McGill Tribune

During my campaign to become SSMU president, I often noted that student groups and student politicians within our community should strive to be a lot “nicer” to one another. Many found this desire to be empty, vague, unattainable, or all of the above. But quality of the argument aside it is most certainly true. Throughout this year, students at McGill have been witness to everything that is wrong with student politics at McGill.

In September, following the closure of the Architecture Café, a student Senator publicly defamed our Deputy Provost (Student Life and Learning) by calling him “Voldemort” in the McGill Daily. And we expect the administration to consult with and respect our student representatives? Immaturity and name-calling: this is what’s wrong with student politics at McGill.

In October, members of SSMU Council attempted to bring to referendum a resolution that would annul QPIRG McGill’s opt-outable fee, part of a year-long campaign to dismantle the group’s finances. The QPIRG Opt-Out campaign has led to students not only opting out of QPIRG, but also wonderful services and funds like Nightline and the Ambassador Fee. Group-on-group attack-rhetoric: this is what’s wrong with student politics at McGill.

In December, student representatives walked out of a meeting with provincial government ministers and university administrators due to our refusal to accept proposed hikes in tuition. Five months later, undergraduate tuition is still going up, but we have learned little about increases in financial aid or any real progress that mitigates the problem of inaccessible education. Lack of pragmatism and an inability to compromise: this is what’s wrong with student politics at McGill.

In February, three SSMU Executives and at least five councillors met in a closed-door meeting to discuss the removal of the SSMU president, based on his personal involvement with the website Jobbook. Subsequent to this we saw public and private defamation, circulation of confidential information, circulation of false information, and unwavering attitudes of pettiness and disrespect. The ensuing drama and politics did far more harm to the Students’ Society than the initial lapses of judgment. “Jobbook-gate” is representative of what is wrong with student politics at McGill.

In March, a McGill student publicly released anti-Semitic death threats during a screening of a documentary hosted by two SSMU clubs. Instead of uniting the student body in a condemnation of hate speech and threats of violence, the situation has further perpetuated ideological divides on campus. Those who had their lives threatened have been accused of exaggerating the effect as a means to gain attention for themselves and their respective student groups. A lack of humanity and empathy: this is what’s wrong with student politics at McGill.

This past Thursday at SSMU Council, the VP university affairs questioned the president’s ability to re-draft the Conflict of Interest Policy, despite there being no formal or informal determination that he ever violated it. The VP clubs and services opposed a financial endeavor of the VP finance and operations because it didn’t prioritize her portfolio enough. Bickering, bantering, crying, swearing, disrespecting, yelling, booing, ignoring, head-shaking, time-wasting: they’re at our Council, they’re at our General Assembly, they’re in our Opt-Out campaigns, they’re in our articles, they’re in the online comment threads at the end of our articles, they’re throughout our campus (you even hear these at Gerts): they are what’s wrong with student politics at McGill.

Cathal Rooney-Céspedes is the SSMU Speaker of Council, and can be reached at [email protected]

Though ESPN is now my homepage and I regularly have 15-20 different tabs of sporting-related articles open at a time, I didn’t like the majority of sports when I was young. My family never gathered around the TV for Hockey Night In Canada, and the only sports programming my dad did tune in for, my parents deemed unsuitable for a child. But this only served to enflame my interest in the one sport I wasn’t permitted to like—boxing.

My dad loved to tell me how, 45 years ago last Tuesday, the second-greatest Canadian fighter in history, George Chuvalo, stood 15 rounds with the champ at Maple Leaf Gardens. My father, 14 years old at the time, listened to the radiocast of the fight from his bed and winced along with every blow to the iron-jawed Croatian-Canadian. Still, through 15 rounds he was convinced that Chuvalo was in it, that he might deliver the greatest upset of all time.

Years later, he saw archival footage of that same fight and was shocked to see the one-sided beating Chuvalo had received. In this way, the demise of radio was a body blow to the sport of boxing. No longer could mismatched or boring fights hide beneath an electrifying shroud of patter woven by dulcet-tongued broadcasters.

When I reached the age of 10, I was no longer required to leave the room when the TV turned to boxing. But my first reaction upon seeing a fight was horror. My parents’ pacifism (and veganism) had rubbed off strongly on me, and the sport seemed barbaric to my youthful eyes. Still, it was something my father and I could talk about, so I stuck it out. Over time I developed an appreciation. Not for the sociopathically brutal Mike Tyson, but for some of the other great fighters of the 1990s and early 2000s, like Lennox Lewis and Roy Jones, Jr.

