November 10, 2020

The Concordian.

NEWS // US Election / BLM Taskforce / Sustainability Plan / CSU and Police Brutality / +

COMMENTARY // Black History / Quebec Separatism / Borat / Future of the CSU / Borat / +

ARTS // Alice Munro’s Poetry / Cinetrii App / Canadian Korean Film Festival / +

MUSIC // Miley Cyrus’ Rebirth / Mac Miller needs Respect / +

VOLUME 38, ISSUE 5 TUESDAY NOV 10, 2020

// theconcordian @theconcordian @theconcordian theconcordian.com

SPORTS // Who’s the Best Fighter? / Being a Stinger during the Pandemic /+

News.

NEWS EDITORS Hadassah Alencar / @Hadassahalencar Juliette Palin / @PalinJuliette news@theconcordian.com

INTERNATIONAL NEWS

Joe Biden will be the next U.S. President, but Trump refuses to concede While Democrats won the 2020 presidential election with a record turnout, the current president claims the election was stolen

Bogdan Lytvynenko Assistant News Editor Joe Biden will be the 46th president of the United States. He is projected to win the presidential election with at least 290 electoral votes, surpassing the threshold of 270 needed to win. Biden’s running mate Kamala Harris will become the vice president, being the first woman, as well as the first Black and first South Asian person in American history to occupy this position.

Biden received over 75 million votes, an all-time high for a presidential candidate, earning 50.6 per cent of the popular vote thus far. Meanwhile, 70.6 million Americans voted for the incumbent President Donald Trump.

Although the presidential election took place on Nov. 3, it was far from over that night. As Biden and Trump had an incredibly close race in several battleground states, Biden was announced as the projected winner only four days later. In his victory tweet, Biden addressed the nation, saying, “America, I’m honoured that you have chosen me to lead our great country.”

On election night, Trump was leading in the majority of swing states. However, in Pennsylvania, Georgia, Michigan, and Wisconsin, Trump’s lead started to shrink the following day as the mail-in ballots were being counted.

The 2020 election witnessed the highest number of ballots in U.S. history, with over 159.8 million Americans having cast their vote. In fact, despite the COVID-19 pandemic, the country had a 66.8 per cent voter turnout, the highest since the year 1900.

Biden and Harris have also broken several records themselves. At the age of 77, Joe Biden became the oldest president-elect in American history. The previous record was held by Donald Trump, who was 70 years old when he won the 2016 presidential election.

Despite the Democrats’ projected win, President Trump appears to not be willing to deliver a concession speech anytime soon. In fact, he refuses to accept the outcome of the election, claiming there was widespread voter fraud and lack of transparency.

“If you count all the legal votes, I easily win the election! If you count all the illegal and late votes, they can steal the election from us!” stated President Trump.

He was referring to millions of mail-in ballots that were counted after Nov. 3, which strongly favoured his opponent and led to Trump’s loss. In fact, those millions of mail-in votes were just as valid as in-person votes that

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were cast on Election Day, since they were all stamped on or before Nov. 3. As laws in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin barred officials from processing the mail-in ballots before 7 a.m. on election day, many of them were counted in the days that followed.

Trump questioned Biden’s increasing lead as the remaining votes were being counted.

“How come every time they count MailIn ballot dumps they are so devastating in their percentage and power of destruction?” asked the president on Twitter.

In reality, the remaining mail-in ballots were coming from heavily Democratic urban centres such as Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and Atlanta, Georgia. Moreover, the Trump campaign ran Facebook ads earlier this fall to warn his supporters not to trust mail-in voting. Republicans were thus more likely to vote in-person than Democrats, which created an illusion on election night that Trump was the favourite to win in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Georgia.

Instead of accepting the result as it became clear, Trump tweeted “STOP THE COUNT!” on Nov. 5. This anti-democratic process would prevent the president-elect from overtaking Trump in battleground states. Besides this unprecedented request, Trump suggested that “there was a large number of secretly dumped ballots as has been widely reported,” even though there is zero evidence that could prove such a claim.

The incumbent president plans on taking this matter to the U.S. Supreme Court, which he believes should determine the final electoral college results. However, it is very unlikely that Supreme Court justices will get involved in the election, as the Trump administration lacks concrete evidence of “widespread voter fraud” for this legal strategy to work.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau congratulated Biden and Harris on their election win Saturday morning. In an official statement, Trudeau said that “Cana-

da and the United States enjoy an extraordinary relationship,” and that he looks forward to working with the president-elect, vice president-elect and the U.S. Congress to “tackle the world’s greatest challenges together.”

When it comes to Canada, Biden’s presidency may add some uncertainty to trade between the two nations. On the one hand, Biden’s environmentally-friendly policies are likely to open the market for Canadian clean energy technology. There will also be less uncertainty regarding Canadian steel and aluminium, which were temporarily subject to tariffs imposed by Trump in 2018.

On the other hand, Biden has pledged to cancel the Keystone XL pipeline, a multi-billion dollar project that would allow Alberta to transfer over 800,000 barrels of crude oil a day across the border to Nebraska. Meanwhile, Trudeau actively supports this project and vowed to press any U.S. government on its approval.

As for the Canada-U.S. diplomatic relations, the president-elect referred to Canada as an ally and a friend, “one that the U.S. needs more than ever.” Biden also called for the United States to play a more active role in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), an international military alliance that includes Canada as a long-time member.

Going forward, Biden promised that he will be a president for all Americans, who “doesn’t see red and blue states, but a United States.”

While Trump refuses to accept defeat and to respect the choice of the American people, Canada prepares for a new chapter in the relationship between the two nations.

President-elect Biden and Vice President-elect Harris will have an official inauguration ceremony on Jan. 20, 2021.

Graphic by @the.beta.lab

CONCORDIA

Concordia’s new initiative is fighting against systemic racism President’s task force on anti-Black racism Hannah Tiongson Contributor

Concordia takes action and launches a plan to address and to fight against systemic racism in the university. On Oct. 29, President and Vice-Chancellor Graham Carr announced the Task Force on Anti-Black Racism.

According to Concordia’s statement, “The task force will direct and coordinate the work needed to generate recommendations that will address anti-Black racism based on the experiences of faculty, staff and students.”

Following the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery, among others, people around the world began to express their frustration with police brutality towards Black people, and took to the streets to march in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. In early June, members of the Concordia community came together and wrote a letter with a series of demands and recommendations for the university, insisting that Concordia take action against anti-Black racism. The letter was written after a short period of consultation. The task force is an opportunity for an ongoing discussion with students, faculty members and staff.

Over the course of two years, the task force will address systemic racism and have an action plan put in place with different recommendations from its members.

Led by three co-chairs, Angélique Willkie, associate professor of Contemporary Dance, Stéphane Brutus, professor of Management at JMSB, and Annick Maugile Flavien, founding coordinator of the Black Perspectives Office, the initiative also includes a 15-person leadership team. The students involved are undergraduates, graduates, alumni and two members of the Black Caucus of Concordia (BBC). As for the faculty members and staff, they represent eight sub-committees: campus security, anti-racist education, Concordia’s history and relations with Black communities, curriculum and educational resources, student services, faculty development, employment initiatives and fundraising.

Flavien stated that over the next years, “There is going to be continuous action put in place depending on what is possible at what time.” She also explained that there are already a lot of changes happening right now; one being inclusion workshops with the Faculty of Fine Arts as well as psychological services that she is leading.

“The task force will look at the demands of the letter with much more in-depth understanding of what is actually happening at Concordia, what is possible to be put into place and what best fits the community as we move forward.”

The task force will finalize the membership of the sub-committees by Nov. 30, 2020.

Amaria Phillips, co-founder of the newly established Black Student Union (BSU), commented on the need of Black students’ representation at the university. Phillips pointed out the necessity for this club especially in a predominantly white university like Concordia. Phillips also clarified that the BSU is not part of the task force but hopes to be working with the initiative in the near-feature.

“The task force is a really important step. Now Black students really know that there is something holding the university accountable in making sure that Black students’ voices are heard,” said Phillips.

Graphic by @the.beta.lab

“The leadership committee is essentially the brain of the task force. In the sense that the leads are the ones working on the recommendations and all,” commented Flavien.

The importance of the student body is highlighted in this initiative as the task force is very oriented towards the student experience. Brutus stated that “The meat of the task force” is found in the sub-committees’ topics. Brutus explained that looking at the eight sub-committees, four of them directly influence the student experience: campus security, anti-racist education, curriculum and educational resources, and student services.

“This task force will aim to do many things for staff, faculty and community members, but a big part of what we want to do is really focus on the student experience in relation to these matters and try to improve the status,” emphasized Brutus.

According to Wilkie, now is really the time to “peel all of the layers of the onion on a wider spectrum.” She highlights that the responsibility of the task force is to take time over the course of two years to evaluate the situation at Concordia and to “dig in” each of the divisions that will be managed by the separate sub-committees.

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News.

NEWS EDITORS Hadassah Alencar / @Hadassahalencar Juliette Palin / @PalinJuliette news@theconcordian.com

CONCORDIA

Concordia launches its Sustainability Action Plan Concordia plans to fully divest from greenhouse gasses and go 90 per cent waste free by 2040 Fern Clair Assistant News Editor

Graphic by Taylor Reddam

On Nov. 3, Concordia held an online panel on the official launch of its Sustainability Action Plan. The plan is a five-year strategy that consists of five groups: food, waste, climate change, research, and curriculum.

