161.10 www.theontarion.com Mar. 25 - 31, 2010

UNDERWATERHOCKEY

HUNGER AWARENESS WEEK Page 11

Page 5

Arts & Culture Sports & Health Life Opinion Editorial Crossword Classified Community Listings

INDEXThe appeal ofaccents

This week’s storiesErectile

dysfunctionPage 6

Page 8Page 15

See page 12

NEWS 3THE ONTARION 161.10

China censors, Google bails

Internet giant Google has decided to redirect Google China’s visitors from google.com.cn to google.com.hk, the Hong Kong version of the site. The move follows a wave of hacking attempts directed at Google in January from unknown individuals within China. Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, all owned by Google, are unavailable in China, but Gmail, Google Maps, and a few other Google services will still be provided to Chinese consumers. Google claims that China interferes with the workings of the search engine, something that has been going on since Google China was established in 2006, and China is inconsistent with the company’s value of free speech. The next step will likely be a total blockade of google.com.hk by the Chinese government. (CBC News)

“Mommy Bloggers” gain cash, community

Thanks to the Internet and social media, a few successful “Mommy bloggers,” as they are affectionately known, now make six figures based on product endorsements, brand-based contests and advertising each year. Although most mothers that blog share daily life experiences online simply to connect with other mothers and deal with the sometimes-isolating process of child rearing, a small group have turned their online ventures into something highly profitable and culturally significant. A recent five-city tour of a conference entitled “Bloggy Boot Camp” has served to promote the trend among young professional women. (New York Times)

String of suicides spurs efforts to promote mental health at Cornell University

A second-year student at the highly competitive Cornell University in Ithaca, New York took his life by jumping from a bridge near campus on March 11. The next day, another student followed suit. These deaths brought the number of suicides in the past month at Cornell to three and the total this academic year to six, causing the university’s mental health services director to declare a public health emergency. Cornell’s president, David Skorton, has garnered wide praise for his efforts to train all university employees, including janitors, residence assistants, and administrators to recognize symptoms of depression. He has also placed daily full-page ads in the campus newspaper that read, “If you learn anything at Cornell, please learn to ask for help. It is a sign of wisdom and strength.” The message seems to be hitting home: it has been written by students all over campus in chalk, including on the bridge where some of the deaths occurred. (CNN)

Referendum fate will be decided on Friday

Students get a look at homelessness‘5 Days’ participants come up short in donations, but not in heart

A judge will decide by week’s end whether a referendum on continued membership in the Canadian Federation of Students (CFS) will take place on the University of Guelph campus April 7-9.

On Tuesday, the national and provincial components of the Federation appeared before a judge of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice to address accusations that they both had acted in self-interest and bad faith when they denied Guelph student petitions seeking a referendum.

Because CFS and CFS-Ontario (CFS-O) are separate organizations, Guelph student organizers had sent petitions to each organization in September and October of 2009. Both components have their own set of concerns regarding the petitions that were submitted.

CFS-O outright denied the petitions back in February. The referendum process with the national petition had come to a

If you noticed a sudden influx of homeless people on campus last week, you’re not the only one. From March 15-19, four University of Guelph students participated in a campaign to raise awareness and money to benefit the homeless.

The catch? They had to be homeless themselves for five days: sleeping outside, never leaving the campus and eating only donated food.

“Going into this campaign, I knew that by Friday at 5pm my life would be back to the way it was,” said Ally Rogin, a University of Guelph student who participated in the 5 Days for the Homeless campaign. “I knew if I got sick or needed to go home because things got too tough, I had that option. Not all of us are that fortunate.”

The event kicked off last Sunday with the understanding that all participants would sleep outdoors on campus, have no access to technology, and eat only what they were given by the generous. Luckily for them, people here like to help.

“There was an overwhelming amount of support from the community. It was great to see how many people were appreciative about what we’re doing and encouraging us to continue,” said Rogin.

The participants were also fortunate to have nice weather during their five days being homeless, which Rogin and her fellow participants report was the easiest of their many challenges.

DANIEL BITONTI

JOSH DOYLE

complete standstill in the past three months.

Lawyers representing the CSA argued on Tuesday that it was a right of students to be able to vote on their national representation.

“Membership is the only opportunity in [the CFS] bylaws where students have individual opportunity to effect change,” said Sandra Barton, one of the lawyers representing the CSA.

CFS and CFS-O’s argument against holding the referendum is that the original petitions were not completed properly in the first place. The CFS-O also argued that the petition sent to them was not submitted on time.

Lawyers for the CFS argued that the right to determine the process used to verify the names on the petition lies solely with the national executive. Their primary complaint is that they were not made part of this process and were asked to accept a verification of the names, which was provided

“Last year’s campaign [had] the participants sleeping in minus 15 degrees. Although the nights were cold, we were more prone to heat stroke than hypothermia this year,” explained Rogin.

The warm weather may have

involvement. So far this year, $173, 144 has been raised through the event; $3,532 of which was raised in Guelph. This, however, is far less than Guelph participants wished to contribute, amounting to only 47 per cent of the $7,500 goal.

According to Rogin, the participants hoped for better.

“If people are reluctant to donate, it may be that they cannot see the impact that their donations have,” she said. “We hope to have opened people’s eyes to the problems experienced by homeless youth.”

Even in this day and age, a common question still posed about the homeless is, “Why don’t they get a job?” The assumption, of course, is that getting a job is quite easy.

A quick look at today’s employment climate tells us that getting a job is actually far from easy, and without access to a shower or a safe place to sleep at night, it becomes nearly impossible.

“If this campaign increased awareness and provided hope and refuge for some of these young people, I think we did an amazing thing,” Rogin said.

Rashaad BhamjeeFour U of G students were homeless for five days on the U of G campus to raise awareness. They were not allowed to leave the campus, they had to sleep outside, and they could only eat donated food.

been easier to deal with than snow, but don’t think this year’s participants had an easy time with their sacrifice.

“The hardest part of the experience was being dependent on others. We take for granted the amount of freedom we have to make our own rules,” said Rogin.

The event was started by business students at the University of Alberta in 2005 in order to help ease the burden faced by homeless people. It has since received international attention and

If people are reluctant to donate,

it may be that they cannot see the

impact that their donations have…

We hope to have opened people’s eyes

to the problems experienced by

homeless youth.Ally Rogin

U of G student and participant in 5 Days for the Homeless

Rashaad BhamjeeOn March 24, in the University Centre courtyard, students wrote what community meant to them on hand cutouts. The event was as part of Hunger Awareness week. >

SEE “CSA,” PAGE 5

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Earth hour approaches, but does it matter?A look at how one hour affects energy use broadly

On Saturday March 27 at precisely 8:30 pm Eastern Standard Time, hundreds of millions of people around the world will be turning off their lights and appliances for Earth Hour. The event was conceptualized by the World Wildlife Fund and began in 2007 when Sydney, Australia shut off many of its non-essential lights. In the following years, more than half the countries around world signed on to the initiative, accompanying Sydney by dimming their lights as well.

The purpose of the international event is somewhat divided, with some people arguing it is about reducing the amount of energy used, while others use the hour to promote the larger concern of global warming in its entirety. Emily Pong, a member of Guelph Students for Environmental Change (GSEC), does not believe that these two goals are mutually exclusive. She defines the purpose of Earth Hour as having both immediate and future aims.

“Earth Hour is a global event aimed at increasing awareness and consciousness in energy use,” said Pong. “Participants are asked to turn off their lights and unplug their energy-using appliances, for an hour on March 27. The long-term goals are for people to reduce their overall

ALDIS BRENNAN

energy consumption.”While Pong supports Earth

Hour and believes it to be a worthwhile cause, she is skeptical about its actual effectiveness.

“I think it is effective in reaching a very large audience and engaging those who don’t care [or] are oblivious to their environmental impact,” she said. “I think the event may be somewhat effective

criticism of Earth Hour: it does not go far enough. The argument is that spending an hour in the dark does not excuse someone for consuming excessive amounts of energy for the rest of the 8764 hours of the year. Nate Goegan, a student at the University of Guelph, is one of these critics.

“It’s Earth Hour, it’s like be environmental for an hour and then

go drive your Hummer. If they’re going to put all this effort into a campaign, then why not make it a campaign that offers practical advice for saving energy,” he said.

As an organization, GSEC supports the idea of a more widespread and longer-lasting initiative combating wasteful energy use and is working actively to attempt to reduce the amount of superfluous energy used on campus.

“GSEC wants to encourage everyone to reduce their energy consumption year-round,” said Pong. “We recognize that one night is not enough to make a lasting impact, so we’ve talked about organizing more regular Earth Hour events and speaking with different building managers on campus to reduce their lighting use, especially during the day.”

Despite the brevity of Earth

Hour, GSEC is still supporting and promoting the event all over campus this week. This includes various visual reminders such as posters and also Earth Hour kits which contain candles as well as activities that can be done in the dark. According to Gillian Maurice, the U of G sustainability coordinator, the university will also be participating

“The residence cafeterias will be dimming their lights, and all staff and faculty will be receiving a reminder e-mail on the Thursday and Friday to make sure all their controllable area lights are turned off for the weekend,” said Maurice.

The most poignant feature about Earth Hour, however, is not the involvement of universities, corporations, or skyscrapers; it is rather the assurance that close to one billion ordinary individuals around the world can make a difference.

Julia Shonfield

On March 27 at 8:30pm, U of G students will be turning off all electrical appliances and lights to raise awareness about energy usage and its effect on the environment.

IN FOCUS

It’s Earth Hour, it’s like be environmental for

an hour and then go drive your Hummer.

If they’re going to put all this effort into a

campaign then why not make it a campaign

that offers practical advice for saving

energy.Nate GoeganU of G student

in increasing awareness about and action against energy consumption, however without a constant or more regular reminder of the issue, most people probably don’t change their habits until Earth Hour happens again the following year.”

This view represents a common

NEWS 5THE ONTARION 161.10

Hunger on the U of G campusMeal exchange and the CSA Food Bank raise awareness about hunger in Guelph

CSA and CFS court hearing

From March 22 to 28 on the University of Guelph campus, Meal Exchange is partnering with the Central Student Association (CSA) Food bank for Hunger Awareness Week. Hoping to spread understanding about poverty and hunger issues on campus and in the wider community, the weeklong campaign features a diversity of events, each addressing a different hunger issue.

by Guelph University, after signatures had bee collected and sent to them.

“The fact that we have been shut out of the verification process and are now being told that we have to accept the verification process without our input is, in fact, bad faith on the part of the applicants,” said Gordon Douglas, a lawyer for the CFS.

According to the CSA, the process undertaken by the university had been accepted by the CFS at other universities. Lawyers for the CSA argued that it was in bad faith to require new verification criteria on the petition, especially criteria that had not been outlined in CFS bylaws. The CSA lawyers argued that hiding the criteria made it nearly impossible for any petition organizer to meet them.