When I was 14 I joined a boxing club with my father and best friend only to quit after realizing that, along with being strongly against violence done to me, I really didn’t want cauliflower ears. A year later I pitched in to see my first ever pay-per-view match—an egregiously overhyped spectacle wherein Oscar de la Hoya, the Golden Boy, suddenly looked very, very old against an unimpressive Shane Mosley. Two summers ago, after a long, late day at work, I remember ignoring both signage and the safety of my fellow commuters in order to get home, pick up my dad, and then sprint off to the nearest bar to watch Manny Pacquiao fight against the highly heralded Ricky Hatton, who was out cold before we completed our drink order.

These memories are bittersweet to me. All these little failures, all these weak title fights and HBO pay-per-view extravaganza flops have signalled the end of boxing as I know it. The sport is dying, soon to be universally replaced by mixed martial arts and the insufferable Dana White.

Boxing is special to me because of the bond it helped me forge with my father and, most of all, because it was beautiful. Rest in peace, boxing.

McGill Tribune

The Quebec government’s recently tabled proposal to gradually increase in-province university tuition from $2,168 to $3,793—which would still make it 30 per cent lower than the present Canadian average—has predictably raised the ire of activists who favour free education for all, and engendered promises of walk-outs, demonstrations, and even a possible student strike next fall. The campaign got off to a shaky start last week, as media coverage of a protest involving 2,000 students focused on the violence at the end, when five activists draped in black were arrested after smashing property and facing off against tear gas bearing police officers. While the negative publicity garnered by a handful of hardliners doesn’t necessarily reflect poorly on the student leaders in general, and says nothing about the legitimacy of their cause, it’s probably worth taking a step back in order to reconsider the strategy students should take in response to these tuition hikes and the tactics they should employ through the summer and next year.

The members of our editorial board hold as diverse views about the wisdom, efficacy, and necessity of tuition as the McGill student body at large. Some think the ideal of free higher education a worthy one. If students should not expect to achieve it, they should at least start from that position and negotiate from there: you can’t negotiate when your starting position is compromise, and the constant absence of youth from politics gives leaders license to ignore them. Others consider such idealism merely evidence of stubbornness: either free education is undesirable or unrealistic; the fear here is that if students take an uncritically antagonistic attitude toward decision-makers on campus and in Quebec City, they are basically asking to be ridiculed and ignored. Though we disagree on certain aspects of the issue, we are in agreement that student leaders need to develop a more diversified program of action in response to the tuition hikes.  Antagonistic threats of strikes and more demonstrations can only be part of the strategy.  But they are at worst ineffective and at best long-term strategies: if we really care about low-income students being unable to pay higher tuition, perhaps more constructive and immediately practicable ideas should be considered, too.

The recent motion passed at Students’ Society Council opposing all tuition hikes and even urging that tuition be lowered is, for some, a step in the right direction. But there need to be other steps taken in other directions. For instance, why is so much effort put into lowering tuition even for those fortunate among us who have no problem paying the current rate, and would even consider paying a little more if it meant our less fortunate friends and peers could be subsidized? There should be a greater emphasis placed on scholarships and bursaries, which would actually help students in need deal with rising tuition costs. Even the most idealistic student activists have to admit that protests and strikes have a pretty dismal chance of convincing any Quebec politicians to change their minds.

Next year’s SSMU executives need to cast a wider net in devising their strategy regarding both tuition hikes and all other areas of disagreement with the Quebec government and the university administration. This needs to be a multipronged effort. Programs like the Arts Student Employment Fund are exactly the kind of thing we need to see more of from student leaders. Moreover, if students really want their voices heard, they should vote in the upcoming election. We need to be smarter about getting those in power to not ignore us. Measures like protests, strikes, and the recent council motion merely give politicians an excuse to continue doing so—and hurt the students they claim to help.

A recent report from the Dean of Arts’ Working Group has suggested the removal of the mandatory minor from the current Faculty of Arts program. As it stands now, McGill Arts students are required to have at least one major and one minor. From both personal experience and a simple understanding of the university experience, I think it’s clear that the removal of the mandatory minor would be an excellent move.

