December 6th, 2021

December 6, 2021

THE VARSITY The University of Toronto’s Student Newspaper Since 1880

Vol. CXLII, No. 12

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SCSU cuts kosher food section from BDS policy THE VARSITY Vol. CXLII, No. 12 21 Sussex Avenue, Suite 306 Toronto, ON M5S 1J6 (416) 946-7600 the.varsity

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Removal follows criticism from President Gertler, Jewish student groups Syeda Maheen Zulfiqar UTSC Bureau Chief

The Scarborough Campus Students’ Union’s (SCSU) board has voted to remove a section on kosher food restrictions from its Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) policy, following criticism from U of T President Meric Gertler and Jewish student groups who said the policy was antisemitic. The removal was made seven days after the policy was first approved.

Board reverses decision The change was made to a policy that reaffirmed the SCSU’s commitment to BDS — a movement which advocates boycotting Israel due to its occupation of the Palestinian territories — thereby putting a number of restrictions on what companies the SCSU can work with.

The removal will go to the Policy and Bylaws Committee next for final approval.

The amendment removed the following note from the original policy: “Efforts should be made to source Kosher food from organizations that do not normalize Israeli apartheid, however recognizing the limited availability of this necessity then excemptions can be made if no alternatives are available.”

Jewish student leaders said that the policy on kosher food created barriers for Jewish students to find kosher food options. The SCSU released a statement this week apologizing for the “distress that our miscommunication has caused the Jewish community on campus.”

SCSU President Sarah Abdillahi brought forward a motion to remove the kosher food section from the policy. At the board meeting, Abdillahi said that the SCSU “[recognized] that the language relating to the access of Kosher

food caused a lot of great distress for our Jewish members.”

“We wanted to take immediate action and make the necessary steps to amend the motion and remove this note.” She added that it was never the SCSU’s intention to restrict access to kosher food, but she understands that “impact of [their] actions supersedes intent.”

In a statement to The Varsity, Abdillahi wrote that they removed the note “because people thought that we were trying to ban Kosher food which is 100% inaccurate considering SCSU has always been fighting for Kosher food at UTSC.” Abdillahi later clarified that the SCSU does not plan on adding any explicit protections for kosher food into the BDS policy, but will instead work with UTSC’s Food and Beverage Department to make sure kosher food options are provided on campus.

She added that they included the note about kosher food to the policy in the first place because the groups they had consulted with on the policy asked the SCSU to include a similar clause.

Two students present at the meeting, Director of Physical and Environmental Sciences Maxwell Fine and Evan Kanter, a student member of U of T’s Governing Council, argued against removing the kosher food section, saying that removing the note on kosher food means there are now no explicit protections for kosher food providers in the policy.

“Instead of addressing the fundamental discriminatory things within BDS, we’re just taking away the exemption for kosher food providers if they support the Israeli people,” said Fine.

In her statement to The Varsity, Abdillahi claimed that “The BDS Policy is separate from Kosher food at UTSC and vice versa.”

Director resignation In a Facebook post on December 4, Anastasiya Gordiychuk announced her resignation as the Director of Arts Culture and Media at the Scarborough Campus Students’ Union (SCSU). In her post, she raised concerns about what she believes is the overpolitization of the SCSU. She wrote, “Personally, I do not think it is within the scope of a student union to take sides in any geopolitical conflict because it divides the student population and doesn’t create an inclusive environment.”

After reading the statement the SCSU released on its Instagram, Gordiychuk decided to resign. She claimed that the members of the SCSU board of directors were not made aware of this statement prior to its release, and that she does not know who wrote the statement.

“I cannot agree with the exclusion of members of the Board from the discussion about public statements which are made on behalf of the union,” wrote Gordiychuk.

Gordiychuk added that whenever the SCSU has released a public statement in the past, it has been correctly labelled as having been written by the executives.

Nevertheless, Gordiychuk believes that the only way for the SCSU to move forward is to “[s] trictly follow the procedures,” focus on issues that will improve student life on campus, and, if needed, create a separate forum for political discussions.

The Varsity has reached out to the SCSU for comment.

Disclosure: Gordiychuk was formerly a Business & Labour Associate at The Varsity.

Casual workers’ new collective agreement includes wage increase, paid sick days Agreement ratified between USW 1998, U of T Padraic Berting Graduate Bureau Chief

After some pandemic-related delays, United Steelworkers Local 1998 (USW 1998) successfully struck a new collective agreement with the University of Toronto, in which it obtained paid sick days as well as a one percent pay increase.

The new contract will last three years. USW 1998 President Colleen Burke described her organization as being “very, very happy with the outcome.”

USW 1998 represents over 8,000 administrative and technical workers at U of T, Victoria University, University of St. Michael’s College, and University of Toronto Schools — 3,500 of which are casual employees. This term includes a myriad of positions, including research assistants, weight room attendants, and standardized patients — actors who pretend to be patients for medical exams and give advice to medical students based on their performance. Wages for these casual workers vary, and some make minimum wage.

Striking a new deal The new collective agreement includes one percent wage increases, two paid sick days a year for members, more protection for members facing termination, and some improvements to a pilot program that gives workers dental benefits.

USW 1998 President Colleen Burke explained that the negotiation process was going well, but that it included delays due to COVID-19 and scheduling conflicts. She said that mobilizing the unit can be very challenging “because people are generally part-time, temporary, [or workers that] have multiple jobs.”

She described bargaining over Zoom to be “just agonizing.” In order to avoid it, she said

REBECA MOYA/THEVARSITY

that USW 1998 pressured the university to hold in-person bargaining meetings.

Once that happened, she found that the meetings were productive and gained momentum. Although USW 1998 went into the negotiations thinking it was only going to get wage increases or paid sick leave, it got both; as such, it was very satisfied with the end result of the negotiations.

In a statement to The Varsity by a U of T spokesperson, the spokesperson wrote that “The University was very pleased to successfully conclude collective bargaining with USW Local 1998 recently for the renewal of the casual employee collective agreement… Although the collective bargaining process was protracted due

to the pandemic, it was constructive, respectful, and professional at all times.”

Ontario’s Bill 124 Ontario’s Bill 124 plays a significant role in deciding bargaining negotiations like these.

The bill prevents public sector employees from increasing their wages by more than one per cent over a period of three years. Passed by the Ford government in 2019, the legislation has been routinely criticized by USW 1998 and other labor groups in the province of Ontario.

Currently, USW 1998 has joined together with the Ontario Federation of Labour to challenge Bill 124 at the Supreme Court level. However, the timeline for that challenge is uncertain at this time.

thevarsity.ca/section/news

DECEMBER 6, 2021

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Faculty of “Farts” & Science?

Sidney Smith sign pranked Student describes seeing would-be vandals on Thursday Lauren Alexander News Editor

A sign outside of Sidney Smith Hall — the home of the Faculty of Arts & Science — has been pranked. The sign, which formerly read “Arts”, has been altered to read “Farts.”

Ayush Sharma, an upper-year U of T student, claimed in a message to The Varsity that he saw the vandals while walking on campus on December 2.

“I walked by on Thursday night and these guys were looking for a ladder and ‘waiting till nobodys around,’ ” wrote Sharma. When

asked for a description of the would-be vandals, Sharma wrote that they were “just your average UofT students. Sweatshirts, sweatpants, hint of depression in their eyes.”

In a statement on Twitter, Dean of the Faculty Arts & Science Melanie Woodin wrote that the vandalism “really stinks.”

Sidney Smith Hall is undergoing renovations soon.

Vandalism at Sidney Smith Hall.

— With files from Padraic Berting.

HANNAH CARTY/THEVARSITY

UTSC students, faculty excited Gyms on campus begin relaxing for return to campus some COVID-19 restrictions with some reservations Hart House gym no longer Community members express concerns about in-person safety, online learning experiences

requires advance registration

Elizabeth Shechtman Associate News Editor

Although the pandemic forced U of T to close down the majority of facilities for in-person use, gyms have recently begun to open back up again for students, faculty, and members of the U of T community.

The services are only open for U of T students and registered members of U of T Sports & Recreation. Gyms will continue to scale up operations with additional programming and offerings added as it is deemed safe for them to do so. Updates will be available on the Sports & Recreation website.

Syeda Maheen Zulfiqar UTSC Bureau Chief

UTSC is planning a largely in-person winter semester after a mostly online fall, but students and faculty have mixed feelings about going back to campus.

Leaving online learning behind A fourth-year UTSC student, Luan Duan, majoring in statistics and economics shared his experience of attending classes virtually from his home in British Columbia. He said that because he has ADHD, online learning has been difficult for him. “It’s not very suitable for me.

It’s too distracting,” said Duan.

Additionally, the online delivery of courses made it quite difficult to interact with professors and approach them with questions. Duan highlighted the time-zone differences, which made it hard for him to talk to his professors.

Despite the many obstacles of online learning, Duan remarked that since most exams are now open-book, he feels less stressed about them.

Guillaume Filion, an associate professor in the Department of Biological Science, also commented on the student experience online, saying that the dangers that a continuation of online learning poses to students’ mental health are potentially greater than the risk imposed

by COVID-19.

Filion also remarked that online options should be created for students who cannot attend in person, giving them the option to attend in person if they’re feeling well or attend

The UTSC campus.

SHANNA HUNTER/THEVARSITY

online if they start feeling sick or unsafe on campus.

Safety Duan is looking forward to returning to campus since, he says, it “has been almost two years since the last time I saw my friends.”

However, given the news of the Omicron variant, he also hopes that the university creates a safe environment.

Filion also shared his impression of the reopening plans in an interview with The Varsity. “I think the campus is ready… I think that Canada and Ontario are not ready.” said Filion.

“I don’t think that anybody’s in the position to say let’s just wait it out forever, because it could take long. So at some point we have to just get out. And the question is, is it now? Is it later? I really think it’s impossible to tell…

My guess is anyway, we have to try at some point,” he continued.

Filion said that he does not believe that UTSG’s success in the fall necessarily has positive implications for the in-person winter semesters. “Like, the weather is different, people’s behavior is different, the time [since] the last vaccine is different,” he pointed out.

Nevertheless, he expressed happiness with the progress that has been made in the past year. “When you look at where we were last year, I am just so happy that we have at least some presence on campus and that it seems to be holding,” he said.

Safety protocols In accordance with provincial guidelines, anyone who uses these facilities must be fully vaccinated, which requires them to have received two vaccine doses at least 14 days prior. Safety protocols are also put in place to protect and limit the spread of COVID-19, some of which include maintaining a distance of two metres from other gym-goers and wearing a mask indoors.

Different gyms on campus are operating with different registration requirements. The Hart House gym is available to all students without

any registration as of November 22. Its website says students have to “sign-in with [their] T-card or membership card at the Fitness Information Desk and access all available Fitness Centre facilities.” Hart House also offers classes, both virtual and in-person, for those interested.

On the other hand, the Faculty of Kinesiology & Physical Education (KPE), which manages both the Goldring Centre for High Performance Sport and the Athletic Centre, requires advance registration for entry into the facilities, including drop-in activities.

Hart House and the KPE both require masks, vaccination, and physical distancing.

When gyms might close There is a chance that gyms might close down again. Whether that happens mainly depends on the provincial government, which might reapply public health restrictions should they be required.

However, Premier Ford has said that further restrictions may be mild. “The chief medical officer of health has been clear: the objective is to avoid further lockdowns and if additional measures are necessary, they will be localized, tailored, and aimed at limiting disruption to businesses and families because this is not just a plan for the short term, but for the long term.”

Gyms following protocols similar to other public spaces.

JOHANNA FORTES/THEVARSITY

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THE VARSITY

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NEWS

New SCSU vice-president campus life appointed Members presented with spring executive elections schedule Syeda Maheen Zulfiqar UTSC Bureau Chief

The Scarborough Campus Students’ Union (SCSU) held its final Board of Directors meeting of the year on December 1. Members appointed a new vice-president campus life and two directors to serve on the Elections and Referenda committee. The committee also presented the schedule for the spring executive elections at the meeting.

Appointments The previously vacant vice-president campus

life position was filled after members discussed the candidates in a closed session during the meeting.

The position has been vacant since the resignation of TJ Ho, the previous vicepresident campus life, in October. Ho resigned from the role to focus on his studies.

Following their closed discussion, the board members appointed Oluwapelumi Michael Sobowale as the new vice-president campus life. Sobowale was the orientation coordinator for SCSU’s Frosh 2021, and was outspoken about his disappointment with Ho’s lack of involvement in planning the event.

Director of Critical Development Studies Muntaha Malik and Director of Biological Sciences Gautham Krishna were also elected by the board to serve on the Elections and Referenda committee.

SCSU spring election schedule Malik, on behalf of the Elections and Referenda committee, presented the schedule for the SCSU’s spring executive elections. She said there will be two weeks for nominations and campaigning followed by three days for UTSC students to vote. This schedule is the same as previous in-person elections.

Director of Political Science Nafisa Nawal inquired about whether, for accessibility reasons, there will be an online voting system.

SCSU President Abdillahi answered that the SCSU is working with what the university is telling them about the winter semester — that is, the winter semester will be largely held in person — and that the union is therefore planning for an in-person election.

She added that doing a hybrid model would be quite expensive. However, if the circumstances change due to COVID-19, the SCSU will implement the election plan that was used in the 2021 elections.

Food insecurity at U of T: From dining halls to food banks Dining hall model implemented last year impacts affordability Lauren Alexander News Editor

Content warning: This article mentions disordered eating.

With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, food insecurity has become an increasing concern.

According to a Statistics Canada study done in early May, almost 15 per cent of Canadians, or one in seven, said that they lived in a household that had experienced food insecurity in the past 30 days. PROOF, a U of T food insecurity policy research group, defines food insecurity as “the inadequate or insecure access to food due to financial constraints.”

On campus, students in U of T’s dining halls are seeing difficulties with food affordability due to new meal plan systems, and one U of T food bank is reporting that more people are accessing their services than ever before.

Dining halls Last year, a group of Chestnut Residence and New College dons organized a one-day boycott of both dining halls. The boycott organizers, who also organized a student petition, aimed to voice concerns from students living at Chestnut and New College about the affordability of their dining halls. At the time, the dining halls moved from an all-you-can-eat model to a pay-per-weight model where students were required to pay for some food by its weight, and a pay-per-item system where students pay per individual item.

At the time, U of T Food Services, which provides the food for both dining halls, said that the changes were made due to COVID-19 restrictions, which prevented the return of an all-you-can-eat model. It also made a number of changes in response to the criticism, including getting rid of the pay-per-weight model and reducing prices.

Recently, The Varsity interviewed three Chestnut dons, some of whom were involved in last year’s strike. They said that while some of their concerns from last year were addressed, they’re still seeing high prices causing problems for students. While the pay-per-weight system has been entirely removed from Chestnut’s dining hall, the pay-per-item system is still in place, and the dons said that many students are quickly running out of funds in their meal plans.

“We believe this model is going to be imposing food insecurity, or the conditions for food insecurity, on student populations,” said one of the dons, Mike Lawler, a PhD student at U of T in the Department of Geography.

The dons also pointed out a strict “regimentation of portions” where students needed to pay more money for additional side dishes and other extras. Another don, Doyun Kim, a Masters student in East Asian Studies, said that he’s been seeing students choosing

to reduce the amount that they eat or choosing to eat at the dining hall less frequently because of its high prices.

