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McGill, News

Dean of Students suspends plans for involuntary leave policy

by Kate Addison on

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The Office of the Dean of Students announced on Sept. 22 that it would suspend the proposed involuntary leave policy released to the public the week before. The policy, which received immediate opposition from student groups, would have allowed McGill to involuntarily remove students from the school if they were deemed a threat to themselves or others.

Although involuntary leave policies have been met with concerns that vulnerable students may be deprived of essential mental health care services, other Canadian universities, such as Concordia University and the University of Toronto, have instituted similar policies. In response to these concerns, Dean of Students Christopher Buddle, decided to reconsider the implementation of the policy. 

“I decided that I need to pull back completely from a policy and actually have some brainstorming sessions [and have] more of a co-creation with students to try and see if there is an alternative model to the involuntary leave policy,” Buddle said. “I don’t want to rush it through, there’s no reason to if students are unhappy with its current form.” 

Frustration with this policy comes largely from many McGill students who believe that the university does not provide its student body with sufficient psychiatric resources, and that support for those struggling with mental health is not prioritized. Madeline Wilson, Students’ Society of McGill University Vice-President University Affairs, expressed her concerns to The McGill Tribune. 

“I think that there are exceptions to be made, but I think that by and large, […] it was not clear that [the policy] was in the best interests of the community,” Wilson said. “It seemed like it was in the best interests of McGill.”

Rine Vieth, a PhD student in anthropology and advocate for mental health care services at McGill, said that the policy should not be a replacement for adequate mental health services on campus.

“I would love for more clinical care to be available,” Vieth said. “I would love for [the Office of Students with Disabilities] to receive more funding so [that] they would be able to work with more students who need [help]. It might just be a little thing, but that little [help] might stop a crisis from happening down the line.”

According to the policy draft, which has since been removed from the Dean of Students’ website, students posing a severe threat to the security of others would be placed on leave from McGill at the discretion of a case management team of members of the McGill community, and the deputy provost on a case by case basis. 

In addition to her concerns about the effects that this policy would have on the support available for students in crisis,  Wilson noted the lack of student input in the creation of this draft.

“Policies that govern students should be created with students, not created for two years behind the scenes and then brought to students for consultation the month before it’s supposed to be brought to the Senate,” Wilson said. 

In a statement released by the Office of the Dean of Students,  Buddle stated he plans to work on addressing the concerns surrounding the policy throughout the coming academic year. 

“[From] the feedback I’ve got, clearly it’s not the time, it’s not right,” said Buddle. “We’ll stop, rethink, regroup and take a longer view.”

feminist scholar
McGill, News

Famed feminist scholar delivers lecture to McGill students

by Magdalena Nitchi on

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Over 600 people gathered in the 6th floor auditorium at the McIntyre Medical Building on Oct. 4 to attend “Complaint as a Queer Method: Dismantling Institutions” featuring Sara Ahmed as a keynote speaker. Ahmed  is a world renowned feminist scholar who has authored books in feminist, racial, and queer studies. The talk opened with brief speeches from organizers Charlene Lewis-Sutherland, Meryem Benslimane, and Alanna Thain.

Thain gave a short biography of Ahmed and highlighted her work concerning discrimination against minority groups and how power is enforced or challenged in everyday life and institutions. She described a morning seminar with Ahmed, and the joy she felt when reading Ahmed’s book Living a Feminist Life. 

“When I read Ahmed’s works, […] I so often feel like I am dancing with the text the way you do as a child, standing on the toes of someone who is showing you the moves,” Thain said.

Ahmed then took the stage by explaining that the purpose of her work is to dismantle the discrimination found in everyday life. Her goal is to change university policies that are ineffective at protecting people from injustice.

Filing complaints is presented by institutions as an effective way to make changes; however, Ahmed pointed out a significant gap between how organizations represent the process of making a formal complaint and how it is experienced by those who are making the complaint.