“This plan is an ambitious living document with five streams that were developed in tandem, because we recognized that in order to be successful we cannot pursue this work in silos,” said Michael Di Grappa, the new vice president of services and sustainability, and a speaker at the panel.

For the five groups of the Sustainability Action Plan, the goal is to have aspects of them in action by 2025, with the end-goal of them being fully implemented by 2040.

Cassandra Lamontagne, the sustainability coordinator for the project, went into more detail about what the five groups meant during the panel.

She explained that the first group is food, with the goal of creating more sustainable, local food options on campus. Environmental and social sustainability will be considered in every agreement regarding food at Concordia. Another aspect of this group is to provide affordable and healthy food on both campuses.

The next group was the zero waste plan, with the goal of keeping 90 per cent of Concordia’s waste out of landfills by doing such things as recycling and composting. Another aspect of this is to reduce the waste generated by Concordia.

According to an article by the Montreal Gazette, Montreal is going through a recycling crisis, and it is unknown what percentage of waste is actually recycled.

Then, for the climate action plan, Con-

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cordia is to transition from gas to electric and stop all greenhouse gas emissions on campus, including transportation. This will be done by improving infrastructure for biking and electric cars. Concordia also promises to completely divest from the coal industry.

The plan for sustainability research aims to create more interdisciplinary research opportunities for students, as well as ensure Concordia is a leader in research on sustainability in Canada.

The final group is sustainability in the curriculum, which would work with faculty and professors on how they can integrate sustainability into their own curriculum, as well as give graduate students the skills and knowledge to implement sustainability in their fields of work after university.

According to the Concordia website, this plan was put into motion in 2017 when Concordia held a community consultation, which started the concept of the five groups.

Then, in 2018, committees were created to represent each of the five groups. After another community consultation in 2019, a final draft of the Sustainability Action Plan was finalized.

“Last year the University foundation committed not only [to] divestment from coal in five years,” said Graham Carr, the university’s president and vice-chancellor, at the panel. “We are the first university foundation in the country to commit to a portfolio of 100 per cent sustainability by 2025.”

Carr also explained that Concordia was the first university to launch a sustainability investment practicum in 2020, which is a collaboration between the John Molson School of Business and Manulife Investment Management, a company that facilitates sustainable investment.

Paula Wood-Adams, the vice president of research and graduate studies, explained during the panel that in 2019 Concordia received $9.1 million from the The Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC). The funds were for 49 research projects in natural science and engineering, including research on climate-resilient buildings and biodiverse ecosystems.

Wood-Adams also talked about how in the same year Concordia received $6.3 million in funding from The Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council for 88 projects, and 1.6 million in a grant from NSERC’s collaborative research

and training experience program.

During the Q&A part of the panel, Wood-Adams stated that the best way to get involved with these newly funded projects is to reach out to faculty and professors at Concordia. “Contact them and say that you want to get involved,” she said.

“The Sustainability Action Plans have come from many years of tough conversations, and we’re glad that they are now available to the community,” said Emily Carson-Apstein, the external and campaigns coordinator at Sustainable Concordia. Carson-Apstein explained Sustainable Concordia is going to ensure the University keeps their promises and is transparent about the progress and decision making.

“Student leadership and activism have been a driving force behind every positive change at Concordia, and that’s what we want to highlight.”

CSU

Abolition or reform? A new CSU position CSU’s police brutality position is controversial in its wording Juliette Palin News Editor On Oct. 28, the the Concordia Student Union (CSU)’s second meeting of the month discussed Arts and Science Representative Shivaane Subash’s police brutality position. In hopes of being added to the CSU’s Positions Book, the position highlights how the CSU does not support the SPVM in its treatment of Black and Indigenous students.

Two distinct positions were recognizable in the discussions: one for abolition, and one against. This doesn’t mean that any parties were against taking a position; rather, they had different approaches to the position.

Subash wrote in the position, “The CSU recognizes its racially diverse student population and how widely reported racial profiling experiences by the SPVM affects their educational experience. Thus, it is vital to advocate for their safety and security to ensure a safe, enriching university environment.”

This universal statement is one that most CSU representatives agree with. However, there are a handful of

representatives that have issues with the last clause in the position.

The section originally read, “CSU stands in favour with defunding and abolishing the SVPM, so as to redirect those financial resources to areas such as healthcare, mental health, housing, education, jobs, and restorative-justice models that better suit the needs of our community.” After the discussion, the section of the quote in italics was removed.

Subash explained that she “looked at the Positions Book and realized there was just a small section on police brutality.”

As one of the only remaining women of colour in the CSU now that many have stepped down, she knew that someone needed to take a stand, and change the CSU’s position on these issues.

Subash is aware that abolishing and defunding the police is a controversial idea, and was expecting push back from fellow council members.

“This is natural, there was pushback and confusion from the general public and different leaders as well, so it was expected by everyone,” she said.

Despite this, she said it’s still exhausting to deal with this type of

pushback.

“It’s mostly tiring … especially when everyone is learning about concepts such as police brutality. They’re not new concepts, but they’re penetrating the public more nowadays.”

She stood by her ideas and statement, based on her own personal experience as a minority.

“A lot of people are against it because the police have always been there as an institution that we’ve had for ages,” she said.

“So people are so used to that police presence, they don’t want to consider abolishing/defunding the police.”

However, this isn’t the section that Tzvi Hersh Filler, a member of the CSU Council of Representatives, had issues with, but rather the word “abolish.”

In Filler’s opinion, “In this case, seeing as [the police] is an essential service, scrapping it doesn’t make sense. Obviously, you have to fix the accountability issues.” He argues that the word “abolish” will create a sour relationship with the SPVM, which can lead to bigger issues.

Filler compares the situation to a similar one that occurred in New York City, where a group of Orthodox Jews were being harassed with bricks. According to Filler, the police failed to handle the situation properly.

He said, “The fact that the police were unable to properly handle [the situation], came down to the fact that the police felt like [the mayor] was out to abolish them, and that created this atmosphere where they couldn’t do their jobs.”

James Hanna, a Gina Cody councillor at the CSU is of the same opinion as Filler. Both agree that the SPVM is extremely problematic and needs to be fixed. However, these two don’t see how abolition is the key to this.

He said, “Without fixing society itself; without lowering the racism score, the level of [racism in] the police also won’t change because it’s the same pool of candidates, it’s still the subset of that same population, unless you radically change the population.”

As of now, the position’s 12.8 section stands as such: “CSU stands in favour with defunding and abolishing the SVPM”.

CSU hosts second event of BLM Campaign: Know Your Rights, Legal Info 101

The virtual workshop helped students to understand their constitutional rights when fighting for change Chloe Elek Contributor On Nov. 5, the CSU hosted a virtual workshop as the second part of their Black Lives Matter campaign. The event focused on educating attendees about their basic legal rights when participating in activism and social justice work.

The workshop was given by Arij Riahi, a Montreal lawyer who focuses on cases of racial profiling and works with grassroots communities, students, and individuals from marginalized communities. Riahi has been involved with social justice and anti-racism work for as long as she can remember.

Riahi’s presentation covered the constitutional rights one has if detained, the different crimes that people participating in demonstrations can be charged with, and how to “cop watch” safely and legally.

Riahi hoped the event would equip its attendees with the ability to make informed decisions in their activism.

“I am a firm believer that knowl-

edge is power,” she said. “I am a firm believer that every single person should evaluate for themselves the level of consent when they enter a political action.”

She also advises activists to think of others when protesting. She said, “Come from a perspective of care, and always be mindful of the people around you.”

“Put your own political practice within a broader scheme, and make sure that you understand who is involved, and why they are involved.”

While she believes strongly in the importance of sharing legal knowledge and understanding one’s rights, Riahi acknowledges the complexities of the law.

“It’s a learning curve,” she said.

“There’s always room to learn more, to know more.”

The event concluded with a presentation from Walter Chi-yan Tom of the CSU’s Legal Information Clinic (LIC). Tom discussed different tickets that can be given at demonstrations, including social distancing infractions, and the ensuing court process, with information about the rights of immigrants and international students when receiving a ticket or a criminal charge.

Tom encouraged students who have legal questions to contact the LIC, a free service for students to receive legal information and referrals.

Jessica Quijano, a spokesperson

for Montreal’s Defund the Police Coalition, agrees that it is important for everyone who attends demonstrations and advocates for BLM to understand their legal rights, but emphasizes the importance of centering minorities to ensure safety at protests.

She urges allies to remember the communities that will be targeted and focus on helping the movement.

“It’s really important to not take the voices away from the people that are the most affected by police violence,” she said.

“Is this about you or is it about a collective movement?” Quijano asked people to consider.

In addition to attending protests and informational events, Quijano encourages those who want to help the movement to try to do six actions after every protest they attend.

“It could be making phone calls or sending emails to your local representatives … educating people around you, and your family,” she said. “The protests and education part is one piece of it, but then it always has to go further than that.”

