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Student Life

Krispy Kremes challenge samosas as McGill’s new go-to snack

by Leanne Young on

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McGill students are known for their love of samosas. The crunchy snack is central to the university’s culture. However, Krispy Kreme doughnut sales are growing in popularity day by day, making their way up the McGill food hierarchy to threaten the dominance of samosas at McGill.

While it is now quite common to find a Krispy Kreme sale when walking through campus, the sales only started recently—the first one this year was held on Sep. 13, 2017 in the McConnell Engineering Building by McGill’s Tashan Dance Company.

“We chose [to sell] Krispy Kremes because it was something different,” Misra Isabel Trana, U1 Arts and VP communications of Tashan Dance Company said. “Everyone sells samosas but not everybody enjoys them, so Krispy Kreme was a nice alternative.”

Although rising in popularity, hosting a Krispy Kreme sale takes a lot more effort than one might expect. For Mary Thieffry, U2 Arts and VP Fundraising for McGill Women in Leadership, getting the doughnuts was the most difficult part of the process. Unlike Pushap, the primary samosa supplier for McGill sales, Krispy Kreme does not deliver directly to campus.

“The closest Krispy Kreme store is almost an hour away from Downtown by public transit,” Thieffry said. “I had to wake up extremely early to go get them and then carry a bunch of boxes in the metro to bring them back to campus.”

Yet, even though transporting the doughnuts was time-consuming, Thieffry admitted that it made up for the labour that goes into holding traditional bake sales.

“Our sale was quite successful, we made as much as a very good samosa sale would make,” Thieffry said, “If you’re looking to sell something sweet, what’s nice about Krispy Kremes is that you and your team don’t have to spend a night baking. Also, Krispy Kreme sales are always popular and sell out fast which means that you can make just as much of a profit as you would during a bake sale in much less time.”

Although many students are willingly hopping on the Krispy Kreme bandwagon, some student groups have sold the doughnuts instead of samosas purely out of necessity. Global Brigades, a student-run club at McGill, ran their first-ever Krispy Kreme sale in the McConnell Engineering Building on March 23. Although they were initially hoping to run their usual samosa sale, the competition for tabling spots left them no choice but to try selling the new food option.  

“We were only able to sell using the sweet table,” Vivian Luong, Global Brigades member said. “We usually sell samosas but you can only sell samosas at the designated samosas-selling table. If the table is already booked by another club then no other club can sell samosas in that area at that time.”

Despite the rising prominence of doughnuts, competition to get a samosa table remains high—an indication that the classic meal still holds a strong seat in the campus snack world. For Olivia Lockbaum, member of the McGill Martlets Field Hockey team, samosas will always remain her favourite go-to tabling option.

“As an athlete, samosas make both a great pregame and post practice snack,” Lockbaum said.“Three samosas can make a lunch, so many students enjoy the typical one-for-one dollar or three-for-two dollar samosa deal, whereas doughnuts are not as fulfilling and cannot really be treated as a lunch.”

Ultimately, the future of the most popular tabling food on campus remains unclear. While samosas are—and always have been—a classic go-to, the excitement of a new option has been enticing for many sellers and hungry students alike.

“Holding a Krispy Kreme sale was definitely better [than a samosa sale],” Trana said. “We were able to sell [the doughnuts] individually and in boxes of dozens. They sold out super fast because everyone loves doughnuts to be honest.”

Out on the Town, Student Life

The Best of Montreal’s vintage stores

by Abeer Almahdi on

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For students and local trendsetters alike, thrift shopping is possibly the best way to find one-of-a-kind vintage items while sticking to a budget. Luckily for Montrealers, the city offers a plethora of local vintage, consignment, and thrift stores. To help students navigate the map of businesses spread across the city, The McGill Tribune found the best Mile End thrift stores based on their budget and style.

Local 23
23 Bernard Street West

Located on the corner of Bernard Street West and St-Laurent Boulevard , Local 23 offers a dynamic space with an endless array of secondhand pieces. Although the store is quite small, its managers have fit an enormous quantity of pieces into that space. Local 23 specializes in ‘90’s vintage clothing, shoes, boots, and accessories. Their styles are ever-changing, with new pieces coming in every week from approximately 25 regular consigners. Most clothing items are priced from 20 to 40 dollars per piece, while accessories sell for slightly less. Unlike many thrift stores, Local 23 has a plus-size jeans rack, which makes it much more accessible to bodies of many shapes and sizes.