“[To file a complaint] involves becoming an ‘institutional mechanic’, figuring out how to actually get the complaint through the system,” Ahmed said. “Because of the difficulty [of] getting [them] through, complaints often end up being about the system. Something that looks linear on paper can actually be quite circular.”

According to Ahmed, another important part of complaining is the process of going through doors. These doors can be both literal, in the sense of going in for meetings, and metaphorical, in the case of minorities being shut out.

“Complaints [always] happen behind closed doors,” Ahmed said. “But you know that no matter how much you do [to be heard], there are doors that remain closed to you. Something or someone [else] is pulling the strings, but you don’t know what or who. So this gap between what does happen and what is supposed to happen remains.”

Ahmed provided examples from 40 anonymous female students who were subjected to sexual harassment at the hands of professors and an Indigenous professor who was relentlessly bullied by her white colleagues. 

The majority of the testimonials she collected came from universities in the United Kingdom and were all dismissed by the institutions that were responsible for protecting their staff and students. Ahmed finished her talk by reminding the audience that forgotten complaints do not need to be a cause for despair.

“The filing cabinet can be seen as an institutional closet [that] preserves things,” Ahmed said. “We can leave something of ourselves behind by complaining. A complaint can let others [in the same position that you were in] receive something from you, even after you are gone. Complaints are writing on the [ walls of the institutions]: we are here, we did not disappear.”

Julia Bugiel, audience member, shared her enthusiasm about the speech.

“It was an incredible talk,” Bugiel said. “I think the lengthy applause [at the end of the talk] speaks for just how much everybody in this room enjoyed their time with someone who is so poetic and also such an insightful presenter who is so knowledgeable [about the institutional systems she discusses]. I think the things that are happening in Canadian media and politics are not divorced, they are very much linked to [the material discussed here tonight].”

Emerging Trends, Student Life

How memes became a form of protest art

by Sophia White on

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The Sept. 27 Global Climate Strike drew half a million protesters to the streets of Montreal in  a worldwide series of demonstrations against climate change. Typical environmental slogans like ‘There is no planet B’ or ‘Don’t be a fossil fool’ appeared on many marchers’ signs, but some of the messages that stood out most in the crowd were far less conventional: With references to SpongeBob, Queer Eye, “Hot Girl Summer,” and other popular memes, tweets, and Vines, there was no shortage of creativity on display.

Protests are a medium for free expression, and appreciating the originality of others’ signs creates a unique sense of camaraderie among students. However, some onlookers question whether the use of humour serves to downplay the threat of climate change as an issue. They wonder whether older generations of policymakers, many of whom may not understand niche pop culture references, are likely to respond to these messages. To those who do, however, memes serve as both a fun way of coping with the looming threat of some of today’s biggest headlines, and as powerful new tools for collective demonstration. 

Originally a term to describe the way that ideas and behaviours propagate through generations, the modern form of the word meme was derived from a Greek term meaning “that which is imitated.” The meme has since become an integral medium for political dialogue and civic engagement. Thanks to the internet, it has become increasingly easy for memes to gain popularity and go viral overnight. Given that there is no real limit on what can be considered a meme, they are often used to relay political or social commentary through humour.

Montreal’s climate march was just one instance of the unique intersection of protesting and meme culture. Pop culture references have recently fuelled a variety of movements around the globe, including Hong Kong’s anti-government protests this summer as well as national school walkouts in the US to demand gun reform. Unlike other forms of communicative protest, memes cannot easily be shut down, so they are a powerful mobilizing tool. With the internet as an efficient medium for disseminating snapshots from around the world, protesters draw inspiration from other signs and build on the movement with their own contributions.

Regardless of the political statements they make, memes are an innovative form of expression. They help to break down and articulate complex issues, spread ideas, and make sense of emotions. While some joke signs may be criticized for oversimplifying complex political matters, others can be comedic while still remaining poignant. 