Samarth Nath, a second-year Rotman Commerce student living at Chestnut, expects to run out of money on his meal plan before the year is over. Nath said that meals are often so expensive that his meal plan funds are running out quickly. At times, he’s spent more than $40 for food in a single day.

Food Services provides a budget calculator that estimates how much money students have to spend on meals with each meal plan. For the meal plan that Nath is on, he gets $5,250 in residence dining dollars, and he’s already down to $2,800 dining dollars. According to the budget calculator, he should be spending $27.63 a day for the year until finals period begins on April 8.

Nath said that as a first-year student in Chestnut last year, his meal plan ran out about two weeks before the semester was over. He was able to continue eating for those two weeks by using friends’ leftover dining dollars. Since he was only at Chestnut for one semester in his first year, Nath is worried that he’ll run out of food even sooner this year.

The dons also said that a number of students are on the opposite side of the spectrum with more dining funds than they will use throughout the year. The system doesn’t make it easy for them to transfer funds to friends or get their money back.

Sarina Iannelli, a New College don who was also involved in the original strike, said that they have been seeing similar issues come up at the New College dining hall. Both the Chestnut and New College dining halls are run by U of T Food Services. Iannelli said that while there have been some improvements to dining, including more dining options, a lot of students were adding money to their accounts after finding that the meal plan they purchased wasn’t enough. Iannelli found that international students often ran out of funds more quickly.

“International students spend so much money to be here, and then now all of a sudden there’s another expense because you have to add more money on top of your already existing meal plan.

It’s gotta be beyond frustrating,” said Iannelli.

The Chestnut dons who organized the strike created a Food Committee this year, aimed at collecting student experiences with dining and bringing them to U of T. However, Lawler said that the committee hasn’t been well advertised, and therefore hasn’t been very active.

Similar issues surrounding the affordability of food have been brought up by students at Victoria College. The college’s dining hall, Burwash Dining Hall, now uses a ticketing system. Students entering the dining hall are given tickets for a certain number of entrées, sides, and other items, and they are restricted to eating as much as the tickets will get them.

ROSALIND LIANG/THEVARSITY

Rebecca Muscant, a first-year councillor for the Victoria University Students’ Administrative Council (VUSAC), has been speaking to students on behalf of the council to find out their concerns about the dining hall.

She said that students have brought forward concerns about the prices in the dining hall.

Through the meal plan, meals cost around $15, which is the same as they used to cost in previous years when Burwash Dining Hall used an all-youcan-eat buffet model. Muscant pointed out that by using this system, students are getting less food for the same amount of money.

Students have also brought forward concerns about how the ticketing system can encourage disordered eating because the portions given to students are limited. “You’re only able to eat a limited amount of food and that discourages people from asking for extra,” said Muscant.

“You’re not allowed to get more than your tickets will give you.”

Muscant has been hearing a number of other concerns from students, including concerns about sustainability. VUSAC is in the process of gathering data from surveys, focus groups, and student consultations on dining at Victoria College to bring to the administration.

Lawler said that the university’s response to concerns about dining is always to point out financial aid options, which he said are not always easy to access.

Food banks Recently, food banks have seen a huge bump in the number of people accessing them. Almost 600,000 people used food banks in Ontario between April 1, 2020 and March 31, 2021 — the highest number of people since the Great Recession.

Adam El-Masri, a recent U of T graduate, is one of the lead organizers of the UofT Emergency Food Bank, a food bank that opened up when the COVID-19 pandemic hit. Due to public health measures, a number of campus food banks, including the University of Toronto Students’ Union food bank, had to close in 2020.

The UofT Emergency Food Bank began its

operations completely contactless due to the pandemic and has made itself available for anyone who identifies as a member of the U of T community. It offers food boxes through delivery, but also has a gift-card program which provides community members with gift cards for groceries.

In an interview with The Varsity, El-Masri said that food insecurity has been a huge issue throughout the pandemic. In fact, he said that the number of people accessing the UofT Emergency Food Bank has increased this year compared to last year.

“What I think kind of scares me in the numbers is it pretty much touches everyone. We have undergrads, graduate students, both masters and PhD [students]. We have students from all age groups, we have students from pretty much every ethnic background, every other sort of equity-seeking group, students who are unemployed, partially employed, [and] fully employed students with and without dependents,” said El-Masri.

According to demographics data provided to The Varsity by the UofT Emergency Food Bank, nearly 60 per cent of the students accessing the food bank identified as undergraduates, 23.8 per cent were graduate students, and 16.3 per cent identified as doctoral students. Most also responded that the food they were receiving would provide for three people other than themselves, and only 13.1 per cent responded that they would be the only person consuming the food.

“There are a lot of people who are foodinsecure and don’t realize they’re food-insecure,” said El-Masri. He said that universities can romanticize food insecurity, creating a harmful narrative that “[being] the poor starving student is kind of a rite of passage.”

He did point out that the university provides a number of financial resources, though he noted that, for students who are experiencing food insecurity, it might be difficult to make time to access them.

The Varsity has reached out to U of T Food Services for comment.

thevarsity.ca/section/news

DECEMBER 6, 2021

5

Noticed changes to dining hall food? The culprit might be supply chain issues U of T dining halls cope with food shortages with mixed results for students Jessie Schwalb Varsity Staff

The food shortages affecting Canada have reached U of T’s dining halls. Food Services has developed and implemented strategies to reduce the effects of supply issues on what shows up on students’ plates. However, many disruptions in the food supply seem to be here to stay — and their effects could worsen in the future.

A national food shortage Canada is facing a food shortage that is likely to get worse. In a joint statement released in early November, 21 produce supply organizations from across the US and Canada warned that there was a “serious threat” of food shortages.

Beyond reducing variety, these shortages could cause ripple effects in society.

The lack of food causes increased prices: food inflation for November was 3.8 per cent.

With inflation outpacing wages, it is more difficult for people with lower incomes to access food.

The food shortages hitting Canadian grocery shelves reflect broader issues in the global supply chain, a carefully orchestrated system that creates products from raw goods and delivers them to retailers and consumers. Problems range from labour shortages — including a lack of truck drivers to shuttle food — to a shortage of spots for ships to port. Delays in getting items to customers have greater effects on produce, because it’s perishable. “When the product finally

comes in, it’s going to be on its last legs, if any legs at all,” said Joe Sbrocchi, the general manager of Ontario Greenhouse Vegetable Growers, in an interview with CTV News. Plus, climate change, which has led to severe drought in western Canada and the western US, has posed further problems for food production.

These issues become all the more pertinent as the Canadian growing season ends. Because more food must be imported during winter, supply chain disruptions will have a greater effect on availability. With all of these pieces in play, this winter is likely to be challenging for consumers and producers alike.

Shortages at U of T U of T dining halls have not been immune to these problems. In an email to The Varsity, U of T Food Services acknowledged that it is “experiencing supply chain challenges across all products.”

“Much of the supply chain has been impacted, from the local farmer to the manufacturer to the transportation of goods,” it wrote. This has resulted in “week to week” fluctuations in the availability of items and sharp increases in the cost of supplies.

However, dining halls are finding ways to deal with these issues. For instance, the culinary team at U of T meets periodically to develop recipes that take ingredient availability and cost into account.

Another way Food Services has dealt with these challenges is by sourcing alternative products and buying in larger quantities to make sure all products are in stock. When it is unable to acquire

Students have observed changes in dining hall options.

MALLIKA MAKKAR/THEVARSITY

a product, it can adapt the menu and ingredients, since U of T largely cooks its meals from scratch.

The troubles encountered by dining hall staff have had mixed effects on students. Some students have noticed differences in food availability since school began. Two students who wrote to The Varsity noted instances where food had run out before closing hours.

Claire Gordon, a U of T student who responded to a survey from The Varsity, noticed discrepancies between the posted meal signs and what is being served. In their survey response, Gordon noted, “Most of the time they do line up, but every so often something will be substituted.” In their view, this was “not a problem at all, just an observation.”

Other students have had more impactful encounters with food shortages. Bianca Quilliam, another U of T student who responded to the survey, said that when she arrived at a station

advertising Beyond Burgers and chicken burgers, she was told that the dining hall was out of Beyond Burgers. She said that, when she asked for the chicken burger, “[the Food Services employee] was like, well, I don’t have any more buns or bagels.”

Quilliam’s order morphed from a Beyond Burger to a plate with chicken and burger toppings.

However, the majority of the 17 students surveyed for this article had observed no changes in food availability or had even seen food items added to the menu. When asked how they had observed food offerings change, many discussed improved fare. “I saw ice cream for the first time recently in Trinity’s Strachan hall,” wrote Jared de Silva in a response to a survey from The Varsity.

For Manal Kamran, small improvements have made the largest difference. In a response to the survey, she wrote, “The rice is a bit more cooked. The zucchini is cut into smaller pieces.

The little things.”

Students say late penalties exacerbate mental health problems Professors, students discuss the changing nature of late penalties at U of T Nawa Tahir Deputy Senior Copy Editor

Due to online learning during the pandemic, some professors have lessened their late penalties, which can improve students’ mental well-being.

Although many professors changed their late penalty policies for the pandemic, some have reverted back to those used before March 2020 for in-person classes. Students benefited from the more lax policies, and now some of them are now struggling to adjust to the pre-COVID-19 late penalties.

Impact on mental health Many students continue to struggle with their mental health, partially due to late penalty policies.

Anoosheh Ahmed, a first-year psychology student at UTM, told The Varsity that she had to go through immense trouble to get an extension while having anxiety attacks. She described the process of requesting an extension, saying that it was “overall a generally stressful process.”

After having explained that she was experiencing anxiety, Ahmed said she felt that her professors “disregarded [her]… pouring [her] heart out.”

Ahmed also commented on the larger mental health crisis at U of T. “[You want to] be treated like a person, and not just one of the masses of students [at U of T],” she said.

Late penalties vary across U of T, since there is no specific policy that professors have to follow.

It is up to them to structure their courses any way they want. Some professors do not allow extensions at all, as is the case with one of the courses Ahmed is taking.

For another one of her courses, she had to go through a tiresome extension request process, which she thinks is unfair to expect from students, especially while there is a mental health crisis at U of T.

Ahmed said that on the day of her deadline, she “physically felt sick… out of sheer anxiety.” The late penalty for that course meant five per cent was taken off her mark every day, and she was worried that she wouldn’t finish in time. When she reached out to the teaching staff, they told her to fill out an absence form on Acorn, but didn’t give proper directions on how to access that form.

“We’re already struggling with mental health, especially when everything’s online. And this class is asynchronous, which makes it that much harder,” Ahmed said.

Waiving late penalties Oliver Zhao is a fourth-year student studying criminology and sociolegal studies, international relations, and French. In an interview, he told The Varsity that he took some courses last year with Kerry Taylor, an assistant professor in the Centre

for Criminology and Sociolegal Studies, where she had waived all late penalties. There was a recommended date to submit assignments by, but there was no late penalty for students submitting assignments until the last day of classes.

Zhao said that these classes were less stressful. “[Taylor] recognized that it was a tough time for everyone,” said Zhao The Varsity also talked to Felan Parker, an assistant professor in the department of Book and Media Studies at St. Michael’s College, who doesn’t have late penalties for any assignments in his courses this year. He first removed all late penalties in spring 2020, when the pandemic started. “It just did not in any way seem fair at that point,” he explained.

Parker extended the same no late penalty policy to the 2020–2021 academic year. He said, “To me, it felt like a moral imperative to not

IRIS DENG/ THEVARSITY

penalize students during such a difficult time.”

Parker explained that he waived late penalties in the beginning as an “emergency measure,” but later found himself questioning why he needs to enforce late penalties at all. “I think that the pandemic has prompted us as professors to reflect on what we do and why we do it.”

In his experience, the majority of students still submit things within a week of the deadline. “Not having late penalties didn’t substantially impact my grading timelines, or when students were submitting things.”

Parker said he did not notice a difference in the average grades in his current classes, which use the new late penalty policies, and classes from before COVID-19 with more traditional policies. He continues to assess the usefulness of his current teaching practices. “This was an experiment, and it definitely continues to be an experiment… this is a transitional year.”

He has also changed his policies over the course of the pandemic. In spring 2020, he didn’t ask students for any explanation or updates on their assignment submissions.

Now, he encourages students to let him or their teaching assistant know if they will be submitting assignments late, though he doesn’t impose late penalties on assignments whether or not the teaching staff is informed that they’ll be submitted late.

In general, Parker said that he is also not in favour of students having to produce proof of emergency to get extensions or accommodations in their classes. “I actually don’t think it’s appropriate for students, for example, to have to share medical circumstances or mental health circumstances, or family tragedies [with professors].”

Discussing his motivations for his current teaching policies, Parker said, “I don’t want my class to be the class that ruins your week or month.”

Business & Labour

December 6, 2021 thevarsity.ca/section/business biz@thevarsity.ca

How to become an influencer: U of T edition U of T influencer Richard Han shares his experience creating content for students Janhavi Agarwal Associate Business & Labour Editor

Influencers are becoming increasingly prevalent in society, with a number of these influencers finding their voices on platforms such as YouTube. U of T is sprawling with a number of students who are ready to share their experiences about applying to U of T, moving into their dorms, or even just what their days look like as students.

The Varsity sat down with Richard Han, a third-year Rotman Commerce student who also runs a successful YouTube channel. On his channel, Han takes prospective and current students through his days at U of T. He has also uploaded a number of videos about his application process and about getting into U of T. Influencing the U of T community Han explains that he started his Youtube channel in his first year at U of T. He wanted to share his experiences as a first-year student and share information of student life at U of T. When asked about his inspiration to start the channel, he told The Varsity, “I [thought] it [would] be fun for me to show my life and help out students that were in the same situation [that] I was when I was applying.”

Han looked up to influential university YouTubers who built their platforms by sharing a part of their lives on YouTube. “So I guess it was both pursuing my dream and to also help out upcoming future U of T students,” he added.

Han considers being a content creator as a hobby. “I don’t do this because I have to, I do it because I like to do it,” he said. “I never had trouble balancing between my life and content creation, just because I saw it more as a way to destress rather than workload, if that makes sense.”

As someone studying marketing, he also

Becoming an influencer and creating content can have financial benefits.

JOHANNA FORTES/THEVARSITY

finds that he can apply the theory he learns in his classes to grow his channel — something that helps him with recruitment for internships as well, such as being able to answer questions about applying these theories to real life circumstances.

The logistics of content creation As a content creator, one of the biggest challenges he faces is around what music he can use. YouTube’s strict rules about copyrighted

music often pose a problem, whenever the best music he can find is copyrighted. He finds that when he runs into this challenge, he just turns off monetization in the video in question so he can still use the music he wants.

Although this impacts his viewership, due to YouTube’s algorithm, he finds that this is the best approach. “I will always take quality over money if I think that using a copyrighted [music] in a video makes the quality of the video better,” he said.

Han also touched upon making money as a YouTuber. In order to make money, a creator needs 1,000 subscribers and to have had viewers watch 4,000 hours of their content in the past 12 months. They also need to be located in a country where the YouTube Partner Program is active, have no community guidelines violations on their account, and have a linked AdSense account.

If they meet this criteria, they can apply to the YouTube Partner Program. Once accepted, creators can earn money through ad revenue, channel memberships, merch, super chats during livestreams, and YouTube Premium.

While he did not disclose the amount that he makes from his channel, Han said that it is enough to cover his sneaker expenses every month.

Han told The Varsity that, as a content creator who creates vlogs about his life in university, he has received requests from a variety of sponsors, including an app development company and a desk company. The process of sorting out the logistics of a brand deal usually takes place over email. However, Han doesn’t take every deal that comes his way — he makes sure the company matches his philosophy and the product is something that his audience will be able to relate to.