Empire Exchange
51 Bernard Street West

As Local 23’s sister consignment store, Empire Exchange is located right across the street, on the corner of Clark and Bernard Street West. Empire Exchange is Montreal’s first and only buy-sell-trade store, meaning that customers can sell their own articles of clothing for an immediate portion of the appraised value or store credit valid at multiple locations. The store specializes in in-season modern and vintage clothing, shoes, and accessories.

Citizen Vintage
5330 St-Laurent Blvd

Focused on repurposing and recycling used clothing, Citizen Vintage offers an alternative to the rise of fast fashion through its environmentally-conscious mandate of recycling and upcycling secondhand pieces. In addition to selling vintage and repurposed pieces, mostly from the ‘60s and ‘70s, the store sells an array of handmade clothing articles from a variety of local designers, promoting the Montreal art scene. Although it is on the pricey side, Citizen Vintage is a great option for sustainable shoppers, and sells sizes up to 16, making it more accessible than many other shops.

Kay Vintage
157 Bernard Street West

With the greatest variety of item prices of all the shops on this list, Kay Vintage offers shoppers a true treasure-hunting experience. Although the space is quite small, the store is stocked from floor to ceiling with everything from five-dollar accessories to 50-dollar dresses and leather jackets. The store’s items are sectioned by price, making it easy and efficient to stick to your budget when shopping there. Its inventory includes hats, dresses, and leather wallets, belts, boots, and shoes. The owner is not only extremely friendly, but is also open to negotiating prices, making this store accessible to even the most frugal thrifter.

Annex Vintage
56 Saint Viateur Street West

Annex Vintage is a hub for vintage clothing-lovers and independent designers alike, showcasing hundreds of pieces from national artists. This shop sells more than just clothes. With jewellery, stationary, apothecary products, pins, patches, artist T-shirts, socks, and many other gift items on display, there is something for everyone. While on the pricier side—with some items selling for 60 dollars—Annex Vintage has a dynamic collection of high quality products that you won’t find elsewhere.

News, SSMU

SSMU Legislative Council votes in favour of student strike for free education

by Julia Kafato on

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At its meeting on March 29, the Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) Legislative Council passed the Motion to Organize the Fight for Free Education and the Cancellation of Student Debt. Council also passed the Motion Regarding the Adoption of a Sustainability Policy and the Motion to Amend the Internal Regulations to Improve Accessibility, Impartiality, and Stability of the Board of Directors (BoD)

 

Council votes to support free tuition and debt cancellation

McGill’s Chapter of Socialist Fightback (SF)—a group advocating for a societal transition to socialism—has campaigned to pass the motion at both the General Assembly (GA) and at Council since March 16. Vishwaa Ramakrishnan, U0 Arts, a member of SF, presented the motion, which councillors discussed in an extensive question period.

SSMU Vice-President (VP) Connor Spencer explained that both the Quebec Student Union (QSU) and the Association for the Voice of Education in Quebec (AVEQ) would have major roles in lobbying the provincial government for the right of students in Quebec to strike. Councillors raised concerns about the legality of a student strike in Quebec after the passing of Bill 78, which was passed following the student strikes in 2012 and prohibits protests on school grounds.

“The best avenues for us to address this is through [QSU] and AVEQ,” Spencer said. “So both of them at their congresses were talking about what specific needs their members want them to bring to the provincial governments to do with the legal rights for students to strike.”

After the question period, Medicine Representative Andre Lametti proposed an amendment to the motion, replacing the call for SSMU to immediately establish monthly democratic assemblies with a call for SSMU to “work towards” establishing monthly democratic assemblies.

“The modalities have not been established yet and this motion taking effect, right now, would mean we would have to start having monthly democratic assemblies, at this present time, which I suppose is what the movers want, but we still have to decide how we are going to do it,” Lametti said.

Following the introduction of this amendment, councillors engaged in heated debate over the accountability and integrity of next year’s SSMU Executive.

“‘Work towards’ has been what has been put in the prior SSMU resolutions for the last 2 years,” Ramakrishnan said. “In those resolutions, there is no concrete action.”

While councillors quickly came to the defence of next year’s SSMU Executive, SSMU VP University Affairs (UA) Isabelle Oke acknowledged students’ general mistrust of SSMU and expressed her support for the inclusion of a firm timeline in the motion, rather than mandating SSMU to take action in an indefinite period of time.

