mcgill daily feb 6 2012
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McGill Daily Feb 6th 2012 "Securtiy"TRANSCRIPT
McGillTHE
DAILY
Volume 101, Issue 30February 6, 2012
mcgilldaily.com
Caught on tape since 1911
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The McGill Daily | Monday, February 6, 2012 | mcgilldaily.comNews 3
L ast Thursday, around 100 students marched from Concordia to Université du
Québec à Montréal (UQAM) to pro-test impending tuition hikes.
Protestors stopped at McGill and Cégep du Vieux Montréal to gather more students. The march was organized by members of the Concordia and McGill Mob Squads.
When the march reached McGill, protestors chanted outside of McLennan library, marched through the Shatner building during the Public Service Career Fair, and outside of the James Administration building. A banner was dropped from the top of the Arts building reading, “même menace, même lutte.”
Escorted by police, the march ended at UQAM, where another banner was hung.
McGill students were notified of the march by an email sent by Associate VP (University Services) Jim Nicell. The email described the march as “peaceful” and promised that “more information will be sent to you when available or as needed.”
Nicell was not available for com-ment on why the administration
deemed the email necessary, less than a week after VP (Administration and Finance) Michael Di Grappa sent an email to all staff and stu-dents warning of a demonstration that never took place.
Largely organized by Concordia students, the demonstration is part of the lead-up to a province-wide dem-onstration against tuition hikes on March 22.
Last month, the Concordia Student Union (CSU) called for a strike vote on March 7.
After CSU called for the vote, Concordia Provost David Graham sent an email to students clarifying the administration’s position on the call for a strike vote.
“Regardless of the outcome of the March 7 vote, Concordia intends to continue operating as usual… The university has a responsibility to provide services that are part of its agreement with our students, even if some of those students decide not to attend class as a form of protest,” the email read.
The CSU isn’t worried about the administration’s response. “There was no backlash against this letter. It was a predictable move. We see it as a posi-tive thing because they are afraid and are trying to pre-empt and prevent [the strike] with fear-mongering,” said CSU VP External Chad Walcott.
Concordia administration did not show a strong response to Thursday’s march, according to Walcott. “We
were only notified that banners had been dropped and that we could come and pick them up,” he added.
Andra CernavskisThe McGill Daily
Concordia and McGill students march against tuition hikesAdministration sends mass email as demonstration approaches campus
R oshi Chadha, member-at-large on McGill’s Board of Governors (BoG), took a leave of absence
last Thursday as media scrutiny mounts over her and McGill’s role in the Quebec asbestos industry.
Chadha is director of the export company Seja Trade Ltd., which exported asbestos – primarily to India – from the Jeffrey Mine in Asbestos, Quebec for 16 years, until the mine suspended operations last fall.
The company is a subsidiary of Balcorp Ltd., which is owned by her husband, Baljit Chadha. He sits on Concordia University’s Board of Governors.
Balcorp is seeking a $58-million loan from the Quebec government to re-open the Jeffrey Mine.
Roshi Chadha also took a leave of absence from her position on the Board of Directors of the St. Mary’s Hospital Foundation, and resigned from the Canadian Red Cross’s Board of Governors over two weeks ago.
Chadha said in a statement that she is proud of her contributions to the various boards, and that she expects to contribute again in the future.
“I have worked tirelessly in public institutions that are important to me, and I appreciate the many supportive messages that have demonstrated appreciation for my efforts,” she said.
“I do not want my personal and professional life to interfere with the governance and performance of institutions that are important to me and to society. My values, principles, integrity, and professional interests remain intact,” she continued.
Chadha has sat on McGill’s BoG since 2003 . Her second and final term as a member-at-large ends in 2013.
In a statement, Chair of the Board Stuart Cobbett said, “Mrs. Chadha is a distinguished senior volunteer in the McGill community, and has given years of sustained service to the University through a range of important roles and contributions.”
“We respect her wishes, though reluctantly, and look forward to her return,” he continued.
Ron Critchley, BoG administra-tive and support staff representa-tive, said, “I’ve been extremely impressed by [Chadha’s] loyalty and dedication to the University.”
Kathleen Ruff, senior human rights advisor with the Ottawa-based Rideau Institute, said she was sur-prised at McGill’s continued support of Chadha, citing international sci-entific consensus on health threats posed by asbestos.
“If you [play] a key role in an aca-demic institution, you should show a commitment to the clear science, and to the clear scientific facts,” said Ruff. “Someone who is on the Board of Governors of McGill should be supporting the public interest.”
Henry GassThe McGill Daily
McGill Board member takes leave of absence
McGill under fire over corporate-funded asbestos researchLetter details McGill’s past and present relationship with Quebec asbestos industry
A letter signed by 76 interna-tional health experts and aca-demics makes two requests
of three senior members of McGill’s Board of Governors (BoG): that they cease inviting Roshi Chadha – who is involved in exporting asbestos from Canada – to sit on the BoG, and to cease using and promoting the use of asbestos.
The letter states that McGill “has a long history of serving the interests of the Quebec asbestos industry,” including an “alliance” between the Quebec Asbestos Mining Association (QAMA) and former McGill profes-sor John Corbett Macdonald in 1966.
According to a recent episode of CBC’s The National, QAMA provided Macdonald at least $1 million between 1966 and 1972 for research into the health effects of chrysotile asbestos.
The letter states that Macdonald “had significant influence around the world in putting forward infor-mation…that was favourable to the industry’s interests.”
Bruce Case, a professor in
McGill’s Pathology department, co-authored a 2001 study on asbestos fibres in the lungs of miners and millers that was partially funded by the J.M. Asbestos Corporation, according to the documentary.
The CBC documentary claims that the asbestos industry contin-ued to fund research at McGill until recently – research that the federal and Quebec governments have used to justify continued asbestos produc-tion and export.
In a statement addressing both the letter and CBC’s documentary, David Eidelman, chair of McGill’s Department of Medicine, said the University “has the highest stan-dards of research ethics.”
“The integrity and scientific value of research carried out at the University is of primary importance. When concerns are occasionally expressed about research ethics, we rely on a rigorous process of investigation,” continued Eidelman.
The letter to BoG members also criticized the use of asbestos-cement storm pipes in the ongo-ing construction of the McGill University Health Centre.
“It is particularly cynical that
McGill is using asbestos-containing materials in a hospital building,” states the letter, adding, “McGill will serve as a priceless ‘poster child’ for the asbestos industry, whose marketing in developing countries will likely feature McGill’s new state of the art hospital.”
Fernand Turcotte, lead signato-ry of the letter and professor emeri-tus of Public Health and Preventive Medicine at the Université Laval, said in the letter that “McGill has regrettably chosen to play the role of acting as a business card for the asbestos industry.” The letter notes that much of Chadha’s donations to McGill have “likely come from asbestos profits.”
Chahda announced she was tak-ing a leave of absence from the BoG last Thursday.
Abby Lippman, a McGill professor in Epidemiology, Biostatistics, and Occupational Health and co-signer of the letter, said she was pleased Chadha took a leave of absence.
“I hope she will seriously consider resigning from the Board,” she said.
Kathleen Ruff, senior human rights adviser for the Ottawa-based Rideau Institute, also signed the letter.
“I didn’t expect to be fighting
McGill. I thought McGill would be on our side,” she said. “I thought McGill would be on the side of knowledge and health, but it isn’t, apparently.”
The letter also referred to Principal Heather Munroe-Blum’s observa-tion of a straw vote by roughly 1,000 epidemiologists at the Third North American Congress of Epidemiology in Montreal last year calling for Canada to cease the use, mining, and export of asbestos, as “quite puzzling,” in light of the University’s history with the industry.
Munroe-Blum is a professor in McGill’s Department of Epidemiology, Biostatistics and Occupational Health. The letter is addressed to her, as well as BoG Chair Stuart Cobbett and McGill Chancellor Arnold Steinberg.
SSMU President Maggie Knight, one of two student representatives on the BoG, voiced concern over the McGill’s potential connections to the asbestos industry.
“Obviously if [the accusations] are fully true, that’s really con-cerning, and I would hope that the University will take fast action, as we don’t want our academic reputation sullied by such events,” said Knight.
Henry GassThe McGill Daily
Victor Tangermann | The McGill Daily
News The McGill Daily | Monday, February 6, 2012 | mcgilldaily.com4
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McGill announced it will be paring back benefits for non-academic retirees, two
months after MUNACA concluded a semester-long strike.