Han made sure to emphasize that his channel is meant to feature his life, in which his experiences as a student at U of T play a large part. In the future, he hopes to feature videos where he talks about whatever else is relevant to that time in his life.

For now, Han enjoys his experience vlogging about his life at U of T. For him, he said, some of the most rewarding moments have been when other students have come up to him to talk about his content, and he’s been able to see exactly how it inspired or helped them.

— With files from Seher Singh

Indigenous entrepreneurs discuss food issues Reviewing UTM’s Indigenous Entrepreneurship Program Ana Pereira Associate Business & Labour Editor

Earlier this year, UTM’s entrepreneurship hub, ICUBE, partnered with Redbird Circle Inc. to launch the Indigenous Entrepreneurship Program — a 16-week initiative focused on eliminating barriers and facilitating mentorships for Indigenous entrepreneurs and leaders.

The program, which ran from March through June 2021, gathered participants from across Canada to cooperatively find entrepreneurial solutions to promote sustainable food systems and clean living. The theme was chosen with the help of community feedback and in light of the food insecurity crisis in Indigenous households, which is a severe problem that affects most communities in the country.

The Varsity sat down with the founders of Redbird Circle Inc., Jonathon Araujo Redbird and Christina Tachtampa, to learn about the Indigenous Entrepreneurship Program.

An innovative framework The program was based on the Red Circle Framework, which was developed by Redbird and Tachtampa and built around the Anishinaabe medicine wheel. The program began with a focus on the personal wellbeing of the entrepreneurs themselves and community building, and later transitioned into skills development and business operations.

Redbird emphasized the importance of Indigenous entrepreneurs focusing on the individual first. “Many Indigenous people are still suffering from residential schools… and the racism and oppression that has occured in this country not even long ago,” he said. “So we had to start with healing the self before putting another layer on top of us.”

“It’s a very different approach to teaching entrepreneurship, and it’s very well received in the Indigenous space,” said Tachtampa.

The takeaways One major challenge participants faced in their entrepreneurial journey was learning to work together with multiple time zones on an online platform. However, online learning also represented an opportunity for Indigenous entrepreneurs to connect while living in different places.

According to Tachtampa, since Indigenous communities are located all over Canada, they can benefit from the virtual space to come together to share resources, skills, and the difficulties of owning a business.

Another major struggle some participants encountered was related to the very issue they came together to solve. Four participants had to leave the program because of issues related to food insecurity. To Redbird, this highlights the severity of the health concerns that Indigenous peoples are facing in Canada today.

One of the participants was COURTESY OF JAY BELL/INDIGENOUS ENTREPRENEURSHIP PROGRAM Isaiah Gilson, a multimedia storyteller, who wants to start a farm with the purpose of providing to new entrepreneurs. clean food. “Going into the Indigenous Gilson commented on the Entrepreneurship Program was like prayers importance of partnering with institutions like answered, because that’s something that I ICUBE that are true allies. “It’s very important prayed for, to have a supportive space that that [the program] is Indigenous-led,” he said. identifies my needs and wants as an Indigneous “It’s really important that U of T is doing this… person,” Gilson told The Varsity. [to] step back and just let us do our own thing… just with their support.”

Opportunities for the future The founders hope to continue the program There are many opportunities in the Indigenous next year. In the future, they plan to record the entrepreneurship space. However, as implementation of an Indigenous garden on Indigenous entrepreneurs are often in business campus and to continue instructing students because of social or environmental motivation, across Canada in establishing food sovereignty rather than for profit reasons, they struggle to businesses on the lands of postsecondary obtain access to institutions that offer financing institutions.

Comment

December 6, 2021 thevarsity.ca/section/comment comment@thevarsity.ca

Take-home exams should be used whenever possible These assessments are more than just an ‘easy way out’ of learning

Ulfa Ismail Varsity Contributor

With exam season quickly approaching, testing is an area of concern given that many courses have switched to predominantly take-home exams as opposed to timed ones. Having recently completed both forms of testing virtually, I have found that many courses benefit from take-home tests because they allow for application of knowledge beyond rote memorization.

This fall, during midterm season, I had two take-home exams and two timed exams. Although my midterms explored various disciplines, I was able to identify common characteristics between all of my exams of the same format.

Take-home tests may seem to be the ‘easier’ format, but they are challenging in that they tend to place greater emphasis on students’ ability to apply their knowledge as opposed to simply regurgitating concepts they have been taught. According to an article in the Journal of College Science Teaching, take-home exams do a better job of testing “what students can do with what they know.”

It would be a false generalization to claim that all timed exams lack any application questions. However, the type of application questions on timed exams in undergraduate level STEM courses, for example, differ from their arts and humanities counterparts — the difference in question being the variety of answers which can be deemed as ‘correct.’

In undergraduate STEM courses, students’ learning mostly consists of memorization and application of knowledge which must be done a certain way to be correct. These

courses generally seek to teach students the facts and laws of the world. Therefore, there is very little variation that each student can have for any given correct answer to a single question. Although they may still be applying their knowledge, students who answer the question correctly will likely have answers that are similar.

If there is only one correct answer, what’s to say that the entire class — whether or not they understand the course content — will not use the surplus amount of time to cheat and get the correct answer? Hence, the rate of academic dishonesty could increase, and cheating would be difficult to detect given that, again, there is only one correct answer.

On the other hand, undergraduate arts, humanities, and social science courses tend to introduce students to theories, events, and worldviews that can be interpreted in a number of different ways. An application question on one of these exams calls upon a student to use their course’s content as a tool in order to provide their personal interpretation of what a ‘correct’ or strong answer would be to an open-ended question. In these cases, academic offences are much easier to detect, given that each student is expected to have a unique answer. One student will find it difficult to unsuspectingly copy an entire essay off of their peers.

In addition to the flexibility takehome exams provide — often allowing students a larger time frame to complete their test — they may cause less stress among students.

While stress is not always purely negative, an article from the academic journal Education Sciences criticizes

timed exams, stating that they impose “an unnatural pressure on the students that has an adverse impact on their performance.”

Pressure is positive when it prepares students for academic challenges they may face in their future. In many arts exams, however, this pressure tends to be unnatural — and therefore unnecessary, as it does not mimic realistic timeframes that students are likely to find in their future careers.

Outside of the classroom, students will have to compete with many peers who have received the same formal education as them. One of the things that is going to make one student exceptional from the other is their personal ability to gather, interpret, and analyze material in a thorough manner. Although time management inevitably plays a role in their decisions, employers are likely to prioritize a student who has experience doing a thorough analysis over a student who is accustomed to a rushed approach.

Therefore, many courses — especially within the social sciences, arts, and humanities disciplines — can benefit from using take-home exams, even as we fully return to in-person classes. They not only give students more flexibility in completing the exam itself, but

also provide professors with an effective way to measure students’ knowledge and ability to apply that knowledge.

Ulfa Ismail is a first-year psychology student at UTSC.

ZACH KOH/THEVARSITY

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comment@thevarsity.ca

COMMENT

We need more accessible kitchens Having a space to cook could significantly improve student mental health Claire Allen Varsity Contributor

For many university students, their meal plan is an integral part of residence life. Between homework, assignments, essays, and socializing, the idea of having to cook for themself may seem overwhelming or simply unreasonable. Many students at U of T who live on campus are even required to purchase a meal plan when they accept their residence offer.

However, while meal plans certainly do have their place in university culture, cooking is an essential practice for independence that often goes overlooked. Giving students better access to kitchen facilities may not only teach them an essential life skill but could also improve their wellbeing and relieve some postsecondary stress.

It may seem redundant to encourage students to cook while they’re paying for a meal plan.

However, the flexibility that a meal plan offers to students actually creates the perfect conditions to ease them into cooking regularly. If students have access to kitchens, they’re free to cook for themselves when they have the time. But if it just so happens that an essay is taking a bit longer than expected, there’s no pressure for students to spare the extra minutes it takes to prepare a meal.

Having this variety of options may also help students to build healthy habits and manage their time around not only school, but also self-care. By setting aside time to cook, students can learn to step away from their work and prioritize their needs.

Cooking has also

been shown to benefit psychological health beyond providing a pause from the neverending barrage of homework. Research has shown that cooking can soothe stress, increase confidence, and decrease negative thinking. Additionally, the process of cooking can allow a person to focus simply on the task at hand, and engages their creativity in a fulfilling and meaningful way.

A 2018 study has shown that daily engagement in a creative activity — like cooking — can lead to greater positive effects and well-being.

Therefore, giving students ample means and opportunity to cook could improve their academic performance and lower their stress levels.

Creating reliable access to kitchens could even allow students to bring an aspect of their home life into their on-campus routine. Giving

students the opportunity to cook their own meals allows them to easily recreate the foods they are used to eating at home, otherwise known as “comfort foods.” A 2015 study found that eating comfort food is associated with close relationships and social ties, which helps curb feelings of loneliness and isolation. These phenomena are crucial to maintaining well-being, especially in one’s first years away from home. Knowing how to cook their comfort meals brings happiness not only to individual students, but could even create bonds between students who share an affinity for a particular dish.

Now, where do we go from here? How do we give students the kitchen access they so deserve?

Luckily, many residence buildings already

have the means to provide students access to kitchens. According to the individual college websites, all residences except for Chestnut Residence contain some sort of studentaccessible kitchen facility.

However, the adequacy of the facilities that do exist vastly vary from college to college. For example, the Canada room in St Michael’s College contains one student-accessible kitchen, even though St Michael’s College residences house approximately 5,000 students each school year.

On the other hand, residences at Innis College and Woodsworth College contain semi-private kitchen facilities in each dormitory to be shared between three to five students.

It may be unreasonable to request that a residence with no student-accessible kitchens construct semi-private kitchens in each student dormitory; however, colleges can reach a fair compromise. Some residences in Victoria College, New College, University College, and Trinity College contain shared kitchens in common spaces. Incorporating facilities of this style into all residences that don’t currently have adequate kitchen space could provide students with the access they deserve while preserving the more traditional-style dormitories.

Overall, cooking is an essential skill that has been shown to improve well-being. Furthermore, giving students access to cooking facilities on a regular basis can help them improve their time management skills, ease them into independence, and allow them to put mental health first. By choosing to create more reliable access to kitchens, the U of T administration would actively prioritize the health and well-being of its student body.

Claire Allen is a first-year visual studies student at the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design.

Why aren’t some residences providing kitchen space?

CAROLINE BELLAMY/THEVARSITY

It’s time to reform meal plans at U of T Meal plans do not suit the needs of all students Shreya Vanwari Comment Columnist

U of T’s dining halls have often been a highly debated topic among students for various reasons, including food quality, pricing, and dining hall opening and closing times. In particular, the limited options and high cost of the meal plans at Chestnut Residence and New College are evident of the inadequate meal plan system at U of T. Chestnut Residence and New College offer their residents four options for meal plans. The costs of these plans range from $5,500 to $6,550, and they are intended to accommodate students with varying appetites and schedules.

At the end of the academic year, any leftover meal plan dollars are converted into TBucks rather than being refunded directly to the student.

However, there is a certain limit to the amount that can be carried over to the next year. As a consequence, students with large amounts of residence dollars left over at the end of the year are forced to scramble to spend until they reach this limited amount so that they do not lose money through their meal plan. Afterward, they can only use their TBucks as payment for on-campus food, vending machines, printing, photocopying, and approved off-campus merchants.

I stayed in Chestnut Residence last semester, and while some people complained about the struggle of getting three hearty meals a day because of the high prices, my experience was quite the opposite. As someone with a light appetite who enjoys eating meals out every now and then, I picked the cheapest meal plan. Still, I spent my last two weeks scrambling to stock up on snacks I didn’t want and to buy food for others so that I could drain my residence dollars.

Diet and appetite can vary significantly between students.

RUSABA ALAM/THEVARSITY

And I definitely wasn’t alone in this, as I knew a few friends in similar situations.

To be fair, the fact that I moved several weeks into the semester due to travel restrictions and quarantine could account for my large amount of remaining residence dollars. The many unexpected circumstances that international students encountered due to COVID-19 is another factor that residences should account for in the design of meal plans.

This system is inherently unreasonable. While students need to pay some funds upfront to maintain the meal plan system at U of T, they

should not have to waste so much money on an ineffective meal plan.

The reality is that generalizing the amount of food that students consume into four categories is unrealistic, because appetite and eating patterns vary significantly between different students.

Additionally, having students pay up front for their meal plan is unfair because an individual student’s eating patterns have the potential to change greatly during the school year.

Each student’s choice of meal in the dining hall also affects the cost of their meal plan — getting the daily entrée is cheaper than getting

something from the grill station or picking up some sushi. Furthermore, it’s important to take students’ schedules into consideration, because some students enjoy eating out significantly more or spend most weekends away. What’s more, the dining hall schedule may not complement the student’s schedule, and students may often find themselves ordering food off campus.

Thus, the meal plan system at U of T provides benefits to very few students. If we also consider food preferences, such as specific diets that are not catered to by the dining halls at U of T — vegan and kosher diets, for example — then the problem of having to spend money on meal plans becomes an even bigger issue.

What’s worse is that costly meal plans only add to the financial burden faced by many students.

Although having meal plans for students is a very practical concept, the truth is that students should have more flexibility with the meal plans offered by U of T. Instead of the current meal plan system, students should pay a small initial fee and be able to refill their residence dollars during the course of the academic year. This would decrease the cost of meal plans and allow students to refill money according to their food preferences and schedule.

Transitioning between these two systems should be relatively simple, as there is already a system in place to add funds to your meal plan if you run out of residence dollars. This alternate system also accounts for the base level costs required to keep the dining hall running because it requires that students pay a small initial fee.

However, unlike the system currently in place, this one would not be as much of a financial burden on students.

Shreya Vanwari is a second-year psychology student at Woodsworth College.

Editorial

December 6, 2021 thevarsity.ca/section/comment comment@thevarsity.ca

We can’t afford to overlook food at U of T Universities must put themselves in their students’ shoes The Varsity Editorial Board

Content warning: This article mentions disordered eating.

Welcome to The Varsity’s Food Issue.

This week, we’re featuring food-related content across all sections of the newspaper. From racialized people’s experiences of food in Features, to the lack of accessible kitchens in Comment, and the impacts of food on mental health in Science, it’s all about food.

Food is a central component of student life at U of T. From the everyday experiences of U of T students to the impact of COVID-19 on food insecurity, we can’t afford to overlook it.

All eyes on food When food is actually paid attention to, it’s often because there are accessibility barriers.

Recently, the Scarborough Campus Students’ Union has drawn backlash for including language regarding kosher food in its Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) policy. As it was originally passed, the policy included an exemption for kosher food providers that were not BDS-compliant, but only if an attempt had been made to source the food from a source that did not “normalize Israeli apartheid.”

Though the union has since removed the language from the policy, it has not replaced it with any explicit protections for kosher food. Proactively protecting all dietary restrictions should be a priority for U of T and its constituent student unions.

Similarly, all students are entitled to food that fulfills their needs — especially students that U of T is responsible for, such as the ones that live on residences.

Last year, The Varsity reported on the concerning financial, mental, and physical implications of a new pay-per-item dining hall system that was implemented during the pandemic. The system has been implemented at Chestnut and New College residences. Students have reported that the pay-per-item system is too expensive, encourages disordered eating, and contributes to plastic waste.

