarily want you to be able to do that. Audience member: Why particularly self-portraits? G L O W Z I: It comes from a story where my mom always told me, “You’re a canvas and you can model yourself however you want.” And it seems like it has just followed me
all my life, because I keep changing styles, changing the way I look. And I keep using my face or my body as a medium of art. So, I would say that it’s pretty much that the first canvas that you will have — and that you will have until you die — is your body, so why not use it? Audience member: Why do you use the golden metal wires in your work? G L O W Z I : The golden wires represent the idea that on a regular basis, we are still slaying. We don’t need to be walking in the halftime show like Beyonce to be doing amazing stuff and to be slaying. I see Black people slaying everywhere, I see them right now! [laughter] And also using metal, there’s the idea that it’s resistant but it also knows how to move. It’s the idea that even though it’s hard to move it, it can still move around and change shapes, just like Black people change their way of acting in order to cope with what we’re being exposed to.
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January 29, 2018 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily
Natural: Kay Nau
Kay: About my piece — instead of talking about the symbols and all that, I’m going to talk about the stylistic choices I made, which is comic art. All my life I’ve been told that comic art is not art, by teachers, by people. So at first, when I got this residency, I was like, I’m going to do realistic renderings, because that’s what I’m used to seeing in galleries and what my teachers always tell me, “This is what art is.” And then I was like, “Nah.” [laughter] “Nah, screw this, I’m going to go with what I normally do for myself.” And it’s kind of like a little slap in the face of, you know, me being a little sassy and being like, “This is comic art and it’s on the wall of a gallery now.” And that’s kind of awesome! Audience member: Was there a choice for the really striking red and blue? Kay: Yeah, actually. Red and blue is not only the colour of the Haitian flag, blue is also the colour of the Quebec flag, red is the colour of the Canadian flag, it’s also the colour of France and England’s flags, which are colonizers not only of Haiti but also of Canada and Quebec.
Montreal, 1985: Po B.K. Lomami, Carl-Philippe Simonise, Valerie Bah Po: We noticed that there isn’t a lot of Black representation in the pub-
lic archives from the eighties. We started from that fact, like, there were Black people in Montreal in the eighties, like obviously, but they aren’t in the public archives. So from that we started to think, “Okay, we can find those archives.” We started to ask questions like, “What about personal archives?” And that’s where we started finding a lot of answers, like people opening their personal albums to show us what it was like in the eighties. From all that research, we decided to create our own archive with all the information we have, all the research we did. And also with our own experience, including the fact that we were wondering, “Where are Black queer people in the archives?” And they are nowhere. We went to Archives Gaies du Quebec and we couldn’t even find them there. So we were like okay from my own experience, queer Black people, they’re kind of everywhere. Like, even if you go to church, we’re fucking everywhere [laughter]. From that we were like, okay, let’s restage a scene from the eighties, ’85 in particular, with all the information we have or we want to recreate. I think we can connect to Black struggles throughout history, like it’s always the same questions asked again, the same issues. Nothing is new, it’s just new vocabulary. It’s the same discussions, the same
Features
questions. So from that we started to do that for the art piece, just starting in an apartment that was built in the thirties in Côtes-desNeiges, which is like, I don’t want to say a non-white neighbourhood, but like, white are not the majority there. Then we went to Balattou, which is a club that was created in the eighties or so, and from there we started a scenario, a story-board, with what could be Black activists talking and Black activists gathering. But not just about the struggles, it’s also about enjoying life, having a romance, just being people that have struggles sometimes but are still people. And they’re there because we can’t find them in public archives so we needed to make them visible with our own research and imaginaries, so we intertwined the archives with Afrofuturism and our own perspective. So we end up with our photo series, made in the apartment in Côte-des-Neiges and then in Balattou — we want to thank Papa Touré who opened the Balattou for us on Monday night, a really cold one, just for us to do the photoshoot. There’s also a personal photo album and a zine that includes the dialogue of what could be a discussion among Black people in Montreal in 1985, discussing about politics, or about wanting to flirt with somebody, or just having a life.