While memes may not directly bring about any tangible policy action or reform, they relay important issues and spread quickly enough to bring them to the forefront of discussion. They reflect what is happening in society at a given point and help justify feelings of rage and fear while allowing us all to feel a little less alone. Further, memes are simple to create and reproduce, and they evolve over time based on their reception.

As students marched through the streets of Montreal and around the globe with posters inspired by memes, slogans, songs, and artwork, they proved that there is no one formula for demonstrating an issue as widespread as climate change. Our generation has the ability to band in solidarity over familiar images and slogans and seamlessly incorporate politics into our everyday self-expression. Memes make us laugh while simultaneously uniting us around common feelings about real world issues. Sometimes a laugh is necessary in the midst of all the political chaos, and a meme offers just that.

Baseball, Sports

Pride from 3,000 miles away

by Miya Keilin on

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54,005 baseball fans crowded into the RingCentral Coliseum, home of the Oakland Athletics, on the evening of Oct. 2 to watch the American League wild card game between the A’s and the Tampa Bay Rays. Fans filled every last seat of the dingy, old stadium, which still doubles as the Raiders’ home field during the NFL season, setting a new record for attendance at a wild card game. Going to the game would have been unrealistic for a variety of reasons, but I wished so badly that I could have been one of those 54,005. 

Being in Montreal has changed the kind of fan that I am. As much as I would love to, I can’t watch or listen to every one of their games as I had become accustomed to doing over the years. The three-hour time difference is one of the biggest factors: Games take place six or seven nights a week, with most home games starting at 10 p.m. EST and ending well after midnight. I recognize that I have it lucky, though, since the majority of the baseball season takes place during the summer. Fans of basketball and hockey face this predicament for almost the entire school year. 

My surroundings are another factor. I could easily eat, sleep, and breathe A’s baseball when everyone around me was also eating, sleeping, and breathing A’s baseball. Here, if I gush about the outstanding night that shortstop, and San Francisco Bay Area native, Marcus Semien had or mention that the team finally called up top prospect Jesús Luzardo, I get an “oh cool” out of pity at best. Even the most devoted baseball fans here do not know much—or care much—about my hometown’s heroes. 

I was not surprised that this was the case. While Montreal used to have the Expos, and plenty of Canadians can at least pretend to care about the Blue Jays, baseball culture in my circles at school is not like baseball culture at home. Similarly, Oakland does not hold a special place in anybody’s heart here like it does mine. Not that it should, of course. I am certainly not expecting people with little interest in baseball or a connection to the Bay Area to care about my team, but it does not change the fact that being an A’s fan in Montreal can get lonely. 

I was pleasantly surprised to find that, while lonely, following the A’s in whatever way I can has helped alleviate feelings of homesickness. When I read The Athletic’s game recaps, it reminds me of chatting with my brother the morning after games, reliving our favourite moments or lamenting our bullpen’s struggles. When I see social media posts from the team, I chuckle to myself over inside jokes only Bay Area natives or A’s fans would find funny. When I celebrate quietly by myself while watching a live stream of a game from my bed, I feel the rumble of the stadium inside of me, as if I was there among the crowd again. 

The A’s lost Wednesday’s winner-take-all wild card game, and I was devastated. Four of my friends, all baseball fans, were at my apartment watching the game with me, but none of them love the A’s. In that moment, with tears on the verge of streaming down my face, I wanted to be surrounded by people who love the A’s as much as I do; by coming here, I lost that chance, just as I had lost the chance to be among the 54,005 fans in attendance. But sitting on my couch in Montreal with my kelly green Matt Chapman jersey on, I was so grateful for the incredible season that my favourite team had played, and I knew that despite being 3,000 miles away, I had not lost any pride or passion for my Oakland A’s. 

Arts & Entertainment, Film and TV

When hide and seek goes dangerously awry

by Deana Korsunsky on

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Girl meets boy, girl marries boy, girl spends her honeymoon fleeing from boy’s murderous family. Such is the plot of Ready Or Not. 