After starting my McGill career in the Faculty of Science, I decided to switch into Arts after two years. This meant that I had two years to fit in the majority of an Arts program that most students have four years to do. Luckily I started my major while I was still in Science, but I still needed to make sure I had fulfilled my freshman arts requirements and also all minor requirements. This effectively limited my possible course choices for the latter half of my university career. Luckily, I had some advance credits from high school and I was able to apply some of my science courses to my freshmen requirements, but I was still stuck in a tricky situation of having to fulfill a minor, which I did not necessarily think was a great way to spend my time.

It should be made clear that this act would only remove the requirement of the minor. Of course, students would still be free to pursue one or more minors. Many of the arguments that could be made in favour of minors are compelling, but few offer strong evidence that a minor should be required of students. Requiring students to minor in another discipline can come close to hard paternalism with McGill telling students they know what is best for them. However, as an 18-22 year old, I feel confident in my abilities to decide what I ought to be studying. If you disagree with this, then I think you would also be forced to argue that McGill should also be telling me in which program I should be majoring, which seems like a bad idea.

Another argument could be made that requiring a minor forces students to expand their studies beyond just their major and learn more about other topics. However, I think requiring a minor actually limits students abilities to expand their study into other programs. Not only do many students feel compelled to stay within their field of study, or something related to it, but they are also forced to fulfill the minor requirements. Now, it could actually be said that forcing a minor is actually good because allowing students to take too many different classes limits their ability to learn something more in-depth and could lead to students missing out on interesting learning opportunities at higher-level classes. There are a few problems with this. First, six classes isn’t really that many. It’s quite easy to take six classes in something and not get so deep into the field. Also, the student should be able to choose whether or not they want to specialize in a few things, or spend their university life tasting as many different parts of academia as possible. You might think this is a waste of their time, but students should be able to decide this for themselves and they are still taking a major, which will be way more in depth than any minor could ever hope to be.

Almost four years ago, I helped my father load our station wagon with the basic accoutrements I needed to begin university life: clothes, bedding, and a new laptop. I also packed one more thing: my recently approved Canadian student visa.

 As a relatively apolitical New Yorker, I assumed going to McGill would be like going to any of the American liberal arts colleges I was considering, except that I needed to cross an international border to get there. Canada was a country to which, like most Americans, I had never given much thought: I knew it was cold, I knew Canadians liked hockey, and I had heard that they often finished sentences with “eh.”   

What I foolishly didn’t realize was that I was entering an entirely different world. I was suddenly a foreigner with an accent, thrust into heated political debates. “How do you defend the fact that not all Americans can get free health care?” “How did you manage to elect Bush?” “What about the fact that gay people can’t get married?”

Being “American” was never a part of my identity in the way that being female, Jewish, or a New Yorker were. Only the second generation of my family to live in America, pledging allegiance to the flag and learning about the pilgrims were things that I did; they were not, as far as I knew, who I was.  

Eventually, however, the heated conversations of first-year—the ones we all engaged in because we were confronting the “other” for the first time—soon gave way to what became the reality of my life; declining  un sac at the grocery store, trudging through icy winters, and ordering drinks at the bar sans fake ID. There was something special about being in a country where everyone was free to get married, to choose whether they want an abortion, and to obtain health care. There was also the revelation that cold weather wasn’t necessarily something to survive, but something to celebrate in its own right. On a recent trip to Quebec City, I experienced many of what my friend called “Canada boners” as I ate frozen maple syrup, watched dog-sledding competitions, and panned over breathtaking landscapes of snowy mountains and rivers filled with floating ice.

But this isn’t about ragging on American values—I’ve heard more than enough of that—and exalting Canada for everything that it is and does. America will always be the place that welcomed my grandparents and gave them the chance to start a new life, and the place that continues to reallize the dreams of countless individuals. Nor would I ever make the mistake of calling the lifestyle and values of the relatively small population of Canadians I have encountered in Montreal representative of the entire country—just as I am outraged when my politics are assumed to be the same as those of George W. Bush.

This isn’t really about America versus Canada at all, but about how my haphazard decision to live in another country gave me a perspective I would never have had living in only one country or the other; how it exposed me to a larger set of values from which I can now pick and choose; how it taught me that we as humans are formed by a random set of factors—where we were born, under which political systems we were raised, the customs we were handed down, and the chromosome combinations that make us like the things that we do. It has made me realize how important it is to decide how we feel about a given issue based on reason and careful thought, rather than on a given list of stances we think we should take because we happened to be born Canadian, American, Jewish, Muslim, white, black, gay, or straight.

We certainly can’t change where we came from—nor should we ever try—but what we can do is recognize that every perspective has something to give, and offer our opinions not as already-formed individuals but as fellow human beings trying to figure out how to best live together in this world.

