The Plant December 2023 Vol.59 No.4

the plant SINCE 1969 VOL 59 NO 4 2023

DECEMBER @THEPLANTDAWSON THEPLANTNEWS.COM

2 THE PLANT

Letter from the Editor Precious readers,

The Plant is an editorially autonomous student paper. All opinions expressed in The Plant do not necessarily belong to The Plant, but are those of individuals. All content submitted to The Plant or its staff belongs to the paper. We reserve the right to reject or edit all submissions for brevity, taste and legality. The Plant welcomes typed and signed letters to the editor under 400 words.

Copyright 2023

Index NEWS

3

ARTS & CULTURE

6

VISUAL ARTS

8

SMALL EVENTS

12

VOICES

13

PLAYLIST

16

CREATIVE WRITING

21

SPORTS

23

SCIENCE & ENVIRONMENT 24 STATEMENT

28

CURIOSITIES

30

Welcome back. Welcome back to the monthly pages that do not only offer heartfelt student words, but a place for hours of tremendous work, of research, of compiling, analyzing, ratifying, and starting over, of fact-checking, peer-reviewing and integrating criticism, to collide and culminate. I want to remind all of you that The Plant’s small team strives, with each issue, to honour the multifaceted ideal of journalism. And that active, engaged journalism, in times of crisis, cannot let down those whose sufferings are continuously eclipsed and dismissed. An independent, student-run publication’s very burden lies in voicing out the truths that mainstream media has tried to erase pitilessly. A duty which, no matter how loud the backlash or sinister the legal threats, The Plant will keep carrying out. Hence, welcome back, beloved readers, to what is not in the slightest “a collection of opinions and narratives,” but the efflorescence of hours of intensive, meticulous efforts to gift an inclusive, quality paper to Dawson’s entire community.

Before going any further, a few questions must be asked. How utterly messed up is it for grown men and women who never once thought of opening The Plant’s pages to put out the names and pictures of 18, 19 and 20-year-olds on the Internet for the world to track down? How utterly messed up is it that an educational institution refuses to defend the freedom of its own press or condemn the harassment of writers, who are, above all, ordinary students? How utterly messed up is it that speaking factually upon decades of occupation, ethnic cleansing, ongoing massacre, and devastation, is problematic or even “political”? Since when has advocating for basic human rights or calling for a ceasefire become controversial? Already, an entire generation of Gazan children, among which many are parentless, will be growing up without limbs and with permanent disfigurements. Thousands of Palestinian children saw their dreams and hopes shattered, while blood keeps spilling. There is no partiality in shedding light on these children’s situation and the history of their land ravaged by colonialism. Ironically, bias would be attempting to censor this information with in mind reputation, fundings, and other such concerns.

Yet behind the aspersion and latest witch hunts, I can only applaud the overwhelming sense of support and kindness The Plant was met with. This same love seeped into the very pages you’re holding, and propelled us to keep pursuing what’s right. I speak for our entire team when I say that our gratefulness goes beyond measure. I thank all teachers, students, and external parties who chose to show encouragement while knowing an angry mob of watchdogs could be set loose on their trail. I also wish to reiterate my support to all our Palestinian and Jewish peers who are grieving, distressed, hurting, or drowning, unable to catch their breath. For every demon unearthed these past weeks, I hope that, through unity, not only will we gain strength, but comfort as well.

This paragraph, I dedicate wholly to my team. I was repeatedly dispirited throughout my time at Dawson, but this semester, The Plant’s staff proved that each challenge was worthwhile. People so engorged with talent, brilliance, care for one another, aliveness, commitment, and genuine passion are awfully hard to find, yet The Plant was blessed with twenty. Angélique, I will never thank you enough for holding the fort with such nerve, cleverness and fierceness. God truly gives the toughest battles to His strongest soldiers.

Sanad, you reinstated The Plant’s very essence through your monthly covers’ breathtaking, sublime vitality, and your untouchable bravery. Mirren, Defne, Sarah, Ezra, Khadija, Mia, Thomas, Hannah, Sabina, Marc, Mara, Emma, Soraya, Tamara, Sophia, Gloria, and Saya, you all brought back my faith in this generation with the astuteness of your words, the sharpness of your minds, and your own beautiful incandescence. I wish for the roaring flame burning within every one of you to never waver.

I honestly hope I haven’t been too much of a disappointment to The Plant’s legacy.

Better even, I consider my task accomplished if I have stirred the urge to write and to create within some of you, in the same way each work I read infuses the ink bleeding from the tip of my pen. As I am still unsure whether I will be sashaying away for good, or if this is a mere see ya later, I can only say that the mystery of my succession shall remain unsolved. What awaits radiates promises, music, and poetry. I trust our paths will converge eventually, but until then, please know that I cherish all of you readers very, very dearly.

And remember, if you can’t love yourself, how in the hell you gonna love somebody else?

Farewell my doves,

SIMONE BÉLANGER Editor-in-Chief, Fall 2023

NEWS 3 3

Modern Slavery: Cobalt Mining in the Democratic Republic of Congo GLORIA BADIBANGA Staff Writer

Cobalt has been exploited for decades due to its many important uses especially in today’s technology-filled world. This mineral is used in the aerospace industry, vehicles, medicine, and many electronic components, such as rechargeable phone batteries and other electronic devices.

Located in central-western sub-Saharan Africa, the Democratic Republic of Congo possesses an abundance of natural resources, one of them being cobalt. It is estimated that between 70 and 80% of the world’s supply of cobalt comes from the DRC, making it the country with the largest reserve of the mineral. Unfortunately, the high levels of cobalt found in the country make them susceptible to becoming victims of Western imperialism and exploitation.

Despite the technological advancements of the mining industry, in the DRC, cobalt is mined by hand, a practice known as “artisanal mining.”

Workers in artisanal mining, unlike those in industrial mining who utilize machinery, only have their bare hands along with tools such as pickaxes, shovels, rebar, and shabby rags to extract minerals.

The formal economy created through artisanal mining also contains a “shadow economy”: after the diggers extract the mineral, cobalt is sold to mining companies through intermediaries who are responsible for refining the mineral before it is bought

by Western tech and automobile companies.

Thousands of Congolese, including children, constitute the bottom of this supply chain. Although legally in the DRC, only children aged 15 and older are allowed to engage in “light work”, reports of children as young as five working in the mining industry have been accounted for in recent years. The lack of financial resources and education opportunities in the DRC have led toddlers to find themselves mining cobalt in horrendous working conditions. In addition, with the help of militias, children have been abducted and brought to work in

mines hundreds of miles away from their homes and families.

The conditions in these mines are utterly inhumane. In the mines, Congolese workers are subjected to unsafe labour, with pay as low as 10 US dollars per day. Whenever miners enter the shafts to access underground tunnels, there is always the risk that the tunnel could collapse on them, burying them alive, which has happened to numerous workers. Cobalt mines also expose children and women to greater risk. Not only are the working conditions atrocious, but women and children are disproportionately affected by the spread of prostitution, rape, and sexually transmitted diseases; this is essentially a case of modern slavery.

As consumers of electronic devices, we are unwitting participants in the modern enslavement of these Congolese men, women, and children.

Many have lost their lives harvesting cobalt, and the exploitation of the mineral has also contaminated the country’s water, soil, and air. Cobalt is highly toxic, harmful enough only by touching the mineral or breathing its dust. Amongst other, the toxic effects of cobalt have gone beyond affecting the workers; people living near the mines have an increased chance of giving birth to children with birth defects, developing cancer or respiratory illnesses. The expansion of the mining industry in the DRC has also led to many communities being displaced; forced to abandon their homes and farmlands. As of October 2023, it is estimated that 400 households have been forcefully evicted as a direct result of cobalt mining.

Today, with the exception of one, all mining companies in the DRC are owned by Chinese. In 2009, Joseph Kabila, former president of the country, signed an agreement with China, allowing the country access to multiple cobalt mines in exchange for billions of dollars in financial aid, loans,

and infrastructure development projects.

When it comes to identifying the responsible party for the humanitarian crimes occurring in these mines, there is no direct answer. Some might blame Kabila for agreeing to the foreign exploitation of the country’s citizens, preventing the DRC from economically benefiting from the fruit of its own labour. Some might point the finger at China for taking advantage of the country’s already vulnerable state.

Upon signing these agreements, it is clear that China’s main intention was not to help the country, but rather, to gain control of the mining industry and to gain economically as much as possible. As the owner of all of these mining companies, China should be responsible for providing workers with proper, safe working conditions, health regulations, and reasonable wages.

As consumers of electronic devices, we are unwitting participants in the modern enslavement of these Congolese men, women, and children.

But what can we do as consumers to help? Opting for tech companies, like Apple, that are trying to monitor their amount of cobalt they use and they’re sourcing is already a great start. Another thing we can do as consumers is to be more sustainable and take better care of our electronic devices; you do not need to buy the newest iPhone everytime it comes out. And when getting a new device, instead of keeping the old one in a box that collects dust in your closet, you can bring your device to recycling stations where the cobalt that is already in them can be recycled back into the supply chain.

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Unity in Action: The Quebec Public Sector Strike Unveiled DEFNE ALIEFENDIOGLU News Editor

Quebec is currently facing a major public sector strike for better salaries and working conditions. The strike is a result of ongoing tensions between the government and various unions, which, according to Global News, represent around 600,000 public sector employees. The unions consist of teachers and nurses who are demanding higher salaries, better working conditions, and lower worker-to-patient ratios. The workers are taking a stand to address these issues and ensure that their rights and needs are met. The strike serves as a powerful demonstration of their unified voice and determination to fight for improved conditions in the public sector.

Four unions, namely: the Confédération des syndicats nationaux (CSN), the Centrale des syndicats du Québec (CSQ), the Fédération des travailleurs et travailleuses du Québec (FTQ), and the Alliance du personnel professionnel et technique de la santé et des services sociaux (APTS) have joined together and formed a “Common Front,” consisting of roughly 420,000 members in health, education, and social service sectors to go on strike together. Additionally, the Fédération autonome de l’enseignement (FAE), separate from the Common Front and rep-

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resenting teachers across Quebec, will also be striking. The Quebec public sector strike took place from November 21st to November 23rd for the Common Front and the FAE, and from November 23rd to November 24th for the Fédération interprofessionnelle de la santé du Québec (FIQ), which, according to FIQ Santé, consists of over 80,000 nurses, licensed practical nurses, respiratory therapists, and clinical perfusionists.

The strike involved approximately 570,000 to 600,000 public sector employees, making it a significant movement with far-reaching effects. Schools and daycare services closed during the strike, causing parents to have to find alternative childcare arrangements. Furthermore, hospitals experienced slowdowns in their services. However, it is important to note that essential services, including emergency rooms, were maintained throughout the strike.

This ensured that individuals in need of urgent medical assistance would still receive the necessary care and attention.

Quebec Labour Minister Jean Boulet has taken a step towards resolving the ongoing strike by appointing a conciliator to facilitate collective bargaining talks. However, the conciliator’s recommendations will not be binding. The strike, if prolonged, could have significant

consequences on the education and healthcare sectors. Schools and hospitals may continue to face disruptions and challenges in delivering quality services. In order to prevent future strikes and ensure the smooth functioning of schools and hospitals, successful negotiations need to take place.

The strikes began after the rejection of the most recent contract offer from the Quebec government, which was made in late October to all workers and included a one-time payment of $1,000 and a 10.3% wage rise over five years, a slight improvement over the 9% for the same timeframe proposed last December. Rather, the unions seek a three-year agreement with salary increases linked to the rate of inflation: in the first year, the increases will be of two percentage points above inflation or $100 per week (whichever is more advantageous); in the second year, three percentage points above inflation, and in the third year, four percentage points above inflation, according to CityNews.

Additionally, as the government refused to listen to the demands of healthcare workers and worsened their working conditions, the members of the FIQ went on strike. Julie Bouchard, president of the FIQ, said, “When a government believes it is reasonable to offer healthcare professionals a salary increase that doesn’t even cover inflation, when it wants to move them between centers of activities likes pawns, without taking their expertise into account, there’s only one thing to do: denounce the unacceptable and turn up the heat.”

The strike has immobilized schools across the province, causing concern among parents and administrators. However, the union has issued a stern warning that the strike may continue until late December if a satisfactory agreement is not reached. The determination of teachers to fight for their demands is evident as they express their willingness to go to great lengths to ensure that their voices are heard.

NEWS 5 5

The Death of Local Newspapers: The Concerning Gap Between Quebecers and Accessible News SABINA BELLISARIO-GIGLIO Science & Environment Editor

As more and more local newspapers and news sources are shutting their doors due to financial problems, the number of readily available, local newspapers is rapidly dwindling. Digitization has helped spread content at an international level at an exceptional rate, but has left local news in the dust, unable to compete with such growing demands. Should Quebecers be concerned with these decreasing numbers, and how does this crisis impact our consumption of media and news?