“The issue at hand isn’t necessarily one of questioning the integrity of the [SSMU Executive], but […] it seems like there is little trust in SSMU as an institution,” Oke said. “If we’re being asked to stick to this higher standard, I would speak against the amendment just in terms of taking the small steps [toward increased accountability] that are required to have that relationship with a membership where we can make these changes and they’re taken for what they are.”

Ultimately, the amendment passed with the addition of a line stipulating that the monthly democratic assemblies must take place by Fall 2018. The motion also passed, with 13 in favour, nine opposed, and two abstentions.

 

Council votes to revamp the BoD

Council passed the Motion to Amend the Internal Regulations to Improve Accessibility, Impartiality, and Stability of the Board of Directors. The motion stipulates that the chair of the BoD must be a non-voting member who will not be counted toward the quorum at BoD meetings. It also requires the BoD to include two alumni representatives in an advisory capacity.

SSMU President-Elect and current Engineering Senator Tre Mansdoerfer presented this motion following concerns raised about lack of transparency from this year’s BoD due to meetings being scheduled on Sunday evenings in the SSMU office, when both the University Centre and the Brown Building require keycard access to enter. To address this, one the motion’s amendments specifies that the agenda for all BoD meetings must be made publicly available at least 48 hours in advance.

 

Editorial, Opinion

Behind the picket line: Accessible education requires a concrete action plan

by McGill Tribune Editorial Board on

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Today’s university graduates are suffocating under record-high student debt. A 2015 survey by the Canadian University Survey Consortium indicates that approximately 50 per cent of graduating students have debt and carry an average of $26,819 in tuition debt. Debt delays or impedes important life milestones, such as buying a home, and can take a significant toll on students’ mental health. Given the adverse impacts of rising student debt, it’s no wonder that the prospect of free education is enticing to current undergrads.

On March 26, SSMU members passed a motion at the Winter General Assembly (GA) mandating the Vice-President (VP) External to organize a campaign for free education across Canada and the cancellation of student debt. Proposed by the Socialist Fightback student group, part of this campaign includes mobilizing a one-day student strike in the Fall 2018 semester. Quebec student unions have a history of successfully pressuring the provincial government on tuition, and this campaign has similar potential to incite real change.

Because the GA didn’t meet quorum, SSMU Legislative Council subsequently accepted the Motion to Organize the Fight for Free Education and Cancellation of Student Debt at its March 29 meeting, after amending it to include a timeline. Looking forward over the next few months, it is crucial that SSMU conducts adequate research to determine how to properly lobby the government for such a revolutionary change, and do the leg-work necessary to see this broad-reaching mandate become an effective student campaign.

The resolution acknowledges SSMU’s historical role in fighting against tuition increases, and references a 2015 policy that commits SSMU to supporting universally accessible post-secondary education. It also acknowledges Quebec’s tradition of student activism, alluding to the infamous 2012 “Maple Spring” protests that mobilized over 250,000 students against the provincial Liberal Party’s proposed tuition hike. In the same spirit, the GA motion voices student frustration over “the lack of accessibility of education” and “skyrocketing tuition fees.” According to Statistics Canada, the average Canadian undergraduate tuition has risen 40 per cent in the past 10 years. It is within this context, and in solidarity with universities across Canada, that SSMU aims to mobilize students for the one-day strike and champion a long-term accessible education campaign.

A one-day strike won’t bring about free university overnight. But, if executed effectively, it could raise awareness on the increasing financial burden of post-secondary education for students, and encourage McGill and the provincial government to reconsider Quebec’s tuition rates.

Notably missing from the campaign, however, is current research and information on viable paths toward more accessible—and potentially free—post-secondary education in Quebec, and how free tuition would impact other important aspects of student life, such as quality of education and enrolment. The lack of a concrete action plan risks hindering the movement’s goals. Free university tuition is certainly attractive, and it’s proven to be feasible—as students in countries such as Norway, Germany, and Finland benefit from it. Still, Quebec and McGill present their own unique challenges.

Closer to home, the 2012 strikes’ success at freezing tuition hikes is a testament to the impact that effective student mobilization can have on the accessibility of education. However, further progress on the pricetag of university education in Quebec will undoubtedly require significant adjustment in the public university funding structure. If SSMU wishes to see its bold vision materialize, it must consider its financial aspects as well. Additionally, to attract the provincial attention necessary to enact substantial change, collaboration with other student unions in the province is essential. In moving forward with its campaign for free education, it is crucial for SSMU and its members to conduct research and strategize about how they would wish to see free tuition implemented. At all stages, students themselves must be continually consulted as stakeholders in the process.