Valerie: It was very important to us, in staging Black folks in the archives, not to try and establish our place in this empire, this white settler project on unceded land. So the discussion in the actual scenario is of the activists arguing and disagreeing about Black liberation struggles around the world, and it ties back to their condition in Montreal.
It was very important to us, in staging Black folks in the archives, not to try and establish our place in this empire, this white settler project on unceded land. —Valerie Bah Po: Yeah, you should read the zine, there’s drama and everything. Audience member: Did you use technology from ’85? Carl-Philippe: A budget from ’85. [laughter]
Sisterhood, Crown, Vasso: Aïssatou Diallo
Aïssatou : (translated from French) My name is Aïssatou Diallo and I am originally from Guinea. I have been drawing and creating art for the past ten years, and I started doing digital graphic design two years ago. I made the three pieces there, the first is called Sisterhood, the second is Crown, and the third is Vasso. This concept was not what I originally planned to do; there were many modifications during the process. But in the end, that, the art, is me. I am comfortable with and feel liberated using the medium of digital art because it is involved with my work. My main idea is to express who I am as an individual, but also express codes that represent the symbols of resistance. You can see these codes by what you wear, your hair, these things, and so my pieces are made by you and are visible to everyone. My pieces are not only a claim of the symbols of resistance, but also show how we share culture. I am looking for an answer to these questions and interrogations of resistance and this is what I expressed in my three pieces. For the first piece, I show that you must know yourself and others in order to share culture. It’s based on a photograph I took of a
Features woman’s back, I was asked if the two women are the same person, and I am leaving that up to interpretation, but the idea behind the piece is “Watch your back” and “I gotchu” as well. The second shows that you must be proud of who we are, where we come from, and that it is important to share these different sides of us with other people. The third shows a mother and child, and it is also essential to show how we pass down and share ideas with the children of the next generation. We explain what it means to be a woman, and especially what it means to be a black woman from Africa, and so on.
So the idea was just to remind Black people while they look at the piece that no matter what they’re doing, they’re symbols of resistance. Because just going to school, just having a job, just following your dream is something that is pretty hard to do here in a system that doesn’t necessarily want you to be able to do that. —G L O W Z I Baggage & Navigation, Stretched Strength, In the Search of Home: SIKA
SIKA: (translated from French) My works here are essentially an introspective exploration based on an emotional congestion that I carry around like every other person in society. I decided to visit this congestion again through three different dimensions: emotional, physical, and spiritual. I wanted to make visual material to combine with another project of mine involving musical expression. I wanted to mix the disciplines of both projects together. I wanted to reflect the presence of Black artists in Montreal, to see how this has affected me, and what carries me forward. I wanted to develop a new technique and explore unfamiliar methods for
January 29, 2018 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily this specific piece. I benefited from working with a new palette: shades of blue. I also wanted to generate content about the strength and endurance of the Black community. I wanted to show our views, values, and marginality in society. I felt the need to create, so I benefited from the residency. It strengthened my work and formed it into an introspective scan I used to inspect the facets of my reality and my identity.