The morning newspaper has long been a staple in homes, but there is a particular type of newspaper, consumed primarily by the middle class, that revolutionized news: the penny press. Benjamin Day founded The Sun newspaper in New York City in 1833, which became “the most successful and influential papers of the nineteenth century,” according to the University of Illinois Press. While they were by no means unbiased, these one-cent papers paved the way for accessible news that often ranged from local police reports to financial and political news intended for the working class.

The journalistic approach and reporting of these non-politically funded papers differed from popularized newspapers. Reporters focused on issues and ideas pertaining to the working class rather than the upper class.

With thousands of copies printed daily, the working class began developing a more positive view of journalism, appreciating its importance as the news catered to their collective needs and ideals.

Recently, the population has seemingly lost its affinity for printed journalism. La Presse, a staple of French-language news in Montreal, suspended printing their weekday papers in December 2015, after publishing for 131 years. The digital push of the Canadian press in 2015 simply foreshadowed the events that preceded the coming years. The pandemic only encouraged the trend of digitization, causing many publications to lay off workers and even temporarily close their doors. As of March 2023,

Six newspapers under the Coopérative nationale de l’information indépendante (CN2i) transitioned from daily and weekly to strictly digital formats.

Even the Montreal Gazette, the oldest newspaper in Quebec, stopped printing its Monday edition of the paper in October 2022. Many of these cuts and losses come from a severe lack of funding, increasing costs of distribution and printing, as well as a lack of advertisers.

Citizens of the province will continue to suffer as crucial reporting on local events will disappear alongside these papers.

However, Montrealers likely noticed the absence of Journal Métro, the newspaper distributed in various metro stations. The paper holder that once held copies of the free daily newspaper now sits empty outside of the Dawson metro-level entrance.

While many factors led to the newspaper’s eventual closure and bankruptcy in August 2023, Andrew Mule, president of Métro Média, mentioned the suspension of Publisac distribution as one of the leading causes. La Presse reported that Transcontinental’s (TC) decision to stop the distribution of these plastic bags containing flyers and local papers, left nearly 115 weekly papers without a network of distribution. Patrick White, professor at UQAM, expressed sadness about this decision in an interview with the Montreal Gazette. “It’s very, very bad news for local democracy [in Montreal and Quebec City]. It’s the end of the hyperlocal news model.” Citizens of the province will continue to suffer as crucial reporting on local events will disappear alongside these papers.

Despite leaving many readers behind, the shift to digital platforms has become the dominant source for news outlets. The Center for Information, Technology, and Public Life (CITAP) addresses concerns of the spread of misinformation and disinformation.

They cited a study conducted in 2018

by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology which discovered that “falsity traveled six times faster than the truth online” and that accurate reporting often reached under 1,000 people while news containing false information often attracted 100 times that amount of people. Local media that attempts to transition to digital platforms will likely never compete with the rapid spread of clicks and likes from platforms like Facebook and X. Bill C-18, or the Online News Act, also poses a significant threat to local news sources. Even The Plant was affected by this issue, as covered in an article featured in our September issue. While Canadian news outlets were warned and given months to draft new strategies to supply their content, it remains difficult for consumers and smaller news companies to keep up with these constant changes. An article in Arthur discussed these issues as the author, Mikaela Lewis, notes how everyone they spoke to “mentioned the fear of consolidation of small local publications and larger legacy media taking over.” Moreover, “local journalism is most at risk and least likely to be able to enter into direct deals with the corporations controlling social media and search engines,” showing the lack of attention and preservation of these important outlets.

As technology continues to evolve, the fateful day printed newspapers become extinct may be closer than we think. Thus, it is imperative to support local newspapers in your borough and, in this digital era, to be mindful of the news you consume online.

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Beyond Cultural Illusions: Anime and the Western “Japanese Culture” SARAH BENSETITI Secretary

In the vibrant world of anime where storytelling and visuals collide, a cultural phenomenon emerges, transcending borders and captivating audiences worldwide. From the stereotypical allure of ramen, cherry blossoms, kimonos, and karate to the ubiquitous sushi rolls, anime weaves a tapestry of Japanese culture that, in turn, becomes a focal point of fascination for Western enthusiasts. Yet, this newfound interest prompts us to question the depth of Western understanding of Japanese culture and its heavy reliance on anime as a cultural guide.

My explanation is nuanced by the notion that anime, as a medium firstly created by and for the Japanese, is believed to offer a genuine reflection of modern Japanese culture.

Consequently, there is a prevailing assumption that the cultural elements depicted in anime accurately mirror the intricacies of contemporary Japanese society. This assumption solidifies the conviction that the knowledge gleaned from anime is not only comprehensive, but also represents a more authentic understanding of Japanese culture. Therefore, people value specific elements of Japanese culture presented in anime because they truly believe these to accurately represent the country they originate from.

This idea even prompts me to delve into the intricate connection between this perception and the characterization of anime as “underground.”

In this narrative, anime assumes the role of a symbol conveying exclu-

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sivity. This hinges on the belief that possessing knowledge derived from anime imparts a heightened level of experience and exposure to Japanese culture, nurturing a subtle sense of superiority. Therefore, by presuming that whatever is portrayed in anime is an accurate reflection of Japanese practices, enthusiasts of the genre might unwittingly entrap themselves in a false sense of cultural knowledge.

This perception may lead them to believe they understand a culture solely through their regular consumption of series like One Piece, Death Note, Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure, without ever having direct experience with it.

Not many would treat French culture as being simply revolving around baguettes and berets; thus why do we allow ourselves to reduce Japan in that exact same way?

This article refrains from being a fact-checker for the cultural accuracy in anime. It is crucial to recognize that, like all forms of media, anime undoubtedly exhibits both strengths and limitations in terms of representation. While basic aspects of Japanese culture are likely accurately portrayed in anime, it is the constraints of that portrayal and the simplistic Western assumptions that all of Japanese culture can be distilled into those depictions that I aim to address.

In fact, the article serves more as a catalyst for discussing the importance of exploring why specific cultural elements in anime resonate so profoundly and stir excitement among Western audiences. It prompts reflection on the curious dichotomy wherein individuals take pride in certain facets of Japanese culture while simultaneously feeling a sense of alienation from it. The underlying question emerges: What fuels this paradoxical relationship with Japanese culture, and how does anime contribute to shaping these perceptions?

Essentially, as exemplified by my prior explanations, and admittedly a certain degree of laziness — an aspect I acknowledge in myself as well — we frequently abstain from delving deeply into the content we consume.

While anime serves as a captivating lens into various facets of Japanese culture, its primary focus is often on crafting a compelling narrative.

Consequently, it may not thoroughly explore the intricacies of the cultural elements it portrays. As we become immersed in the narrative, we tend to overlook the fact that beyond the anime world lies a reality far more complex than the seemingly straightforward imagery of ramen and cherry blossoms.

Culture, by nature, is an exceedingly diverse and intricate concept that cannot be distilled into a mere handful of common items. Even if certain customs are prevalent in specific cultures, it does not warrant these customs becoming the defining features or exclusive representations of that culture. In its entirety, it is multifaceted and defies reduction to simplistic representation through a few selected elements. Not many would treat French culture as being simply revolving around baguettes and berets; thus why do we allow ourselves to reduce Japan in that exact same way?

Hence, instead of engaging in thought-provoking inquiries about Japanese culture that would allow for comprehensive appreciation, we tend to commit to memory specific and generic elements encountered in every anime out of pure ignorance and lack of stereotypical awareness.

We then label these generic elements as our “knowledge of Japanese culture,” when, in reality, a more inquisitive approach is warranted. Why do the Japanese include bowing in their customs? What exactly sets a kimono apart from a yukata? These questions underscore the imperative for a more nuanced and in-depth exploration of the cultural intricacies depicted in anime. This media stands as a significant gift from Japan; perhaps it is time we delve deeper into their culture as a sincere gesture of gratitude.

ARTS & CULTURE 7 7 7

Quebec Love: Defining National Identity THOMAS FRENETTE Arts & Culture Editor

Québec is the biggest French-speaking enclave in English-dominated America.

The culture generated by its unique geographic and political circumstance justifies, for Robert Charlebois, the title of “presqu’Amérique.” Initially, Québec’s culture resisted external influences — France and the United States — in an effort to promote self-determination and to scorn the structure of the Grande Noirceur of Maurice Duplessis, Québec’s prime minister in the mid-20th century, who championed religious, artistic, and political conservatism.

In classrooms, the history of Québec is often limited to the economic and political shifts — from French colonizers, to citizens of the Bas-Canada, to an oppressed working class — spanning the 16th century to the Second World War. When the timeline approaches the last half of the 20th century, where culture — cinema, music, television productions, and language itself — finally matured as its own distinct entity, the educational system shies away and the province’s culture become harder to access, especially if one is not actively involved in a French-speaking environment.

A new vision of societal values began to emerge when, in 1948, 16 automatist artists, including painter PaulÉmile Borduas, poet Claude Gauvreau, and dancer Françoise Sullivan published an anti-establishment and anti-religious manifesto entitled “Refus Global.” From there on, Québécois culture vowed to expand beyond tradition and question its own identity. Félix Leclerc and Gilles Vigneault wrote unofficial Québécois anthems and nursery rhymes like Gens du Pays, Moi, mes souliers, and Le p’tit Bonheur, later adapted as popular proverbs like “Mon pays ce n’est pas un pays, c’est l’hiver.” In the 1970s’, the band Harmonium, led by Serge Fiori, adapted a progressive rock style and metaphysical lyrics to an orchestral scale in their album L’Heptade. Robert Charlebois validated the joual, the French Canadian dialect, with titles such as Te v’la and Y’a sa Pichou and polished a playful, yet conscious irony to his politically active songwriting—namely by modifying Vi-

gnault’s classic: “Mon pays c’est pas un pays, c’est un job.” In the 2000s’, Les Trois Accords had a special knack for producing comedic hits like Hawaiienne and J’aime ta grand-mère that will never cease to be quoted by bickering children.

Les Cowboys Fringants have composed songs which address concerns from the distressing climate crisis in Plus Rien, to the saving grace of love in Tant qu’on aura de l’amour, and the ephemerality of life in Les Étoiles Filantes.

In fact, the cultural sanctity in Québec was manifested on November 15th when Karl Tremblay, the lead singer of Les Cowboys Fringants, passed away at the dismay of people around the province. Although the singer preferred to remain reserved, the nostalgic significance of Karl’s voice could not be denied — I, for one, did not expect to cry over a childhood memory — and the national funeral on November 28th at the Bell Center celebrated his life and music.

Cinema too is a thriving cultural industry — second to France in the number of productions of French-speaking cinema — defined today by the famous careers of Denis Villeneuve, Jean-Marc Vallée, and Xavier Dolan. Surnamed the grandfather of Québec cinema, Claude Jutra created a marvelous meditation on identity, race, and homosexuality in À tout prendre (1963) — although indignation followed Yves Lever’s biography of Jutra, which accounts that he regularly had sex with boys as young as 14 and 15. Pierre Perrault, a prominent direct cinema documentary director, traveled through Charlevoix, interviewing locals and recording their music for his weekly radio series, Au pays de Neufve-France

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(1959-60) and following films. Gilles Groulx reacted to the hypocrisy of the daily lives of Québecers in Où êtes-vous donc? (1969) with a disturbing mix of voice, song and mass media samples to dissent against consumer society. Shortly after the letdown of the first Québec referendum, Pierre Falardeau created the famous character Elvis Gratton, a federalist who is alienated from his own cultural identity under the pervasive influence of America, in Les Vacances d’Elvis Gratton (1981). Denys Arcand’s Les invasions barbares (2003) describes the ideological confrontation of an ill father, best described as a “sensual socialist,” who is joined at his deathbed by his son who is plagued with an affinity for money and individualism.

As film-watching has become a personal activity, American providers such as Netflix, Amazon Prime, and Crave have provided digital access to vast collections for a small monthly fee.

But the National Office of Film (ONF) offers a free alternative to American omnipresence and fees. Created by an act of the Canadian Parliament in 1939, the ONF’s mandate is “to produce and distribute and to promote the production and distribution of films designed to interpret Canada to Canadians and to other nations.” The ONF is thus to thank for the production of many cinematographic productions — documentaries, feature and short films, animated movies, indigenous and female voices — in Canada up to this day. Québec’s culture, though seemingly remote, is demonstrated by events like the death of Karl Tremblay and disseminated by platforms like the ONF.

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Visual Arts by MIA GUELI Visual Arts Editor

Artwork by Khadija Fatima @SAKOUMEI

Artwork by Mia Gueli @MIAG.DRAWS

Artwork by Christopher Dimitriadis @DYSFUNCNOODLE.PNG

VISUAL ARTS 9 Artwork by @AURRREELIE

Artwork by Noah Alec Mina @NOAHWITHMONEY

Artwork by Angélique Babineau @PHOTOGRAPHYAB__

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The Art of Bathroom Graffiti: A Window into Dawson Goers’ Lives MELISSA JABRAYAN Contributor

The thought of public restrooms conjures images of disgusting, rancid-smelling, bacteria-filled, poorly lit dumpsters but, contrary to popular belief, they can transform into brainstorming hubs for art and creativity. A brief scan of the stall walls in most of Dawson’s restrooms is sufficient to notice graffiti etchings and, while it might strike us as silly, idiotic, or even disrespectful, it serves as a public canvas where Dawson students can scribble their interests and preoccupations.