The series of virtual workshops provided by the CSU’s #BLM Campaign aims to equip students to participate in anti-racism work. They will be occurring regularly throughout the rest of the fall semester.

Riahi is currently working to allow her workshop to be accessed online.

Graphic by Taylor Reddam

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Commentary.

COMMENTARY EDITOR Aviva Majerczyk / @aviva_majerczyk commentary@theconcordian.com

CULTURE

The importance of teaching Black History How the story of a Black enslaved woman resonates today

Hadassah Alencar News Editor

Photo by Christine Beaudoin

An enormous portion of Montreal had burned down; among the devastation numerous households, merchant shops, a hospital, and a convent were lost. After the destruction on April 10, 1734, the city turned its eyes to Marie-Joseph Angélique, a young Black enslaved woman, as the culprit.

Maintaining her innocence throughout the trial, Angélique denied the hearsay allegations of majority white citizens. After almost six weeks of a trial that collected no definitive evidence or testimony, Angélique was sentenced to death. 29-year-old Angélique was tortured, hanged, and burned on June 21, roughly two months after the fire, for a crime many historians believe she did not commit.

Today, tucked away in Montreal’s Old Port, a plaque honouring Angélique tells a different story: the fight for the abolition of slavery, and the remembrance that slavery did occur here in our city. Angélique has become a symbol of resistance, not only because of her treatment in the colonial justice system, but of the testimonies revealing her fight for freedom, 100 years before the abolition of slavery in Canada.

However, the hard-to-spot plaque emphasizes the lack of any outstanding acknowledgment for Angélique, and magnifies the criticism of Montreal’s suppression of minority people’s history.

Montreal Black history tour guide Rito Joseph runs “Tour-

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ist in My City,” a tour in the Old Port and Little Burgundy which sheds light on the city’s centuries-long diverse history. A selftaught historian, Joseph believes that learning about Black history is crucial to understanding Canadian history and systemic racism.

For Joseph, the story of Angélique represents the reality of racism in the city, and how the impact of the trial resonates today.

“Marie-Joseph Angélique shows us that Montreal, Quebec, Canada, was involved in slavery and they benefited from the Transatlantic slave trade, it also shows us that systemic racism goes beyond what we can imagine.”

At the time of Angélique’s trial, Montreal was part of the French colony “New France,” where Black individuals were not legally considered people. For the trial, Angélique had to prove her innocence against a slew of allegations, and was not allowed a lawyer.

“They had about 20-something people testify against her, none of them had seen her set the fire. It shows a lot, and it shows us that the mentalities haven’t changed much,” said Joseph.

The lack of monuments and school curriculum dedicated to Black history, for Joseph, are in line with Angélique’s treatment and the suppression of Black people in the city.

“It shows that Black history here is not being taken seriously and by not taking Black history seriously it shows the lack of appreciation or respect for the Black community here.”

Montreal saw the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement during the summer, followed by the protests calling for justice after the death of Indigenous woman Joyce Echaquan in September.

Protestors and organizers said the city has a problem with racism, and that systemic racism exists in institutions in Montreal, such as the police.

For Joseph, learning about Black history is a step towards fighting systemic racism.

“Theres a level of dehumanization that we have to face on a regular basis that is rooted in slavery [and] racism and because we don’t take time to study the history that affects us on a regular basis, its really hard for us to really acknowledge or deconstruct

what we call nowadays systemic racism,” said Joseph.

Montreal theatre and film producer Ayana O’Shun produced both a play and documentary about Angélique, after watching an episode on the History Channel about her and becoming inspired by the character’s story of resilience.

“Can you imagine being in a society that treats you like less [than] an animal? You’re actually like furniture, a piece of furniture? And to stand up and say no, everyday trying to establish her human dignity,” said O’Shun.

“I found this is a sign not only of strength but a sign of self-awareness, and consciousness of who she is, and what it takes to fight everyday against a system that tells you to sit down and do what we want you to do. I found it absolutely amazing and admirable,” she said.

After being refused her freedom, Angélique attempted to run off with her lover, a white man named Claude Thibault; a relationship which was forbidden at the time. She was often rebellious in her home in an attempt to gain freedom, but unfortunately Angélique’s behaviour was despised, and instead of contributing to her freedom, it was used to pin the arson crime on her.

Her gruesome death speaks to the missing history of Black Montrealers throughout the centuries, and how previous injustices mute their voice throughout the historical landmarks of this city.

O’Shun believes it’s important to include Black history landmarks throughout the city and teach it in schools, because through it, we can learn the real story of Canada.

“When you teach history, you should teach a whole history, not take out some part[s] because it doesn’t look good,”she said.

“The real story is much more complex, nuanced, and the story of Angélique is a proof of that.”

Poster Courtesy of Bel Ange Moon Productions

CANADIAN POLITICS

1995: The independence we almost had

The 25th anniversary of Quebec’s bitter defeat Elyette Levy Assistant Commentary Editor The first time I ever heard the words “vote ethnique” was during my high school Monde Contemporain class. My teacher, a notso-secret diehard Quebec separatist, explained that it was one of the reasons that many voters felt robbed of a “Yes” majority during the 1995 referendum.

It was claimed that the federal government had rushed the process for immigrants to obtain their citizenship right before the vote in hopes of skewing the results — an accusation that has left a lasting bitterness towards foreigners and minorities.

My teacher also brought up the hundreds of thousands of dollars unlawfully spent by the federal government on their conservative campaign, though failed to mention the ballots illegally rejected by the “Yes” camp.

I’ve been looking back on all this political drama, as the last referendum turned a quarter of a century old on Oct. 30. The separatist ideology has since fallen considerably out of popularity, with 82 per cent of Quebecers

siding with remaining Canadians in 2016.

Despite the dwindling sentiment of nationalism, independence remains a major talking point in provincial elections, to wonwhich brings us der what even still drives this conversation 25 years later.

T h e economic implications of obtaining sovereignty are almost always the first objection to this matter. Despite Quebec representing just under 23 per cent of the country’s population, our share of Canada’s total debt — which sits at around 37 per cent — would be a major obstacle to our success without the federal government’s help. Our debt to capita and to GDP ratios have also been some of the highest in the country at the time of both ref-

erendums.

When the 1995 votes were cast, it was also uncertain whether the Clinton administration would’ve even recognized Quebec’s independence and accepted it as a member of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Without a free trade agreement with its neighbours, it would be nearly impossible for Quebec’s economy to survive.

Not to mention the

opment of renewable energy sources like hydroelectricity, and to build up our economy in an environmentally-friendly way.

Less reliant on oil and with full control of major ports like Montreal and Quebec City, the new country could make a name for itself on the international stage and form its own economic and political alliances.

The Bloc’s argument for the inclusion of immigrants is also particularly interesting because it asks newcomers to integrate into Quebec culture — by learning French, for instance — so that they can contribute to a general culture, rather than follow the current Canadian model that they claim encourages foreigners to stay within their bubbles.

What they call the “children of Bill 101,” or the second and third generation immigrants who were proudly raised as Quebecers, are proof that this is an achievable and desirable objective.

For now, I’m not sure many expect the third and final referendum to be called. Yet, we can still speculate on what could have happened just 25 years ago, and whether there is still hope for Quebec to regain its sovereign ideology.

friction this would cause with Indigenous nations, who would have to renegotiate their position in the country, and with ethnic minorities, for whom the rule of the French tongue may pose an even greater challenge.

But the Bloc Québécois and advocates for secession also do make some good points. Independence would allow us to focus our resources on the devel- Graphic by Taylor Reddam

COMMUNITY

One Brossard library’s next pandemic chapter

Covid-19 hasn’t dissuaded the strong community behind this library.

Aminah Hannan Contributor Sept. 30, midnight: the deadly hour. Libraries across Greater Montreal were set to shut down at this time, courtesy of a fresh wave of COVID-19 sweeping the province. But the curious hum that greeted me as I entered the Georgette-Lepage Library of Brossard on the eve of closing day, after a six month self-imposed exile, both surprised and elated me.

You’d be forgiven for believing that libraries have been living on borrowed time, especially during a global health crisis. Spaces to read, eat, study and unwind — the virus does not discriminate; it upends every communal meeting ground where rest and imagination usually converge.

The future of this Brossard library, however, might not be so dim after all.

The woman on sanitization duty, a kindly, middle-aged brunette whose name I didn’t catch, showed me the gel dispenser.

Books can still be loaned, she said, but I should be wary about touching the spines and pages unnecessarily.

I nodded and she let me pass. Behind me, no less than five giggling schoolchildren queued up to enter with their parents.

I took a moment to look around. Everything was bright and luminous, and, barring the closure of the butterfly display near the glass doors, all seemed to be nearly as it was.

Further right were the same tall bookshelves and children’s playing area that had always been there. The colourful, life-sized cushions shaped like classic literary tomes were not occupied, but I saw heads bobbing between the aisles.

I noticed, with grim relief, that the elderly librarians I used to know were not present to service the front desk.

A hushed electricity pulsated through the air: it was the last day to collect books, and those who were most apt to having their noses inside a page would

not pass up the opportunity.

