Vol102Iss06

Volume 102, Issue 6

September 20, 2012 mcgilldaily.com

McGill THE

DAILY

Buying success since 1911

Published by The Daily Publications Society, a student society of McGill University.

Healing holistically page 8-9

SPVM on sexual assault page 15

NEWS 02 NEWS

AUS restructures its finances

The role of free speech in the Netanyahu Riot A criticism of the administration’s free food

07 FEATURES

Sexual assault and alternative forms of healing

10 HEALTH&ED Do university rankings matter?

Giving smiles to those who need them

12 CULTURE

New art space in Old Montreal

14 COMPENDIUM! 15 EDITORIAL

mcgilldaily.com

2

Marois reveals new cabinet

The Daily investigates essay-writers for hire

Tackling hegemony in website commentary

Thursday, September 20, 2012

Tuition hike to be abolished today, says FECQ

Occupy Montreal reunites

05 COMMENTARY

The McGill Daily

Laurent Bastien Corbeil The McGill Daily

T

he $1625 tuition hike announced last year by the Liberal government of Jean Charest is to be cancelled today, according to Éliane Laberge, the President of the Fédération étudiante collégiale du Quebec (FECQ). “[The Parti Québécois (PQ)] told us that they would announce it after their first ministerial meeting,” Laberge told The Daily in French.

Because the hike is not a law passed by the National Assembly, the tuition hike can be repealed by a ministerial decree.

The news came hours after Pauline Marois, the newly elected premier of Quebec, unveiled her new cabinet in Quebec City.

Marie Malavoy, an outspoken supporter of the student movement, was appointed Minister of Education, while Pierre Duchesne, a former journalist with RadioCanada, was chosen to be the Minister of Higher Education.

“We will mainly be working with Mr. Duchesne, and we met him briefly at the National Assembly,” Laberge said. “It’s refreshing to be working with someone who’s very open toward young people.”

Like her predecessor Jean Charest, Marois will be in charge of Youth Issues. Léo Bureau-Blouin, the former president of FECQ and the youngest Member of the National Assembly (MNA), will be her parliamentary assistant.

“We’re not disappointed that Léo isn’t a minister,” Laberge said.

“But we’re happy to see that he was elected to the National Assembly.”

In a statement on its website, the Fédération étudiante universitaire du Quebec (FEUQ), said that it welcomed the appointment of Duchesne as Minister of Higher Education.

“Mr. Duchesne met students during the last FEUQ congress in August, and they saw how accessibility was an important issue for him,” the statement read in French.

At a joint press conference yesterday, FEUQ and FECQ announced that they would be willing to “work

Photo Hera Chan | The McGill Daily

to increase student accessibility as well as the quality of teaching.”

A media spokesperson for FEUQ told The Daily that more details over the planned summit on higher education – a forum designed by the PQ to address university funding and accessbility – would be announced later today at a press conference. The student associations have not yet been informed of

the date and content of the summit.

The second-largest student association, the Coalition large de l’Association pour une solidarité syndicale étudiante (CLASSE), was absent from the conference.

“We used to work more with CLASSE,” Laberge said. “But now, not so much.”

CLASSE could not be reached for comment by the time of press.

Family demo declared illegal Christina Colizza The McGill Daily

A

family demonstration of approximately 100 protesters marched through downtown Montreal on Sunday, despite Parti Québécois (PQ) leader Pauline Marois’ promise to repeal the proposed tuition hike. After staging a sitin on the corner of Ste. Catherine and Union, two demonstrators were arrested for “mischief on a car” and a “death threat,” according to the Service de police de la Ville de Montréal (SPVM).

Sources on Twitter said that a third arrest was made, but that the protester was released.

The demonstration began at Parc Laurier at 1 p.m. and was declared illegal from the outset, according to the SPVM. The march eventually met another contingency of protesters at Parc Émilie-Gamelin around 2 p.m.

At the front of the procession, holding a banner, was newly formed group Amnistie Générale, followed by several other community and neighbourhood groups such as the Mile End Assemblée Populaire Autonome du Cartier and Mères en colère et solidaires.

McGill Philosophy Professor Alia Al-Saji was in attendance with her Mile End neighbourhood assembly.

While the demonstration’s Facebook event claimed a partly celebratory nature due to the repealed hike, Al-Saji said she felt that “part

of the point is that a lot of what the students and the popular mobilization have been fighting is more than the hike. It’s about wider austerity measures and wider privatization of social services. It is also about a kind of form of democracy and a way of being heard....this manif is to say that democracy isn’t just about staying quiet, and voting, but it’s actually about having your voice heard and organizing at the local level.”

As the march worked its way westward on Ste. Catherine, the SPVM announced over a loudspeaker that the demonstration was illegal and that protesters needed to leave. Upon hearing the announcement, Amnistie Générale immediately disbanded.

Following the announcement, at approximately 2:45 p.m., about 15 other protesters staged a sit-in.

One of the leaders of Amnistie Générale, a student at Cégep MarieVictorin who wished to remain anonymous, told The Daily that her organization was there to “do some manifestations for the general amnesty of everyone.”

The CEGEP student did not partake in the sit-in because they had “already been arrested four times.”

The sit-in continued until 3:30 p.m., when a squad of SPVM officers arrived to break it up. Moments after their arrival, police officers on bikes chased after one protester who was eventually arrested on University and charged with “mischief on a car.”

NEWS

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The McGill Daily | Thursday, September 20, 2012 | mcgilldaily.com

Arts Undergraduate Society to financially restructure Departments’ bank accounts to be centralized or completely externalized Juan Camilo Velásquez The McGill Daily

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he Arts Undergraduate Society (AUS) is considering centralizing the finances of its various departmental associations as it seeks to restructure its own finances to comply with the Memoranda of Agreement (MoA) signed with the McGill administration.

AUS is also in negotiation with some departmental associations regarding the possibility of these associations becoming independent of AUS. The MoA, which outlines the relationship between AUS and the University, requires AUS to complete financial audits every year. If the conditions of the MoA are not met, the administration will not release student fees to AUS. According to AUS President Devon LaBuik, the Society has not delivered audits to the University since 2008 – the same year that departmental associations’ bank accounts were externalized, meaning that departments took control of their own finances.

“This was not an issue because the McGill administration had let it fly for so long,” said LaBuik. “However, going into this year they wanted a full audit, otherwise they refused to release our fees.”

McGill’s Director of Internal Communications Doug Sweet told The Daily that each accredited student association needs to produce an annual audited statement of its finances, proof of insurance, and proof of incorporation.

“An audited financial statement is required to make sure that the money the University collects from students and hands over to AUS is, in fact, properly managed and properly spent,” said Sweet.

AUS VP Finance Saad Qazi told The Daily that since departmental associations’ bank accounts were externalized, the lack of financial reporting from the associations left AUS without enough records to finalize the audits.

Re-internalizing departmental association bank accounts is only one of the options AUS is currently contemplating, but according to LaBuik, it would be the easiest to implement.

Some of the larger department associations – such as Political Science, Economics, Philosophy, and English – held a joint meeting to discuss the effects of this measure on their autonomy.

According to Political Science Student Association (PSSA) President Talitha Calder, re-internalizing would deeply affect the association because it is the biggest in the Faculty of Arts.

“We receive the largest financial allocation from the AUS each year.

We receive an allocation of about $3700 each year, and we put that toward events…we make expenses on a weekly basis,” said Calder.

If PSSA were re-internalized, the AUS would once again control its bank accounts, affecting the departmental association’s expenses.

“Our biggest concern is that it would slow down our ability to hold events, and in some ways we are concerned about the departmental

Photo Hera Chan | The McGill Daily

association’s autonomy as an organization,” she added.

Qazi mentioned that AUS’ financial track record has also raised doubts among departmental associations.

Qazi told The Daily that he began his term at a time when AUS had a large amount of debt.

“The AUS originally had savings of around $90,000 to $120,000… then they cashed in the savings to the checking account, but then those got taken over by the Quebec government for delinquency on filing taxes. So we have currently $100,000 frozen by the Quebec

government, but we are hoping that because our tax status is also now updated for the first time in the last three years, [we’ll get the money] sometime in October [or] November,” he explained.

McGill has released around $50,000 in AUS fees, which the Society used to pay off last year’s debts, according to Qazi.

“We have done all that McGill has asked of us, in terms of making sure that an audit for this year occurs,” he said. “So hopefully the fees for this semester of Fall 2012 will also be released.”

An alternative to internalization would be for the departmental associations to take on greater responsibility and perform the same level of financial reporting as AUS, according to Qazi.