The most common comments written by these unknown graffiti artists are questions. Some of them are simple and playful, like “Why are all women’s bathrooms stinkier than men’s bathrooms?” to which one might wonder how they have been able to smell the men’s bathrooms’ air, or “How is yr day so far?” — alright, thanks for asking — and “Why is the gap between the wall and the stall so big…” which sheds light on an unresolved engineering error that fails to provide privacy in the stalls. I figured that since I was seeking graffiti, I might as well contribute, and so I wrote, “Who’s your favorite artist?

Need song recs.” To my surprise, as I periodically returned to that same stall, each visit elicited additional responses.

My question’s popularity is probably connected to students’ affinity to share artists they enjoy in the form of short notes like “yall should listen to Greta Van Fleet!” soon littering the stalls in a collective, yet anonymous discussion.

It is an opportunity to break the rules of a system that sometimes allows for little freedom.

Other questions address serious topics, such as relationship advice: “Do you think it’s a good idea to still be best friends with your ex? I’ve been friends with him for two years before we dated.” Seeing as the question had not been answered after a few visits, I took the liberty of responding with a resounding “NO.”

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Sometimes, people offer unsolicited advice or inspiring words.

Comments such as “His ‘too much’ is someone else’s ‘that’s all?’” or “Don’t text your ex” — this comment might be useful to the person who thinks it is fine to remain best friends with their ex — speak to how intimate and personal something as corny and indecent as graffiti in stalls can be.

In frequently visited places such as bathroom stalls, these messages — like small pick-me-ups on hard days — have the ability to function as honest pieces of insight in the hardships college students might face. Sentiments like “I’m in a toxic relationship with my education,” “I hate boys,” and “closeted lesbian :(” are exceptionally personal and may be the saving grace for students feeling alienated, isolated, or agonizing in the same situations.

Students are not simply taking on the role of graffiti artists for its own sake. Individuals choose to partake in this art to express their emotions and be vulnerable in a public space while remaining anonymous. There might also be a cathartic element to the act of rebellion. While being punished on account of it is unlikely, it is an opportunity to break the rules of a system that sometimes allows for little freedom.

Bathroom graffiti can take on different interpretations when observed from the perspective of men, women, and non-binary people. Culturally, women’s bathroom stalls have been a hideaway, a place to disassociate from the rest of the world and process emo-

tions. When I shared the existence of bathroom graffiti with my male friend at Dawson, he was immediately confused.

He asked me, “What do you mean ‘graffiti’ in the bathrooms?’” He did not recall seeing many of these drawings in the men’s bathroom or, at least, had not bothered giving them any particular attention. This may reflect on the contrast of bathroom experience with urinals occupying half of the mens’ restrooms or that men simply may not designate bathrooms as sanctuaries of peace and recollection where it is deemed fitting to exhibit emotional states and concerns.

At any rate, bathrooms continue to be effective locations to encourage community building via graffiti.

They offer a way for men, women, and non-binary people to breathe life into these spaces and share their pains and aches, laughs and distractions, advice and concerns. When I first began making a conscious effort to seek out these graffiti, I discovered a ragged-edged tally board categorizing uses people had made of the bathroom and, every time I returned, not only would new votes be cast, but new columns as well — what started as just “Piss, Dookie, Period, Vomit,” became a whole slew of categories and additions. The ever-expanding, community driven essence of bathroom stall graffiti serves as the catalysts of social bonding and are at the source of a banal, yet significant movement that allows all to engage in frivolous or serious conversations with people you might be accidentally elbowing while circulating between classes.

ARTS & CULTURE 11 11 11

The Clean Girl Aesthetic: The Dirty Truth EMMA CASPI Staff Writer

As she rearranges her quilts and stacks her books in the ‘perfect’ order, Yara Bitar, a 19-year-old North-South studies student at Dawson, does what she can to achieve the unattainable routine that the clean girl aesthetic promotes. Looking in her spotless mirror, she smooths her hair so it is tame and applies her makeup to seem effortlessly refreshed. Everything is minimal, dainty, and seems irrevocably perfect. “[It is] mostly like a state of being so put together: no hair out of place, you have your life together, you have a routine. You’re just…together!,” Bitar says on a brief Facetime call. Nonetheless, she states that those unable to reach these standards of so-called cleanliness and perfection can “make them feel like less of a woman” and “feel worse about themselves.”

The clean girl aesthetic is a trend that emerged on TikTok, encouraging an elegant and minimalist look by wearing a slick ‘ballet’ bun, glossed lips, gold jewelry, and neutral clothing. Many look to celebrities such as Hailey Bieber and Bella Hadid for inspiration on how to look and seem naturally put together with a touch of sumptuousness. According to Seventeen, the clean girl aesthetic has accumulated 2 billion views on TikTok. This trend, however popular, is filled with a disillusionment seldom acknowledged or explained. For example, the clean girl aesthetic has appropriated other cultures, is capitalistic, and, probably the most important, perpetuates harmful Western beauty standards that are impossible for most to achieve.

For years, black, brown, and Latinx communities were and still are shamed by conventional Western beauty standards for wearing chunky gold hoops and slick back hair. Now, the clean girl trend has appropriated these aspects of various cultures without proper recognition. “When people appropriate culture, oftentimes the groups that created that standard or… aesthetic are often penalized for it.

When it is taken on by people higher

up on the hierarchy, which is usually white wealthier women, then they are celebrated for the same thing,” explains Sarah Beer, a Dawson teacher in the Sociology department. The demonized communities are forced to watch from the side lines as wearing chunky jewelry and hair oiling is celebrated in the clean girl trend.

Aside from the lack of credit, the clean girl trend perpetuates consumerism. Beer elaborates by explaining that “there is part of a capitalist undercurrent too, which is if you set a beauty standard that is completely unachievable by the average person [...] it keeps you constantly insecure and striving to reach this pinnacle of wealth.” Therefore, the clean girl trend convinces the participant to buy pricey products that indirectly promote happiness, beauty, femininity, and well-being through the advertisements of clean girl models. The promoters of this aesthetic are convincing when they explain how their 60$ Dior lip oils and 200$ Coco Chanel perfume will help you be your best self. This capitalistic side blatantly disregards those who earn lower wages. Soon, a new trend with new products and standards will take over with the same deceitful message.

The most prominent problem of the clean girl trend is the Western beauty standards unachievable by most, which can be physically and mentally detrimental to those who do not conform. Alessandra Pothier, an 18-year-old Dawson student, sits in front of her mirror, feeling discour-

VIA THE NEW YORKER

aged with herself for not being able to achieve the ideal life of a clean girl.

She explains through a frustrated text that “the clean girl aesthetic is really hard to achieve for most people and it only fits people who fit a certain look. I’ve tried to achieve it so many times [and] I’m super envious of the girls who can pull it off.” Calling those who fit the standards of Western beauty ‘clean’ sounds as if those who differ, or are non white, are inherently dirty and impure. As an example, skin bleaching is not an uncommon practice among Indigeno us communities; they were made to feel unclean. Not many can fit into the minuscule box fabricated for and by a white audience which sustains a colorist, racist, fatphobic, and transphobic outlook.

There is nothing wrong with participating in the clean girl trend.

However, it is crucial that one knows where the trend got their inspiration from, how it promotes certain products with faulty promises, and the unattainable Western beauty standards it upholds. Perhaps the clean girl trend could uphold its message of embracing one’s natural essence better by giving credit where it is due, providing makeup, hair, and clothing inspiration without profit, and allowing for a broader inclusion as well as showcasing imperfections to subdue the narrow minded view of society.

Although this trend will eventually die down, we cannot stop potentially harmful trends. We can, however, change the way we see and participate in them.

12 THE PLANT

EVENTS

SMALL EVENTS

Curated by

THOMAS FRENETTE Arts & Culture Editor

MEDIA NIGHT Where: Dawson College, Dawson Theatre When: December 7, 2023 at 7 p.m.

Cost: 5$ Media Night is the biggest night of the semester for CinCom students. It is an opportunity to connect with peers and guests, but is primarily an event where the student films and media-related projects are shared and judged by media experts and distinguished in several award categories—best fiction, best experimental movie, achievement in editing, achievement in sound, etc.

VIA ARTS, LITERATURE AND COMMUNICATION FACULTY OF DAWSON COLLEGE

COMPLEX STUDIO ARTS VERNISSAGE Where: Dawson College, 5C Hallway When: November 30 to December 7, 2023 Cost: Free Dawson’s own Studio Arts students join arms in this exciting final vernissage. Fundraising via print sales and a drawing booth enabled eleven students to showcase their works during the last stretch of this semester in the hallway near the library entrance.

VIA FINE ARTS FACULTY OF DAWSON COLLEGE

STEEPLE, POMEGRANATE AND MIDNIGHT CRAWL Where: Turbo Haus When: December 9, 2023 at 8 p.m.

Cost: 13$ presale, 15$ at door Everyone can use a distraction from the stressful study of final exams. Thankfully, Steeple, a four-piece band formed at Vanier College, are performing their very first concert along the sides of Pomegranate, a punk-noise mashup project, and Midnight Crawl, a hard rock lineup.

VIA @STE3PLE

VELVET TERRORISM: PUSSY RIOT’S RUSSIA AT MAC Where: Museum of contemporary art of Montréal When: October 25, 2023 to March 10, 2024 Cost: Free Pussy Riot is a feminist protest and performance art collective famous for the provocative political lyrics and actions to its punk allure. Their modus operandi, by which all protest art should be “desperate, sudden, and joyous,” aims to uncover the systematic injustice of its native Russia through aggressive surveillance, political imprisonment, and endless other means to restrain liberty of speech.

VIA MITYA ALESHKOVSKY

VOICES 13 13 13

A Marxist Perspective on Political Participation PERCY BRABANDER Contributor

We have become all too accustomed to waves after waves of man-made horrors beyond comprehension created by late-stage capitalism. It seems like it is only ever going from bad to worse and infuriatingly, we, the general population, feel powerless. The one thing we are always encouraged to do is vote, but even that feels basically pointless because nothing seems to ever really change. The politicians we elect inevitably let us down and do not follow through on their promises and, once people get frustrated enough, the other party wins, and the cycle continuously repeats itself. Over and over and over again. We only ever seem to get closer to the end of the world as opposed to lasting, meaningful progress.

Take Trudeau’s Liberal party, for example: they got elected by promising — amongst other things — to bring Indigenous communities clean water and fight climate change, but eight years later, according to the Council of Canadians, 73% of First Nations’ water systems are still at medium or high risk of contamination and Canada is nowhere near its climate goals. Whenever positive reforms or changes do happen, they are so slow and incremental that by the time one aspect of our society has changed for the better, we are several new humanity-threatening crises deep.

So what do we do? Clearly, continuing to just vote the way we do is not working. This is where we can turn to a Marxist perspective on how to create the real, progressive changes in society that we want to see. To clarify, this does not necessarily mean a complete communist revolution — the man just made some good points about political participation.

In the Address of the Central Committee to the Communist League of March 1850, Marx argued that workers had to represent themselves politically, and not side with or settle for the Liberal bour-

geois candidates. He thought that “worker’s candidates” should be platformed and promoted wherever possible, even if there was no real chance of them winning the election. There were three main reasons for this strategy: “to preserve their independence, to count their forces and to lay before the public their revolutionary attitude and party standpoint.”

He rejected the argument that doing so would “split the vote” — a common argument against voting for smaller, more left-wing parties in Canada — and allow reactionaries to win. August Nimtz, Political Science professor, summarizes in his book The Ballots, The Streets, or Both, Marx’s argument like so: “The potential gains from independent working-class political action outweighed the risks of ‘reactionaries’ being elected.”

If voters only ever vote for the lesser of two evils, it all too easily becomes a race to the bottom.

For Marx, it was worth platforming a leftist candidate even if they did not have a hope in hell of winning — if nothing else, it allowed their message to be heard by the masses and sent the message that they would not settle for catchall parties who only ever upheld the status quo. If voters only ever vote for the lesser of two evils, it all too easily becomes a race to the bottom.

A few years later, philosopher Friedrich Engels discussed the failure of Liberal “reforms” made in an effort to democratize Europe, his insights remaining relevant today.

Following a series of uprisings, Liberal politicians settled for a constitutional monarchy instead of pursuing the revolutions that had been started. This failed to adequately advance workers’ rights and create meaningful structural change, which Engels criticized harshly: “These poor, weak-minded men, during

the course of their generally very obscure lives, had been so little accustomed to anything like success, that they actually believed their paltry amendments, passed with two or three votes’ majority, would change the face of Europe.”

A modern example of the same idea is when people argue that reform cannot fix policing in the United States, therefore the entire police force must be abolished — incremental reforms designed to curb the very worst of a problem are no way to solve deep-rooted, structural issues.