Given the preliminary nature of the motion, as a measure to gauge student support, the lack of research included with it is understandable; however, if students wish to see real impact, concrete plans for change must follow. A one-day strike won’t bring about free university overnight. But, if executed effectively, it could raise awareness on the increasing financial burden of post-secondary education for students, and encourage McGill and the provincial government to reconsider Quebec’s tuition rates.

The VP External must also mobilize McGill students, both on the strike, and on the broader campaign for more financially accessible education that the resolution proposes. Substantial change does not happen from one strike in one semester, or in one year, as even the most prominent student activist groups on campus can attest. For this campaign to have the same longevity and impact as causes like Divest McGill or Demilitarize McGill, it must hit the ground running, and then keep running.

SSMU is right to stand behind accessible education and campaign against student debt. While the strike is set to only last one day, it should generate further conversation about the accessibility of education in Quebec and Canada more broadly. As Quebec students have proven, when it comes to fighting for affordable education, they aren’t quick to back down.

 

A previous version of this editorial incorrectly stated that the Motion to Organize the Fight for Free Education and Cancellation of Student Debt was pending an online student vote. Legislative Council passed an amended version of the resolution on March 29.  The Tribune regrets this error.

Sports

Impact: Concussions in youth and collegiate sport

by Miya Keilin on

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Rowan Stringer, a 17-year-old rugby player from Ottawa, suffered a concussion during a rugby match but ignored her symptoms and took to the field again less than a week later. In that second, and ultimately final, match on May 8, 2013, she suffered a second concussion that sent her into a coma—from which she would never wake up.

Stringer is far from the only athlete to have suffered a concussion practicing youth sport. Thirty-one per cent of Canadians who have participated in youth sports report having suffered at least one sport-related concussion, according to a 2015 study conducted by the Angus Reid Institute. While most concussion stories do not end as tragically as Rowan’s, they always threaten permanent damage to the brain. In turn, sports leagues for players of all ages have taken measures to curb the harm caused by concussions.

A concussion is a traumatic brain injury that occurs when a hard impact to the head or body jolts the brain, resulting in a temporary impairment of brain function. The brain is surrounded by three layers of membrane and cerebrospinal fluids that cushion it; however, upon forceful impact, these protective measures are not strong enough to hold the brain in place, allowing it to move within the skull. Such movement can affect the brain’s chemical equilibrium, damage nerve tissue, and cause bruising.

Typically, it takes one to two weeks to recover from a concussion, but optimal recovery times vary depending on factors such as age, mental conditions—including anxiety, depression, sleep disorders, or post-traumatic stress disorder—and the severity of the concussion. Rest is key to the healing process, but patients must often avoid bright lighting, screens, and strenuous brain activity, too.

Alyssa Crichton, BSc ‘18 and Martlet soccer player from 2013 to 2017, suffered a concussion after taking a couple of hard shots to the head in back-to-back games. After the second, she was removed from play and taken care of by a team of doctors and therapists, but her recovery was still long and painful.

“I had a headache every single day for about five months and was constantly in pain because of it,” Crichton wrote in a message to The McGill Tribune. “I couldn’t really do much of anything [….] I have had a lot of bad injuries in my life, but the concussion was a whole new experience.”

Professional sports are leading the way in concussion prevention policy, looking to medical professionals and research for guidance. Teams and leagues across North America have started incorporating protocols into their treatment practices, like the Sport Concussion Assessment Tool (SCAT)—a standardized evaluation form to check athletes for concussions—return-to-play policies, and baseline neurological tests.

These are undoubtedly improvements compared to a decade ago, but professional sports still have a long way to go in addressing concussions. Concussions continue to slip through the cracks because of poorly-written protocols, inadequate implementation, and, in some cases, an appalling lack of policy. For example, the NHL places much of the discretion on teams to decide when a player should fall under concussion protocol. This procedure reduces the chance that the concussed player receives proper care because teams will always push for their players to return to competition as soon as possible. On the other hand, organizations like the MLB and NBA have implemented league-wide policies that strictly dictate when a player should be removed, how long they must sit out, and the conditions of their return.

Youth and collegiate sports leagues have followed their professional counterparts by writing concussion protocols into their own rulebooks. Most policies help responders decide when athletes should be removed from play and how long they should be kept out; however, especially in youth sports, these protocols are often unclear and are not consistently followed.