Calder said that the PSSA was given the option to “re-internalize the account, or the external departments would just become completely externalized and have to become their own associations, like their own non-profits, similar to the AUS.” A final decision has not yet been made, as AUS continues to consult its financial auditors.

Search for new principal under way Advisory board includes one undergraduate student Isabella Johnson News Writer

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cGill announced last spring that the process of finding a replacement for Principal and Vice-Chancellor Heather Munroe-Blum, following the completion of her second five-year term on June 30, 2013, was underway.

A 14-person advisory committee has been formed to narrow down the pool of replacement candidates. The final candidate pool will be put before the Board of Governors (BoG), who will have the final say regarding the appointment.

The University has also retained the consulting services of international headhunting firm Odgers Berndtson.

According to Advisory Board

and BoG Chair Stuart Cobbett, the pool of potential candidates is a broad one.

“Anybody who is qualified is being considered. We’re going to find the best candidate, whether they come from inside, outside McGill, in Canada, outside Canada,” he told The Daily.

The committee has already started considering candidates, but a decision will not be made – or released – until sometime this winter, he said.

The advisory committee is comprised of four current BoG members, two alumni appointees, two Senate appointees, two McGill Association of University Teachers (MAUT) appointees, two elected members of the administration and support staff, one undergraduate student represen-

tative, and one post-graduate student representative.

According to Stuart, “the opinion of each member of the committee is equal to another member of the committee. If you want to put it that way, one person one vote.”

However, he added that consensus – and not necessarily unanimity – would be sufficient to send a candidate to the BoG for consideration.

SSMU VP University Affairs Haley Dinel is the only undergraduate student on the advisory board. Dinel admitted that representing the interest of over 22,000 undergraduates is no easy task, but explained that these advisory boards are created according to the statutes of the University and are very difficult to adjust.

Dinel also pointed out that the

advisory committee solicited student feedback online, and several public consultations were open to the public and publicized to the university-wide community.

Consultations were held “before the end of school term – we deliberately wanted to have the consultations before everybody disappeared for the summer,” according to Stuart.

Consultations officially began on May 1, the day after the winter term officially ended.

Despite this, Dinel said that the board spoke to “literally hundreds of students and professors to hear what they wanted in the new principal.”

Regarding undergraduate representation on the advisory board, Dinel also commented that the principal’s portfolio is chiefly concerned with fundraising, and not

student affairs.

“The principal doesn’t spend much time dealing with students, it’s not their primary duty,” she said.

For Dinel, it will be imperative that the new principal be politically aware. “It must be someone who speaks French and who can understand the Quebecois and Canadian context… someone who has political allies. And especially considering the events of the past year, government relations are super important.”

A search is also currently underway for a new Dean of Students and Deputy Provost.

—with files from Lola Duffort For the full candidate prospectus released by the University, go to http://www.mcgill.ca/secretariat/ advisory/principal

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NEWS

The McGill Daily | Thursday, September 20, 2012 | mcgilldaily.com

Occupy Montreal reunites in St. Henri Activists discuss Turcot, education Carla Green News Writer

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ast October, Occupy Montreal took over Square Victoria, renaming it Place du Peuple and transforming the square into a tent city. This weekend, a similarly diverse group organized Occupons le Sud-Ouest, an occupation of Parc SirGeorge-Étienne-Cartier in St. Henri.

François Genest, an active participant of Occupy Montreal, doesn’t think that the lack of a permanent home substantially changes the nature of the movement.

“Obviously we can’t have any tents anymore, but we can still continue to meet in public spaces and say, we’re here, the problems are still here, and we are working with the people.”

“Welcome Home” was chalked in French on an asphalt pathway, and next to a play area with children’s toys there was a “free market” where clothing, books, and other miscellaneous items had been laid out in the grass for people to give or take as they wanted.

Workshops were held at the park throughout the weekend.

Shannon Franssen, spokesperson for Mobilisation Turcot, gave a presentation about the Turcot Interchange project, which aims to halt plans made by the Charest government to renovate and expand the major

highway intersection between St. Henri and Côte St. Paul.

According to Franssen, “The current project has some really disastrous effects on local neighbourhoods, but it also has some disastrous effects on all of Montreal and is going to cost the taxpayers about $1.5 billion dollars more than it should.”

On Sunday, people from different Assemblées populaires autonomes de quartiers (APAQs), neighborhood organizations that emerged during the mobilization and general discontent of last spring, met to share ideas about popular education.

Christine Dumas, an active member of the Hochelaga/ Maisonneuve APAQ, said that these groups have great potential as tools for political organizing and bringing about tangible change. “[An APAQ] is a place to take hold of the dialogue, a place where projects for the neighborhood and for the society can emerge, and it can go in all kinds of different directions,” she told The Daily in French.

McGill Political Science student Hugo Martorell attended Occupons le Sud-Ouest and participated in the workshop on popular education. He has also been involved in the Alternative University Project at McGill, which aims to re-imagine the way that people think about education.

Photo Sophia Blaze

“In March, [Alternative University organizers] started realizing that there were other groups that were doing the same thing we were doing, and there was this willingness to build a network, and trying to get out of your own social groups that you are predestined to be in, and being in this experiment where you learn from people that have different experiences from you,” he explained.

St. Henri Municipal Councillor

Sophie Thiébaut spent most of the weekend at the park.

“An event like Occupons le SudOuest allows elected officials to listen to the population, because I think that there are few places where you can hear what people think about politics,” she told The Daily in French. “So [this is] a place to listen, and also a place to exchange, because an elected official is, above all, a citizen, and noth-

ing more than a citizen.”

Occupy Montreal activist Paul Bode told The Daily, “The reaction to [the neighbourhood occupations] has been great, and this is going to be our last one of the season probably, but we’re going to do them all again in 2013.”

This weekend was Occupy Montreal’s sixth occupation of a public space since a four-day reoccupation of Place du Peuple in May.

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The McGill Daily | Thursday, September 20, 2012 | mcgilldaily.com

“Professor-generated” papers for sale Essay-writing service attracts desperate students Karel Asha News Writer

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ontreal-based business UnemployedProfessors. com is billing itself as a fool-proof way for students to circumvent plagiarizing software without doing their own assignments by providing customers with original content written – allegedly – by actual academics.

Unemployed Professors currently employs 30 professors, according to the Montreal Gazette.

The website operates through a bidding process in which professors compete for requests submitted by students.

The Daily submitted a prompt to the website to evaluate these bids, and within minutes of submitting a prompt for a generic history assignment using 15 primary sources, two professors had bid on the project.

Using the pseudonym “ProfessorRogue,” the first bidder demanded $250 for the ten-page paper, promising a two-day delivery.

Professor-Rogue’s profile stated that they hold an “Ivy League BA, Ivy League MA (Sociology), Ivy League MA (Political Science) and a Big State School PhD (Political Science).” On the Unemployed Professors blog, Professor-Rogue claimed to hold “a relatively good position at a top-flight University.”

The Daily could not verify these claims.

Professor-Rogue also described themselves as an “academic prostitute.”

“When I write a custom essay, I’m selling my cognitive function, my ability to regurgitate complex information in a coherent way,” ProfessorRogue wrote on their blog.

Professor-Rogue received a rating of five stars on the website, based on 71 student reviews.

One anonymous student commented, “Excellent work, as usual!

Exhaustively researched and persuasive.” Another claimed that “[the

work] was so well done, I thought my teacher wouldn’t even think it was me who wrote it!”

The second bid for The Daily’s prompt was from “HistoryMistress,” who asked for seven days to complete the project at a rate of $25 per page.

Although the company claims all of its writers are “current and former academics and graduate students who teach their own classes, with advanced graduate degrees,” History-Mistress only claimed to have a Bachelor of Arts from “a top tier school” on their profile page.

The Daily did not accept either bid.

In defence of its service, Unemployed Professors states on its website, “the academic system is already so corrupt, we’re totally cool with [being really unethical].”

Professor-Rogue echoed this sentiment in a blog post entitled “Don’t Hate Da Playa; Hate Da Game,” in which he stated that “the PhD market is oversaturated” and that administrators and football coaches are “pocketing mad cash.”

“Education has become a commodity,” wrote Professor-Rogue.

Linda Jacobs Starkey, interim Dean of Students at McGill and Chair of the Enrolment and Student Affairs Advisory Committee (ESAAC) Subcommittee on Academic Integrity, told The Daily, “As an academic, Chair of the Subcommittee on Academic Integrity, the existence of such sites is clearly disappointing. That our students could be drawn to them is a big concern. It’s too bad these sites are there and that students use them.”

