vol100iss5

LAW ADMISSION INFORMATION SESSIONS The following Mondays at 4:30pm September 20 2010 October 18 2010 November 22 2010 Meet admission representatives and law students Peel metro

mcgilldaily.com

3644 Peel Street (Peel & Dr. Penfield)

Deadline for University and Mature candidates: November 30 2010

http://www.mcgill.ca/law

Motorcoach, School bus, Minibus & Van

Proud alliance with

(514) 990-9236 www.symphonybus.com

Write for the McGill Daily!

For more information, email us: coordinating@mcgilldaily.com

News online!

- School Field Trips Local or Long Distance - Educational Tours - Sports Trips Throughout - Sightseeing Tours North America - Multi-day or Weekend Trips

3 News

The McGill Daily | Monday, September 20, 2010 | mcgilldaily.com

The unknown occupation Israeli author says two-state solution dwindling, Hamas must be brought into negotiations

G

ideon Levy has worked as a journalist and editor at the Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz since 1982. His column, “The Twilight Zone,” appears weekly. Levy’s latest book, The Punishment of Gaza, was released

by Verso Press in July. He will be speaking Monday in Leacock 132 at 7:30 p.m. The Daily reached him by phone in Israel.

The McGill Daily: In the introduction to your book you write, “I am asking all Israelis to be outraged – or at least to understand what is being perpetrated in their name, so that they may never have the right to claim: we did not know.” What is it, do you think, that Israelis are unaware of?

Gideon Levy: They are not aware of what is being done on their behalf, they are not aware of what the friends of their sons and the sons of their friends are doing, they’re not aware of life under occupation, they are not aware of their bleak, dark backyard – the backyard of the Israeli occupation.

MD: Would you say that the Israeli media are at fault for this?

GL: Absolutely – the Israeli media are covering it up sys-

GL: No, unfortunately I don’t have any faith in those negotiations. And the best indication of Netanyahu’s real intentions is his attitude toward freezing the settlements, because would he be really serious and sincere about the twostate solution and evacuating most of the territories, if not all of them, he wouldn’t insist so much about continuing to build the settlements.

MD: People are losing faith in the two-state solution. Do you believe that the tack of the Palestinian struggle would be more effective if it were oriented as a civil rights struggle, rather than a nationalist struggle?

GL: It’s a very good question, and maybe in any case the twostate solution is already part of the past. More and more I think the chances for a viable Palestinian state is really vanishing – and if this is the case, then there’s no other way than to start a new struggle about human rights and civil rights to all the people who live between the Jordan River and the sea. It’s not my favourable solution but maybe it’s the only one that’s left.

MD: Is peace really at issue in

“The Israeli media are covering it up systematically while dehumanizing Palestinians...”

Gideon Levy, author, The Punishment of Gaza tematically while dehumanizing Palestinians, and hardly covering life under occupation.

MD: The top headline last Wednesday on Ha’aretz read: “Netanyahu to Abbas: Don’t let end to settlement freeze foil peace talks.” Summits like these are being ridiculed left, right, and centre in the international press. Do you have any faith in the current peace process?

WHAT’S THE HAPS Maisonneuve launch party Tuesday, September 21, 7 p.m.

Drawn and Quartrly, 211 Bernard Ouest Lauch party for a new issue of Maisonneuve that is hitting newsstands September 24, with stories on the last of Canada’s lighthouse keepers, how to smoke, and how the Internet is affecting sports fandom.

these talks? It seems to me that peace talks are what needs to be happening between Hamas and Israel.

GL: Hamas is excluded from the negotiation by Israel and by the entire world who is boycotting Hamas. I don’t think that real peace can be achieved with half of the Palestinian people – or with the representatives of half the Palestinian people over half

Montreal youth discussion with City Council Tuesday, September 28, 7 p.m.

CEGEP du Vieux-Montréal, 255 Ontario E., room 482 In collaboration with the Conseil jeunesse de Montréal, the City Council’s Committee on Services to Citizens invites Montrealers aged 12 to 30 to participate in a public consultation on the topic of communications between the city and its youth. The consultation is also open to citizens of all ages, and all are encouraged to participate.

the Palestinian occupied territory. So therefore I would make an enormous effort to try to aid Hamas to the negotiation table.

And I never understood why it is legitimate to negotiate with Hamas over the fate of one captured Israeli soldier [Gilad Shalit] and it’s not legitimate to discuss with Hamas the future of two peoples.

MD: What options does Hamas have then?

GL: I’m not here to give advice to Hamas, and in any case they wouldn’t listen to me, but I believe that also in Hamas there are reasonable people who want to achieve some progress for their people. But the first step must come from Israel and from the West.

MD: During Operation Cast Lead, 500 Israelis signed a declaration of support for the international campaign for Boycotts, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) against Israel.

The movement is also growing around the world. Do you believe that the BDS campaign has the potential to improve things in the Middle East?

GL: I really don’t know. It might go in both directions. It might really make the Israelis pay for the occupation, think about the occupation. It might also push them to a more nationalistic and rightwing corner. It’s very hard to tell. I think that by itself boycott is a very legitimate weapon. Israel is using it itself against Hamas, against Gaza, and calling the world to put sanctions on Iran, so by itself in principle it is a legitimate weapon; the only question is, “Is it an effective weapon?” and, “Would it really have the right effect on Israeli public opinion?” This is very hard to predict.

MD: In a recent column you write that the exclusion of Arabs from Knesset [Israel’s legislature] is “likely to happen. In a society whose institutional defenses of democracy have started to deteriorate, nothing is safe any more.”

QPIRG 101 Wednesday, September 22, 6 p.m.

3647 University, 3rd floor Learn more about QPIRG and how to get involved.

Senate Wednesday, September 22, 2:30pm Leacock 232 The year’s first Senate session is this Wednesday – a monthly meeting between the administration heads, deans of faculties, and elected student representatives.

Photo courtesy of Gideon Levy

Gideon Levy will speak in Leacock at 7:30 Monday evening.

Could you elaborate?

GL: Israeli democracy is in any case a very fragile one, and not well established. In the last one and a half years it is really deteriorating, and this is I think the biggest danger for Israel right now – the danger of losing its democratic character, which is in any case limited to its Jewish citizens and for sure not for the Palestinians who live under its occupation. Now, it’s not only about the Arab members of par-

Save the Arch Café Rally Wednesday, September 22, 2:00 p.m.

Outside Leacock Continue the fight to resurrect the last student-run food provider on campus. Come out and protest the closure of the Architecture Café Wednesday afternoon, a few feet away from the first Senate meeting of the year.

liament, it’s about [mechanistic] spirits which blow against NGOs, against civil society, against anyone who dares to raise his voice and to criticize Israel. This is a very very dangerous tendency, especially when most of the checks and balances are quite paralyzed in Israel. So this is a real danger to Israeli democracy and we are witnessing it now day after day.

—compiled by Niko Block

JHR fundraising concert Thursday, September 23, 10 p.m.

Les Trois Minots (3812 St. Laurent) Come support the McGill Chapter of Journalists for Human Rights, featuring Tonal Ecstasy, Sheila Giffen, Barn Owls, Crystal Cadence, and McGill Improv.

Tickets $7 in advance, $10 at the door.

4 News

The McGill Daily | Monday, September 20, 2010 | mcgilldaily.com

SSMU Council Queen Arsem-O’Malley reports on the first Council meeting of the year.

S

SMU Legislative Council held its first meeting of the year last Thursday, approving extra pay for SSMU executives, revealing new payrolls on the books, and discussing the administration’s separation of the McGill name from University student services and groups.

An Executive Committee decision to grant a $1,000 stipend for May to all SSMU executives was ratified, despite the concerns of several councillors about the extent of executive financial power.

President Zach Newburgh acknowledged the criticism, but explained that SSMU executives forgo employment in order to spend the month of May in preparation for their positions, and that the stipend was calculated at a rate of $10 an hour for the executives’ work.

SSMU General Manager Pauline Gervais defended the decision,

describing the expense as “really worth the payment, really something you’re going to gain [from] at the end.”

Council also discussed the administration’s complaints about SSMU clubs’ use of the McGill name. VP Clubs & Services Anushay Khan and VP University Affairs Joshua Abaki described a meeting with Deputy Provost (Student Life & Learning) Morton Mendelson in which they discussed the name changes, including those of TVMcGill and McGill First Aid Service.

Khan criticized the administration for “not giving students respect and appreciation for all that they do,” expressing worry that the University would fail to compensate for the loss of any of SSMU’s services. The administration “wants to make a huge distinction between McGill University and the students who go to McGill,” Khan said, adding

that “without the students, there would be no institution.”

Khan also announced that all SSMU services had been reviewed over the summer, streamlining the services, while Plate Club moved from club status to a service.

Council hinged on reports from the six SSMU executives, which focused on new projects and informing Councillors of summer business.

During the executive reports, VPs outlined improvements in SSMU operations such as new organization of Gert’s events and new formatting for the student listserv, which has increased visits to the SSMU website to unprecedented levels.

In an effort to improve transparency, all financial approvals made by Council will now be posted, in addition to the financial documents that are already posted dating back to 1992. The release of the yearly SSMU budget,

however, has been delayed due to the unforeseen costs of hiring a replacement comptroller for the summer months, Newburgh explained.

The executive created two new paid positions over the summer: a SSMU photographer to photograph events, and a Green Building Summer Researcher, with a mandate to look into possibilities of recycling and composting in the Shatner building.

Lilith Wyatt, the Sustainability Projects Fund Administrator, announced another green hire, a Food Systems Adminstrator, as part of the new Sustainability Projects Fund. Wyatt announced 13 approved projects, including the expansion of gardens surrounding Burnside, a new bike collective, and weekly Meatless Mondays.

Your Daily Council primer: Legislative Council is SSMU’s

VP University Affairs Josh Abaki

Zach Newburgh: There are several issues that we’re going to have to address, and as you know it’s a very important year; we’re dealing with the renegotiation of our lease for [the] University Centre, as well as our MoA with the University. There are several other issues that I mentioned during the campaign ….We’re really looking to build a community. We recognize that the community was divided in many ways last year, and in years previous, and we’d really like to bring everyone together.

MD: Last year, both SSMU General Assemblies were problematic. What plans do you have to make this year’s General

One representative from every faculty sits on Council (there are usually vacancies) with a few exceptions – there are four Arts reps, three from Science, and two from Engineering.

There are also two Speakers, who alternate from Council to Council. They are tasked with mastering the esoteric rules of Council, from the way a motion can be presented to how to handle a preamble to who can speak when.

Keep an eye on SSMU Council this year: in the past it has been the eye of the storm for campus debate on abortion, IsraelPalestine, the environmental movement, and more.

Noah Lanard for the McGill Daily

Dave Huehn for the McGill Daily

President Zach Newburgh McGill Daily: Now that the school year is well under way, what do you feel are the most pressing issues for your office to address? Do you have any major priorities?

main decision-making body. It is composed of 35 to 40 councillors who meet every two weeks to discuss the expenditures, external policy, and assorted controversies of SSMU.

Assemblies both well-attended and efficient?