The film follows Grace (Samara Weaving), the newly-wed bride to Alex Le Domas (Mark O’Brien) of the wealthy Le Domas game empire. After the wedding ceremony, Alex sheepishly informs Grace that his family traditionally welcomes new members by playing a game at the stroke of midnight. An amused Grace agrees, and draws a random card to decide which game the family would play. Little does she know, by choosing a card labelled “hide and seek,” she unwittingly agrees to a deadly game of cat and mouse. The audience quickly realizes the fatal stakes of the game before Grace does. She spends the rest of the film hiding and fighting for her life, as the weapon-wielding Le Domases attempt to hunt her down before dawn, supposedly to give Satan his sacrifice and protect the family fortune.

Even though its heroine spends the film fleeing from her in-laws, Ready Or Not hesitates to identify itself as purely horror. Its scenes are interspersed with blood, gore, and the occasional jump-scare, but the film catches the viewer by surprise as it blends a dark sense of humour into its plot. One of the film’s memorable comic-horror moments arises when Fitch Bradley—Alex’s brother in law—is shown watching an instructional video on his phone entitled, “Getting to know your crossbow.” Bradley’s cluelessness challenges the idea that horror villains exist as well-oiled killing machines. The movie humourously juxtaposes a terrified Grace battling murderers with a naive, inept villain. 

Ready Or Not is a horror film that commits to the blend of horror and comedy. This union of genres makes for an engaging viewing experience; the audience is at the film’s mercy, waiting to laugh or jump, and equally prepared for either. Samara Weaving’s portrayal of Grace wields this power flawlessly: Her hilarious and creative combinations of curse words provide comic relief even during a chase scene that teems with suspense. 

The casting only adds to the successful union of genres. Andie MacDowell gives an arresting performance as Alex’s mother, Becky Le Domas. MacDowell, who is largely known for her roles in classic romantic comedies such as Groundhog Day or Four Weddings and a Funeral, continues the film’s tendency to privilege unlikely creative choices.

Equally as delightful is the comforting familiarity of aesthetic and narrative tropes. The wealthy Le Domas family’s dysfunction is reminiscent of Schitt’s Creek’s hilarious Rose family, while the trope of an unsuspecting victim entering a villainous family harkens to Jordan Peele’s Get Out. Relying more on humour than horror, however, Ready Or Not similarly critiques elite society. The Le Domases’ bloodthirst is prompted by faithfulness to family tradition and preservation of their wealth. 

Ready Or Not is a horror-comedy of manners, satirizing the wealthy class while aligning the audience with its “final girl,” a refreshingly sharp and relatable protagonist who strays away from the dumb blonde horror victim stereotype. Directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett craft an inter-genre thriller that combines seemingly incompatible themes, bloodshed and humour, to create an engrossing viewing experience. Moviegoers will find that there is but one thing they can say to Ready or Not:“Here I come!”

Science & Technology

Écotech event aims to implement eco-friendly solutions through technology

by Angelina Giordano on

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Young professionals recently took part in EnergyHack, an energy efficiency hackathon. The event, hosted by Écotech Québec on Sept. 28, prompted participants to choose and solve one of two challenges provided by the city of Varennes, an off-island suburb of Montreal, and the borough of Saint-Laurent. The winning teams from each competition will work to bring their project solutions to fruition. They will also travel to the Smart City Expo in Barcelona this November, courtesy of Air Canada.

The event started with a welcome address from various speakers in the tech industry. Throughout the day, mentors were available to answer questions from participants; they also presented a series of workshops covering topics such as business savviness, challenges that experts in the field face, and artificial intelligence (AI).

The first challenge was proposed by Alan DeSousa, the mayor of Saint-Laurent. He asked for a way to install an intelligent ventilation and window-opening control system in an existing building in Saint-Laurent. Meanwhile, Martin Damphousse, the mayor of Varennes, asked for plans that would integrate eco-efficient solutions when constructing a new municipal workshop in Varennes. Participants used data on energy consumption, carbon emissions, and architecture plans to propose AI solutions.