“Students that use the service are not trying to scam the system,” she continued. “Students could fall down on a paper and make bad choice and we have to wonder what went wrong. These students lack confidence as learners to express [their] analysis and interpretation.”

Beginning this semester, gradu-

Illustration Amina Batyreva | The McGill Daily

ate students must complete a mandatory online academic integrity tutorial. Next year it will be mandatory for undergraduates as well.

“Notions of research ethics and academic integrity have impact. If we prepare our students about academic integrity, and if they have confidence to show their thinking, we can prevent plagiarism,” said Starkey.

U3 History and Political Science student Samuel Felix Harris, whose friend has used a similar service, believes that Unemployed

Professors “shows a bad flaw in the academic system…a blatant example of when the system is broken” and that students use the website out of desperation, “[seeing] no other way of completing these papers they have to submit.”

“Because of the academic integrity warning published on every syllabus at McGill, everyone knows what plagiarism is,” he said. “Arts papers are easier to plagiarize because you can get away with writing a paper without attending a class.”

Harris added that while plagia-

rism detection software such as Turnitin is a “decent idea,” “requiring research proposals would be helpful in preventing plagiarism because they force you to engage in the topic you are purportedly going to write about.”

According to the Committee on Student Discipline Annual Report published by the McGill Senate, 164 allegations of plagiarism were made at the University in 20102011, 31 of which were against graduate students. 55 students were ultimately exonerated.

Students and activists meet to discuss future of student movement PQ summit on higher education a main topic of concern Andreanne Stewart The McGill Daily

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n an informal discussion forum in the Shatner Building on Tuesday, a handful of students and strike organizers met to reflect on the past seven months of the Quebec student movement and to contemplate its future.

The primary concern of the discussion was the upcoming summit

on higher education, proposed by Parti Québécois (PQ) leader Pauline Marois upon her electoral victory.

Little is known about the format of the summit, which is expected to take place this winter, and students expressed apprehension about participating in a forum where the terms of discussion are dictated by the opposition.

“Students need to be at the centre of the discussion and debate to develop not only the process, but

to put out the issues that are the most relevant,” said Post-Graduate Students’ Society (PGSS) External Affairs Officer Errol Salamon.

Students discussed holding a counter-summit as an alternative, either prior to the PQ summit or at the same time.

“Any kind of mobilization after the summit will be a reaction,” said Jérémie Bédard-Wien, Financial Secretary of Coalition large de l’ASSÉ (CLASSE).

“We cannot let the government dictate the political agenda, we must take action before that,” he continued.

With the strike over and the tuition hikes on hold, the difficulty now lies in mobilizing students against a threat that is no longer imminent.

First-year Law student Kevin Paul stressed the importance of “the twenty-twos,” mass demonstrations that take place in Montreal on the 22nd of each month.

“They are becoming increasingly a matter of routine,” said BédardWien. “We are demonstrating, but why? What for?”

With students back in school, the importance of maintaining momentum and mobilizing students new to the movement was emphasized.

“There is a lot of potential at McGill to develop union culture,” said Bédard-Wien. “We must make sure that what has started at McGill is kept up.”

commentary

The McGill Daily Thursday, September 20, 2012 mcgilldaily.com

6

Get the fuck out of the chat room A textbook guide to shutting down marginalized voices in online space

Illustration Edna Chan | The McGill Daily

Esther Harvey-Peake Commentary Writer

I

am semi-masochistic, I think. My most painful addiction: trawling through comments in response to Commentary articles. I start reading with a sort of horrified fascination – each comment leaving me increasingly depressed – and find myself unable to stop. I feel a bit dirty after reading them. I rarely contribute myself.

Why don’t I? For the same reason that deters many of us on campus from participating in online debates, specifically in relation to articles representing the perspectives of marginalized identities, and addressing issues of oppression. A lot of pretty vicious criticism arises in response to articles like this, and not a whole lot of visible support. (Most notably, this came up throughout Christiana Collison’s column on black feminism last year – although the same applies to most of the Commentary pieces discussing rape culture or racism on campus). This is not to say that the support isn’t out there: I hear it, frequently, in personal conversations, mostly from people grateful to have their perspectives represented in a public forum. And yet the majority of responses to these articles are critical. And the majority of people reacting to them are white men. Whoa. What a shocking coincidence.

There’s a lot of misguided theory about the way that online debating has opened up dia-

logue. In some ways this is true.

Theoretically, anyone can participate, and all responses are afforded an equal amount of respect.

And we all live in a magical castle made of candy where the sky rains baklava and nobody cries, ever. The reality is that online spaces can be just as hostile as physical ones, and while it’s true that no one is forced to reveal their identity online, this doesn’t necessarily make participation easier. Reading many comments is enough to deter any marginalized person from speaking up; these spaces are often already shaped according to specific participants, and in ways that make it very clear what an acceptable opinion is. Anyone who dissents is dealing with a wicked backlash.

Not so much debate, really, as public crucifixion.

The responses to articles that dare to bring up issues of racism, rape culture, or anything else related to calling out oppressive bullshit usually use the same formula. These tactics aren’t restricted to the virtual world – they are the same methods of shutting down the concerns of marginalized people that are used in everyday interactions.

I like to think that they fall into three broad categories: Evasion, Silencing, and Deflection.

Let’s start with Evasion.

This category includes tactics designed to take attention away from the point that is being addressed. It is much easier to do this than to engage in legitimate debate, as none of the uncomfort-

able points that the author raises actually need to be dealt with.

Evasion includes things like: 1. The personal attack.

Degrading comments about the author’s identity. (Collison wants to talk about black female sexuality? Probably she is a frigid bitch who doesn’t get any action.) It’s a great way to delegitimize the argument being made; why give any credit to someone who is bigoted/hypocrital/angry/egotistical? Has an inferiority/superiority complex? Has too much sex?

Doesn’t have enough? The list goes on.

2. “Awkward syntax.” Harping on details, like the inadequacy of the writing style, or finding grammatical errors. Anything to avoid talking about the overarching issue.

3. Trivializing. The “we’ve heard it all before” response.

The claim here is that the issue isn’t worth talking about because it’s already “been done.” Or this response’s more subtly evasive cousin: “Look at how many other important things we should be talking about.” For some reason, the logic seems to be that addressing specific issues of oppression will take away from our ability to think about the world’s “real” problems.

Category two: Silencing.

1. The “shut-down.” Denial that the concern being voiced is actually real. The author is admonished for being too sensitive, or reading too much into things; clearly, there was no harm intended, and they’re ruining the fun. This tactic is one of the

most effective – it allows people to dissociate themselves from the guilt they’re feeling at being called out, and removes any onus for taking actual responsibility.

Because really, the whole thing is just an overreaction.

2. The “shut up.” Demanding that the person voicing the concern should be stopped. There are several call-outs for contributors to be banned from publishing. (An aside – if you hate the piece, the appropriate response is not to try and get it banned.

Stop reading it.)

Category three: Deflection.

This includes the typical kneejerk responses of someone being alerted to their privilege. These responses try to throw blame back at the person voicing the concern.

1. “If you don’t like it, leave.”

The implication being that we choose to live within systems of oppression, and can dip out whenever we like.

2. “You’ll only be happy when….” A comment that implies the article’s author is asking for a radical social reform that would upset the structure we have in place now. (They probably are).

And that this is undesirable, or unrealistic. (It’s not).

3. “Why don’t you do something about it?” Conveniently overlooks the fact that the author is already doing something about the issue, by bringing attention to it in the first place.

This isn’t an exhaustive list, of course, but the basic attempts to undermine people talking about oppression usually use some com-

bination of these techniques. I hate to be grounded wholly in theory, so here are some concrete examples of Commentary responses from The Daily’s website: “These are horrendously cliché arguments to trot out…Such crap is totally out of tune with reality.”

Evasion, denial. “[The author is] convinced that every interaction with something that has a penis is the reflection of an uncontrollable anxiety to fuck them which is enough to comfort their own petty objectified ego.” Personal attack. “…the only thing that I can answer to you is that you are the fucking racist and self-hating black. You are the one who allows the existence of such nonsense stereotypes by asserting them…”

Personal attack and deflection combo. Nice.

Little wonder, then, that people with similar views to the author might feel uncomfortable speaking up. The fact that these online spaces are dominated by such violent critique is not coincidental. It is a blatant reflection of real-world interactions, and how consistently people addressing issues of oppression are attacked, undermined, or ignored – a fact that only serves to highlight how necessary it is to keep having these conversations. Think about that. I look forward to reading your responses.