According to Lynne Gervais, associate vice-principal (Human Resources), as of 2016, MUNACA retirees will be responsible for pay-ing 70 per cent of their medical costs, and 100 per cent of their dental costs. Currently, all MUNACA employees and retirees split these costs 50-50 with the University.
The proposed changes will also affect retirees in the other unions represented on the Staff Benefits Advisory Committee (SBAC), which is comprised of four unions – includ-ing MUNACA – and totals roughly 5,000 McGill employees.
According to Gervais, the idea for the changes dates back to 2008 and Provost Anthony Masi’s Administrative Task Force on Dealing with Economic Uncertainty. In an email to The Daily, Gervais added that the proposal formed part of the recommendations from a working group on cost efficiencies within the Strategic Reframing Initiative (SRI),
which launched in October 2010. In an interview with The Daily,
MUNACA President Kevin Whittaker reviewed minutes taken at the July 27, 2011 meeting of SBAC. According to Whittaker, the committee was told at the meeting that Dean of Management Peter Todd, chair of the cost efficiencies working group, had presented the recommended cuts to the SRI Steering Committee.
“That was passed to the senior administration for approval,” Whittaker said. “And then it was to be implemented.”
Whittaker said MUNACA filed a grievance in July.
“They did not consult us. They simply informed us that this is what has been done, and that’s not the process,” he said.
“We will definitely challenge it,” he continued. “I’m sure we’ll be in court at some point.”
Pierre Moreau, executive direc-tor of Planning and Institutional Analysis and lead of the SRI Project Management Office, said the pro-posal is “not on my radar.”
“We’re trying to...look into some of the things that were announced already by the [Board of Governors],” said Moreau.
“So the only thing that the SRI’s doing about those decisions is just
trying to help with the methodol-ogy to deliver on them. But this has not been part of the SRI,” he said.
Gervais said the change had origi-nally been scheduled for last month.
“It is important to note that the administration has reconsidered, and that for current retirees, up to June 1, 2016, there will be no changes. Thereafter, the 70-30 medical cost-sharing will apply, along with the 100 per cent dental,” she wrote in the email.
The changes were affected by independent talks between the administration and the McGill Association of University Teachers (MAUT), one of the constituent employee groups of the SBAC.
MAUT President John Galaty said the July announcement of the cuts “raised some major issues about how we govern our financial mat-ters, and what kind of voice employ-ee groups…have in these changes.”
“When it first was proposed, it was going to apply, right now, to all the people who are already retired. So we fought that desperately, and we’ve made representations, argu-ments,” he continued.
“What the University argues is that [the cuts were] done last summer,” said Galaty. “So we feel we’ve done something positive by rolling it back.”
Whittaker said he understood
and appreciated MAUT’s efforts. However, he added, “That is not how we should be conducting ourselves.”
“If there is something that impacts on all the groups, all of the groups should be involved with the discussion,” said Whittaker.
“I don’t know if [the change is] something that MAUT proposed, or is that something that came out of the talks? Nobody knows because we were not present, and I think all the groups that this impacts on should have been involved in that discussion, which is the purpose of the SBAC,” he continued.
On October 24, 2011, the SBAC voted unanimously to reject the administration’s proposed cuts.
Whittaker said MAUT’s amend-ments made the proposal “less painful…but it’s still a cut to those that will feel it most.”
Ron Critchley, president of the McGill University Non-Academic Staff Association (MUNASA) – one of the SBAC unions – echoed Whittaker’s sentiments.
“Sometimes people don’t real-ize that $1,800 spent at the dentist’s office is a considerable part of a pensioner’s income,” he said.
Henry GassThe McGill Daily
McGill cutting MUNACA benefitsUnion appealing administration’s decision from before strike
Vic
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Control over benefits was a key point in the MUNACA strike.
The McGill Daily | Monday, February 6, 2012 | mcgilldaily.com 5News
The first in a multi-part series on University security
Over the course of the fall semester, numerous inci-dents, including the treat-
ment of non-academic staff on strike and the events of November 10, transformed the public image of McGill Security in the views of many and made security on campus a regular topic for discussion.
Dean of Law Daniel Jutras noted, in his report on the events of November 10, that several sub-missions he received referred to the “securitization of campus.” The report also states that “for some people on campus, security agents were the outward manifes-tation of the injunction [against MUNACA].”
The Independent Student Inquiry into the events of November 10 noted that a com-mon theme throughout its 33 tes-timonials was “a strong sense of disapproval and disappointment at McGill Security’s response [to November 10].”
Associate Vice-Pr incipal (University Services) Jim Nicel l stated in an interview that relat ions between Security
Services and students have been damaged – “there’s no question about that.”
“It doesn’t take many incidents to tarnish the image, at least in the views of some,” Nicell added.
In an email to The Daily, Vice-Principal (Administration and Finance) Michael Di Grappa stated that the University has the “utmost confidence in the qualifications and experience of those who manage our Security Services.”
Agent breakdownMcGill Security contracts its
agents from a private security agen-cy, Securitas.
According to the Jutras Report, under regular circumstances at McGill’s downtown campus, there are up to 12 agents on duty. Due to construction projects, between 15 and twenty additional agents are on duty in order to secure the con-struction sites.
Last semester, additional agents were assigned to “strike-related duties.” On November 10, six agents were performing such duties.
Agents on “strike-related duties” amounted to a maximum of twen-ty additional agents, according to Jutras’ report.
Five McGill employees are respon-sible for managing Security Services’ operations and have managerial
authority in circumstances necessi-tating a response or intervention.
TrainingSecuritas agents who regularly
work at McGill receive between 64 and 144 hours of on-site training in specific operating procedures, depending on their position.
All McGill employees within Security Services are trained in non-violent crisis intervention. Since last June, training on social diversity and equity issues has also been provided to these employees.
Securitas agents are subject to the Private Security Act, which establishes regulations and stan-dards for Quebec’s private security industry. The Act applies to private security activities, which are provid-ed to a client for a fee and generally occur on the client’s property.
To obtain an agent license in Quebec, an applicant must dem-onstrate to the Bureau de la sécu-rité privée, the body enforcing the Act, that they have the profes-sional and practical skills neces-sary – an interview and/or exami-nation process may be instated at the Bureau’s discretion, along with meeting the requirements specified in the Act.
The Act requires an applicant to be of “good moral character,” to never have been convicted of an offence under the Criminal Code (unless they have been pardoned), be a minimum of 18 years old, and have completed the required training.
For security guards, required training is the completion of a 70-hour training course offered by a private security guarding pro-gram, which provides a transcript of marks issued from the school board. The course costs about $500. However, the Bureau will also accept applicants whose “level of knowledge and skills [are] equiva-lent to the training required.”
The Act states that, in a context like McGill where private security is not the University’s “business,” only persons whose main activities are private security activities are required to hold an agent license. Under the Act, the immediate superior of a security agent, who must hold an agent license, is not required to have undergone any training, as long as they personally do not carry out any private secu-rity activities themselves.
Nicell explained his role in inci-dents involving security at McGill.
“Security Services are a people that are trained to respond to an emergency situation, mobilize in a very short term. In some situations, what they require is authorizations or they may require input, advice on how to react. This is not about a protest per say,” he said.
On November 10, Nicell said that he immediately went to the scene “to be a resource person.”
It is unclear if McGill employees within Security Services – in particu-lar, the seven employees who are deployed in the event of a security intervention or response – or their superiors, are required to hold agent licenses. Security Services declined multiple requests to comment on this article, citing an interview as “premature” in light of Principal Heather Munroe-Blum’s forthcom-ing plans to implement recommen-dations from Jutras’ report.
Perceptions of McGill SecurityJosh Redel, president of the
Engineering Undergraduate Society (EUS), said EUS has worked closely with McGill Security’s community relations team on events like Open Air Pub and Frosh.
The team was created about a decade ago to emphasize preven-tion and community relations. Two McGill employees are responsible for the team.
Though Redel described the community relations team from past years as “very polite, very approachable – good at what they did,” he noted a recent change in EUS’s relationship with the team.
Redel described EUS’s inter-action with McGill Security on November 10. Redel was inside the entrance of the McConnell Engineering building when two Securitas agents arrived on the scene, searching for the EUS office.
“They were instructed to search EUS and all other student lounges in the building to see if we were housing protestors,” he said.
The agents searched the EUS lounge and found no protestors.
“That’s really offensive to send Security to search our office. That’s really not okay with us, especially [since] we have a real-ly good relationship with them,” Redel added.
Nicell explained his view on changes to the operation of the community relations team.
“It used to be that there was one person, [who] just kept visiting place after place after place.”