Upstairs, the spaced-out study area was packed. I spotted an older man dozing on a desk. The next chair over, someone watched a film on Netflix, while the girl across scribbled on a print-out sheet, languid.

I walked around in a daze for the next half hour, rediscovering my favourite reading nooks. I knew that the next day, they would be snatched from me again, for at least another month.

That evening as I exited the building, an Ernest Hemingway short story came to mind.

I pondered how, in that “Clean,

Well-Lighted Place,” everyone seemed at ease. Troubles melted under that wash of light.

Hemingway had been right: all that people needed was a space to escape that familiar, hollow feeling of “nothing.” The library’s tidy quietness provided refuge for “all those who do not want to go to bed, [...] all those who need a light for the night.”

Even in isolation, there was a community.

Once the worst has passed, I am certain of finding it again.

Graphic by @the.beta.lab

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Commentary.

COMMENTARY EDITOR Aviva Majerczyk / @aviva_majerczyk commentary@theconcordian.com

OPINIONS

The turning tides of the CSU

For the past few years, the CSU has felt out of step with Concordia students — do we now have reason for hope?

Aviva Majerczyk Commentary Editor Disclaimer: The Concordian is a feelevy organization To say I’ve been embarrassed by the Concordia Student Union (CSU) in my past few years as a student would be an understatement. In recent memory, the CSU has jumped from controversy to controversy, spanning from allegations of anti-semitism, an attempted impeachment, to mockery of non-binary gender identities.

While it may seem like Concordia just has bad luck with student politics, or that there’s something in the water that’s making everyone collectively go insane, all these issues have precedents set by North

American politics en large.

The most hotly contested CSU issue in the past year or so has undoubtedly been the implementation of online fee-levy optouts. Fee-levy groups are student organizations that are funded by students based on a per-credit fee. These include People’s Potato, Cinema Politica, CJLO 1960AM and Queer Concordia.

Since the referendum question asking if fee-levy opt-outs should be brought online passed with 61.1 per cent of the vote last November, the process of actually building the system has been marked by a lack of transparency and bad faith reinterpretations of the purposely vague question.

Despite the fact that only 16.6 percent of Concordia undergraduates actually voted in the referendum, the question passed, and thus must be enacted. With that being said, it is still important to critique why this question was ever even up for vote in the first place.

Former General Coordinator of the CSU, Christopher Kalafatidis, who put forth the question, remarked at the time to The Concordian that, “Fee-levy groups never work towards building better relationships with students.

Having this option to optout would put them in a situation where if they are going to be using student money, they are going to have to earn it.”

The

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quote

says it all. It was political — the move was always political, not financial. We need to move past their assertions that the online opt-out question was posed to protect the interests of students who desperately need to save about $60 a semester, and reckon with the fact that this move was intended to put pressure on fee-levy groups. For what exactly? It’s hard to say. But there is no reasonable way Kalafatidis and his colleagues at the CSU could believe that all the disparate fee-levy groups have the same approach to student relations, as stated in his comment. Furthermore, this ongoing false dichotomy between fee-levy groups and tuition-paying students is misleading, as it paints said groups as if they were a third-party, not just fellow students in an organization.

What do Kalafatidis and his supporters get from this move? Well, they get a reinforcement of their conservative ideals. Online fee-levy opt-outs can be understood through the lens of taxation. Much like federal taxes, students pay a few cents or dollars to fee-levy groups, some of which they will never interact with in their time at Concordia, and some of which will be imperative to their student experience.

From a progressive perspective, when all students pay into the fee-levy system, our campus organizations are well-funded and able to provide resources for all students.

However, a conservative might argue that we should not be paying into services that we don’t plan on using, no matter how small the cost overall.

The conservative position of simplifying the opt-out process wouldn’t exist if not for the general shift to the right in Western politics and push to defund social security programs. Since the era of Reagan and Thatcher, conservative

politicians have been further and further critical of welfare programs, which the majority of them feel that they don’t directly benefit from. Whether we like it or not, student politics reflect politics at large, and this connection between fee-levy groups and taxation is too blatant to ignore. It’s just unfortunate to see these individualistic and neoliberal ideas enacted on our campuses through the lens of impartiality and the assertion of ‘having the students’ backs.’

The moment it was most obvious that many on the CSU were out of touch with political realities was at the Aug. 26 special council meeting. At this meeting, former councilor Mathew Levitsky-Kaminski presented a motion to have the CSU denounce certain extremist groups.

The motion named “groups” such as the KKK, “Unite the Right,” Antifa and Resistance Internationaliste.

desire for comprehensive anti-racism measures from the CSU, like General Coordinator Isaiah Joyner has been suggesting should be put forth?

Much like in general North American politics, racism and inequality cannot be solved through band-aid fixes. Additionally, making this sort of “both sides” argument on extremism only serves to echo Trumpist rhetoric further endangering people of colour who are affected by the much more common right-wing extremism.

With those resignations and the election of the “We Got You” slate of executives, the tides are finally turning on the CSU. An online opt-out system is finally being implemented with sufficient input by the fee-levy groups and with a survivor-centred sexual misconduct policy finally in the books, there’s reason to look forward to the future of the CSU.

I see this meeting as a turning point for the CSU. Between the accusations of political bias, and the pointed racial comments, the divisions on council had passed the point of civility.

However, after this meeting, multiple councillors resigned, including Levitsky-Kaminski.

To anyone actually aware of extremism’s rise in North America, this list would make absolutely no sense. For one, Unite the Right is not a group, it was a two-day rally event in 2017. Additionally, despite what Trump wants Americans to believe, Antifa is also not a definable group either, but instead a political movement and ideology literally connoting “anti-fascism.” If Levitsky-Kaminski truly cared to protect Concordia students from extremist violence, he would have cited groups that actually have a decent presence here in Canada, such as the Proud Boys, rather than the KKK or mere ideologies like Antifa.

Then why put forward this motion, if it was so disconnected from reality? What motivation was there other than to obfuscate the

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Commentary.

COMMENTARY EDITOR Aviva Majerczyk / @aviva_majerczyk commentary@theconcordian.com

OPINION

What in the wawawewa is Borat wearing, and why does it work?

Borat’s success depends on a painful truth in western culture Simona Rosenfield Assistant Commentary Editor “Borat,” a satirical film released in 2006, stars Sacha Baron Cohen as Borat Sagdiyev, a caricature of a local news journalist from Kazakhstan who embarks on a trip to “the U.S. of A.” to learn about “the greatest country in the world” — America. His hilarious-yet-cringy findings shocked audiences around the world, and gave energy to a form of self-exposing, subjective journalism that first made its debut with Hunter S. Thompson’s radical writing in the late 1960’s, Gonzo journalism.

Gonzo journalism is making a comeback, with big media companies like Vice Media piggybacking off its reputation with their series “One-Star Reviews,” and independent media like All Gas No Breaks using the style to create original, culturally relevant content.

What do they all have in common?

An ill-fitting suit. So the real question becomes, why does a shitty outfit work so well at disarming people, and why does it matter?

Borat exposes the underbelly of western society through painfully awkward interactions with politicians, celebrities, and the public. He is a cocktail of pathetic, bigoted, and lovable (at a safe distance). His look is the visual equivalent of a stiff one — with a mix of ignorance, moustache, and slapstick, the combination relaxes people into singing with him, “Dr. Fauci, what we gonna do? Inject him with the Wuhan flu. WHO, what we gonna do? Chop ’em up like the Saudis do.”

How does this wacky character work so well at exposing people’s ignorance?

A lot of Borat’s success is the result of his tapping into a sense of nationalism that is downright intense in America. Canada shares this self-congratulating vein, despite our many failures in championing human rights, animal rights, and environmental rights.

With these shortcomings in mind, Canada has managed a pretty cheerful international reputation, thanks to an excellent public relations team that tirelessly works to reinforce the notion that North America is a civilization run on the basis of freedom, dignity, and integrity. Despite Canada’s efforts, Borat calls bullshit on western values, especially American western values. Baron Cohen’s work has resulted in ousting the otherwise inaccessible political figures and upper crust, some of whom are caught with their literal hand in their

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Creativity is overrated Aviva Majerczyk Commentary Editor

Graphic by @ariannasivira

pants. This really happened.

A crowning jewel in Baron Cohen’s career as a satirical entertainer comes from his collaboration with Bulgarian actress Maria Bakalova, the co-star in his sequel to “Borat,” “Borat Subsequent Moviefilm,” which was released just a few weeks ago. The film stars Bakalova as fictional character Tutar Sagdiyev, Borat’s 15-year-old daughter, who interviews President Donald Trump’s personal attorney and former Mayor of New York City, Rudy Giuliani.

We are in an age where the court of public opinion is brutal, and the gladiator sport of our time is catching people’s worst sides and worst moments on film.

In 2006, Borat popularized the sport, and now in 2020, Borat has perfected it.

We’re in the confessional age of journalism. We want to see firsthand accounts of events. We want to see corruption with our own eyes. We want to see real-life villains describe their evil master plan to our heros while they’re slowly lowered into a tank of hungry sharks. We want a video confession.

Borat gives it to us.