Crowning: Chelsy Monie
I’m really trying to have the real question of how we can look at space, not only as places we may walk through but we can look at space through the clothes that we wore, through the things that we did in those spaces. —Chelsy Monie Chelsy: Hi everybody. I’m very nervous, I don’t know what to say. My work Crowning focuses on the headwrap and just trying to take back all the histories and all the places the headwrap has been. Initially I knew I wanted to work with headwraps, and I knew I wanted to work with history and location, but I didn’t know how to translate that into my work. So I did a lot of research and I spent a lot of time looking at maps and thinking about the idea of mapping. What I ended up doing is using topographic maps, which are maps where lines and curves are used to represent the reliefs on land, which means mountains, rivers, hills — all represented by lines, which is what you can see in my work. What this allows you to do is to read the headwrap as showing a location that is in space and time and this is only emphasised by the grid, or lines of longitude and latitude. I’m really trying to have the real question of how we can look at space, not only as places we may walk through but we can look at space through the clothes that we wore, through the things that we did in those spaces. I used wood because, based on the histories and based on what I found out, headwraps are so tied to Black bodies and wood is a natural fiber, so to me, the way I see it is head-
wraps are in a sense natural to the Black body. That’s what the wood is there to represent. As you can see in the images my eyes are blacked out, and as much as that’s because that looks really cool [laughter] it’s also because I want viewers, other Black people looking at my art to see themselves within it. Blacking out my eyes really removes my soul from the art, right now it’s a canvas for you to look at and see yourself in any given space and time. My work necessarily is very involved with Black identity and I really want to show the Black reality as something that is artistic and something that is specific to us, so I like to take things that Black people do every day and they think, yeah, this is just us, and project it and put them in spaces like these where people can actually come and visualise them in a different way. In part of my work I am doing multiple, multiple things and one of them is I wear a headwrap everyday for this month. This was really to question my relationship with headwraps, because usually I find myself wearing headwraps when it looks nice or I don’t wanna do my hair. But what I’m really wondering is how will my relationship with my body, as well as headwraps and time and space, change when I wear a headwrap every single day. And today is a lot! [laughter] This is my headwrap for today, tomorrow I’m going to leave my house and have
to wear another one, and go on and on. I’m really interested to see what it is that happens to me and how I perceive myself and also perceive headwraps. I grew up in Cameroon and then in Tanzania, and women all around me wore headwraps. I grew up with my mom going to church on Sunday and she would always have a headwrap, but I never thought of it as anything more than that. I think wearing a headwrap every single day really pushes me to see beyond that. Another part of this project is I have collaborated with photographers around the world to bring actual representations of headwraps to you. What the photographers have done is they have taken pictures of people in headwraps in the spaces they navigate. That’s what I want to share with everybody, because headwraps, like I said earlier, are natural to the Black body, and it’s very interesting how, though we live on many different continents and many different countries, we can still be identified by this one singular thing. The last part of Crowning is on the 28th of February. I am inviting Black people everywhere to wear headwraps. I think this is really a mark of solidarity and also helps us to connect to all the histories we may not necessarily connect with on a daily basis. This is really a chance for everybody to decide that okay, today we’re going to stand up and celebrate this
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one thing we think maybe is just a mundane thing we shouldn’t pay attention to. I am circulating two hashtags because you know, I’m a millennial, it’s 2018. [laughter] So the hashtags are #UbuntiCrowning and #UbuntuTalks. What I’m inviting people to do is wear a headwrap on the 28th, take a picture of yourself with the headwrap and you can post it on any social media platform using those two hashtags and those will be projected onto my website, which is Ubuntutalks.org. The reason it’s very important for me to project it is so as to archive this day in time. And when you look back, Black people, or POC in general, have not always been given the ability to archive their activities. It’s very hard for us to look back in history and find out what did this Black person do, and that’s something we have to change. We have the resources now, and I think it’s very important for us to start to archive and document our activities so that future generations may be able to look back and see what we’re doing today. That’s it! “Symbols of Resistance: an Exhibition Celebrating the Convergence of Black Artists and their Stories” is on display at Galerie Mile-End, 5445 Avenue Du Parc from February 1-28, 2018. This artists’ talk was edited for clarity and length.