With a report and files from Danielle Webb, Ontario Bureau Chief of the Canadian University Press

NICOLE ELSASSER

a Budget” where the manager of the Bullring, Kristina Lindsay, will hold a cooking workshop in Lambton Hall residence on March 25, teaching students how to make meals without breaking the bank. Krista Kermer, the coordinator for the CSA Foodbank, is particularly excited about this event because of her knowledge of what the average student is working with when it comes to kitchen appliances.

“The idea [of the workshop] is using as little pots and pans that we can because not everyone can afford a crock-pot or a slow cooker or something like that,” said Kermer. “They use like a basic pot or a basic pan and make something that can be altered to fit all different diet needs. It can

be vegan, it can be vegetarian, and if you add some ground beef you can make something that’s omnivorous. But also it’s fairly nutritious as well. She’ll be making a stew, or more like a chili, and a stir-fry using stuff that is readily available and fairly cheap to use.”

Kermer explained that at the workshop, attendees will be given recipes for foods they can easily and cheaply prepare, as well as the estimated costs for the dish and the best ways to buy ingredients.

“With [something like] spices, it’s really easy to pick them up for a couple of cents at the Bulk Barn. If you’re a good shopper, you can,” said Kermer.

Kermer advises visitors to the Food Bank to make large batches

Rashaad Bhamjee

As part of Hunger Awareness Week, an “X’ marked one in five chairs in the University Centre cafeteria to remind students that one in five of people in the community go hungry.

with simple ingredients, rather than spending all of their money on individual and often overpriced microwaveable dinners.

“Sometimes I’ll have students who come into the Foodbank and say, ‘there’s nothing here,’ [because] often people are very addicted to the fast, one-minute Michelina’s servings that you can pop in the microwave and leave,” said Kermer. “However there’s some points where I see that we have lentils, we have beans, we have rice. You could make a chili right now…If you do have time, like a couple of hours, you can always freeze it later and it can be a quick instant meal and a lot of times something like a stew contains quite a bit of protein and it will keep you full more than a

< CONTINUED FROM PAGE 3

small [microwave meal] will.”If there remains skepticism

about whether hunger is a problem in Guelph, Su points out that one in five people in the community deal with hunger related issues, and because of the nature of poverty, most people suffer silently.

“I think hunger is usually an invisible issue. If you can’t eat lunch or dinner, you’re not going to go around telling your friends about it,” said Su. “Asking your friends to buy food is not a very socially acceptable thing to do, so hunger is usually something that is under the radar. A lot of times there’s a stigma attached to hunger.”

With files from Daniel Bitonti and Greg Beneteau

Asking your friends to buy food is not a very

socially acceptable thing to do, so hunger

is usually something that is under the radar.

A lot of times there’s a stigma attached to

hunger. Yvonne Su

education and promotion coordinator for Meal

Exchange

According to Yvonne Su, the education and promotion coordinator for Meal Exchange, many people still don’t realize that hunger is an issue facing students at the University of Guelph.

“A lot of times you’ll hear about international hunger but not about hunger locally or in students,” said Su. “A lot of students are running out on their meal cards right now. It’s kind of a way to link onto that and make them realize that food is precious, that not everybody has money to buy food.”

Among the events taking place was a screening on March 23 of the documentary Food Inc, a film that deals with the politics of food production. Another much-anticipated event is “Cooking on

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IN FOCUS

Why accents are so sexy?Psychology prof says there’s rhyme and reason for our attraction to accents

It’s happened to all of us. It might have been a bartender listing off drink specials. It might have been a professor introducing themselves to the class. It could have simply been a stranger apologizing for bumping into you.

Whoever it was, wherever it was, the result was the same—they opened their mouth and something unexpected came out. Not in terms of what they said, but how they said it—that person had an accent. And chances are you were drawn to it.

From the pronounced Irish brogue of Colin Farrell to the soft Spanish lilt of Penelope Cruz, most of us have probably had crushes on celebrities from foreign countries. However, the mystique of an accent is not limited to aiding the already beautiful and famous. As anyone who has ever traveled abroad or

DAN HOWSE

met foreigners visiting Canada can tell you, accents typically increase a person’s attractiveness.

There are many hypothetical reasons for this increased attractiveness: It could be the modern day manifestation of an evolutionary preference for a wider gene pool. It could also be the result of seeing gorgeous movie stars with these accents and then subconsciously associating their physical beauty with their pronunciation and dialect. However, Saba Safdar, a University of Guelph psychology professor, feels that while these arguments may be valid explanations for our increased attraction, this increase might just be a manifestation of a more general trend—our attraction to the exotic.

“It is wanting to be the otherness,” Safdar explained. “It is wanting something that is less common in the immediate social environment and finding that more attractive and more desirable.”

According to Safdar, this preference is not limited to what we hear.

“For the Japanese, having

wider eyes and lighter skin colour [is considered more attractive],” Safdar said. “For the westerners, getting tanned is considered more attractive.”

Of course, this attraction to the exotic is not necessarily a naturally occurring process. In India, for example, there has been a history of trying to make one whiter to blend in

w i t h the dominant class, leading Safdar to conclude, “there might have political roots for these preferences.”

Armed with an exotic Persian

cadence of her own and dating a British man, Safdar seems an excellent candidate to personally attest to the power of accents in dating.

“Hearing that voice was very different f rom my everyday interactions, so

that sounded exotic,” she said. However,

while she cited the accent as a point of attraction, it was only one of many factors that drew her towards him. Even for those of us that have always been intrigued by foreign

accents, what we’re looking for might be almost just around the corner.

Courtesy

It is wanting to be the otherness. It is

wanting something that is less common

in the immediate social environment

and finding that more attractive

and more desirable.Saba Safdar

U of G psychology professor

“Personally, I think accents are a very sexy thing,” said fifth-year political science student Ben Janzen. “For a long time, I imagined the dream girl. She’d have a Spanish accent. But I’m totally satisfied with my current girlfriend and she doesn’t have an accent. It’s not the be all and end all.”

7THE ONTARION 161.10 ARTS & CULTURE

This past weekend, the Juried Art Show saw its 42nd year. As one of the longest running student art shows in Canada, JAS 2010 was a success thanks to curators Miles Stemp, Darryn Doull and a slew of enthusiastic volunteers.Jurors Lorna Mills, Gareth Lichty and RM Vaughan had a tough job choosing winners out of the hundreds of undergraduate student entries that took up every nook and cranny in the Zavitz building.The interesting part about JAS is its focus on the undergraduate student. Being student installed and operated, jurors and faculty members praised everyone involved for taking part in something so unique and worth while. Sharing first place at the top of the top 10 were Liam Sanagan’s Untitled and Vicki Dziuma’s Vanna White Completes 1 km 42 times.

Top 1010 - Aislinn Thomas Eater Compatibility Por-trait #1: Rod, Peggy, Aislinn, Zachary, Katie09 - Stefan Herda Shots!08 - Olivia Bidzinski Rainbow Waist07 - Liam Sanagan Untitled (Space #3)06 - Gin Murray Self-Portrait as a Knitter05 - Ben Arbor The Kill Floor04 - Patrick Kryzanowski Jurassic Park03 - Alison Hendricks Pregnant Men01 - Vicki Dziuma Vanna White Completes 1 km 42 Times

Honorable Mention10 - Darryn Doull Untitled (CCTV Zavitz)09 - Miles Stemp Nightlight (Wall Effects)08 - Donna Willard Transparent Thoughts 407 - Aislinn Thomas Nice06 - Anna Kovler I Hate Doull05 - Darryn Doull Germain Gardens, Sar-nia Ont.04 - Laura Simon Monstrous Moonshine03 - Dan Frawley Burden02 - Anne Rawn Comma, Come On01 - Patrick Kryzanowski Triangle

Juried Art Show

ARTS & CULTURE8 MAR. 25 - 31, 2010 THEONTARION.CA

Hooligans and whores! Curtain Call’s Reefer Madness hits all the right notes

For 53 years now, Curtain Call Productions (CCP) has been the go-to source for musical theatre on campus. Initially performing plays and musical numbers about campus life, since 1993 the company has moved on to performing full-scale Broadway musicals during College Royal weekend. This year the company brought the cult documentary-turned-musical Reefer Madness to the stage.

The musical retains some of the cautionary themes of the original documentary with a Lecturer, played by the fantastic Tim Clarke, who introduces the show as a parable of young Jimmy Harper, whose life was ruined by marijuana. The story unfolds with scandal upon scandal: from murder, to orgies, to baby selling.

It is far from a morality play,

DUNCAN DAY-MYRON

were tight, and, probably most importantly, the humour was intact.

The performance had a fairly large cast, with half a dozen people sharing the stage and a musical number on a few occasions, but each of the performers worked well off of one another. It was a very cohesive, well-rehearsed performance.

Clarke— as the Lecturer, Mr. Poppy the soda jerk, and President Roosevelt— hit each role with the perfect balance of sincerity, lunacy and menace. When Clarke’s Lecturer opened the play with the title song, “Reefer Madness,” he had enough enthusiasm and presence to assuage any doubts anyone in the audience might have had about the production.

Chanelle Ouellet, a veteran of last year’s production of Fame, played the role of Mae, the proprietor of the reefer den. Mae is an important character but not a major one, and in less capable hands, could have been a mere side note, but Ouellet belted her songs

with.”Performances aside, another

reason this production was so successful could be due to a different approach from the Curtain Call Productions executive.

“The process this year with Curtain Call has changed a lot […] We’ve tried to be more professional; we’ve tried to model ourselves with professional theatre,” said CCP president Brian Cunha.

“We want to expand, we want to be bigger, more professional,” Cunha said. “But it’s difficult because our budget is relatively high compared to other clubs but compared to other theatres or theatre companies, it’s terribly low. This year we had a lot of funding from the CSA, which was good. They were very supportive this year.”

One of the changes was putting more advertising behind auditions, which ended up quite successful for the company.

“We ended up getting 130 people auditioning, which is quite substantial for a cast of 25,” said Cunha.

In their advertising for auditions, CCP also made an effort to pull from the Guelph community, rather than just the campus.

“This year we talked about wanting to open it up to the community a little bit more. We

to the rafters and made them count. More than anyone else, she made the entire thing seem effortless.

All in all, there wasn’t an off performance in the bunch. The two leads, Eric Da Costa as Jimmy Harper and Gillian Henry as Mary Lane, had enough naïveté for their puppy love to be convincing, but not so much that it felt at all apart from the satire.

But a certain special kudos has to go to the entire cast for one special reason: the orgy. After taking his first hit of sweet, sweet marijuana, our Jimmy is instantly caught up in a world of sin and debauchery, where the ensemble as well as some of the leads took to the stage in their underwear.

“It’s something that I thought was important,” said Pellerine on the scene. “I wanted to capture the raw sexuality that it represented. The idea of the show is that pot makes you this crazy sexual person, so we wanted it to be the best sexual experience someone could have.”