“We want to broaden it a little bit because it’s not about an individual – it’s about communicating. It’s about every person in a responsible position constantly trying to renew and main-tain good relationships,” he continued.
Nicell said McGill Security’s com-munity relations team is “probably less overt than it used to be, but it’s not a dead issue, that’s for sure.”
“We’ve been shifting our resources here and there because of the limited resources. I think what we’re going to try to do is beef it up a little bit more,” he said.
The “human-on-human ap-proach”
McGill Security does not have a complete monopoly on campus security. In the Shatner building, SSMU employs its own security force that operates separately from McGill Security.
SSMU Security Supervisor Wallace Sealy explained that, “There used to be a time when I would solely report to McGill, but over the years I’ve broadened that to have a better relationship with the police. So we do more communication with the police than we do with McGill, but we do advise them of anything that’s going on that’s detrimental to the students.”
The SSMU security force con-sists of five agents that report to Sealy. SSMU agents receive differ-ent training than McGill’s agents, being trained directly by Sealy in what he calls the “human-on-human approach.”
“Since I’ve been at SSMU, I’ve made it one of my top priorities that anybody that works for this department understands that we’re providing a service,” Sealy explained.
When Sealy started working at SSMU in 2004, he explained that both McGill administration and stu-dents were looking for a change in security operations at SSMU.
“The only problems that we do get into [are] when we’re using out-side companies and they’re dressed in our shirts,” Sealy said.
SSMU, like McGill, contracts private security agents from external companies for special events when additional person-nel are required. All of SSMU’s agents are holders of agent licenses as recognized under the Private Security Act.
SSMU executives are also incor-porated into Shatner’s security operations. SSMU President Maggie Knight explained that executives receive training from Sealy at the start of their term.
“We are part of that team…because we know the building well, people will know us, and hope-fully recognize us as some people who are supposed to know what’s going, who are supposed to be able to direct things,” Knight said.
Erin HudsonThe McGill Daily
Private security in a public university
Smile, you’re on candid camera!
Vice-Principal (Administration and Finance)
Michael Di Grappa
Associate Vice-Principal (University Services)
Jim Nicell
University Safety DirectorLouise Savard
Security Services Associate DirectorPierre Barbarie
Operations Administrator (Security Operations Centre)
Melanie Ouellette
Operations Administrator (Special Events)Kevin Byers
Operations Administrator (Agent Services)Hugo Bourcier
Operations Administrator (Construction Projects)Marius Dospinoiu
Operations ManagerChristopher Carson
Pool of 65 regular contracted Securitas agents (downtown campus)
News The McGill Daily | Monday, February 6, 2012 | mcgilldaily.com6
The highest authority in SSMU met last Thursday to vote on recommendations
about the future of the Judicial Board (J-Board).
The meeting followed the SSMU Board of Directors’ (BoD) deci-sion on January 26 to suspend all J-Board activities pending a review of its structure within the SSMU Constitution.
The recommendations aimed to ensure SSMU’s compliance with the Quebec Corporations Act and the province’s Accreditation Act
by constitutionally recognizing the BoD as the highest governing authority of SSMU.
Concerns over J-Board’s rela-tionship to the BoD were raised in light of the current J-Board case, filed by students Zach Newburgh and Brendan Steven. The case con-tests the results of the QPIRG ref-erendum question. Both students were present in the gallery at the BoD meeting.
The ad hoc Bylaw Review Committee met on January 30 to decide how to move forward. Its goals included protecting SSMU from liability while ensuring “a fair, unbiased method of address-ing complaints/petitions.”
The committee decided it was in the best interest of all SSMU mem-bers for the J-Board to resume activ-ity as soon as possible, and to hold hearings for current cases before reading week.
Members also agreed that the BoD must submit a question dur-ing the Winter Referendum period that would clarify the relationship between the BoD and J-Board.
The motion, debated Thursday by BoD members, sought to rein-state activities of the J-Board imme-diately, with consideration of the rec-ommended constitutional changes. The motion passed with eight BoD members in favour, one against, and three abstentions.
Constitutional recommenda-tions put forward by the J-Board – which were then reviewed by the Bylaw Committee – include amending the current provision that J-Board is “the final author-ity” on the interpretation of the SSMU Constitution and By-laws of the Society to J-Board having “the authority to adjudicate” on those matters.
Gabriel Joshee-Arnal, a law stu-dent and legal advocate in the cur-rent J-Board case, was in the gallery and asked for clarification regard-ing the motion’s application to the current case.
In response, VP External Joël Pedneault proposed an amend-ment and explained that the motion is only in effect until the Winter
Referendum period is complete. The amendment read, “With the addi-tional provision that decisions made by the J-Board which are unreason-able, or contrary to its procedures, may also be overturned by the SSMU BoD.”
Pedneault said that he hoped this would “keep the logic that the BoD can overturn a decision of the J-Board for clearly demonstrable reasons,” and maintain compliance with Quebec law as soon as J-Board activities resume.
During debate on the amend-ment, Newburgh said that he was “concerned about ‘unreasonable’ and whether it can be used to over-turn a decision for political reasons.”
Arts Representative Isabelle Bi also expressed that she was “wor-
ried about the use of the term ‘unreasonable’,” but Joshee-Arnal clarified that it is a standard legal grading.
The amendment passed, along with one put forward by Arts Representative Jamie Burnett, which called for SSMU to create a working group “to investigate democratic avenues of resolving issues of constitutionality” in the spirit of placing SSMU’s general membership at the foreground of decision-making processes.
Review of the SSMU’s Constitution and Bylaws is ongoing. “The goal is to have a full by-law review done by the end of this year,” said SSMU President Maggie Knight.
Newburgh and Steven’s case will be heard Monday.
Kallee LinsThe McGill Daily
Judicial Board activities reinstated
Newburgh addressed J-Board’s status at last week’s SSMU GA. Nicolas Quiazua | The McGill Daily
Science General Assembly to be held in March
A t last Thursday’s Science Undergraduate Society (SUS) Council meeting,
President Akshay Rajaram con-firmed that SUS will be holding its first General Assembly (GA) for undergraduate science stu-dents.
Rajaram told The Daily that the major motivations for the GA are issues that students are facing, namely tuition hikes and the pos-sibility of a general student strike. The Arts Undergraduate Society (AUS) has held two GAs this year; both have dealt with similar issues.
The upcoming GA will be the first in SUS history. Rajaram claimed that it had not previously been necessary for the SUS to hold its own GA.
In reaction to the failures of the recent SSMU and AUS GAs to reach quorum, Rajaram expressed his concerns.
“You really can’t predict the way that the GA will turn out. It really matters on the issues being discussed,” said Rajaram.
“At this point, I really can’t comment on what motions are going to be. And until we know what the motions are, we can’t predict the attendance of the GA,” he continued.
Cyrille Lavigne, VP External for the Department of Chemistry, said Science students are “strong-ly apolitical in general.”
“Science people don’t usually read the news and keep informed about politics,” he said. “I don’t go to [SSMU] GAs, personally.”
“I feel if there is [an SUS] GA, it would be the same thing, and I think most students will still not care. Having a forum is impor-tant, but then you need people to talk in that forum,” he continued.
On the other hand, mem-bers of the Science Mobilization Committee (SMC), an unofficial student organization mobilizing against tuition hikes, believe that
having an SUS GA is important. Matthew Henry, a U2 Mathematics
student and a member of the SMC, said, “Because we’ve realized that we don’t have much mobilization power yet, that’s why we need to get things going. The first thing we need to is to get the GA started, and then have a general mandate against tuition hikes.”
Another member of the SMC, Aidan Drake, added, “A GA should happen every semester, at least once a year, to consult the students.”
During the meeting, the GA bylaws were also amended to only take motions submitted two weeks before the GA. Rajaram explained that this is necessary to make sure everything dis-cussed in the GA is within the scope of SUS.
The approximate date for the Science GA is during the first week of March.
At least 125 students must be present to make quorum, and at least fifty students must be pres-ent to constitute a consultative forum.
Doris ZhuNews Writer
SSMU’s Board of Directors discusses constitutional changes
The McGill Daily | Monday, February 6, 2012 | mcgilldaily.comCommentary 7
The corporatization of Canada’s foreign aid A response to “Harper’s Social Justice Hit List”
I n her article, “Harper’s Social Justice Hit List” (January 23, Page 8) on the politi-
cally motivated defunding of Canadian NGO’s, Tamkinat Mirza talks about formerly govern-ment-funded NGO’s having their funding cut and their reputation attacked for disagreeing with the Harper government’s policies regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It is important to con-demn the actions of our govern-ment, but also to look at this defunding as a part of the larger issue of Canadian International Development Agency’s (CIDA) ongoing politicization. While the Palestinian issue may be one important example of this pat-tern, it is in Latin America where the biggest changes to foreign aid funding have taken place.