ZN: What we have actually done that is different from other administrations is that we have put together an entire calendar of events, so we know when exactly our General Assembly is – October 21 – and we know when it is going to be in the winter, as well. The second piece to it is that we are going to be assembling a General Assembly Review Committee that will explore the purpose of the General Assembly and the goals that we have for it, will determine whether or not we are meeting those goals and purposes, and will give us recommendations that we would like to see take shape in the future with General Assemblies. Hopefully, as a result of that committee, we will see high attendance at General Assemblies and see more thoughtful and intentional presentation.

MD: As a member of the Board of Governors, what do you plan on doing about the tuition hikes on behalf of SSMU? Is there anything you really can do?

ZN: We have a very clear policy that states that we are against any kind of tuition hike and that we would actually like to work towards the elimination of fees when it comes to postsecondary education. As stated in the [1948] U.N. Declaration of Human Rights – which is a supplement to the previous one – the government of Canada signed that it is committed to free or accessible post-secondary education to anyone who wants it. I am committed to fighting for this, and I will be doing so at the Board of Governors meetings.

—compiled Cernavskis

by

Andra

McGill Daily: What role did you play in extending library hours this year? And where is the extra money coming from?

Josh Abaki: I sat on the Library Improvement Fund committee last year, and one of the things we did as a committee is we went and talked to students, and, by far, most students elected to keep the libraries open for longer, so that is something I did push for really strongly while sitting on the committee. The extra money that came to finance the extra hours basically came from close to half a million dollars that we get every year that we have to allocate to different libraries. Sometimes this money is for renovations. Sometimes it is for keeping the libraries open longer, and sometimes it is to improve the collections. This year, we decided to allocate $80,000 more towards extending the operating hours.

MD: The administration has taken the position that TVMcGill must be called TV-SSMU. Why has McGill

asked TVMcGill to change its name now, when CKUT was forced to change its name in 2007?

JA: It is a whole part of McGill’s policy in which they are concerned about liabilities. They are increasingly looking at groups who are using the McGill name and asking them to use the name in a way that they think won’t get the University sued because of the liability issues.

As SSMU, we don’t think this is fair because these groups are an integral part of the University, and without these students, we don’t have the University. We don’t think it is right for McGill to be [more] concerned with liability than what is best for it’s students. For McGill, it is an issue of reputation, but I think they are wrong in thinking that the students are not interested in protecting McGill’s reputation. McGill should put its students’ interests before its concerns about liability.

—compiled Cernavskis

by

Andra

News

The McGill Daily | Monday, September 20, 2010 | mcgilldaily.com

McGill Daily: With recent attention on Principal Munroe-Blum’s proposed tuition hikes, what do you and SSMU plan to do to fight these increases? What role do you envision TaCEQ playing in this issue, and who are some of SSMU’s other allies?

Myriam Zaidi: Because we have a policy that is against tuition increases, we will definitely inform as many students as possible of the consequences of tuition increases and of HMB’s stance on it. We will also try to present alternatives to solve the underfunding crisis in postsecondary education in Quebec. Our biggest allies are the members of the Quebec Student Roundtable, but at this point the most important ally I would say would be PGSS, because she [MunroeBlum] is both of our principals.

MD: As the University focuses on increasing funding to grad students, how will you maintain good relations and solidarity with PGSS? MZ: When [the administration] presented this plan I was with PGSS members – and I’ve talked to PGSS members and said, “What do you guys think of this, do you support this?” They were pretty clear on saying they’re against tuition increases for anyone, no matter what the end goal is. So this will not divide us, no matter how some people wish it would.

QA: How do you plan to work on relations with the Milton-Parc neighbourhood?

MZ: The Community Action and Relations Endeavour (CARE) has been adopted [since] last semester. We did a trial street team dur-

compared to last year. For instance, we got rid of the happy hour special and replaced it with a daily special for drinks, for instance we have Martini Mondays, which is $5 for martinis and it happens all day, same thing with TNT [“Thursday Night Tradition”] pricing.

Dave Huehn for the McGill Daily

ing frosh, because frosh is where there are the highest tensions between the Milton-Parc community residents and students and the administration. So basically it was student volunteers set up at strategic corners, from 10:30 to 3:30 in the morning for the first two nights of faculty froshes. It went really well… [but] there was a lot of room for progress. frosh leaders definitely need to be trained more, but the training of frosh leaders is a McGill administration [task]. Unfortunately there’s a lot of room for progress, and work to do with faculty associations. Now that CARE has been adopted and signed, we need to promote it as much as possible, and I think through faculty associations and other events we can promote them.

—compiled by Queen Arsem-O’Malley

MD: What are your feelings on the University’s insistence on removing the name McGill from TVMcGill? What impact will this have on the service, and do you think the same regulation will be applied to other services?

VP Clubs and Services Anushay Khan McGill Daily: Do you plan on increasing SSMU’s focus on sustainability by creating environmentally friendly services such as the Plate Club? If so, how? And how will such services be paid for?

Anushay Khan: Our long-term goal is to not even have a [plate] service, such that the idea of using sustainable or re-usable dishware is so innate that you wouldn’t even think of using styrofoam or plastic, and that we would incorporate it very much into the way our building functions. In our coming lease negotiations we are including very strict clauses about sustainability whereby you can’t use certain materials and where we regulate the way you produce your food, the quality of the food, and the nature of where the food is coming from.

MD: Will the Midnight Kitchen be set up as a replacement of the Architecture Café? Do you envision something similar happening to the Midnight Kitchen because of its status as a low-cost student-run food service?

AK: As far as Midnight Kitchen goes, we are looking into making room 302 [of the Shatner building] into a space for students to come and eat while Midnight Kitchen is serving, because that’s often the room that they

MD: SSMU faced criticism last year about investments in companies connected to tar sands. Will you divest from RBC, which is hugely invested in the tar sands? What other companies tied to the tar sands do you plan to keep in our portfolio?

VP External Myriam Zaidi

serve from. This does cause multiple problems because other clubs and services book that room, and if we book it out for Midnight Kitchen then other clubs and services can’t use it. It’s a tough line to draw.

Parker Moore for the McGill Daily

5

McGill Daily: The SSMU Book Bazaar was instituted this fall as a replacement for the services previously offered by Haven Books. Is the Bazaar a sustainable and viable replacement for Haven?

If not, what, if anything, is being planned to serve as an alternative to the McGill Bookstore?

form, because we do see that there is a need for [it], despite the fact that it was a huge sinkhole for money, it provided a very good service for students to buy cheaper books.

And we want to continue that way without breaking our Memorandum of Agreement with the University.

Nick Drew: Not really, it’s completely subsidized by the SSMU, we’re spending about $17,300 on it – that includes security as well as the supplies and materials and bad debt.

What we’re looking to do is to change that and make it an online plat-

MD: You mentioned Gert’s being a major project for this year. What are some of the plans for Gert’s, and where is the money for improvements coming from?

ND: I’ve actually gotten in contact with RBC regarding these issues and they’ve given me a response back, which I’m going to bring to Financial Ethics Reform Committee (FERC) and after that we will review whether or not it is a sound investment. But at the same time things always change with banks and their investments. So it’s something that’s constantly under review and hopefully FERC will help me out with that. That’s why I’m happy that it’s not ad hoc anymore, we’ll meet on a regular basis, we’ll be constantly reviewing our investment portfolio to see what our options are.

ND: Well, [we’re doing] certain things that work

— compiled by Queen Arsem-O’Malley

Parker Moore for the McGill Daily

VP Finance Nick Drew

with McGill. I know there’s a lot of red tape, so I definitely don’t want them to control our events, or by any way have that indicates the direction we’re taking. We’re all about student empowerment here, so we definitely want student events to stay student events.

AK: I think that the University’s dialogue always talks about this idea of community, but if you’re going to exclude the University’s students from the University’s community, I’m really unsure as to what the University’s definition of community even means. Firstly, it’s a little hypocritical on their part to say that students are not a part of the University.

The question to ask is how far the University is willing to separate itself from students just for the sake of public relations. Are we a public relations company, or are we a school?

MD: Unlike your predecessor Alex Brown, who was criticized for her neglect of athletics, you have been accused of being too focused on athletics, and have expressed a desire to see more athleticsoriented events at Gert’s. How do you plan on maintaining a balance between athletics and other vital aspects of student life when planning events?

MD: If TVMcGill refuses to change its name, what do you think the outcome would be?

AK: The whole point of [Deputy Provost Morton] Mendelson’s position is to complement student life and to add to it, but if you’re going to steal from it, I don’t really see what the point is. In our meeting with Mendelson he was non-negotiable about the issue, and that’s not cooperation. It’s more of an ultimatum, and we’re not children. We’re very mature adults, and I think that the work that students have done over many, many years is proof enough that we can actually get shit done. It makes me very upset to see that the university is constantly saying that it’s a student-run University when it’s constantly proving not be one. It prizes students when it feels it will benefit, and backs off when it doesn’t, and wipes its hands clean.

—compiled by Maya Shoukri

Parker Moore for the McGill Daily

VP Internal Tom Fabian McGill Daily: This year’s homecoming is unprecedented in that the University is partnering with SSMU to sponsor the event. Does SSMU plan on partnering with the University for all large-scale events? What impact will this have on the quality of said events, and will they have more funding?

Tom Fabian: It is the only event that we’re partnering with the University on.

We don’t plan on doing a lot of events

TF: I’ve definitely been criticized. When I came in one of my goals with the executive was to see everything in a new light.

I’ve learned this summer that there are a huge amount of different groups, a lot of diverse groups, and I’m working with a lot of them to make a lot of types of different events. Obviously I love athletics, and that’s where I’m from, but I’ve actually focused a lot less on the athletic events. I’m promoting “Fill the Stadium” because I think it’s a great event. Other than that, I’m trying to get the word out there, but I don’t have that many athletic events this year – I wish I had more – but there are a lot of other events that I’m in charge of and a lot of other events where I want to partner with different groups to make it happen for them.

—compiled by Maya Shoukri

6 News

The McGill Daily | Monday, September 20, 2010 | mcgilldaily.com

Business owners strike back at billboard ban Media comp anies band together to oppose new Plateau bylaw The McGill Daily

O

n September 10, a meeting took place between three major media companies – Astral Media, CBS, and Jim Pattinson Industries Ltd – to decide how to proceed in the face of a new bylaw banning billboards in the Plateau Mont-Royal borough.

The bylaw gives the landlords of the 45 billboards in the borough, and the companies leasing ad space from them, one year beginning in November 2010 to remove their advertisements.

The September 7 decision comes on the heels of an earlier bylaw that came into effect in July preventing the construction of any additional billboards.

Media companies who rent billboard space were taken by surprise by the latest bylaw, saying they were not given warning.

“They never called us,” said Jeannot Lefebvre, spokesperson for the Regroupement de l’industrie de l’affichage extérieur du Québec and Real Estate Director of CBS Affichage. “Only the boroughs made that call [to ban billboards].

In July the article for outdoor

[commercial activity] was redone, a month and a half later it is to change,” he said.