“We had naked rehearsals and it was a process of getting everybody comfortable. There was definitely a fine line and we had to make sure that everyone was comfortable,” Pellerine continued. “We were communicating a lot between the cast and the exec and we tried to make something that was good for everybody and everyone was happy

though. The criticisms of marijuana that the source material posited satirized to the point of absurdity and comedy. And that’s what made it so great! It was certainly a consideration for Curtain Call during the selection process last spring.

“We were really looking for something new, something different,” said director Adam Pellerine. “A lot of the stuff that comes up is where the student body is and how we can relate to them and what we can do. Reefer Madness is something that came up because of the political climate.”

“I think it’s important to look at the subject matter of Reefer Madness and what it represents. It is a moment in time where we can take risks and try to break boundaries. I wanted to […] get people thinking out of the box, and I think that’s important,” continued Pellerine. “We wanted to show that musical theatre can have meaning. It can have a message.”

“What we created was everything that we wanted it to be,” said Pellerine of the production.

He has every right to think so. The company accomplished something noteworthy. With only two-and-a-half short months to prepare and rehearse, the show was one of the best of CCP’s recent history. The satire was never heavy-handed, the performances

are interested in being a university theatre company but we also wanted to expand it and have different sources,” Cunha continued. “[Although] the only people that does not go to this school are Tim [Clarke], the lecturer, and Eric da Costa, Jimmy Harper.”

Although his future with CCP is as yet undecided, Cunha does

have ambitions for the future of the company.

“Next year we’re talking about maybe a drama or perhaps a show that’s very well known but difficult to produce because we want a challenge. What’s the point of doing theatre if it’s going to be easy? I want people to come and be surprised that we’re doing this.”

Christine Cerullo

Top: Eric DaCosta as Jimmy Harper pulls a gun on Marc Hardwood’s pot dealing Jack while Chanelle Ouellet watches.Bottom: DaCosta holds his dying lover Mary Lane, portrayed by Gillian Henry.

What’s the point of doing theatre if it’s going to be easy?

I want people to come and be surprised that we’re doing this.

Brian Cunhaproducer, Curtain Call Productions

ARTS & CULTURE 9THE ONTARION 161.10

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Campus talent on the MainstageMainstage Productions shows RUR at the George Luscombe theatre

Inside the intimate space of the George Luscombe theatre, a brightly coloured stage inspired attention. With its bright green walls and orange corridor, it reminded me of an early episode of Star Trek. Large projection screens filled the empty walls, illuminating everything in the scene and complimenting the shows themes.

RUR (Rossum’s Universal Robots) is this year’s Mainstage Production, adapting Karel Capek’s 1921 play that is noted for introducing the term “robot.”

Company actors in beige overalls moved mechanically across the stage, performing all of the menial tasks we humans do, but as robots. Their costumes were not robotic, and at first seemed too modest for the science fiction portrayal I understood this years Mainstage to be. It became clear soon after that these were not robots in the traditional sense, and that costume design was one of the finest points of the play.

Right away, the show thrust itself at the audience. Lead actor Nick Nahwegahbow burst through the corridor generating an energy he retained throughout the night. As the ambitious Domin, leader of the robot production factory, his character’s confidence formed the backbone of the play and helped the others along in making strange events believable.

The play begins with Domin’s romantic seduction of a pretty human rights activist, Helena, played by the talented Kaya Bucholc, as her plans to shut down the factory backfire, and leave her as a permanent resident.

Much of the opening is spent with Domin as he explains the workings of his robot factory, making he and Helena the only two characters on stage after Helena’s conservative servant Emma exits. The audience begs for human presence, and the quirky management staff delivers, providing not only comic relief but human interaction as well. Their unit of four scientists moves about like an excitable gang of 60-year-old school children, all eager to please their new guest and master’s lover.

This all male quartette may have been a masculine overload in other productions, and director Jerrard Smith’s choice to have the majority of these male characters played by women was a good one. Their portrayal of old men had them bouncing about the stage with an energy old men rarely show, and made their scenes the most entertaining of the night.

The play makes a sudden move from light-hearted humor to sullen robot Armageddon, leaving you wondering where things went wrong. Fortunately, strong acting

JOSH DOYLE

pulls the audience through this confusing moment of script and we come out the other side without much insult.

The real trouble starts when people stop having children, as robots “do everything” and leave no need for human work, or reproduction. This is where the

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cheap labour through robot slavery, happily accepts these two lovers as a solution to humanity, remarking on their biblical reference before sending them on their way. His performance saves the ending from an emotional vacancy by the robots, which speaks for the whole play. Strong performances by actors and stage crew alike helped the mediocre script, making for a production that is nonetheless well worth seeing for its campus talent.

The audience begs for human

presence, and the quirky

management staff delivers,

providing not only comic relief

but human interaction as

wellrepercussions of paradise are felt.

The play borders on preaching humanity, but gets off without seeming like a lecture by showing instead of telling. The story relays the message, and the movement on stage makes you forget you’re being taught.

RUR’s dark second half hungered for a love story, as Domin and Helena’s distant affair lacked romance. It tries to answer this call in the end, by robots no less, as the twosome’s petty bickering and stubborn love for one another reminds the audience that we need argument and emotion like we need air.

The end of RUR is perhaps tied up too nicely, as the pair of Adam and Eve-like-robots present themselves more or less as human, skipping off to repopulate the earth. The other remaining human, Alquist, the only scientist who did not selfishly pursue the dream of

Jerrard SmithHelena and the robots, from left to right: Shelby Vilneff, Kaya Bucholc, Josh Marentette, Jennifer Alterio run through a rehearsal of RUR.

ARTS & CULTURE10 MAR. 25 - 31, 2010 THEONTARION.CA

7:30 pm doors

live music Thurs Mar 25club vinyl | 52 Macdonell

$15 all ages/licensed Co-presented with Kaleidoscope Promotions.

sunday cinema Sun Mar 28war memorial hall

$3 UoG stu | $5 generalThe game is afoot!

nooner Wed Mar 31uc courtyard

Whet your appetite for this summer’s Guelph Contemporary Dance Festival, this June 3 to 6, with this presentation of the powerful, risk-taking and fiercely contemporary Chimera Project.

docurama Thurs Mar 25 thornbrough 1200 | free

Co-presented with MacLaughlin Library

Absorbing insight into a larger-than-life eccentric.

7:00 pm noon

prev

iew

8:00 pm

Visit www.sundaycinema.ca for more info on these Central Student Association events

SHE & HIMVOLUME TWO

Like an addict chasing that first high, Volume Two by She & Him tries hard to recreate the magic of Volume One. Fortunately, unlike most sequels, Volume Two doesn’t fall too far behind its predecessor. This is partially owing to the fact that Volume One was never all that original to begin with, so using the same tricks for a follow up album with the title Volume Two is only too appropriate.

She & Him are one of the few bands deserving of the somewhat arbitrary categorization of “indie-pop,” which is often used to refer to “popular independent” music. In the most snobbish sense of the terms, they are distinct. While popular indie music could refer to just about anything that is not on a major label (even then it gets fuzzy), indie-pop is a specific genre with a number of further specific sub-genres. Indie-pop/Twee-pop/C86 emerged as a counter-counter-culture to British punk-rock, in the late 1970s in that it was so overtly sweet and innocent that it made the average teen want to puke. At the same time it was the perfect sarcastic rebellion.

She & Him might sound more like country-pop than quintessential indie-pop as it was known in the ‘80s, but they fill a similar niche for those who are sick of angst-filled revolt.

The couples’ music is clean, easy listening with predictable old-fashioned song structure, and even though She & Him cross genres, they keep it simple. Furthermore, Deschanel provides an alternative feminine figure to the GaGas and Beyonces. She’s a feminine figure who isn’t afraid to sound vulnerable or shy, but with a bit more maturity than Taylor Swift. It’s an odd mix: perfectly clichéd and yet quite refreshing.

Her songs tend to have a “time capsule” quality as if they were written in any decade 40 plus years ago. Subsequently Matt Ward is her equal in instrumentation and production and is looking more Robert Downey Jr. than ever these days. The duo is clearly not above covering a tune they like, as there are two covers on each volume. Volume Two includes NRBQ’s “Ridin’ In My Car” and an impeccable cover of Skeeter Davis’ “Gonna Get Along Without You Now.” It’s gravitating to think that these covers and related artists must have been inspiration while writing, which may give you the sense of where Deschanel and Ward’s influences come from. Seemingly, unless you happen to be familiar with those songs, you wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between them and Deschanel’s own writing. In other words, Volume Two flows easily from front to back with no disruption.

Deschanel and Ben Gibbard (Death Cab For Cutie) may be the cutest newly weds in contemporary music, but for some reason there are no guest appearances by Gibbard. Perhaps they’re too modest for that sort of “PDA” or maybe they’ve decided to save it for the next Death Cab album. In any case, head over to NPR.org for a free stream of the full album, which was kindly available prior to release.

Notable Tracks: “Thieves”, “Me and You”, “Home”

Listeners May Also Enjoy: Linda Ronstadt – Simple Dreams, Camera Obscura – My Maudlin Career

Next Sound Check: MGMT - Congratulations

-Daniel Wright

Top to bottom:FramboiseM, Pour Vous, D.Porter de FemmePour Vous

Featured artist:Maryse Larivière

Maryse Larivière’s practice can be described in two categories: photo-conceptual performance and Pavilion Projects; to which you might reply, what is a Pavilion Project? I’ve never heard of that medium before. It’s not a medium, it’s something that Larivière started in Montréal with co-organizer Robin Simpson in 2003. With this project, the duo are arts and culture facilitators, working with a wide range of intellectual facets. They have organized art and music performances, held exhibitions in various art spaces and non-art spaces (convenience stores, OddFellows restaurant or in a defunct arcade for example) and are publishing the Montreal Art Map

Through Pavilion Projects, Larivière and Simpson have been prolific cultural producers. They have produced exhibitions within, not only their city of origin, Montreal, but throughout Canada (including Guelph’s Fine Art Department’s newest development, the Guelph Goodwater Project in Toronto). Recently they have been invited to do their thing abroad in France.

With regards to Larivière’s practice, she majored in photography at Concordia where she did her BFA. Her own work uses her keen eye for image creation and places her photographs in the realm of performance. With this, she creates beautiful images that act as reference for her performances. Her work is also very funny; it’s a

subtle humor that is only revealed after some visual and mental digging.

In Framboise, a young male stairs off into the middle ground blankly poised in deep thought, yet he has a raspberry jammed up his nose and no shirt on. His bare chest coupled with the domestic interior and casual demeanor hints at an intimacy between subject and artist. These signifiers indicate some sort of romantic connection and casually playful, spontaneous art creation. It’s completely absurd, though not Monty Python absurd, more of a Bill Murray absurd.