Operating within the existing parliamentary voting system is not by any means the only or the best way to participate in politics. Historically, it has largely been the masses mobilizing and taking to the streets that has won victories — such changes almost never come from the government, but rather from bottom-up action by the people. This can look like protesting, boycotting, striking, petitioning, etc.

Voting is an important right to exercise and we should feel encouraged to use it, especially to support independent/non-mainstream candidates whose ideas one actually agrees with; but we should not limit ourselves to parliamentary means to accomplish revolutionary/radical goals.

If we have learned anything from history, it is to use all the resources at our disposal to actively and effectively participate in politics, so we can create the changes in society that we want to see. The better we understand local, provincial, and federal politics, the better we can engage with them to make society better.

14 THE PLANT

For My Grandmother and Dina ANGÉLIQUE BABINEAU Managing Editor

On November 17, 1948, my grandmother, Jacqueline Daoust (née Pardo) was born in Bordeaux, a city located in the southwest of France.

On November 22, 1970, my grandmother left her native country with just a suitcase, less than 200 Canadian dollars, and no idea where she would sleep once she reached the other side of the Atlantic. By the time this article comes out, my grandmother will have celebrated her 53rd anniversary as a Quebec resident.

Daughter of a World War II veteran, my grandmother experienced a childhood cushioned by a father determined to provide her with everything she needed — despite the bullet holes in the walls, testimony of the war’s horrors. From the pair of shoes she had pointed out while window-shopping magically appearing on her bed at night to the extravagant summers in Cannes, my great-grandfather compensated for what he had lacked throughout his rough upbringing and years as a soldier by spoiling his daughter. But, despite his efforts, the economic state of a struggling country rebuilding itself post-World War II was unpredictable and lacked stability. Even with her rich educational background, economic conditions persuaded her to immigrate at 22.

Although initially considering Spain or Switzerland, an accidental visit on a regular Wednesday afternoon in 1970 redirected her journey.

That day, she drove to the consulate of Switzerland — except she had taken note of the wrong address and, instead, found herself in front of the Canadian consulate. Walking up the stairs as the red and white Canadian flag fluttered in the wind, she came across a plaque that read, “Consulat Général du Canada.” Nonetheless, she proceeded to the main desk and grabbed the form required to submit an immigration request. On the same week’s Friday, my grandmother received a letter from the consulate requesting her presence the next Monday for a formal interview.

Though her eye was initially set on Saskatwechan, “right in the middle of Canada”, the francophone reality prevailed. She recalls, “they asked me why I wanted to immigrate to Quebec. I thought to myself, ‘I don’t want to go to Quebec, I want to go to Saskatchewan!’ But I was a francophone, I had completed my studies, and so I never really had the choice.”

Three weeks elapsed, and after a formal interview and work visa under her belt, she bought her oneway plane ticket, stomach tied up in knots. Despite her excitement, the realization that she would be leaving her family and friends truly kicked in when boarding the plane: “[My father] told me, ‘If you start overthinking it, you’ll never leave and you’ll regret it for the rest of your life. If it doesn’t work out, you can always come back.’ But knowing myself, I knew that I wasn’t coming back once I left.”

On November 22, 1970, my grandmother left her native country with just a suitcase, less than 200 Canadian dollars, and no idea where she would sleep once she reached the other side of the Atlantic.

Upon her arrival on Canadian grounds, my grandmother recalls hopping on a taxi that took her to 10609 Saint-Denis Street, a private property owned by the provincial government housing immigrants from across the world. Never having had a job and with limited funds in hands, she had no financial safety net whilst starting anew. Her first job was as a secretary at Hachette, where she worked for four years: “I eventually had to quit because, like many women and immigrants, I was exploited.” She recalls earning 70$ per week, dwindling to 53$ after tax-

es. With 34$ remaining for weekly groceries and clothing after transportation and room rental expenses, she, like most immigrants, was not properly equipped for the upcoming winter.

Beyond financial hardships, integration into Quebec society also proved to be difficult. Facing stereotypes surrounding both her native country and immigrants, being French, she grappled with the labels “pretentious,” “uptight” and, as an immigrant, “job thief.”

Although a number of governmental measures have been put in place since she immigrated, my grandmother emphasizes the need for continued changes to ensure a safe, supportive, and welcoming environment for immigrants. She explains, “It is completely wrong for the country to pretend they are ready to welcome immigrants without being able to guarantee them any kind of job security, a salary, or even a roof over their heads. [...] People not being able to find work in their field of expertise is ridiculous. When you see trained doctors working as taxi drivers, it is just absurd.”

Despite the obstacles marking her journey as an immigration, my grandmother never looked back.

Whether that can be attributed to the fact that she met my grandfather six months upon her arrival, with whom she celebrated her 52nd marriage anniversary last June, or to her strong, fierce, yet genuine character, the story does not divulge. Nevertheless, throughout the last 53 years, her relationship with France and Canada has evolved into a nuanced blend of identities. “It’s strange because I cannot say that I feel completely Canadian, yet I would not say I feel French either. It is as if I am sitting in between two chairs, but France’s seat is slowly drifting away. I feel at home here, but I would be lying if I claimed I truly identified as a Quebecer.”

This sentiment of not fully belonging, even after spending the majority of her lifetime in Canada, is shared by many immigrant’s stories, one of my closest friends’, Dina Jouni, included.

VOICES 15 15 15

Two Tales; One Journey

My grandmother Jacqueline when she immigrated to Quebec in 1970

*** The beginning of October was, for most of us, synonymous with midterms, anxiety, and crippling insomnia. However, October 5, 2023, for Dina, marked three years since her family immigrated from Qatar, meaning they were at last able to request Canadian citizenship.

Dina was born on July 2, 2003, in the coastal town of Latakia in Syria. Following the invasion of Iraq by the United States, Syria’s economy collapsed. To secure a stable future, her father took on a job offer in Qatar, where the family resided until Dina turned 16.

As citizenship in Qatar remains one of the hardest to obtain in the world, Dina and her family held temporary residency under a work permit. If fired under a work permit, the owner of the permit is given 30 days to either find a new job or to leave the country. Amid economic uncertainties, Dina’s father started the process of applying for immigration to Canada during their last eight years in Qatar..

Two years after the submission of their first request, the family’s application was denied due to age restrictions as Dina’s parents were

deemed “too old.” A subsequent six-year application process ensued, culminating in their arrival in Canada in 2020. The war in Syria had begun during that time and Dina states, “The state of instability we lived in for these five or six years was severe.

There was this fear of the process not working, my dad being fired, and us having to go back to Syria where our lives would technically end.”

The challenges did not cease upon arrival. Without a Canadian bank account, credit score history or a stable job, securing housing proved arduous for Dina’s family, as tenants were either expected to provide predated checks or the rent to be paid in cash, both of which were financially straining for Dina’s family. The process of finding a job was equally challenging for her parents as most international degrees are invalid in Canada. “To get a job, you need a degree; to get a degree you need to go to school; to go to school you need either French or English, and it’s like a cycle of things you don’t have, but that you need in order to survive,” explains Dina. This meant that at only 16 years of age, Dina found herself juggling full-time studies at Concordia, a part-time job, and Francisation classes, coping with exhaustion and financial strain.

Although Dina believes both the provincial and federal governments may provide initiatives — paid Francisation, the CNESSST, and the Centre social d’aide aux immigrants — newcomers are often left to fend for themselves. Dina emphasizes the challenges of navigating these scattered platforms. She states, “The idea that they portray to immigrants is that they will teach you French, get you a job, a house, and a better life where all your needs are met and all your rights are respected. This is not far from the truth, but it’s just not that easy.”

Despite nearly 60% of recent immigrants holding at least a bachelor’s degree according to Statistics Canada, prejudice persists, putting newcomers under tremendous amounts of pressure to become the

“perfect immigrant,” to be “worthy” of being in Canada. The desire to prove harmful stereotypes surrounding Middle Easterners wrong combined with the need to make her parents proud not only affected Dina’s sense of belonging, but of self-worth and identity.

“It was a huge struggle for me to figure out who I was,” says Dina.

While she describes Quebecers as mostly welcoming people, the inaccurate, negative portrayal of Middle Easterners in Western media greatly affected her sense of identity and perception of self. Dina continues, “It makes you hate yourself. It makes you look in the mirror and wish you did not look like this; that your hair was not curly and black and that your eyes were not brown.”

Despite these challenges, Dina expresses immense gratitude. “My parents sacrificed their money, time, careers, aspirations, stability, and dreams so I could grow up Canadian and have a future where my kids would never have to go through the same struggles as we did,” says Dina.

As October 5th approached, Dina reminisced about the summers in Syria before the war as well as her childhood and high school days in Qatar: “At the end of the day, both of my parents are Syrian and I was born in Syria. I still have family there. I do miss Syria sometimes, but now, I have Canada,” Dina says, smiling.

Though 50 years separate my grandmother’s and Dina’s stories, they echo each other, testifying the shared, isolating experience of immigration. Despite the nuances, both narratives emphasize the resilience and determination required to forge a new identity in an adopted home.

Their identities as immigrants, although disparately created, unite in a collage of similar, mirrored experiences. Whether the story traces its roots to a war-torn country or to French bourgeoisie, the ending might strangely, coincidentally collapse into a poetic amalgam of analogous confusion and self-discovery.

16 THE PLANT

PLAYLIST

Playlist by MIA GUELI Visual Arts Editor

VOICES 17

Trauma-Feeding: The Best Art Shouldn’t Come from Pain MIRREN BODANIS Voices Editor

If you were someone who both read books and went through a breakup in the eighth grade, you wrote cringey sad poems. Don’t lie. I did, we all did. Life at that time was so simple, yet brutally vivid, and for my fellow introverted 14 year olds all of that brutality was poured and contained into stanzas upon stanzas in the Notes app. I remember the feeling so well: after finishing a final verse, probably rhyming “sigh” and “cry” with “die,” I stared hatefully across the page (or screen) into an oblivious classroom, feeling unseen. I am suffering. I am an artist. This is what real art feels like!

So much of art is trauma and we love it. It is the most vivid; the most “real.” We love trauma in the artistic process: artists who died right after finishing a painting, musicians who wrote while overdosing on LSD or Jared Leto sending castmates used condoms and dead rats to method act the Joker. The 27 club isn’t full of tragedy, it’s full of great artists.

Professor of philosophy Jeremy Bendik-Keymer and visual artist Misty Morrison explore this phenomenon in their article “Trauma Feeding: Why It’s Not Okay To Exploit Trauma in Art,” featured in the Cleveland Review of Books. They define “trauma-feeding” as “a practice of making art about trauma that has the obvious effect of soliciting people’s sympathy and, possibly, stirring up more trauma or trauma-related effects in spectators.”

As an example, they provide “Open Casket,” a figurative painting by white artist Dana Schutz depicting the

disfigured corpse of Emmet Till. The painting received massive backlash, with many protesting its exposition, and artist Hannah Black writing an open letter to the museum stating that “it is not acceptable for a white person to transmute Black suffering into profit and fun.”

Bendik-Keymer and Morrison’s article reinforces this into a general context. “Dana Schutz’s painting was a form of trauma-feeding because it seized on the sympathy of spectators as someone who was neither working through the trauma exhibited nor as someone who was following through on it.” This detached sympathy is core to the ways we trauma-feed off of art. Although many films, books, songs, and paintings depicting trauma can be helpful in terms of bringing issues to light, they also allow us to sympathize without empathy. They give us the opportunity to feel bad about someone else’s trauma without helping them work through it, or work through it ourselves. We can understand the sentiment without working through the problem itself. In Bendit-Keymer and Morrison’s words: “Trauma-feeding keeps everything in its place, and covers over this conservative preservation of the status quo by rewarding viewers with spectacular sympathy.”

Society fetishises trauma not only in the content of art, but in the process of its creation. We love troubled artists, we love work born from a terrible experience, and that was a terrible experience to create. In my own community of cinephiles, directors like David Fincher and Stanley Kubrik are revered for forcing their actors to perform hundreds of takes, or abusing them into “great” per-

Open Casket by Dana Schutz VIA WIKIPEDIA

formances. In popular culture, we revere the “method actor”: one who forces themselves into experiencing as much trauma as their character in the name of a convincing performance.

“Trauma-feeding keeps everything in its place, and covers over this conservative preservation of the status quo by rewarding viewers with spectacular sympathy.

Endless examples of this type of reverence for traumatic processes exist outside cinema. In an article for Rolling Stone, American music journalist Mikal Gillmore explains how for The Beatles, “unwitting initiation into LSD would find its fulfillment the following year in Revolver, the Beatles’ bravest and most innovative album.” No discussion of the greatness of Vincent van Gogh can end before mentioning that none of his paintings were sold during his lifetime and that he cut his own ear off. We cannot mythologise an artist without mythologising their trauma.

It seems modern society is truly obsessed with insisting that great art means great trauma, and great trauma means great art. In our capitalist world, our own trauma has become commodifiable and, in our false meritocracy, to suffer for your work makes you moral and worthy of myth. And all for what?