Lefebvre spoke on behalf of the three major media companies that attended the September 10 meeting.

He described the outcome of the meeting between Astral, CBS and Jim Pattinson: “Our lawyer is preparing letters to send to the mayor. The next step is to have a meeting with these people [councillors].”

“We prefer to have a meeting with [the] City to have a good conversation or we will go do our own thing. We won’t wait; we [will] take measures to preserve our business,” Lefebvre continued.

Lefebvre does not expect the three media companies to accept the ban. “I don’t think we will take them [the billboards] down. We will fight,” Lefebvre said.

Alex Norris, Projet Montreal (PM) councillor for Mile End, says council is not backing down.

“Our hands are not tied,” he said. “[We are] free to act to defend public interest against private interest [that] might be offended. [We are] an activist administration [looking] to improve the quality of life in the community.”

“We assumed high tax revenues

[were what] justified [billboards] being there,” Norris continued.

The City of Montreal receives $40,000 in tax revenues from billboards every year. Individual billboards bring in roughly $1,000 a year in taxes. Norris called the sum a “pittance.” Landlords with billboards on their properties rent the space to media companies, who in turn rent the ad space to other companies whose ads are displayed. Norris said he spoke to a landlord who received $8,000 a month from the media companies renting the billboard space.

Lefebvre defended the public contribution billboards make.

“A lot [of people are] involved.

The landlord we pay rent to? They live in the Plateau,” he pointed out.

Lefebvre also contends that the bylaw violates the right of the affected media companies to freedom of expression, as outlined in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the Quebec Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms.

Norris called Lefebvre’s Charter argument “ludicrous.” “The constitutional freedom of expression [argument] will not stand up in court,” he said. “What is being snuffed

Noah Lanard for The McGill Daily

Billboards like this may become extinct on the Plateau. out? What can’t be expressed elsewhere?”

McGill Law Professor Colleen Sheppard explained that bans on the “time, place and manner,” of expression can be constitutional, as long as a court determines that the ban is in some way “justified.”

“Since it is likely that the advertising restrictions would be considered an infringement of freedom of expression,” she wrote in an email, “it is necessary to consider whether the infringement is ‘reasonable’ and ‘demonstrably justified in a

Teach English Abroad

MCGILL UNIVERSITY PROUDLY PRESENTS:

Bookwork:

Where can I get a GREAT DEAL buying CONDOMS and LUBE on campus?

Where can I find information on SEXUAL HEALTH?

Medium to Concept to Object to Art A Talk by Garrett Stewart, James O. Freedman Professor of Letters, Iowa University

Prof. Stewart is an international leader in the field of intermedial studies today, whose work sits at the crossroads of the disciplines of painting, literature, cinema and photography. His landmark study, The Look of Reading (Chicago 2006), provided the first full-scale interpretation of the place of text in the western painterly tradition. His current project, from which his talk will be drawn, concerns the increasingly compelling position of the book within the field of contemporary art.

Where can I purchase natural and ALTERNATIVE MENSTRUAL PRODUCTS?

Come learn about safeR sex at the SHAG SHOP! A convenient and friendly place to visit.

We are provided by McGill Health Promotion to inform students about SEXUAL HEALTH & WELLNESS. Open Mon-Fri from 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

O Lo L o Located in Student Health Services Brown Building, 3600 McTavish Br

SPONSORED BY THE BEATTY MEMORIAL LECTURE FUND

TESOL/TESL Teacher Training Certification Courses Intensive 60-Hour Program Classroom Management Techniques Detailed Lesson Planning ESL Skills Development Comprehensive Teaching Materials Interactive Teaching Practicum Internationally Recognized Certificate Teacher Placement Service Money-Back Guarantee Included Thousands of Satisfied Students

OXFORD SEMINARS 1-800-269-6719/416-924-3240

www.oxfordseminars.ca

(in the back, near the intersection of PE PEEL and DR. PENFIELD)

news@mcgilldaily.com

Check out theShagShop website:

www.mcgill.ca/StudentHealth/BOUTIQUE

Thursday, September 23 at 5:30pm The Rare Books and Special Collections Room 4th Floor, McLennan Library 3459 McTavish Street

free and democratic society’ – to use the words of the Canadian Charter.”

Sheppard did not state whether she thought the ban was constitutional or not.

Norris said the reaction to the bylaw from residents of the borough has been “overwhelmingly positive.” “[It is] the most popular thing we’ve done to date. Montrealers agree we should take pride in our city, not deface it with these kinds of eyesores.”

Write for News,

boom.

Erin Hudson

Letters

The McGill Daily | Monday, September 20, 2010 | mcgilldaily.com

7

The desire to compete is destroying McGill principles, and it is time for the students to teach the administration something about the nature of power.

Ryan Hughes Vice-President external, PGSS

Alumni purse strings tighten Dear Morton Mendelson, My name is Hilary Papineau and I am an ’07 graduate of the urban studies program. I am writing with great concern and dismay regarding the administration’s alleged closure of the much-loved Architecture Café. The Architecture Café is a unique and cherished study cove, source of healthy, sustainable and inexpensive snacks, and a gem of a café that is unique to McGill, in contrast with the sterile, corporate environment of Chartwells and its mass-produced food.

The Café is a gem that resonates with the values of students both current and former.

I urge the administration to include quality of life and principles of environmental stewardship and fair labour standards into its calculation of what it considers a sustainable operation.

As an alumna, I believe in the importance of giving back to the University that has given me so many opportunities; at the same time, I also believe that the University has a responsibility to make decisions that reflect the values of its students and alumni. I know that my personal contributions as well as others within my network of alumni will hinge on the administration’s support of decisions that are truly in line with a high-quality student life.

I therefore strongly urge the administration to take stronger efforts to address the fiscal management of the Café to keep this unique and beloved McGill institution up and running.

Sincerely, Hilary Papineau BA 2007 Urban Studies

Another alumna bemoans boarded-up Arch Café

Listen up, admin. It’s learning time

Mmm… delicious stale Aramark food

Dear Morton Mendelson and Marc Weinstein, I am writing to let you know how extremely disappointed I am that McGill has once again attempted to shut down the historical Architecture Café.

Although I am currently a student here, I am also an alumna twice over – I completed my BA (2004) and MA (2006) at McGill, in no small part thanks to the Architecture Café, where I spent long, 50-cent-coffeefueled hours with my studies. The Café’s atmosphere, fairly-traded goods, and locally produced sandwiches contributed to what I felt was a culture of friendly, small-scale community that has since been largely stamped out at McGill. The increasingly corporate attitude and presence on campus alienates those who, like myself, came to university looking for independent thinking – not only in the classroom, but also in campus life. That small café gave a place for people who might not fit in with the frosh-week/Gert’s crowd but who loved McGill because it provided a space for them.

As a student, I do not purchase my food at other campus establishments, nor will I start to do so – the prices are simply too high and I have no idea where any of the food comes from. As an alumna, this move on the part of McGill makes me think twice about whether I would want to donate money to McGill in the future – if my vision and my memories of the University, which I’m sure thousands share, are so carelessly discarded without consultation, why should I contribute? Why should I contribute to what I can see is the increasing corporatization and uniformization of my alma mater? I would want to contribute to keeping student-run, conscientious businesses like the Architecture Café afloat; I hope your decision turns out to be only a momentary mistake.

One of the biggest problems about being a student is the short lifespan. We come to university and spend a great deal of time learning about our various disciplines, and rarely understand how the university actually works until our senior years. We tend to know what is currently going on, but the past is often murky, so we are unable to root ourselves into a continuous history.

What went on a few years ago probably does not register with a freshman who accepts the reality of university life at the time of enrolment.

So, it is the responsibility of those who do remember or know of times gone by to inform other students how the culture of this University has changed over the past ten years.

McGill is aggressively pursuing cost-cutting measures, charging for services that were previously free, while selling off student culture and the mandate of our university to multinational corporations. For years, student life has been sacrificed for an obsession to place better on the scale of international rankings. This desire to compete is destroying McGill principles, and now it is time for the students of this great university to teach the administration something about the nature of power.

On Wednesday, September 22, 2010 there will be a rally to save the Architecture Café, but if anyone in the administration or faculty believes this protest is just about the closure of this studentrun “lemonade stand,” as it has been described by our Deputy Provost, Morton Mendelson, then it is clear you need to return to the classroom, because your lesson in discontent is about to begin.

Morton Mendelson claims that the Architecture Café was not “sustainable financially.” Until McGill admin releases the Architecture Café’s accounts, the student body cannot decide for itself whether these claims are fair. We must call upon Mendelson to release the accounts. While waiting for the release of these accounts, we students must ask questions about the underlying motivations at work, not just in the Arch Café case, but all of the administration’s policies affecting student life.

I’ll start off by pointing out that that among other functions, the Arch Café was a study space. I am wondering how Mendelson plans on converting the Architecture Café study space into a more financiallysustainable study space. We all know McGill cares a great deal about making revenue wherever it can, so I’m glad to give my suggestions. Perhaps the administration should charge a toll for entry to the study space?

After all, why should the whole student body “subsidize” heating and lighting for a study space only used by a few students? But let’s not stop raising money there; I suggest no entry into a library without purchase of one Aramark soup product. If you don’t like the selection in the Redpath Oasis, don’t worry, the Aramark McConnell cafeteria has a marginally different selection of Aramark soups to choose from. If you want a chocolate croissant, though, you’re out of luck.

The general feel amongst students is that McGill plans to monopolize the food services so that future food contracts can be sold at a higher price. The administration has a record of trampling student-run initiatives in that aim.

So the next time you’re waiting in line for a stale, overpriced Aramark sandwich, consider what policies your money is supporting.

Olivia Messer | The McGill Daily

Meredith Warren BA 2004, MA 2006 PhD Candidate – Greco-Roman Judaism

Ryan Hughes Vice-President external, PGSS

Guy Mark Lifshitz U5 Honours Computer Science

Let us know what you think! We always want to hear from you. Send your missives (300 words or less) to letters@mcgilldaily.com from your McGill email address. The Daily does not print letters that are misogynistic, racist, or otherwise hateful.

Commentary

The McGill Daily | Monday, September 20, 2010 | mcgilldaily.com

8

Our social system is endangered Citizens in need are increasingly forced to pay for necessary services Adrian Kaats Hyde Park

C

anada’s social systems are being systematically dismantled. There are two levels at which this process needs to be understood. At the “upper” level, we must consider what these systems are meant to do for society; this role is largely static. On the “lower” level, there is the physical implementation and management of the system, which is more dynamic and changing.

It is difficult to envision a state in which some combination of machinations from our legislature, economy, bureaucracy, or judiciary might accidentally cast an individual out of “society,” with re-entrance by her own means a near impossibility. It is easy, however, to imagine any number of scenarios whereby a person might, by no fault of her own, come to lack the material wealth, affluence, education, health, or will necessary to participate in society, and more fundamentally, to preserve her own dignity.

Broadly, the problems that persistently daunt societies include restrictions on access to physical and emotional health care, education, valuable employment, avenues of self-expression and selfdetermination, safety, and meaningful interactions with governance structures.

