McGill Tribune

The Library Stampede kicks off when you wake up. After slamming your alarm clock you stumble groggily from bed, glaring around the room, daring anything or anyone to mention something about good sleep leading to good grades. The glorious image of an open, spacious library spot—plug-in included—begins to form. Interlocking, pulsing neurons, teeming with memorized information, mould the picture of oneself strolling through those library doors after a peaceful night’s rest. A librarian nods smilingly on the left as the elevator doors open on the right. Step into it, and you’re carried to a floor where your clean desk awaits. Open windows frame your work with leafy views of campus while the surrounding books stand like encouraging guardians of your intake of knowledge.

Oh, if only. Before this picture can become solidified in your mind, the smart, calculating side of you—the side that got you here in the first place—starts to take control. It takes the montage of tranquil study time and screws with it, unapologetically inserting the realities of what this library spot will actually look like. Pages are strewn everywhere. Cold War-era grey walls encircle windows through which you have to squint to glimpse a square foot of green grass. And every five seconds some punk is trying to move the electronically controlled book stack, leading to a sharp, high-pitched, gonna-kill-something-if-I-hear-it-again beep.

Halfway to school, you realize you left your laptop charger at home. Consciously trying to suppress profanity as you run, you hear the clock slowly clicking down. If you’re lucky enough to reach the library before the doors open, then you’re unlucky enough to sit in sheer academic tension till they do. Students line the walls awaiting the rush. A foot taps anxiously here, a pen is clicked constantly there. And then it happens. The security guard mutters something into a wireless radio, eyes scan the area, and the doors are opened.  

The next moment is key: as students fly by, swinging bags, fists or both, do you take the elevator up to the best spots or do you book it up the stairs? There is no right answer. It all depends on the collective psyche, wind pressure, humidity, subject of study, and many other incalculable factors that change with the day. You’ll have to take it as it comes. However, to avoid the small-but-horrific risk of being stuck in the elevator, I suggest you duck your head, clutch your belongings to your chest, and sprint up the stairs, voicing a constant Braveheart-esque war cry all the way.

In my time here, I have found my fellow McGill students to be mostly friendly in conversation and selfless in deeds. Not in the library. The best spots are fair game. And so be it—few things promote studying as much as sitting comfortably in a spot you arduously fought for. If you have an issue with this, be vocal about it. There are political voices galore on campus that would be ecstatic to take up the “A LIBRARY SPOT IS A RIGHT, NOT A PRIVILEGE” cause. Until then, get up early, get up strong, and get on top of those library doors before the break of dawn.

You are familiar with the words usually attributed to Bob Marley: “In every life we have some trouble/ But when you worry, you make it double/  Don’t worry, be happy.” This famous line—adopted as a mantra by stoners everywhere—was actually written by an early 20th century Indian mystic named Meher Baba, who spent the last 40 years of his life in total silence, communicating with his followers via alphabet board. “Don’t worry, be happy,” has virtually become the modern enjoyment ethic. This consists of roughly two principles: 1) Pursue happiness. 2) Don’t interfere with others’ pursuit of happiness

The idea of the pursuit of happiness has a long philosophic tradition, from Epicurus to Jeremy Bentham, who believed that happiness was the only intrinsically good quality, that it was the best common denominator in the context of liberal values like equality, liberty and tolerance. The beauty of Bentham’s idea is that the more we embrace a simple ideal like enjoyment, the more we encounter others who share our ideal, which in turn produces more enjoyment.

But taken to an extreme, this doctrine makes us passive and apathetic, distorting the traditional ideal of tolerance. For instance, suppose you meet someone at a party who you consider not only bigoted and ignorant, but aggressively so, and you say: “Hey, if that’s what makes you happy, great!” Bentham’s position creates a passive social space, where there is no longer any reason for internal conflict if the ethics of enjoyment are followed.

An ethic is an internal dialogue, in which we repeatedly ask ourselves, “Am I doing what I think is right?” The enjoyment ethic puts the cart before the horse; before we jump to the creation of an ethic, we should determine what it stands for.

A useful ethic should be like a good sports coach. A good coach will tell you to do more than just “score a goal,” unless he wants you to run around the field aimlessly muttering, “How do I score a goal?” A good coach will tell you how to score and his explanation will involve an appraisal of how your abilities can be used effectively toward that end. Similarly, ethics aren’t about constantly asking ourselves, “How can I enjoy myself?” A person becomes ethical when they can play the whole game.

The blind pursuit of enjoyment or happiness demands something inherently unnatural from its surroundings: it requires total control of a situation which is generated from involvement and investment of desire in the outside world. Real enjoyment is a by-product of the creative process, rather than the pursuit of a Zen-like state of pure consciousness and bliss.

Seeking enjoyment has become a cultural imperative. Although enjoyment is great, it doesn’t ask us to care, to direct our energy outwards, to form opinions, to disagree, or to fight for a cause. It leads us to prioritize “how” we are doing over “what.” It bypasses the need to ask why we are pursuing happiness, because that answer is already part of the question. An ethic is a dominating force in our lives, a standard by which we measure our self-worth; it is a terrible thing to waste.