I used to think my eighth grade poetry was the peak of my art. As I worked through the pain from which I drew out those poems, I stopped writing them.

And yet, you are reading this in The Plant.

We, as Dawson students, struggle through this world, as we claw our way through exams and finals and summatives and tests and pain. It is our choice: Do we destroy our sleep schedule or fail a test? Do we go out to the bar or do we stay home and paint till our hands ache and the work is done? Do we suffer through or maybe drop a few courses?

Maybe it is time to choose the latter, and maybe that is okay. Our art and life will be better for it.

18 THE PLANT

Choosing the Right to Choose Anonymous contributor

This story is a tough one to tell since my brain wiped out a good number of memories from these foggy months.

But as so many struggle silently or are still grieving from this distressing experience, and as the world keeps challenging women’s power over their own fates, I think my story is worth being shared. I want to emphasize that this experience is my own, and therefore does not necessarily reflect others’ journeys. I hope, with this piece, to bring comfort to those who once found themselves quivering in the bathroom, facing two lines after urinating on a plastic stick, confronted to the undeniable presence of the thing, to those who try to forget and often dismiss the legitimate trauma that is still buried deep within us. I do not glorify abortion, nor wish to invalidate those who choose to keep the fetus. I simply want to put out the unfiltered, raw account of the early stages of my pregnancy, and the process that followed the agonizing decision.

It seemed to me that pregnancy was a mythical entity, an urban legend, something that only happened to others, like getting cancer at 19 or hitting a deer while driving.

It was the end of March 2023, everything felt gray and dull, and I was drowning in schoolwork. I had gotten a notification from my period-tracking app, announcing the monthlies should start imminently.

Three days passed, still not a single drop of blood. I closely monitored my calendar, used a condom when I was ovulating, and took Plan B the few times I had flown too close to the sun.

It seemed to me that pregnancy was a mythical entity, an urban legend, something that only happened to others, like getting cancer at 19 or hitting a deer while driving. After more than a year of being lucky, I thought my-

self immune to the threat. I had had pregnancy scares before, yet this time, I had the gut feeling that it was for real. Five days later, I was dragging myself to Jean Coutu to get my hands on a pregnancy test.

Although I expected my intuition to be right, nothing compares to those two seconds of utmost incredulity, eyes wide open as I stared in disbelief at the tiny cross indicating that a fetus was growing inside of me by the second. I did a second test; positive again. Beaten and overwhelmed, I laughed in disbelief then started to sob. From that point on, everything happened absurdly quickly. The first symptoms I noticed were a barely visible, tiny bump on my lower abdomen, and highly sensitive, swollen breasts. By the fourth week, about a week after finding out, the moodiness kicked in. Every emotion was magnified tenfold, small issues became tragedies and my eyes morphed into broken, leaky faucets.

By the end of the fifth week, morning sickness became intrinsic to my daily life. Breakfast was a relentless battle. I chose fasting over throwing up, yet still found myself running to the bathroom, bent over, shuddering from waves of nausea. I felt isolated, neglected, and constantly exhausted, a fatigue that would worsen.

I stopped drinking coffee, alcohol, and smoking cigarettes or weed. Eating any form of junk food was out of the question. The sight of coffee disgusted me, and cigarette smoke made me sick to my stomach. These were no deliberate, health-centred inclinations, but unconscious manifestations of a very complex machinery at work.

At this point, my mind was set on getting rid of the fetus, not only out of urgency, but because it had become physically unbearable considering my lifestyle. Oddly, another symptom appeared: the genuine yearning to keep the baby. I felt a powerfully instinctive urge to protect the thing. Already, my brain chemistry had been altered, repurposed to love and nurture the growing fetus. The human mind truly is wonderful.

By the sixth week of the pregnancy, my lower abdomen and breasts

were visibly inflated. I had intermittent daily nausea, could not stand near the kitchen when food was cooked, and had thrown up several times both at school and at home. I took afternoon naps whenever I could. I had become a groggy, nauseous blob. My body felt like a heavy flesh bag that needed to be dragged around. Performing basic tasks, not even mentioning school, was exhausting. I had turned into a different person.

I had become a groggy, nauseous blob. My body felt like a heavy flesh bag that needed to be dragged around.

Performing basic tasks, not even mentioning school, was exhausting. I had turned into a different person.

I aborted at exactly six and a half weeks. Two weeks prior, I had faced the daunting task of scheduling an appointment. I had tried the Santé Montréal number, a resource promising abortion services in less than two weeks, which proved useless. The people I had spoken to were rude, dismissive, did not take me seriously, and made me feel even more powerless and anxious. As they could not offer an appointment on the spot, I waited neurotically to be called back.

My advice is to not waste your time with governmental services or the different CIUSSSs. Contact free clinics directly. After trying a few, I finally found one that would offer me an abortion 10 days later, l’Alternative.

Securing an appointment brought me inexpressible relief. After weeks of anguish, I could take a breather.

There are two ways to abort legally in Canada. The first is the medical abortion, which uses two different compounds to expel the pregnancy, and can only be performed until weeks 9 to 11. The second option is

VOICES 19 19

My Story with Early Pregnancy: On Safe and Legal Abortion

surgical, accessible until week 24. At the time, surgery seemed extremely invasive, and frightening. I chose to abort medically.

The procedure goes as follows: you get tested for STDs, then ingest the first medication, mifepristone, which detaches the fetus from the uterus’s walls. This initial medication has little to no side effects. The second medication, four tablets of misoprostol, has to be taken 24 to 48 hours following the first pill, and kept pressed on your gums for 30 minutes – the time for it to dissolve into the bloodstream. The fetus should then be expelled within the following five hours.

At the clinic, nurses thoroughly explained what each option involved, ethically and physically, ensuring I was making an enlightened decision.

They also walked me through different contraceptive methods to consider so I would not find myself undergoing this distressing process again. The clinic’s staff was professional, gentle, and considerate. I was then set free, misoprostol in hand, after scheduling a follow-up appointment about a week later.

I stayed at a friend’s house on the given night. Having heard multiple medical abortions’ horror stories, I was stressed out of my mind.

At this stage, I strongly recommend being somewhere you feel safe, with someone you trust to intervene if needed. As the tablets were dissolving in my mouth, I was lying on the couch in sweatpants, over layers of towels. The nausea, headache, and cramps were surreal. I was prescribed hydromorphone, morphine’s synthetic, much stronger little sister, in order to cope with the pain. While drugged out, huge, dark blood clots I didn’t even know my uterus could foster were being expelled. My stomach growled and ached. I had to run to the bathroom frequently to remove the piling up clots. Three hours later, the worst was behind me. Unable to sleep for the rest of the night, I stared at the ceiling while the apartment cat watched royally over me.

The relief was instantaneous.

Even after a sleepless night, I felt the

most energized I had in weeks. I was reborn. But the nightmare wasn’t over yet. Upon my check-up appointment, the nurse detected major debris in my uterus, which would lead to further complications if not dislodged. I was offered to have the clots surgically removed or to repeat the medical process, risking it would fail again. I chose the latter. After another consultation, the diagnosis stood: the debris had not moved. Desperate to move on, I reverted to surgery.

About a week later, I was back at the clinic. I was intravenously administered fentanyl, and drifted on pure opioid bliss throughout the entire surgery. Looking back, I never should have accepted the drug. I was monitored for about 15 minutes and asked if I felt nauseous before being allowed to leave. A friend had come to pick me up, a requirement of the procedure. Before getting on the bus to school, the nausea started. I spilled my insides on the sidewalk of Sherbrooke Street. And once more when I exited the bus. Then again in the café I had gone to study before an exam. I ended up feeling so terribly unwell I had to rest nonstop for two days, unable to attend school. Only then did I start believing I would soon return to normalcy.

There are a few last things I want to recall from this experience. Primarily, always use thorough, adequate protection. The odds of becoming pregnant may seem low, but pregnancy does not discriminate. Following

VIA HUIZENG HU / GETTY IMAGES

this experience, the fear of being subjected to another unexpected pregnancy compelled me to get a hormonal IUD. Although the threat of harmful side effects, ranging from weight gain to depression, remained significant, nothing could ever compete with the mental and physical distress I endured for two months.

In many ways, receiving a safe medical abortion saved my life. The decision to abort a fetus is nonetheless excruciating. It crushes you. Throughout my pregnancy, I often reminisced on how our society’s frameworks are deeply hostile to younger parents who wish to have a child and properly sustain it. As a student without steady income, raising a child is simply not viable. The knowledge that I ultimately had no real choice remains bittersweet to this day.

I hope my testimony rendered some justice to the reality of early pregnancy and abortion, and managed to echo the battles of those who share a similar story. If you are struggling with pregnancy, I encourage you to speak up, and surround yourself with people you love and trust. I know how alienating it feels to suffer silently, and to pretend to be able to function while your mental and physical health are drastically plummeting. The trauma lingers and never quite fades. I know the sweat and exhaustion under which hides a shared, muffled longing to feel seen. Together, we must cherish our right to choose. We are incredibly brave. We are not alone.

20 THE PLANT

VOICES

The Missing Piece in Autism Diagnosis EZRA BUCUR Staff writer

Autism, known officially as Autism Spectrum Disorder or ASD, is a fairly recent research topic. The first person to be formally diagnosed, Donald Gray Triplett, recently passed away at the age of 88. Despite its short existence, the perception of autism rapidly evolved. One prominent example of this would be the condemnation of the “r-slur,” used originally as a diagnostic criteria. Another example, more ingrained within the medical field, would be the “Asperger’s syndrome” diagnosis. Up until the publication of the DSM 5, an individual could be diagnosed with it, even if its origins traced back to eugenics carried out by Nazi Germany.

Hans Asperger, who this diagnosis was named after, worked for the Nazi government and was responsible for outlining the criteria for Asperger’s syndrome. In his mind, those who were considered “intelligent enough” had to be spared from the “child euthanasia” campaigns. As of 2013, Asperger’s is no longer a diagnosable condition and, along with other disorders, is included under the ASD diagnosis.

Nowadays, autistic individuals themselves communicate their grievances and experiences to the general public. This is mainly done online where discussions of autism and representation run rampant. The online community has significantly contributed in raising awareness about topics such as the use of the r-slur, personal experiences with autism, or the dangers of organizations such as Autism Speaks, which portrays autism as a harmful disease. Through the Internet, autistic people can share their experiences in early childhood, traumatic life events, and difficulties fitting in with imposed social norms.

Unfortunately, the existence of this online space, like many others, can also have negative consequences. One such example, which relates not only to autism, but to a generalized popularization of mental health discourse, is disinformation. Since many who engage with mental health

content are not professionals, myths surrounding “detecting” mental conditions such as autism or even personality disorders form. The virality of social media causes these falsehoods to spread faster than peer reviewed clinical research. Additionally, bullying campaigns have started to prop up as a result of the growing discussion surrounding neurodivergence. A prominent example is seen in pages such as “r/fakedisordercringe” on Reddit, where people, often aged between 13 and 16, are mocked for being “fakers.” Ironically, while they mock these teenagers for not getting a professional diagnosis, they are oftentimes not medical professionals either.

Whilst neurotypical people, whether medical professionals or not, often struggle with understanding autistic perspectives, letting a neurological condition be defined by current trends is also counter productive.

Interestingly, through viral trends, videos, and posts, it seems a new archetype of autism was created. This time, rather than emerging from albeit flawed clinical research, it comes from individual testimonies and anecdotes. Whilst neurotypical people, whether medical professionals or not, often struggle with understanding autistic perspectives, letting a neurological condition be defined by current trends is also counter productive. In the mind of psychologists, autism means a young socially awkward white male obsessed with math. Their stereotyping often makes these clinical tests expensive and seemingly inaccessible. Many young people in unapproving families have turned to self diagnosis as a way to explain the way they interact with society. The conclusions drawn from self-diagnosis then spread online, creating a different stereotype surrounding au-

tism. This time, autism means specific stims, “cute” hyperfixations, and an extensive stim toy collection.

Instead of being taken seriously, it is now infantilized in the view of the general public, reinforcing the belief that autism is overexaggerated and simulated by anyone who is not a cold robot.

These two stereotypes conflict with one another, yet explain one another. Since the medical field promotes the exclusionary narrative that neurodivergence is for “genius” little white boys from upper middle-class families, akin to Hans Asperger’s ideas, online movements try to include everyone in the diagnosis, rendering the word devoid of all meaning. The flaws of medical diagnosis become “addressed” with self-diagnosis, rather than changing the clinical perspective and making assessments accessible. Whilst many people who self-diagnose do end up needing professional help for their symptoms, oftentimes not having another person’s expertise can lead to improper solutions for these problems.

Oftentimes, the reaction one gets when announcing they were either diagnosed or are getting a diagnosis is one of uncertainty. You get told you do not “act autistic” enough, or that you are simply malingering as a means to get attention.

However, this does not mean that you will be seen as neurotypical, and be shielded from ableist bullying.