A year later, U of T hasn’t reverted to an allyou-can-eat dining hall model or made any significant changes. U of T’s reluctance to change the dining hall system — in spite of these welldocumented problems — shows a disregard for students’ well-being.

Food impacts all parts of student life.

CAROLINE BELLAMY/THEVARSITY

University students face disproportional food insecurity Being a university student can be costly when factoring in textbook costs, housing prices, and tuition fees — especially for international students and students in formerly deregulated programs. However, university students — particularly graduate students — are also plagued with food insecurity, which has been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Food security is a critical issue for university students across the country. According to a Maclean’s article, about 40 per cent of Canadian postsecondary students deal with food insecurity, compared to around 14.3 per cent of the general population.

Furthermore, food insecurity presents itself in a variety of ways: both the quantity and quality of accessible food pose issues for university students. When budgeting, students often view food spending as the one negotiable category amid necessary tuition and housing costs. Thus, when university students are in financial trouble or nearing the maximum amount of money they can spend, they may consider eating less before sacrificing their education and housing.

Similarly, students may opt for less nutritious and less expensive food, like instant ramen noodles and fast food. These food items may be cheap and filling, but they are high in sodium, which can lead to long-term health consequences like high blood pressure and heart disease.

Students are often told to buy unprocessed, fresh ingredients from the grocery store instead, but these items are often difficult for one-person households to use up. They’re also expensive, especially with the supply-chain problems this pandemic has caused. Moreover, there is a pervasive student culture in which students prioritize their grades over their physical and mental health. Some students even wear their sleep deprivation and toxic productivity as badges of honour.

Of course, students need to be more aware of their food consumption and must view eating with the same importance as breathing. They should research how to eat well and learn how to budget their time to allow themselves to cook or have a proper sit-down meal in their residence dining halls.

However, not all of the blame for food insecurity can fall on the students themselves — far from it. Universities task themselves with

educating the next generation of world leaders, scientists, and teachers. Education is more than providing the information that students need to succeed in their fields.

If universities really want to provide the best education, they must create an environment conducive to learning, which includes not only physical spaces like lecture halls and residence buildings but also student feelings of safety and security.

Just like how universities cannot ask students to perform their best without secure housing and access to clean water, they also cannot adequately teach students who cannot eat properly.

Universities can provide students with as many resources as they would like, but little substantial change will happen unless universities put themselves in university students’ shoes.

When schools are preparing to accept graduate students and provide financial aid, they should research the costs associated with living in cities, including but not limited to rent, water, electricity, groceries, and recreation. No, your students should not, cannot, and will not be eating, sleeping, and working at all times of day. On that note, time constraints should also be considered since proper, nutritious food requires not only financial resources but time.

Food in the long term COVID-19 has put an increasing number of people in financially unstable situations. Especially near the beginning of the pandemic, many people around Toronto — and around Canada and the wider world — lost their jobs. In addition, many people around Toronto have recently faced additional economic pressures like rising housing costs.

All of this has been reflected in the rates of Ontarians currently experiencing food insecurity.

Over the course of the pandemic, food banks across Toronto saw their attendance going up to record highs, and the number of people who needed to access food banks over the course of the year went up by 10 per cent between April 2020 and March 2021.

Siu Mee Cheng, the interim executive director of Feed Ontario, a nonprofit organization that’s been measuring this increase, told the CBC that she doesn’t think we’re going to see a decrease in people having to access food banks anytime soon. At the same time, some food banks are finding it increasingly difficult to operate because of factors like rising rent prices.

The pandemic has put many people in newly food-insecure positions, and, as usual, its effects are being most acutely felt by people who are already financially vulnerable. However, fears about its effects on food security have spread, at various points, even to many in financially stable positions.

At many points during the pandemic, we saw waves of panic-buying as the threat of disrupted supply chains frightened people in many metropolitan areas. Panic-buying is a provably bad idea; not only does it make it more difficult for everyone to access the resources they need, but it often means, again, that people who are already vulnerable have even more trouble accessing necessities.

It’s an understandable response, though — the idea of food insecurity is very scary, and, for many people, it’s not something that they’ve had to consider very often before. The pandemic has felt — if you’ll excuse the expression — unprecedented, and so it’s presented challenges that many people had not prepared for.

But that’s something we need to change. The pandemic is not going to be the last large-scale crisis we see in our lifetimes that will carry the possibility of disrupting our access to food. As the climate crisis worsens, we’re likely to see more and more natural disasters, some of which will affect various parts of our food supply. Already, the recent flooding in BC has seen people in some areas hoarding groceries in fear of perceived shortages.

That can’t be our default response. We need to start preparing for future food crises — and not by stockpiling cans of chickpeas in panic bunkers.

Instead, we need to make our food systems more resilient. As a country, we should look into building more distributed supply networks, so any individual crisis can’t hit us as hard. We need to start building up crisis response systems, so that people hit by food crises — especially those who are already experiencing food insecurity — can still access food. As individuals, we should be educating ourselves and the people around us about what else we can do to prepare our communities for difficulties in accessing food.

Food is a universal part of the human experience. It’s something we interact with every day, and it’s something many of us take for granted.

But food issues affect all of us, even if we aren’t paying attention to them. It’s high time we start treating them as the high-priority stories they are.

THE VARSITY

FEATURES

Beyond the ‘shame’ narrative: How imm

The ‘lunchbox moment’ is easy to d

Tahmeed Shafiq Managing Editor

Content warning: This article mentions antiAsian racism.

If you’re the child of immigrants, you may have endured a ‘lunchbox moment’ at school, when you would open your lunchbox in the cafeteria and other, whiter kids would judge the homemade meals your mom had made.

You’d receive funny looks — maybe even an outright gag. They said your food was “weird” or “gross,” that it looked “like puke” or smelled “rotten.” And if lunch was a meal eaten with your hands, like roti and curry, you’d be stared at as an object of exotic fascination.

It didn’t matter that it was your favourite dish or that it carried your mom’s love, worked into the dough or stirred into the soup late the previous night. Your lunch was just too different. You were just too different.

The lunchbox moment is a real experience, and it’s common enough that people of colour can relate to each other through it. However, it never represents the full story of what food means to many racialized people.

In an essay for Eater, food writer Jaya Saxena brilliantly exposes how the trope flattens the experiences of racialized students.

It emphasizes a desire for whiteness over any more positive or nuanced emotions racialized people may experience as they interact with members of their own community.

Growing up as a brown, Muslim kid in Toronto, I wanted to be like the other kids. I was upset that my dad didn’t watch hockey like the other dads — that he didn’t even know the rules and had no knowledge of the sport to share with me. I was upset that I got lumped together with the only other Muslim kid in class, even though our parents came from different countries and spoke different languages. But the longing I felt never manifested in a lunchbox moment.

When discussions about racialized food experiences are framed around the lunchbox, they don’t actually serve us in the way we might wish. “The lunchbox moment doesn’t require the reader to think about how class, religion, or caste could all change an immigrant’s experience,” Saxena writes.

“It doesn’t point out all the invisible ways immigrants and [racialized people] are made to feel unwelcome.”

It’s precisely this simplicity that makes the trope appealing to a white audience. It reduces our stories to a sense of loneliness, eliminating the complexity of the racism — and the complexity of the joy — that racialized people experience in relation to food.

Food is about family Sharon Liu, a fourth-year undergraduate at U of T studying East Asian studies, English, and creative writing, remembers experiencing her own lunchbox moments in middle school.

Liu, who is Chinese-Canadian, grew up in Brampton, Ontario and frequently took leftovers from dinner to school for lunch the next day.

Liu remembers her classmates staring at the food she had brought. One boy asked her if she was eating cat or dog meat. She expected some kind of support from her teacher, but none came. So she put her food away, uneaten.

Still, making the lunchbox moment a universal shorthand for the experience of racialized people effectively ends the story of

our childhoods with a painful moment. People of colour who’ve experienced lunchbox moments in childhood aren’t defined by them.

They can come to celebrate and share their food later in life, in order to fully understand and embrace the otherness that inflicted them as children.

Liu certainly has. She remembers asking her mother for different lunches, especially Lunchables, because she wanted to fit in.

But looking back, she finds that yearning somewhat ridiculous — the food her mother made “had flavour, for one thing,” and Lunchables are just indisputably bad.

“Looking [back], Lunchables kind of suck,” Liu says. “It’s just like, worse charcuterie.”

Liu has since spoken to her mother about those conversations and apologized for them.

“She was hurt a little bit. She thought that I didn’t like her food, which is just the complete opposite [of how I feel] because my mom’s the best cook I know.”

Today, when Liu goes home, food is a family affair. Her mother would always try to

In 1974, when Marcelo first came to Toronto to work in the restaurant industry, Ecuadorian cuisine was not well-represented in the city’s food scene. That is changing, but slowly.

“If you think [of] South American cuisine, you’ll probably [think of] Peruvian food or Colombian food. Ecuadorian food [is] not really well-established here,” says Andres Rosero, one of Marcelo’s sons who manages the storefront. “One customer that always comes by is like, ‘You guys have to make the birria tacos.’ We don’t do that.”

Birria tacos are a type of Mexican beef tacos that are served with soup. They’ve become wildly popular in the past couple of years, as photogenic videos of the tender beef being dipped into a spicy red consommé have been shared widely on TikTok and Instagram.

Andres’ anecdote is a perfect example of one complexity of immigrant food cultures: sometimes certain foods become stand-ins for an entire region’s culture, especially when they are swept up in social media trends.

All recipes are family-owned, reflecting Marcelo’s desire to showcase the way his family does Ecuadorian food. “I wanna be firm in my flavours,” he says.

Andres hopes more people will warm to Ecuadorian food over time. “Just being in Toronto, we have such easy access to so many cultures. I think everyone should be open to trying new foods… because you never know what you might be into.”

make hui guo rou, also known as Sichuanstyle twice-cooked pork belly — one of her favourite dishes since childhood. Her father would leave work early to buy the best quality pork belly. Then her mother would take up the laborious cooking process, which involves boiling the meat till tender, searing it, and finally stir-frying it in classic Sichuan flavours of chilli and fermented black beans.

Liu witnesses how taxing the cooking process is for her mother; “she’s sweating because [of] all the fumes, but she still does it every single time.” Making food for her daughter is an expression of love. Liu sees that more clearly now.

Marcelo insists that Ecuadorian food is unique, and he wants his customers to appreciate it that way. For example, he says that Ecuadorian food is less spicy than Mexican food because, in Ecuadorian cuisine, spicy sauces are served on the side.

There are some parts of La Morena’s menu that would be recognizable to people who aren’t familiar with Ecuadorian food. For one thing, they serve their own versions of the fresh fruit juices you can often find at Mexican restaurants, including lulo juice. Lulo is a small citrus fruit that only grows in Central and South America, with a taste halfway between passionfruit and orange. Of course, they also cook some uniquely Ecuadorian dishes like humitas, steamed bundles of corn flour and cheese that resemble a tamale, but taste sweeter.

But the café’s signature items are their empanadas, which come in three flavors. Each one uses a different type of casing, made with wheat flour, rice flour, or morocho, which is a kind of corn flour made from a maize cultivar grown in Argentina and Ecuador. I found the fried cheese empanadas the most delicious: light and filled with warm, melted cheese and served — if you ask — with a sprinkling of sugar in the traditional Ecuadorian way.

in Windsor, Ontario by two white parents.

He describes the neighbourhood they grew up in as “very white”— apart from him and his sister, there was only one other Chinese kid at their school. “The closest you could get to quote unquote ‘ethnic food’ was the one Italian restaurant in the whole town,” Faubert recalls.

As a result, his childhood experiences of Chinese food revolved around the ‘Westernized’ Chinese food that was available. Because his mother was often too busy with work to cook, his school meals were often Lunchables.

In his early teen years, though, he took a trip to Toronto that began to change his perception of Chinese food. His mother took him and his sister to Pacific Mall, a large Asian shopping mall in Markham. It was the first time he had ever seen so many Asian people. “We had really good Chinese food,” Faubert says.

“It felt... more genuine, being surrounded by so many people who looked like me.”

Later, in high school, Faubert got a job as a dishwasher at a Cantonese restaurant.

The staff spoke to each other in Cantonese, which he couldn’t understand. “Once in a while, they’d snap their fingers at me to get my attention and say, ‘You got to do this,’ or

Food is a journey It’s true that food presents an opportunity for racialized people to celebrate their culture and communities, but not everyone grows up with a strong connection to their cultural food.

Sometimes, it takes time, new experiences, and the right company for that connection to flourish.

At least, that was the case for Yasi Faubert, a third-year undergraduate studying immunology, bioethics, and health and disease. Faubert and his younger sister were both adopted from China and raised

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Food is about sharing one’s culture Beyond school lunches and family dinners, food is often the best way to share one’s culture with the broader society. No one does that better than families who run restaurants.

This is certainly the case at La Morena, a family-owned Ecuadorian café on St. Clair Avenue West in Toronto. The café is operated

by Marcelo Rosero, a restaurant veteran of over 40 years; his ex-wife, Graciele Riofrio; and their children. Patrons can enjoy a variety of Ecuadorian classics, including empanadas, tamales, and ceviche.

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migrants express culture through food

digest, but there’s more to the story

‘You got to do that.’ ” But the staff also wouldn’t let Faubert go unfed. If he hadn’t eaten all day, they would give him a meal to take home. Having come from a family where his parents’ schedules meant sit-down family dinners were uncommon, Faubert found their unexpected kindness deeply touching. He felt a sense of a shared identity with his co-workers — an experience of connection and culture that was new to him.

Now, Faubert lives with two roommates who both love to cook. One of them is also from a Chinese background. Going grocery shopping together and cooking with them has brought Faubert into closer contact with Chinese culture; now, he has someone to coach him through the names of unfamiliar ingredients or explain the significance of unfamiliar foods.

His confidence in the kitchen is also growing. Last year, he started cooking Asian dishes on his own. He started with tteokbokki — Korean rice cakes — before moving on to other dishes like mapo tofu and katsudon, or Japanese cutlets over rice. One day he made udon, and as he sat down with the bowl of brothy noodles he had made entirely by himself, a feeling of pride washed over him.

“I was one step closer to being comfortable with the fact that I’m Chinese, and I can make food that tastes good.”

Today, many of his memories of cooking Chinese food are connected to pride. “It’s made me want to cook more,” he says.

Food is a problem Faubert’s story is a heartwarming reminder of why food is central to our identities. And yet, if we end conversations about food on a uniquely happy note, we can fail to notice the racialized people who aren’t as fortunate — people whose experiences are shaped by larger, systemic forces of class and economic precarity.

The clearest food-related intersection between race and politics is food insecurity or the lack of stable access to healthy food.

Unsurprisingly, one of the most common

causes of food insecurity is a low income, but racialized people are also at a higher risk.

Statistics Canada’s 2017–2018 Canadian Community Health Survey identified that one in every eight households was foodinsecure. PROOF, a U of T-based research group studying national food insecurity, found that those households were more likely to be racialized. 28.9 and 28.2 per cent of Black and Indigenous respondents, respectively, reported being food-insecure, compared to just 11.1 per cent of respondents who identified themselves as white.

“We consistently see that Black and Indigenous households are at greater risk of food insecurity, even after accounting for other sociodemographic factors,” wrote PROOF research coordinator Tim Li in an email to The Varsity.