In the absence of publicly-supported systems designed to mitigate these problems, they grow.

Unchecked, they can evolve into insurmountable class gaps, oligarchies, and tyrannies, which serve to undermine dignity – perhaps the most important endowment of all.

At that upper level, we recognize that there is effectively a static body of needs which can

only be satisfied by acknowledging our interdependence: we are individuals who can only hope to guarantee that our needs may be more permanently addressed even when we ourselves falter, via the existence of robust and stable collective efforts. It is the cumulative contributions to this communal pot that allow an individual in a time of need to have access to a stable support system, even when that need may be protracted. At the upper level – what role the system should play in society – collective support is meant to nullify the transience of individual inputs and withdrawals.

At the lower level, we recognize that a number of factors involved in the physical implementation and management of our social systems are not necessarily static. The state of our society – its resources, capacities, needs, and aspirations – is not static, not deterministic (or at least does not

that these systems were born to satisfy. That is, managing the system shouldn’t change its goals.

Unfortunately, that is exactly what we are seeing: transient solutions to resource allocation problems are changing the very nature and purposes of the system for which these “solutions” are proposed.

Presently, the purported guardians of our social systems have concocted the idea of applying escalating “user fees” in order to access them. This is ostensibly being done to address shortfalls in public financing. It is an offence – both intellectually and emotionally – to suggest that those availing themselves of these systems should be made to financially support the system

have access to it, and those that can’t, don’t. These ideas are totally contrary to the founding principles of our social systems and must be fought vigorously.

A consequence of the current

Ol

ivi

a

M

es

se

r|

Th

e

M

cG

ill

Da

il y

appear to be), not homogeneous. This fact gives rise to a need for dynamic management of the physical life of our social systems. By this, I mean that we need to manage how, for example, our hospitals and schools operate on a day-to-day basis. However, we absolutely must resist the temptation to conflate the changes in these factors, and the requirements they impose on managing the system, with the static body of (perhaps more abstract) needs

that is supposed to be supporting them, precisely at the time when they shouldn’t be made to pay at all. This runs entirely contrary to the premise of such systems. This ideology seeks to turn our public social systems into businesses selling products to individuals and thus removing the systems from the collective pot. Such a commodification subjects these systems to the economic principles governing any business: those that can afford the product

Errata In the article “Med school scraps MCAT” (News, September 16), Saleem Razack was quoted as saying, “This is a far preferable outcome than having all institutions ignore their local stakeholders and result in the same cookie-cutter admissions process at every medical school.” In fact, it was Harold Reiter who made this statement.

In the article “The little black book” (Culture, September 13) Armand Frasco’s name was misspelled as Armand Franco. He started his blog in 2004, not 2009.

The Daily regrets the errors.

“management logic” is that the very mandate of these systems, and what they are meant to produce, is being all but disregarded.

Hospitals and schools are being cast as competitors within their respective arenas of service. What exactly they are competing for, and to what ends in the context of benefiting society, is not clear. Who are we competing against? And why are we competing at all? Aren’t our schools meant to educate people, and isn’t the purpose of research to advance the general state of

knowledge and understanding?

Who cares who publishes the paper first, who publishes the most papers, and how much cash can be generated? Competition is not what underlies education and research, and competition for a market share of the sick and dying is not health care. Sure, competition can be a useful tool for resource management, but it’s not the goal!

(With respect to post-secondary education, it has been demonstrated by the Institut de recherche et d’informations socio-économiques that the complete abolition of tuition fees in Quebec could be implemented with a 10-year annual increase of 0.2 per cent in Quebec’s budget. It would cost about $500 million per year, which is, compared to the province’s budget, peanuts. The entire notion of modulating a “user fee” – tuition fees – as a means to finance our post-secondary education system is pure nonsense used to distract from the real trajectory that this system is on: commodification of education, and transformation of the postsecondary education and health care systems from fundamental constituents of a socialized society into simply so many cogs in the economic apparatus.)

When this management logic comes to define the ends of a social institution, the institution is destroyed from the inside out, ultimately eroding the larger social system network. If instead we consider the principles from which these institutions arose, it becomes evident that the current path of commodification undermines their purpose. There should not exist a requirement to perform a “costbenefit analysis” when deciding to pursue an education, or open-heart surgery.

Adrian Kaats is a PhD II engineering student, and he is a member of several PGSS committees. The views expressed here are his own.

Write him at adrian.kaats@mail. mcgill.ca.

September 20, 2010 Dear Reader, Do you know how lonely I was this weekend? Really lonely. I want to hear what you did, I want to hear what you think of me. I need you to make me feel less alone, Reader... Write soon. Write soon!! Write sooooooon!!!! letters@mcgilldaily.com

Commentary

The McGill Daily | Monday, September 20, 2010 | mcgilldaily.com

9

Is “Jersey Shore” racist?

An Italian-Canadian considers MTV’s “guidos” Davide Mastracci Hyde Park

I

n the last few years, MTV has become known for its arsenal of reality TV shows which have essentially waged a war on the brain cells of millions of susceptible youth around the world. Its most recent spectacle, “Jersey Shore,” is no more thought provoking than past shows like “From G’s to Gents,” or “The Hills.” However, it has managed to accumulate a level of success unseen in the last couple of years on MTV, as well as a level of controversy unobserved among the channel’s prior shows.

The bulk of this controversy has been levelled against the representation of Italian-Americans in the show.

At the forefront of these claims of racism is Andre’ DiMino, the president of UNICO National, purportedly the largest Italian-American group in America. In the past, Andre’ has also protested such TV shows as “The Sopranos,” “Growing up Gotti,” and most recently, the video game “Mafia II.” In a public letter, DiMino expressed his frustration with media portrayals of Italian-Americans as either “bimbos and buffoons” as seen in “Jersey Shore,” or, “mobsters and mafiosi,” as seen in “The Sopranos” and “Mafia II.” I recognize that DiMino’s criticism of the show is well intended, however I cannot help but feel uneasy about his public statements and views. First of all, it is important to classify the scope of the show in terms of DiMino’s claims. The show contains no “real” – as in born in Italy – Italians. Instead, only those

born in the United States are represented. This distinction is critical, as “guidos” (the term for the faketanning, iron-pumping, club dwellers present in the show) are simply harder to find in Italy than a cast member of “Jersey Shore” with a three-digit IQ. However, this is not true in relation to the United States, where a large population of “guidos” does certainly exist, primarily on Staten Island, in Queens, and of course, on the Jersey Shore.

This is where DiMino’s argument begins to falter. He claims “Jersey Shore” attempts to portray all Italian-Americans as “bimbos and buffoons,” whereas, I believe it provides its weekly viewers with a look into the lives of an entertaining band of “bimbos and buffoons.” The difference between these classifications is that in reality, “guidos” do exist, but are a subculture of youth like skaters, not defined to a single race. DiMino’s claims that the show portrays “guidos” as a cancer affecting only the Italian-American community are utter trash. In fact, out of the eight original cast members on “Jersey Shore,” only four are completely ItalianAmerican. The other four represent a mix of Italian with Chilean, Polish, and Puerto Rican ancestry. One cast member “J-Wow” is entirely free of Italian descent, as she represents a mix of Irish and Spanish heritage.

Firsthand experience at clubs almost anywhere in the world will show that meatheads are not exclusive to one race or country. This experience evidently evades DiMino, however, as the sight of the grey haired UNICO president in a club, fist pumping or breaking out into an ecstasy-fuelled tecktonik trance would completely

Alex McKenzie | The McGill Daily

“Guidos:” what role do they play in the Italian-American community? warp a person’s mind for the rest of their existence.

As an Italian-Canadian, I’m all for UNICO National and other groups that focus on preserving Italian heritage. What UNICO should focus on, however, is emphasizing the accomplishments of the Italian-American community – not attempting to rid the mass media of representations of “gui-

dos,” within or without that community. This allows for a more accurate and fair depiction of the situation (no pun intended), with all factors considered.

Essentially, DiMino should have more confidence in ItalianAmericans, as the average human surely recognizes that the “guido” Italian-Americans are a minority. If this statement ever becomes false,

then it is obvious that the mass populace has deteriorated to the level of dumb beasts, in which case, the representation of Italian-Americans will be a minor issue in comparison to what humanity itself will face.

Davide Mastracci is a U0 Arts student. You can reach him at davide. mastracci@mail.mcgill.ca.

Do your job, Deputy Provost An open letter to Morton Mendelson Nicholas Dillon Hyde Park

H

ello, While I wish we could be confident that you know your duties as Deputy Provost (Student Life & Learning), it seems you have forgotten your role. Let me remind you of what your position entails: The Deputy Provost (Student Life & Learning) serves as a central liaison among the University’s senior administration, faculties, student organizations and Senate, with a view to ensuring that impact on student life and learning is factored into decision-making. The Deputy Provost also oversees the university-level academic quality control and international education.

Well, at present, the learning chunk is not of major concern; McGill’s place in the recent QS World University Rankings only changed negligibly, and – even

ignoring rankings and their attendant complications and biases – McGill’s research output is surely world class, and its academics likewise excellent. This is not to say that there aren’t large issues that need to be addressed, but these are less clear to me, so perhaps you’ve gotten the “& Learning” bit down with some adequacy. But student life?

Let’s review a key clause from above: “ensuring that impact on student life and learning is factored into decision-making.” Need I really say more? You failed to take into consideration the express wishes of both the Architecture Students’ Association specifically, and students wishes more generally; study space (which, based on the dimensions of the Café, would increase only marginally) is not “sorely needed.” Sure, libraries get cramped at certain times of the year, but that’s university life. And if you’re convinced that the minute confines of the Arch Café would drastically increase available study space – well, I’m certain that there’s

unused classroom space of equal dimension (read: small) that could be converted much more readily (read: with almost no changes at all) into mixed-used space. In any case, a key fact that you’re forgetting is this: the Architecture Café was already very much a study space. The fact that it didn’t feel like the basement of Burnside or the far-reaches of the stacks doesn’t mean it wasn’t functional. Comfort, coffee, and couches are a sure-fire way to increase GPAs, as far as I’m concerned. So the study space argument is a cop-out.

What is needed is a place for cohesive student interaction. We go to a big school where people disperse the second they leave class or campus.

It’s not always easy find a place on campus where you actually feel (really, truly) part of a community.

That said, let’s review another key role you are to fulfill: “Encourag[e] a strong sense of community for both current and future students.” I am doubtless not alone when I say that, for me, the Arch Café was one of

the few spots at McGill where that sense of community was always palpable. Though of course there are exceptions – well-run conferences, seminars, certain departments and majors, et cetera – the barrier between students unacquainted with one another seems at most times too sacrosanct to disturb here. Or at least that has been my experience – and the Architecture Café provided a welcome respite from that alienation, for which we all are responsible. You could sit for hours in LEA132, zombified by its size and the mutual detachment of everyone inside, and then leave, enter MacDonald-Harrington, and realize: it’s okay! Real people go here; you can even talk to them if you want. It didn’t matter that you might never speak to most of the other students and professors you encountered there; it was at least a possibility – and given the loyalty of the patrons, a very real one. It sure didn’t hurt that there was delicious and affordable food (11:00 a.m. brownies, anyone?), either.