McGill Tribune

Demasduit was 23 when she saw her husband die. In 1819, Newfoundland colonists raided her village and took her captive. They shot her husband before her eyes, leaving her newborn child to die.  Eventually the colonists tried to return Demasduit to her people, but could not find them. She died a captive.

This story doesn’t sound like the Canada we know. We know only of a Canada that is supposedly awesome: a premium version of the United States that mixes northeastern liberalism with southern friendliness and a pseudo-European multicultural twist. But when it comes to the issue of aboriginal rights, Canada is far from awesome.

Canada has screwed aboriginals royally. First we stole their land, and then tried to kill them. Next, we gave them blankets with smallpox. Eventually we decided not to kill them, and tried to forcibly assimilate them. We outlawed their customs and forced them into residential schools, where they were physically and sexually abused.

Why should you care about all this? You didn’t steal their land or crush their culture. How are you responsible for the misdeeds of the past? You aren’t. But the point is that their plight is not only in the past.

We are responsible for the fact that the average aboriginal gets 2.5 times less funds from the government than other Canadians. We receive services from three levels of government. They receive services from only the federal government.

We are responsible for the fact that they get less resources for healthcare and less for education. We are responsible for the staggering levels of disease, poverty and social ills on reserves and among urbanized Native communities. We are responsible for the fact that Canadian aboriginals live in Third World conditions in a First World country.

But we can stop screwing them over. We can correct a great historical injustice. Canada needs to reconstitute aboriginal sovereignty within the federalist structure. Give them jurisdiction over relevant policies: health, education, and wildlife, among others. Canadian aboriginals I’ve spoken to reject the idea of a paternalistic state trying to solve their problems. They want the freedom to address their own issues, which can only happen through the reconstitution of Aboriginal sovereignty.

Social ills like suicide, alcoholism, and  endemic school dropout rates are inextricably linked to national self-esteem. Sovereignty is the only way to boost aboriginals’ collective self-worth.

Many would tell you that it can’t be done or that it’s too complicated. Not only can it be done, but such solutions have already been designed. The Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples advocated creating a third order of government, that gives Aboriginals powers similar to those of the provinces.

As a large federalist country, we already include competing sovereignties in one system. We can successfully add one more without damaging our national fabric.  

None of this should make any Canadianss gloomy about our country. As I said, Canada is great. We have the chance to be even greater.

Let’s embolden the Canadian values of justice and federalism. Let’s reconstitute aboriginal sovereignty. Let’s free Demasduit from her endless captivity

Michael Morgenthau is a U1 Political Science student. He can be reached at [email protected].

McGill Tribune

Last Friday, the Supreme Court of Canada outlined certain principles for assessing cases in which journalists in Quebec are asked to reveal the identities of anonymous sources they use in gathering sensitive information. The Tribune feels it is vital to the public interest that reporters are able to plausibly assure sources that their identities will never be made known to the public or to those interests that might be angered by the dissemination of whatever information is being shared. To that end, we feel the court’s decision is a step in the right direction, but does not go far enough. The National Assembly of Quebec now needs to follow the court’s recommendation and enact a closely worded shield law, which, while not absolutely protecting journalists from ever having to reveal their sources, would make it clear that the onus is not on the journalist to prove she is concealing the identity in the public interest, but on the litigator to claim that they would be acting in the public interest by revealing the identity of that source.

Any proposed solution needs to address this issue’s complexity.An absolute shield law would mean an absence of journalistic accountability, and would too often prevent the courts from fairly judging certain civil and criminal cases. However, rules which make it too easy for journalists to be prosecuted for not revealing their sources would inevitably lead to greater governmental corruption and a less-informed citizenry, because individuals privy to vital information might be less willing to share it with the media. The court is right to say decisions should continue to be made on a case-by-case basis.

There must be specific principles to guide such judgments. According to the Globe and Mail, this decision makes two specific recommendations: “Journalists should be forced to reveal their sources only when there is no other alternative to get the information and when disclosure of sources’ identities is vital to the administration of justice.”

The first of these principles evades the issue entirely. The problem arises when there is no other way to get the information. Stating that in the case of an impasse the journalists will always have to yield means no longer judging things on a case-by-case basis. It is to say that the public interest is always served by using the coercive power of the state to force a reporter to betray a solemn promise to someone revealing information we might not have otherwise known, and which we are better off for knowing. This is a massive loophole in the court’s decision, a tiny asterisk next to the freedom of the press, and should not be preserved in any future legislation.

The second principle—that journalists should have to reveal their sources if concealing them would prevent “the administration of justice”—is also too heavily weighted against the journalist’s right to conceal and the source’s right to remain anonymous. By virtue of their profession, judges are more likely to think about judicial issues and not about the importance of protecting sources for the public interest.

While we agree that cases should be judged according to which outcome would further the public interest, the court is wrong to place the burden of proof on the journalist rather than on the person trying to reveal the anonymous source. Such an onus might prevent journalists from securing the confidence from their sources that is necessary to gain access to sensitive information. The Quebec government should reverse this formula, through robust legislation that gives journalists the power to do their jobs, and gives sources the incentives they need to keep us all in the know.