Dear McChill Brobune,

SSMU’s open forums will be moved to Friday afternoons as opposed to Wednesdays after dark so as to avoid any scheduling conflicts (seriously, what were we thinking). Also, I finally figured out what OAP stands for. See you there in the fall! One last thing: who’s Broseph Walsh?

Cheers, Broël Pedneault

Incoming SSMU VP External

McGill Tribune

North American society has an intense focus on individualism and subsequently placing one’s self-interest and personal pursuits above all else. The consequence of this is a narrow, linear view of personal goal pursuit that does not always fit properly with our basic need for close intimate interactions and relationships. It’s important to think about yourself, what you want to do with your life, and how you will achieve it. Nevertheless, there is a point where one must slow down before casting everyone to the side because they seem to be blocking your path and impeding your progress.

Recently, I read something rather sad but quite profound. Basically, people, due to the emphasis on individualism in our culture, are growing incapable of wholly loving other people. This claim is based on the idea that these people are so intensely focused on themselves, and truly loving someone else necessitates a shift of interests off oneself. The power of self-interest doesn’t allow some people to open up and give themselves up, wholeheartedly and unselfishly to someone else.

Emotional commitment to others is just as vital and significant in our lives as success at school or work. If school or work falter, it will be the support and care from your closest relationships that helps you along. Discussing and emphasizing this seems superficially important to some people, but there are numerous instances where it is forgotten.

This promotion of self-focus and self-serving action can seriously compromise other people through a focus only on one’s success and a disregard for the well-being of others. Situations like this can be seen in the news in the actions of greedy people trying to get their hands on as much money as possible. Particular cases of this can be seen in the documentary Food Inc., which illuminates certain situations in which large corporations disregard health regulations in their factories, resulting in millions of people being put at risk of contracting diseases, or even dying. All this is done to maximize their production and increase profit. Clearly extreme self-interest in a capitalist society is ultimately a negative for the whole population.

On a different level, nearing the end of one’s university adventure seems to bring out this quality in many people, since it suddenly strikes them that, after a few years of fun, it’s time to get serious. Many people’s instinct is to presuppose that time-consuming relationships are the cause of their lack of concentration in school. I must admit that on rare occasions relationships can get out of hand. But your interactions and relationships add an unquantifiable amount of pleasure and experience to your life, so even with exams just around the corner, and maybe graduation, or even the beginning of a career, don’t forget to appreciate all the important people in your life.

Five years from now are you going to remember those 10 extra hours you spent in the library, or that pretty afternoon when it finally stopped snowing and you went on an adventure? Undoubtedly everyone is entitled to their own priorities, I just wish to express words of caution: attending to one’s self and one’s future is clearly essential, but we must not forget all the people deeply intertwined in our lives.

Chloe Turner-Bloom is a U2 student in philosophy. Contact her at [email protected].

charlesforan.com

Richard was born in 1921 in a very different Quebec from the one in which he died 79 years later. Highly rural, Catholic, and politically silent, French Canadians—as they then permitted themselves to be called—were depicted as content to be ruled by English-speaking Westmount overlords and regressive Catholic priests, and to let modernity pass them by.

Rising quickly from the Montreal municipal leagues to the relatively new National Hockey League (its offices then located in downtown Montreal), Richard was signed by the Habs, the Anglophone owners of which were then looking for a new French Canadian star to bring in bigger hometown crowds. His prowess on the ice was immediately evident and Richard’s mostly English teammates called him “the Rocket.” He established himself as the most talented player in the league, scoring 50 goals in as many games during the 1944-1945 season—the first time that ever happened, and the only until 1980.

As the Habs began to rack up Stanley Cups and established a specifically French Canadian way of playing hockey—fast and furious (in Richard’s case, a bit too furious)—the team’s biggest star began to feel burdened by the expectations of his increasingly politicized fans. As Foran notes, Richard’s notoriously violent playing style enabled many French Canadians to satisfy their revenge fantasies vicariously through his fists. Richard, often depicted as a simpleton, wasn’t dumb, but neither was he fully aware of the political storm brewing around him. As always, he just wanted to play hockey.

“For his entire life, he is bigger than himself,” Foran noted in a recent interview. “This regular guy has to negotiate throughout his entire life these expectations and hopes for him that are not only outside his own sense of himself as a man, but sometimes even outside of his understanding.”