What does that say about the subjects of Baron Cohen’s interviews, that they so readily lean into bigotry when a man with an accent and loose suit nudges them? What does it say about her interview subjects that when Tutor (the young journalist with bleach-blonde hair and an accent) performs Borat’s classic antics, she endures very different consequences?

What does it say about us, the viewers, for the fact that we watch this — the demise of bigoted people and the discomfort of vulnerable people — for entertainment?

Wawawewa?

Have you ever gone so deep into self-reflection that you come out the other end knowing less about yourself than when you started? It happens to me a lot. I fall so far down the rabbit hole of astrology, Myers-Briggs types, enneagrams, and Buzzfeed quizzes, that by the end I know I’m a taurus, ENTJ, 3 wing 2, Schmidt from New Girl, but have no concept of what these labels actually mean for my life.

These ways of categorizing people can be alluring because they all play on the base desire to truly know oneself.

Overall, as much as I participate, I’ve become a bit wary of this desire to mine the depths of our psyches in order to gain some knowledge of our elusive “true selves.”

I think most of these characteristics aren’t innate to the core of a person whatsoever. Honesty, loyalty, warmness, sensitivity, neuroticism are subject to change for a myriad of personal reasons, this is especially true for the characteristic of creativity.

Whether or not I’m an inherently creative person is a question that has bothered me for most of my young adult life. Culturally, there is a romanticization of the sort of creativity that causes artists to isolate themselves in tiny studios and stay up all night making their masterpiece because they were compelled by some intense inspiration. But how many of us truly relate to that experience of creativity?

This focus on monumental and sporadic artistic output as the definer of who is and is not creative really limits how all of us view our own creations. This view causes us to make up excuses for why we cannot produce artistic content. You either don’t have inspiration, don’t have the right materials, have too busy of a schedule or so on. Then, you never create the art you wanted to make, and convince yourself that you aren’t a “real” artist because you don’t practice a craft consistently. The cycle continues.

I noticed this defeatist cycle most prominently in the beginning of the COVID-19 lockdown. I had time to make all the creative output I desired once I was staying at home indefinitely. However, I couldn’t bring myself to bust out the random craft supplies lying around my apartment for fear of not being able to achieve something I was proud of.

But since divine inspiration never struck, I convinced myself that I was indeed one of the world’s poor left-brain “uncreatives” and that was that. However, after beating myself up time and time again, I no longer believe in this sort of dichotomy.

Creativity looks different on everyone. As children, we’re all fairly confident in our artistic abilities, and then something happens throughout the years to knock that out of most of us. And through our adolescence, as we’re no longer practicing drawing, music, dancing etc., the skills stagnate. Then, when we try to pick the habit back up, nothing has progressed. That’s not a failure of us individually, but of a system that convinces us that as we grow up, creativity becomes a skill we either have or don’t, rather than a component of every choice we make. Viewing creativity as something inherent to the human condition, rather than a personality quirk can be helpful to escape from the confines of what you expect from yourself.

Graphic by Taylor Reddam

Arts.

ARTS EDITORS Lorenza Mezzapelle / @lorenzamezzapelle arts@theconcordian.com

LITERATURE

Subversive strength: Alice Munro’s confident, unassuming prose Alice Munro writes without a trace of didacticism or judgement Aminah Hannan Contributor A lot has been said about Alice Munro.

Her writing: incisive, intuitive and economic. Her voice: ineffably poised — on paper and on camera, on the rare occasions this reclusive writer offers interviewers a piece of her mind. Yet, some have remained skeptical of the richness of possibilities offered by Munro’s narratives, real and fictitious.

Perhaps, in the end, Munro’s stoicism in the face of all these assumptions is her most lasting legacy.

When she first won the Nobel Prize in literature seven years ago, reactions from the literary community were mixed. Many were agape at how Munro, with her outmoded, interior backdrops, conventionally feminine characters and preferred short story format (which is often considered a diminutive of the novel) managed to secure a win from the Swedish Academy.

If Munro was aware of any incoming controversy, she seemed unsurprisingly nonplussed: “Well, I don’t care what they feel as long as they enjoy reading the book,” she said, when asked by the Academy if she feels she had inspired writers — women, par-

ticularly — with her win.

Her habit of being coy — showing rather than telling — naturally lent itself to the question of feminism, where Munro remained similarly noncommittal. Her answers on the movement have continued to waver over the years. She remains steadfast, however, to the definition of her writing as a product of intuition — a desire to illustrate her visions of girl and womanhood, rather than expressing a concerted effort to follow political theory.

Maybe what is most feminist and remarkable about Munro, then, is exactly this ability to draw out the hidden agency of characters in circumstances of disadvantage. Marlene Goldman, a literary scholar who has written extensively on Munro, said of the twists and turns in the architecture of her narratives: “Munro’s stories don’t promote the view that we’ll live happily ever after. Instead, they insist that life is full of radical, shocking, sometimes supernatural transformations.”

Munro’s canon is indeed stuffed with transformations. Rather than settling characters in their positions of poverty or pitifulness, Munro renegotiates their power without making that human hunger — a reckless reach for freedom — a revolutionary act. Each human impulse is treated with compassion and

empathy, as a simple fact of life.

On the inspiration front, she isn’t doing too badly either, despite previously apparent nonchalance. Sonja Larsen, who won the 2017 Edna Staebler Award for Creative Non-Fiction for Red Star Tattoo: My Life as a Girl Revolutionary, said reading Munro’s Lives of Girls and Women in her early twenties was a formative experience for her.

“She had people who were vulnerable and underdogs, but also not without their own power,” Larsen says. “The women were oppressed, but not powerless. That was eye-opening to me.”

The portrayal of human beings as neither victims nor perpetrators is something Munro does masterfully, added Larsen.

Munro’s ability to craft prose that is simple but emotionally impactful has remained with her as she progressed in her own career as a writer.

Larsen’s sentiment will resonate with many Munro fans. And to those who continue dismissing Munro’s proficiency, her catalogue of award-winning books persists, as she did, in quiet defiance of all who belittled her ability to make the small meaningful.

Graphic by Laura Douglas

FILM

Cinetrii merges computer science and film

Your next movie night

is about to get a whole lot more interesting

Lorenza Mezzapelle Arts Editor

standing the lineage and history of art, in all its different forms.

“The subject of the video was a Rihanna song, but it got me interested in exploring the “lineage” of cinema in some way as I’m more of a film nerd,” says Everling. “I was studying computer science at the time, so I thought to apply natural language processing to movie reviews and see what insights could be gained from it.”

While most film recommendations are based on popularity, likes, and ratings, Cinetrii’s algorithm analyzes written critic reviews for a given film; it can recommend works that have been influenced by it and works that have influenced it.

In regards to traditional recommendations systems, Everling says, “While the results can be more consistent, they usually exhibit a strong bias toward the most popular movies, stuff everyone has already seen.”

Instead of recommending popular box-office films, Cinetrii looks for mentions of other films in reviews of a particular film and tries to evaluate whether the mention is interesting, explains Everling.

For example, a search for Taxi Driver will yield The Assassination of Richard Nix-

Movie recommendation websites and generator apps rarely produce satisfying results. For the most part, the films recommended either share the exact same cast or are way too similar to be exciting. Well, most recommendation websites.

Cinetrii is designed to establish connections between films. These connections can be anything from recurring themes, motifs, explicit references, and homages. It’s simple interface is easy to use and each search yields a multitude of results.

“The results range from profound to quite spurious, but for certain films with rich discourse surrounding them it works pretty well,” says Nils Everling, creator and founder of Cinetrii. “For example, I am a fan of Michelangelo Antonioni who made a string of great films in the 60s and 70s. Through Cinetrii I found Burning by Chang-dong Lee since critics had compared it to L’Avventura.”

Everling got the idea for Cinetrii after watching a YouTube video wherein the narrator discussed the importance of under-

on, among others, both old and new. The recommendation links to a 2004 review stating that “The character [of Richard Nixon] is based on a real person and true events which also may have been the inspiration for the similarly named Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver.”

“Two films with intersecting casts are unlikely to make up an interesting connection, a connection will score higher if multiple critics establish it, and so on,” says Everling. “Under the hood there are a sequence of technical problems that have to be solved, like finding reviews, determining which parts of a web page constitute a review of a particular film and resolving references to other films.”

Since finishing his studies in computer science, Everling employs data science in other, less artistic, ways. Cinetrii remains his creative pass time.

“There is plenty to do within Cinetrii still, such as improving the coverage of international films and reviews in other languages,” says Everling, adding that he is in the process of updating the Cinetrii algorithm.

“I maintain Cinetrii because I use it myself and it may be of interest to others.”

Everling encourages viewers to reach out via Facebook to let him know if their favourite movie is missing.

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Arts.

ARTS EDITORS Lorenza Mezzapelle / @lorenzamezzapelle arts@theconcordian.com

FILM

Korean Film Festival Canada is now open to the public

Shedding light on the works of women directors from Korea Ana Lucia Londono Flores Assistant Arts Editor

The 7th edition of the Korean Film Festival Canada (KFFC) is here. It has selected distinctive works from entirely female, Korean directors, including feature films, shorts, and documentaries from Korea, as well as films from Korean-Canadian directors.

The online festival features unique and compelling stories that highlight the theme Narratives Beyond Borders: The Korean New Wave Cinema by Women Directors (1950-2020, Series I).