Larivière’s recent works have taken the form of an ongoing series of performances written for her by other artists with the series titled Pour Vous. In English, the title means “for you all” informally but when directed at the single person, it caries romantic connotations. These nuances bring a more personal emphasis to the work and allow the viewer to approach it and become more familiar with the subject. The work also takes the form of a poster advertised well after the event has occurred¬ – if there is even an event at all. With this strategy, Larivière creates hype around something that may be over or never actually happened, a beautifully tongue and check mode of disseminating information. It also removes the emphasis on the event and directs our attention to the poster; something we are not used to because posters function as information givers.

-Miles Stemp

SPORTS & HEALTH 11THE ONTARION 161.10 SPORTS & HEALTHHealth problems from toxic skies a myth?

Pucks clash with snorkels in ‘breathtaking’ sportGuelph’s underwaterh o c key c l u b i sattracting considerable student interest

Sports synergies are not at all uncommon, whereby two activities are combined to form a completely new sport altogether. Frisbee golf comes to mind, as does the ever-popular phys-ed pastime from grade school: soccer baseball.

And, in Guelph, another sports synergy has captured the interest of many students: underwater hockey.

Underwater hockey is not new. It was invented in England in 1954, as a recreational means of developing the breathing capacity of divers. Teams of six players are equipped with masks, snorkels, flippers, specially-crafted foot-long sticks – often made of plastic – and a lead puck, weighing nearly one kilogram, allowing it to travel along the bottom of a swimming pool.

Three-metre troughs – that serve as nets – are placed at opposite ends of the pool, with the objective being scoring goals. There are no goalies and ‘shooting’ the puck is done with a flick of the wrist, a technique that also allows the puck to be raised off the bottom of the pool.

Brittany Haughton is the president of the Guelph Underwater Hockey club and has been dedicated to the sport for the four years of her university career.

“In my first year, I was looking for something to keep myself active. I’ve always liked swimming, but I found that just doing lengths was

A study by University of Guelph economics professor Ross McKitrick has made arguments that challenge previous research acknowledging the negative effects of air pollution.

McKitrick, in collaboration with Gary Koop from the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, Scotland, and Lise Tole, from the University of Edinburgh, analyzed air pollution rates from 11 Canadian cities over a 20-year period.

“A lot of studies only look at a single city, and for a very short period of time,” said McKitrick “A single city might only have six months worth of data.”

This means attention to variables, such as smoking rates, isn’t considered, because there is so little data to work with.

The researchers found no evidence that air pollution affected hospital admission rates or time spent in hospitals. They did,

MIKE TREADGOLD

SARAH DUNSTAN

boring,” said Haughton. “I happened to come across underwater hockey through a friend and I came out, gave it a try, and I loved it.”

The Guelph team, which has existed since the early 1980s and was recently featured on the Discovery Channel’s Daily Planet program, is primarily developmental, allowing first-timers an opportunity to try out this innovative sport, while providing opportunities to play in larger tournaments.

“The biggest limitation when you first start playing is holding your breath,” said Haughton, who estimated

her average time under water to be between 30 and 40 seconds. “From personal experience and based on what others have told me, it takes about a month [of playing] to get your breath hold up to where you can dive to the bottom of a pool, do something useful with the puck and then go back up to breathe.”

Timing your breathing is a huge factor in underwater hockey, knowing when to dive down and anticipate the play, and when it is a safe opportunity to go up for air. Substitutions occur throughout the game, with team sizes often varying

between 10 and 15 members.The game is played in pools

that vary in depth and design; however, the Gold Pool at the W.F. Mitchell Athletic Centre on campus was constructed with underwater hockey in mind: seven feet deep in all locations, with 90-degree angled corners at the edges and large glossy tiles on the bottom, allowing for easier puck movement.

The trademark event of each year is the Annual College Royal Tournament, a 51-game series that was played in the Gold Pool last weekend. Teams from all over

North America came to Guelph for the College Royal tournament, including clubs from Michigan, Georgia and Illinois, in addition to other Canadian clubs from the likes of Hamilton, Peterborough, Calgary and Montreal, where the skill level is particularly high.

The club plays twice per week, on Monday and Thursday nights from 10:00 - 11:00 p.m. Participants are given a free initial tryout to decide whether or not this catchy and intriguing sport peaks their interest and helps channel their inner dolphin.

Brittany HaughtonUnderwater hockey equipment consists of snorkel gear, a short plastic stick and a lead puck. Controlling one’s breathing is critical to gameplay.

however, determine that smoking and income levels directly affected one’s respiratory health.

McKitrick’s study employed a technique called Bayesian Model Averaging to analyze the data.

“Bayesian Model Averaging evaluates every possible combination of data variables, and assigns a weight to each one based on how much support it gets within the data,” said McKitrick. “You end up with a set of results that captures everything.”

McKitrick’s choice of model was carefully calculated as to avoid ‘cherry-picking.’

“A lot of times, someone will publish one set of results based on one model, then someone else takes the same data and runs the analysis a bit differently and comes up with entirely new results,” he explained. “If there’s a particular set of results you want to find, you can choose to find it by choosing the model that you’re using.”

Though such studies are largely handled by epidemiologists, as an environmental economist, McKitrick looks at a variety of policy issues, particularly regarding energy supply. Although

McKitrick had previously spent time assessing the social costs of air pollution, his involvement in the new study came about through simple curiosity.

“I’d heard a few years ago this claim that there were about 5,000 deaths and 17,000 hospitalizations in Ontario each year due to air pollution,” said McKitrick.

Due to technological advances, such as catalytic converters on cars and scrubbers on smokestacks, air pollution rates are now quite low compared to the 1960s and 70s. McKitrick resolved to apply the model used for the study to air pollution during the 1960s and 1970s.

“I got a hold of the model that was used to produce that claim for the Ontario Medical Association, and it turned out that the numbers it gave back were truly implausible,” said McKitrick, “Somewhere between 75 and 100 per cent of deaths would’ve been due to air pollution.”

McKitrick said that although the study’s data possessed merit, the model neglected key factors, such as fluctuations in socioeconomic status and smoking rates over time.

Socioeconomic status has a large effect on hospitalization rates, because many poorer families can’t afford healthy foods, and having to work more hours to support themselves means less time for

exercise and resting. However, the situation can go both ways.

“Some high income families experience ill health because they’re working too many hours,” said McKitrick.

U of G professor debunks air pollution with new study

Hans Thoursie

C ollege Royal is a huge event. Every year since 1925, this student run open house brings large numbers of people from in and around Guelph to our beautiful campus. This year, over 30,000 people visited the university to take part in the 12-day-long exhibition. College Royal is an event that is totally Guelph. From the livestock show, to the photography contest, College Royal is a chance for

students at the University of Guelph to show off their work and their interests to throngs of interested people.

The most impressive aspect of the event is in the planning and execution; the entire exhibition is student run and operated, with over 3,000 volunteers helping out in a wide variety of ways. With hundreds of volunteers doing a seemingly endless amount of tasks, there is definitely something for anyone to enjoy.

One of the highlights from College Royal is the always exciting dog show, where the partnership between dog and trainer are tested on skill, teamwork, performance and attitude.

The logging competition also gathers huge crowds on Johnston Green every year. This event is made up of a number of exciting games including log roll, pulp toss and cross cut saw. Each event acts as a test of skill and brawn, showcasing a unique series of sports that always provides plenty of laughs and an impressive display of athletic ability.

The arts community is also an important niche within College Royal. This year with Curtain Call Productions’ adaptation of Reefer Madness, and the 42nd annual Juried Art Show, the viewer with culture on their agenda was not disappointed.

As the largest university open house in North America, College Royal was a success this year, showing the community at large our worth here in the Royal City.

The horse category is one of six at the livestock show. Others included sheep, swine, cattle and ducks.

Left: Six teams went head to head in a tug of war on Johnston Green on Sunday.

Left: The square dancing competition in the athletic centre included many teams, including the College Royal organizers.

The lumberjack competition pitted teams against each

other in six events held on

Johnston Green.

Below: Synchronized swimmers of all ages demonstrated their sport in the athletic centre pool

The pancake breakfast and

flipping contest was a major draw in the

UC courtyard all weekend .Pvwhoto by

Christine Cerullo

Children of all ages were attracted by

the chance to ride pedal powered

tractors around a track outside the landscape

architecture building.

Above: The Wildlife Club displayed birds of prey as well as other animals at their exhibit. Photo by Julia Schonfield.

Left: Food science students made milkshakes at the Guelph Food Technology Centre.

Right: Dogs of all sizes and types were present

in the Dome during the dog show on Sunday.

Below: The Department of Geography’s natural disasters theme included a volcano demonstration

every half hour

SPORTS & HEALTH14 MAR. 25 - 31, 2010 THEONTARION.CA

POSTGRADUATE CERTIFICATESFOR REWARDING CAREERS

business.humber.ca

FINANCIAL PLANNINGGLOBAL BUSINESS MANAGEMENTHUMAN RESOURCES MANAGEMENTINTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENTINTERNATIONAL MARKETINGMARKETING MANAGEMENTPUBLIC ADMINISTRATION

Competitive lifeguarding team makes a splashClub sport requires athleticism and the ability to make fast judgments

When you first think about it, lifeguarding doesn’t sound like a sport, but rather an important profession that is critical for public safety at pools and beaches.

However, this sport has been around for a long time, once featured as an Olympic demonstration sport in the 1900 Games in Paris. First-year student and Guelph team member, Josh Tremblay, recalls the competition held at Guelph earlier this school year, similar to the events held here about 30 years ago.

Guelph’s team, coached by Patrick King and Chantique Payne, and captained by Véro Taylor, Nathaniel Trotter, Michelle Irvine and Pamela Ritchie, did better than expected this year, placing seventh among nearly 20 teams at the provincial championships, and fifth in the overall points race. The team consists of approximately a dozen students, whose dedication drives them to practice three times a week from the beginning

DAN O’KEEFE

of September until the end of February.

The competitions are divided up into two styles of events: technical and physical.

The technical events include priority assessment, water rescue, and first aid. In priority assessment, the lifeguards enter a situation and must assess which victims need assistance first. The teams have two minutes to prioritize, rescue, and perform basic treatment.

The water rescue event is essentially lifeguarding; participants have four to six minutes to observe and assess a situation, and then treat the victims accordingly. The first aid event poses a complex situation and requires the team to assess, prioritize, and treat the victims.

The first aid situation is where the creativity of the organizers can really show.

“There have been some crazy [events], including plane crashes and caves,” said Tremblay, recalling situations posed to participants in the challenges.

One particular event stood out in Tremblay’s memory. There was an 18-minute event at Waterloo that took competitors all over the campus.

Tremblay recalled one of the most creative and interesting situations, which occurred during the First Aid finals at the provincial championships last year. It was fairly standard with the assessment, prioritizing, and treatment. Then, one of the team members had to call 911, but the emergency phone was hidden in a person’s pocket. The phone was eventually located and the paramedics were called. Shortly before time was up, the paramedics actually arrived and took one victim for treatment. After they left, another individual came in to report that the paramedics had dropped the victim and worsened their condition. On top of that, one paramedic had twisted their ankle and the new individual was hyperventilating, and both needed treatment in addition to the victims that the situation began with.