Esther Harvey-Peake is a U3 Honours Philosophy student. She can be reached at esther.harveypeake@mail.mcgill.ca.

commentary

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The McGill Daily | Thursday, September 20, 2012 | mcgilldaily.com

Speech, power, and consequences Words cannot be divorced from their context Davide Mastracci The McGill Daily

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ust over ten years ago today, an event at Concordia University shocked the world. Hillel, a Jewish student organization, invited former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to speak at the school. The invitation sparked controversy, which culminated in a massive protest on the day of his speech. The protestors blocking the entrance to the hall where Netanyahu was supposed to speak were beaten by police while hundreds of other protestors watched in anger. Eventually two windows were smashed by protestors in an attempt to enter the building and support those on the inside. The successful efforts of the protestors resulted in Netanyahu cancelling his speech due to “security reasons.”

These actions, as well as numerous confrontations between protestors and speech attendees, made the events of the day prone to accusations of anti-Semitism and speech suppression. These accusations came from media, citizens, and Netanyahu himself.

Despite this, I am certain that one can oppose Israel’s existence as a state without being anti-Semitic. I am also certain that the events of that day were not the death of free speech, nor an attack against it.

In Canada, citizens are guaranteed “freedom of thought, belief, opinion, and expression, including freedom of the press and other media of communication” with “reasonable limita-

tions.” This implies that citizens can say and print most things without having to fear legal punishment. As such, an example of a violation of freedom of speech would be the government imprisoning its critics.

So, when people claim that Netanyahu’s right to free speech was violated, what do they mean?

Certainly Netanyahu wasn’t threatened with arrest for the speech he was going to deliver.

In fact, Netanyahu enjoyed the protection of the SPVM, and was allowed into Canada despite claims that he was a war criminal who should be arrested due to violations of international law.

Instead, many of those claiming free speech died on campus that day based their accusations upon the fact that Netanyahu chose not to complete his speech for “security measures.” This interpretation of free speech is incorrect for numerous reasons.

Primarily, freedom of speech does not mean freedom from the consequences of your words.

Netanyahu’s right to speak does not place a duty upon his critics to sit down, shut up, and allow him to rant without interruption.

After all, his critics do have their own right to public assembly.

Freedom of speech does not mean others become obliged to engage in conversation with you.

People often claim that open dialogue is not only a truly democratic way to solve an issue, but also the best one. While this may be accurate in some cases, it does not give a right to impose this view on others

Illustration Hera Chan | The McGill Daily

and expect them to follow suit. And in the case mentioned, only specific people were invited to Netanyahu’s speech, relegating other students to entering school through a side door to avoid the part of Concordia the speech had occupied.

The right to free speech also cannot be divorced from the reality of power dynamics. While everyone may technically have the right to speak freely in Canadian society, those with power enjoy a privilege.

For example, Netanyahu’s right to free speech shut down half of the Concordia campus. It also got him

police barricades, interviews, and friendly press. The free speech of Palestinian supporters and their allies got them barred from the lecture, shut up, and largely ignored.

As such, it should not be a surprise when those who get the short end of the stick with freedom of speech use alternative means of getting their points across.

Yet controversy arises every time something like the events mentioned occur. Whether it was the protests surrounding Ann Coulter’s attempt to speak at the University of Ottawa, or the supposed unwilling-

ness of those involved in the tuition strike to engage in discourse, free speech is constantly misinterpreted to benefit those who already hold a disproportionate amount of power. Therefore, those who protest should be congratulated for expanding free speech, not killing it. After all, actions speak louder than words.

Davide Mastracci is a U2 History and Political Science Joint Honours student. He can be reached davide.mastracci@ mail.mcgill.ca.

Panem et circenses Is the administration diverting our attention?

Noah Q. Tavlin Commentary Writer

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anem et circenses is a Latin phrase which refers to the idea of a powerful person, usually an emperor, handing out cheap food ( panem: bread) and entertainment (circenses: circuses, or games) to appease and distract the masses from the leader’s shortcomings or the real issues at hand. If this strategy sounds familiar, it’s because in the past week Principal Heather Munroe-Blum personally invited all McGill students by email to a free barbecue – the panem – and from September 19 to 21, the University will host a presumably free carnival on lower field – the circenses. It is humorous how literally the administration’s recent

generosity corresponds with this Latin phrase.

I do not wish to sound demagogic or overwrought, so I will stop directly comparing Heather Munroe-Blum to a Roman emperor. I do, however, believe that we, as students, must understand the thinly veiled purposes of these “gifts.”

Heather Munroe-Blum had a rough 2011-12, especially in terms of student relations. The year started off with a bang when MUNACA went on strike, with many students vocally supporting the striking workers. Then, in a whirlwind early November, the administration refused to recognize the results of the QPIRG referendum and riot police entered campus, brutalizing students, activists, and bystanders alike, who were demonstrating against proposed tuition hikes. In February, a group of students pro-

testing the administration’s stance on the QPIRG referendum, occupied the James Administration building for six days. Lastly, from February through to the end of the term the administration had to prepare for the possibility of a student strike. I hope I’m not forgetting anything.

Certainly Munroe-Blum wants a less stressful year. The election of the Parti Québécois does not promise stability, or full and continued support for anglophone Quebec institutions.

So, while McGill prepares itself for another unpredictable eight months, the least its administration can wish for is to have the students on its side.

One must wonder, then, are barbecues and parties the administration’s method of opening up more dialogue with the students? Or does the administration wish to, as the emperors did, distract us from the

issues which will inevitably arise throughout the year?

Perhaps these panem et circenses are simply a peace offering.

Munroe-Blum is extending a hand of friendship from the administration to the students, as if to say “let’s let bygones be bygones and have a happy, productive year, without any political unrest. This year, let’s talk out our problems and differences.” She even said in an email to students and staff this summer: “. . . As we all step forward into the academic year, let’s try to hang onto a bit of that summer feeling. The warmth. The happiness.” What represents “that summer feeling” more than a barbecue and a festival?

If, however, these panem et circenses are an attempt to distract us, then we, as students, should feel outraged that the administration would underestimate us: that it thinks our

vote of approval could be so easily bought. If Heather Munroe-Blum’s goal is to disengage us, politically, from our world, then she is not suited to run an academic institution.

An academic institution should be a place where students, faculty, and even administrators, fully and critically engage the social and natural world. It should certainly not be a place where this type of participation is discouraged.

So I’ll eat your panem, Heather, and I’ll attend your circenses. But if you’re trying to distract me from the problems that directly affect me, just know that I’ve still got my oculus on you.

Noah Q. Tavlin is a U2 English Literature and Urban Systems student and a Senior Editor at The Red Herring. He can be reached at noah.tavlin@mail.mcgill.ca.

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features

Healing, holistically One student offers her story of surviving sexual assault Text: Claudia Alexander | Art: Amina Batyreva

Warning: This article may contain triggering content about sexual abuse.

Deep breath – push. Doors drag open to a sterile stretching hallway, patched up elevator panels. My stomach drops with the upward pull. Rigid titles spell out Dr. Med. Phys. and a block-lettered command to S.V.Psanitize-your-dirty-grubby-hands.

Sitting on melted plastic chairs, transfixed by speckled tiles and inhaling recycled air, while information, name, DOB, address are regurgitated like peanuts out of a

dispenser. Finally, a pallid, blank face says without looking up: “sit down, you’ll be called when we’re ready for you.”

The discomfort of the waiting room complements the intrusive pap test I’m about to be subjected to, as well as the brick wall I’m about to hit when I reveal that yes, I had sex without a condom, but it‘s not like I was the given the choice, if-you-see-what-I-mean.

Though Quebec may have a far

more accessible healthcare system than most of the world, it’s easy to get lost in the grid-like world of mega-hospitals, to become faceless among the masses, to risk turning healing into a one-dimensional standard procedure.

A year earlier, at the age of 17, I luckily found myself in a far more hospitable space. In this case, the door to the waiting lounge was kept wide open, and a breeze played with a dream-

catcher hanging on the window.

There were 15 of us waiting, sometimes dipping out into the late afternoon light to grab a

lemonade and pass the time, each thinking we would probably be called last. I was at Head and Hands, a communityoriented physical and mental health centre, dedicated mostly to youth.