The KFFC is a non-profit cultural organization in Tiohtià:ke/ Mooniyang (Montreal) founded in 1996 that presents works by emerging and established Koreans and/or Korean-Canadians in film, media, and digital arts.

The film festival’s mandate is to create a cultural exchange between Korea and Canada, but also bridge audiences from around the world to engage with Korean film and media.

The festival is taking place online, giving the public the opportunity to watch the many feature works. KFFC 2020 offers single tickets for $4.50 and a full pass to watch the entire catalog of films for only $9.50. The audience can see a movie of their choice or have access to the full selection.

Now, what to watch? Here are some recommendations: For instance, The Recorder Exam (2011), directed by Bora Kim, tells the story of

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nine-year-old Eunhee who is anxiously preparing for her recorder exam as she tries to find her place in her family, in which all members struggle with their own personal issues. The film is only 29 minutes long, but it is sincere and there’s a sense of comfort found in Eunhee’s character. There is a great presence of love even when it isn’t shown properly. Simply sad, yet beautiful.

I’ll Be Seeing Her: Women in Korean Cinema (2003) by So Young Kim is captivating film footage of the energetic world of South Korean cinema from the 1950s to early 2000s, highlighting the importance of womens’ presence in cinema and reconstructing

the history of Korean cinema.

Actresses such as Eun-hee Choi who has played in My Mother and Her Guest (1961) and Junghee Yun from Mist (1967) are voices heard in the film, sharing their perspectives of women in the cinema.

Another poignant film to see is A French Woman (2019) directed by Hee-Jung Kim that tells the story of Mira, a 40-year-old woman who visits her native Korea after 20 years of living in France — following her divorce with her French husband who cheated with a younger Korean woman. When she arrives in Korea, Mira meets up with her old friends at a bar.

When she goes to the bathroom

and returns to her friends, time has reversed by 20 years.

The movie explores Mira’s sense of being torn between two places: France, which was at one time a foreign place to her, and her native Korea, which feels foreign to her now. Mira seems to struggle with her present life, as she relives moments of her past.

The works of these women directors are exceptional and depict different aspects of Korean society from their own perspective. These are only a few of the many remarkable films presented by the film festival.

The KFFC also presents ART-Talks, a small conference created to discuss the perspectives of women filmmakers, sharing their accomplishments and stories. Directors, artists, film critics, and researchers will discuss their thoughts and research on the topic of “Perspectives of Women in Film” in a series of short videos that are now available online.

All proceeds will be donated to art and women’s film organizations in Quebec and Korea to support artists during the pandemic.

Films are available to watch until Nov. 29. Tickets are sold exclusively online.

THEATRE

Tiktok’s Ratatouille musical scurries into hearts worldwide A Ratatarticle about TikTok’s Ratatousical

Graphic by @the.beta.lab

Talia Kliot Contributor There are few things that are better than the TikTok theatre community coming together to turn Ratatouille into a musical.

Ratatouille, the 2007 animated film, follows the story of Remy, a very personable rat, who finds his way into a declining French restaurant and dazzles critics with his cooking prowess.

Naturally, he can’t be seen as the chef; therefore, he enlists the help of Alfredo Linguini, a gangly dish boy desperate to keep his job at the restaurant. Remy (consensually) controls Linguini’s movements by tugging on specific strains of his hair and cooks up a storm. It’s safe to say that it’s a masterpiece.

Even before talks of a musical, Ratatouille was considered by many as one of the most meme-able movies, and was popular on TikTok and other social media sites for that reason. Its vibrant characters and dramatic plot, however, make it a lively story to adapt for the theatre.

The idea for the Ratatouille TikTok Musical didn’t just happen overnight. Em Jaccs, a TikTok content creator known for her musical numbers, posted a video on Aug. 10 of an original song based on the movie.

Quickly, the video gained traction and reached other people who thought that this musical was rat up their alley. For example, Daniel J. Mertzlufft, a composer and arranger on TikTok, saw Jaccs’ acapella song and added orchestration and an ensemble, giving it the full musical theatre effect.

More and more of theatre TikTok creators became enthralled with the nostalgic thought of a Ratatouille musical, affectionately known by some as the Ratatousical. They’ve been using Mertzlufft’s audio to come up with choreography, which others have been dueting with their own vocals. Some have begun writing their own original songs and even designing sets and playbills for this show.

While extremely entertaining, these videos were simply blessing For You pages worldwide without any clear direction.

That is until someone called Josh Abram rectified this problem by creating a TikTok account

called @RatatouilleMusical.

At the time that this was written, the account had already garnered 75.6 thousand followers and 186.6 thousand likes. On Oct. 26, Abram’s first video was posted, calling actors, singers, tech designers, musicals, composers, songwriters, choreographers and dancers to come together to make this dream a reality.

“I don’t know how we’re going to do this, but we’re going to do it,” Abram says, urging people to email him with original art, dance, song and design.

The next day, an update video was posted, thanking creators for their overwhelming support.

Abram explained that the first round of auditions will be held on TikTok, but further details would be announced shortly.

A week later, on Nov. 3, an FAQ video was uploaded to @RatatouilleMusical. It starts with a screen recording of the many emails the team has received and explains that they’re doing their best to respond as quickly as possible.

Abram says that in order to become involved, creators should show their work by tagging the account in their videos and emailing in their portfolios. It’s also specified that this is purely a “passion project” and that the Ratatouille TikTok musical has no affiliation with Pixar or Disney. As for how it’s going to work, they’ve decided that their first goal is to create a concept album and then expand the project to create a full virtual

production.

“I think considering everything that’s going on, it’s a really fun thing to be focusing on,” says Aleah, a first-year student in Concordia’s Acting for Theatre program who prefers not to disclose her last name.

In this way, TikTok’s Ratatouille musical “shows that the theatre community is a community,” according to Rubin.

Collective creation within the arts is not a new phenomenon, however. Melanie Thompson, communications manager at the Segal Centre, remembers a time when Weezer crowd sourced one of their CDs on YouTube.

Nonetheless, she explains that the “resources that TikTok gives you and the medium of it allows you to do so much more.”

Therefore, Ratatouille’s “anyone can cook!” philosophy is echoed in the birth of the musical on TikTok — anyone can, and should, partake!

Vassiliki Gicopoulos, a third-year Dawson Theatre student, says that she “laughed” upon hearing about the musical, but echoes Aleah’s sentiments that “it’s just a really cool way to unite people throughout the pandemic, because there’s not a lot of art going on.”

Lisa Rubin, the artistic and executive director at the Segal Anyone interested in Centre for Performing Arts, finds this project “impressive and en- contributing can email Josh tertaining.” She commends the Abram at ratatouillethetikTikTok creators for “the speed at tokmusical@gmail.com. which they seem to be able to turn out such unique content in such short little bursts, and also their talent, their vocal ability, and their writing ability.”

Using TikTok as a platform for the Ratatousical also renders the show more accessible. Aleah recalls that in order to watch the Mean Girls musical, she had to watch a “bootleg” version recorded on YouTube. She says that “something like this is great” because it allows everyone to enjoy it.

Even more than that, people are coming together from all corners of the world to create and watch the musical together.

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Music.

MUSIC EDITOR Louis Pavlakos / @louispavlakos music@theconcordian.com

COMMENTARY

She’s just being Miley

Miley Cyrus and the road from Disney darling to rocker chick Lillian Roy Editor-in-Chief

most that you do / You make me love you.

While Miley’s Disney gig undoubtedly propelled her career as a solo artist, it On March 24, 2006, the first episode of also placed her beneath a microscope.

Hannah Montana aired on Disney Channel.

The premier was an instant hit, earning 54 million views and subsequently launching the career of then-14-year-old Miley Cyrus, daughter of famed country singer Billy Ray Cyrus. Almost overnight, Hannah Montana evolved into one of the most iconic Disney shows of all time. It wasn’t long before Miley’s face was plastered across the bedroom walls of pre-teens everywhere.

Much of the show’s success can be credited to its original soundtrack. The songs were pure pop and positivity, featuring Disney-approved lyrics about friendship, self-confidence, and livin’ life to the fullest. As a care-free 10-year-old whose self-confidence was yet to be squandered by the perils of puberty, Hannah Montana’s music really resonated with me.

“You’re right, Miley,” I would think. “Everybody makes mistakes.”

I utterly idolized Miley Cyrus, as many girls my age did. When Breakout came out in 2008 — her first studio album unaffiliated with the Hannah Montana franchise — I loaded up my iPod shuffle with each track and listened religiously. Aptly titled, Breakout provided a glimpse of Miley beyond her role as Hannah Montana; the woman behind the wig, if you will. While certainly not as bold as some of her later music, this album had an edginess to it unparalleled by her Disney-discography.

Take Breakout’s lead single, “7 Things,” for example. The song is less about a school-girl crush, and more about the complexities of a toxic relationship, illustrated by lyrics such as You’re vain, your games, you’re insecure / You love me, you like her and The seventh thing I hate the

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Disney stars are often held to near-impossible standards in terms of their public image, and there’s little room for personal-growth, experimentation, or mistakes.