The physical events are very similar to the events that were once part of the Olympics. Four-person teams compete in a variety of different relay events. The obstacle relay is a 50m swim with a barrier that must be negotiated.

third rescues the fourth. The line throw is also done as

an individual competition. The competitors only have to rescue one person in this event by pulling in the line, throwing it out to one victim, and pulling the victim in. Guelph’s own Sarah Monaco won the individual line throw competition at the university championships.

For scoring, the participants are graded by judges. The scores range from zero to three, and the criteria for the marks are based on the Canadian National Lifeguarding Standards. A score of zero is given for not attempting to rescue a victim. Two points are awarded for a rescue equal to the national standards. An above-par rescue earns three points while a sub-par rescue earns one point.

The university championships take place shortly after reading week and nearly 20 teams attend from across the province. With the volume of teams, the championships are divided into preliminary and final rounds.

“[The preliminaries are] all basic skill, with nothing hidden,” said Tremblay.

After the preliminaries, the teams are narrowed down to eight qualifiers for the finals.

“[In the finals], the organizers always get creative, so the final events take longer, but are worth more points,” added Tremblay.

The Guelph team was very happy to have qualified for the finals in every event this year, which is quite a feat for the smaller team.

The team is small, but successful. They have excellent leadership and potential. Guelph will be hosting the first event of the 2010-2011 season, which will hopefully be sanctioned, and worth points in the overall standings. The bright future of the team shows that they are anything but dead in the water.

Nathaniel Trotter

Participants in competitive lifeguarding have both their physical and mental capabilities tested across a number of events. The ability to make quick judgments is essential for success.

The technical events include

priority assessment,

water rescue, and first aid.

In priority assessment, the

lifeguards enter a situation and

must assess which victims need

assistance first.The mannequin relay consists of

the team members swimming 25m with what Tremblay describes as a 40-pound “plastic orange guy.”

In the medley relay, all four members perform a different task, consisting of four 50m segments. The first segment is freestyle swimming, followed by swimming with fins, which are very large and stiff flippers. Next is freestyle swimming with a rescue tube, and the final segment calls for the fourth person to tow the third person with the rescue tube while wearing fins. There is also the line throw relay where the first team member pulls in a rope line, throws it to the second team member, and rescues them. The second member then rescues the third, and the

SPORTS & HEALTH 15THE ONTARION 161.10

IN FOCUS

Ah, that’s it?

For the love of kicking

For the most part, sexual dysfunction in young men is all in the head (brain)

Gr yphons s t a r kicking his way to the CFL

If you’re a sexually active young man, the situation might not be that unfamiliar: you’re with your partner, you’re both feeling frisky, Boyz II Men is playing in the background. Then, when your partner is ready for you, you just can’t get it up.

And you can only blame it on the booze so many times.

Then, of course, there are the times when you’ve become the very unpopular two-minute man.

“I was just so turned on by you – I couldn’t last,” you tell your partner, panting heavily as you fall back into the pillow.

If you’re basing your understanding of sexual dysfunction off of television ads, issues like ED (Erectile Dysfunction) only affect wealthy men with a bit of distinguished grey.

In reality, it’s a lot different. “It could be intermittent, but

it is very common, whether we are talking about erectile dysfunction or concerns about premature ejaculation,” said Dr. John Aquino, a physician who specializes in men’s health.

In 2006, Dr. Najah S. Musacchio, a fellow at Children’s Memorial Hospital in Chicago, discovered that 13 per cent of college-aged men surveyed for a study reported

For those of you who don’t know – and most of you probably don’t – one of the top kickers in Canada has played for the Gryphons football team for the past four years.

Kickers are often forgotten, and do not attract much attention. They are often stereotyped as not being ‘real’ football players. All they do is kick a ball, right?

But, kicking a ball has been the focus of Rob Maver’s athletic career, and it just happens to be a critical aspect in the kind of three-down football played in Canada.

A kicker can have a huge impact on a football game, which may go unnoticed to the casual fan. A top-flight kicker can change field position, pin opponents deep in their own end of the field, and put valuable points on the scoreboard when offensive drives stall. These are just a few of the reasons why many Canadian Football League coaches and scouts are salivating at the thought of adding Maver to their special teams unit.

Yes, we are talking about a kicker; the same guy who stands alone on

DANIEL BITONTI

JUSTIN DUNK

suffering from ED; 25 per cent said they could only hold on to the erection till the point of putting on the condom. The young men in the survey who described a history of sexual dysfunction also said they didn’t discuss this problem with their health care providers.

But Dr. Aquino has numerous young clients frequenting his clinic, saying he believes that younger men are now more willing to deal with the problem than in years gone by.

“Today, I’ve already seen two guys in that age group,” he said. “I think it’s pretty evenly split in the guys I see. Premature ejaculation is something I think they can put up with or ignore, but with ED, they can’t really [ignore it]. A lot of times, it’s both [issues] together.”

Part of Dr. Aquino’s job is to rule out any physical issues in patients and then work on the associated psychological issues.

Recent research suggests that ED is a vascular disease. If a man has a vascular dysfunction, it’s going to show up in his penis long before it shows up in his heart. The penis is one of the only places in a man’s body that shows men a vascular function.

But ED in young males is still – most often – a psychological matter. Aquino says that regardless of how it starts, sexual dysfunction always ends up being partly psychological.

“Just having the problem one time sets you up for a psychological issue, so it makes the problem worse,” he said. “Most of the time, it is more of an anxiety condition, but

that’s not to minimize it…that’s a huge thing. Your mind is one of the most important sex organs you have. So, if that gets out of whack, that’s a big deal.”

The results can be a romantic nightmare. There is denial, when a man starts convincing himself that he isn’t into sex, instead of confronting his problem. Aquino says that younger men just shy away all together. They stop socializing and don’t talk to women, because they are afraid of what it could lead to.

“Guys start avoiding relationships altogether, and that’s pretty tragic in a way,” Aquino said.

Aquino suggested that even young men should take the approach of, ‘what is good for your heart, is good for your penis,’ so regular exercise and a balanced diet are key tools in tackling sexual dysfunction. He suggests keeping the stresses in your life under control and to get enough rest. For ED, he also isn’t opposed to prescribing drugs for young men.

“Often, what people need is a few good experiences under their belt, and then they are off to the races. I get them to relax, but I don’t hesitate if they are game to start something like Cialis to get them going,” he said. “What they need is a dose of confidence.”

In terms of premature ejaculation, Dr. Aquino says men should approach sex in a way that will lead them to a better awareness about how sensitive and how stimulated they are.

Courtesy

the sidelines during a game, barely breaking a sweat, only running on the field to kick the ball before returning to the sideline.

Regardless of all the stereotypes about kickers, they do have an impact on the final score of a game. Maver works tirelessly on his kicking skills,

similarly to any other player on the team, and has seen his skills improve over his time at Guelph.

“One of the things that I feel was key to my success here at Guelph was having a coach (Kyle Walters) that was so mindful of special teams,” said Maver, about the positive

impact of former Gryphons head coach and current Winnipeg Blue Bombers special teams coordinator Kyle Walters.

Maver has had a stellar career with the Gryphons, hitting 57 of 74 field goal attempts, accounting for a Gryphons record 290 points scored, along with an impressive career punting average of 41.8 yards.

former NFL kicker Steve Christie, and another week in Phoenix, AZ with American coaches, working on perfecting his craft.

A chance to kick and play in the CFL would be a dream come true.

“I really like kicking, as goofy as that sounds,” he said. “I just really want to play in the CFL.”

Maver is currently ranked as the nation’s seventh-best draft-eligible prospect by the CFL scouting bureau heading into the 2010 draft on May 2, and was the only kicker invited to the E-Camp.

In front of CFL scouts, Maver lived up to his reputation, hitting on 18 of 20 field goal attempts.

“ I was a little nervous the day before [the E-Camp], but as soon as I got on the field, I become really calm and it felt pretty good,” he said.

If the rankings hold true, Maver could join former Concordia kicker Warren Kean as the only kickers to be chosen in the first round of the CFL draft in the past decade. Maver is well aware that he must continue to improve his game in order to excel in the pro game.

“At the next level, [CFL teams] are expecting every kick to be made,” said Maver. “When you are on the field, it is your job to make the kick.”

“I don’t think thinking about baseball is a good approach to premature ejaculation,” Dr. Aquino said, referencing the many suggested Internet home remedies. “It might get a guy two seconds longer on a given night, but it ultimately makes the problem worse in the long run.

“The issue is not being very good at knowing how stimulated you are in relation to where your orgasm is…your threshold,” he continued. “We’re trying to keep you below the point [Point of no return]. What we want you to do is pay attention to

your body to learn the relationship between where you are and where that line is.”

For both ED and premature ejaculation, another general piece of advice is to stay relaxed, as anxiety is simply counterproductive. Early communication with a partner is important, because it removes some of the pressure that men place on themselves. Lastly, Dr. Aquino says to not ignore the problem. The faster you take care of it, the less likely it will spiral out of control.

Rashaad BhamjeeAfter establishing himself as one of the nation’s top kickers, Rob Maver nears his dream of playing in the CFL.

I really like kicking, as goofy as that sounds. I

just really want to play in the CFL.

Rob MaverGryphons kicker

He has continually thrived in all aspects of the kicking game and hopes to continue his success at the professional level.

Maver has been working hard to ensure that his CFL dreams come true. In preparation for the CFL’s Evaluation camp, which took place in Toronto from Mar. 12-14, Maver spent a week in Bradenton, FL with

SPORTS & HEALTH16 MAR. 25 - 31, 2010 THEONTARION.CA

Sexposure: Consent and the Dance Floor

Ontarion

Honouring yet another outstanding group of Gryphons

At the end of the Fall semester, the first edition of the ‘Golden Mikes’ were handed out to some very deserving Gryphons, recognizing their accomplishments in athletics from September through December. With the varsity season now complete and the department’s Intercollegiate Awards Banquet coming up on April 8, Speak into the Mike will take this time to hand out the second series of ‘Golden Mikes,’ along with a few honourable mentions.

Male Athlete of the Half Year – Kyle Boorsma: Boorsma, a fourth-year track and field athlete, won double-gold at the CIS championships, placing first in both the 1500m and 3000m events, after a very strong overall season. Honourable mentions: Jay Mott (basketball), Andrew Ford (swimming), Gabe deGroot (volleyball)

Female Athlete of the Half Year – Chantique Payne: A third-year swimmer, Payne was a runner-up for this same award in the Fall. Gold medals at both the OUA and CIS championships capped a brilliant season for the explosive butterfly and freestyle specialist. Honourable mentions: Rachel Cliff (track and field), Sarah Peirce (track and field), Dayna Kanis (hockey)

A few weeks ago, one of the excellent volunteer groups within the Wellness Centre, SAFE (Sexual Assault Free Environment) conducted a consent awareness campaign. They handed out

MIKE TREADGOLD

AISLINN WYATT

Rashaad Bhamjee

Gryphon men’s volleyball coach, Cal Wigston, made several difficult, yet rewarding playoff decisions.