Not only are autistic people often socially ostracized by their peers, but the mere fact of being referred to as stereotypes implies the lack of knowledge regarding the topic.

Destigmatizing the diagnosis of autism, as well as other conditions related to neurodivergence from its exclusionary origins is essential, yet it must also remain consistent enough to meet the actual needs for help and support.. Whilst autistic people have been compelled to listen to neurotypical people their entire lives, redefining the public understanding of these conditions may be the only way to truly include those who are neurodivergent.

CREATIVE WRITING 21 21 21

As December marks my last month at Dawson, I am glad to end my college experience with yet another issue from The Plant. Over the semesters, I have written a dozen articles and have read dozens more. Now, as Creative Writing editor, I have been lucky enough to be trusted with so many wonderful, vulnerable pieces sent from amazing contributors. The Plant has taught me how to be courageous enough to send out what I write. It has provided me with endless inspiration, support, and I have trusted it to keep the practice of writing at Dawson thriving. Moving forward, I must trust you, the readers, to keep The Plant alive. Have a good break everyone. Now is the time to eat and sleep and cuddle and do nothing else.

Keep writing and keep sending.

Thank you, HANNAH DANE Creative Writing Editor

Self-Plagiarizing

Queen BP’s Revenge

HANNAH DANE Creative Writing Editor

LUCA MESSINA Contributor

The silence on my paper Stays intact Through the empty cans Clashing in my lungs And the un-un-un Of grinning furnaces Who cannot see yet taunt me so.

You’ve worn the crown upon your head Stared through the lives of the many And spit the bare faced lies you said In hopes we wouldn’t mutiny.

This dependence I have On the unreal, the untruths, Will never suffice in this Beaten profession, Vertebrates curling in, Trapping escaping breaths, two sighs.

Every tense tooth snapping At these pages, Snapping, slobbering, Inside the coal mine of my mouth Might just collapse within me.

Pens pierce through tense tendons.

Pencils sharpen on snagged Edges of my ribcage.

Paper cuts in thick cuticles.

These are lines I have written before.

Two fingers pushing lightly On the cherry pill on my tongue, Overpoured rhum dripping Its leaky faucet down my throat; Can’t sip or chew what won’t dissolve.

But a bad rhyme will push A bubble up my throat Unpopped ‘til I chuckle it out, Unclasping my thorax.

We’re all good pirates: to raze, To pillage the soil and take, Burn it all and warm our feeble Bones by the blaze.

Oh, feed us our daily rum Squeezed from only the freshest Of high-fructose corn syrups “Now with real rum concentrate.”

Below the deck in sorrow, Through tight-lipped frowns we swallow The poisons of the captain’s rations.

But some day you will walk The plank itself gilded with gold For your retirement under the palms Of virgin beaches on the islands.

We know the game: Only the cruelest peg-legs keep their doubloons.

Just imagine it now sailors, The crown falling overboard, Swashbucklers no more.

We will sing, our freedom an ode To the end of the gore.

We’ll be handed the reigns Of this unsavable shit Reveling in joy From our plastic ship.

See the space left unwrinkled Between your eyebrows When your fingers ache just right?

Inch those blue lines closer To see them not much clearer.

Take a bite.

Doodles by

SANAD HAMDOUNA and HANNAH DANE

22 THE PLANT

CREATIVE WRITING

Woman to Woman, Me to Me CHELO-MAE ALMANON Contributor

being a woman is a love-hate relationship. beauty industries making profit off insecurities they put into our heads, not feeling safe walking late at night, make sure to be where there’s light, keep looking behind. i had to learn that no man is actually kind. paying to bleed, the pill making us ill; as long as they make money, they don’t have a single worry, seems like nobody cares about our bodies. they reap sow they can repair. oppression leading to depression. don’t talk like that, don’t sit like that, and don’t you dare talk back. just smile and agree. you were born to please. you were born from a woman just to be called weak, soft, sensitive. all these creeps catcalling but forget calling the police. those pigs won’t even help me. that’s why it’s fuck 12 ‘til the day I die. a rapist won’t even be given 12 years, especially if he’s white. the system’s not in my favor, but I just hope the universe is.

I must keep faith to believe I am not just bait. no I am not just a woman. the truth is I am everything. no one would be here without us. “the future is female,” the future can be repaired. just teach these young girls that they’re not any less than a man.

in you, I see my little me, filled with innocence until it all got stolen.

I lost her. somebody issue an amber alert, my inner child has gone missing.

I keep writing her letters, sorry after sorry: sorry I couldn’t protect you. sorry I couldn’t speak up. sorry I almost gave up.

I promise you are okay now. you are safe now. you have made it back home and you are striving better than ever. you have dug your power back out of the grave. thank you for being so brave. you’re now surrounded by good energy and pure love. let me tell you how much I love women, women who let you hit their joint in a concert crowd, women who protect you in clubs, women who give you a tampon or a pad when you forgot your own, women who compliment others, women who uplift those around them, women who see the beauty in everything. now, I can hug her tightly when I close my eyes, and tell her: “you’ll be okay, I promise you’ll end up finding your voice.” thank you for staying, my love.

Fingertips LEO HUSSAIN Contributor

Your arm abruptly extends towards me My words, impossibly fainter, blend with the echoing drone My eyes trace over your decorated fingertips Why has my one distant wish become your command?

Tight in your hand, the barrel faces your person Your voice orders in unison with the grip TV static runs through my veins and out of my ears “Take it,” you both say Tight in my hand, the barrel follows your wishes I wince — the cold carbon steel presses against my skin But wait; the deafening drone is but a begging siren When my eyes flick open, the sirens go mum I see my dim prophecy you authored spelled out on your face Unconvinced, the frigid tool ricochets beneath me Scoffing, your whispers rattle my ground “If you were a quarter of a man.”

SPORTS 23

The Olympics Feature Lacrosse After Decades... Without its Indigenous Inventors?

MARC PHAM Sports Editor

Despite its booming popularity, lacrosse is not the most mainstream sport and has not gotten a chance in the limelight for over a century. In fact, the United States, Canada, and Great Britain were the only countries with teams competing in the 1904 and 1908 Olympics, the first and last instances of the sport being contested.

In 1904, two teams from Canada and one from the United States competed in St. Louis, United States. Only two teams, one from Canada and one from Great Britain competed in London the second time. Canada won both times.

In 2018, as a step towards international recognition of the sport, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) granted provisional recognition status to the Federation of International Lacrosse (FIL). The status means that the organization can receive funding from the IOC and apply for development programs as it pursues full recognition status. It was one of three organizations granted this status, joining the World Association of Kickboxing Organisations and the Federation Internationale de Sambo. Thereafter, it had a rebrand and changed its name to World Lacrosse.

Lacrosse achieved a colossal breakthrough in October 2023 by being added to the Olympics for the Summer Games in Los Angeles in 2028 alongside baseball/softball, cricket, flag football, and squash sports with roots and popularity in the United States. They were a package deal recommended by the Los Angeles 2028 organizing committee and accepted by the IOC Executive Board.

After 120 years, lacrosse will be making its return as a medal sport in the Olympics again. “[The inclusion] is a testament to our sport’s enduring legacy, worldwide popularity and unique ability to bring people together,” said World Lacrosse CEO Jim Scherr. “It also signifies the culmination of an extraordinary journey to return North America’s first game to the Olympics, a journey made possible by the unwavering passion of our lacrosse community.”

However, this celebratory occasion for the sport may not be all sunshine and rainbows. Despite being the originators of the game, and one of the top-ranked teams in World Lacrosse, the Haudenosaunee (pronounced hoedee-no-SHOW-nee) may not have a spot in the 2028 Summer Olympics.

The Haudenosaunee Nationals, formerly known as the Iroquois, are made up of athletes from the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, including the Kanien’kehá:ka (Mohawk), Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, Seneca and Tuscarora nations. They are members of World Lacrosse and compete at the global level. They are ranked second in the world in men’s box lacrosse and eighth in women’s field lacrosse.

The men’s team has won three bronze medals in world championships, including one this year. At the 2022 World Games, the men’s team finished fifth and the women, seventh.

In a formal statement, the IOC declared that only nations with national Olympic committees (NOCs) would be allowed teams into the games. “This means it is up to the two NOCs concerned (USA and Canada) - in coordination with World Lacrosse and the National Federations concerned - to decide if they include athletes from Haudenosaunee in their respective teams depending on the passport they hold,” the IOC said in a statement to The Associated Press. In other words, Haudenosaunee athletes must compete for either the American or Canadian team.

“Throughout the history of colo-

VIA GETTY IMAGES

nialism, it felt like the Haudenosaunee people and all Indigenous people were just fighting every day to still be alive,” said Kason Tarbell, a member of the Haudenosaunee men’s team.

“Society keeps trying to put us back down and erase us from the history books. But with our flag, we’re showing every other country that we’re still here, we’re still fighting.”

“It’s just really important for them to understand and recognize what we bring to the Olympic Games.

Who we are as people comes with the game. They’re intertwined.” said Claudia Jimerson, director of the Haudenosaunee Nationals women’s program. She expects the road to the Olympics for the Indigenous team to be arduous, but remains optimistic.

The outcome will depend on whether or not the IOC will buck a decades-old tradition or will find a way to include players under the Haudenosaunee flag. Such a decision would pay homage to lacrosse’s Indigenous roots, in an ecosystem always seeking more inclusiveness and diversity.

“When you listen to stories told by elders, and those in the Native American community, the first game of lacrosse, or Dehoñtjihgwa’és, was between the land animals and the air animals,” said Marc Riccio, CEO of USA Lacrosse, the governing body of lacrosse in the United States. “The story shows that the game is for everyone. From the mouse to the deer, to the sparrow, to the eagle. The game is about inclusivity, it’s about positivity and friendship.”

24 THE PLANT

Wired to Worry: Deciphering Genes, Anxiety, and You KHADIJA FATIMA Copy Editor CLARA EL HAYEK Contributor

Authors’ note: This article is a reminder that knowledge is a powerful ally against anxiety disorders. Believe in yourselves and know that this new emotion from Inside Out 2 does not have to take over your Joy. If you or someone you know is struggling, please reach out; here is a suicide hotline that is easy to remember: 9-8-8.

Think of the letters A, T, C, and G as the alphabet that writes the tale of our biology. But there is more to it than just these genetic letters – the true complexity unfolds with unseen epigenetic authors, subtly guiding the rhythm of our story. When you are looking up menus of restaurants online and reciting your order 10 times ahead of arriving, remember that it is not just the ATCGs you were taught in highschool biology that are responsible for anxiety. There is an entire invisible team of epigenetics adding layers to our narrative of gene strands, highlighting certain feelings whilst editing out others, and ultimately shaping our encounter with anxiety.

To delve into our individual narratives, it is crucial to first grasp the concept of epigenetics. Common knowledge dictates that our phenotypic traits, like eye color or finger length, are determined by the human genome (DNA).

At the molecular level, DNA consists of long chains of nucleotides — Adenine (A), Thymine (T), Cytosine (C), and Guanine (G). These chains of As, Ts, Cs, and Gs, consistent in size and number across all cells, are enfolded around histones, which act like anchors. However, the distinguishing factor between the cells of eyes and those of hands lies in epigenetic mechanisms, as explained by Nicole Palacio, Ph.D. Student at McGill University in the Integrated Program in Neuroscience.

Visualize epigenetic mechanisms as small chemical compounds attaching and detaching from the genome — they do not alter the genetic code, but instead regulate its expression. Palacio explains that genes often express themselves by coding for proteins which are crucial for

orchestrating our cell functions. As our cells contain the genetic instructions for diverse tasks, it is crucial to “turn off” or repress some of the genes for specializing cell functions. The variance between cells in the eye and the hand emerges from differences in protein formation due to the selective repression of DNA – a phenomenon termed “epigenetics.”

Furthermore, epigenetic mechanisms transcend cell specialization; they encompass gene-environment interactions as well. Palacio explains that environmental factors, like one’s diet, can impact genes. One specific epigenetic mechanism, known as “DNA methylation,” occurs when a molecular “methyl” group attaches itself to the DNA strand, thereby repressing the associated gene. To elaborate, these methyl groups target the C nucleotide (Cytosine) in a Cytosine-Guanine sequence (CpG), inducing DNA strands to coil around the histones, thus inhibiting the expression.

In easy terms, DNA methylation is akin to crumpling a paper; if you crumple this article (not recommended unless you are aiming to break hearts), reading it becomes impossible .

Additionally, other mechanisms such as acetylation – which relaxes the genes around the histones – and non-coding RNA (ncRNA) also influence these epigenetic modifications.

Recognizing the importance of these modifications is crucial as they can be inherited by subsequent generations, potentially correlating with behavioral patterns. Since genes encode proteins that regulate cell functions, any hindrance in their expression could lead to significant changes in our daily lives. The next time your heart races in the grip of social anxiety as you raise your hand in class, blame it on the subtle methylation of a few DNA strands.