This is especially unfair considering most of these celebrities are hired as teenagers — a time when growth, experimentation, and mistakes are the name of the game.

In 2008, when Miley was just 15, intimate photos she took for her boyfriend were leaked on two separate occasions.

That same year, Miley faced fierce backlash after the release of her Vanity Fair cover, on which she was wrapped in a sheet with her bare back exposed. She later apologized for the image, saying in a statement, “I have let myself down. I will learn from my mistakes … My family and my faith will guide me through my life’s journey.” She has since revoked this apology.

Looking back, I’m inclined to think that instances such as these played a huge role in how Miley’s music evolved moving forward. By the early 2010s, Miley’s image had changed entirely. As if to symbolize her entry into a new era, she traded her long brown hair for a short, icyblonde pixie cut, and her pop-rock sound for a mix of synth, pop, R&B and hip hop.

Although songs like Cardi B’s “WAP” make Miley’s “We Can’t Stop” (2013) sound like a nursery rhyme, at the time the track was considered quite provocative, featuring lyrics such as It’s our party we can love who we want / We can kiss who we want / We can screw who we want. From this point onwards, Miley’s artistic choices became increasingly controversial: she posed naked in her “Wrecking Ball” video, twerked at the VMAs, and sported an over-

sized diaper and pacifier in her BB Talk (2015) video, to name a few things. This time around, however, her controversies were intentional, unlike when she was a teenager. I can’t help but think that through these controversies Miley was simply fulfilling a need to express herself freely and openly — express her sexuality, her boldness, her queerness — because during her Disney days, she wasn’t allowed to do so.

In a 2013 interview with Barbara Walters, Miley’s words said it all: “I don’t think I was ever really happy with who I was.”

Today, in 2020, Miley has taken on yet another new image. In the past few

months, she’s released a series of new wave, rock, and grunge covers, from Blondie’s “Heart Of Glass” to Velvet Underground’s “Sweet Jane” to “Zombie” by the Cranberries. Along with her single “Midnight Sky,” released in August, the songs perfectly showcase Miley’s smokey, powerful voice.

Her blonde hair now shaped into a shaggy, Joan Jett-esque mullet, she’s fully leaning into the role of rocker chick, and it suits her. Her new album, Plastic Hearts, is set to arrive soon, and I’m looking forward to hearing how her sound continues to evolve.

I think part of the reason I’m so emotionally invested in Miley and her career is because I grew up alongside her. Miley has undoubtedly played with different identities over the years, and so have I — I’m not exactly a care-free ten-yearold anymore. The lesson I get from all

this is pretty clear: nobody’s perfect.

Graphic by Chloë Lalonde @ihooqstudio

Revisiting Mac Miller’s Faces: a mixtape ahead of its time Mac Miller’s 2014 opus isn’t available to stream, but it Victor Vigas Staff Writer

sure is worth the download on DatPiff

Six years after its release, Faces is still Mac Miller’s pièce de résistance. The 2014 mixtape came out during an interim period between Miller’s tenure with Rostrum Records and his subsequent signing with Warner Records. Following his sophomore album, Watching Movies with the Sound Off, Miller was making music at lightspeed. His projects, You, Delusional Thomas and Faces are a fraction of the projects that Mac released after 2012’s Macadelic. Miller was not shy about his work ethic as he proclaimed on his track, “Malibu,” “I’m recordin’ like I’ll die tomorrow.”

Having ditched Rostrum Records, Miller showcased his freedom by fleshing out his Larry Fisherman alter ego, producing 14 out of 24 tracks on the project himself. As mentioned by Miller over the course of his career, most of the songs on this tape segue from one into the next in an attempt to leave the project as a start-to-finish listening experience. Using production play and sample cuts from movies, classic jazz and famous writers alike, the tape draws from a variety of sources of inspiration. Faces features a variety of guest appearances, most notably Thundercat, Earl Sweatshirt, and Vince Staples.

Faces has no shortage of dark, funny, and borderline terrifying lyrics. On some tracks Mac is singing his own praises, other tracks see him joking around with his friends, on “What Do You Do” he’s alluding to his own demise (“A drug habit like Philip Hoffman will probably put me in a coffin.”). This tape has no shortage of drug references, whether it’s PCP, LSD, or referring to cocaine as “the same shit that got Whitney,” Faces is an unadulterated view into Miller’s

Quickspins

WALLOWS REMOTE

With their second EP, Wallows plays into the hands of finding a new sound.

Victor Vigas Staff Writer Nearly two years after their debut album, Nothing Happens, Remote is an example of the choice faced by most new bands: stick with the same sound or branch out before the fans box you in? With their entire first album having been produced by Grammy-winner John Congleton, the band opted to explore new production styles by a new team of producers including Sachi DiSerafino, John DeBold and Ariel Rechtshaid.

The project’s opening track “Virtual Aerobics” boasts a strong performance from drummer Cole Preston. As the EP progresses, he puts on more of a display in tracks “Nobody Gets Me (Like You)” and “Talk Like That.” Though Preston’s drumming ability is often drowned out behind overbearing production gimmicks and his bandmates’ instruments and vocals, his touch on the percussion end still finds a way to be a spotlight in this EP.

drug infested lifestyle at the time. His bars don’t sugar coat any of it, making this tape some of Mac’s most candid and soul-bearing work.

At the midway point in the album, Mac presents a trio of songs named after celebrations, “Happy Birthday,” “Wedding” and “Funeral.” Each one segueing into the next, the trio tells three separate tales of introspection going from an upbeat yet depressing birthday party, to a failed love story, ending with “Funeral,” where Miller admits, “Doin’ drugs is just a war with boredom but they sure to get me.”

The closing track, “Grande Finale” serves as the conclusion to the tape’s winding road of cocaine-induced delirium and wide range of sonic experimentation. The closing track sheds some closure as Miller admits his habits could kill him, as they eventually did. In an interview with Billboard, Miller admitted that “‘Grand Finale’ was supposed to be the last song I made on earth.”

From top to bottom, Faces is a complete body of work that takes listeners on a journey narrated by Miller. Coming in at a lengthy 86 minutes, this project isn’t necessarily the type of album you’d sit down and listen to start-tofinish, but the road that Miller navigates with Faces has something for everyone to appreciate. Whether it’s the snappy back and forth with Vince Staples on “Rain” or the psychedelic trip that is “Colors and Shapes,” this tape covers a variety of bases and still finds a way to be some of Mac’s best work lyrically and production-wise.

Collage by Lily Cowper

Aside from a few stragglers, most of the lyrics on these tracks are juvenile and frankly, underwhelming. In spite of this project featuring a handful of punchy lines about the COVID-19 pandemic, there is really no one song that stands out as a lyrical crown jewel. The aforementioned “Nobody Gets Me (Like You)” is full of corny and overplayed clichés that listeners have heard a million times before.

We’ve seen this with other boy bands and Wallows hasn’t fallen far from that tree.

With the vocals split between Dylan

6.5 / 10

♫ TRIAL TRACK:

VIRTUAL AEROBICS

Minnette and Braeden Lemasters, there are a few moments that give their impotent lyrics some heart and soul when performed. On “Dig What You Dug” Lemasters takes the bull by its horns and delivers a pleasing performance with harmonies and supporting vocals from Minnette. The EP’s fourth track “Coastlines” sees Minnette pushing himself a little harder and gives the track a memorable vocal strain even though the song itself is lyrically simple.

While this EP doesn’t measure up to the standards set by Nothing Happens, it still has some shining moments. Though it doesn’t appeal to the Wallows sound that fans are used to, there are still a few tracks that have the potential to be fan favourites moving forward. When listened to from start to finish, each song in the EP segues seamlessly from one to the next, which is not something traditionally expected from an EP, giving it the merit of The Strokes’ The New Abnormal or SZA’s Ctrl; projects that are best experienced when listened to in the tracklist order.

At a brief 16-minute runtime, Remote is safe and sound. What it missed in terms of providing strong lyrics, it makes up for by playing around with production effects, making it an easy listen for Wallows stans and casual listeners alike.

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Sports.

SPORTS EDITOR Alec Brideau / @alecbrideau sports@theconcordian.com

MIXED ARTIAL ARTS

up a weight class and challenging Michael Bisping for the UFC middleweight championship. St-Pierre won by theatrical submission in the third round and became the fourth UFC fighter ever (at the time) to hold a belt at two different weights.

Finally, his only losses were emphatically avenged, and his clean career slate removes most, if not all notions of doubt.

Nurmagomedov being listed amongst MMA immortals like Jones and St-Pierre is a testament to his sheer dominance. He defended his UFC title only three times, and yet, he tops many people’s lists.

The ability to “maul” his opponents and make title contenders look like amateurs is something that only a handful of fighters can do. Meanwhile, Nurmagomedov has never failed to assert his dominance. He’s never bled in the octagon, and he’s only lost two rounds on the judges’ scorecards in his entire career: once against Conor McGregor in 2018, and the other in his final bout with Gaethje.

He proceeded to finish both opponents in the ensuing round.

Most importantly, much like St-Pierre, Nurmagomedov has been a role model and ambassador for the sport through his tenure. He meaningfully contributed to the popularization of MMA and the UFC into mainstream culture through masterful performances, opting to let his actions do the talking.