In 2009, CIDA cut back its aid to African countries, choosing to focus it in Latin America and the Caribbean. The primary reason for this shift: the promotion of Canadian mining interests in the region. 34 per cent of Latin American mines are Canadian owned, with Canadian companies such as Barrick Gold, Gold Corp, and Inmet Mining as key world players in this industry. Thus, when Minister for International Development Bev Oda says that CIDA’s new strategy
will focus on countries that align with “Canadian foreign policy pri-orities”, it is the needs of those com-panies that are being prioritized. A quick glance at CIDA’s operations in Peru give a good idea of the way in which the interests of the government and Canadian mining companies have become aligned. One of CIDA’s key projects to pro-mote sustainable growth happens to occur in the Quiruvilca region, in the same communities that have – for the last seven years – been in conflict with Barrick Gold over water contamination and overuse due to their Lagunas Norte Project (Fact Check). CIDA’s other projects in the area aim to “Enhance the Development Impact of Extractive Industries” or “Promote Corporate Social Responsbility”, and are often partially funded by corporate bod-ies. I do not mention this to degrade the good work CIDA often does in these communities, but, rather, to demonstrate the dangerously close relationship our aid agency has with these often exploitative companies.
Recent Wikileak’s cables also show Canadian embassy staff speaking about the impor-tance of Canada’s mining inter-ests and identifying anti-mining activists as potential threats. This trend was prevalent under Paul Martin’s administration; in 2005, the Canadian government informed the Canadian Lutheran World Relief that they would have their funding cut off if they con-
tinued to support Peruvian NGOs that protested against Canadian mines. The Canadian NGO subse-quently cut funds to these orga-nizations. Other groups such as Kairos and Development and Peace have decided to maintain their criticism of the mining
industry, and have had their fund-ing cut. So while it is important to condemn the actions Mirza discusses in her article, let us not forget the larger efforts taken by this and previous govern-ments to politicize aid and pro-mote Canadian mining in Latin
America, often at the expense of free speech, local sovereignty, and socially just development.
Sean PhippsHyde Park
Sean Phipps is a U1 Latin American Studies student. He can be reached at [email protected]
Vote ‘Yes’ to direct democracyWhy the AUS needs general assemblies
One of the most striking things McGill students have experienced since
November 10 is the significance of physical community. It’s on this note that I’d like to begin a discussion of how vital general assemblies are to student associa-tions and their student members who live, study, and work at this University. General assemblies are a place where we can have human relationships with others and col-lectively empower ourselves to make democratic decisions.
These gatherings are the most open and democratic forums available to student associations
like SSMU, the AUS, and the SUS. These assemblies allow the entire membership of an organization to debate and decide on whatever topics they collectively deem sig-nificant. Anyone who is a mem-ber of a student association can bring a motion forward, debate on it, and vote with equal say. At general assemblies we can open-ly discuss major issues, hearing all sides of the debate, and take meaningful positions that can be translated into concrete action. It’s this basis of direct democ-racy upon which the victories of Quebec’s social movements – including the lowest tuition fees in Canada – have in part been built.
No one would deny that online voting has its place. It is impor-
tant to have a forum where thou-sands of people can quickly and easily agree or disagree with cer-tain positions, and often things like fee levies and constitutional changes are decided this way. To be sure, technology opens up real democratic possibilities when thoughtfully and carefully used, but it has significant limitations. Technology cannot replicate the effect of hundreds of people meet-ing in person at a general assem-bly to decide how mandates are written; online votes only allow students to decide which policies are implemented. Certainly, no technologies can feasibly build the sort of physical community general assemblies allow – where our human relationships with each other hold us accountable for
the choices we make, quite unlike many of the bureaucratic deci-sion-making processes I’ve been involved in as a SSMU Councillor.
Despite the possibilities of overburdening procedures and weak chairing, the process of debating and amending is central to the democratic process. GAs allow us to do more than check a box: these assemblies allow indi-viduals to set the terms of discus-sion and action. When GAs are effective – when they are grant-ed the power to make concrete resolutions, when people under-stand and care about the issues – they are a central mechanism of student direct democracy. They become real physical spaces where we can collectively change our society. It’s happened in the
history of Quebec, and it can and should happen again.
Starting this Tuesday, February 7, Arts undergraduates at McGill will have the opportunity to vote to change the constitution of the Arts Undergraduate Society and allow General Assemblies to make effective decisions. The proposed reforms include: allowing General Assemblies to make financial deci-sions, amend bylaws, and take precedence over AUS Council deci-sions. I urge you to vote ‘yes’ to this important initiative.
Jamie BurnettHyde Park
Jamie Burnett is a U2 Economics and Women’s Studies Student and an Arts Representative to SSSMU. He can be reached at [email protected]
Amina Batyreva | The McGill Daily
Features8
Go immediately south of the unmis-takeable paifang that welcomes you to Chinatown and you’ll see what is probably the largest, and certainly the most striking, public art display in Montreal. There, graf-
fiti climbs up the walls, tall and sheer like a concrete glacier, of the Old Brewery Mission: There’s a sub-way train that seems to be ploughing towards you. A black and red Haida raven stares from above the fifth story windows. The silhouette of an oak tree fades away at the branches. There is a small but conspicu-ous crucifix on the roof.
And though you might miss them amidst the artis-tic fireworks, most afternoons there are dozens, some-times hundreds, of men lining up outside. These men are homeless, and they are waiting to claim a bed for the night inside the graffitied walls, under the cross-adorned roof.
The Mission is the largest private homeless shel-ter in Canada and the largest male shelter – public or private – in Quebec. Its main building on Clark, the Webster Pavilion, houses up to 319 men. Here, they are offered emergency shelter, free meals, showers, clothing, and counselling on a first-come, first-serve basis. Webster Pavilion also offers transi-tion services, where men get to work one-on-one with counsellors, who focus on helping the men get jobs and become self-sufficient.
I arrived there on a recent Thursday afternoon, just as a line was beginning to form outside.
Inside, I met Michelle Meurnier, communica-tions director for the Mission. A young and animated Montreal native, she’s a walking cache of information about Old Brewery Mission and its clientele. (Mission staff invariably call the homeless men using their ser-vices “clients.”)
Meurnier starts walking me through the building. The second floor houses the beds, showers, and wash-rooms for men using emergency services. It’s bright, with vibrant green walls. Two large, airy rooms con-
tain long rows of bunk beds, like in a youth hostel. Meurnier tells me that the linens get changed every other day, and that every client must shower before going to bed. While they’re welcome to stay as many nights as they like – hypothetically, anyone could stay at the shelter for years on end without joining a transi-tion program – there’s no guarantee that a client will have the same bed for more than a couple nights. This, Meurnier said, is to make sure clients don’t become “too comfortable.”
Since the main shelter is only available at night, the rooms were empty, with the exception of one man, who was lying on a bottom corner bunk. His leg was in a cast.
“We make exceptions for the sick,” Meurnier whis-pered to me, anxious not to disturb the lone man.
I know the rules are intended for the benefit of the homeless, and may well be beneficial. But it must be strange, I think, for grown men to take instructions from a staff of professionals, to be told when to wash and in which beds they may sleep.
At this point, I was hoping that my tour of the shelter would be short, so that I could join the clients in the cafeteria for dinner. Michelle told me that I would prob-ably not get the opportunity to speak to anyone.
I was also disappointed to hear I would not be able to see Webster’s third and fourth floors, which act as temporary homes for those using the transi-tion programs. Meurnier told me that she doesn’t like to “show off” the clients and the shelter, because “it becomes like a zoo.”
She’s right about this. They have enough to con-tend with without me sticking my tape recorder in their faces. I came here because Montreal’s home-less are too often ignored. Now I was being careful not to stare.
Still, when we came back downstairs, I asked
Meurnier once more if I could speak to a client. I was there to report, after all. And so she returned a moment later with a thin, stern-looking man wearing an apron. He introduced himself as Derek, although I had ear-lier heard a staff member call him “Patrovksy.” Later on, after he had became more comfortable speaking to me, he told me that everyone at the shelter calls him “Patrovsky” because no one can pronounce his name, and “Patrovsky” is the Polish equivalent of the English surname Smith. He reached into his chest pocket for his wallet, and placed his ID card on the table in front of me, pointing at his name in the bottom-left corner.