I already mentioned why the “study space” argument is a poor one; based on the administration’s reluctance to furnish financial details of the Café’s operation, the financial unsustainability argument seems to be a bad bet, too.

By the sounds of it, the operation did break even. Without figures, we can’t be certain of this, but throwing around catch-phrases like “the University cannot afford to subsidize anyone’s lunch” helps no one, and is just patronizing.

So, all said, you have not only failed to take student considerations into the decision-making process, you have made a decision which adversely affects the student community for current and future McGill students. You are not fulfilling your role as Deputy Provost (Student Life & Learning).

Sincerely, Nicholas Dillon Nicholas Dillon is a U3 Cognitive Science student. You can reach him at nicholas.dillon@mail.mcgill.ca.

Science+Technology

The McGill Daily | Monday, September 20, 2010 | mcgilldaily.com

10

For the good of bacterial kind Researchers study survival strategies of antibiotic-resistant E. coli Alyssa Favreau The McGill Daily

A

lthough one wouldn’t expect to see caring tendencies in bacteria, a new study conducted at Boston University shows the behaviour of Escherichia coli organisms, commonly referred to as E. coli, in a surprising new light.

Published in the journal Nature on September 2, the study, “Bacterial charity work leads to populationwide resistance”, shows how certain antibiotic-resistant E. coli individuals share their resilience with their more vulnerable neighbours, unexpectedly acting to benefit others bacteria, even to the point of exhibiting something similar to altruism.

The researchers observed cultures of E. coli bacteria as they increased the levels of an antibiotic called norfloxacin present in their environment. Lead author Henry Lee says that “most bacteria were less resistant by themselves than the population as a whole.” Lee says that it was a surprise to find that only a few rare mutated individuals within the antibiotic-resistant population were actually capable of producing indole, an organic compound that stimulates the bacteria’s protective mechanisms and helps them pump out the fatal drugs.

Though all E. coli organisms are capable of making their own indole, their production mechanisms usually shut down when a stressor is introduced to their environment.

Some mutated bacteria are never aversely affected by the antibiotics’ presence and never stop producing

Abigail Howard with Olivia Messer |The McGill Daily

indole. Lee’s study suggests that they produce higher levels of indole than necessary in order to release it into their environment, enhancing the survival of the overall population.

The population-saving indole production comes at a cost for the resistant constituents. According to Hyun Youk, a biophysicist at MIT, by helping their non-resistant neighbours and

focusing their efforts on making the indole, the mutanted bacteria had fewer opportunities to grow. “They could have invested that energy for their own growth instead of using it to help out their non-resistant neighbours,” he said.

The researchers sequenced the genomes of the anti-biotic resistant E. coli and found that the compulsion

to share the indole seemed to be an innate feature, programmed into the bacteria at the genetic level. This natural altruism, though often observed in more complex animals and even in several plant species, is not commonly associated with the bacterial world.

According to Lee, though there have been cases of resource sharing found among bacteria, particularly those

residing together in aggregated biofilms – layers of bacteria – there is still a tendency to “discard the idea…, expecting [the bacteria] to fend for themselves.”

Although self-preservation is a biological imperative, “altruism is good for the survival of the species,” said Youk, and many species’ individuals will value the evolutionary fitness of their kind over their own. Kin selection, for example, refers to individuals that help their relatives reproduce successfully, even at the cost to their own personal reproduction.

Lee thinks that many aspects of his research point to kin selection, though the researchers are still exploring the possibility. The mutanted bacteria’s indole production seemed to benefit those individuals in their vicinity, as well as those with common genetic material.

Regardless of the purposefulness to the individual bacteria, the altruistic strategy may shed light on how doctors can counter antibiotic-resistant bacteria, and block indole pathways.

“The work is important because it shows how such a cunning strategy develops over a period of a few days,” explained Youk.

Lee added that helping doctors’ diagnoses is “definitely the goal,” and that their methodology could be helpful, since “testing a whole population versus testing individual bacteria is not the same.” Their study and ongoing research will hopefully help physicians understand the bacteria’s behaviour, bringing them closer to determining how much antibiotic is sufficient and how to better treat patients.

Rats, monkeys, and the human brain Prof discusses animal models in neurocognitive science as part of the Cutting Edge lecture series Debbie Wang Science+Technology Writer

D

espite rapid advancements in the field of neurocognitive science, many complexities of the human brain, the “last frontier” of the human body, remain elusive. Executing even a single function, such as vision, requires simultaneous cooperation of dozens of regions of the brain. Isolating and studying specific regions in the human brains is often costly, impractical, and sometimes impossible.

If the processes behind human behaviours are too complex to understand, can we study the processes

behind the behaviour of animals to shed light on that of humans?

At the September Cutting Edge science lecture titled “Dissecting the Components of Animal Behaviour as a Window into the Human Mind,” Yogita Chudasama, associate professor of psychology at McGill, discussed compelling evidence to support the viability of researching animal behaviour to shed light on that of humans.

Chudasama, whose main area of research is behavioural neuroscience, explained that the belief that animals are incapable of exhibiting complex behaviour akin to humans is quickly losing ground. Proof that rats are capable of performing intricate behavioural tasks suggests that

we can in fact use animal models to “decompose” the causes of compromised brain function.

A region of the brain that controls a specific behavior in rats is likely to control the same behavior in humans.

For example, the OFC region of the frontal cortex in both humans and rats is responsible for higher cognitive functions such as decision making.

Chudasama’s research has found that damage to this region impairs a rat’s propensity for “reversal leaning.” If a rat with OFC damage were to learn to associate choosing a door with a triangle on it with a reward, it would be nearly impossible for the rat to forget the correlation. Even when choosing the door with the triangle no longer

science. writing. science writing!

yields the reward, the rat will compulsively continue to choose that door.

Chudasama explained that humans with OFC damage also exhibit difficulty in reversal learning, as was shown in the Wisconsin card sorting experiment. The experiment tested the speed at which an individual can catch on to a change in rules in sorting a special set of cards.

When the experimenter changes the rules, a subject with OFC damage will not alter their method of sorting even if they are repeatedly informed they are sorting the cards incorrectly. This behavioural correlation between animals and humans with OFC damage supports the idea that animal models can be used to accu-

rately gauge human behaviour.

Further experiments in Chaudasuma’s lab use primate models, and have drawn parallels between damage in the pre-limbic system with memory impairment, as well as the connection between emotional reactions and the ability to adapt to an environment.

Chaudasuma thinks that information about the correlation between brain function in various mammals and humans will be invaluable in the ongoing quest to decode the enigmatic mystery of the human mind.

The next Cutting Edge lecture is on October 14 at 6 p.m. in the Redpath Auditorium.

scitech@mcgilldaily.com

Science+Technology

The McGill Daily | Monday, September 20, 2010 | mcgilldaily.com

11

Online communities: orcs to hand-knit scarves National Science Foundation gives grant to study creativity on the Internet Tom Acker The McGill Daily

T

he Internet is home to all kinds of creative communities. Two married researchers at Indiana University have recently been given a $686,000 grant from the U.S. National Science Foundation to map and model aspects of two major online communities – the craft-selling website Etsy, and the massive multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) “World of Warcraft.�

Jeffery Bardzell, assistant professor of Human Computer Interaction and Design, and Shaowen Bardzell, assistant professor of informatics, will look at how these sites have been successful in creating productive communities among their millions of users.

Their study will attempt to understand the organizational structures and communication frameworks needed to support these two massive creative collaborations. It may have applications in creating better design software, both for the sciences, and other areas of study.

Etsy offers a platform for its 650,000 artists to set up and main-

tain online stores, where they can sell their homemade crafts, art pieces, and clothing. Anyone can set up an account with the site to buy or sell crafts and vintage items. “There’s a lot of variety,� said a U2 Arts student and Etsy user who goes by the username “biancawarhol�. “It’s different because you can talk directly to a particular seller. I like it better than buying something from a huge store and having to deal with an automated 1-800 number.�

Bardzell and Bardzell plan to analyze the site in order to see how ideas of creativity and social understanding have developed in a predominately female community.

World of Warcraft, known to those in the community simply as “WoW, will provide a different lens with which to view online creativity.

With over 11.5 million users, WoW is one of the largest, and most popular, MMORPGs online. WoW allows users to create online avatars who can complete quests and battle other creatures to gain experience and “level up�. Players can also join guilds to interact with their peers.

Guilds organize a large number of users so that they can plan strategies, and a host of other in-game activities.

Classifieds

The researchers aim to analyze a specific subset of the WoW experience – a type of user-created movie called “machinima,� which uses gameplay footage to tell a story.

These videos are usually created by a handful of users and then uploaded to YouTube or other video sharing sites. Some of the more popular series have 100,000 or more hits each. The researchers will analyze these videos in order to get a better understanding of the form and it’s history. “The people who make movies are a small group as far as I know,� said U1 student Michael Fu, who was an active member of the WoW community up until a couple months ago. “They are similar to short films shot with real cameras, some of them are done using non-standard servers to be able to achieve camera angles not possible in-game. Some of them were quite creative.�

Nick Mudrick, a U1 Arts student, also recognized the creativity in the WoW community. “There are a lot of outlets with which to showcase a sense of creativity.

You’re required to manage your character in such a way as to be a member of a functional team,� he explained. “It’s a lot harder to do

Stacey Wilson for The McGill Daily

than you’d think. It requires a lot of time and strategizing, communication and cooperation.�

It’s exactly that kind of communication and cooperation that Bardzell and Bardzell are interested

in examining throughout the course of their study. The researchers hope the information will produce a better understanding of how the productivity of small-scale teams can be applied to large-scale models.

University of Ottawa

To place an ad, 2( $* () #/ # ()4-1!)(" 0(,+/ ,.& 5 -',+$

5 % 3

(+ -$./,+ " 2(/' 0 1(0$ ,+0.$ )

Cost: " ()) 01#$+0/ 0 # 4 # 4 %,. ,. *,.$ # 4/ $+$. ) -1!)(" # 4 # 4 %,. ,. *,.$ # 4/

# * , * %$&$, # * /$%% # *" ) * (',* , !(* '1 # * , *+ (. * ,# %$&$, *$ + $' %- , 0 +

+ (+, (-' + * !* ,# * , "(*$ + $' %-

(. *+ ,(* " &)%(1& ', *.$ + 2 * (* % (+, (-' ++('+ (-*+ + (,$ + (%-', *+ ,

CANADA COLLEGE www.collegecanada.com +4 @ +&1 &$ ,1./$ ',1. < A@ $.0(K " 0(,+ C$",&+(I$# !4 < @ + # A<=@ ( <= <= -.$- . 0(,+ 01#$+08/ 2(/ D(/ .$+$H ) 514-868-6262 info@collegecanada.com

(+0$ 0'$.(+$ E$/0 6 ,+0.$ ) FREE TANGO LESSONS A"0,!$.