Male Rookie of the Half Year – Thomas Kiriakou: There were a number of outstanding first-year Gryphon men; however, Kiriakou burst onto the scene as a centre on the men’s hockey team and went on to win OUA Rookie of the Year, leading the Gryphs in scoring with 32 points, and centring one of the league’s most dangerous lines with Ed Gale and Kris Belan. Honourable mentions: Jake Jagas

(wrestling), Jason Diston (track and field), Tim Priamo (hockey)

Female Rookie of the Half Year – Genevieve Lalonde: Another runner-up from the Fall, the first-year runner picked up CIS Female Rookie of the Year honours in both cross-country and track and field and is ranked third in the country in the women’s ultra-competitive 3000m distance. Lalonde took bronze in the 3000m at the OUA

Championships, to go along with numerous other medals throughout the year. Honourable mentions: Danielle Skoufranis (hockey), Bethany Flemington (swimming), Erinn Bickle (volleyball)

Gryphon Coach of the Half Year – Cal Wigston: Wigston led the upstart Gryphon men’s volleyball team to the OUA Finals, where they were defeated by Queen’s in an epic five-set match. The Gryphons mastered the role of underdogs throughout the playoffs, taking down favoured Windsor and McMaster before falling to the Gaels. Wigston was also the brains behind inserting Jamie Stamler into the lineup off the bench against McMaster in the semi-finals, a move that baffled the Marauders and keyed the Gryphons come-from-behind win. Honourable mentions: Dave Scott-Thomas (track and field), Rachel Flanagan (women’s hockey), Don Burton (swimming)

Best Performance in Final Game as a Gryphon – Jay Mott: Concluding his five-year career as a Gryphon, Mott went out in style against the Brock Badgers on Feb. 20, scoring a career-high 41 points and adding 11 rebounds in an 86-64 win. A dedicated athlete, Mott finished the season in the top 10 in league scoring, earned an OUA second-team all-star nomination and reached the illustrious 1000-point plateau.

Game of the Half Year – OUA men’s volleyball semi-finals: After

dropping the first two sets against the first-place McMaster Marauders, the Gryphons executed a miraculous comeback, winning the final three sets en route to a five-set upset over the league leaders, sending them to the OUA Finals.

Team of the Half Year – Men’s track and field: Two national championships in the past three years and another feather in the cap for Guelph’s famed running programs.

Stinker of the Half Year – Brock – 81, Guelph – 44: 2009-10 was a rebuilding year for the Gryphon women’s basketball team, who had their fair share of lopsided defeats. Injuries and inexperience limited the team; however, look for major improvements heading into next year.

Blowout of the Half Year – Guelph – 9, Brock – 0: The men’s hockey team hit their stride in the second half of the season, unleashing their high-octane offence on the rest of the league. The top line of Kiriakou, Belan and Gale combined for seven points in this one.

Quote of the Half Year: “I’ll always be loyal to Guelph and cheer for Guelph. It was an unbelievably opportunity to get back and coach there. The most difficult part of this was to walk away from the [players] and the relationships that I’ve had over the last few years.” – Former Gryphons head football coach Kyle Walters, shortly after being hired by the Winnipeg Blue Bombers in the CFL.

LIFE

t-shirts emblazoned with their slogan, “Consent is Sexy” on which participants tried to get as many signatures as possible. SAFE also had paper shirts at their information booth, on which people could pledge that “Consent is, indeed, very sexy”.

Consent is one of the most important aspects of partnered sex, but is not often discussed. There is a prevailing sentiment among North Americans that sex should happen spontaneously, and therefore, explicit discussion about sex is something most people tend to shy away from. Consent is something that needs to be confirmed, not assumed, and the only way to do this is by talking.

Many people believe that not saying no means yes, and that consent is implied as long as someone doesn’t tell you to stop. This is a dangerous assumption to make, since a partner could very well be nervous, or feel like they cannot speak up. If we all ask for consent, we’re all given the opportunity to give consent. So speak up!

SAFE outlined four “excuses” that society tends to fall back on when it comes to a violation of consent: Inebriation, Intimacy, Dress and Relationships. “He was drunk,” or “but they got me so horny,” or “she was dressed like a slut,” or “he’s my boyfriend, I can always have sex with him,” are the sorts of things someone falling back on these clichés might say. I’m going to dismantle them one by one.

Inebriation: A person who is intoxicated cannot consent to sex. If someone is smashed, they are in

no state of mind to make a decision about sex. Also, just because you might be drunk doesn’t excuse you from violating someone’s consent. There is no “blaming it on the alcohol” when it comes to sexual assault.

Intimacy: If someone has consented to say, kissing or oral sex, this doesn’t mean that it’s a clear go-ahead to take things further. Prior intimacy doesn’t excuse not gaining consent for further intimacy.

Dress: Just because someone is dressed in a sexy way does not imply they automatically consent to sexual behaviour. People dressed sexy are not “asking for it”: what you should be asking for is their consent.

Relationships: Even in a long-term relationship, such as a marriage, it’s important to confirm that you have your partner’s consent before sex. Even though you might have sex every day, it’s always within a partner’s rights to say no to sex, and it’s not within a partner’s rights to demand it.

It is not just sexual intercourse that requires the affirmation of consent. In my 18th century literature class, we’ve been studying the etiquette of the dance, when the process of asking a woman’s hand to dance a minuet was ritualized and

of grave social importance. While this stuffiness would be a bit out of place in a downtown Guelph club, I still think there is something to be learned from the past.

The culture of the student bar dance floor isn’t one conducive to asking for and giving (or not) consent. They’re loud, dark and crowded with (often drunk) people, making any sort of conversation difficult. This has led to a situation of retroactive consent: someone will be approached on the dance floor without being asked, or sometimes even forewarned, and it’s up to them to get themselves out of the situation should they not want to be in it.

This situation is so incredibly backwards! I don’t know how the change would be implemented, but something needs to change. No more having to scurry away from unwanted touches: how about we ask first if the object of our desire wants to be touched? Making eye-contact first is a good step forward, but in my perfect world, there’d be something more along the lines of the 18th century balls: asking a partner to dance.

I’m interested in what you have to say on the topic of consent. Send your opinions, questions and thoughts to oneditor@uoguelph.ca!

17THE ONTARION 161.10

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Earth HourThe ubiquitous palate. We all

have one, and yet when reality show chefs talk about someone having a ‘sophisticated palate,’ few know what they are talking about and even fewer know how to achieve the aforementioned palatal sophistication. There are a few things that a person can mean when referring to a ‘palate’ and I have come to think that the true definition is a combination of all of them in one way or another.

The first, and perhaps the most misguided definition of a great palate, is simply a person with refined taste. Someone who eschews all peasant food in favour of the gourmet. An individual who not only eats caviar, foie gras and black truffles, but also prefers them on a day-to-day basis to the fodder that makes up the common person’s diet. In a way, an appreciation of fine things can indicate that a person has a sophisticated palate, but generally this is a product of their good palate rather than the definition itself. Someone can certainly have a fine palate and delight in said ‘peasant food,’ just as a person can have the palate of a philistine and eat expensive food for the sake of appearance.

The second, and arguably most important component to a sophisticated palate, is the ability to taste a dish and immediately recognize what is contributing to its flavour. This could mean picking out anything from spices, herbs, oils and vinegars as well as occasionally recognizing techniques used in the cooking process. Along with this ability, people who have incredible palates can point out areas for improvement in dishes and recommend various changes like a need for salt, or even provide advice about better flavour combinations.

The last component to what makes for a sophisticated palate, at least in my opinion, is a strong sense of taste memory. With one bite of a particular dish, let’s say pizza, someone with a good palate is able to consider that particular pizza in relation to every other pizza they have had. By tasting the dish in perspective, they are able to survey it and place it in a spectrum, recognizing how that particular dish compares to the worst, the best and everything in between. They might do this as well as pick out why it is better or worse than others.

This coming Saturday marks another event where people will make the smallest amount of effort to show off their obvious concern for the environment. It’s another time when people who are trying to make larger, positive changes for the environment get overshadowed by the more popular, but negligible, efforts of those only willing to do less.

Yep, Earth Hour. Yay!! The one-hour of one day where people switch off their lights to show their concern about climate change. Apparently billions of people even gather around to watch huge monuments like the Eiffel Tower, the Empire State Building or the Symphony of Lights in Hong Kong turn out their lights, too. Meanwhile, they’ve left their porch light on, their stereo plugged in, and hey, maybe even their toilet running at home.

This hurts my brain because this event has gotten so popular, having hundreds of thousands of fans and attendees on Facebook and earthour.org, all because it is something simple to do to make a bold statement about your interest or distress over the changing climate.

Guess again, it doesn’t. One hour, out of the 24 in a day,

or the basically incalculable amount that you have conscious control over in your lifetime, is trifling. And yes, it is simple to flick that switch and sit in the dark or by candle light, waiting for the minutes to tick by when you can then again use electricity. But it hardly does much, even with ‘billions’ participating, or saying they will participate.

I have a better idea. How about this: turn your lights off for an hour everyday, or two hours. “Impossible,” you say? I say, “You did it once. Success. Now actually do something that matters.” Or how about other simple things, more than once a year, that with billions doing them, also more than once a year, may actually amount to a small change. Things like unplugging your electronics on the wall and turning off your powerbar, drying your laundry by air or putting on a sweater instead of turning up the thermostat. Simple, right? But enough little tips, that is a whole other article all together.

Back on Earth Hour, I asked my ever-introspective housemate about

NICOLE ELSASSERGINI BEAUMONT

So with this multifaceted explanation of what makes up a palate, there are things one can do to improve one’s palate and bring it closer to the level of those very impressive reality show chefs. Firstly, stop smoking. While there is some debate as to exactly the effect that smoking can have on your taste and smell sensitivity, most scientists agree that cigarettes take a toll. Many smokers, upon quitting, report an increased ability to taste and smell within days of their last cigarette. Also, and this should go without saying, if you are bent on improving your palate, now would not be the time to pierce your tongue. Enough said.

Possibly the most enjoyable way to improve your palate is to throw yourself into the food. Experiencing new flavours, textures and entire cuisines is crucial for the education of one’s palate and should be undertaken with a childish enthusiasm, though without a child’s discriminating food tastes.

The next thing you can do to improve your palate is to practice mindful eating. All too often I find myself eating while working on my computer or with my nose buried in a book. This will not help my

burgeoning palate along at all. The best thing to do is to eat

at a table, slowly, with thought and consideration about what you taste. Chew each mouthful of food slowly and contemplatively and, if you are lucky enough to have a dining companion also committed to palate development, discuss the dish you are enjoying: what you like about it as well as how you would improve it.