“Say it how it’s written,” he told me. I tried, but immediately butchered the Polish, so gave up and resorted to calling him Derek. I laughed, and I saw, for the first time, a smile creep on to his face.
Derek came to Montreal from Poland over twenty years ago. He did not share many details about his per-sonal story, but I could sense some lingering resent-ment over how he has been treated in the past.
“Nobody likes the homeless, so they push them away,” he told me.
Derek is in the first step of Old Brewery Mission’s transition program. Although this is his second try with the program, he assured me he is serious this time around about making a change. He didn’t specify what he meant by this. He said that he wasn’t ready before, and that he needed to prepare himself mentally before returning to Webster.
“So far it works very well,” Derek said of the program. Now he volunteers in the cafeteria. Because he’s not
a “troublemaker,” he told me, he’s well-liked by the staff.
After speaking with Derek, I saw the cafeteria was beginning to fill up. At each place-setting was a large mug – Meurnier later told me coffee is served in abun-dance at the shelter. Some alcoholic clients, she said, use it as a replacement for alcohol. Strangely enough,
Blankets, sugar, and hot-air vents
by Nastasha Sartore
HOw Quebec’s Biggest shelter
is helping montreal’s homeless cope with winter
The McGill Daily | Monday, February 6, 2012 | mcgilldaily.com 9
there was also a package of individually wrapped cara-mels at each place.
(Most of the food served by the Mission is donated. In fact, half its funding comes from private donors, while the other half comes from the three branches of government – and this portion must be put toward emergency services.)
I followed Meurnier to a table at the far end of the cafeteria, where an older, white-haired man named Yvon was seated, working on a large plate of pasta. Yvon and Meurnier chatted for a few moments in French while I stood by, understanding little. Yvon finally looked at me, smiled, and offered me a caramel.
He didn’t seem to speak English, but Meurnier later told me about him. Like many others, Yvon lost his job before coming to live at the Webster Pavilion. He went straight into a transition program, and is now on the wait list for one of the thirty apartments available at the Marcelle and Jean Coutu Pavilion, located just around the corner from Webster. During the day, he likes to help out with small tasks at the Mission’s administra-tive office around the corner on St. Antoine.
Graduating from one of the Mission’s transition programs isn’t a guarantee of success. Meurnier told me about Mike, whose path to homelessness also began with a lost job. He had worked at a bank branch. As an Anglophone, he didn’t have much luck finding another job in Montreal, so, after losing his home, he uprooted his wife and children and moved to Toronto. There, he began to develop signs of depression and started drinking. Not long afterward, his wife left him, and his children, now grown up, moved back to Montreal. He came to Old Brewery, and immediately began a transition program.
“Now it’s the mystery of what happens next,” Meurnier said. She hasn’t heard from Mike in two months.
Despite what they have in common, Meurnier stressed that the shelter’s clientele is diverse, com-
plex. While the economy and job loss are often fac-tors, Meurnier recited a grim list of causes for home-lessness: divorce, tragedy, addiction, mental illness. (The latter is particularly acute among women – 70 per cent of the Mission’s female clients, whom they serve at locations around the city, have been diag-nosed with mental illness, compared to 40 per cent of male clients).
I asked Robert Lavigne, chief of emergency ser-vices at Webster, what they were doing for homeless men with addictions. I had recently read about 1811 Eastlake, a unique housing project in Seattle that allows homeless, chronic alcohol-ics to continue drinking in their apart-ments. According to a recent study on the effectiveness of the program, published in the American Journal of Public Health, residents of Eastlake consumed significant-ly less alcohol per day than they had on the street. Research has shown that the program also costs less money for taxpayers.
Lavigne was skeptical about how it would work at Old Brewery Mission shelters:
“We have programs for people to take their lives
back in their hands [and] I think it would be a bit contradictory if we allow individuals to come into the same house and consume alcohol – even pot – when we have other people in the same building trying to rid themselves of the addiction problem.”
“In the future it’s obvious we’re going to be discuss-ing these issues,” he continued, “but at the moment…we’re not going to open up that door yet.”
With or without addiction, the bitter Montreal
winters make everyday an uphill battle for those living on the streets. Some spend more time in the malls, in the metro, or near big building vents that push out warm air. Others will eat sugar to keep their energy up. Old Brewery Mission gives out winter clothing starting December 1, unless a snow storm hits beforehand. Lavigne told me that these gar-ments are especially “hard to replenish each year.”
“We don’t run out, because we do such a good job begging to the public,” he said. A tin-eared remark, given where we were.
When I left Webster almost an hour later, clients were still trickling through the doorways to claim whatever was left of dinner. Soon, those that were not using the mission’s transition services would have to leave. They would either come back later in the eve-ning to claim a bed on the second floor, or find a place to sleep elsewhere: at another shelter, in a nook at Champs de Mars Metro, or hidden under a bundle of old blankets on a street corner.
“You never know exactly what they’re doing, where they are,” Meurnier said.
Blankets, sugar, and hot-air vents
by Nastasha Sartore
All Photos by Sergey Tsynkevych
“Nobody likes the homeless,
so they push them away”
HOw Quebec’s Biggest shelter
is helping montreal’s homeless cope with winter
Commentary The McGill Daily | Monday, February 6, 2012 | mcgilldaily.com10
The politics of shade: J. Cole, hip-hop, and the hue complex
Delving into the perpetuation of gendered shadeism as displayed in J. Cole’s videos
I am probably one of the biggest hip-hop heads you will ever meet and I secretly want to be
a rapper. But since having put the production of my (non-existent) mixtape on a momentary pause, I’ve found myself archiving the semi-commercial, underground, new school hip-hop artistry scene. While for the past three years I have come across some greats, there’s always been only one has always stood as the top played artist on my iTunes: J Cole. I can still talk about his music for days, months, years even, especially when discussing it from a feminist lens.
I want to consider two specific videos from J. Cole’s hip-hop reper-toire, exploring the existence of (get ready for it…) shadeism. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the term, it refers to a form of oppres-sion that, according to an excellent documentary entitled Shadeism directed by Nayani Thiyagarajah, can be defined as “the discrimina-tion that exists between the lighter-skinned and darker-skinned mem-
bers of the same community.” I want to look at the perpetu-
ation of shadeism within the black community as maintained through hip-hop, exploring how the women of darker shades fea-tured in Cole’s videos are hyper-sexualized compared to the light-er-skinned women he features. I chose to explore “In The Morning” and “Can’t Get Enough” because both songs, lyrically, are essentially giving the same message: the sexu-al attractiveness of females in gen-eral, and of the ones present in the video. The songs are arguably on equal footing, and thus I will high-light the differences in the way the women in “Can’t Get Enough” were portrayed versus the woman in “In The Morning.”
First, I’ll take up J. Cole’s “In The Morning.” While I don’t deny that the main female love/sex inter-est is sexualized – and some may argue even hypersexualized – her role as the sole and focal female of the video, I argue, de-hypersex-ualises her, especially in relation to the women in the other video. In this video, we see that the cen-tral female, who is clearly of lighter skin, is depicted as Cole’s potential “girlfriend” or specific “love inter-est.” This depiction is affirmed sev-eral times: first, when she’s given
special entrance backstage after watching Cole’s performance, and is later seen seated under J. Cole’s arm; second, when Cole exclusively introduces her to Drake.
This personalized, interac-tive and heightened status as his sole potential love interest is paramount to understanding how shadeism is at work here. Her potential for girlfriend status de-hypersexualizes her. Rather than being merely a “hit in the morning,” her girlfriend poten-tial allows for a “hypersexualized transcendence,” of sorts. It trans-forms her from a state of immobile sexual objectivity to one of mobile potential girlfriend subjectivity – a mobility evident in the physical movements of the varying females in both videos. The lighter-skinned woman literally moves throughout the entire video: she walks with Cole, she dances to Cole, et cetera. The darker-skinned women in “Can’t Get Enough,” however, are seen dancing in one position, and only experience movement when they’re relocated from the yacht to the beach, and back. Thus, the women of this video, who are pre-dominantly of darker skin, do not experience this same hypersexual-ized, active transcendence.
I’ll now explore “Can’t Get
Enough.” Both this video, and J. Cole, have received great praise for the significant use of darker-skinned women throughout the video, something that has become more and more absent in the rap video of today.