9=.(# 4: 0

-* A"0,!$. 9E$#+$/# 4: 0 -* "

www "

e du Parc Viateur)

ć&#x2014;Ľć&#x153;ŹčŞ&#x17E;ă&#x201A;&#x2019;ĺ&#x2039;&#x2030;埡ă &#x2014;ă Śă &#x201E;ă&#x201A;&#x2039;ă&#x20AC; č&#x2039;ąčŞ&#x17E;ă&#x192;ťă&#x192;&#x2022;ă&#x192;Šă&#x192;łă&#x201A;ščŞ&#x17E; ă Žă&#x192;?ă&#x201A;¤ă&#x192;Şă&#x192;łă&#x201A;Źă&#x192;Ťă Şă&#x201A;Ťă&#x192;&#x160;ă&#x192;&#x2021;ă&#x201A;Łă&#x201A;˘ă&#x192;łďź&#x2019;äşşă &#x152;ć&#x2014;Ľ ć&#x153;Źäşşç&#x2022;&#x2122;ĺ­Śç&#x201D;&#x;ă Žďź&#x201C;äşşç&#x203A;Žă Žă&#x201A;ˇă&#x201A;§ă&#x201A;˘ă&#x192;Ąă&#x201A;¤ă&#x192;&#x2C6;ă&#x201A;&#x2019;ć&#x17D;˘ ă &#x2014;ă Śă &#x201E;ă žă &#x2122;ă&#x20AC;&#x201A;ă&#x201A;˘ă&#x192;&#x2018;ă&#x192;źă&#x192;&#x2C6;ă Żă &#x160;ć´&#x2019;č?˝ă Şă&#x192;&#x2014;ă&#x192;Šă&#x192;&#x2C6; ă&#x192;źĺ&#x153;°ĺ&#x152;şă Žă&#x192;­ă&#x192;źă&#x192;Şă&#x201A;¨é§&#x2026;ă &#x2039;ă&#x201A;&#x2030;1ĺ&#x2C6;&#x2020;㠧䞿ĺ&#x2C6;Šă&#x20AC;&#x201A;ă &#x160; é&#x192;¨ĺą&#x2039;ă Ż10ć&#x153;&#x2C6;ďź&#x2018;ć&#x2014;Ľă &#x2039;ă&#x201A;&#x2030;ĺ&#x2026;Ľĺą&#x2026;ĺ?Żč&#x192;˝ă&#x20AC;&#x201A;厜čł&#x192;ă Ż ďź&#x201E;495ďź?ć&#x153;&#x2C6; ďź&#x2C6;ć&#x161;&#x2013;ć&#x2C6;żă&#x192;ťé&#x203A;ťć°&#x2014;ă&#x192;ťă&#x201A;¤ă&#x192;łă&#x201A;żă&#x192;źă&#x192;?ă&#x192;&#x192;ă&#x192;&#x2C6;ă&#x192;ť é&#x203A;ťčŠąäťŁčžźă żďź&#x2030; G,# * /0,.$ &* () ",*

Housing classifieds are FREE for McGill students! <* () 1/ H(0' 4,1. + *$ " ()) >; +1*!$. +# ") //(K $# 0$30 0 ##$/(&+ # ()4-1!)(" 0(,+/ ,.& +# H$ H()) ## (0 0, ,1. ,+)(+$ ") //(K $#/ - &$ %.$$ ,% "' .&$ mcgilldaily.com/classifieds

80â&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Re-wind Party Friday Sept.24 Theatre Lâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;Olympia 8 PM. =$ 01.(+& )(2$ /',H !4 C("G -.(+&K $)# J?$//($8/ (.)L D > B .$/$.2$# /$ 0/ 1- "),/$ 2 () !)$ -$. 0("G$0 )) * F,. ".$#(0 " .#/ ""$-0$# $00$. 1/(+$// 1.$ 1 $*!$.

7 1 . +0$$#

: /3&0) *-"52o qt@qualityplustickets.com www.ticketsolutionsmontreal.com The Strawbs! @(2$ (+ ",+"$.0 B.,&.$//(2$ .,"G &.,1- %.,* <+&) +# Thursday Oct.7th Outremont Theatre B .$ 0 .$/$.2$# /$ 0/ 2 () !)$ -$. 0("G$0 $00$. 1/(+$// 1.$ 1 $*!$.

7 1 . +0$$#

: /3&0) *-"52o qt@qualityplustickets.com www.ticketsolutionsmontreal.com Montreal Canadiens Tickets Available Here! ;( $.$+0 ,-0(,+/ ,.# !)$ -.("$/ $00$. 1/(+$// 1.$ 1 $*!$.

7 1 . +0$$#

: /3&0) *-"52o qt@qualityplustickets.com www.ticketsolutionsmontreal.com

Study Law in the National Capital Obtain a uOttawa JD degree in either English or French with a concentration in 8 8

Social Justice International Law

8 Law and Technology 8 Environmental Law

Or take advantage of our many joint programs,* including 8 8 8 8 8

JD/LLL (National Program) with uOttawaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Civil Law Section JD/LLL (Programme de droit canadien) with uOttawaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Civil Law Section JD/MBA with uOttawaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Telfer School of Management Canadian & American Dual JD with Michigan State University College of Law or with American University Washington College of Law JD/MA with Carleton Universityâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Norman Paterson School of International Affairs

*You may be eligible for financial aid through the HENNICK LEADERSHIP PROGRAM .

We also offer LLM and PhD programs.

Application deadline: November 1, 2010 For more information:

www.commonlaw.uOttawa.ca

Hi there! The sci+tech section needs columnists.

MASTER SCHOOL OF BARTENDING .0$+#(+& +# 0 !)$ /$.2("$ ",1./$/ 01#$+0 .$! 0$ ?,! .$%$.$+"$ /$.2("$ : 514-849-2828 www.Bartend.ca (online registration possible)

Submit a short vision statment, two 500 word sample columns, and one additional writing sample by midnight on Friday September 24th. Email for more info.

Love, scitech@mcgilldaily.com

Sports

The McGill Daily | Monday, September 20, 2010 | mcgilldaily.com

12

Down for the count Restructuring of McGill Athletics leave teams without support from the University Erin O'Callaghan The McGill Daily

L

ast April, twenty McGill sports teams lost their varsity status. Due to budget cuts and restructuring of the department, McGill Athletics said they simply did not have the money to support the original 49 varsity teams. Combined with a reduction of $147,000 to the Intercollegiate Operating Budget, the department was forced to effect cost-saving changes to the program.

Geoffrey Phillips, Sport Programs Manager, wrote in an email to The Daily, “The McGill sport model is reviewed every five years in order to ensure that all teams still meet their competitive mandate and that all resources (physical, financial, and human) are utilized effectively.

Through this exercise we determined that the demands from our 49 varsity teams and competitive clubs exceeded our ability to adequately manage the program in its current structure.”

Phillips went on to explain that Ontario University Athletics (OUA) and the Quebec Student Sports Federation (QSSF), provincial sporting organizations, re-evaluated what programs they offer and have set out a new operational path for the future. “The OUA has removed league play in several sports which leaves our squash, tennis, figure skating, and women’s lacrosse with no comparable university league within which to compete,” wrote Phillips. “These teams, with [the] help of Campus Recreation, are currently reassessing their competitive options to decide how to operate within the new structure.”

Despite Phillips’s insistence that head coaches and club executives received advance warning that restructuring of the varsity program was pending, many teams say that they were blindsided by the decision to be cut from the varsity program.

Wayne Mah, a research assistant in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology and the former coach of the McGill wrestling team, expressed dismay at not being given any warning prior to the loss of varsity status. The Intercollegiate Office cited lack of competitors as a reason for revoking varsity status.

“If I had known our lack of competitors was a problem,” wrote Mah in an email to The Daily. “I could have urged them to compete to ensure the survival of the team.”

Tier three sports teams had to wrestle with the McGill administration.

In the case of the wrestling team, the loss of varsity status means more than just the loss of access to the varsity weight room, access to the Windsor Clinic available to varsity athletes for medical issues, or having students on the student-athlete honour roll. Without varsity status, the wrestling team has had to fold due to lack of funding, equipment, and practice time. Yet, McGill only provided the team with the practice space and time; the team received their funding and equipment from Wrestling Canada.

“When the McGill Wrestling team was a varsity team…the athletes were not funded and I was not funded by McGill as the coach,” wrote Mah. “The only funding we received was at the end of the season to compete at the CIS [Canadian Interuniversity Sports] Championships. McGill would pay for those who qualified to attend this tournament.” Wrestling Canada provided the team with a wrestling mat essential to their survival, and an annual coaching grant, of which Mah used only a portion for his salary, saving the rest for the operation of the team. However, after the team’s var-

sity status was revoked, Mah was no longer eligible for the coaching grant, as it is only given to teams that compete in the CIS. Wrestling Canada also took back the wrestling mat it had lent the team. Without funding, equipment, and practice time, the team no longer exists.

While the case of the wrestling team is one of the more extreme examples of the consequences of losing varsity status, every team The Daily spoke with has been negatively affected by the decision.

“It’s kind of like a slap in the face all of the sudden,” said Marilyn Fontaine, a U2 Anatomy and Cell Biology student and assistant coach for the McGill Cheerleading team.

“I understand that not everyone can be the elite, but we don’t get funding from the school, [the decision] doesn’t change how much money [McGill Athletics] put into us.”

The McGill Men’s Volleyball team was another team drastically affected by the loss of varsity status. As a Tier 2 varsity team, they had received a $70,000 budget last year, according to Ryan Brant, a U4 Economics student and former play-

er and assistant coach for the team last year. However, Brant said that the administration made it difficult to look at the budget to see exactly where money was being spent.

Justin Cruanes, a U3 Economics student and treasurer of the McGill sailing team, expressed frustration with the system as well. “We’ve been making progress in every domain, everything is going perfectly well for us, and now we’re being punished for it.”

“The big blow was when it was suggested [at a meeting on September 1] that we leave and become a SSMU club,” stated Alex Fyfe, a U3 Economics student and president of the McGill Sailing team.

While he said the team had heard the rumours of reorganization, Fyfe explained that at first, losing varsity status did not sound so bad. “[We were] told [at a meeting in May] that we would have the same funding, that there would be opportunity for more funding…and told that travel regulations would probably be relaxed,” he said. The reality this fall is very different. Instead of receiving their regular $400 funding from McGill

Take your talents to South Beach.

Write for Sports. sports@mcgilldaily.com

Matthew Milne | The McGill Daily

Athletics, the team must instead pay a fee of $100 to belong to the competitive club league and retain the McGill name, and travel regulations are even stricter. Teams relegated to the newly-created competitive club league are struggling with whether it is beneficial to remain associated with McGill Athletics. “There is no way to play our sport in the venues that exist in this part of the world with the [travel] restrictions we face right now,” stated Danji Buck-Moore, a U2 Music and Political Science student and former president of the McGill Ultimate Frisbee team.

Despite the McGill Athletics mandate encouraging the involvement of students in athletics, the cut to varsity teams and the new regulations put in place seem to do anything but that. While budgetary issues came up last year and cuts inevitably had to be made to the varsity program, the manner in which the administration went about these cuts highlights major issues of communication between teams and the administration, and calls into question whether the administration has the athletic teams’ best interests at heart.