Seven teams took part in the event: Four were assigned to the Saint-Laurent challenge and three to the Varennes challenge. David Fauteux, an advisor at the Institut de Développement des Produits (IDP), advised the participants to stay patient while searching for solutions.

“[The] issues come from not finding the good stuff at the beginning,” Fauteux said. “If you don’t have much reflection, and you go too fast, you go [for] the quick solution, and then it’s not always a good option. With these kinds of events, […] it’s more about […] how you make sure that your reflection is good, [and] what have you done to make sure that not only your family and friends like your idea.”

Participants came from all around the Montreal area. Claude Belizare, founder of Human Level AI, heard about the event the day before and travelled from Trois-Rivières with his son. Club Poly Énergie, a group of engineers and data scientists from Polytechnique Montréal, won the Saint-Laurent challenge. Ultimately, all participants, no matter where they came from, attended the event because they were interested in using AI to help Montreal residents. 

“It’s [about] what your idea can do for people,” Amir Nosrat, a founding director of the environmental charity Climatable, said during a speech about different kinds of business pitches. 

The event also illustrated that AI can be a useful tool for solving many problems. Jean-Baptise Débordès, a mentor at the event and Founder of SEED AI, emphasized that AI is not the killer robot that it is made out to be.

“It is a tool to make better decisions, better run our lives, our businesses, our cities, do smarter thinking,” Débordès said in an interview with The McGill Tribune.

The winners of the Varennes challenge were Pierre Manach, a consultant at Solution Techso, and Guinel Garçon, an energy analyst at ENGIE. The two, who are also the founders of an energy podcast called La Patate Chaude, kept Nosrat’s advice in mind with their winning idea.

“From [La Patate Chaude], we’ve talked about different issues around the energy sector, and we’ve come [to EnergyHack] […] to help with the management of energy,” Pierre said.

Arts & Entertainment

POP Montreal spotlights local talent

by Sophie Brzozowski, Katia Innes, Kevin Vogel on

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This year, POP Montreal International Music Festival turned 18. Born in the Mile End, the festival had humble beginnings showcasing then-unknown acts Broken Social Scene and Stars. Now, the festival has grown to include over 300 acts, extending its commitment to championing independent arts across the seas: This year saw Congolese collective KOKOKO! and French experimental artist Felicia Atkinson gracing its stages. Yet, POP Montreal is still devoted to promoting local artists; The McGill Tribune reports our best findings this year. 

Ada Lea, Theatre Rialto

Sophie Brzozowski, Managing Editor

Accompanied only by an acoustic guitar and a sampler, Ada Lea’s performance style is enchanting in its sparseness. Opening for Tiny Ruins and Aldous Harding on Sept. 28 at the Rialto Theatre, Alexandra Levy performed songs from her debut album what we say in private, which she released under the moniker of Ada Lea on July 19. The album is intensely personal, such that it feels intrusive to sit amongst an audience of hundreds and watch Lea bare her soul onstage. With her silvery voice and delicate instrumentals, however, she effortlessly brought the packed auditorium to a hush.

Trapped in Elon’s Mansion, Cinema L’Amour

Kevin Vogel, Arts & Entertainment Editor

When Elon Musk got into a Twitter spat by insulting public transportation advocate Jarret Walker, Montreal writer Joe Bagel decided to clap back. With the billionaire’s wealth of completely bonkers legal fiascos, Bagel had no shortage of source material for Trapped in Elon’s Mansion. Bagel’s new Shakespearean comedy dramatizes some of these celebrity feuds—in verse. Written entirely in iambic pentameter, the surrealist play brings Azaelia Banks, Grimes, Jay-Z, Musk himself, and even the human incarnation of Siri together in an acid-fueled marathon of pop-culture lambastement. Despite its dated poetic style, Trapped in Elon’s Mansion gives a hilarious spin to Shakespearean tradition.