So now, because you are all desperately committed to achieving palatal sophistication, go to the nearest market, select a perfectly ripe piece of fruit (pay for it), slice it and then eat it slowly and alone. Concentrate, consider and enjoy.

With that under your belt, you’ll be well on your way. Be sure to send a postcard when you finally get there.

it, thinking he’ll be brazen on the topic. But even as a hippie-hater, his insights again astound.

“Earth Hour is a double-edged sword. It's one of the best events for raising environmental awareness. Alternatively, it is abused by companies and cities [that] advertise their commitment to Earth Hour while media attention is high, and revert back to weak or nonexistent environmental policies for the remaining 364 days of the year.” Agreed, the main idea behind Earth Hour is ‘doing something,’ while raising awareness. But anyone who thinks that this is good enough, can then be directed to Stuff White People Like’s article #18, titled “Awareness.” Putting aside the potential offence the term “white people” could bring about (“Being Offended” being article #101), and using it as a global thought, this article so-coolly puts raising awareness into perspective. “Raising awareness is awesome because once you raise awareness to an acceptable, arbitrary level, you can just back off and say “Bam! did my part. Now it’s your turn. Fix it… Because, the only challenge of raising awareness is people not being aware. In a worst case scenario, if you fail, someone doesn’t know about the problem. End of story.” Point, proof, comment. Raising awareness does not solve the problem, and most often the true source of the problem is not even addressed.

Moving on though, my housemate does have praise for Earth Hour. “That being said, the ability of cities and corporations to capitalize financially from an environmental event may be exactly what the world needs. Market-driven capitalism and environmentalism are too often viewed as mutually-exclusive when this doesn't have to be the case. Earth Hour can set the precedent for this type of interaction.” Fine, this could lead to something good. But how long will that take? And at risk of being labeled an alarmist I’ll add, “Do we have that long?”

Hating on Earth Hour aside, as you flick that switch this Saturday, I’ll ask you to strike up the conversation, “Is what we’re doing here, in this hour, enough? If we really care, why wouldn’t we do more?” And for that last little zinger, I’ll just say, “Forget Earth Hour, how about an Earth Life?”

The popular belief that each section of the tongue represents a different type of taste (1. Bitter, 2. Sour, 3. Salt, 4. Sweet) is widely being considered a myth, and doesn’t do justice to the explanation of what a palate is and how to improve your own.

Courtesy

LIFE18 MAR. 25 - 31, 2010 THEONTARION.CA

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If you’re at all like me, the minute that the ground shows signs of green in the spring is a good day. Time to dig out the old sticks and find a range – the season is back.

Maybe you haven’t had this feeling before, but you do have interest in getting into a sport that is loved by many. I’m going to tell how to get into golf.

Before telling you how to get into golf, I’ll start by dispelling a few myths and misconceptions surrounding one’s initial interest in golf.

First of all, if you’re not a patient person, perhaps you should try another hobby. Like many other skill sports, golf requires patience and the ability to accept that for the first little while, you won’t likely be any good.

Secondly, going to the driving range and mindlessly beating the crap out of a range balls with an overpriced and oversized driver will provide virtually no real benefits, other than being a way to exhaust some pent up anger.

Now, what to do.When you’re first starting to

learn to golf, don’t put too much stock in ridiculously expensive equipment that you may never use enough to justify the price tag. You can find a capable and low-cost set of clubs at a used sporting goods store, your smelly neighbour’s yard sale or grandpa’s garage. Clubs doth not make the golfer.

While I am critical of mindless hacking, driving ranges still serve an effective purpose. If you’re new to golf, don’t start on a course – start on the range. Learn how each club works and what it feels

like to swing a club before plying your craft at the local country club. The lower the number on the iron, the further the ball should travel. Better yet, go to the range

with a friend; someone who is patient and a

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feeling ambitious, investing in a lesson

with a local pro is a far better use of your funds than

on expensive clubs. Pros will give you lessons at a range, where you can see their tutelage transfer into actual ball-striking results.

Replication in golf is critical. Remember the feel of that great drive, when you finally made contact? Try to replicate that same swing, over and over again.

Golfers stress etiquette. Oftentimes, the unwritten rules of engagement are learned with experience, but here are a few to keep in mind:

Don’t drive a cart on the green (the place where you putt). Park nearby and walk over.

Talking or making noise while someone else is taking a shot is frowned upon. Save the trash talk and chatter for after – have you SEEN Tiger freak out on cameramen?

If you happen to knock out a chunk of the ground while taking a shot, replace your divot.

Playing a little slow? Let the group behind you play through – there’s no shame in doing so and we’ve all been there. And, if you’re getting frustrated, just pick up the ball. Learning to play is more important than your early scores.

Most of all, enjoy yourself. Getting pissed off only worsens your swing, not to mention your experience. Have a beer – but not 20 – it’ll loosen you up and make it a social activity, instead of a job. The rest will come with practice and experience and golf is a fantastic way to spend a nice day.

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ARIESGet ready to have your hot buttons pushed this week! You have a very fiery temper, and someone who is well aware of your short fuse will tangle with you on Tuesday. Remind yourself not to let anyone manipulate you. On Thursday the Sun in assertive Aries squares intense Pluto and you’ll need to dig a bit in order to locate your inner strength. Don’t worry. You’ll find it. On Saturday you’ll be in a restless mood and unable to sit still.

TAURUSYou’ll be very productive this week, Bull! On Monday you’ll put aside your mellow self and kick into high gear when Mars sextiles industrious Saturn in your sector of daily activities. You’ll expend a bit of elbow grease cleaning your residence and tackle paperwork with gusto. A legal issue crops up on Thursday. If you don’t want to get a parking ticket, observe all the rules of the road. Family issues rear up on Saturday and a relative will need assistance.

GEMINIOn Monday you’ll put on your scholarly hat, Twin, as the Moon in clever Gemini trines Neptune in your zone of higher learning. You love to learn new skills and you adore increasing your brainpower. You’ll enroll in an adult education course this week. Don’t give up the ship on Friday. You’re involved in a difficult situation, but you’ll find a solution very soon. You need to slow down on Sunday and take it as easy as possible.

CANCERThe changeable Moon rules you, and your feelings ebb and flow, similar to the tides of the ocean. On Monday the Moon squares erratic and unpredictable Uranus and you’ll be extremely moody. You’ll find it hard to stick to your schedule due to your restlessness. You will come out of your shell on Saturday. You may decide to reach out to a close associate and confide all your secret thoughts. Make sure you don’t start to doubt yourself on Sunday.

LEOYou enjoy being the center of attention whenever you walk into a room, Lion! However, on Tuesday you won’t be as sure of yourself as you normally are. The Moon squares stern Saturn in your zone of communication and you’ll find it hard to talk to your associates. Your normally sunny disposition will return to you by Thursday and you’ll be back in the swing of things. On Saturday you’ll give serious thought to what you value the most in life.

VIRGOYou’ll say goodbye to the past once and for all this week, Virgo! On Wednesday you’ll decide to toss your memory book away and begin to concentrate on your present circumstances. You may decide to become a pet owner on Saturday. You love animals and your heart tugs whenever you see a photo of a dog or cat that needs to be rescued. Be sure you’re ready for the responsibilities of pet ownership before you bring one home with you.

LIBRAThis week you’ll make a schedule and actually stick to it! You’re longing for a regular routine and a sense of security in your life. On Monday Mars sextiles Saturn in Libra and you’ll establish more order in your life. You’ll tune in to your spiritual side on Saturday when the Moon in your sector of metaphysical activities trines profound Pluto. You may check out various religious organizations in your area and join a group that shares your personal belief system.

SCORPIOMake sure you don’t close your eyes to reality this week, Scorpio! You’ll see only what you want to see in a certain situation in your life on Thursday. Make an attempt to be honest with yourself when the Sun in forthright Aries squares Pluto, your ruling planet. You’ll make a new list of goals for yourself on Sunday when the Moon enters your sector of hopes and dreams. Feel free to think big and include all of your aims and aspirations.

SAGITTARIUSYou’re the most idealistic person on your block, Centaur, and you know that! However, this week you’ll discover you need to do more than just wish upon a star in order to achieve your heart’s desire. On Monday you’ll combine action with thought. Make sure you’re very wary when you interact with an associate on Saturday. The Moon opposes deceptive Neptune in your communication sector and you’ll be faced with someone who has a false tongue and is deceitful.

CAPRICORNAvoid getting yourself into dangerous situations this week, Capricorn. You’re usually very safety conscious, but you’ll throw caution to the wind on Monday. Don’t send text messages while driving. Home issues will come into play on Thursday. You’ll need to take out a hammer and nails and start fixing up your residence. You’ll realize it’s a mistake to allow negative thoughts to cloud your thinking on Sunday when the Moon opposes Jupiter in your sector of the mind and imagination.

AQUARIUSDon’t procrastinate on Monday. You’ll run into trouble if you put off an important project. Remind yourself that a stitch in time saves nine, and take out your sewing kit when see a big hole in your sock. You’re normally very logical, thanks to your Air Sign, but on Friday you’ll be teeming with turbulent emotions. A former foe will reenter your life, as the Moon in your zone of adversaries is quincunx your ruler, Uranus. Keep your cool!

PISCESYou’ll be uncharacteristically stubborn this week, Pisces. Usually you go with the flow, but on Monday you’ll be very dogmatic regarding a particularly hot topic. Do your best to consider all viewpoints before you alienate a close associate with your inflexibility. Don’t get discouraged on Friday. It’s true that you aren’t making progress as quickly as you would like in an endeavor. Consider if you’re setting the bar too high for yourself when the Moon opposes excessive Jupiter in Pisces.

19THE ONTARION 161.10 OPINION

LOOSE CANNON

CATHLEEN’S CORNER

Falling into the Coulter trap

What’s really going down at the Shore

Few people would relish the opportunity to hoist up Ann Coulter as a poster child for free speech.

But thanks to the circus surrounding the right-wing media pundit’s planned appearance at the University Ottawa – scuttled by a protest and concerns for Coulter’s safety – that’s what we got. So I’m running with it.

There was little question as to the academic value of Coulter’s speech. People got a taste of her “ideas” at the University of Western Ontario on Monday, the day before she was scheduled to appear in Ottawa.

It had all the trademark commentary one expects from an incendiary pundit. Her routine was so well-worn it was almost comical to watch.

“There are only two things gay men can’t do,” Coulter mused on same-sex marriage. “Number one, get married to each other. Number two, throw a baseball

When I asked Toronto Star television critic Rob Salem what he thought about the MTV reality show, Jersey Shore, he said that it was “an indisputable sign of the coming of the apocalypse.” Salem compared it to slowing down on the highway to catch a glimpse of a horrific accident; he said, “You just can’t help yourself, you have to watch it, but you’re glad that it’s not you.”

