Opinion

Opinions from our editorial board and contributors.

Helping Haiti: doing our part for the relief effort

It has been one week since an earthquake measuring 7.0 in magnitude struck near Port-au-Prince, Haiti, devastating the country’s infrastructure and sparking a humanitarian disaster. The Red Cross has confirmed that 50,000 people are dead, while Haitian officials say the death toll could be as high as 200,000.

COMMENTARY: Change the world

As a recent graduate of McGill, I’ve been reflecting on the time I’ve spent over the past five years trying to organize for social change in a university context. I have heard people say that universities are fertile ground for this kind of activity, and it’s not hard to see why: thousands of young people in close social proximity to each other, many of them in a new place, encountering new ways of thinking about the world.

RIGHT MINDED: Defending prorogation

Contrary to what some of you may believe, proroguing parliament is not the “democratic travesty” that many are making it out to be. Canada is supposedly stirring with “grassroots fury,” according to the Toronto Star. More than 100,000 people have now joined a Facebook group in opposition to Stephen Harper’s decision to prorogue Parliament, united by their hatred of our prime minister.

AMUSE vote leaves some students in the dark

The Association of McGill University Support Employees is now the official union of McGill’s non-academic casual workers, receiving accreditation from the Quebec Labour Board last month. An October mail-in vote of eligible employees resulted in an overwhelming 85 per cent of casual workers voting in favour of the union.

FRESH HELL: Die “Hipster” die

Dear Diary, Over the winter break, I was called a hipster for wearing a high-waisted skirt and glasses and then found out that Joey Jeremiah only asked me out as a joke and I totally fell for it. I was so embarrassed!! I just wanted to DIE. My life is so sucky.

MY POINT … AND I DO HAVE ONE: Bring it on, 2010

2009 was a wretched year. On a personal level, it was full of injury, emotional rollercoasters of human interaction, far too much time spent on academics, and the deaths of some very special people to me. And for the world, 2009 saw the entrenchment of superficially humanized global American military domination with the coronation of Emperor Obama.

LETTER TO THE EDITOR: PGSS Council sounds fun

Re: “Letter to the editor: Can we go too?” by Matthew Hodgetts (24.11.09) Regarding whether the PGSS Executive has a firm foundation upon which to base reforms to the Canadian Federation of Students (CFS), here are a few examples illustrating that the PGSS does, in fact, practice the democratic basics on our home turf.

LETTER TO THE EDITOR

An open letter to Students’ Society Vice-President University Affairs Rebecca Dooley by former student Senator Nick Wolf regarding his resignation. Dear Ms. Dooley, I would be less hesitant to bring my resignation to SSMU if I were not afraid of what SSMU would do with my vacant seat.

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