We are introduced to the women of this video in very impersonal shots in which they are shown dripping in water, wearing swimsuits. Mere visual objects of stimulation, these women, unlike the main female in the former video, receive no personal interaction with Cole – no introductions, no arm on the shoulder, nothing. Rather, they are positioned dancing on a yacht while Trey Songz blurts terms like, “mistress” and “hoe” during their shots. There is even a point where Songz, when saying “hoe,” opens his arms to indicate he’s referring to the women – pre-dominantly dark-skinned women – at his back. No joke.
Thus, unlike the prior video, the women of “Can’t Get Enough” do not experience a personalized, interactive element, such as the one the lighter-skinned woman in “In The Morning” experiences by being characterized as the “potential girlfriend.” These darker-skinned women experience no “hypersexu-
alized transcendence.” Rather, they become increasingly hypersexual-ized throughout the video, seen bouncing, wining and gyrating on the beach behind Cole.
While some may characterize this difference as coincidental, that it just so happens that “Can’t Get Enough” has darker-skinned women and “In The Morning” has a lighter-skinned woman, I’d like to refrain from such foolery. Not to say, however, that it was intentional. I simply wanted to show how a close read of hip-hip videos (even from, comparatively speaking, more enlightened and socially conscious rappers such as J. Cole) can, and still do, per-petuate and reassert shadeism. This trend is not only demon-strated by having lighter-skinned women portrayed in interactive and more personalized positions, but also by depicting darker-skinned women as impersonal, hypersexual objects of mere aes-thetic validation.
Tyrone Speaks
Christiana [email protected]
Tyrone Speaks is a column written by Christiana Collison on the subject of black feminism. It appears every other Wednesday in commentary. You can email her at [email protected].
Edna Chan |The McGill Daily
The McGill Daily | Monday, February 6, 2012 | mcgilldaily.comScience+Technology 11From
the sketchbook Edna Chan
The McGill Daily | Monday, February 6, 2012 | mcgilldaily.comSports 12
Money first, fans secondHow the NFL let its fans down when they needed them most
I wish that this column about sports could be less cynical, could just stand back and
appreciate the beauty and the transcendent emotions that a simple game can conjure. I wish. But there comes a time when, as fans, we realize that not every-thing is as ideal as we wish it could be. We realize that many of the players we look up to are f lawed, and that many play for the money or the fame as opposed to winning one for the team. We realize that the owners care more about the bottom line than the winning percentage, and treat the players on the team without emotion, like employees, in a cold-hearted business manner. When the sheen of excitement is lifted and when the game is over, if you think too hard about it, it’s all business. Always business.
There might be no more ster-ling example of these difficult realizations for fans than the week leading up to the NFL’s Super Bowl. A corporate orgy descended onto this year’s host city, Indianapolis, with sponsors of the league getting maximum exposure. And, during the game, there were the oh-so-important commercials, costing 3 million US dollars for thirty seconds of time. Who is left behind in all of this? The common fan, the aver-age person.
Consider an event that was happening right on the doorstep of the Super Bowl. The Indiana state government has passed a controversial labour bill that would severely cripple union power in the state in an attempt to encourage business develop-ment, effectively making Indiana a “Right to Work” state. Companies will now find it in their favor to hire non-union members, and unions will find it harder to col-lectively bargain. It’s a great law for business owners, who now can hire cheaper labor and drive up their profit margins, while the unions will lose their power and wages. In response to the bill’s
movement through the State gov-ernment, there have been decent-sized protests by union support-ers at Super Bowl festivities. The unions, in a strategic move, have taken the protest to one of the biggest stages in the US right now, drawing the ire of some of the city government, who spent a lot of time and money preparing for the week’s events – which may usher in the best weeks of business the city has had in years.
After a contentious summer that saw the NFL and its players engaged in their own labour battle, there has been no statement by the NFL or any players about the pro-tests. The NFL and the players, by the end of the lockout, were spout-ing out platitudes that they were happy to have a season “for the fans” and were sorry that “the fans” had to suffer through a protracted, ugly legal battle. In a process of
reconciliation for the league, they claimed coming back was all about “the fans.” Yeah right.
Sure, it’s in the NFL’s best interest to remain apolitical and not come out on either side – and that’s exactly the problem. The NFL has become so tied up in corporate interests, from adver-tisements to sponsorships, that truly supporting their fans is impossible. But how many union workers in Indiana are football fans who shell out a good portion of their paychecks to go to Colts games or buy a Peyton Manning jersey? These are everyperson fans, the base of the NFL’s mas-sive national empire, but the NFL has nothing to give them besides a product. Beyond their abil-ity to buy the product, the fans aren’t important. This message has been made clear by the fact that the NFL has decided to show
no support for their fans in this struggle in feat of angering cor-porate interests.
You may argue that the NFL shouldn’t step in, that they must remain neutral. Well fine, but they shouldn’t pretend that they exist for the fans, then.
The players shouldn’t get a pass, either, especially after championing the rights of the workers this summer and claim-ing to play every week for the adoration of the fans, all while having made no effort to show any support for these fans. They want the fans to support them, but the relationship does not go both ways.
The NFL can sometimes even give the message that they don’t want your average person as a fan in the first place. Just look at the advertising during any NFL game, and you will see, other than the
classic beer and fast food com-mercials, ads for luxury car com-panies and premium insurance. These ads are aimed at a higher wealth demographic than the union workers in Indiana.
The corporations, individu-ally, are giving as much money as thousands of common fans can. Losing one fan is less dam-aging than losing a big corporate sponsor. The NFL will support the common fans as far as their money can go, but not beyond that. That’s the uncomfortable thought that preys at the back of your mind as you watch another touchdown, a beautiful pass, an impossible field goal: this isn’t an equal relationship. We are loved by the league and the players, but only to a point. We love our teams unconditionally, stick with them through thick and thin, but what do we get back?
A Fan’s Notes
Evan [email protected]
Sad the NFL season is over? Write about [email protected]
Julia Boshyk | The McGill Daily
The McGill Daily | Monday, February 6, 2012 | mcgilldaily.comCulture 13
Whose turn is it to “eat”?Inequality and crimes against humanity in Kenyan politics
In November of last year I took a trip to Mfangano Island – a tiny and remote island located in
the very southwest corner of Kenya on Lake Victoria, Africa’s largest inland body of water. Upon arriving, I hailed a piki-piki – or motorcycle taxi – and went on what I thought would be a tranquil sojourn around this tropical, insular paradise. I quickly realized, however, that Mfangano was completely devoid of what the Western world would call “infrastructure.”
I asked my driver why the roads were so bad, and his answer was essentially the answer to all of Kenya’s most intractable prob-lems: “The roads are bad because the president is not a Luo, he’s a Kikuyu.” As the logic proceeds, since Mfangano is in Kenya’s Nyanza Province, and Nyanza’s residents are predominantly ethnic Luo, why would a Kikuyu president bother to pay the island any attention?
It is exactly this type of tribal competition over the control of government coffers that precipi-tated Kenya’s post-election violence
in 2007 and early 2008. During this ethnic upheaval an estimated 1500 people were killed and 300,000 displaced from their homes, not to mention that billions of dollars were drained from Kenya’s econo-my as a result of steep declines in tourism and agricultural output – two of Kenya’s main industries. For those who were forced to consider the notion that ethnic violence was possible in Kenya – once seen around the world as one of the rare stable democracies in Africa – the signs of growing tribal resentment were tragically palpable.
In her book It’s Our Turn To Eat, Michela Wrong reports that one day, during the run-up to the election in late 2007, “[Kenya’s] Nakumatt supermarket chain announced, after logging a strange sudden spike in machete sales, that it was limiting purchases of garden-ing tools and kitchen utensils such as knives to just one per person.” Clearly, some people were getting ready for a fight.
The underlying causes to this heightening of ethnic antipathy are displayed in the title of Wrong’s book. The Kenyan government, police, and judiciary are all notori-ous for being corrupt institutions. They allow powerful business and political elite to essentially go about their illicit ways with a self-
assured sense of impunity. What’s more, those high-up in government are expected to use public funds to dole out patronage, government contracts, and civil service jobs to those belonging to their own eth-nic group. Kenyans have a name for this sleazy practice of using state resources for tribal gain: “eat-ing.” And, whichever tribe runs the government at any particular time, well, it’s their turn to eat. Currently it’s Kenya’s most populous tribe, the Kikuyu of Central Province, lead by President Mwai Kibaki, who have controlled government since he was sworn in in 2002. And they certainly have done well relative to their tribal competition.