An on-ice incident in 1955 that culminated in Richard breaking a stick over a ref’s face and his subsequent suspension for the remainder of the season eventually led to a riot on St. Catherine Street. Richard’s French Canadian fans felt the suspension was unwarranted and the player was being unfairly treated—”just another emotional, self-indulgent French Canadian,” as Foran writes—by a wholly Anglophone league establishment.

The famous Quebec journalist André Laurendeau wrote at the time, “French-Canadian nationalism seems to have taken refuge in hockey.” Indeed, what came to be known as the Richard Riot was considered by some the awakening of the Quebec people to the injustices they had for centuries suffered under the dual yoke of Anglo domination and anti-modern Catholic political hegemony in the province itself. Richard became an accidental hero of the modernizing forces which would eventually emerge as the leaders of the Quiet Revolution.

Foran argues that there is a certain “Zelig element” in the Richard story, referring to the Woody Allen character who stumbles into important historical scenes and accidentally changes their outcomes. It didn’t take long for Quebecers to ditch Richard when they realized he was more representative of the old, acquiescent French Canada than of the new, empowered Quebec.

The central question of the book is what role Richard played in that transition, despite his awareness of that role or lack thereof.

“Of what exactly was he even a symbol?” Foran writes. “Of quiet defiance and steady resistance, of an incremental awakening of an entire people? Or, less happily, of the ultimate ‘small’ French Canadian being played for a sucker by church and state, the accidental company man shilling for interests that weren’t really his own and that didn’t deserve the imprimatur of his dignity and ferocity?”

Ultimately, Foran argues, he was all of these things. It’s this dramatic complexity that drew Foran—a novelist and journalist, not a sportswriter but a big sports fan—to the Maurice Richard story. Sports in general, Foran believes, are great narratives because they display tendencies latent in the culture they come from.

“I’m a big believer in sports as a vital expression of populist views, yearnings, and dreams,” he says. “Sport is an arena of drama.”

Foran’s book—coming in at just over 150 pages, it’s more of an essay than a book, and can easily be read in an afternoon—will satisfy the curiosity of both the sports fan and the general reader interested in Quebec history. Foran’s eloquent storytelling and deft employment of historical context make it both informative and enjoyable, an excellent introduction to Richard, to hockey, to Quebec, and to the relation of sports to politics, culture, and society in general.

Mathieu Darche is the first McGill alumnus to play in the NHL in the past 50 years. In 2000, Darche’s final season at McGill, he led the CIS in scoring. Since then he‘s played professional hockey at both the AHL and the NHL level. Despite leading five different AHL teams in goals, Darche was never given much playing time in the NHL until last year. He has played on the Montreal Canadiens since January 2010 and is having one of the best seasons of his career with 24 points  in 56 games. The Tribune recently sat down with Darche to discuss his unique path to the NHL.

After a decade of playing professional hockey, how do you look back at your time at McGill?

I’ve been quite few places but that’s where it started—I had so much fun playing here, you know, you meet great friends and great coaches so it’s always a place you cherish.

Very few NHL players make it out of the CIS. How were you able to succeed as a professional hockey player coming from the CIS?

It was an adjustment, but for my first three years pro I was lucky enough to have good coaches in the AHL that gave me a chance right away to have [an important] role instead of burying me right away on the fourth line. They let me play so I was able to catch up with the lack of games I had playing in university (the CIS schedule is half the length of the NCAA and other minor leagues). It took a long time but there are different paths to the NHL. But the bottom line is I’m there now.

How does it feel to finally play for your hometown Habs?

Like every kid growing up [around Montreal], I grew up idolizing this team. It’s a nice reward later on in my career after all the years I spent going up and down—more often in the AHL [than the NHL]. But it’s great being back in the NHL on my hometown team [that] I grew up idolizing.

How did it feel to lead five different AHL teams in scoring but never be given long periods of playing time in the NHL until the last couple years?

It’s always disappointing to not get called up, but every year I saw guys going up and making a career in the NHL and was like “I know I can play with them.” I played against those guys and I have nothing to envy. I just stuck with it and luckily it worked for me.

Why do you think you’re having your best season at the age of 34?

Better late than never. I always try and improve every year. Even now at 34, I still try to improve. You watch and learn over the years from the players you’ve played with, and you get a few things from different guys and you try and bring that to your game to improve.

What do you plan on doing when your hockey career comes to an end?

I hope I still have a few years left … but I’d like to stay in hockey in some sort of management capacity. I don’t know if I want to coach but I’d like to stay involved in the game one way or another.