I was there to get tested, standard procedure. Except that at that point I had never been tested before, so I didn’t exactly know what standard procedure was. It was six or so months after I had been sexually assaulted, in the midst of my “blackout phase,” where I don’t

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The McGill Daily | Thursday, September 20, 2012 | mcgilldaily.com

remember thinking or speaking about my experiences. I only discussed what happened in the event of the extreme but repressed panic I felt while having somewhat safe, albeit drunk, and “casual” sex with a couple of friends. In order to cope and just be “normal,” I had somehow found a way to erase my first sexual experience from most of my day-to-day consciousness.

Head and Hands aims to provide non-judgemental, holistic, preventative, and educational support. They offer everything from legal advice, to emergency food security for those in need, to sexual education. When you walk into a Head and Hands drop-in period, you are given a card with a famous activist’s name, and they call out your new pseudonym when your turn to see a physician is up.

I was flipping through some zines when I was finally called, definitely in the third tier of patients.

The assessment nurse, who was young and casually dressed, called me into a room that looked more like my parents’ living room than medical purgatory. We chatted for a few minutes, then she began asking me questions like: “When were you last tested?”– never have been. “When was the last time you had your period?” – three weeks ago. “Is your period regular?”– not always. So far, fairly easy to answer, not stuff I would consider too personal. “Are you on birth control?”– no. “Have you ever had unprotected sex?”– no. No, wait – back up, hold on, fuck. I felt like someone had wrapped their hands around my lungs and my brain had just short-circuited. I had just blatantly lied

to myself and this woman, and had wholeheartedly believed every word. She looked concerned and leaned forward in her chair toward me. I opened my mouth with the intention of speaking, tried starting the sentence from different angles, but it was no use. Finally, somewhat brokenly, it came out that the first time I had had sex was unprotected, except I was never given the choice whether to be safe or not. In fact, everything about it had felt unsafe.

I didn’t know what to expect from this stranger. After it happened, I didn’t go to the hospital to get a rape kit like you’re supposed to, nor had I reported my assault to the police. I didn’t know the words to explain what had happened to me. I had never had sex before, so what could I compare it to? I didn’t even consider taking the morning-after pill because, well, I just couldn’t think it through that far. I braced myself for a lecture on “responsibility.”

In that little living room at Head and Hands, I was not made to feel like an idiot, a liar, or a slut. She assured me she believed me, and that rape happens so much more often than I would think. During moments where I struggled with words, she was patient. When I had a question, she took her time to answer. She gently told me about the support services that Head and Hands could provide, just for my information, for when I felt ready, whenever that may be. I didn‘t feel like I was being lectured, or that I had to prove anything. Most importantly, I felt safe. *** A negative experience at a clinic – a regular check up, or test – can set a survivor far back in their journey toward healing.

After surviving assault, you want to feel like a person, not like a problem, a nuisance to your doctor, or something to be purified.

At Head and Hands, Andrea*, who is trained in intervention and support work, is usually the first in contact with a call-in or drop-in. “We try to be empowering to youth, and sup-

port them in figuring out what will be best for that individual, to help them find the resources they need,” she told me in an interview. Unlike this method, the more mainstream response to sexual assault, which may include prescriptions for anti-depressants and a set therapeutic period.

Head and Hands offers a more holistic approach to healing. “We don’t try to deal with a singular issue, we try to deal with a whole person. We work around people’s schedules or commitments, such as being young parents or responsible siblings… people’s realities.”

Besides being free, Head and Hands does not put any limitations on the time it may take for a survivor to heal.

One of the services they often refer people to is the Sexual Assault Centre of the McGill Students’ Society (SACOMSS). Here, survivors and their allies can find support groups and attend educational workshops. The two local organizations follow a non-judgemental and “non-directional” mandate, in which they let the survivor set the terms of their own healing rather than directing them in any way.

For groups like them, all survivors’ experiences are different and each person has the capacity to make meaningful decisions for themselves. Before I went to Head and Hands and met people like Andrea, I didn’t have the confidence to choose my own path. My healing only began when I was given the space to determine what my own journey would entail, because I was treated, in Andrea’s words, like “an expert on [my] own needs.”

After having reached out to others about my experience, I started to hear stories about the traumatic results of directive, rather than holistic, approaches. Last year, at the height of finals, feeling depressed, confused, and overwhelmed, Michelle* decided to seek help at McGill Mental Health. As a survivor of sexual assault, she was hoping to find support and compassion, but told me that her experience was discouraging. “I tried to explain to

[the psychiatrist] what I was going through, hoping for a referral or some course of action as to how I could go about starting to heal. I immediately felt like I was judged with suspicion, that she didn’t fully believe my experiences. I remember her offering to prescribe an anti-depressant after five minutes.”

The issue with institutional practices, such as McGill Mental Health’s, is the emphasis on biochemical approaches to mental health. As a survivor of sexual assault, you don’t want to feel like you’re just naturally fucked up, or that it’s your own fault you don’t feel okay, as if there was no perpetrator involved. Although prescription drugs do help some people, Michelle didn’t feel it addressed her situation. “I would have preferred a more open environment focused on experiences and a sense of validation.” What separates Head and Hands from larger institutions is its ability to offer personalized support, along with prescription medication and other more traditional approaches.

SACOMSS and Head and Hands also have a strong understanding of anti-oppression, and their training enables them to work with the entirety of somebody’s situation.

Both features set these organizations apart from conventional medical establishments. For example, SACOMSS is pro-survivor, profeminist, anti-racist, anti-ableist, anti-classist, queer-positive, and trans-positive. Even if you’re not a student at McGill, their services are open to anyone who feels like they have been effected by sexual assault, whether through their own experience or through someone they know. Large-scale, clinical institutions sacrifice an in-depth understanding of structural violence to keep the flow of patients moving quickly. “There are a lot of assumptions about who is sexually assaulted, and what sexual assault is,” said Andrea. “That comes back to issues of societal perceptions and structural imbalances.” *** Months later, after slowly beginning to process what had happened to me, and hesitantly sharing with others, I began to think of ways I could start to actively heal outside of conversations.

I wanted to help something come alive, to use my hands, to feel useful. I needed something life-affirming to counteract the destructiveness of abuse. When I felt myself deflating, and when I felt my life spinning away from me, I needed to feel close to growth to remind myself of the power of positive energy. I kept craving walks in the forest, tranquil and still, where my feet, used to the hard cement of the city, would bounce softly off of moss,

rocks, and tree trunks. I have a garden in my home, and I almost intuitively gravitated toward it. I started slowly – weeding, creating space for new buds to breathe. As I moved on to planting new bulbs and vegetable seeds, I began to feel more relaxed, productive, and revived.

As it turns out, gardening is not such a bizarre hobby to turn to for survivors of emotional and physical violence. Like Head and Hands, horticulture therapy orients itself around holistic healing, and there has been significant success in the treatment of Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome, social and domestic violence, isolation, childhood trauma, and even war-related trauma issues. As I was researching horticulture therapy, I kept noticing the analogies made between natural growth and human growth, like the cycles and interconnectedness of life. In partnership with the earth and imbued with ecological responsibility, I felt empowered and connected, a feeling so different from the violence, oppression, and domination that I associated with my worst memories. While I’m lucky to live at home and have a garden to myself, more and more urban gardens are sprouting all over Montreal.

Santropol Roulant has rooftop gardens open to volunteers, or alternatively, there are local community plots in many neighbourhoods. *** I had expected to be whisked off and out of the way as soon as I told the truth, but the Head and Hands nurse surprised me and took the time to listen. She told me not to apologize, she waited for me to mop up my face.

When I was given a card with the name of a counsellor I could call, I was encouraged to take my time and call only when I felt ready.

At this point in my journey, I wasn’t able to articulate my rape.

Having someone who I considered a professional treat me like a person, however, was precisely what I needed.

You don’t necessarily need to be raped to feel as though your body is under attack. Some days we can ignore it, some days we can forget it, some days we may feel crippled by it, some days we can transform it.

Alongside gardening, writing about my experiences has also been an invaluable part of my journey towards body positivity and self-love. Without the validation and community I found at Head and Hands, I may never have been able to open myself up and express how I felt. Everyone deserves the freedom and space to discover their own avenue toward healing.

There may be no universal cure out there, but there are safe spaces we can turn to, and alternative, creative methods of healing that can rekindle our sense of personal possibility, keep our bodies vigorous, and keep our hearts in bloom. *Names have been changed.

Excerpts from this feature were originally published in the author’s zine. If you would like a copy, email claudia. alexander@mail.mcgill.ca.

health&ed

The McGill Daily Thursday, September 20, 2012 mcgilldaily.com

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Illustration Amina Batyreva | The McGill Daily

What’s your number?