Likewise, studies from 2011 and 2013 found that Latin American immigrants to Toronto who were food insecure had trouble accessing resources because of a language barrier. They had difficulty understanding food labels, communicating their needs with store clerks, and reading coupons that could have saved them money. They also lacked access to foods they were used to, and even when these foods were available, they had no idea where they could be found.

According to Ken MacDonald, a UTSC professor in the human geography department, part of the problem is that culturally relevant foods tend to be clustered in small neighborhoods. For racialized people without access to a car, that presents a challenge.

“You’re going to spend two hours on the bus to go and get stuff that you’re familiar with. You can take four hours out of your day [to go] once a week,” MacDonald explained.

MacDonald’s research has shown that this problem is a modern one. Before World War II, cities were responsible for creating spaces where people could access affordable food, so they built and maintained public markets for food purveyors. But, in the 1950s, supermarkets became more common.

They were spaced farther apart because they

responsibility, not their own.

MacDonald thinks we can solve food insecurity if we return to this model. He points to cities like Barcelona, where public markets still exist. To him, a growing city like Toronto can easily build more markets just by including them as part of current development plans. Governments can already require new property developments to provide some level of public service, like a green space or community centre. “Why not make a public market a condition of actually developing new space?” he asks.

The rush to build new condos when we can easily build new public markets is a failure of imagination. Ultimately, so much of the way we think about food is also a failure of imagination.

When we tell ourselves that food is just nutrition, we mask its political nature. When we construct simple narratives around food, we hide the complexity and fluidity of personal experience. And when we rely on the La Morena is a family-owned Ecuadorian café on St. Clair lunchbox moment to define racialized Avenue West. food experiences, we lose out on all TAHMEED SHAFIQ/THE VARSITY the stories of joy and found family that food can create — overlooking the structural racism embedded in the were designed with car-owning customers in urban landscape. mind. It’s because of this change, MacDonald A lunchbox has multiple components. So says, that public institutions came to think do our stories. of providing food as the private sector’s

The owners of La Morena want customers to appreciate the uniqueness of Ecuadorian cuisine.

TAHMEED SHAFIQ/THE VARSITY

Arts & Culture

December 6, 2021 thevarsity.ca/section/arts-and-culture arts@thevarsity.ca

Make ‘em a sandwich they can’t refuse: Food in mob movies Exploring the relationship between mobster entertainment and food Angad Deol Sports Editor

As far back as I can remember, I’ve always noticed how food played a huge role in mob movies. We all love food because it’s tasty, but food in movies can be used to subtly foreshadow a future event, paint a picture of the current scene — or even just make you hungry.

This is best depicted in classic mob flicks, such as Goodfellas, the Godfather trilogy, and even the television series The Sopranos.

Goodfellas: Food to show decline In the movie Goodfellas, I saw food as a narrative device that showed the decline of Henry Hill, the main character of the film. We follow Henry from the bottom of the game, to the top of the ranks of the mafia, all the way back down to ordinary life when he flips on his former pals in exchange for freedom. At the beginning of the film, Henry sees the mob as a way out of ‘ordinary life,’ which, to him, means normal things like waiting in line for bread at the bakery on Sundays. It’s a metaphor for the mafia being his ticket to a life of relative luxury.

Later in the film, we see Henry sentenced to 10 years in prison. That would be a nightmare for most, but for Henry, prison is nothing short of a blast. In an iconic scene, Henry discusses how he and his friends would have magnificent dinners every night in prison, including pasta with fresh sauce made by a peer and garlic cut so thin it would “liquify in the pan.” As the group eats, Henry is shown pulling out a bottle of wine and breaking bread behind the cement walls of jail. He may be behind bars, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t having a great time.

When Henry leaves prison, he makes a series of poor decisions regarding the trafficking of cocaine, which eventually leads to him having to rat out his peers to avoid further jail time. The movie ends with Henry talking about how can’t even order

good pasta anymore. Instead, he just gets “egg noodles and ketchup,” a far cry from the luxurious dinners he had prior, and laments about his life as an ordinary nobody — exactly where he started.

The Godfather: Food to show death The symbolism of food in The Godfather has often been analyzed. However, the presence of oranges as symbols of violence is particularly interesting. When Vito Corleone, The Godfather’s

and playing with his grandson in his garden, in front of a background that features tomato plants.

He starts cutting an orange, and places the rind in his mouth to make faces at his grandson. Shortly afterwards, as the two chase each other around the backyard, Vito dies from a heart attack.

In this scene, the tomatoes represent a wealthy and powerful man returning to his peasant roots.

It’s also suggested that Vito growing tomatoes symbolizes his preparation for the future, as his

Food is symbolic of violence in some of my favourite flicks.

COURTESY OF YASIN ARIBUGA/UNSPLASH

protagonist, is shown at the start of the film, he is purchasing oranges on the street. The oranges then spill across the road as Don Corleone stumbles toward his car, catching bullets from hitmen. During a meeting with the bosses of the five big crime families, oranges are placed near Tattaglia and Barzini, who have plotted against the protagonist’s family.

Tomatoes are also a key symbol in the film, especially during Vito’s death scene. Vito is retired

family will inherit his wealth after he’s passed. The presence of his grandson also represents future generations that he’s caring for, which is shown by the way they play around the tomato plants.

The Sopranos: Food to show disconnectedness During the first few months of COVID-19, I decided to catch up on some shows I had always wanted to watch. My favourite of them ended up being

The Sopranos. I’m not alone in this experience — many people I know became fans of the mid 2000s prestige drama during the pandemic.

Something I noticed throughout the series was the placement of food. It was subtly included in the background of many scenes that depicted conflict or a disconnection between characters and the real world.

For example, in season two, Tony Soprano — the main character — takes a business trip to Italy with his colleagues Paulie Gualtieri and Christopher Moltisanti. While there, we see Paulie — who, earlier in the series, talked about how American coffee shops were stealing from “real” Italians — comically refuse a plate of squid ink pasta. Instead, he asks for “macaroni and gravy.” The Italian waiter, unaware of what gravy means, comes to realize that he is asking for red tomato sauce after asking the Italian mobsters sitting in front of Paulie, who later mock Paulie’s request. This is an example of the incredible irony of The Sopranos: the character boldly proclaims his love for Italian invention, being disgusted at authentic Italian cuisine, and truly craves an Italian-American medley.

Another scene early in season two revolves around Tony’s daughter Meadow and her best friend Hunter. Both find themselves in hot water with their parents after throwing a party at Meadow’s grandmother’s home. While venting their frustrations about how strict their parents are, the angsty pair make a mess of Meadow’s kitchen, spilling hot chocolate mix and littering the stove with what appears to be french toast. I found it quite funny that these two talked about themselves like mature adults while making a mess of what could be called kids’ food.

All in all, it’s evident that food included in films is more symbolic than we think. So, when the holiday break rolls around and you settle in front of your television to consume some mafia-related content, maybe keep an eye — or a tongue — out for some food-related Easter eggs.

Fast food chains are deceiving you — and you’re buying it How celebrity endorsements mask the problematic aspects of the fast food industry Jwan Omer Varsity Contributor

Last fall, McDonald’s launched a partnership with famous rapper Travis Scott. For a limited time, the franchise’s customers were offered Scott’s go-to order: a Quarter Pounder with Cheese with bacon and lettuce, medium fries, barbecue sauce, and a large Sprite. The launch was accompanied by the release of merchandise featuring Travis Scott and the McDonald’s-related imagery.

At first thought, the partnership might seem innovative. However, it was promptly followed by a series of collaborations between the franchise and

other famous figures like Saweetie, J Balvin, BTS, and Mariah Carey, whose campaign images bizarrely featured an ocean.

Let’s face it; McDonald’s is simply rebranding current menu items with these promotions.

They’re not offering consumers anything new.

But we can’t blame only one franchise for the bizarre phenomenon of celebrity promotion.

Using public faces to promote food is nothing new. Take Super Bowl commercials, for instance.

After starting with supermodel Cindy Crawford in 1992, Pepsi gained a reputation of collaborating with famous celebrities to produce iconic advertisements. Their collaborations have included Cardi B, P!nk, and Enrique Iglesias.

Though television commercials are effective in promoting collaborations, it can be argued that the platform is becoming dated. Instead, like with most trends we’re currently witnessing, promotion is moving to the internet.

The relationship we have with celebrities has been fundamentally altered by social media. They are no longer mysterious figures that we connect with through mediums like magazines or movies. Instead, their social media presence offers us a genuine, less produced glimpse into their personal lives.

This is where food franchises come in.

These collaborations are not only ways of obtaining products connected to your favourite celebrity

— they also play a crucial part in establishing a parasocial connection with that celebrity. When you order Saweetie’s favourite meal, it’s almost like she’s a friend who’s recommending you try her usual order.

Increased promotion through celebrity endorsements has come at the right time for the fast food industry.

Recent years have seen a rise in ‘clean eating,’ a lifestyle which encourages people to consume primarily whole foods and limit their consumption of processed foods. Last year, the International Food Information Council’s Food & Health Survey found that 54 per cent of consumers cared more about the healthiness of their food than they did a decade ago. Additionally, 43 per cent of participants claimed to regularly diet.

And then there’s the pandemic to consider. In its early days, there was a societal emphasis on purchasing from local businesses instead of large corporations so that employees of those small businesses could earn a living wage. Nevertheless, local businesses weren’t the only sector suffering; in February this year, Canada’s Labour Force Survey found that there were 319,000 fewer restaurant workers than there were a year prior.

But corporations are aware of their weaknesses, which is why they’re banking on their strengths; nostalgia, endorsement, and accessibility. Fast food chains have always been the antithesis of the high-end health food trends and

TimBiebs are just one example of the confusing partnerships between food franchises and celebrities.

COURTESY OF TIM HORTONS

of small businesses. To hide this reality, corporations use the excitement of beloved celebrities to override the rationality of their consumer base.

There’s no better example of this than the fact that, in the same month that McDonald’s BTS meal launched, their American workers were striking for an increase in minimum wage. Needless to say, there’s an incredibly insidious motivation behind using the appeal of celebrities to cash in at a time when their employees are perhaps the most vulnerable.

So, despite any clever marketing, it’s clear that partnerships between celebrities and fast food corporations are nothing to celebrate. These collaborations are simply a reminder that we’re susceptible to heavy marketing and the promise of a new sauce to coat the same french fry.

thevarsity.ca/section/arts-and-culture

DECEMBER 4, 2021

I imagine my vagina as a grapefruit Change your mindset for an improvement in your sexual diet Madeline Szabo Varsity Contributor

Being ashamed of your vagina is not a good feeling. Take it from someone whose Google search history has often contained the question, “What should a vagina look like?” And, when those searches failed: “What should a vagina look like — not porn?”

My insecurities have lived on for far longer than I’d like to admit.

What’s more troubling is that my worries were not uncommon. A 2013 study by British medicine company MedExpress found that 36 per cent of respondents worried that their genitals were “not normal” in appearance. Of those people, 73 per cent were women.

I don’t know if this trend is fueled by the plastic surgery bodies we often see in porn, the candle Gwenyth Paltrow’s company released that supposedly smells like her vagina, or just the unrealistic standards that vaginas are supposed to be small and shaven. Nonetheless, all of these reasons have caused me to spend too much of my life wanting to keep my underwear on forever.

However, there’s another trend that’s silently being woven through society — using fruit names as euphemisms for your vagina. Fruits have become sexual. Don’t just take my word for it: vagina references litter pop culture. Having penetrative sex for the first time is often summed up by the phrase “popping the cherry,” which refers to the tearing of the hymen during intercourse. Harry Styles’ “Watermelon Sugar” — the singer’s first number one single on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, and a song that he admitted is about “the female orgasm” — is the catchiest way to picture someone eating me out.

Most notably is that, throughout literature, the fig

has been linked to symbolize women. Perhaps most famously, Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar uses the fruit to represent the restrictions placed on women when choosing a future life path. The fruit is also often associated with sex and fertility.

This fact isn’t surprising once you cut into a fig.

Its insides are small, fleshy threads, which form a flower that carries a seed. For each species of fig, there’s a species of fig wasp — an insect that relies on the fig for its reproduction.

When a female fig

Thinking of vaginas as fruits offers a new standard of what genitalia should look like.

CAROLINE BELLAMY/THEVARSITY

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wasp reproduces, it climbs into the fig through a small opening and deposits its eggs. In the process of squeezing into the fig, it loses its antennae and wings and becomes trapped. The wasp then dies, and the fig digests its body for nourishment.

The moral of the story is that, to the wasp, it doesn’t matter if the fig on the branches was lopsided or wrinkly — either way, the wasp was willing to die in the name of fig sex.

Vaginas also have this effect, metaphorically.

Society may confine our vaginas to a singular standard of perfection, but there’s no perfect look or smell to them. The important part is that, like the fig, they are ready to be eaten.

Picturing your vagina as a fruit is not as straightforward as it sounds — it’s also about imagining your vagina as desirable. Your vagina is a part of your body worth touching and embracing, not scrutinizing. Grapefruits also resemble vaginas, and no two grapefruits look the same on the inside.

Thinking of your vagina as fruit not only makes your partner’s snack break more fun — it also offers a new standard for how genitalia should look. It doesn’t have to just be figs, grapefruit, or watermelon; it can be sensual food or a common item, as long as you think of your vagina kindly enough that it reminds you of your beauty.

So, before you write off trying it, hear me out — thinking about my most hidden body part with such passion makes me feel like my vagina is worth looking at, eating, or even putting in a decorative bowl. Fruits are sensual because of their taste, not because they’re symmetrical.

So we need to stop googling what we’re supposed to look like and just have a snack. There is no normal vagina. I’m convinced the one inside the clementine next to me is perfect, but there will also be a perfect one in the clementine I eat after that.

Ultimately, being self-conscious about my vagina eats me up inside —at a time when, really, I just want to be eaten out.

Food isn’t just for survival — it’s also culture As the saying goes, we really are what we eat

GEORGIA KELLY/THEVARSITY

Sky Kapoor Associate Arts & Culture Editor

I am a first-generation Indian-Canadian. For me, the ultimate comfort food is a hot bowl full of moong dal on a bed of fluffy basmati rice.

To you, this could be an odd choice. However, I refuse to apologize for it. My food preferences are personally — and also culturally — meaningful.

Because of my cultural background, I grew up eating a healthy mix of cuisines. A typical day was mapped out by turkey sandwiches for lunch and chole bhature for dinner. These eating habits have shaped what have now become my cooking habits. Though I consider myself to be a mediocre home chef at best, the dishes I make are incredibly significant to me.

The foods that I crave and cook aren’t as simple as being a product of my taste buds — though I am a sucker for certain flavours.

Instead, they’re an accumulation of my experiences. All the recipes that I’ve learned, the kitchen experiments I’ve miserably failed at, and the signature dishes I’ve recreated are all subtly

peppered with their own special memories.

Though it’s necessary for our nutrition, the significance and appreciation of food is also universal. For example, many religions and cultures use traditional dishes as part of their celebrations. During Hanukkah, families eat latkes and sufganiyot to celebrate the Festival of Lights. On Karamu Ya Imani, families enjoy traditional African cuisine like mazoa and muhindi. On Omisoka, people usually enjoy Toshikoshi soba because it represents a long life and removes bad luck.

Of course, as previously mentioned, the primary purpose of food is simple: survival. Some of our favourite cultural dishes were forged on the basis of economic necessity, while others were invented to stretch limited resources. For example, the traditional Welsh dish bara brith came from poverty, since it was made using leftover dough collected at the end of the week.