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February 5, 2018 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily
Sports
“It’s just that previously, you
The McGill Daily talks to SEASON
Rosalind SweeneyMcCabe & Felicia Pennant The McGill Daily
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EASON zine is a London England based soccer and fashion magazine that puts women first. Publishing biannual print issues, hosting events, and selling merchandise, SEASON aims to empower women in football culture: whether they’re playing, watching, or designing. Founder and editor-in-chief Felicia Pennant sat down with Rosalind Sweeney-McCabe of the McGill Daily to talk about the magazine, fashion, and what it means to be a fan of the beautiful game. SEASON ZINE McGill Daily (MD): I was wondering how SEASON came about, generally speaking. Felicia Pennant (FP): I always wanted to do some kind of magazine because I’ve always been into fashion and magazines. I actually went to St. Martin’s [College] and did fashion history and theory there, so I worked at Elle and GQ and went to America and New York and worked at magazines, but I always thought that at some point I’d like to do my own. Then I did my final year thesis on footballers and metrosexuality and, kind of, ideals of masculinity and how footballers wearing suits were portrayed in fashion magazines, so I turned to GQ and spent a lot of time there. Stuff about David Beckham, Cristiano Ronaldo, Mario Balotelli, and Didier Drogba, who had a re-
ally cool l’Uomo Vogue shoot back when that magazine was still alive. Then, over the course of my internships, I was meeting loads of really cool creative women who were also into football. I thought that was really cool, that it wasn’t just me. So all of these things [came] together and then one day I just saved money and said, okay, I’m going to do this and see what happens with it. I found people to work with on Instagram, and all I had was a really poorly-done powerpoint showing what I want to do and who I want to speak to. A friend of a friend was a graphic designer who helped me put it together. We put the the first one out called “The Female Fan,” with the idea of speaking to women that were involved in fashion but also football fans. I liked the DIY feel of it. [I had gone] to the British Library and found there an incredible collection of fan zines. With stapled paper, photocopied, you know. So SEASON is kind of elevating that, putting that into magazine format. MD: I read your interview for Us and Femme, and I was really interested in how you talk about SEASON and archives, and particularly how fashion and football has such a history in England. Could you speak on how SEASON zine is kind of an archive for women in football? FP: I think that’s something I’ve become more aware of as we’ve been making the magazines. There’s really not much else out there talking about female fans. We are in the British Library now and also the National Football Museum. Sometimes SEASON is used as an educational
resource, too, because when people talk about fans, women aren’t usually represented or given a voice. The whole magazine is really just about how women interact and engage with football. So yeah, that’s something I have in mind when I’m making a new issue. We try to tell these interesting stories, but of course we’re just a magazine with a finite number of pages. There’s so many more amazing people out there, so we also do events where we try to bring people together. I always ask people about women’s football and I think a lot of people think that SEASON is about women’s football. Yes, but we’re really about women in football, and that can be men’s football too. In fact, it’s more likely to be men’s football, as we concentrate on the supporters and the fashion around football, and there are just so many more fans in the men’s game. MD: How do you see older women interacting with the magazine, and just generally, how do you think the demographic of the magazine will change? Because I think my mum’s generation of women is a bit less enthusiastic [about football]. FP: I mean, that’s something that’s on my mind. Like we did a soccer mum piece where we had a range of ages. A football nail art piece was inspired by an older woman who had done her nails to match her club. Two of the ladies that we did a betting [gambling] piece with were in their forties. I try to focus more on a person’s story than their age, but I will say that looking at the staff that I do have, we’re really all 25 to 35, mostly from London. Some people from New York and Paris. MD: And those are the cities where your magazine is stocked? FP: Yes, we tried to get stocked in Canada but we just don’t have the ability to print enough. Right now it’s in stores across Europe, and a few in Asia, and the U.S., but of course you can buy it online or read it on the website. I send it out worldwide personally. I go to the post office to send them off. I’ve sent them to Australia, Japan, China, literally around the world. Scandinavia a lot. There’s a lot of interest. MD: Do you see SEASON increasing its circulation? How do you want to grow? FP: Ideally, yeah, but everything does come down to money and what we can afford. Production and printing costs a lot, and we don’t have much to begin with. The way I see SEASON growing is trying to be more global. We started off as a really close group in London, maybe a couple in Manchester and Liverpool, but then we hit France, so we’re starting to think
more globally and also doing events and parties to create a more rounded program. Thinking about ways in which we can bring women together to connect and be empowered. The overall goal is really to empower women in football. There’s plenty of women who love football. It’s just that previously, you might not have seen us. We’re trying to dispel the stereotype of a football fan being a man. When I was younger, the female football fan was always stereotyped as a tomboy, or lesbian, or this, or that. I’m not a tomboy. I’m just a very big football fan. And I know loads of other women who are too. We’re trying to be really diverse, showing as many cool stories as possible, and connect and empower women by showcasing as many as possible. A lot of people just want to speak about football, and I hope SEASON is a safe space and platform for that. MD: Football’s aesthetic history, too, is so long and always evolving. Talking about fashion theory, I think football often reflects what’s going on in the fashion world to an extent. FP: It does. That’s basically why I decided to do this. I did fashion history and theory in uni, and the idea that everything you wear reflects what’s going on: you send a message with what you wear. As a football fan wearing football clothing, you’re communicating a message about football. SEASON being a record of this moment in time, we’re archiving what’s happening right now. It could eventually be a primary resource, you know. I’d like to think that in the future someone
might use my magazine as a primary source in their essay, like people do with Vogue.