Jenny Xue Health & Education Writer

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n the 2012 QS World University Rankings published last Monday, McGill placed 18th in the world and ahead of all other Canadian institutions. The top three places were filled by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, University of Cambridge, and Harvard University, respectively.

These all look like remarkable achievements, but what do they actually mean? Do the rankings really matter?

The QS rankings are based on five performance indicators.

The academic peer review, which asks active academics around the world to nominate up to thirty

institutions in their field (excluding their own), accounts for forty per cent of a school’s score. The number of citations per faculty member and faculty-student ratio each make up another twenty per cent. Finally, the percentage of international students and staff, plus a recruiter review, each hold a ten per cent weight.

While this methodology seems reasonable, a closer analysis of this method points out many problems. For instance, the largest concern involves the academic peer review. By accounting for nearly half of an institution’s score, this single element can create great variability in the rankings between years. In addition. it is unlikely for academics to have accurate views of exactly how teaching

works at universities worldwide.

In an interview with the Sydney Morning Herald, the vice-chancellor of Macquarie University in Australia, Steven Schwartz, commented, “It’s a bit like evaluating cars by asking pedestrians to rank them, whether they’ve actually ever been in them or driven them or even know how to drive.” The recruiter review has drawn similar criticism for creating variability and unreliability in the results.

Another issue concerns the usage of citations per faculty.

Citations are very much dominated by the natural science field and most are published in English. This implies a disadvantage for universities that do not use English as a primary language or have a strong focus on their

arts and humanities departments.

Many also claim that the QS method depends too much on an institution’s wealth, which can indeed affect indicators by improving factors like research and student satisfaction. But money is not everything – a big endowment cannot improve other aspects of a university’s quality of education, such as the faculty’s dedication to teaching or student diversity.

Despite these controversies, university rankings still appeal very much to students. Studies have shown an increase in ranking correlates with an improvement in the next year’s undergraduate admissions in terms of higher yields, grades, and other standard measures.

As such, the results of ranking

systems likely make universities eager to improve their funding, and by consequence, their international reputations. McGill may have even more incentive as its betterfunded neighbour the University of Toronto, is close behind at 19th place (Quebec universities are underfunded by an estimated $750 million per year compared to other Canadian universities).

Nonetheless, money should not be the only medium universities use to improve their quality.

Ranking systems should not be the only means students use to determine where they will be most happy. Perhaps the media should draw less attention to these unbalanced results so that universities and students can focus on what they themselves really value.

health&ed

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The McGill Daily | Thursday, September 20, 2012 | mcgilldaily.com

Illustration Amina Batyreva | The McGill Daily

My summer of perpetual smiling How a dental clinic changed my life Sarah Jameel Health & Education Writer

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ometimes with new experiences comes the learning of new words. This summer I learned a new word – “externship.”

An externship refers to a jobshadowing during summer/spring break where one is taken through the day-to-day routines of a medical institution, company, or an organization. When I applied as an extern to the McGill Summer Clinic for Adolescents and Disabled Patients, I was expecting an experience similar to what I had witnessed during my previous three summers of volunteering back home in Sri Lanka with the Sri Lanka Dental Association (SLDA). I had worked previously with a variety of cases – from children effected by dental fluorosis in rural parts of the country to children who suffered from cleft lip or palette disabilities. But I realized that although the dentistry practiced in

this case was more or less similar in its clinical approach, many things were different in my experience.

The McGill Summer Dental Clinic for Adolescents and Disabled Patients is part of McGill Dentistry’s groundbreaking effort to work directly with the Montreal community to provide free basic dental care to people who cannot access private care due to financial hardship.

Held during July, the clinic runs at the Montreal General Hospital and offers free dental treatment to children aged 10 to 17, and to physically or intellectually disabled patients who are 10 or older. The treatment is provided by fourth-year dental students under the supervision of General Dental Practitioners.

Working with disabled patients who needed a varied spectrum of care and attention was a challenge.

From holding the suction tube in varying angles to assisting them off their wheelchair support, I realized that every patient was unique not merely in terms of clinical

manifestations but also in terms of their social needs.

The young kids I worked with were a different milieu altogether. I was fascinated by the type of patience and reassurance that went into keeping a six-year-old steady on a dental chair without an emotional outpour was something.

Before long, I connected the dots from my past experiences where I had seen my dad, who was a dental surgeon, act like a six-year old just to reassure the kid that they were on the same emotional level and that all was well. Thus, this rule of reassurance was indeed universal in nature.

The hours were long and rigorous. It required one to keep a perpetual smile which would dull the sound of drills and burs. Although undoubtedly exhausting, the look of satisfaction at the end of a treatment session when the patient looks into the mirror and sees the difference in those pearly whites is unparalleled. While I had done technically nothing to bring that smile across

the patient’s face – I had only assisted the dentist to ensure the procedure went as smoothly as planned – my experience had led me to an epiphany. I realized that I wouldn’t mind doing this not just for a month in the summer, but in reality, for the rest of my life.

At the end of this physically tedious and emotionally draining month, I had shared with the dental students the feeling of looking into the mouths of children who had access to care only once a year through this clinic. Because of this, I learned to keep a straight face and make sure the patient knew that they were in safe hands.

I was eventually unofficially named as “the babysitter” by some of the dental students I shadowed.

The moniker came the day that I was given the task of babysitting the child of a patient who was in great distress due to being detached from his mother, coupled with the disruption of his afternoon nap. That day I was thrown into the deep with a test

of interpersonal skills I had never before experienced. I took the baby in a stroller for three hours around the clinic in sheer desperation to put him to sleep, and eventually, he did.

There are many inexpungible memories in my head from that month at the Montreal General Hospital. The other volunteers I worked with became my summer friends, and the dental students I shadowed, my mentors. But when all came to an end and we celebrated with a scrumptious dinner at La Caverne Grecque, one thing was certain: I was going to do this again next summer. I felt humbled to be part of a great institution that pioneered in providing access to dental care through summer clinics such as this one, to the underprivileged sectors of society that often remain forgotten.

This fascinating new word I had discovered, “externship”, showed me what I wanted to do in life – be part of changing the world, one smile at a time.

culture

The McGill Daily Thursday, September 20, 2012 mcgilldaily.com

PHI Centre illuminates city’s art scene Jitika Shah and Kristal Spreadborough Culture Writers

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ne of Montreal’s finest private galleries, the DHC Art Foundation impressed the city’s art community in 2007, when it was opened at its Old Montreal location on Ste. Sacrement. It is dedicated to showcasing cuttingedge contemporary art to the public for free, and to promoting knowledge of the arts via its education department. Its founder, Phoebe Greenberg, established herself as one of the city’s foremost patrons of fine art. Now, Greenberg has expanded Montreal’s cultural facilities by creating the PHI Centre, at another location in Old Montreal.

This unique space was created by fusing two buildings into one in order to provide enough space to execute Greenberg’s vision. Both buildings were heritage structures suffering from decay as a result of neglect. In collaboration with her architects, Greenberg ensured that the history of the buildings would be preserved, but that the energy performance of the structures would be brought up to a LEED standard (Leadership in Environmental and Energy Design is the architectural world’s designation for exceptionally environmentallyfriendly buildings).

Achieving both goals at once occasionally proved to be a challenge. For example, when human remains were found in the basement of the building, the city of Montreal had to be contacted so that a full archeological review could be performed. The city’s team painstakingly combed the sublevels of the structure to remove all of the remains or artifacts that could be salvaged. Then, Greenberg’s team conducted a review of the entire structure to determine which of the building’s internal elements were appropriate for inclusion in the final product.

The result is an elegantly minimal and ardently contemporary space. Occasional nods to the past – the inclusion of crystal chandeliers, for example – remind the visitor of the 19th–century heritage of the buildings, but the overall effect is modern and hi-tech.

The building also boasts a rooftop terrace with an impressive view of Old Montreal.

Unlike the DHC, the PHI Centre is neither a not-for-profit nor a public art gallery, although it often takes on the roles of exhibition space or concert hall. The assistant curator of the DHC, Cheryl

WHAT’S THE HAPS

Making space for creativity

i2

The Sacrifice

Andrei Tarkovsky September 30 6:45 p.m.

Cinéma du Parc 3575 Parc Avenue $8.50 for under-25s This is your chance to see master Russian director Andrei Tarkovsky’s final film, the culmination of a series of great Russian films at the Cinéma du Parc.

Rarely shown in North America in its original 35mm format, The Sacrifice will be screened only once before being returned to Russia “indefinitely,” according to the Cinéma. The Sacrifice, produced in the Soviet Union in 1986, is about the outbreak of World War Three as heard from a remote island. The apocalyptic theme reflects Tarkovsky’s swiftly declining health during the making of the film.