Closer to home, in nineteenth-century America, leftover food was so fundamental to everyday cooking that the public didn’t have a name for it.

Breakfast was usually the food left from dinner the night before. Because of these humble roots,

the significance of our traditional fare often runs much deeper than taste.

Not only is food vital to our cultures, but it’s incredibly important to social experiences as well. Whether it’s family-style sit-down dinners where everyone talks about their day, waiting in line at the local greasy spoon with friends after class, or secretly trading snacks in elementary school despite strict allergy rules, eating is a major social activity. In fact, the first social experience many people engage in is being breastfed by their mother, an activity that enhances cognitive development and emotional interactions between a mother and their baby.

Most cultures aren’t predisposed to think about their food in monolithic terms, though the manner in which they eat is also extremely telling. In India, it can be common to eat with your hands, perhaps to personally mix your food to fit your precise taste. In Japan, it’s customary to slurp noodle soup as loud as possible because it shows enjoyment and enhances the flavours of the soup you consume. In South Korea, when you’re served food or drink, it’s normal to hold

your dish or glass with two hands to be polite.

Because Canadians usually eat at least three times a day, it’s no wonder that culinary habits passed onto us are often the last vestiges of our cultures that remain while others fade away.

Most of my good memories are surrounded by food. While I could deem it the single greatest unifier of cultures, I’d go even further — food inherently is culture, and it’s something that defines us wherever we go.

I feel it when I read the English muffin recipe that I used with my ex-girlfriend during our lunch breaks in high school.

I feel it when I stop by the European market from where a former coworker introduced me to apple mint Tymbark and plum-filled paczki.

I felt it when an old friend brought over a slice of coffee cake — the same kind that they had made for me the first time we met.

In all these moments — and in all moments, in general — food is culture. Food is love. Food is a memory. Whether I’m cooking, eating, or sharing my meals, they will always mean something to me.

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ARTS & CULTURE

Why do we leave milk and cookies out for Santa?

There’s more than just one cookie crumb trail that leads to the answer Alexa DiFrancesco Arts & Culture Editor

I was born to a carefree atheist father and a strict Catholic mother. Given these dynamics, December 24 was somewhat of a compromise — my mid afternoon consisted of arriving three hours early to mass service to observe the rosary, while my evening was occupied by watching older uncles get drunk from drinking too much wine at Christmas dinner.

To other practicing Catholics, the chaos of this schedule might seem typical. The end of each

neighborhood, perhaps I’d be given a better gift than I would have otherwise received.

My father works for Mondelez International, a confectionery, food, and beverage company.

Some of their most recognizable brands are Oreo, Chips Ahoy, and Cadbury. Adjacent to their Scarborough bakery is a gift shop that sells newly made treats to visiting customers.

During the holiday season — when the factory made more treats than could be sold and shipped to other locations — my father hauled human-sized cardboard boxes of treats home from work. Eagerly, my brother and I made

Saint Nicholas, a fourth-century Christian bishop who raised money for the poor and the sick by selling his personal items.

One year on December 6, Dutch immigrants held a feast in Saint Nicholas’ honour. Unable to stay awake for the celebration, children would instead leave treats for Saint Nicholas and his attendants, who travelled a long distance to be there, and awakened to discover their kindness had been exchanged for presents in the night.

As the Protestant Reformation spread across Europe, this ceremony started to be considered excessive. In order to continue honouring Saint Nicholas, the feast was delayed until Christmas.

Eventually, the tradition of leaving treats for travellers soon transformed into the practice of leaving cookies for Santa Claus.

The Great Depression Some also believe that leaving milk and cookies for Santa Claus originated as an American holiday tradition in the 1930s, during the Great

Christmas Eve, they leave carrots and hay to fuel these animals.

Germany’s paradise tree Another theory of the milk and cookie tradition is that it corresponds to the history of the Christmas tree. The main prop of a popular medieval play about the biblical figures Adam and Eve was a “paradise tree” — a fir tree from which apples hung, which represented the Garden of Eden.

Germans set up a paradise tree in their houses on December 24 to mark the religious feast day of Adam and Eve. On their trees, they hung wafers — symbolic of the eucharist, a Christian sign of redemption. As years passed, the wafers were replaced by cookies and apples.

By the sixteenth century, the paradise tree had merged with Christian traditions to create the version of the Christmas tree that we know today. However, as Christmas tree decorations modernized, the idea of leaving snacks for Santa remained crucial to the celebration.

Leaving cookies and milk for Santa is a widelyknown tradition, but few know how it started.

COURTESY OF RODRIGO ARGENTON/CC WIKIMEDIA

calendar year was regularly accompanied by the challenge to indulge in Western Christmas traditions, while, in the words of my mother, “Remembering to thank God for all that he’s given you this year.”

However, the observance of Christmas as a Christian holiday is slowly diminishing. A 2019 survey by the Angus Reid Institute found that 92 per cent of Canadians planned to celebrate Christmas that year. At the same time, only 10 per cent regarded the holiday to be primarily a religious celebration. Considering these findings, it’s fair to assume that Canadians of all religious beliefs will incorporate Christmas into their holiday plans this year, with activities such as setting up a tree and hanging stockings over the fireplace.

As a child, my favourite memory of Christmas was the surge in anticipation I felt when leaving milk and cookies on the mantle. Like many children worldwide, I believed that Santa Claus — an elderly man in a red suit who was carried in a sleigh by flying reindeers — would arrive at my home and leave me a gift for good behaviour in the previous year. To some degree, I was convinced that if I left the tastiest cookies in my

numerous trips to his car, dragging the packages up our front porch steps to unbox them. This tradition lives on today — I write this article with the bright yellow packaging of a Mallomars box lying across my desk.

After putting aside treats for friends and family, my brother and I tore into our remaining stash and scattered it across our fireplace mantle to give to Santa. We then poured three glasses of milk into large cups — my brother drank goat’s milk, I drank two per cent, and my parents drank skim — and placed them hastily near our Christmas tree. Needless to say, my parents’ cleanup job must have been dreadful.

Though years have passed since my family has been participating in this tradition, I imagine that the shared excitement of it is unchanged.

So, as children worldwide delightedly prepare their offerings to Santa, I examined how this custom came to be.

Feast of Saint Nicholas If you come from a Catholic family that’s a fraction as religious as mine, you’ve probably heard of this theory numerous times. It involves

Depression. During that time of economic hardship, parents tried to teach their children to give to others and to show gratitude for the gifts they received at Christmastime.

In an article for The New Yorker, author Jon Michuad notes that chocolate chip cookies were invented during the same time period. Although chocolate was in short supply, women were encouraged to bake chocolate chip cookies to send to their enlisted husbands overseas. This practice eventually translated into the holiday season.

Norse mythology Norse mythology includes the body of myths of the North Scandinavian peoples, which stems from Norse paganism. Odin, the most important Norse god, was described as owning an eightlegged horse named Sleipner, which he rode with a raven perched on each of his shoulders.

During the Yule season, children left food out for Sleipner, in the hopes that Odin would stop by during travelling to leave gifts in return. This tradition continues today in many European countries, where children believe that horses carry Santa’s sleigh instead of reindeers. On

While the true history behind leaving treats for Santa Claus may remain unknown, different countries have spun the practice to create their own Christmas Eve traditions. In Argentina, children leave their shoes outside their front doors with the hopes of finding them filled with presents in the morning. They also leave out water and hay for Santa’s reindeer. German children write letters to Christkind, a gift-bearing angel that represents the Spirit of Christmas. In Sweden, gifts are delivered by Tomte — “the Gnome” — for whom children leave a cup of coffee. Australians offer cookies for Santa alongside a glass of beer.

While I’m not yet ready to say goodbye to my father’s colossal boxes of cookies this year — my mother unsuccessfully attempted to give them away to coworkers — I’ll be saving my parents the hassle of cleaning the ripped cardboard of cookie boxes from under our fireplace.

To replicate that Christmas spirit, I’ll be passing on the tradition of milk and cookies to my niece. I recently stocked up on Lucky Charms-flavoured cookie dough, and will be spending Christmas Eve introducing her to Santa and having a sugary food fight.

Science

December 6, 2021 thevarsity.ca/section/science science@thevarsity.ca

Should we take nutritional ‘facts’ with a grain of salt?

The challenge of communicating food-related facts and risks Food research isn’t as cut and dry as it may seem.

COURTESY OF KATIE SMITH/CC UNSPLASH

Shankeri Vijayakumar Varsity Contributor

Science is constantly shaping how we attribute risk to certain activities, our food consumption, our use of medications, and much more. The science around human health is constantly evolving as our understanding of research and science changes.

It’s important to keep up with the many areas of science that are evolving, especially those that relate to human health. We want to understand how the findings of the latest research can impact human health, but our changing information landscape may lead consumers to misconstrue the facts.

It may seem like every type of food is related to a health risk or a negative health outcome. Every so often, new studies, articles, and the media claim that there is a new risk with eating a certain type of food.

This can lead to confusion and fear about what eating certain foods may do to people’s health.

Some ‘scientific studies’ have made people fear that the overconsumption of coffee might lead to a heart attack, eating bacon is as dangerous as cigarettes, dairy products will clog arteries and lead to heart disease, and so on. While some of these individual claims are untrue, speaking about food-related risks is much more complicated than any one statement.

The information ecosystem The likelihood of experiencing negative health effects from eating foods regularly associated with health risks tends to be relatively low.For example, the World Health Organization announced in 2015 that evidence strongly indicates that eating bacon and other processed meats can contribute to colorectal cancer.

However, Cancer Research UK wrote that the risk of developing colorectal cancer is relatively rare. For people that rarely eat meat, there is a 5.6 per cent risk of developing the disease, and for frequent meat eaters, the risk rises to about 6.6 per cent. Therefore, while eating processed meats has risks associated with it, giving up these foods completely and opting for ‘healthier’ options may not lead to much change in your health either.

Breaking down bits of data from nutritional studies and accurately contextualizing them when they’re used in media can provide more insight into the relative risks of consuming certain foods. So why do we see a lot of hype about food-related health risks in the media? In an era when many online media publications are driven by clicks for

articles, website page traffic, and social media engagement, attention-grabbing and misleading headlines are unfortunately too common.

In the age of the ‘infodemic’ — a rapid and far-reaching spread of accurate and inaccurate information — it is vital to responsibly report information and statistical data. Information can easily become convoluted, intentionally or unintentionally.

A major risk with improper representation of and reporting on food-related risks arises when information enters the realm of the internet and social media. Research has found that false information can spread faster than accurate information on Twitter. When misinformation is so prevalent, especially as it relates to health information, reporting accurate statistics and information related to human health is paramount.

Reporting on the findings of nutritional studies responsibly requires looking at how strong a given correlation is. However, there is not always a strong incentive to do so — if the media did report statistics with appropriate context and report the statistical data meaningfully, would these be understood by the average reader?

Reporting statistical data Many foods are associated with health risks, but statistical literacy plays a vital role in reporting these risks meaningfully and ensuring that they are understood accurately by readers.

Many publications run into the pitfall of assuming that the correlation between certain foods and negative health outcomes is causal. Conflating correlation and causation with nutritional research findings can take findings about health risks out of context. When nutritional research finds that a certain food is associated with a negative health outcome, it means that people might be at an elevated risk of developing that outcome, not that eating that food will necessarily lead to a given individual developing that negative outcome.

There is also the grey area of statistical significance. Statistical significance indicates that there is evidence to conclude that the observed relationship is not simply chance and that it exists significantly in the population. However, this still does not address causality. While statistical significance is deeply ingrained in scientific research, many researchers and statisticians are calling for scientists to abandon its widespread use.

The calls to drop the use of statistical significance are not asking that this tool be done away with completely, but saying that it should not be used as a catchall measurement of significance.

Using an arbitrary numerical threshold to decide whether hypotheses are accepted or rejected also determines which studies are published and how information is marketed, especially as it relates to products and consuming foods. Using an arbitrary value as a determinant of what is true can lead to research being biased and important observations being overlooked.

study results. Marion Nestle, a nutrition professor at New York University, tracked studies funded by food and beverage companies and trade groups in 2015 and found that 168 nutrition studies were funded by these groups. Nestle found that 156 of those studies contained biased results that favoured the interests of the food manufacturers funding those studies.

Nutritional studies It is also important to consider the accuracy of the source of the nutritional facts reported in the media. Unfortunately, nutrition research and the methodologies used to explore related questions are not immune to flaws.

While randomized controlled trials (RCTs) are considered the gold standard in scientific research, they can be unrealistic for exploring nutrition questions. First and foremost, carrying out long-term RCTs is expensive. It is also difficult for researchers to ensure that participants in the experiment or control group are following their assigned diets. RCTs might be more feasible for assessing short-term outcomes related to specific foods or diets, but this can lead to gaps in knowledge on the long-term health effects. At this point, researchers are relegated to inferring these impacts based on the short-term data.

Observational studies are another common study design in nutrition research and have been valuable for learning about health-related risks for things like smoking. They can run for many years and track a large number of people, but, unlike RCTs, they are not controlled, which can lead to observations being influenced by confounding factors or external variables.

Conflicts of interest are also a major issue in nutrition research, as food manufacturers can be involved in funding nutrition research studies. Have you heard of the conspiracy theory that the sugar industry wanted to implicate saturated fats as the cause for heart disease instead of sugars so they paid scientists?

Well, this is actually a true story. In 1965, the Sugar Research Foundation funded research on coronary heart disease. This led to a literature review published in the New England Journal of Medicine that focused on fat and cholesterol as the dietary causes for coronary heart disease and downplayed the consumption of sugar as a risk factor.

This is unfortunately not an isolated incident in nutrition research. This pattern has led to many studies investigating these conflicts of interest, which has found that research funded by food manufacturers often produces more favourable

The role of science communication It may seem like a challenge to know what to believe about food-related risks, but there are ways to accurately talk about food-related health risks meaningfully and without sensationalizing new discoveries. Good science communication is important in ensuring nutrition research findings are reported accurately and appropriately.

When reporting on research findings from nutrition studies, it is important to evaluate who is funding the study to discern potential conflicts of interest. Consumers of information also need to be comfortable with the changing information landscape.

Science is always evolving — which is a good thing, because it means that we are learning and hopefully adapting to new information accordingly.

However, we should exercise caution before latching on to new discoveries on food-related health risks. When it comes to emerging findings, it can be helpful to look at the accumulated information and what is already known in that area.

Rather than reporting a food-related health risk based on a single study, looking at multiple studies or systematic reviews and meta-analyses can help to talk about risks meaningfully.

When reporting on food-related health risks, writers should include information on the study population and the context that these risks were extrapolated from. Context is important because food and diets will not impact everyone in the same way. If research is conducted on a nonrepresentative sample, the reporting of these findings needs to reflect this. Contextualizing who these findings may apply to and being careful with how they are generalized are important to ensure nutritional studies are not taken out of context.

Science and research is complex, but this complexity shouldn’t detract people from pursuing complex questions and talking about exciting new findings. This should encourage the people involved in conducting research and communicating scientific findings to be empowered to critically analyze research methods and sources of information, and strengthen how we conduct research and communicate science.

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THE VARSITY

science@thevarsity.ca

SCIENCE

How food engineering benefits people’s health around the world

Diosady suggested a couple of ways to overcome this problem. Public education may promote the healthy benefits of fortified salt, especially in pregnant and lactating women. If breakthroughs on how to overcome the misconception are unsuccessful, then further chemical developments will be needed to overcome the challenge of colouration.