Hildegard, Theatre Rialto

Katia Innes, Arts & Entertainment Editor

It would be remiss not to mention the stage debut of Hildegard, an electronic music duo composed of two of Montreal’s most exciting artists, Ouri and Helena Deland. A joint project between the DJ-producer-multi-instrumentalist and singer-songwriter, respectively, Hildegard performed an informal medley of new mixes, and bandcamp favourites. On Sept. 26, the two found their respective places behind twin synths, launching into a mesmerizing performance shrouded in fog. Mixing their way through heavy bass and atmospheric dream pop, Hildegard kept things light, interspersing their set with goofier soundbites such as sirens and cartoony vocals. 

Markus Floats, Theatre Rialto

 Katia Innes

By his own description, Markus Floats makes “very serious bleeps and bloops.” The ambient electronic artist delivered this material, as promised, to Theatre Rialto on Sept. 27, seated comfortably behind a MacBook Pro. In contrast to the testosterone filled, over-hyped bro DJs of Piknic Electronique-lore, Markus Floats was fittingly at-ease, focused and attentive, moving through otherworldly mixes. Shifting from calm and atmospheric to dissonant and industrial, it was a delight to bask in Markus Floats’ sonic landscape. 

Yves Jarvis, Theatre Rialto

Katia Innes

Playing Rialto Hall on Sept. 28, under the name Yves Jarvis, lo-fi singer-songwriter Jean-Sebastian Audet delivered a fittingly relaxed set to a patient crowd of onlookers. Audet drew from his full-length solo debut, The Same but by Different Means, which dropped earlier this year, as well as unreleased material. Blending funk sensibilities with gauzy ballads, Audet moved through his set alone onstage. Audet is about to embark on a European tour with fellow POP Montreal performer Aldous Harding, so seeing him in such an intimate setting was a delight.

OSD Office
Commentary, Opinion

OSD note-takers are another example of undervalued labour on campus

by Sepideh Afshar on

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McGill’s Office for Students with Disabilities (OSD) is responsible for facilitating wider access to learning and providing adequate resources for all students. To this end, one of the services offered by the OSD is providing notes for students who may be unable to take their own. Note-takers are tasked with taking, organizing, and uploading legible notes for students who are registered with the OSD. Compensation for the work done by note-takers has steadily decreased, and now, it is a volunteer position. By removing incentives for students to become note-takers, the OSD is extending a pattern of unpaid student labour at McGill and betraying their responsibility to those who need their services by potentially degrading the help they receive.  

On Sept. 19, all students in classes in need of note-takers received an email which stated that note-taking is now a volunteer position that offers 10 volunteer hours on student’s co-curricular record and a chance to win a $50 gift card. Students know that they are doing work worthy of compensation, because previous note-takers received payment, and by removing this, the OSD is depreciating the work that students dedicate. The main concern other than lack of participation is the quality of the notes: The same quality of notes cannot be expected for a position that is now unpaid. The OSD has maintained their screening process, but the quality anticipated should be very different now that there is no compensation. If the overall quality of notes for students with disabilities decreases due to the lack of compensation, this falls directly on the shoulders of the OSD.

“By removing incentives for students to become note-takers, the OSD is extending a pattern of unpaid student labour at McGill and betraying their responsibility to those who need their services by potentially degrading the help they receive.”

The work done by note-takers has been overlooked for years. In the 2018-2019 academic year, the OSD paid students either $100 or $50 per class per semester, depending on the class and the term. To put that into perspective, most McGill classes take three hours per week, and in a semester, there are about 36 class hours. If note-takers were paid the Quebec minimum wage of $12.50 for those class hours, not including out-of-class time spent organizing notes, they would receive $450 in compensation. Besides the already inadequate pay, Reddit users identifying as note-takers have complained of inconsistency as well as poor communication from the OSD. Reported incidents on Reddit include allegedly forgotten or incomplete payments. There have even been multiple accounts of people graduating, moving out of Montreal, but still not receiving payment. Despite all of these experiences, students be note-takers for a variety of reasons: It may have incentivized them to go to class or they wanted to help their fellow students. 