Dr. Taryn Taylor is the co-owner and medical director of the Carleton Sports Medicine Clinic and chair of the newly-formed U Sports Injury Surveillance Committee. Currently, each U Sports conference individually manages concussion protocols, but the committee is working toward implementing a nation-wide policy. She outlined some of their biggest challenges and priorities in designing new protocols.

“There is very little a physician can do once a concussion has occurred,” Taylor wrote in an email to the Tribune. “The best treatment is prevention. This can be achieved with encouraging fair play and respecting opponents, stronger penalties for unsafe play, rule changes, and skill development [….] Athlete and coach education is important to improve reporting of concussion symptoms to ensure athletes are removed from play if a concussion is suspected and to prevent athletes from playing with a head injury.”

Youth athletes don’t enjoy the luxuries of designated team doctors and trainers caring for their team, but there’s still plenty that can be done to protect them. Every state in the United States—and as of March 2018, Ontario, too—has passed concussion legislation specific to youth sports, detailing protocols on when an athlete should be removed and for how long, as well as requirements for educating parents and coaches on concussion identification and treatment. However, the gamechanger for youth sports will be to ensure that every athlete, coach, official, and parent is confident and consistent in taking a conservative approach when dealing with potential concussions during practice or a game.

“If [athletes] are being told that they are fine, or are being pushed into returning to play, they will convince themselves that they are okay and put themselves at risk of doing more damage,” Crichton wrote.

Because of that competitive inclination to keep playing, and because concussion symptoms lurk below the surface, progress for a safer concussion culture has been slow.

In January 2018, Dr. Scott Delaney, an associate professor in McGill’s Department of Emergency Medicine and team doctor for McGill Athletics, the Montreal Alouettes, and the Montreal Impact, published a study about why professional football players don’t come forward when they suspect they are concussed. The study concluded that players knew that if they did report a suspected concussion they would be removed from play, and that they did not always understand the danger of playing while concussed.

“I think it is still hard for a lot of people who have never had a concussion to fully understand the injury and how terrible it can be, because […] it’s an ‘invisible’ injury,” Crichton wrote. “If you can’t see it, it’s harder to believe that it’s actually there.”

Concussions will probably remain an inevitable part of athletics. Youth, collegiate, and professional sports leagues alike have been making a steady effort in the last 10 years to eliminate concussion-causing impact in sports—but it might be impossible to completely eliminate concussions.

That’s not the present goal, though. Instead, the current focus is on improving the attitudes of athletes and coaches toward concussions—from education, to diagnosis, to treatment.

“We have to somehow change the culture involved in concussions and make people better understand the risk and try to take the pressure off the players if they come forward,” Delaney wrote.

This goal is achievable and shows that the sports world is moving in the right direction. But the work doesn’t end with new legislation. Above all else, everyone in sports must understand and emphasize that, at least when it comes to concussions, health is always greater than glory.

Off the Board, Opinion

National Geographic’s race cover story misconstrues multiraciality

by Emma Avery on

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When I first read Patricia Edmonds’ cover story on Millie and Marcia Biggs—half-black, half-white fraternal twins—for National Geographic’s April 2018 Race Issue, I felt conflicted. As a person of mixed race, with a father from Hong Kong and a mother of largely Scottish descent, I was happy for this family’s opportunity to share their experiences. Although national media are increasingly latching onto stories about race, people of mixed race don’t often get the spotlight.

National Geographic’s cover is undoubtedly an attempt to normalize multiraciality and destabilize false notions of ‘race’ as a natural category. Yet, by focusing on the visual differences between the twins, the article misses more meaningful and nuanced questions of culture and identity that people such as myself often grapple with. Instead, it places mixed race children on a pedestal that risks exoticizing them.

Edmonds claims that people are more accepting of racial differences now than they once were: While the twins understand what racism is, their parents apparently have not witnessed racist behaviour towards their daughters. However, even if based on interviews with the family itself, the picture painted by National Geographic overlooks the complexity of the varied manifestations of racism, or at least racial categorization. If the author is (rightly) asserting that race is an invented category with no scientific basis, it’s odd, then, to title the issue “Black and White.” Paradoxically, the article critiques the way we think about race, while at the same time fixating on the twins’ stunningly contrasting appearances.

As Doreen St. Félix points out in the New Yorker, society latches onto mixed race people with a sort of removed fascination: Liberals vaunt them as “diviners of social progress,” while simultaneously ignoring that multiracial individuals are by no means new, particularly among colonized populations. Yet, our collective trouble with understanding multiraciality is not surprising, given that systems of racial classification have been ingrained in us for so long. Questionnaires ask us to choose from options like “white,” “Black,” “Hispanic,” “Asian,” and the the catch-all “mixed race” because, for statistical purposes, this is all that matters.