“The overall goal is really to empower women in football. There’s plenty of women who love football. It’s just that previously, you might not have seen us.” —Felicia Pennant FASHION MD: Fashion in football has always been linked with the English Premier League, in groups like the casuals [English supporter groups in the 1980s]. Do you think the intersection of fashion and football has a particular flavour in Britain? Is there a long history of it there? FP: Certainly. I mean, a football match is a place where you dress up to go. And with the casuals and other football hooligans, they were groups, and they all dressed the same, developing distinct ways to show support for their team. I think with men, there’s the idea of peacocking. And that goes with casuals and their designer labels.
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might not have seen us.”
zine founder and editor-in-chief Felicia Pennant The fact that Liverpool were playing in Europe in the eighties and their supporters were able to go to Italy and other places and discover these brands and wear them in their own way. Now, of course, everyone can do that. I think where women come into that is that there’s this historical perception that fashion is a female thing. So if you’re into football as a woman you can find way more ways to express that. As a Chelsea fan, I wear blue in my hair. You can get your nails done. You can wear make-up. You can do so much more in traditionally ‘feminine’ styles. Football fashion is so much a part of culture that even if you’re not necessarily a fan, you’ve been affected by football somehow. I don’t know if you saw the SS18 shows but Lacoste did a collaboration with Paris Saint-Germain. And Rihanna’s FW collection had really cool football dresses and deconstructed football shirts. Off-White worked with Umbro as well. And the footballers themselves are models too, so brands realize the influence of these athletes. Cristiano Ronaldo has so many different clothing lines of his own. Zlatan [Ibrahimovic] has a line. Neymar has designed stuff in collaboration with people. They’re all getting in there, and when you have that following you see that people care what they’re wearing. MD: Wearing football clothing as women, there is a certain kind of androgyny to it. More designers now are making clothing that works for both men and women, so I think sportswear and football wear kind of fits into that. I think brands are catching on to that in some ways. FP: Yes, although I wish they could make things that are specifically for women, rather than tagging us on to the end. It’d be nice to have actual, like, women’s clothing. BEING A FAN MD: You’re a Chelsea supporter you say? FP: Yeah, definitely. I think people, especially women now, are unafraid to say that they’re fans. . . they’re proud of it. I was at Glastonbury wearing my [Chelsea] hat and you just had people coming out everywhere like “Oh, you’re a Chelsea fan,” and there’s always a bit of banter there with them. So it’s just super funny. It’s hard as a woman doing things like that though, you’re lucky to have a friend with you in situations like that. It can be quite lonely sometimes. You have to find friends that can be interested in [football] with
you. To watch Match of the Day with, listen to TalkSport. MD: My friend and I watch every weekend. We have a couple other friends who join us sometimes, but in Canada it’s not really the culture, so finding other supporters can be a bit difficult. We go to certain cafes to watch where there’s all these old men and us. FP: I love that though! That’s how I was watching for years. Like going to the pub with a friend. Or finding a stream online. Usually though, I’d go to the pub with my dad, have a drink. We still do that now, really. I’ve gotten lucky with getting tickets to Stamford Bridge but really it’s so expensive these days. I live in South London, and everyone round here is a Chelsea fan so you’re with your people. I have sat in a pub myself or been that annoying friend on holiday. When Chelsea was in the Europa League final, I was in Paris at the time. I turned to my friend and said “Look, we need to find a place to watch this,” and I went and found a cafe and watched it and we won and it was great.