13

Sports

The McGill Daily | Monday, September 20, 2010 | mcgilldaily.com

Return of the King The Daily interviews NBA star Samuel Dalembert on his involvement with Haiti relief efforts Madeleine Cummings The McGill Daily

T

he “NBA Jam Session” came to Montreal this past weekend, transforming the corner of Maisonneuve and de la Montagne into a bustling basketball-themed square. NBA player and former Montreal resident Samuel Dalembert, now playing for the Sacremento Kings, appeared on the scene at 4:00 p.m. for a short Q and A and autograph session. Just prior to this event, I sat down with Dalembert to talk about basketball, his family in Haiti, and education.

Dalambert was born in Portau-Prince, Haiti, but emigrated to Canada when he was 14. While living in Montreal, he attended Lucien-Pagé High School in Park Extension. Later he competed in the FIBA (International Federation of Basketball) Americas Championship for Canada, but quickly moved south, attending Seton Hall University in New Jersey. During his second year at Seton Hall, Dalembert was drafted into the NBA with only six years of experience in the sport.

Nevertheless, he quickly became famed for his exceptional talent as a defensive player.

At 6’11”, with a massive wingspan of 90.5”, Dalembert towers above most of his fans, but his personality isn’t nearly as intimidating. Softspoken and humble, Dalembert spoke candidly about his connection to Haiti. “I was born there, my family’s there... They were going through the same thing that the whole country was going through,” he said. During last year’s earthquake in, his family’s house in Port-au-Prince collapsed, forcing them out on the streets.

Feeling a responsibility to Haiti as a native, Dalembert has been a significant contributor to the country’s relief efforts. Throughout his career, he has given over $72,000 to the country, including $20,000 after the earthquake. In 2007, he also started the Samuel Dalembert Foundation, which aims to give underprivileged Haitian children academic and athletic opportunities.

Dave Huehn for The McGill Daily

NBA star Samuel Dalembert signs autographs at event in Montreal.

“It’s the least I can do .... I’m just giving back and most importantly, keeping that small door open so that the next [person] can come and do better than me,” he said.

Dalembert had just recently returned from a trip to Haiti where he was visiting his family. “They were sleeping under tents for six months, so I got another place built very quickly,” he said. After moving his family into a house with his close friends, he helped out at a camp, organizing activities for peoples’ children and bringing food.

“The little things will mean a life for them,” he said.

The foundation’s latest project is to open a school and sports academy in Haiti. Dalembert hopes the school will help underprivileged children in the long-term. “I want to start the kids when they’re little and to keep the same kids at the same school all the way through to university.... I want to make sure we grab them because I don’t want them to lose track of anything.”

Dalembert is designing a system of education that blends sports with academics in order to maximize the amount of opportunities for underprivileged children and envisions a circular process in which gradu-

ates mentor younger students. Even successful adults who make a living for themselves outside Haiti, he argued, have a responsibility to go back and give back. He hopes to see more children rise to or even surpass his level of success, though his size 16 shoes might be hard to fill. He has planned various phases of fundraising and hopes work will start on the school in March.

When asked about the “NBA Jam Session,” Dalembert explained that events like this allow organizers to get a feel for Canadian communities and their level of enthusiasm toward basketball. Though there is

only one Canadian team in the NBA, Dalembert feels that this could very well change in the future. The crosscountry “NBA Jam Session” tour is hailed as “a free interactive basketball festival,” with family-friendly activities, dance workshops, giveaways, and special appearances. Yet at Saturday’s event, basketball took the backseat to corporate cheerleading and products. It seems that his humanitarian work had no place at an event like this, which was a shame. But of course, Dalembert being surrounded by sponsors promotes his celebrity, giving him the power to give back.

McGill Daily Sports online at mcgilldaily.com/sports and on Twitter @thedaily_sports

mcgilldaily.com almost daily.

Culture

The McGill Daily | Monday, September 20, 2010 | mcgilldaily.com

14

A tiff in the Canadian film industry Quebecois film makers are heading for Hogtown Lyndon Entwhistle The McGill Daily

N

ow in its 35th year, the ever-burgeoning Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) is living up to the name ‘Festival of Festivals’ under which it was founded. Critic Roger Ebert famously touted TIFF to be “just as great” as the prestigious Cannes Film Festival, the French venue where good films that few people will ever see, made by directors that most people never have heard of, compete for the Palme d’Or. The big and brawny TIFF is instead seen as the opening of Oscar season. The last three Best Picture winners – No Country for Old Men, Slumdog Millionaire, and The Hurt Locker – all played at TIFF. Unfortunately for Quebec’s moviegoers, however, TIFF’s appeal is causing a decline in the number of Quebec films making their North American premieres in Quebec.

“The Toronto International Film Festival has effectively displaced Montreal festivals in terms of marketability,” said Alanna Thain, assistant professor in McGill’s English department. TIFF’s pervasive influence was highlighted earlier this month by the underwhelming attendance at the typically highprofile Festival des Films du Monde in Montreal, the only Canadian festival besides Toronto accredited by the Fédération Internationale des Associations de Producteurs de Films, a Paris-based cinema watchdog. “It’s a business decision,” Quebec producer Kevin Tierney told the Gazette about his decision to debut his film Good Neighbours at TIFF. “In the highly competitive world that is international film festivals…decisions are made based on where the international buyers are. They are in Toronto. They are not in Montreal.”

Anna Foran for The McGill Daily

When it comes to funding, Montreal cannot compete with the financial lure of Toronto. as Sundance are no longer where undiscovered films go to be discovered,” said Thain. In the mix of 400 entries making the final cut at this year’s TIFF, which runs September 9 to 19, are 18 French-language films

by Quebec filmmakers. Only seven Quebec feature films played at the 2010 Festival des Films du Monde.

As it stands, this is not an immediate cause of concern for

“[TIFF] has effectively displaced Montreal festivals in terms of marketability” Alanna Thain McGill professor The importance of major festivals, such as TIFF, for a movie’s marketability has been heightened because of what Thain explained as “the consolidation of what used to be a dispersed market in terms of independent and art cinema”. TIFF does not hesitate to line up avantgarde films alongside major studios’ Oscar hopefuls. “Festivals such

the Quebec film industry. “Quebec is a unique case, for unlike the Canadian film industry it has its own identity and audience,” said Thain. “Filmmakers can have commercially viable products based solely on the Quebec market.”

Bon Cop, Bad Cop, the tale of two policemen – one anglophone, one francophone – overcoming their

linguistic prejudices and catching the bad guys, is the most commercially successful Canadian film to date. Made for the relatively small sum of $8 million, its box office take dwarfed that of Paschendale, the most expensive Canadian film ever made.

While this particular achievement is due more in part to the fact that Paschendale is an abysmal wartime melodrama, Quebec film still has much to be proud of. Three of Quebecois filmmaker Denys Arcand’s movies were nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the Oscars, and his Les Invasions barbares actually picked up the statuette. Twenty-one-year-old Montreal wunderkind Xavier Dolan’s film Les Amours imaginaires, his second in as many years, was praised at Cannes this May. Critics and scholars consistently cite Claude Jutra’s Mon oncle Antoine as the greatest Canadian film of all time.

For a film to officially qualify as a Canadian production under federal audiovisual promotion agency Telefilm Canada – and to receive the accompanying funding – it must be eligible to receive

a minimum number of Canadian content points. These are allotted when nationals fill positions such as director, writer, and lead actors.

The film’s production team must also be Canadian. This last restriction is particularly daunting for upand-coming Canadian filmmakers, who cast envious looks south of the border toward Hollywood’s bulging pockets. Many of our country’s finest filmmakers have migrated, including Paul Haggis (Crash) and Jason Reitman (Up in the Air).

The most notable case of Anglo-Canadian talent going south is James Cameron, raised in Kapuskasing, Ontario, and director of the epic blockbusters Avatar and Titanic – respectively the two highest-grossing films ever made.

His compatriot Atom Egoyan (The Sweet Hereafter), however, warned the Canadian film industry about following Avatar’s example. “We can’t make a film with that sort of budget,” he recently told a Cannes panel. “It would completely drain us in one fell swoop”. Dolan, speaking at the same panel, claimed that far from being a stumbling block, budgetary restrictions can actually

inspire creativity. “What is great with these low budgets is that they conveniently serve the creativity of the film and allow you to go places you would not naturally go,” he said.

The temptation for Hollywoodsized budgets is perhaps easier to resist for Quebec filmmakers working in French, knowing that Frenchlanguage films will never be given wide releases in non-francophone markets and, as a consequence, will never be soaked in funds. Of course, lack of recognition – especially on one’s own continent – serves as a deterrent to continue working in French. This problem is not especially new for Quebec filmmakers, but the nearby TIFF’s growing reputation as a festival swarming with distributors hungry for quality content – Juno, for example, grossed over $145 million despite its small budget ($8 million before advertising) and lack of spectacle – might exacerbate it. On top of simply vexing the province’s festivalgoers, TIFF’s new Hollywood status could prompt a decline in the production of Quebecois French-language films.

Culture

The McGill Daily | Monday, September 20, 2010 | mcgilldaily.com

15

Locavorus Montreali How to eat local on- and off-campus Joan Moses The McGill Daily

T

he term “locavore” was first used in 2005 to describe a group of San Franciscans who chose to only eat food grown within 100 miles of their city. The original movement was a statement against global food distribution systems, and in support of more sustainable, healthy, and socially productive local food networks. Since then, their ideas have spread considerably.

There are now groups around the world that embrace their ethos and identify themselves as locavores.

But how accessible is this growing food movement for students?

Local food has a reputation for being expensive and inaccessible. The very term “locavore” conjures up an image of yuppie parents crowding their hybrid SUVs into Whole Foods parking lots. This image, though, does not reflect the realities of the locavore movement as it exists in Montreal or at McGill.

Warren Huard, a member of Greening McGill – an organization that promotes environmental initiatives at McGill – asserts that local food is “fairly easy to get, especially at McGill”. Students can buy local produce from a number of sources on the McGill campus. The student organization Organic Campus sells local produce and food items every Tuesday outside of the Shatner building, and a variety of local farmers sell their crops at the McGill Farmers’ Market, which is open in Three Bares Park every Wednesday afternoon through October.

A number of places off-campus in Montreal also provide local produce.

Katherine Gray-Donald, a professor at McGill’s School of Dietetics and

Human Nutrition said, “local food is not more expensive when one goes to big competitive markets such as Jean-Talon.” Sunday mornings at Jean-Talon host a diverse group of customers, shopping for their week’s groceries as local buskers play cheerful polkas on the accordion.

If taking the metro to a farmers’ market seems too inconvenient, students can still get local food through participation in a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm. CSA farms operate as a collaboration between food growers and consumers. At the start of the season, a consumer can pay for a share of the harvest, which is given to them in installments of weekly food baskets over the course of the growing season. A number of these farms operate in and around Montreal, delivering produce to almost all areas of the city.