National Geographic’s cover is unsettling because at the same time that it affirms the falsity of race as a concept, it focuses entirely on contrasting visual appearances. In this way, it reminds me far too much of my own lifetime of uneasy interactions, during which I’ve lost track of the number of times that perfect strangers have asked me, “What are you?”

The end result is that mixed race people in their day-to-day lives generate a lot of intrigue and confusion. A stranger got mad at me once because he couldn’t guess what race I was, and thought that I was lying to him. Friends—mid-winter—ask me incredulously how I’m so “tanned,” leaving me at a loss for words, as if my skin doesn’t belong on my body. Like any person who doesn’t fit into a box, the twins intuitively know the awkwardness of responding to this disconnect, too, as they often have to clarify that they are in fact sisters.

To suggest that half-white children embody the possibility of a post-racial future betrays the fact that we haven’t yet figured out how to understand them. Because skin colour and visual appearance are readily noticeable, in my own experience, the same weight is not attached to cultural background or identity. Yet, the things that matter—that I want to share with my friends, or pass onto my children—are not my brown skin and dark hair, but my childhood of Chinese martial arts and large family dinners and my dad’s love of Hong Kong.

National Geographic’s cover is unsettling because at the same time that it affirms the falsity of race as a concept, it focuses entirely on contrasting visual appearances. In this way, it reminds me far too much of my own lifetime of uneasy interactions, during which I’ve lost track of the number of times that perfect strangers have asked me, “What are you?”. It’s not that I mind the question, per se—there is a part of me that likes the thrill of being different and unique, and the weird sense of satisfaction I get when I surprise people with my ethnicity. What bothers me is that my skin colour and facial features are dwelled upon at the expense of my cultural background. Because I don’t look Chinese, any real, meaningful connection to my Chinese heritage is assumed to be nonexistent or irrelevant, or worse—a racist joke punchline. Any claims of attachment I might have to that part of myself are somehow less legitimate because I don’t look the part.

The crux of being mixed race—particularly, half-caucasian—is that one is at once neither and both, occupying a weird in-between space that society hasn’t yet figured out how to make sense of. My fundamental discomfort with the National Geographic story—as honest as it is in its intentions—is that it still uses racial appearance as a reference point. Further, it implies that half-white children have overcome racism, when their realities are far more complicated. The more interesting questions are how it feels to be Millie or Marcia—how they navigate between the varying influences in their lives, where they find common ground between them all, and how all of this informs their identity, values, and experiences.

Basketball, Sports

DeMar DeRozan, Kevin Love, and opening up about mental health in the NBA

by Alec Regino on

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Athletes do not often publicly expose their perceived weaknesses, physical or otherwise, for others to see. So when Toronto Raptors superstar shooting guard DeMar DeRozan tweeted about his struggle with depression during the NBA All-Star Weekend in February, his words sparked a difficult—and extraordinary—discussion. With that red-eye tweet during a weekend designed to celebrate the NBA’s finest, DeRozan unintentionally helped others to acknowledge their own struggles with mental health. In response to DeRozan’s statements, fellow All-Star Kevin Love composed a heartfelt essay outlining his own battles with mental health and anxiety.

“I knew on some level that some people benefited from asking for help or opening up,” Love wrote in The Players’ Tribune. “I just never thought it was for me. To me, it was form of weakness that could derail my success in sports or make me seem weird or different [….] Call it a stigma or call it fear or insecurity […] but what I was worried about wasn’t just my own inner struggles but how difficult it was to talk about them.”

Revelations regarding anxiety and depression from NBA players signify a greater point on how men address their bouts with mental health. Being “tough” and failing to confront one’s problems is a road that men, especially those who epitomize masculinity, continue to haphazardly trudge through.

In broad strokes, NBA stars are cartoonishly presented akin to superheroes. They are in peak physical condition, famous worldwide, and extravagantly wealthy. To some, these NBA players are role models. In a global sport where millions watch their every move, the NBA and its players are uniquely aware of their public perception in a way most other leagues and their athletes are not. LeBron James and Stephen Curry, the league’s two most widely recognized players, leverage their status to discuss social issues.

On the flip side, these NBA players are also perceived by the general public as the apex of what it means to be a man. Hyper-masculine attitudes persist in basketball and make it difficult for some to address “un-masculine” topics. Love compares learning how to be a man to mastering a playbook: “Be strong. Don’t talk about your feelings. Get through it on your own.”