U of T researcher offers solutions to end nutritional deficiencies through fortified foods Angel Hsieh Associate Science Editor

Have you ever noticed the word “fortified” on your milk labels? It’s not just milk that needs fortification. In simple terms, food fortification means the addition of micronutrients — vitamins, minerals, or amino acids — to increase an item of food’s nutritional value. The Canadian Food Inspection Agency has an extensive list of foods subject to mandatory food fortification. Due to the prevalence of vitamin D deficiency in Canadians, for example, most dairy products are required to have vitamin D added synthetically.

Deficiency in micronutrients is a chronic health problem widely seen in developing countries. U of T researchers have developed techniques to

potential maternal and infant deaths.

NI has dedicated several projects and initiatives to alleviate these health problems. One of these projects took place in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, where more than 50 million locals were put on diets with fortified salt. Remarkably, one year later, 20 per cent of women showed improvement in their iron levels.

Right across the Indian peninsula, 5.5 million school children in Tamil Nadu were provided with lunch cooked using double fortified salt for a decade. Positive results were seen in eight months, and around a third of school children from ages six to 12 were cured of anemia.

Salts as a fortification vehicle Dietary salt is an ideal medium for food fortification

core ingredient like salt is surrounded by a coating of special materials — the micronutrients — to create small capsules of a wide range of sizes.

Microencapsulation is used because micronutrients can interact with each other. Iron is known to interact and destroy iodine compounds, and B vitamins can react with ambient particles. Air molecules, UV light, and heat are some other factors that may damage or alter micronutrients.

The microencapsulation processes in Diosady’s lab have successfully stabilized all micronutrients tested so far. Added layers of protection ensure the safety of fortified salts.

Spray painting at microscopic scale Diosady’s lab makes premixes that are the size of a grain of salt — less than half of a millimetre in

Global upscaling of food fortification practices Diosady said that the main challenge, as of now, is to establish universal standards for food regulation. For safety, the exact overdose or toxicity threshold of various micronutrients must be accurate. Strict manufacturing definitions are also critical to ensure consumer safety.

Such standards may include required chemical stability for specific micronutrients. Significant progress has been made in India, as the national government is quite open to create legislation in accordance with latest scientific research. Indian policymakers have successfully incorporated proper fortified food label requirements, safety dosage of micronutrients, and more into their policies.

There is a push for the Tanzanian government

Contrary to popular belief, adding chemicals to foods can increase their health benefits.

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incorporate micronutrients into food staples such as salt and oil through innovation in the field of food fortification. The Varsity spoke to Professor Levente L. Diosady from the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering about the progress being made by his ongoing research on the subject, which he’s conducting at the Department of Chemical Engineering & Applied Chemistry.

Applications of food fortification technology For more than 40 years, under the leadership of former president Venkatesh Mannar, Nutrition International (NI) — formerly known as The Micronutrient Initiative — has been at the front line of the battle against the debilitating problem of nutrient deficiency for people in need around the world. Mannar first approached Diosady with the idea of fortifying salt with iron and iodine in the early 1990s, which is how this research interest initiative took off at U of T. To frame the prevalence of nutritional deficiencies, Diosady pointed out that “roughly one person in three in the world is short of micronutrients.” This phenomenon is especially prominent in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. In India, roughly 54 per cent of women are affected by anemia — iron deficiency — to the degree of

since it is an important part of our diet. “Everybody has to eat salt,” Diosady said.

A large percentage of people living in developing countries do not buy manufactured products from grocery stores — instead of buying bread or flour, they make their own. Therefore, salt reaches rural populations much more effectively than fortified processed foods.

Due to their high solubility in water, this line of investigation focuses on water-soluble micronutrients including, but not limited to, various B vitamins, iron, and zinc. Fortified salts are expected to dissolve during food preparation and release their micronutrients.

Diosady elaborated more on the chemistry of fortified salts. One of the downsides of salt is that it is an aggressive chemical — for instance, Diosady brought the example of how salt on roads and sidewalks in the winter accelerates the deterioration and rotting of cars.

In response to this chemical property, the research team is finding strategies to make sure that the micronutrients on the solid salt crystalline are safely preserved and retained until consumption.

Diosady deployed a technique called ‘microencapsulation’ as a protection for fortified salts. Microencapsulation is a process in which an active

diameter — with water-repellent and colour-masking coating, since salt is soluble in water. Additionally, salt fortified with folic acid gives the final product a tint of yellow, which is the reason for this colour masking. These premixes are made to be put into salt. The ideal product will have these particles of micronutrients integrated in the salt particles.

Most commercial salts in the world are iodized.

The way that the salt-fortifying technology works resembles spray painting. First, iodine compounds — specifically, potassium iodate — are dissolved in water. After spraying the solution onto salt, the salt is left to dry. Iodized salt is then ready to be consumed.

Fortunately, researchers found that the same process also works on folic acids, which can be stabilized alongside iodine in the spraying solution. This discovery opens up the option of easily producing double-fortified salts. One disadvantage, however, is that folic acid tends to tint the salt grains with a yellowish colour.

The change in colour is even more prominent for salt that has been fortified by getting sprayed with a solution containing vitamin B12. The bright pink hue is something that “looks absolutely gorgeous, but it doesn’t look like something you want to put on food,” Diosady joked.

to mandate iron food fortification. Mannar, a long-time friend of Diosady, is currently working with some Tanzanian ministry officials on the need for food fortification, putting an emphasis on its medical justifications.

Complications to this campaigning arise when targeted countries are experiencing political or military instability. Ethiopia’s civil conflicts are blocking the implementation of food fortification technology that would improve the health of Ethiopians. Diosady must revise his research proposals to match the state of affairs of countries of interest.

Despite present obstacles, there are reasons for optimism. Mannar has a collection of international and local contacts to promote the use of food fortification. “I don’t think there’s a country in the world where [Mannar] hasn’t been,” said Diosady, reinforcing the point that their research holds great potential for global upscaling.

In the near future, Diosady hopes to formulate premixes that can put five different micronutrients on salt at the same time. These projects have attracted numerous influential sponsors, such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, who are interested in providing funds toward research and global engagements.

thevarsity.ca/section/science Mehrshad Babaei Associate Science Editor

Throughout history, at the precipice of the human mind, we’ve come to consider the burden of existence, the meaning of life, our purpose — and, recently, surviving a full course load online. Besides ‘How do I get off TikTok and finish this paper?’ mankind’s ultimate, most instinctive question has always been what we will eat next.

Some of us grew up familiar with the notion that proper nutrition and healthy foods directly benefit our physical well-being in many ways. When we think of this association, we typically consider weight gain or loss and its contribution to or prevention of diseases like heart disease, diabetes, and even cancers. However, something that is not always a topic of discussion is the impact of diet on our mental health and how different foods affect who we are on a daily basis.

In addition to intervention strategies that are already in use, researchers have been looking for more ways to reduce the impact of mental illnesses like depression and anxiety. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), depression could be “the largest contributor to disease burden” by the next decade. In fact, the WHO reported depression as the leading cause of illness and disability worldwide in 2017.

Studying the impact of nutrition on mental health has caused researchers to look specifically at the role of diet in the prevention and treatment of mental illness.

How does diet affect mental illness?

In 2017, a research article reviewing 21 studies from 10 countries assessed the link between different dietary patterns and risks of depression.

The review found that a diet characterized by “high intakes of fruit, vegetables, whole grain, fish, olive oil, low-fat dairy and antioxidants and low intakes of animal foods” is associated with a decreased risk of depression. On the other hand, a ‘western-style diet’ — characterized by “high consumption of red and/or processed meat, refined grains, sweets, high-fat dairy products, butter, potatoes and high-fat gravy, and low intakes of fruits and vegetables” — was found to be associated with an increased risk of depression.

DECEMBER 6, 2021

Can a good diet help prevent mental illness?

The emerging field of nutritional psychiatry suggests our diet can affect our brain

ANDREA ZHAO/THEVARSITY

Additionally, a recent study in 2019 found that a dietary pattern consisting of saturated fat and added sugars was associated with higher levels of anxiety in adults aged 50 years and above.

However, such findings regarding mental health are not exclusive to adults.

Another 2019 research article reviewing 56 studies found a link between nutrition and depression in adolescents. The authors highlighted that foods such as olive oil, fish, nuts, legumes, dairy products, fruits, and vegetables are “inversely associated with the risk of depression and might also improve symptoms.”

Can healthy nutrition help with treatment of mental illness?

The SMILES trial, a randomized controlled trial (RCT) study published in 2017, assessed the role of diet in treating major depression. The study spanned 12 weeks with 67 individuals who had moderate or

severe depression. The authors note that it is the first RCT “to explicitly seek to answer the question: If I improve my diet, will my mental health improve?”

Individuals were either placed in the intervention group or the control group. Those in the intervention group received nutritional counselling by a clinical dietitian, whereas individuals in the control group received social support, in addition to any preexisting treatment.

Dietary support for the intervention group emphasized higher consumption of whole grains, vegetables, fruits, legumes, as well as other previously identified ‘healthy’ foods like fish and olive oil, with moderate levels of meat and reduced intake of processed foods, fast food, and sugary drinks.

By the end of the trial, the researchers found those who received dietary support had “significantly greater improvements” in symptoms of depression. In fact, 32 per cent of those in the intervention group saw a reduction in their

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symptoms, compared to the eight per cent in the control group.

The results of this study certainly provide a gateway to the implementation — or at least consideration — of therapies involving diet. With that, however, there remains great room for solidifying these findings. As the researchers put it, replication, along with larger and long-term studies are necessary in this new field of ‘nutritional psychiatry research.’

A review article analyzing 16 RTCs found dietary interventions helpful in significantly reducing depressive symptoms, but no effects were observed for symptoms of anxiety.

The takeaway Overall, observational studies have identified a link between food intake and mental health.

While there is no conclusive explanation as to exactly how nutrition plays a role, researchers have noted some possibilities. For one thing, the role of inflammation in depression has been well established, and dietary strategies to reduce mental health symptoms include foods like fruits and vegetables, which possess anti-inflammatory properties.

Another explanation could be the link between gut health and brain health. Ongoing research has established a strong relationship between a healthy gut and healthy brain function. In fact, a recent review article of 26 studies, published in 2020, highlights the potential association between maintaining a healthy, diverse microbiome through proper nutrition — or otherwise supporting the good bacteria in our gut — and decreasing depression and anxiety symptoms.

Ultimately, an important aspect of tackling therapeutic and preventative strategies for mental health concerns with diet is keeping in mind the many contributing factors at play, like trauma, genetics, and even socioeconomic factors such as having access to healthy foods in the first place.

While there is a lot more research to be done, science currently gives us this food for thought: no matter how big or small the influence, our dietary choices matter. Food may be a small piece of the complex puzzle that is mental health, but its role still gives us something to chew on.

The bias against women professionals in medical referrals Bias leads to gender wage gaps, longer wait times for patients in need of care Christina Lam Varsity Contributor

A recent paper found that men physicians in Ontario display preferences for men surgeons when making referrals. The study was conducted by Dr. Fahima Dossa, a general surgery resident at U of T, under the supervision of Dr. Nancy Baxter, a surgeon at St. Michael’s hospital.

After analyzing over 40 million referrals made to surgeons in Ontario between 1997–2016, Fossa found that, 32 per cent of the time, men physicians have the tendency to make same-sex referrals.

Women physicians only make same-sex referrals 1.6 per cent of the time.

It was previously thought that the gender wage gap in medicine was partially perpetuated by women choosing lower-paid specialties because of lifestyle choices. Dossa’s results defy that belief by showing that active bias against women surgeons exists even in Ontario’s fee-for-service system.

A persistent gender pay gap Gender-based wage gaps in medicine are wellrecorded in Canada and other countries. Despite a significant increase in the number of women physicians, the gender wage gap persists and, in some cases, is expected to widen over time. A study from the United States found that men physicians earned 16.3 per cent more than their women counterparts between 1996 and 2000. This disparity jumped to 25.3 per cent from 2006–2010.

In Canada, the number of women physicians has risen exponentially in the last 50 years. Women now make up 40.6 per cent of all physicians, with 54 per cent under the age of 40. Similarly, the majority of medical students in most schools are women.

Despite improvements in representation, there continues to be a wage gap between men and

Patients are more likely to be referred to men surgeons across the board.

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women physicians in Ontario, even after adjusting for factors such as geography and specialties.

Excuses for this disparity include ‘hidden curricula’ in medical schools that discourages women from choosing lucrative specialties like surgery, and the fact that women work fewer hours than men within those specialties. However, this disparity in earnings persists even when women are in the same fields as men and working the same hours, because of the structural bias in medicine.

Ontario’s fee-for-service system Dossa believes that there are other factors at play here. In 2019, she published a paper stating that even though Ontario operates on a fee-for-service system, women surgeons still earn 24 per cent less than men surgeons on an hourly basis.

In that paper, Dossa found that women surgeons receive fewer opportunities to perform more lucrative procedures than men surgeons, a fact that intrigued

her. “As procedures become more lucrative, you see fewer and fewer female surgeons performing those procedures,” said Dossa in an interview with The Varsity. “I don’t think that that’s a coincidence. I don’t think that women in surgery specifically decide that they are going to do the procedures that pay the least amount of money,” she explained.

Considering that patients require referrals to see specialists in Ontario, Dossa saw the potential for bias against women surgeons in that process and set out to investigate it. Her study found that, after adjusting for patients’ and surgeons’ characteristics, the gender of the referring physician played a strong role in the number of referrals a surgeon receives.

Although men surgeons account for 77.5 per cent of the total number of surgeons in the province, they received 87.1 per cent of referrals from men physicians and 79.3 per cent from women physicians.

The data revealed that all physicians, irrespective of their gender identity, refer more people to men

surgeons. However, men physicians display much greater bias than their women counterparts. This bias was most apparent in specialties with more women surgeons and does not taper off over time ,according to Fossa’s calculations. This implies that increasing representation of women might not be enough to reduce the gendered wage gap in surgery.

Fossa found this fact particularly alarming. “Not only is [an increase in] representation not enough to fix the problem, we actually have a signal that [it] would create a representation of women where the problem may actually worsen,” she said. She still thinks that it is important to encourage more women to enter the field of surgery, but a more lasting solution would be to change the referral process altogether.

The referral process needs change Fossa proposes a centralized system where a referral is forwarded to a group of surgeons instead of a particular individual. Patients can then be assigned to the surgeon with the earliest availability, effectively removing any bias that a referring physician might have against women surgeons.

This would not only provide women surgeons with more opportunities, it would also improve patients’ care. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, there is “a huge backlog of surgical procedures that have been delayed because of our healthcare system being overwhelmed,” Fossa said. She noted that, if many physicians are referring patients to the same few men surgeons, many capable and available women surgeons will end up being underutilized.

While her work is the first to look at referral bias in medicine, Fossa believes that we are past the stage of data generation. “Although data is helpful, I think the next step — at least for me — is to translate this into policy change. How can we use the data that we’ve generated to actually fix the problem?”

Healthy sweets for the holidays These recipes from Instagram are sure to spice up your winter break Audrey Miatello Associate Sports Editor

Now that classes are coming to an end and the winter break is approaching, you might find that you have more free time in your schedule.

Whether you’re an experienced chef or a beginner, why not fill that spare time with baking?

These recipes are fun, simple, and will surely get you in the holiday spirit! Whether you’re a gym-goer hoping to satisfy your sweet tooth or a student who just wants to experiment over the break, The Varsity is here to sweeten your time off.