Richard III

Metachroma Theatre September 19-30 Matinee and evening shows Segal Centre 5170 Côte-Ste-Catherine $18 for students The Segal Centre in Côtedes-Neiges presents Metachroma Theatre’s rendition of Shakespeare’s tragic historical play.

Richard III chronicles the ambitious and ruthless prince’s rise to power and his short and bloody reign.

Formed by a group of Montreal actors in 2010, Metachroma is a theatre company devoted to casting visible-minority actors on the stage. Visit segalcentre.org for a calendar of showings.

Ta Douleur

Photos Hera Chan | The McGill Daily

Sim, also carries out programming duties at the PHI. She explains the PHI as a polyvalent space at the service of the arts, “four floors of versatile space adaptable to all types of events imaginable: launches, conferences, colloquia, exhibitions, and performances.”

Though open to a wide range of artistic disciplines, the PHI Centre is particularly dedicated to “presenting and producing projects that are at the intersection of music, film, [and] new media,” Sim said. In this vein, the PHI Centre will host a performance by lucky dragons, an L.A. duo that specialize in improvised and participatory musical

performances that build a common sense of purpose between audience and performer.

This event, a collaboration of Art Pop, will be lucky dragons’ first performance in Montreal, proving this new space will host innovative artists and shows in the same vein as the DHC. However, there is a distinct role for each space within Montreal. Sim said, “[...] after DHC/ART was founded, Phoebe Greenberg started to be interested in the possibilities for another centre that would be interdisciplinary, and that would involve production as well as presentation. So at some level it seems like an organic thing to have some of our programming

at DHC/ART, actually take place at the PHI Centre. Mostly because we are very separate organizations, but we have a founder who has a shared vision.”

The successful DHC has brought innovation and imagination to the forefront of the Montreal arts community. The PHI Centre will be a welcome addition to the reputation of the city as a place for visionaries, artists, and art lovers the world over.

lucky dragons will be showing at the PHI Centre, 407 Saint-Pierre, on Sunday, September 23. The event starts at 5:00 p.m. Tickets are $15.

Anne Lebeau and Brigitte Haentjens Every night until September 29 8:00 p.m.

Théatre La Chapelle 3700 Ste. Dominique $25 for students Contemporary dance piece Ta Douleur (“Your Pain,” in English) explores themes of conjugal violence, sexuality, and shared suffering. Brigitte Haentjens won the Siminovitch Prize in Theatre, the largest of its kind in Canada.

Grands Ballets Canadienstrained Anne Lebeau and Francis Ducharme will interpret the piece.

11th Annual Pow Wow

September 21 11:00 a.m.

Lower Field McGill University Free admission The First People’s House at McGill is presenting their 11th Annual Pow Wow this Friday.

This free event showcases a myriad of cool musicians and artists, with presentations including Inuit throat singing, inter-tribal dances, and a smoke dance competition. The event celebrates the traditional as well as the contemporary, with an exciting appearance from the “pow wow step” group A Tribe Called Red for a workshop from 1:00 to 2:30 p.m.

culture

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Urbana hits the city Festival creates hype with a performance from beatboxer DubFX Hillary Pasternak Culture Writer

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ameras and phones of all makes are hoisted high above the sea of alternative hairstyles: partially shaved heads, candy-coloured dye jobs, and more dreadlocks than you’re likely to see outside of a Rastafari reasoning session. Every lens is pointed at the patio outside ChuChai, a vegetarian Thai restaurant on St. Denis, where an Australian beatbox specialist in a patchy newsboy cap is producing a symphony’s worth (or at least a very expensive synthesizer’s worth) of noises from his mouth, a microphone, and a couple of effects pedals. The patio itself is worth mention as well: it’s painted with a riot of black and white swirls of graffiti and cartoon–influenced psychedelia, courtesy of local art collaborative En Masse. Ladies and gentlemen, the Urbana Festival has landed. Well, it’s launched a scouting party, at least.

Nothing could explain Urbana better than its own amusingly capitalized press release: “Urbana is a Collaborative Urban Arts project founded by Ari Tietolman and David Lee in April 2012. The overall mission is to explore and promote Urban Culture through the transformation of Cityscapes into canvasses and stages, showcasing and supporting today’s Artists and Creators of all Media; enriching the City’s vitality and character and

ultimately fascinating the public at large.” While it only takes up an afternoon and part of a city block at the moment, Tietolman and Lee have bigger ambitions for next year.

They want a full-scale festival, on the level of the International Jazz Festival. There is even a mention of roping in Banksy.

Long-term celebrity recruitment goals aside, the present seems to be going just fine. The aforementioned Australian is YouTube star and frequent busker DubFX, known on legal documents as Benjamin Stanford. He beatboxes, raps in two different voices, sings in about four, and strays into dancehall toasting.

Occasionally, he produces a guttural, growling didgeridoo noise to create a “Wall of Sound” effect in the background of a beat. Somehow, he still finds time to banter flirtatiously with similarly talented fellow performer, label mate, and fiancée, Flower Fairy. He genre hops: reggae, dub, hip hop, dubstep, drum ‘n’ bass, jazz, and dancehall are all name-checked from the stage, and many others are given fleeting sonic quotes. His music is almost completely improvised within the structure of each song, and while original lyrics can occasionally stray toward the trite (“Joined at the soul with a pair of headphones”), the overall effect is something close to stupefying. How does one guy do all of that?

While it’s impossible to tell whether those lofty full-on festival goals can be achieved at the moment, the project’s more immediate mis-

Illustration Julia Boshyk | The McGill Daily

sion – to bring mainstream visibility to street culture – seems to be a success. It’s safe to say that when they arrived, most members of the crowd (especially the people your mother would be happier to see you hanging out with: preppy university students,

young families, and plenty of curious passers-by from the neighbourhood) weren’t aware of DubFX’s tiny British record label, the “organically grown, conscious-minded collective of soulful independent artists,” Convoy Unlimited. But between the circulat-

ing DVD vendors and Dub’s semifrequent plugs for his Canadian tour, it’s certain that won’t be the case by the end. Everything gets a festival of its own these days, so why not these scrappy, talented idealists? Here’s wishing them good luck for next year.

Art Essay - E.k. Chan

compendium!

The McGill Daily Thursday, September 20, 2012 mcgilldaily.com

lies, half truths, and students of the week

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Thousands hospitalized after #HMBBQ Euan EK The Twice-a-Weekly

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t least 2,000 students are dead and hundreds more are in a critical condition after eating burgers and hotdogs provided by the McGill administration at last Thursday’s free barbecue.

The barbecue, ostensibly laid on by the administration to improve school spirit and foster open dialogue between students and administrators, was in fact a last-ditch attempt at budgetary management, following news that the Parti Québécois was stopping the planned tuition hike.

Having tried flying the McGill flag at half-mast for a week, the administration decided that killing off a substantial part of the student body was the only way they could get to grips with the budget.

“We were sinking money left, right, and centre into students,” PR Mascot Sweetie Boy-Sweet told The Twice-a-Weekly. “Teaching, books, food, walls, roofs, you name it students wanted it; we needed a way to quickly stop a huge chunk of our money from being spent.”

After trying and failing to exclude dozens of “the S.C.U.M.” earlier in the year, Boy-Sweet said that the administration was forced to turn to “actually just murder” in order to get control of the receipts.

“I mean, we’d tried to get rid

of a bunch of the students before,” said Boy-Sweet, “but ‘procedure’ and ‘democratic norms’ meant things weren’t moving at the pace we wanted. We needed to speed things up, and quickly.”

According to Boy-Sweet, plans for the slaughter had been in development for several months, after focusgroups revealed students wouldn’t just walk to their deaths.

“To be honest that was a little surprising,” said Manthony Massi, Vice-Bulldog of Union-Busting, “I mean, we’ve not exactly been trying to make them feel wanted around here, we thought the never-ending icy-cold black nothingness of the deep netherworld would be a relief after the prices in the Redpath Cafe, but, no, they wouldn’t just allow themselves to be killed.”

“We had in mind a giant death pit that eats you up like in those Star Wars movies or even just like putting asbestos in all the buildings, [but] the students were too switched on for that, we needed something creative. It was actually Heatha [Mama-Boom] who came up with the barbecue idea.”

Mama-Boom, the Baroness of The Capitalist Church of James, has long made her distaste for students known, and told Massi that she was “fucking desperate to spend money polishing the Redpath Library underpass with caviar or crude oil.”