Following that playbook, therefore, means being steadfast on the traits that make one manly: Always show strength. Weakness is the antithesis of what an NBA player is supposed to represent. Add the stigma surrounding mental health to these principles, and players are strongly dissuaded from confronting their battles.

DeRozan and Love, however, display another side to this coin. People make erroneous assumptions of the type of lives these figures lead without considering the notion that they, like everyone else, go through their own battles. No matter how much fame, fortune, or physical fitness a person may have, anyone can be predisposed to mental illness.

As the two stars point out, acknowledging one’s internal battles is not a sign of weakness, but of strength. Not feeling able to talk about mental health is the weakness in itself: It robs us the opportunity to reach out to those in need and robs others of the chance to support us.

“It’s not nothing I’m against or ashamed of,” DeRozan told the Toronto Star on Feb. 25. “At my age, I understand how many people go through it.”

Displaying one’s vulnerabilities is difficult, but the words Love and DeRozan imparted broke barriers that both their fellow players and our broader society can benefit from. Like any physical injury, psychological injuries can and should be mended. Seeing two incredibly accomplished athletes reveal their struggles allows those who look up to them to face mental issues in their own lives. The two essentially implore their fans to challenge the status quo and question the notion that men can’t talk about their feelings or ask for help. Though the players provided the assist, it rests on everyone’s shoulders to carry the conversation.

Joke

First-year intramural team, Threezus, falls to 0-6 in gritty affair

by Gabe Nisker on

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In another riveting Open B intramural game, Threezus (0-6) fell to Love Competition Ball (6-0) 86-35.

When Threezus forward Jeffrey Smith, U0 Arts, joined his intramural basketball team for the winter season, it’s safe to say he didn’t know what he was getting into. The McGill Tribune was unable to attend any of the team’s practices, as it has opted to keep their training sessions closed to media.

Like many intramural teams, the 10 first-year students on the roster seem to believe they’re better than they are. Threezus team captain Leo DiNardo put together his roster of friends and residence-mates on a whim, picking short guards and surprisingly not-much-taller forwards and centres. In their matchup with last year’s Open B champions, Love Competition Ball, Threezus was simply overwhelmed by the height, speed, and skill of their opponents, losing by a 51-point margin in the final game of the regular season.

When they briefly took a 3-0 lead, hooting and hollering could be heard on the Threezus bench. A quick 19-0 run by Love Competition Ball, however, took the bounce out of the game. DiNardo called a timeout in an attempt to regain momentum, then subbed all five bench players into the game—himself included

“It wouldn’t be fair to start myself,” DiNardo later explained.

Slapping his hands on the floor, DiNardo verbally expressed his readiness to play defence. By the time he’d finished slapping the floor, his man had already blown by, scoring an easy lay-up.

Threezus forward Ronald Scott, his high school basketball team’s statistics manager, was very clear that, while the team lacks any applicable skill, they’re certainly louder, more passionate, and definitely more positive than any of their competition.

“Last semester, a guy crossed me over so hard that I literally broke my ankles,” Scott said. “But that didn’t happen this semester, so who’s the real winner here?”

After putting up a combined eight points in the first half, Threezus turned their attention to their most pressing issue: Defence. During the two-minute halftime break, the team discussed maybe switching to zone defence at some point because what they’re doing now certainly isn’t working.

“We just have to communicate better in the future,” DiNardo said. “They got out and ran and we have to stop those transition buckets.”

Threezus is a team that can be prescribed with the classic case of overconfidence. In their attempts to prescribe their defensive deficiencies, they neglected the offensive end where they’ve gone as cold as the Montreal January. The high-school to university intramural jump wasn’t as kind as they hoped.

Next up for Threezus is midterm season, while Love Competition Ball will move onto the Open Intermediate B quarterfinals next weekend. That should be more fun to watch.

 

Notable

Threezus forward Jeffrey Smith debuted a fresh pair of Velcro kicks that you just have to see to believe.

Quotable

“I read this thing somewhere, it went like this. ‘Finish last in your league and they call you an idiot. Finish last in medical school and they call you a doctor.’ I think that might be relevant here, somehow.” – Threezus team captain Leo DiNardo

Stat Corner

Love Competition Ball scored an Open Intermediate B record 79 fast break points.