Gluten-free chocolate protein peppermint oats by @basicswithbails Whole grain oats are a great source of fiber, phosphorus, and magnesium, and have even been shown to help prevent heart disease. In this recipe, you will also add protein powder to your oats. Protein is an important part of any diet — your immune system requires it, and it keeps your heart and brain in running order. Protein is also useful for athletes looking to build muscle.

Thank you to @basicswithbails on Instagram for this healthy holiday recipe!

Ingredients: • ½ cup gluten-free oats • 1 tablespoon cacao powder • ½ mashed banana • ⅓ cup almond milk

• • • • • •

¼ cup Greek yogurt ¼ teaspoon peppermint extract ½ scoop chocolate protein powder 3–4 melted tablespoons white chocolate chips 1 teaspoon coconut oil 1–2 crushed candy canes

Directions: 1. Combine the first seven ingredients in a bowl and mix thoroughly.

2. Leave the mixture in the refrigerator for at least two hours.

3. Once it has finished chilling, melt the chocolate chips and coconut oil.

4. Next, cover the oats with the chocolate mixture, and decorate the top with crushed candy canes.

5. Finally, place your dessert in the freezer for 10 minutes to let the chocolate harden. Bon appétit!

Matcha shortbread cookies by @keepupwithliv Matcha, famous for its bright green colour, is a type of tea. But it can also be used in desserts like these festive cookies. Matcha has a high antioxidant count, which helps protect your body’s cells from damage. It has also been linked to better liver and heart health. This recipe comes from @keepupwithliv on Instagram!

Ingredients: • ⅓ cup cassava flour • ¼ cup almond flour • 3 tablespoons melted coconut oil • ¼ cup maple syrup • 2 teaspoons vanilla • 1 tablespoon matcha • Crushed candy canes Directions: 1. Start by preheating the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.Combine the first six ingredients in a bowl and mix well.

2. Next, flour the surface and a rolling pin to ensure that the dough does not stick.

3. Carefully roll out the dough and use cookie cutters to shape your cookies.

4. Place the cookies on a baking sheet and sprinkle them with the crushed candy canes.

5. Finally, place the baking sheet in the preheated oven for 10 to 12 minutes.

Gingerbread loaf cake by @sunnysrecipes Eating too much refined sugar can lead to a variety of health problems. Luckily, there are many alternatives that can be used in its place. Although this recipe does call for some brown sugar, the banana and maple syrup sugar substitutions are critical in reducing the total amount of refined sugar needed. What’s more, maple syrup contains important antioxidants, and bananas are filled with potassium. This recipe comes from @sunnysrecipes on Instagram!

• • • • • • •

2 eggs ¾ cup milk 2 cups flour 1 teaspoon baking powder 1 teaspoon baking soda 2 teaspoons ginger powder 1 teaspoon cinnamon

Directions: 1. Begin by preheating the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit. Combine the first six ingredients in a bowl.

2. Pour the dry ingredients into the mixture. Make sure to stir the batter until all the ingredients are mixed, but be wary of overmixing.

3. Line a loaf pan with parchment paper so that the batter does not stick to the pan. Or, to be more environmentally friendly, just butter or oil your pan and avoid single-use papers.

4. Pour the batter into the pan and spread it out evenly.

5. Bake the loaf in the preheated oven for 45 to 55 minutes.

6. To tell if the cake is done, insert a toothpick into the middle of it, and check to see if it comes out dry.

7. After the loaf is cooked, let it cool, and give it a taste!

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Sports

December 6, 2021 thevarsity.ca/section/sports sports@thevarsity.ca

Ingredients: • 2 mashed bananas (alternatively, you can use ½ cup of applesauce) • ⅓ cup brown sugar • ⅓ cup maple syrup • ⅓ cup melted coconut oil

How I conquered my fear of ramen through physical activity If the 80/20 rule doesn’t work for your bowels, try exercise Alexa DiFrancesco Arts & Culture Editor

Two weeks ago, I eagerly linked arms with friends and chose a booth at Toronto’s Robo Sushi restaurant. We entered at 6:00 pm and were awaiting our first meal of the day; we watched eagerly as miniature, robotic creatures roamed the space to serve plates of sushi to nearby tabletops.

As we passed the futuristic menu to one another — a menu that was showcased on an iPad — our anticipation grew.

When the iPad was passed to me, I squinted at each section and carefully selected my favourites.

Miso soup. Shrimp dumpling. Salmon pizza. Swipe after swipe, the menu’s categories meshed into one another, and I — in the gleeful, irresponsible fashion of a typical 20-year-old — forgot about my choices.

That is, I forgot about them until I stumbled across one alarming word: noodle. Abruptly, I dropped the iPad and ignored my friend’s protests that I hadn’t finished reading the menu.

“My stomach doesn’t react well to noodles,” I explained sheepishly, omitting the fact that it was the item I most loved. If I were to indulge in my desires, I could only imagine the abdominal cramps that would follow the gruesome period of constipation they’d cause.

There was a long pause before a friend nodded.

“I’m lactose intolerant,” he muttered. “I’m familiar with that kind of pain.”

Early childhood constipation As a child, I suffered from constipation. The average frequency of emptying one’s bowels is described to range from three times a day to once every three days; sometimes, I was lucky enough to squeeze in the act once every three weeks. These extended periods of defecation drought would end usually with a night of agony. If you’ve stumbled across a meme about crying on the toilet, just imagine that — except the pain wouldn’t subside for hours.

Despite my bodily struggles, I knew that I

wasn’t solely to blame for my anguish; part of the responsibility fell on my family history. In the midst of my crying spurts, my mother would often describe how her doctor regularly prescribed her laxatives in her youth, in response to which my grandfather would threaten to increase her vegetable intake.

I’m sure you’ve heard the statement that food affects your poop — after all, your diet makes up its composition. Feces is primarily a collection of water, fat, bile, undigested food, mucus, inorganic salts, and dead bacteria. This is why specific

body is also why the ‘80/20’ rule is sometimes recommended. The rule dictates that one eats nutritious food for eighty per cent of their meals, and consume whatever they please for the remaining 20 per cent.

So, like many would, my mother recommended I eat healthier and wait for results. Out of desperation, I did; I eliminated processed foods such as instant noodles from my diet altogether.

But, to my dismay, this advice didn’t work, and I was back to the drawing board.

Exercise helped me find peace within my digestive system.

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components of food are often recommended to patients who have trouble with emptying their bodies — for example, fibre isn’t digested, so it moves to the colon to be expelled and can help with bowel movement.

The impact healthy eating has on one’s

Creating an exercise routine Growing up, I was never active. Instead, I was that kid who frequently discussed menstruating with their cisgender, male gym teacher in order to skip running laps every month. I wasn’t proud

of my habits — so, true to the common “self improvement during a pandemic” tune, I decided to begin exercising.

My mother joined me on my venture, which consisted of a daily walking routine. I adapted to this game plan well — but I noticed that in the middle of my hobby, I would often feel an instant prodding to empty my bowels.

If this feeling seems ordinary to you, congratulations! You probably use the bathroom at a normal rate. I, on the other hand, had lived with unhealthy bowel functions for such a long time that I assumed my body’s schedule was normal. So, in the first week or so of regaining healthy habits, I thought that I was severely ill.

Nevertheless, as COVID-19 ruthlessly persisted, so did my walks. Soon, my mother and I had evolved from a 15-minute neighbourhood stroll to two-hour-long hikes. Throughout this process, I noticed that I was becoming physically healthier — my stomach hurt less frequently, and my body was no longer bloated. Soon, I began consistently increasing the intensity of my exercises through YouTube workout videos. If you’re looking for an intense instructor, I recommend Pamela Rief.

For anyone aching to know the science behind my miraculous transformation, the best I know is this: physical activity can regulate bowel movements. Exercise has been proven to quicken digestive processes and increase muscle contractions in the colon, which helps move stools more regularly. I also know that the Canadian Digestive Health Federation recommends a minimum of 30 minutes of physical activity, five times a week.

If you’re looking for an emotional, humanistic sign to exercise, know this: before exercising, I watched as friends ate ramen for every meal on their Snapchat stories and cried in envy. Now I too can enjoy the meal periodically, because I know I’ll be able to empty my waste afterwards.

Exercise doesn’t have to be about changing your appearance or building endurance. Instead, you can exercise to snatch an iPad from your friends and order ramen at a sushi restaurant, like I did.

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DECEMBER 6, 2021

How to get shredded like Spider-Man

left leg till both touch the floor and alternate. Do this for 10 reps. If your core doesn’t burn after, you’re not doing it right.

A workout based on your friendly neighborhood hottie

Dumbbell curls In order to do dumbbell curls, place your elbow on your knee, choose a relatively light dumbbell, and curl it till it hits your shoulder. The main focus here should be maintaining good form.

Squeezing your biceps is the main objective here.

Mekhi Quarshie Associate Sports Editor

People say there are three guarantees in life: death, taxes, and Marvel movies grossing over $100 million in box office sales. Well, maybe not the last one, but it still seems to be true. Marvel Studios has been dominant in the filmmaking industry for the past decade and currently includes the highest grossing movie franchise ever.

Its newest movie, Spider-Man: No Way Home, is coming out this month and features Peter Parker struggling with the fact that his secret identity has been exposed. Spider-Man movies are always packed with action, romance — and, lately, Tom Holland’s shirtless brilliance. Ever since he flashed fans with his washboard abs in his second Spider-Man solo movie, Spider-Man: Far From Home, Holland has been respected in the workout community as a true athlete.

The British actor took over the role from Andrew Garfield, and has been a staple in phase three of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. One of the main reasons he got the role of Spider-Man was because of his athletic prowess that came from being a gymnast.

As we get into the holiday season, it’s tempting to bulk up on cookies and junk food galore. In light of that, The Varsity has curated a special workout based on the routines that Holland’s trainers implemented throughout his movies, which will keep both your spidey senses sharp and your fitness on track throughout the winter.

comprised five rounds. The article recommends that you take a 30-second break in between exercises to make sure that you have enough energy to continue. While Ashwell’s exercises differ from the ones listed below, we think they’ll do a great job of keeping you fit during the winter break.

The circuit In an interview with Men’s Journal, Tom Holland’s trainer George Ashwell revealed that he trained Holland through four exercises that each

Running a mile on the treadmill Warming up for a long exercise period on a treadmill burns a decent amount of calories to pair with the muscle gain that the rest of the

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Dips Holland incorporates a lot of dips in his daily weightlifting workout. Usually, to do dips, you need a dip stand, but they can easily be done at home with any two equally leveled surfaces — if you make sure that they are about waist level so you aren’t hitting your feet when you go down — and a little bit of creativity.

To do a dip, you want to put your hands on the parallel bar, jump up, then lower your body by bending your arms and leaning forward; dip down until your shoulders are below your elbows. Then you lift your body by straightening your elbows again.

Dips are great for strengthening your shoulders and chest. If you’re feeling like a superhero, you could even wear a weighted vest to increase the gains and the pain.

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exercises focus on. Ashwell also suggests that mobility movements are good to prime the joints before the intensive workout begins.

Dead bugs After you warm up, the next thing you need to do is get your core involved. The first step is to lie on the floor with both your shoulders and lower back on the floor. Once this is done, lift both your legs so your knees are above your hips and raise your arms high. Lastly, lower your right arm and

Bear crawls This workout is really good for your chest, triceps, biceps, and even your legs. A bear crawl is done by channeling your inner bear, getting on all fours without allowing your knees to touch the ground. It can be done going forward and backward or side to side, and you should do three sets each worth 10 seconds.

There you have it. We won’t promise that you’ll be swinging from buildings if you follow the workout, but it will definitely help you get in shape in no time.

Three sets, 12 reps, 10 songs: How to craft the perfect workout playlist Music is as much a part of gyms as are the weight machines Nidhil Vohra Varsity Contributor

Gym memberships — the Honda Civics of new year resolutions — are a coveted commodity in the twenty-first century. Although everyone works out with different goals in mind, it is safe to say that achieving those goals isn’t always easy. Working out requires time, energy, and accountability, a trifecta which is immensely hard to attain.

However, people often find ways to make the whole process easier. Music is one such aid that can make exercising not feel like an insurmountable task.

Music is as much a part of gyms as the weight machines, the water fountains, and the vending machines that contain ‘healthy snacks,’ which are placed almost as if the establishment isn’t neighboured by a Wendy’s and a Taco Bell. A commonality found in people who work out regularly is the fact that a majority of them don vibrant ear- or headgear to listen to music while working out.

So, the question that arises is this: how do you create the perfect workout playlist that is vibey enough to ensure that you are enjoying yourself, while also being hype enough to double as the metaphorical spotter helping you through that

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almost impossible last rep? Don’t sweat, because The Varsity has compiled some advice for you to construct that perfect workout playlist.

Know your vibe Primarily, you should focus on the artists and genres that you know, like, and appreciate. Discovering new music is indeed a beautiful feeling, but it does not feel the same when you are exerting immense physical force. Listening to music that you aren’t entirely sure you’ll like while working out can also result in headaches or fatigue before you hit your maximum potential. Therefore, the first order of business in making the perfect workout playlist is to figure out what kind of music you can happily listen to over a long period of time.

Beats per minute Creating a workout playlist involves a lot of factors, one important one being that the songs should complement each other. You want to reduce the number of ‘skippable’ songs to a minimum to ensure your focus is on working out and not constantly changing the songs.

If you are aware of the type of workout you are going to engage in, it is advisable to create a playlist that corresponds to the intensity of the

workout. For instance, for heavy lifting exercises, you would want songs with a faster tempo to ensure your mind is constantly stimulated and your body can move to the beat. Although The Beatles arguably have the best discography ever, dead lifting to “With a Little Help from My Friends” would not help you get through your sets. Similarly, engaging in yoga or pilates while blasting “Sicko Mode” could be a major obstacle to your focus.

Create an experience Engaging in the exercise is just one part of working out. People tend to overlook the preceding and succeeding activities, like the determination that it takes to leave one’s house — which is even harder in the cold — sticking to your routine in uncertain times, and finding the energy to carry on after an exhausting set.

Music can help overcome these feelings; not only can one use high-tempo songs to aid the workout but you can also sprinkle in a handful of songs with motivational lyrics that would urge you to take that step toward a healthier lifestyle. These could include songs from artists like J. Cole, Dave, or Eminem. Rachel Platten’s “Fight Song” also does wonders in motivating you to go and get it.

If you’re reading this, turn to Drake Billboard’s Artist of the Decade has an unbelievable range in his discography. Drake has everything in his arsenal, from lyrical rap to soulful R&B to chart-toppers. The man has done it all — which is why his music can prove to be the solution in any given scenario. Over the years, the 6ix God has released many songs which are perfect to hype you up and supply you with instant energy to continue your workout. Some notable ones are “Jumpman,” “What’s Next,” “Nice for What,” and “Energy.”

10-song playlist Here is a quick 10-song workout playlist for highintensity workouts to get you started.

1. “Family Ties” by Baby Keem and Kendrick Lamar 2. “Thiago Silva” by Dave and AJ Tracey 3. “Levitating” by Dua Lipa 4. “Goat” by Diljit Dosanjh 5. “Going Bad” by Meek Mill ft. Drake 6. “Rockstar” by Post Malone ft. 21 Savage 7. “Lucid Dreams” by Juice WRLD 8. “CAMALEÓN” by Belén Aguilera 9. “Immortal” by J. Cole 10. “Power” by Kanye West

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DECEMBER 6, 2021