“I think people, especially women now, are unafraid to say that they’re fans.” —Felicia Pennant MD: What’s interesting about football [to me] is that everyone has a different experience but there’s so many similarities present in those experiences. FP: Yes, everyone shares the same moments, but then reacts and engages with those moments in such different ways. You’re totally right about that. What is it like in Canada? What I find so incredible is that here in South London, I’m right next to my team. Chelsea is right there. The level of fandom that people have halfway across the world is incredible. I don’t even know if I would be so ardent if it wasn’t so easy for me to be a fan, you know? MD: Yeah, I think a lot of it for me is my family. My grandparents sending me Liverpool hats to take on holiday, things like that. I’ve been playing since I was like four. I think it’s a really important way for a lot of people in Canada to keep a connection to their family, or where they come from. A lot of people from England support Premier League clubs, or others support-
ing teams from where they come from. It becomes a way to hold on, I guess, to where we come from. It’s something our families have done and continue to do. It feels like a bit of a secret handshake. You’ll go places and just know. People will be at a cafe working on their laptops and then suddenly a bunch of football fans come in and the owner turns the TV volume all the way up and everyone is screaming in the middle of the day. I guess that’s the way a lot of us in Canada
engage with the sport. FP: Yeah, and then there’s the World Cup. Is Canada in the World Cup? MD: No, [laughs] our men’s team is kind of trash so I support England in the World Cup. But our women’s team is really good, although most people only tune into that for the Olympics. There is a women’s World Cup, but in Canada, you only really hear about the Olympics for Women’s football. It’s one of the only summer sports we can win, I guess.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity. Felicia Pennant and SEASON zine continue to work towards more representation of women in the world of soccer by focussing on the fan experience and the fashion that goes with it all. Issue 5 will come out on May 2018, but until then, SEASON can be found on Instagram and Twitter: @season_zine. Issues 2-4 are also for sale at www. season-zine.com Photos by Rosalind SweeneyMcCabe.
Art Essay
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“Untitled,” Krysten Krulik
Culture
February 5, 2018 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily
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Indigenous resistance on screen First Voices Week broadcasts shades of decolonial resistance
Arvaa Balsara The McGill Daily Content warning: abuse, sexual violence, murder
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n January 29, Cinema Politica Concordia screened half a dozen Indigenous-made short films about Indigenous communities around Turtle Island (North America). These screenings are part of First Voices Week, an annual Indigenous-led initiative to acknowledge and celebrate Indigenous peoples from around Tiotia:ke (Montreal). The screening was followed by a short question and answer period with Haudenosaunee filmmaker Katsitsionni Fox. Nuuca The screened films focused on portraying Indigenous women and their experiences. The night began with Nuuca by Michelle Latimer, which elaborated on the relation between violence committed against Indigenous women and the exploitation of land by resource extraction industries near the Fort Berthold Reservation in North Dakota. The film oscillates between scenes of picturesque beauty and disturbing images of crude oil extraction sites. A powerful voice-over provided by a young Indigenous woman exposes some of the horrors — abuse, rape, and murder — that are commonly committed against the women in her community. She states, “just as the land is being used, these women are being used.”
Nuuca [...] elaborated on the relation between the violence committed against Indigenous women and the exploitation of land by resource extraction industries. The Mandan, Hidatas and Arikara tribes (the MHA Nation) of the Fort Berthold Reservation are located near a major fracking site — the Bakken oil patch. Unlike other nations, the MHA Nation have found prosperity in the oil industry. However, the growing industry in the area attracts male workers who perpetrate violence against
Laura Brennan | The McGill Daily Indigenous women on a regular basis. Latimer exposes the systemic and systematic abuse of Indigenous women in this thought-provoking and heart shattering film. The Violation of a Civilization Without Secrets In 1996, a prehistoric skull was accidentaly discovered on the banks of the Columbia River, in Kennewick, Washington. This discovery gave Adam Khalil, Zack Khalil and Jackson Poly, directors of the movie The Violation of a Civilization Without Secrets, the chance to expose the ways Indigenous oral histories have historically been disregarded as proof because they do not meet Western systems of evidence, Western epistemologies. The Umatilla tribe of the Columbia Basin argued that the skull belonged to their ancestor, referencing a long tradition of oral history that traces their ancestors to the region, and demanded the return of the remains for reburial under the federal Native Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA). Nevertheless, forensic
anthropologists, such as Douglas Owsley, contested their claims, arguing that the Kennewick Man (the name of the skull they discovered) could not possibly be an ancestor of the Umatilla people due to the inconsistencies between the bone structures of the 9,000-yearold skull and present day Umatilla.