Joke

McGill Food and Dining Services to host a Real Food Week

by Abeer Almahdi on

More in Joke:

McGill Food and Dining Services often hosts themed food events, such as Tropical Dinner, Taste of Greece, Seoul Food, Vietnamazing, and Taste of India. Now, it has decided to take its theme in a different direction. For the first time in McGill history, cafeterias will hold a Real Food Week, to give students a taste of edible food. This initiative follows the event Sustainable Eating: Last Week’s Leftovers, after student complaints that the food was too similar to regular cafeteria days.

“Preparing for Real Food Week is going to be a real challenge,” Director of Food and Dining Services Shirley Temple said in an interview with The McGill Tribune. “We are going to have to make an effort to use all real ingredients like actual fruits, vegetables, and dairy products. We are going to have to stop getting all of our produce from decade-old cans, and make sure any products we use have not yet passed their expiration dates […] it’s going to be tough. These aren’t things we’re used to thinking about.”

Since this is the first time that McGill Food and Dining Services has decided to embark on a challenge of this magnitude, it created a feedback form for students in residence to express their desires for the week.

“I was pleased to see that almost all students in residence filled out this form,” Temple said. “Over 96 per cent wanted to see a pinch more spices so that the food tastes slightly less cardboardy, while just over 94 per cent wanted to feel safe knowing that they will not get sick after eating, and finally, almost 100 per cent of students don’t remember what fresh fruit and vegetables taste like.”

Temple is open to hosting more themed events in the future, but with certain conditions attached.

“Of course we will try to integrate some of the feedback,” Temple said. “One of our goals for this week is to bring back those nostalgic memories of edible food for students, so we will definitely look into bringing a variety of real vegetables and fruit to campus. However, our kitchens are adamantly against the use of spices and seasoning. We have never have used them, and we never will. It’s just not in our beliefs or value system. We destroyed our last spice rack in 1831, and we never looked back.”

Even though Food and Dining Services is maintaining its flavourless mandate, students are excited about the prospect of food slightly less likely to make them ill.

“At the McGill cafeterias, you are getting more than just a meal, you are also getting food poisoning, or nausea, its almost always one or the other, or even both for the adventurous eater,” U0 Arts and Molson Hall resident Arnold Palmer said.

Real Food Week is set to take place in the Fall 2018 semester, at the Royal Victoria College Cafeteria. If the initiative turns out to be a success, Food and Dining Services will continue it as an annual event, and may even start integrating real food into the cafeterias’ daily menus.

This article is a work of satire and is part of the Tribune’s 2018 Joke Issue.

Joke

U0 science student still trapped in the Adams Auditorium disaster zone

by Katia Innes on

More in Joke:

This excerpt belongs to a series of documents recovered from the FDA stairwell. They are speculated to originate from during the Adams Auditorium Ceiling Tile Blitzkrieg.

As I write this, I am currently trapped in the fifth row of seats in the Adams Auditorium. I wish I could leave–I wish I could be free to toil through WebWork in Schulich, or even feel the crunch of snow beneath my feet again–but as the ceiling tiles fall left and right, I find myself paralyzed with fear, unable to run as a precariously bent tile looks greedily towards the ground.

It all began last Monday. It was a day like any other, and as I sat in my usual spot in Adams, I noticed that something seemed off. Maybe it was the fact that the newly installed projector suspiciously ceased to function. Maybe it was the giant X made of yellow caution tape thrown across the entire fourth row. Or it may have been the mysterious water that seeped through the ceiling tiles. Regardless, no one could have seen what was coming next. As I found myself dozing off through the third clicker question of the lecture, an unmistakable, unforgettable thud was heard throughout the auditorium. I will never forget that sound. An entire ceiling tile had fallen onto the roped off seats and landed violently on the ground, just like Aja did in the premiere of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars 3.

Since then two more tiles have fallen, the puddles keep growing, and the water is slowly rising. I am now ankle-deep in brown water. I don’t know how much longer I can hang on. There are only so many empty Roddick Roast cups I can use to collect the dripping water. At this point, the question is no longer “Will another tile fall?” but “When will the next fall?” I have fashioned a hat out of one of the many “McGill 24” posters to offer myself meager protection from the falling debris and the dripping water. The ink that once proudly read “Thank You to Our 30,000 Donors for Keeping Our Campus Beautiful” has long washed away, leaving only streaks of red and white on my sorry face. The syllabus says that there’s a General Chemistry 2 lecture scheduled here at 10:05, so I will shoulder this burden for as long as I am able. IF YOU FIND THIS PLEASE SEND HELP.

This article is a work of satire and is part of the Tribune’s 2018 Joke Issue.

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