“If note-takers were paid the Quebec minimum wage of $12.50 for those class hours, not including out-of-class time spent organizing notes, they would receive $450 in compensation.”

McGill overlooking student labour is not new. In 2018, social work students participated in a strike against the required 800 hours of unpaid field placement work worth three credits per year. Other than having their protests called premature by Quebec Education Minister Jean Francois Roberge, social work students did not see any real action from McGill. Lack of funding has also been an issue for the OSD. In 2015, McGill became responsible for funding OSD as opposed to the Québec government who had previously been doing so. OSD director, Teri Philips, stated in 2017 that some services were hampered due to new financial restrictions. This funding issue could easily be a belated effect of the switch between the government and McGill. 

Students deserve compensation for the work they are doing, no matter the reason behind it By taking away any monetary incentive, the OSD is doing a disservice to those in need of note-takers by removing incentives for high-quality notes. Beyond the OSD itself, McGill needs to reallocate their resources and ensure that they are not disadvantaging students registered with the OSD. 

Executive
Editorial, Opinion

The Involuntary Leave Policy lacks foresight

by The McGill Tribune Editorial Board on

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Content warning: Mentions of mental health issues

In September, the Office for the Dean of Students, released an “Involuntary Leave Policy”, the process for which has now been suspended. An “Involuntary Leave Policy” sub-policy would allow the university to place a student who is “in crisis” on involuntary leave until the student has met the conditions for returning to the University and requests a return.

The proposal specifies that this action would be taken only in the most severe cases, such as if the administration deemed that a student is a danger to themselves or others. Additionally, the proposal stresses that people should not interpret this policy as a disciplinary measure; Instead it is meant to exist in partnership with other support resources for students. 

While these caveats show that the administration’s intentions were well-meaning, the Office of the Dean of Students must have the foresight to understand how a policy like this will situate itself into the larger dialogue regarding mental health at McGill, and therefore understand the student opposition they met regarding this proposal. Messages like this proposal should also come with a content-warning, considering the sensitive nature of mental health issues.

Following the proposal’s release, Buddle and the administration faced significant student backlash. In response, Buddle sent out a second public message saying that, in light of student opposition, he would be suspending this policy draft immediately to continue to work with the student body and find alternative solutions for aiding students in crisis. While the Office of the Dean of Students made the right decision to withdraw this policy from consideration, the policy’s mere proposal evinces some of the ways in which the McGill administration has remained oblivious to student concerns about mental health, wilfully or not. While this policy is not necessarily meant to apply only to situations which pertain to mental health, it is crucial that the administration is meticulous and careful when they enter a consultation process for a policy of this sort. 

This proposal fails most gravely in that it addresses only the most extreme situations. Regardless of how beneficial an involuntary leave policy would be to students in crisis, the reality is that, in many instances, students can be helped before reaching that point. It seems absurd that the administration would propose an involuntary leave policy when McGill lacks a voluntary leave policy to allow struggling  students to take time off after the withdrawal period in the first month of school as ended. Additionally, over the last two years, there has been a consistent and clear message from the student body that the existing mental health resources at McGill are inadequate. Specific instances include the administration’s decision to cut the eating disorder program without informing students who used it; the lack of accessible Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, or long-term counselors through any McGill program; and massive wait times for many methods of counseling that are present throughout campus. Further, these resources often rely on unpaid, or at least underpaid, labour. The administration’s continued apathy and failure to provide adequate voluntary resources to aid students’ mental health makes the introduction of an involuntary policy which pertains only to crisis situations seem all the more abrupt and shortsighted. McGill’s administration should take preventative measures before addressing the most extreme scenarios. 

“Additionally, over the last two years, there has been a consistent and clear message from the student body that the existing mental health resources at McGill are inadequate.”