In 2006, four years after Kibaki was inaugurated, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) reported in the Kenya Human Development Report that a Kikuyu resident from the city of Nyeri – the capital of Central Province, and just north of Kibaki’s constituency – would live 23.4 years longer than a Luo from Kisumu – the capital of Nyanza Province. Furthermore, in the largely Kikuyu city of Thika only 16.7 per cent of adult residents were illiterate, but in the predominantly Kalenjin town of Bomet adult illiteracy was a stag-gering 78.1 per cent. As statistics on life expectancy are a good proxy
for health spending, and those on adult literacy are a decent gauge of education spending, simply looking at such disparate figures leads one to conclude that government funds disproportionately find their way to Kikuyu areas and tend to neglect other areas where marginalized ethnic groups predominate.
It is no wonder then, with the striking inequity between gov-ernment treatment of people from different ethnic groups, that tribal resentment began to reach its apogee right before the 2007 election: an election that would determine whether Kibaki and his Kikuyus would get to “eat” for another four years. And when Kibaki was crowned the victor after the election – after many reports of ballot-stuffing and bla-tant attempts to intimidate voters – it’s no surprise that other tribes, who thought it was their turn to “eat,” did not take kindly to these rigged results. In the days follow-ing the election, many thousands of minority tribesmen took to the streets, violently assaulting, and, in many cases, clubbing and knifing to death, thousands of Kikuyu – some of whom hadn’t even voted for Kibaki. Hundreds of thousands were forced to flee their homes to avoid the blood-shed. And the worst crime of all
is that most of this violence has gone unpunished.
To be fair, there wasn’t com-plete impunity. Currently, three of Kenya’s most senior politicians, as well as a popular radio announcer, are scheduled to stand trial for crimes against humanity at the International Criminal Court (ICC) later this year. Two of the four have confirmed that they are running in Kenya’s presidential elections set to occur late in 2012 or in early 2013. One presidential aspirant and con-comitant ICC defendant is Uhuru Kenyatta, a Kikuyu, and the son of Kenya’s founding president Jomo Kenyatta. He is also Kenya’s richest man – a poster child for Kenya’s “It’s Our Turn to Eat” culture.
The ICC prosecution of these four men, allegedly behind the execution of systematic attacks against opposing ethnic groups, is a positive development. It sends a strong signal to Kenya’s elite and politically well-connected: that they are not above the law. Ethnic inequality will be the dominant theme of Kenya’s upcoming elec-tion, just as class inequality will be the theme of America’s. Let us hope an overarching lesson from history has been learned: fair-ness in the distribution of wealth is key to the peaceful coexistence of any society.
The West and the Rest
Kurtis [email protected]
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Culture The McGill Daily | Monday, February 6, 2012 | mcgilldaily.com14
Whenever companies put on plays dating from before about 1900, the
buzzphrase “updated for a modern audience” instantly becomes ubiqui-tous. But Greek tragedy hardly needs this. After all, theatre aims to pres-ent you with the reality of the human condition, and how much has that changed over the last 2500 years?
The Classics department’s staging of Hippolytus, written by Euripides and first performed in 428 BCE, hammers this point home with a blaze of miscommunications, ven-geance, sensuality, lust, betrayal, and forgiveness. Lynn Kozak, assistant professor in History and Classical Studies and organizer of the depart-ment’s now-annual play, spoke of how tragedy emphasizes “how out of control our lives are,” and evokes emotions that are viscerally real.
The protagonist, Hippolytus, is an overwhelmingly self-righteous virgin who refuses to worship the goddess of love, Kypris (also known as Aphrodite), instead devoting his worship to Artemis, goddess of chastity and hunt-ing. Kypris is so offended she takes revenge, making Hippolytus’ mother-in-law Phaedra fall in love with him. Things take a turn for the tragic when Hippolytus’ father Theseus returns. The human characters prove to be far more complex than the deities, man-aging to provoke both annoyance and sympathy from the audience.
While Phaedra agonises over her unrequited love and Hippolytus raves against the uselessness of women, the chorus offers its opinion on the unfolding events at every opportunity. 12 cast members scattered through the audience move about freely, dance sensuously, mourn, and rant as the occasion demands. In the cavern-
ous space of La Sala Rossa, with the audience scattered around tables, the effect was immersive and multisenso-ry in a way theatre often doesn’t dare to be.
Adding to the sensory experi-ence was the surprising and suc-cessful electronic soundtrack com-posed by Nick Donaldson, aka Virek, who graduated from McGill with an MA in Music Technology in 2011. Heartbeats and horse hoofs mingled with ethereal synths – and a fair smattering of doom-laden bass – in a way that both blended into and enhanced the tension of the unfolding drama. When asked why this genre should be chosen for the soundtrack, co-director Carina de Klerk explained, “Because it’s syn-thetic, and the restaging of classical plays is synthetic.” While “synthetic” is more commonly interpreted as “artificial,” in this sense, I’m more inclined to think of it in its second sense, as a combination: the mission to stay true to the text, paired with the realities of staging a play for a 21st century audience.
Speaking about the translation process, Elizabeth Ten-Hove – who played Hippolytus, and contributed to the translation – said, “It was a lot of fun! You’re always translating in class but it was really interesting to come together as a group and talk about the translation. It has to sound good in English. It’s not just about getting the right meaning, it’s the right shade of meaning.” The task of translation was clearly not taken lightly, with con-tributions from eight students under the purview of de Klerk and Kozak. While modernized, the resulting play flows smoothly: idiom was well integrated, and the chorus retained the sense of poetry – while avoiding
any forced rhythm or rhyme – that set their interjections apart from the emotionally-charged dialogue and soliloquy of the principal characters.
Most would agree that ancient Greek is a dead language. But its lega-cy is certainly living, and performanc-es such as this one take that legacy out of the classroom – where, indeed, it is liable to remain trapped in an endless recitation of conjugations and declensions. Kozak enthused that “performance makes [classical plays]
real in a way that reading doesn’t, especially with translation, you get stuck in every word.” For her, stag-ing classical plays is essential to her project to “bring Classics to a wider audience. I don’t like that Classics is just a niche thing.” Only one third of the cast are “hardcore Classicists,” as Kozak described them. Rather, many came to the play out of interest in the culture and in acting.
The overall response among the cast was that the whole thing was
a lot of fun. “We take the darkest parts of ourselves and bring them out for the world to see!” Thurber remarked, with a huge smile on her face that completely vanished when she took to the stage to pour out the doomed fate of Phaedra.
Taking classics out of the classroomNaomi Endicott reviews a student production of Euripides’ Hippolytus
Winter gets inside Centaur TheatreCanadian playwright warms up Montreal crowds this season
Reminiscent of the Theatre of the Absurd, the work of renowned Canadian play-
wright Morris Panych is known for its blend of black comedy and dark ruminations upon the meaning of life, human interaction, and isolation. With these eerie qualities of Panych’s corpus in mind, the Centaur Theatre in Old Montreal has revealed itself as a venue uniquely suited to his style of plays. Half-traditional theatre and half-black box, the dark and isolated interior of Centaur itself contributed greatly to the strange ambience of In Absentia, Panych’s newest play, which premiered there this past Thursday.
This mystery story is a powerful meditation on the nature of lost love and grief, depicting a woman whose dire circumstances force her into
deep contemplation of her marriage, both its ups and downs. Working with such a complex text as Panych’s, the production triumphs on the backs of an extremely talented cast.
The play follows protagonist Colette (Jillian Fargey) as she resides in her remote country cottage a year after her husband Tom’s abduction while he was on a business trip to Colombia. Amidst the frozen winter of her grief, a young stranger, Jasper (Jade Hassouné), arrives in desper-ate need of shelter from the cold. Jasper, however, displays uncanny similarities to Tom (Paul Hopkins), who still constantly interacts with Colette, either as a ghost or a fig-ment of her imagination. This spurs Colette to prolong Jasper’s stay and investigate this strange connection, much to the chagrin of her con-cerned sister, Evelyn (Susan Glover), and suitor Bill (Carlo Mestroni).
Jillian Fargey plays Colette bril-
liantly, as a woman much too compla-cent with her grievous situation, as her wryly humorous and giddy attitude attest. This attitude, however, cun-ningly betrays her character’s denial. Unable to face such a grave loss, she stubbornly refuses to give up hope for her husband’s return. Her character’s emotional stasis is conveyed through powerfully arresting monologues and her interaction with the mysteriously present Tom. Fargey and Hopkins masterfully perform their roles of two people so in love that they remain connected even in separation. Indeed, their natural chemistry together makes this duo the most impressive onstage presence.