This support of urban farming is echoed in the land policy of the city of Montreal. Eighteen city boroughs of Montreal offer plots of lands for their residents to use for gardening, and a number of these employ a gardening instructor and provide basic materials for enthusiastic amateurs. On campus, the McGill student organization Campus Crops encourages students to add more local food to their diets by, in the words of its summer garden coordinator Maddie Guerlain, offering students “hands-on, experiential learning” about how to maintain their own gardens.

Despite these resources, though, eating locally is not without its challenges. Gray-Donald suggests that “the biggest challenge is the staple foods…[such as] grains and rice are not local”. There are other food groups that pose problems too – affordable local cheeses and meats

Montreal has varied options for finding local food. tend to be more difficult to find than affordable local vegetables. These realities – along with the difficulty of finding locally- produced food in the winter in the cold climate of Quebec – can limit the locavore diet. GrayDonald stated that, to make this

diet feasible, one “need[s] to know at least five different ways to prepare the same food,” – a daunting requirement for most students.

Because of these difficulties, it is tricky for most students to take the same plunge as the original

Alex McKenzie for The McGill Daily

locavores, and vow to only eat food grown within 100 miles of Montreal.

Yet, the accessibility of local food in Montreal should allow students to supplement their diets with locally grown produce, and take part in this growing movement.

Monkeying around with evolution New novel falls short of solving the great scientific controversy of our time Tim Gentles The McGill Daily

T

he conflict between science and religion is one of today’s most lively political issues, and is the source of many a vigorous debate. Mark Laxer’s brand new novel, The Monkey Bible, attempts to intervene in this debate and achieve something of a reconciliation between Darwinist and creationist positions.

The novel follows a deeply devout young man as he comes to terms with the fact that due to a sinister and top-secret government experiment, his genealogy may not be entirely human. The experiences that follow from this revelation lead him to question the rigid divide between humans and animals, as well as the Church’s posi-

tion on where evolution fits into the picture of what it is to be human.

Such an educational and reconciliatory premise for a novel is of course commendable and politically incisive. The real trouble, and where Laxer seriously falters, is being able to pull this kind of thing off with any nuance or aplomb.

Far too often, The Monkey Bible reads like a thinly (or noteven-remotely)-veiled polemic for the inherent good of science and scientists. This is not to say that this reviewer necessarily disagrees with the sentiment, but it is this vitriolic quality of the book that cuts through and overwhelms anything that might make it enjoyable to read, such as a compelling plot, character development, convincing dialogue, or any of the other niceties that one might expect from decent fiction.

Instead the reader is left with

an endless series of conversations between the novel’s characters on biology and evolution that read like Socratic dialogues (with all the condescension, but none of the wit) instead of furthering the story. Each minor plot development seems to occur only as an excuse for Laxer to have one of his characters wax lyrical for ten pages on something that bothers him. Random diatribes recur as motifs, like one of the protagonists’ hatred of cellphones: “Cell phone users have become more than a nuisance – they’ve taken over the global airwaves in cities, airports, supermarkets, classrooms, bathrooms, and remote sites in nature. You can’t get away from them!”

Such is the novel’s main failure; its seeming inability to function as anything other than a forum for Laxer’s own rather patronising lec-

tures. This also manifests itself in an infuriating tendency to erect straw men as convenient interlocutors so that the characters can further expound upon the infinite goodness of science. The main villains in the novel are a neo-Nazi and a postmodernist university professor, and both are set up as two-dimensional figures of anti-rationality, transparently functioning only to further Laxer’s own agenda. What else could explain his brutal and basically arcane parody of deconstruction? “They represent science and rocks and male phalo-gender-plenipotentiary-istic hardness…The selfreferential Derridarian [sic] ploy of non-linguistic intercourse proves, through the power struggles of the Euroneuro-phallically challenged, that there can exist no meaningful communication.”

The particular view of science

that is espoused in The Monkey Bible – as infinitely rational, nobly devoted to the pursuit of truth, and above all posing scientists as paternal overseers of humanity – strikes me as somewhat problematic, if not rather insidious. It deifies science and ultimately evacuates any legitimacy from critiques of certain aspects of science, such as its professed neutrality. Laxer’s book, in this sense, doesn’t so much reconcile, or explore the intersections between, science and religion, as much as it sends a strong message that science and religion can coexist, as long as religion knows its place.

The book also comes with an accompanying music CD by “an unwavering optimist who believes in the power of positive music with all this heart and soul,” if you’re into that kind of thing.

Compendium!

The McGill Daily | Monday, September 20, 2010 | mcgilldaily.com

17

Lies, half-truths, and a song in our hearts

DAILY TO COME OUT WITH SPECIAL “THREE-D.” EDITION

The winner of The Daily’s protest song contest!

NOT TO BE OUTDONE BY SO-CALLED “CBC,” WHICH PLANS ON BROADCASTING IMAGES OF MONARCH THIS EVENING DAILY EDITORS DEEM BROADCASTER “MBC:” MONARCHIST BROADCASTING NETWORK

Ivanna Bedonkadonk | The McGill Daily

We had ourselves a café, Ran it on our own Before you higher powers Closed our café down

Télésphore Sansouci The McGill Daily

S

ome call it “three dimensions.”

Others, “Three-D.” Still more: “the triple D,” or “DDD.” Whatever way you slice the ham, this powerful trifecta of dimensions is currently being mobilized by the tax-payer-funded “Canadian” Broadcasting Corporation for nefarious ends indeed – diffusing Three-D. images of the usurper monarch, the most notorious Elizabeth Windsor (alias: Queen Elizabeth II!!!!).

That the more properly titled Monarchist Broadcasting Corporation (henceforth: MBC) does not even deign to send to our television screens images of our noble country’s Vice-Reine, Michaëlle Jean, is an affront to all true patriots of Upper and Lower Canada. One that must be protested!

You say we don’t make profit That the cause for us is lost Good ol’ administration Will take care of our lot.

#

Look at this photo with special “Three-Dee” Looking-glasses and it will appear in three dimensions (length, width, height)!

This reporter encourages you to protest the airing of the “threedimensional” images of this unlawful, unjustified Imperatrix by DESTROYING YOUR TELEVISION BOXES AT PRECISELY 8:00 POST

MERIDIEM ON MONDAY – TONIGHT! LONG LIVE THE REPUBLIC OF CANADA! LONG LIVE DEMOCRACY! DOWN WITH THE QUEEN!!!!!

Across

∃

%

&

∋

(

!#

!∃

!%

!&

!∋

!(

!)

∀∗

∀%

∀∋

#∋

∀) #%

#(

%∀

!∀

#∗

#!

#∀

#&

∃∀ ∃%

∃∃

%!

!!

#)

∃!

∃∋ %∗

∀(

#∃

##

∃#

!∗

∀#

∀&

∃∗

)

∀!

∀∀ ∀∃

We don’t believe a word; Your contracts show the truth.

But student-run will flourish No matter what you do.

Bikuta Tangaman | The McGill Daily

The Crossword Fairies ∀

(The lyrics are to the tune of “Which side are you on?” by Florence Reece.)

Which side...

Happy autumnal equinox !

Don’t forget to sing this song at the Arch Café rally on Wednesday, September 22 at 2:00 p.m. in front of Leacock!

Which side are you on?

Which side are you on?

Which side are you on?

Which side are you on?

∃&

∃(

∃) %#

%∃

%%

%(

%)

&∗

&!

&∀

&#

&∃

&%

&&

%&

%∋

1. Absinthe flavouring 5. In__tion, summer blockbuster 8. Belittle 13. Bananas 14. Star explosion with super 15. Beta follower 16. Bohr’s study 17. Sheikh 18. Hodgepodges 19. Environmentalist’s Holy Grail 22. Hawaiian tuber 23. Golf ball prop 24. Is appropriate to 27. ___-di-dah 29. What’s expected 33. Japanese cartoon art 34. Sword of Damocles?

36. Edgar Allen 37. Environmental consequence of overpopulation 40. Zero time difference zone 41. Matchmaker 42. Meanders 43. Facility 45. What’s up?

46. All over again 47. After expenses 49. Pencil case 50. Being indecisive 58. Historic Nile area

The author of these lyrics wishes to remain anonymous.

Which side...

We just want our coffee And we don’t need your hell, Or all the excuses; The lies that you tell.

59. Volcanologist’s study 60. Neck of the woods 61. Crème de la crème 62. Mars, to the Greeks 63. Castle part 64. Papier-mache adhesive 65. Affirmative 66. Schools of thought

31. Crucifix 32. Deshent person 34. Rosy hue 35. Obedient 38. Cantankerous 39. Japanese chicken, beef, or salmon 44. Beat the draft?

46. Book of maps 48. Gladden 49. Overhangs 50. Ginger cookie 51. ___ hoop 52. Sacred wading bird 53. Kill, epically 54. Tortoise racer 55. Angers 56. Natural pesticide 57. Holes

Down 1. Winged 2. Post-It 3. Representation 4. When we should hang out 5. Food deal 6. Bad to the bone 7. Peel a pear 8. Past, archaic 9. Whale teeth 10. Late-night falafel stop 11. E.P.A. concern 12. Like pie?

14. Approaches 20. Diluted 21. Set of principles 24. Scout reward 25. There’s no nice way of saying this 26. Angry hands 27. Righty tighty, ____ loosey 28. Opera solo 30. Express

Solution to “Dress to Impress” ! ∋ ! %

∀ + , ∋

1 . & 0 !

+ & 4 ∋ #

( !

4 !

2 ∋ ( #

# ∃ % ∋ , ∋ ∋ ! & # 0 & ) 1 ∋ 2 ∋ ( . , + + # , ∃ ∋ # , . ! ∋ + . , 0 , , & + − ! + ( ) , # ∋ & )

& + ∋ .

& + / ( )

% ∋ . & , !

+ ∋ ) 1 , 3 # ∋ / 3 + ! ∋ 0 + 5 , ∋ , + ! + 4 ,

∋ − ,

( + + , 3 ∀ ∗ ( / . ,

) & ∀ +

∗ . , 1

!

0 ( ∀ ) + , / , ∋ 4 ! # , 0 , , ( . , + 2 , & # ! & ) ! % ( + , ∋ . !

3 0 . &

% , ! ! + , ! ) ! ! ) & 5

RENDEZ-NOUS NOTRE GIVE US BACK OUR Use this sign during the rally to save Arch CafĂŠ! The rally will be held on Wednesday, September 22 at 2:00 p.m. in front of the Leacock building.

Bring this ad for a FREE pair of clear disposable contact lenses!

OPTIQUE

MCGILL STUDENTS AND STAFF Eye examinations given by an ASEQ Authorized Optometrist

TOWN

Dr. A. Wootten

CONTACT LENSES & EYEGLASSES BEST PRICE IN TOWN!

ONLY A FEW STEPS AWAY...

1460 Sherbrooke W. (corner of Mackay) 514.286.8020 Bring this ad for a FREE pair of clear disposable contact lenses!

YOU PAID FOR IT !

USE YOUR SUNLIFE INSURANCE ! !