In addition, the language used in this policy proposal creates an issue. The proposal also states that a student may be redirected to relevant resources, which could include those pertaining to mental health. However, it is difficult to take a policy that purports to direct students in a crisis situation to the relevant resources seriously when many of those resources simply do not exist. Finally, the policy’s statements regarding a student who is “deemed to be a danger to themselves or others” sends an inappropriate message that those struggling with mental health issues may be dangerous. It is the explicit responsibility of the administration not to alienate or debase individuals who may be battling mental illness, but the language of this proposal has the potential to harm those who are already vulnerable. 

In the future, the Office of the Dean of Students and other offices need to treat proposals of this sort with scrupulous care, both in terms of the language they use to discuss mental-health issues, and in their awareness of how a given piece of dialogue will be contextualized in the larger, ongoing conversation between the administration and the student body. Ideally, the administration will strive to be attentive to the concerns of McGill students, take very seriously issues of mental health, and exercise care when it comes to the language they use when speaking about sensitive experiences. 

 

Off the Board, Opinion

Cancel political stan culture

by Katia Innes on

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I have mixed feelings about the discourse that inevitably surrounds election seasons. Though I enjoy a good Scheer-centric takedown as much as the next person, I find myself unnerved by the surface level engagement on social media where stan culture intermingles with politics. 

Stan is shorthand for ‘stalker fan’ and is named aptly after the Eminem song. To be a stan, or to stan someone, is to obsess over a celebrity and provide nearly unequivocal support, regardless of their behaviours or values. Stan culture is heightened on social media, where interactions between celebrities and their fans, as well as fan communities that arise, can create echo chambers of preoccupation. While stan culture remains mostly harmless, involving real world actors into this lore becomes morally tricky: It is fine to write erotic fanfiction involving Gilmore Girls characters, but it is invasive, inappropriate, and above all, really weird to write about Donald Trump, Vladmir Putin, and Hillary Clinton having a threesome. It is crucial to recognize that by treating politicians, and politics, as fictional characters and narratives, we remove the ability to see them as whole beings capable of failure. 

 In 2015, shortly after Justin Trudeau was elected as Prime Minister, there was no shortage of thirst articles. An unofficial calendar entitled “Justin Trudeau, My Canadian Boyfriend 2018 Wall Calendar” was sold on Amazon. In light of current criticisms against Trudeau for his lack of climate action and the resurfacing of multiple photos of him in blackface, these posts expressing undying adoration have not aged well.

This hyper-sexualization of politicians taps into another weird aspect of this “stan” culture — the infamous horny tweet about Democratic Presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke for instance, shows how lusting typically reserved for Bachelor in Paradise contestants emerges in this new political discourse. This vantage point positions politicians as objects of admiration to be fawned over, not elected officials with agendas. 

Similarly, there is a concurrent trend were politicians are equated to protagonists from popular media: A uniquely bizarre tweet that photoshopped O’Rourke, along with other Democratic presidential candidates Elizabeth Warren and Pete Buttigieg as the main characters from Harry Potter circulated earlier this month. Framing politics within theses imaginary worlds, and placing politicians as protagonists fated to triumph over “evil” shows a stark disconnect with the realities of federal bureaucracies. 

Conceptualizing politicians as virtuous saviours is also an unsound way of expressing admiration. Because of the incredibly high standard admirers hold them to, when these public figures inevitably misstep, their error is fundamentally incompatible with the conception of forgiveness, or growth. 

People’s disengagement from the unglamorous, mundane realities of political systems is vapid, entirely self-serving, and irresponsible. Of course, popular culture offers useful vehicles for critiquing political structures: Satirization of Trudeau’s blackface scandal, Amazon’s mistreatment of workers, and the rise of the conservative right may prove to be insightful. However, it is important to accept the fact that, not every aspect of our lives exists as an item of consumption, and instead we should meaningfully engage in political discourse and hold ourselves and others accountable for the real world effects of political actions. It seems redundant to say, but a politician is not an entertainer. They are an elected official who is supposed to serve your interests. 

 

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