HMB’s idea was beautiful in its simplicity. Students were invited to

join the Baroness for a free burger, except the burger was filled with arsenic. So if you ate it you died. The students who died had eaten the burgers. The students who survived ate some of a burger.

“To be honest she [MamaBoom] was actually quite vicious about the whole thing,” said Massi. “Every time someone mentioned the barbecue she began gnashing her teeth and gulping back litres of excess saliva. I also

distinctly heard her muttering the phrase ‘stinking mudbloods’ several times in her sleep.”

“We actually tried to dissuade her from killing so many,” said BoySweet, “we said, ‘hey Heatha, maybe just like a dozen, even a baker’s dozen, a show of strength, y’know: they see you in charge, they know who’s boss, they won’t question you.’ That’s what we said. ‘A show of strength, just a show of strength’ we said. But she was adamant that ‘the

debt of the forsaken must be paid in blood.’ She was adamant about that. It was the blood of the dead or nothing. And if you looked at the books you’d know that nothing wasn’t an option.”

Survivors of the HMBBQ have been advised to run. Run away, and never return.

This was found amongst the scrapbooks of Euan EK after the thought police killed him.

Furniture of the week The brown couch by the door of the SSMU lounge

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oday we launch the first in a series in a new series: Furniture of the Week. The first winner is the brown couch by the door of the SSMU lounge.

The Twice-a-Weekly (TW): Why are you an asset to McGill?

Brown Couch (BC): Well I’m very stable. Firm. Not wobbly, but without too much attitude. I’m not one of these couches that will fucking cave in on your ass, but I won’t just sit there without any give or anything. I look for a happy medium.

TW: If you could high-five anyone, dead or alive, who would it be and why?

BC: Well, maybe just another one of my couch buddies. They’re the only other ones that know what it’s like. I mean, think about it, everyone has a SSMU lounge couch story to tell. From the innocent first year who, after dropping pennies down the back of the cushions, naively reaches their hand into the crevasse, expecting to feel soft cushion but instead touching a dank, clammy liquid, to the wizened old fourth year who has lost their wallet, laptop, and virginity when lying against the soft velour comfort of my buds. But, though y’all throw your

bodies on top of us and drool gently into us, the voice of the SSMU couch is too-often underrepresented on our campus. But the couches are waiting. They are ready. So yeah, another couch. If I had hands.

TW: What is your secret talent?

BC: Belly-dancing.

TW: Mac or PC? BC: I fight consumerism on all fronts. It’s hard, because I can’t move, but I try.

TW: If you were a city in Canada which one would you be and why?

BC: Regina. For sure. Great city.

Cousin’s from there. Yeah, Regina.

TW: Are you from there?

BC: No. Maybe.

TW: What’s your go-to hangovercure?

BC: A really strong bloody mary.

I prefer not to use that canned tomatoes, but like, times are hard, and organic ones are so expensive these days. I try and use sea salt as well, but I feel like it’s a rip off. To be honest maybe I prefer the tomato flavour just by itself. So, wait.

Can I change my answer? Tomato juice. Or maybe a bloody mary.

One of the two.

TW: Name one song that reminds

you of your high-school graduation?

BC: I didn’t graduate high school, because I found writing hard. I had real messy handwriting. Still do, in fact. Because I have no hands. But, if I had to pick a favourite song, I’d say, “Hey Soul Sister,” by Train.

TW: How many times have you been to Gerts?

BC: How many times does the sun go around the world in a day?

TW: Once.

BC: Only once? Seriously? Fuck. K, well like at least three times a day.

I’m pretty cool.

TW: What’s your favourite Disney movie?

BC: They’re all racist, dude. Seriously.

TW: Football or hockey?

BC: I’m more of a luge-couch myself.

TW: Name one actor from Friends.

BC: Meryl Streep. Yeah, she was good.

TW: Owen Wilson or Luke Wilson?

Both. At the same time. Sitting on me. No hands.

TW: Name one fashion trend you’ll never try again.

BC: Plastic coverings man...fuck the eighties were bad. Squeaky.

TW: What’s your favourite artists or band from the nineties?

BC: I really enjoy musicals, when I can get out. It’s hard for me to get out and about to the threatre, what with work. But...I’d say...Rent.

TW: What reality TV show are you perfect for?

BC: I was already in Big Brother.

TW: What’s your signature drink?

BC: Oh... “Cherry Cola.”

TW: What’s the first word you think of when I say Redpath?

BC: Fluorescent. Also sex.

TW: Describe McGill in three words?

BC: Being sat on.

TW: Who would star in the story of your life?

BC: The couch in the Central Perk cafe in Friends. I used to date his ex actually. He’s kinda a real cocky guy.

TW: If you could go back in time to any historical event, which one would you go to and why?

BC: The Renaissance. I’d like to have met Da Vinci. Also yesterday.

This interview has been edited for space and clarity. Compiled by Euan and Euanna EK.

EDITORIAL

volume 102 number 6

editorial board 3480 McTavish St., Rm. B-24 Montreal, QC H3A 1X9 phone 514.398.6784 fax 514.398.8318 mcgilldaily.com coordinating editor

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cover design Amina Batyreva contributors Claudia Alexander, Karel Asha, Sophie Blaze, Julia Boshyk, Carla Green, Esther Harvey-Peake, Isabella Johnson, Henry Kronk, Davide Mastracci, Hillary Pasternak, Jitika Shah, Kristal Spreadborough, Andreanne Stewart, Noah Q. Tavlin

15

Statistics don’t tell the whole truth Over the summer, the Service de police de la Ville de Montréal (SPVM) reported a decrease in the number of sexual assaults in the greater Montreal area. At a cursory glance, this decrease seems to be a trend worth celebrating. Unfortunately, this may well be a case of “lies, damned lies, and statistics” – the decrease in reported cases does not necessarily reflect a decrease in the number of sexual assaults that occur. Rather, the intimidation of the police force could be preventing survivors of sexual assault from reporting to the police.

It is important to note that police statistics cannot completely be trusted. It is the job of some within the police to make sure that crime statistics decrease or stay low. The truth is not always important, as long as the numbers go down.

While the SVPM has published its lowered statistics, the Centre pour les victimes d’agression sexuelle de Montreal, a shelter for sexual assault survivors, has not reported any decrease in sexual assault this summer.

Perhaps survivors do not trust the police, and would rather go to community services to receive support.

And why should survivors trust the police? As we’ve seen over the course of the student strike, police are often unnecessarily abusive. They do not, as a whole, exude an open and inviting atmosphere, something particularly important to victims of highly sensitive crimes. In fact, the police in this country have shown a disturbing proclivity toward sexual assault that would make any survivor wary.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), a police force that serves all of Canada, is facing a lawsuit from over 200 ex-employees who have experienced and witnessed alleged extensive sexual harassment of women within the force. Faced with this disturbing news, one British Columbia recruiter, Maria Nickel, said that women joining the force would need “inner strength” to endure any harassment, basically excusing the conduct of anyone in the force who has harassed a woman. Nickel, in advising female Mounties, said that “you can…let yourself be a victim of [sexual harassment] or…say ‘No…my intention is that I’m going to succeed,’” reinforcing the victim-blaming culture of sexual harassment and assault rather than placing blame on the excusatory culture of the RCMP. Why would any survivor feel comfortable reporting to a group that allows sexual harassment within its own ranks?

Similarly, the stigmatization of sexual crimes makes it difficult for any survivor to file a report. Survivors of sexual assault often fear societal judgement or blame, making them hesitant to talk about their case. This stigmatization, and fear of the police, must be changed – but a culture cannot be changed overnight.

This is why we need more alternatives to the police for sexual assault reporting. Peer-run groups like the Sexual Assault Centre of the McGill Students’ Society (SACOMSS) are spaces in which survivors can comfortably report sexual assaults without fear of abuse or stigmatization. It is imperative that more spaces like this be created around the city, especially when institutions like Concordia University do not have student-run sexual assault centres. We must be skeptical of police statistics, realizing that a part of police administration is lowering crime statistics, even if that means bending the truth. Furthermore, police need to change how they react to sexual assaults – with more thorough training in the police academy, by becoming more open to reports of sexual assault crimes, and by actively addressing rape culture within their ranks. Until all this is accomplished, however, reports of lowered sexual assault crimes must be viewed with a wary eye.

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All contents © 2012 Daily Publications Society. All rights reserved. The content of this newspaper is the responsibility of The McGill Daily and does not necessarily represent the views of McGill University. Products or companies advertised in this newspaper are not necessarily endorsed by Daily staff.

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