While it might seem obvious that epigenetic mechanisms cause environments to shape individuals, their inheritance remains less evident. Gametes’ formation, like spermatozoids and ovaries, is highly regulated through a process of cell division called meiosis, aiming to establish a “clean slate” for offspring DNA by wiping away epigenetic markers. According to a study conducted by Emily Cartwright for Novus Biologicals, some markers persist and

are transmitted to daughter cells and subsequent generations, contributing to contemporary concepts, such as “intergenerational traumas,” commonly circulating on social media.

As humans, our programmed behaviors are influenced by our surroundings, and our response to stress, a known trigger for anxiety, varies from person to person. Stress is a natural response, designed to help us navigate immediate challenges, such as exam worries.

In contrast, anxiety extends beyond, persisting even when prepared for situations like exams, eventually evolving into an anxiety disorder when it starts interfering with daily life. Beyond innate predispositions, some individuals learn to become more prone to stress through personal experiences, fostering anxiety. This, in turn, triggers lasting changes in DNA structure through DNA methylation. These modifications in the epigenome persist through cell division, transmitting to daughter sex cells and subsequent generations. This challenges the view that only genetic mutations are inherited, emphasizing that changes in the epigenome, while not mutations, are crucial modifications controlling whether genes are turned “on’’ or “off.”

However, decoding behavior from a genetic standpoint remains intricate, given that a plethora of genes collectively contribute to our brain chemistry. Various studies adopt different approaches; Genome-Wide Association Studies (GWAS) delve into small DNA sequences, linking them to phenotypic traits. Using GWAS to study anxiety is like learning the language of genetics through flashcards - you might win the spelling bee, but are still struggling to hold a meaningful conversation in that language. In contrast, Twin Adoption Studies - studies that involve identical twins that were raised in different environments - are much more popular and offer the empirical knowledge that about half of the variance in personality is attributed to genetic effects.

Anxiety is an emotion closely tied to our environment, and ongoing research suggests that the world around us can influence the way our genes function, impacting mental health and potentially affecting future generations. While heredity contributes to anxiety disorders

SCIENCE & ENVIRONMENT 25 25

30-50% of the time, the environment, encompassing work, school, personal life, and traumatic events, plays a more dominant role (50-70%). The article by Steven et al. underscores the need to manage environmental factors, as DNA methylation, an inherited epigenetic change, can also be influenced by experiences.

Examining a collaboration between genes and neural pathways reveals the complex molecular processes influencing our physiological reactions to stress. Genes play a crucial role in regulating stress, since turning “on” and “off” genes impacts the function of the nervous system. We are specifically interested in the autonomic involuntary nervous system (ANS), which has two main parts related to anxiety: the sympathetic nervous system (SNS) activating our “fight or flight” response, and the parasympathetic nervous system (PNS) responsible for the “rest and digest” mode. Information flows in the nervous system in the form of chemicals known as neurotransmitters, and changes in their quantities affect these systems.

In the primitive sense, these systems are essential for survival, but epigenetic mechanisms can impair them, leading to anxiety disorders. These disorders are characterized by excessive fear and behavioral disturbances. DNA methylation can make the SNS more reactive, increasing stress responses.

Conversely, turning off genes related to calming signals in the PNS can result in less effective relaxation after a stressful event. These changes may seem “permanent” after repeated experiences with stress and are coined as disorders.

VIA PIXAR

Dealing with anxiety can feel challenging, but changes in the epigenome are not irreversible. Anxiety manifests itself in various ways, including worry, fatigue, tension, difficulty concentrating, insomnia, rapid heartbeat, and restlessness. Experiencing an anxiety disorder that modifies our gene expression does not insinuate that it has to necessarily stay that way. In this hopeless loop of stress, understanding the bidirectionality of epigenetics is crucial for mitigating anxiety and preventing its potential transmission to future generations.

Several coping mechanisms are available to help with anxiety. Practicing mindfulness and meditation for short durations upon waking up or right before you sleep can be very helpful. Meditation consists of focusing on your breath and observing your thoughts as they flow through your brain. This is shown to reduce activity in the SNS, the system that causes increased heart rate and regulation of cortisol - the stress hormone.

Meditation activates the PNS, promoting relaxation by slowing the heart rate.

Moreover, you can also take one mindful minute during your day to focus on your breath and pay attention to the sounds around you, or practicing unconventional mediation which still works just as well. For an active alternative, practicing yoga meditation combines both movement and calmness. Additionally, if some of you have a subscription to Chegg Studies: all subscribers have free access to Calm. This mindfulness app offers guided meditations and relaxing sounds for stress management that can also get you better sleep.

Another effective technique during

challenging times is considering what advice you would offer a friend in a similar situation. Research by Igor Grossmann highlights our ability to provide insightful advice to others, advice we do not necessarily follow ourselves. It is easier to think wisely about someone else’s situation than it is about our own.

Therefore, viewing our worries from an external perspective helps channel the wisdom needed for making good decisions for ourselves.

Additionally, sharing emotions with others promotes a sense of comfort and validation. Card games like We’re Not Really Strangers facilitate open conversations and understanding among friends. It makes you open up and understand each other fully, helping one another by just hearing each other out.

If you are looking for a professional opinion, Dawson provides counseling services for short-term therapy through the Dawson Student Assistance Program (DSAP), which can guide you to longterm commitments if need be. Having access to a professional opinion can help you personally cope with your troubles and allow for individual growth.

Engaging in hobbies like writing, journaling, reading, listening to music, and baking are all additional ways that might aid releasing stress . As Natasha Daniels says in her book Anxiety Sucks! A Teen Survival Guide, start this weekend maybe by trying out foods that can help with anxiety such as oatmeal, bread, pasta, bananas, and potatoes - bonus points if you make them yourself!

As you navigate your emotions, it is essential to recognize your individuality and understand yourself to determine which mechanisms work best for you. Whether it is by practicing mindfulness, engaging in self-reflection, or exploring therapeutic interventions, these small steps can significantly impact your emotional state. Comfort can be found in those small acts of gratitude, in self-complementing in the mirror, and remembering that you, as a complex organism, are important. You are not your anxiety. Embrace your story, authored by the interplay of genetic letters and guidance of epigenetic authors. Through its many highs and lows, with the right strategies, no obstacle is insurmountable.

26 THE PLANT

The IPad Kid Phenomenon RALUCA-MARA MARE Staff Writer

Kids are reputed to cry, yell, and express anger every two minutes over something silly. Therefore, the modern-day fast solution to this disruption of equilibrium is to give the kid a tablet to distract them.

Memes of this phenomenon surfaced in the media in recent years, attributing the now famous “IPad Kid” stereotype to any child with Cheeto fingers and persistent cough using a dirty tablet to watch Cocomelon during long car rides. Children are not really learning anything from these programs despite many child-oriented YouTube channels portraying themselves as helpful and instructive like Cocomelon. This animated story features flashing lights, a diverse range of colour shades, and memorable music, with scene changes occurring every one to three seconds. As these elements come together on a tablet, the child’s developing mind gets overstimulated, causing a daily dependence on this addictive drug. Children are more interested in the visual and aural experience than in the story or educational value of the video presented.

The integration of technology also interferes with the period of crucial social and emotional development in childhood. According to the Pew Research Center, approximately 70% of parents today acknowledge that their child’s use of technology is impairing their social skills and capacity to build meaningful relationships. The

VIA THE NEW YORK TIMES

new generation will grow up lacking genuine relationships and an established sense of self as their reliance on technology will replace the fundamental abilities acquired during early childhood development. In light of this, parents who expose their young children to the world of Internet entertainment should be mindful of their potential negative effects.

Consequently, it is important to understand how technology addiction is created among children. Technology addiction is a behavioural issue brought on by excessive interaction with devices. Interacting with an entertaining technological device releases dopamine, a neurotransmitter that signals the prefrontal cortex, responsible for organizing and planning tasks. This feeling of pleasure and satisfaction becomes addictive, which motivates the children to keep using their tablets and technological devices. Most parents of little children have seen their zombie offspring losing consciousness in front of a screen, followed by fits and tantrums when the gadget is removed. This sudden change of behaviour is a result of the sudden drop in dopamine caused by the removal of the device. “The withdrawal of it is experienced as painful,” says Dr. Christakis, M.D., M.P.H., director of the Center for Child Health, Behavior and Development at the Seattle Children’s Research Institute. “You experience transient withdrawal like you’re coming down from a high,” continues Dr. Christakis. Young children lack the emotional self-control necessary to

regularly make that adjustment without becoming anxious.

There is still no international classification of diseases and mental disorders that include technology addiction. Experts do acknowledge though that there is a distinction between responsible technology usage and misuse that is connected to psychological, physical, and social issues.

Numerous consequences of overuse include anxiety, depression, and a potential reduction of self-confidence and emotional stability. Furthermore, children who are dependent on these devices are frequently stressed, unable to unwind, and sometimes sleep-deprived. The constant use of devices rather than face-to-face conversations restricts the development of social skills. Besides, excessive screen time can lead to headaches, eyestrain, discomfort, and blurred vision. There is also the fact that a significant amount of screen time might cause a child to become physically unfit and suffer musculoskeletal issues, leading to an inactive lifestyle.

Symptoms of device overuse in children are as follows: being constantly attached to a screen, getting upset whenever there is no access to a device, not showing interest in other activities, being overly invested in the devices, and being unaware of the surroundings. According to the Melbourne Child Psychology & School Psychology Services, there are a few ways to control overuse. Firstly, you can replace the device used with other enjoyable activities (drawing, going outside, playing board games, etc.).

Other techniques, such as a gradual reduction of screen time instead of abrupt stopping and setting boundaries for a daily period of use aid in reducing the impacts of technology on kids.

It is important to acknowledge that children need to grow and explore the world on their own; that is how we learn. Implementing a tablet to distract them may be efficient short-term, but will affect the child’s long-term development. In reality, this is not an IPad Kid phenomenon, this is an IPad Parent problem. This overuse has been perpetuated by parents, but they have the power to reduce it.

SCIENCE & ENVIRONMENT 27 27 27

Diving Deeper into the Cold Season: The Science of Winter SOPHIE HALPIN Contributor

As you draw back your curtains in the morning to see, the season’s very first snow out of your window, you can feel that familiar sentiment building up in you. While some of us will run outside to swirl in the snow and have our main character magical moment, others will shut the drapes and jump back in bed with a grunt. After all, Mariah Carey might have defrosted a bit too early this year. Either way, scientists affirm that both of these feelings are absolutely normal.

Unfortunately for many of us, shorter days, harsh weather, and cold temperatures come in a bundle with a bow on top: seasonal depression.

The close arrival of the winter solstice means one thing: shorter days.

Ever wondered why daylight time reduces as that critical day approaches?

As the Earth rotates around its axis and revolves around the sun, light does not shine for the same amount of time everywhere on the globe. The planet is not spinning straight up, but is actually tilted at about 23.5 degrees. Therefore, during our winter season, the northern hemisphere is tilted away from the sun, resulting in reduced accessibility to sun rays. Simultaneously, the southern hemisphere is tilted towards the sun, leading to its summer season, explaining the opposite seasons on either side of the equator.

Unfortunately for many of us, shorter days, harsh weather, and cold temperatures come in a bundle with a bow on top: seasonal depression. The winter blues people experience has a clinical name: seasonal affective disorder. SAD is a type of depression defined by a seasonal pattern where symptoms are experienced for about 4 months, generally starting in the late fall. According to the National Institute of Mental Health, symptoms include oversleeping,

social withdrawal, decrease in energy, persistent sadness, and/or anxiety… Sort of like hibernating! However, these have to last consistently for a long period of time to be considered SAD, hence do not panic if you experience these briefly during end-of-semester cramming and the forthcoming finals season. If symptoms persist, consult a mental health specialist to get a proper diagnosis. There are many treatments to SAD apart from antidepressant medications, including more natural options such as psychotherapy, vitamin D, and even light therapy.

If, on the contrary, you were already jamming to Christmas music on November 1st and are looking forward to the holidays, you might be interested in knowing why it is that, scientifically, winter is so magical. Snow itself is mesmerizing. How can such tiny flakes be so detailed, beautiful, and perfect? The secret behind their hexagonal shape is their molecular structure. Ice consists of an arrangement of water molecules which form a stunning pattern of hexagonal rings. As per the research done by the National Snow and Ice Data Center, snow forms in the sky as ice crystals agglomerate onto a dust particle. So, to all hypochondriacs out there, you might want to think twice before sticking out your tongue at the next snowfall! Lastly, all snowflakes are unique because their shapes vary according to atmospheric conditions, particularly temperature, encountered during their descent.

The elegance of snowfall is one of the many magical elements of winter, but what if you combined it with the sound of your little cousins’ giggles alongside their footsteps as they run around the house, the warmth of your mother’s hugs, and the comforting smell of your grandmother’s pie in the oven?