The Kennewick Man, was only buried in 2017 according to Umatilla customs after advanced DNA sequencing technologies were able to confirm Indigenous oral history. The three filmmakers shine a light on the treatment of Indigenous oral history in this brief but alarming documentary.
[The Violation of a Civilization Without Secrets] expose[s] the ways Indigenous oral histories have historically been disregarded as proof because they do not meet Western systems of evidence.
Ohero-Kon : Under the Husk Katsitsionni Fox shifted the attention back to Indigenous women and their experiences with culture, femininity, and adulthood in her heartfelt and moving short film, Ohero-Kon: Under the Husk. Kaienkwinehtha and Kasennakohe are childhood friends from traditional families living in Akwesasne, a Mohawk Nation territory that straddles the Canada-U.S. border. The two partake in four-year rites of passage ceremony called Ohero-Kon that has been revived in their community. The ceremony is meant to challenge them spiritually, emotionally, and physically, shaping them into the women they will become.
The [OheronKon] ceremony is meant to challenge [the participants] spiritually, emotionally, and physically, shaping them into the women they will become. Fox offers a refreshing perspective that depicts the power and agency of Indigenous women. Rather than depicting Indigenous women as victims of violence and systemic abuse (which are issues that Indigenous women still experience), Ohero-Kon leaves the audience excited for the colourful future of these two young women.
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February 5, 2018 mcgilldaily.com | The McGill Daily
culture
“At least it’s better than before?” Born in Flames sheds light on resonating issues of oppression
Kayla Holmes Culture Writer
“N
ot the Church, not the State, women must control our fate!” These are the words chanted by thousands of protesters fighting for women’s rights at a massive demonstration against the fictional American government of Lizzie Borden’s 1983 film Born in Flames. A week after the second annual Women’s March brought together hundreds of thousands of people globally to stand up against inequalities perpetrated by the White House, the movie feels like an eerily accurate portrayal of current day, despite its release in the early 80s. The film was screened at Concordia Speculative Life Cluster’s first “Speculating Through Movies” event of the year, which aims to present and discuss different perspectives and themes through film. The documentary-style movie was originally filmed on 16mm film, giving it a gritty, underground feel. Shots of fictional newscasts and radio broadcasts add a level of realism to the film by giving viewers insight into the sociopolitical system against which the characters are fighting. Set ten years after a “socialdemocratic war of liberation” put a socialist government in power in the United States, — explores the complex intersectionality of a women’s movement, the dangers of an “at least it’s better than before” mentality, and the rising inequalities under the same government that promised their end. The film makes a point of highlighting both the shared and unique struggles concerning women of different races, classes, genders, sexualities, and abilities, and doesn’t shy away from criticizing those who don’t acknowledge the system of inequality in place. Written, directed, and produced by Lizzie Borden, the film features a cast made up almost entirely of nonprofessional actors, mostly Borden’s friends. The style of the film and the portrayal of the characters bring a real spirit of rebellion to a movie that is frighteningly relevant today. Adding to this are the broadcasts of two women-run underground radio stations Radio Ragazza and Phoenix Radio which give the audience both background to the situation and an incredible soundtrack that brings life to the film. The violence and tension present in the streets of 1970s New York are clearly replicated in the film, with news footage showing protests met with violent reactions
Nelly Wat | The McGill Daily from the police, and women facing constant catcalling and harassment in the streets and on the subway.