Nurmagomedov has openly pushed for a bout against his perceived greatest of all time St-Pierre in the past. The fight never materialized despite both parties expressing interest out of mutual respect, and Nurmagomedov’s recent surprise retirement has made the dream matchup unlikely to occur.

Regardless of who ranks higher on a largely subjective and unserviceable all-time UFC standing, both fighters boast unparalleled legacies that will surely stand the test of time.

Who’s the greatest fighter of all-time?

Comparing the illustrious careers of Khabib Nurmagomedov and George StPierre Liam Sharp Assistant Sports Editor UFC 254 was headlined by the highly anticipated unifying title bout between lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov (29-0-0) and interim-title holder Justin Gaethje (22-3-0).

While competitive matchups against the Eagle are tough to come by — as his undefeated record indicates — many Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) enthusiasts predicted the contest would be Nurmagomedov’s most threatening challenge to date.

The undefeated fighter exerted his unmatched pressure early and often, eventually winning by way of submission due to a triangle choke in the second round. Nurmagomedov won the UFC championship belt after dominating an overwhelmed adversary once more.

However, the excitement was short-lived as a mentally-fatigued Nurmagomedov crumpled to the octagon canvas post-stoppage and ultimately

16

proclaimed his retirement from the sport, vacating the belt and liberating the UFC lightweight division from pending onslaughts.

At the peak of his athletic prime and one-win shy of the fabled 30-0-0 record, the decision was nonetheless fathomable given the passing of his father earlier in the year. Nurmagomedov shared an immeasurably close relationship with his dad, who acted as his mentor in life and in sport.

The news rekindled the Greatest of All Time (GOAT) debate in MMA. Nurmagomedov already cemented his status as one of the best pound-forpound fighters prior to his latest performance at UFC 254, but the conclusion of his storybook MMA career has drawn wildly differing sentiments as it pertains to his individual greatness.

While it’s impossible to distinguish a bonafide greatest, the discussion boils down to the now former UFC lightweight champion Nurmagomedov, active and former UFC light-heavyweight champion Jon Jones (26-1-0), and the retired former UFC welterweight champion George St-Pierre (26-2-0).

Jones is currently at the peak of his supremacy at 33 years-old and can improve his claim at the throne in the coming years. His sole loss came by way of disqualification due to an illegal elbow he threw against an underqualified opponent in Matt Hamill that was seconds away from defeat.

In addition, Jones has 11 title defenses, and, despite having two separate title reigns at 205 pounds, he never lost the belt inside the octagon. His stacked resume includes victories over former champions and legends such as Cormier, Gustafsson, Shogun Rua, Rampage Jackson, and Lyoto Machida.

Jones’ biggest challenges have come outside the octagon; a history of arrests and drug-related issues has damaged his reputation for some in what is otherwise an undeniably boundless MMA career.

St-Pierre’s longevity and consistency were unmatched in a sport where mistakes are common and a single slip-up can influence the trajectory of an entire career. As a result, he was the UFC welterweight champion for several years and his reign spanned multiple generations of 170 pound fighters.

As a combatant, the Montreal native could do everything.

His early years were characterized by youthful energy and explosive finishes that resulted in dominant victories over staples in the sport such as Matt Serra and Matt Hughes. He was a masterful tactician in his prime years that was displayed through his historic run of consecutive rounds won (recently overtaken by Nurmagomedov).

He cemented his case for the GOAT when he returned from a four-year hiatus by moving

Graphic by Carleen Loney @shloneys

STINGERS

A most unusual finish Rounding off a Stingers career during a pandemic Moritz Wittmann Contributor Sports are on hold once again and Concordia’s student athletes are learning to cope with the disappointment of time lost on the playing field or the arena.

Among those are fourth and fifthyear athletes, who are spending their last moments with the Concordia Stingers in limbo.

Audrey Belzile, fifth-year forward with the women’s hockey team, has been spending time at her family’s cottage outside of Montreal to escape the province’s hotspot, and is hoping for a season after Christmas.

“It’s tough because I chose to do a fifth year to focus on school and hockey,” Belzile said. “Now, there’s no hockey or training for a while, so I am just here with school. At least it’s keeping me busy.”

Belzile was hoping to cap off four successful years with the Stingers with a fifth and final season. Before joining the Stingers, the plan had been to go to a Division 1 NCAA school, but when that didn’t work out, she

settled on Concordia because of the inclusive team culture.

“All the staff and girls were super welcoming,” Belzile said.

“That was the biggest difference for me between Concordia [and other schools]. I felt welcome the first day I was in the rink.”

Three Réseau du sport étudiant du Québec (RSEQ) all star teams, two U Sports All-Canadian teams, a provincial championship, and a national bronze medal later, she said it has turned out to be a great decision.

The men’s rugby team also has to face the reality of the cancelled sports season. Jackson Marquardt, fifth-year veteran on the team, said he was “a little thrown-off” by the fact that practices were able to resume for the better part of September, as sports were allowed at that time in the province, but then had to be shut down again when red zone restrictions were put in place in October.

Like many students, the Ottawa native took refuge back home to focus on school, and while it’s nice to be busy, he said it’s tough being away from

his usual rhythm.

“I miss playing rugby, and every single aspect of competing with the team,” Marquardt said.

“It also feels like I’m missing out on a ‘what could have been’ season … especially after missing out on nationals last year.”

Marquardt has accumulated an impressive resume over his time as a Stinger athlete. After just one year of university rugby, he was invited to go on tour with Team Canada U19.

He then followed it up with two All-Canadian nominations, as well as three RSEQ championships and two all-star team selections over the course of three seasons with men’s rugby.

Marquardt spoke highly of the Concordia environment, including the coaching he received.

“It’s some of the best coaching you can get in Canada and it was right at my university,” Marquardt said. “Looking back, I wouldn’t have done what I’ve done in rugby so far if I’d gone anywhere else.”

For student athletes, the time spent playing sports for their university will always be precious. It’s the culmination of years of development and

growth as an athlete. As I’m writing this piece, I know my time spent as a Stinger will always be one that I look back on with immense pride and gratitude.

Concordia has a small athletics community compared to some universities, but this is often its greatest strength.

Daily interactions with other teams and coaches are almost frequent and almost unavoidable (the hallways of our complex are quite narrow), but it’s how the Stinger culture has been formed over the years.

So for the sake of personal memories and great Concordia sporting moments, I hope these athletes didn’t finish their university careers last season, without even knowing it.

Images Courtesy of Author

COLOUR COMMENTARY

Could the NHL follow the AHL and start their season in February?

Recent AHL news could indicate when the next NHL season will start Alec Brideau Sports Editor

on playing a full season.

Considering that without COVID-19,, the NHL’s 2020–21 calendar would have started in early October, it’s hard to see the same number of games being played in four fewer months. Of course, that’s if the league doesn’t plan to declare its Stanley Cup champions in the fall once again, in hopes of finally returning to their regularly scheduled seasons.

Especially if played without fans, a shortened season might be considered by the league in order to not lose too much income, which is in part used to pay the players. As the NHL isn’t in danger of bankruptcy, the best thing would surely be to focus on the most reasonable and safest hockey calendar for all, in a way that doesn’t bring us to the same dilemma next fall, which is: are we going to play a full season in 2021–22?

As we’re still waiting to know when the next National Hockey League (NHL) season will start, news from the American Hockey League (AHL), the NHL’s minors, may have given us a hint.

The AHL announced on Oct. 28 that it was pushing back its anticipated 2020–21 starting date to Feb. 5, 2021. With the AHL and NHL normally starting and finishing their seasons around the same dates, this may be indicative of when the next NHL season will start.

NHL commissioner Gary Bettman has repeated constantly since the end of the 2019–20 playoffs that the goal would be to play a full 82-game season, with playoffs following as usual. However, there hasn’t been any clear details so far about when or how this Graphic by Rose-Marie Dion would happen, or even why the league has been insisting so much

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Editorial: Farewell, Donald

The 45th President of the United States is gone, but his supporters aren’t After four stressful nights, the world finally got its answer: the president-elect of the United States of America is Joe Biden. Winning both the popular vote and earning enough electoral college votes to secure the presidency, he won fair and square — despite what the orange guy will have you believe.

While America’s worst golfer may be on his way out, the repercussions of his time in office will continue to be felt. The man undeniably has a few fans out there — over 70 million of them. Trumpism — defined by right-wing populism, conspiracy theories, and a fervent campaign against liberal ideologies — has a firm grip on much of America. In fact, it even has a grip on some Canadian politics; in one poll, 30 per cent of Conservative Canadians said they’d prefer Melania’s husband as leader of the country over Justin Trudeau.

So… where do we go from here?

It’s safe to say that the media should do all it can to limit the spread of misinformation and conspiracy ingrained within Trumpism. We will continue to investigate and scrutinize ideologies that harm marginalized communities, and to track said ideologies within our own country and beyond.

Always remember: Donald may have been fired, but the fight ain’t over.

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VOLUME 38 ISSUE 5 DATE NOVEMBER 10 2020 OUR COVER THIS WEEK “HANG IN THERE BUMI!” BY: KIT MERGAERT

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