The combination of all the senses makes the holiday season so magical. More specifically, scents provide a lot of comfort and nostalgia. Olfactory responses are directly associated with the emotional center of our brains, the limbic system. As we forge memories throughout our childhood, the stimuli related to important magical moments that generate strong emotional responses, such as the holidays, are recorded by our hippocampus. Consequently, when these stimuli reoccur, for instance when a signaling molecule binds to an odorant receptor in our nose, an action-potential, an electric signal, is sent through our nervous system. When it reaches our brain, it activates the hippocampus, retrieving those memories.

Overall, it may be said that winter is a season that triggers various emotions in us, all of which can be supported by scientific evidence. Whether you enjoy the winter season or not, make sure to take advantage of the winter break to enjoy yourself, let your biological rhythm readjust, and stay curious. The SparkMind team wishes happy holidays to you all!

VIA MARY LONG/ADOBE STOCK, T. A. MCKAY/GETTY IMAGES

28 THE PLANT

Official Statement on Behalf of The Plant Addressing the Issue Released on November 16, 2023 November 28, 2023 The editorial team of The Plant, Dawson’s independent student-run newspaper, would like to issue the following statement to address the release of the November issue on November 16th, 2023. We will discuss the concerns of Dawson students and outline our guidelines, values and principles to address those concerns, as well as discuss the threats to the safety and security of The Plant’s staff. Finally, we will respond to the statements put out by Dawson College itself.

As asserted in statements issued by both the Dawson College and the DSU, The Plant, although funded by the DSU, is editorially independent from both administrative entities. Neither Dawson College nor the DSU oversees the content featured in The Plant. If this were to be the case, The Plant would lose its integrity and freedom as press media. The threat of moderating any Plant content is a violation of our freedom of the press as well as The Plant’s constitution, and would be seen as direct censorship of student voices.

On Plant editorial and journalistic standards The Plant follows strict journalistic standards and the guidelines of the Canadian University Press Code of Ethics. All Plant work is peer-reviewed, fact-checked, and thoroughly edited. No article is published unless reviewed and edited by a minimum of three different staff members, often upwards of five. The articles in the November issue were also reviewed by expert consultants before publishing, including a Jewish historian. The information presented in The Plant’s November issue observed this exact process, and reflected the same regard for the utmost accuracy; the issue used sources from third parties and both Palestine and Israel scholars, including Israeli scholars like Ilan Papé, and each claim was corroborated by multiple sources. Regarding the previously stated allegations against The Plant, it is important to shed light on two crucial points of the Canadian University Press Code of ethics, which The Plant entirely abides by. These points serve to elucidate the allegations of bias and lack of representation within the November publication.

“Journalists’ perspectives are determined by their positions within society, and will be necessarily biased.

They must therefore recognize the political implications of their work, and attempt to treat their subjects fairly despite their biases.”

“Journalists should strive to seek out all points of view that they deem relevant to the issue at hand. They should especially seek out those whose views have been neglected by the mainstream press, or in previous coverage of the issue, and those who may stand to suffer by the effects of that event or decision under consideration.”

Furthermore, both the articles and the resources page provided its readers with Israeli and Jewish sources.

The sources used and shared by The Plant came from a variety of academic and journalistic contexts including: Ilan Pappé, an Israeli historian and political scientist; Ze’ev (Vladimir) Jabotinsky, a Jewish Zionist leader and writer; Noam Chomsky, a Jewish professor and intellectual; David Ben Gurion, Israel’s first prime minister; Moshe Sharett, Israel’s second prime minister; and Guy Davidi, an Israeli documentary filmmaker. The aforementioned points reinforce The Plant’s editorial decisions regarding all content presented in the November issue.

The Plant condemns all forms of racism and discrimination, including antisemitism. One of the articles in the November issue features a caricature by Carlos Latuff. Within the context of the article, the selected caricature serves the purpose of elucidating the subject matter and highlighting the discourse on propaganda. It has come to our attention that the chosen caricaturist has a history of utilizing antisemitic tropes, of which we were previously unaware. We stand by the content of the article, however, we commit to better researching the artists’ bodies of work before selecting their artwork for our newspaper. Although the caricature could be interpreted as upholding the antisemitic trope that Jewish people control the media, it is important to understand that the cartoon refers to the Israeli lobby and not the Jewish people.

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Many insinuations of antisemitism were solely motivated by the illustration on the cover. This illustration features a protester wearing a keffiyeh and holding a flare releasing smoke in the colours of the Palestinian flag. A keffiyeh is a patterned cloth traditionally worn by Middle Eastern farmers and travelers to protect their head and face from the sun. It is now also worn by many pro-Palestine activists and people who stand in solidarity with them, which inspired the cover artist. The protestor also wears a coat adorned with a historical symbol of a crescent, a cross, and a menorah. This was a symbol used by Palestinians in the 1980s to represent their hopes for a united, non-sectarian, and democratic Palestine. Displaying the Palestinian flag, historical symbols of unity, and illustrating current events is in no way antisemitic.

On the harassment that took place on November 16, 2023 The Plant strives to open a dialogue with its readers and give consideration to opposing viewpoints, which is specified on p. 2 of all Plant editions. Acting upon serious safety concerns, The Plant refused to debate the content of the November issue when tabling in the upper atrium, although students were encouraged to write to The Plant and share their thoughts within the student community. Nevertheless, these conversations should never reach the point of verbal and physical harassment of Plant writers and staff, as was seen on November 16 on College grounds, as well as online throughout the following days. It is absolutely unacceptable that Plant members and other Dawson students were harassed, photographed, and filmed without their consent. Plant members and others were insulted, yelled and cursed at, and had editions of The Plant torn up and violently thrown at their faces. Many individuals explicitly took issues for the sole purpose of their removal from circulation, which constitutes censorship of the press. Writers have also been followed and harassed on College grounds, had their names massively leaked online and saw their pictures released by students and influencers on platforms such as Instagram and X. With regards to these numerous documented instances of harassment, the College administration has remained entirely passive, has not contacted The Plant, or implemented measures that would help its members feel safe on College grounds. Many Plant members have expressed fear for their safety as their personal information and pictures were divulged online. While the College strives for the school to be a safe environment for all, they have yet to take action to ensure the safety of Plant staff.

On the College’s response The Plant finds itself extremely disappointed in the College’s response to the events of November 16. The statement sent out by Dawson College was extremely condescending as well as dismissive of the work put into each article featured by The Plant. Although Plant writers are not and do not define themselves as professional journalists, an inherent fact that applies to every single student newspaper, the rigour in our practice and the fact-checking process of the publication render the statement circulated by the College’s Communications Office slanderous and denigrating. Following the previous section regarding The Plant’s journalistic standards and adherence to the Canadian University Press Code of ethics, the College’s depiction of The Plant as “a collection of opinions and narratives that do not adhere to professional journalistic standards” (Statement from Dawson College’s Communications Office Nov. 17, 2023) is fallacious and defamatory, and attempts to diminish The Plant’s journalistic credibility in the eye of the general public. On these grounds, The Plant demands an immediate apology from the College for defamation, and the rectification of the misrepresentation of the organization known as The Plant.

Furthermore, the wording “conflict in the Middle East” (Statement from Dawson College’s Communications Office Nov. 17, 2023) is fallacious and establishes a misrepresentation of the ongoing crisis in Palestine. This phrasing was perceived as highly offensive by a large part of the student community.

The fact that such a dismissive euphemism should be communicated to all students once more echoed the downplaying and dehumanizing of Palestinians’ sufferings and of the ethnic cleansing taking place in their country. Using improper terms and refusing to accurately portray the current crisis, with the undeniable intent of avoiding all forms of backlash, is quite ironic coming from the same institution that criticized the journalistic practices of The Plant.

The Plant condemns the College’s hypocrisy regarding students’ safety in their announcement, which reads, “Our paramount concern is the well-being and safety of our students and employees,” followed by “There is no tolerance for violence or hate” (Statement from Dawson College’s Communications Office Nov. 17, 2023). Yet, as mentioned in our discussion of the harassment of Plant members which took place on College grounds on November 16 and which continued online throughout the following days, the safety of Plant members was never once addressed by the College. No support of any kind was provided by the College to Plant members who were the victims of serious harassment, insults, threats, acts of verbal and physical violence as well as the leaking of Plant members’ pictures online without their consent. Not one resource or helpful reference was provided, and not once did the College contact The Plant’s team directly. For these reasons, The Plant can only denounce Dawson College’s negligence and hypocrisy when it comes to the safety of their students.

The Plant’s team, 2023

30 THE PLANT

ANSWERS TO LAST MONTH’S PUZZLE

PUZZLE

ACROSS 2. Ballet usually associated with the holidays 6. Man of balls 9. Sliding on ice, but as an activity 10. The season of hibernation 11. The reason why we slip and slide 12. The white blanket that falls upon us 14. Heavenly fluffy cloud that matches perfectly with [7-down] 17. Brand of pre-cut sugar cookies with classic designs 19. Kiss kiss Justin 20. Rhymes with pookies 21. He who stole Christmas COME BACK NEXT ISSUE FOR THE ANSWERS!

DOWN 1. Holiday of the season 3. A fever dream of a movie involving a train 4. A cup of Joe 5. A sweet that supports one’s walking 6. The star of season 7. Classic go-to drink to warm up 8. Acapella group that 13. How do you just forget your kid when you go on vacation?

15. Buddy, I love you !

16. 3rd of December 18. Official footwear of the season!

Curiosities by TAMARA GALINATO Curiosities Editor

CURIOSITIES 31 31 31

COMIC

Comic by

SAYA HIDAKA-MASSICOTTE @4a4k4a

HOROSCOPES ARIES (Mar. 21 - Apr. 19): “Energy goes where intention flows.” You are speaking in motivational quotes this month in preparation for the “New Year, New You” season. You are so ready for 2023 to be over.

LIBRA (Sept. 23 - Oct. 22): You are in for a treat this month. Things will start to die down which will allow for more free time by yourself! I suggest you splurge on an outing with friends. Notice the little details; they will make you appreciate life even more.

TAURUS (Apr. 20 - May 20): Beware of plagiarism! You have to give credit where it is due and I am not speaking strictly academically. You are making moves in silence (whatever that means, ninja era?) and by doing so, avoiding unwanted consequences.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23 - Nov. 21): The grind never stops, but you sure wish it would give you a break. You are surviving despite everything being thrown at you (you have really good dodging skills). Focus on yourself and do whatever is necessary to keep your peace.

GEMINI (May 21 - June 20): You are once again faced with another dilemma (you sure took my advice to do it for the plot). To clear your mind, inhale the cool breeze and go on a sprint around the block — block them? No, don’t do that!

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22 - Dec. 21): Wake up, it is time to deal with the issues at hand and figure out what the hell to do with yourself. On the other hand, I think you took my advice about silly little treats too seriously (as you should).

CANCER (June 21 - July 22): Despite life being a rollercoaster, you are rolling with it.

You have to learn how to read signs, and I do not mean only in terms of navigation. Seriously, stop pulling the door when it says “push!”

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22 - Jan. 19): Go and reconnect with nature; you need it after this semester (just don’t forget to layer up). The cold weather means that you will finally be able to do the classic activities of the winter season. Remember to cherish every moment!

LEO (July 23 - Aug. 22): Currently no thoughts in your head (per usual). That is probably because you’re already mentally on vacation.

You will finally get some well-deserved rest after a long semester.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20 - Feb. 18): “Going with the flow” is your motto this month. You are taking things as they appear, simply riding the wave of life.

Take advantage of the opportunities presented to you and smile at the camera!

VIRGO (Aug. 23 - Sept. 22): Obstacles have never stopped you (only red lights can do that), so what is stopping you now? You have a goal and so a little bump on the way should not stop you!

PISCES (Feb. 19 - Mar. 19): This is your sign to do that thing you have been wanting to do for a while. Speak your mind Pisces! You have something you want to say and do not be afraid to let it be known because you are simply stating facts (as always).

32 THE PLANT

MASTHEAD

CONTRIBUTORS

Simone Bélanger Editor-in-Chief

Marc Pham Sports Editor

Angélique Babineau Managing Editor

Tamara Galinato Curiosities Editor

Khadija Fatima Copy Editor

Sanad Hamdouna Cover Artist

Sophia Widell Graphic Designer

Soraya Djia Social Media Manager

Antony Ma Graphic Designer

Saya Hidaka-Massicotte Cartoonist

Sarah Bensetiti Secretary

Gloria Badibanga Staff Writer

Defne Aliefendioglu News Editor

Ezra Bucur Staff Writer

Thomas Frenette Arts & Culture Editor

Emma Caspi Staff Writer

Mirren Bodanis Voices Editor

Raluca-Mara Mare Staff Writer

Sabina Bellisario-Giglio Science & Environment Editor Hannah Dane Creative Writing Editor Mia Gueli Visual Arts Editor

Melissa Jabrayan Percy Brabander Luca Messina Leo Hussain Chelo-Mae Almanon Clara El Hayek Christopher Dimitriadis Noah Alec Mina Sophie Halpin

CONTACT The Plant Newspaper Dawson College 3040 Rue Sherbrooke O Montréal, QC H3Z 1A4 2C.12 theplantnews.com theplantnewspaper@gmail.com @theplantdawson