Jade Hassouné delivers a char-ismatically flirtatious Jasper, whose wooing of Colette allows him to gradually absorb some of her and Tom’s chemistry. Hassouné skillfully renders a character that is affable and yet wholly – and perhaps threaten-
ingly – enigmatic and mysterious. Like Colette, we too feel like we know him from somewhere. Susan Glover provides comic relief portray-ing the quirky Evelyn with her clumsy attempts at meeting her sister’s emo-tional needs, while Carlo Mestroni succeeds in presenting Bill’s frustrat-ed and unrequited love for Colette.
Roy Surette’s direction adeptly conquers what must have been an intensely challenging script. With one act of over thirty scenes, the story moves quickly through a fragmented timeline, and Surette manages to enact this movement with surprising smoothness. The lighting used to dif-ferentiate between scenes was highly effective, instantly transporting us from a sweltering hospital room in Mexico to the snowed-in Canadian cottage. The set was simple but suc-cessful in establishing the remote-ness of the domestic setting within a desolate wintery expanse.
The play’s only weakness was a sense of incompleteness upon the story’s conclusion; many questions were left unanswered, and I doubt whether this was to a thematic end. Nonetheless, the accomplishments in performance, direction, and light-ing established this production’s real strength as an expressionistic exploration of one individual’s grief. The production uniquely and pow-erfully communicates the workings of a mind discordantly whirling and searching for its bearings, attempting to grapple with lost love, emotional stasis, and isolation. To anyone fond of Panych’s work, or simply in the mood for a highly evocative theatri-cal experience, this is a must-see for Centaur’s 2011-2012 season.
Tyler WentzCulture Writer
In Absentia runs at Centaur Theater Until March 4. Visit www.centaurtheatre.com for ticket infor-mation.
For more information, email [email protected] or visit mcgill.ca/classics/classicsplay. Nick Donaldson’s music can be found at virek.bandcamp.com.
Am
ina Batyreva | The M
cGill D
aily
The McGill Daily | Monday, February 6, 2012 | mcgilldaily.com 15
EDITORIAL
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Dust off your MUNACA buttonTwo months ago, we took off our MUNACA buttons and welcomed back over 1,700
employees to campus after a semester-long strike, dedicated in part to gaining greater pro-tection of the medical benefits workers pay their salaries into every year. But now, McGill has announced that all McGill employees retiring after May 2016 will have to pay 70 per cent of their medical expenses, along with 100 per cent of their dental expenses. Currently, both these expenses are split 50-50 with McGill.
The administration made this decision unilaterally last July, which MUNACA alleges vio-lated the contract in place at the time. That contract mandated the administration to con-sult with the union before making decisions on benefits. This change (egregious as it may seem) actually represents a concession on the part of the administration – who originally scheduled these cuts for last month – for current and future retirees. However, this hardly makes a difference for MUNACA members being denied their benefits.
As soon as MUNACA signs the new contract, employee groups will be receiving more decision-making power over possible changes to pensions and benefits – effective as soon as MUNACA signs its new contract – but the administration’s actions did not even follow the regulations outlined in the old contract. This is not the first time the administration has clawed back on benefis; in January 2010, McGill reduced its contribution to worker pensions by $1 million.
It is clear that McGill’s administration is taking liberties with the significant institutional power it possesses, evidenced both by this incident and their voiding the results of CKUT and QPIRG’s referenda results last semester. The repeated dismissal of democratic process at McGill is of major concern, especially when it puts the future livelihoods of McGill’s longest-serving employees at risk. Concessions after the fact do not make up for a refusal to consult in the first place.
There was a lot of talk about restoring trust after the strike ended, yet it is hard for McGill students and employees to trust an administration that does not listen to the com-munity it should be serving.
The strike may be over, but its instigating factors continue today, for MUNACA and all campus employees. Students should dust off their MUNACA buttons and unite in a call for greater campus democracy.
Amina Batyreva | The McGill Daily
In the article “ Deputy Provost portfolio under review” (News, January 26, Page 3), it is stated that Maggie Knight was the sole author of the for-discussion document; rather, Knight and numerous faculty association presidents helped write the docu-ment. The Daily regrets the error.
Errata
The McGill Daily | Monday, February 6, 2012 | mcgilldaily.comCompendium! 16Lies, half-truths, and pirates!!!!!!!!!!!1!1!!!!!11
Across1. Neverending board game5. Throw8. Brightest star in the con-stellation Aries13. Infinitesimal amount14. Achilles, e.g.15. Ammonia derivative16. Q-Tip17. Like pie?18. Male genitalia (alt. spell-ing)19. Environmental impact22. Barley beards23. “Arabian Nights” bird24. Spanish rice dish27. “Aladdin” prince29. Write on stone or glass33. Pond slime34. Shoot secretly36. Clod chopper37. Inability to write on left-most desk of row40. Blood letters41. Loudness units42. Golden or garden, e.g.43. Swim’s alternative45. Annoy46. “Lively”, in music47. Neckline49. Hindu princess50. D&D, for one58. Thin rock ledge formed by glaciers
59. By ___, I think she’s got it!60. Dumbfounded61. Christmas wish62. Ripens63. Pasta server64. Second-year students, for short65. Tattle-tale66. Choice word
Down1. RNA-Induced Silencing Complex2. Corn Belt state3. The Sun, e.g.4. Madonna’s religion5. Flips (through)6. Ish7. Mate8. Hungry, hungry animal9. Punish with an arbitrary penalty10. Short skirt11. Gulf of ___, off the coast of Yemen12. “___ we forget”14. Reddish brown dye20. Little owl21. Hogwash24. Pokémon #4625. Accused’s need26. Encourage27. Take over28. Tops
30. Angle letter31. Trig function32. “Siddhartha” author34. All there35. Trim38. Shack39. Explore44. Whine46. Wind indicators48. Foils49. Fix firmly50. Reputations51. Black and white cookie52. Vault53. Close to closed54. Lulu Lemon sport55. Missing from the Marines, say56. Department store depart-ment57. Verge
The Crossword FairiesThe McGill Daily
Six more weeks of winter (but only two until reading week)!
Pirates invade principal’s officeAdministration loots proper fact finding investigation
The pirates who docked on the Saint Lawrence River and made their way to the McGill
Board of Governors meeting last Tuesday proceeded to the principal’s office after the meeting adjourned. The goal of this pirate occupation was to raise awareness of the McGill’s Board of Governors ties with the exploitative 1684 East India Trading Company
Other concerns raised by the ruckus inducing seafarers included unfair MOA agreements the McGill adminstration signed with student run scurvy prevention programs, Intramural Settlers of Catan leagues, and Inner Tube Water Polo teams. The occupation ended in a violent conflict between administration members and pirates.
Two of the pirates, Imannuel Volfe and Smelli Weedman, had identified themselves when The Daily went to press.
Speaking to The Daily, Weedman had stressed much of his frustra-tion with the McGill Administration’s recent actions and violent conflicts.
“We arrrrr occupying to create a better space for McGill students, staff, and pirates alike…do these land-locked administrators honestly think they can appoint executives of highly exploitative 16th century trrrrading companies and not expect a pirate presence,’ she said.
“In terms of productivity, I could be sailing the seven seas or I could be get-ting real results here in Montrrrreal. Things are pretty stormy in terms of the obvious lack of student friendli-ness on behalf of the administration. I mean they’re making things hard for student groups while chowing down on cashew nut cookies… I’m here to hijack those proceedings and plunder those fancy-ass cookies”.
The administration was not responsive or sympathetic to those pirates who suffered injury. In an inter-view with The Daily, Weather Meerkat-Broom discussed her immediate reac-tions to the pirate occupations.
“These kinds of pirate occupa-tions are absolutely immature and should have no place in our campus discourse. We are all landlocked. I will call upon one of my close admin-istrative groups to assist me in a fact finding investigation to cover up any mistakes on behalf of administration
members”, said Meerkat-Broom. When asked about the impartial-
ity of the fact finding investigation, Meerkat-Broom denied any conflict of interest.
“ Oh you wanna talk about conflict of interest…that’s not a problem here. You should speak for yourselves. You
think I don’t know about the suppos-edly impartial pirate media having secret ties with the student-run inner tube water polo league.”
With regards to corporate social responsibility. Fip Frobbett, arch-exec-utive of the 1684 East-India Trading Company and member of the Board
of Governors spoke to The Daily about his company’s involvement in exploitative industries.
“We don’t have any corporate social responsibility issue. You think it’s easy to be a mean spirited colo-nizer. These stupid pirates should just fuck off and go back to their boat.”
Zee Lo GreenThe McGill Daily
Nicolas Kidman | The McGill Daily
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