Born in Flames explores the complex intersectionality of a women’s movement, the dangers of an “at least it’s better than before” mentality, and the rising inequalities under the same government that promised their end. The characters in the film, many of them queer women of colour, lose their jobs and find their voices stifled by the racism and sexism perpetrated by the political system they live under. While the characters all protest differently, the major organization of the film, and eventually the unifying actor, is the Women’s Army. Though the broader aims of this organization are not immediately clear, they are seen patrolling the city on bicycles to scare off harassers on the street, putting up posters with pictures of accused rapists (an action reminiscent of
the #MeToo movement), and generally attempting to unite women in the face of oppression. The greatest challenges to the Women’s Army are recruitement and unification. This is tackled by the army’s founder, Adelaide Norris. Set over a clicking projector displaying photos and videos of Norris and her family and friends, the FBI agent investigating the Women’s Army reports on her life and involvement in revolutionary actions. A financially disadvantaged queer Black woman, Norris finds herself unemployed and dedicates her time to garnering support for the army. Footage earlier in the film shows Norris asking other members of the army to leave their jobs in order to commit themselves fully to the cause. The women have to refuse for fear of the economic burden it would place on them, demonstrating the complex social and economic factors affecting a person’s ability to participate in activism. Norris is seen attempting to recruit a number of women with various reasons for not joining the army, leading to a scattered and divided group of women hoping for change.When she approaches three white journalists whom she accuses of failing to recognize the oppression they face as women, they talk to her about how “things are so much better” than before the revolution, and how progress may be slow, but it is inevitable. Others that she approaches feel that an organization like the Army is unnecessary, while others still, such as the women at Radio Ragazza,
feel that the actions of the army are too muted, failing to make any real change.
The women have to refuse [to give up their job to dedicate themselves fully to the cause] for fear of the economic burden it would place on them, demonstrating the complex social and economic factors affecting a person’s ability to participate in activism. This all changes with Norris’ death. Upon her return from North Africa, where she travels to learn about the struggle for equality there and to bring back weapons to aid in the fight, she is arrested and imprisoned on charges of arms smuggling. Shortly thereafter, she is found dead in her cell. Her death is ruled a suicide, but the three journalists whom she had previously attempted to recruit publish their suspicion that she was mur-
dered by the government, sparking a unifying reaction from all of the women who had originally refused to join the Army. The relevance of the film within the current political climate is striking. Many of the challenges confronted by the women in Borden’s New York are the very challenges being brought to light by women today, and the lack of real change despite frequent promises by governments and institutions is particularly hard hitting. Additionally, as images of Black bodies murdered by police flood the media today — and especially in wake of Sandra Bland’s death in a Texas jail cell in 2015 — the film’s footage of Norris lying in her cell is jarring. The role of the media in painting the public’s perception of the anti-government movement rising in the city is a constant theme running through the film. The various news segments have newscasters referring to the Women’s Army as “terrorists,” “extremists,” or, almost comically, the “radical lesbian women’s army.” Actions taken in defence of women being harassed are painted as “vigilante justice,” and the initial offenders they are defending others from are pointed as victims, another startling reminder of the media’s tendency to question the accusations made by female victims. The film ends on a unifying note, with the various women throughout the movie coming together despite what originally divided them. After both radio stations are shut down by authorities, a new combined “Phoenix and Ragazza Radio Station” is broadcast from stolen uHauls around the city. The final broadcast in the film is a call for unity and for action, with the goal being to “deconstruct and reconstruct all the laws that suppress and oppress.” The women in the film make it clear that violence can be necessary to tear down the system of oppression in order to rebuild and enact real structural change. The final speech is a welcome call for unity and inclusion that resonates powerfully: “It is not only the story of women’s oppression, it is the story of sexism, racism, bigotry, nationalism[...], the story of environmental poisoning and nuclear warfare, of the powerful over the powerless[...]. It is all of our responsibility as individuals and together to examine and to re-examine everything[...] It’s the time of sweet, sweet change for us all.”
compendium!
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Lies, half-truths, and hoping The Link will slide into our DMs.
Unlikely friends at McGill University
Rayleigh Lee | The McGall Weekly
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