Salem isn’t alone in his critique of the show – Lisa Kudrow of Friends fame has been quoted as saying on the success of Jersey Shore: “It makes me cringe that despicable has become the biggest craze in entertainment.”

On top of that, since the show first aired in December 2009 several organizations have come forward to publicly oppose the show, including Italian American groups and the communities of Seaside Heights in New Jersey.

But why all the bad press? Why are people so revolted and offended by an MTV show?

The show isn’t much different from most other MTV reality pursuits. It follows a group of outrageously egocentric, materialistic, and arguably unintelligent 20-somethings around as they drink, fight, and tan.

But, what is different about Jersey Shore is the role of ethnicity. The characters on the show are all intent on being the perfect ‘guido’ or ‘guidette,’ and it is this which makes the show so interesting.

During the first episode, DJ Pauly D said, “I was born and raised a guido. It’s just a lifestyle, it’s being Italian, it’s representing family,

GREG BENETEAU

CATHLEEN FINLAY

without looking like a girl.” Gay marriage? Canadians

are so over it, Ann. Gays in our country are too busy excelling in business and politics to learn how to throw properly.

Coulter later said that Muslims barred from air travel should take “flying carpets” instead. A 17-year-old female Muslim student later professed during question period that she didn’t have one.

“Take a camel,” Coulter replied. Wow, those 60s stereotypes still got zing!

Coulter’s shtick is always the same, whether she’s ranting in a book, on FOX News or in person. She insults and antagonizes in a particularly cruel manner while contributing little to political discourse.

Sadly, the most important part of Coulter’s speech – her insistence that liberals use political correctness and intimidation to silence opposing views – was proven correct by her reception at

the University of Ottawa.First came the pre-emptive

warning from Vice-president Academic and Provost François Houle, who sent an e-mail reminding Coulter that “our domestic laws, both provincial and federal, delineate freedom of expression (or “free speech”) in a manner that is somewhat different than the approach taken in the United States.”

“I therefore encourage you to educate yourself, if need be, as to what is acceptable in Canada and to do so before your planned visit here,” Houle wrote.

He was careful to add that “what may, at first glance, seem like unnecessary restrictions to freedom of expression do, in fact, lead not only to a more civilized discussion, but to a more meaningful, reasoned and intelligent one as well.”

Judging from his comments, Mr. Houle has never actually heard Ann Coulter speak. Civilized and reasoned aren’t in

her repertoire. She is, however, quite

intelligent. She knows exactly how to maximize exposure for her particular brand of smut. That includes playing on the passions of the strong left-wing presence at Canadian universities.

They didn’t disappoint, showing up en masse to disrupt the Ottawa lecture. In the end, Coulter’s bodyguards determined it was unsafe for her to proceed and cancelled the talk. Now there’s talk of a human rights complaint.

And so ends the Coulter saga. A Rush Limbaugh clone in a skirt managed to get herself shut out of a university campus, something that hasn’t happened at Harvard, Yale or any other institution of higher learning she had visited.

Coulter achieved a masterful performance in the media, without ever opening her mouth.

Yet some tried to turn the embarrassing ordeal into a victory.

“On campus, we promise our students a safe and positive space,” one Ottawa student protester said. “And that’s not what (Coulter) brings.”

If that’s what students at U of O are promised, they’re in for a rude shock on graduation day. In the real world, there are no protections from being offended, insulted or generally subjected to Coulter-style haranguing, nor should there be.

Helped along by student unions, university campuses in this country have become almost womb-like in their desire to maintain harmony at all costs. Generally, that means stifling any political expression to the right of NDP territory. I doubt any conservative figures in the U.S. would pass muster.

We didn’t get to hear Ann Coulter, but she still got her point across.

friends, tanning, gel, everything.” Sammi Sweetheart also described what she aspires to be: “A guidette is someone who knows how to club-it-up, takes really good care of themselves, has pretty hair, cakes on make-up, has tanned skin, [and] wears the hottest heels.”

The show has become so amusing to viewers because of the casts’ earnest desire to emulate something that seems so unappealing to most people. Most North Americans do not share “Snookie’s” ultimate dream to “move to Jersey, find a nice, juiced, hot, tanned guy, and live [their] life.”

According to the show, the

perfect ‘guido’ involves the emphasis of a number of things:

1. Wealth – This explains DJ Pauly D’s decision to permanently brand his body with a Cadillac symbol.

2. Sculpted Body – What would Mike ‘The Situation’ be without his abs?

3. Tanned Skin – Pauly D insisted, “I got a f---ing tanning bed at my place, that’s how serious I am about living up to that [‘guido’] lifestyle.”

4. General Appearance – Ronnie has said, “The bank account could be low, but you always have to look good, always have to get a haircut

always have to have new sneakers, always have to look fresh.”

5. Hair – This accounts for Pauly D’s 25-minute hair procedure and Sammi Sweetheart’s hair extensions.

6. Sexual Prowess –As seen with Mike ‘The Situation’s tireless quest to ‘smush’ girls.

7. Having a Tough Side – Sammi’s insistence: “I’m the sweetest bitch you’ll ever meet, but do not f*** with me.”

What lies under the surface of these characteristics, and the history which has informed them, is something that has received little

attention by the media.The Italian American

immigration story is the ultimate tale of the American Dream. Many Italians immigrated to America with humble beginnings, and through their own determination and hard work, were able to provide a good life for their family. This show and its exaggerations of leisure time and money are reflections of a desire to reaffirm their socio-economic niche within society.

University of Guelph English professor, Jade Ferguson, insists that a show like this could not have been made if it featured only African Americans or Asian Americans.

“People who still are fighting discrimination on a serious level like Latinos or blacks could not have a show like this,” Dr. Ferguson said.

Ferguson continued: “Jersey Shore is entertaining because it’s non-threatening. It doesn’t threaten white privilege, it doesn’t threaten family values. They’re not wading into anything that challenges norms.”

“It’s the ‘not-quite white’ that’s intriguing to people. That also makes it less threatening as well, because it is still a form of whiteness. The show is playing around with these things, but not actually challenging anything.”

Rather than dismissing the show as “despicable” television, perhaps we should be considering why Jersey Shore is so popular and what it says about our society today.

Come May, filming for season two will begin in the new location of Miami Beach where, no doubt, the GTL (Gym, Tan, Laundry) phenomenon will continue.

Courtesy

OPINION20 MAR. 25 - 31, 2010 THEONTARION.CA

OPEN CONTENT

ACADEMICS AGAINST APATHY

Decades of struggle

The Chief Librarian rants

Dr. Nonita Yap’s conviction to end unjust corporate practices and improve conditions around the world

Come on, it’s called a garbage can!

Dr. Nonita Yap is a professor at the School of Environmental and Rural Design, and teaches courses such as Industrial Ecology, Environmental Impact Assessment, and Disaster Planning. She studies the role of technology and policy as they influence environmental sustainability. Her research, volunteer and professional activities have taken her to close to 20 countries. Nonita recently participated in a panel discussion at an on-campus event regarding relief efforts in Haiti, speaking on the complex issue of rebuilding.

Kelsey Rideout: What barriers have you come across, in aiming to change environmental conditions and corporate practices?

Dr. Nonita Yap: One is greed, insatiable greed. It’s actually amazing that there are people and groups who have made so much money, and yet there’s not enough somehow. One of the sweatshops in Haiti that makes pinstriped suits that sell for over $500 a piece in New York, just re-opened after the earthquake. A New York Times article describes a woman who works in this sweatshop. For eight hours of works she gets $3.09. She does hemming, and if she finishers 60 sets in a day, she used to get $2.60 as bonus. After the earthquake the bonus was reduced to a dollar and some. Now, it boggles the mind, why would it be reduced? You would think people are more generous, but actually it was reduced to less than half.

I do think though that in the

Ok, this is a rant. Think of it like the Rick Mercer rants. It goes on and on. I’m walking around as I speak it; as I rave on. Except I’m not in some alley in Toronto. I’m walking around the floors of the Library. I’m seeing students at computers, in discussions, writing, reading, typing, talking. And this is all good. And as Chief Librarian I should be happy. And all should be right with the world. But it isn’t. I’m not happy; in fact I’m pissed off. This shouldn’t be, but it is. I’m walking around and I’m seeing students but I’m also seeing ….. garbage. Cups, paper, food, wrappers, crap. I’m also seeing lots of garbage containers; some for

KELSEY RIDEOUT

MICHAEL RIDLEY

final analysis, we consumers are all responsible for corporate behavior... I don’t think corporations would be so aggressive if they did not think they could get away with it.

KR: What do you hope will result from your work and efforts?

NY: Well I’m self-centered. I just feel good knowing that I am trying my best. In terms of actually bringing about lasting and important changes, I think the problem is too big. But you need to continue because there are always opportunities for achieving a bit of change. There was for example a project I was involved with in southern Africa, a four-year project funded by CIDA…It was just around the end of Apartheid, and there was a lot of anger against South African whites. So in each of the training courses, I required that there had to be a session on conflict management. In my course on cleaner production, for example, I could sense resentment and distrust towards the white South Africans among the training participants, but at the end of two weeks, people sharing rooms actually became friends. It was a matter of getting to know each other to be exposed to each other. I don’t think the resentment was banished, but it was a beginning. It felt good to actually see those instances, where people overcome their prejudices, or at least give each other the benefit of a doubt.

KR: How can academics overcome this disconnect between academic theory and practical on-the-ground change?

NY: I think exposing students to community work, that’s one way. I always used to say to my students, ‘how can you do research overseas when you haven’t knocked on doors here? If you do not know how difficult it is to knock on doors here, you’ll have lots of surprises overseas.’ So I’ve always asked students to get involved here as well,

volunteer with a women’s shelter, be involved in something that can give you a taste of the challenges of community entry…the news about business students at the university going homeless for five days… that’s the kind of exposure I am talking about.

KR: What would you say to a tired university student who is beginning to feel that academia cannot lead to any real form of change?

NY: First of all, I think you have to always remember the future is yours. The mess that my generation leaves is yours to clean up. You have no choice. You have to be involved in shaping your future. You can’t give up because you will be the ones to suffer…Students have to vote. Students have to be involved in politics. Otherwise decisions will be made for you.

KR: What are some ways to transform ambivalent attitudes into action, concern or compassion?

NY: It is very difficult. Change is very difficult. Just try to change family members. Try to change how your brother, your sister, your mother, your son, your daughter does things. And you can see how difficult it is to change someone who is not even related to you. I do think that change can come only from extreme adversity, and even then it’s not certain. I think people change when something really dramatic happens. But of course look at Haiti, the elite in Haiti seem to be impervious to the tragedy, so I don’t know. I think personal exposure is certainly one way…to see people struggle for the most basic of needs … for food and water, to see children struggle for pencils,

for books and shoes, things that we take for granted…if you go to a country where you’re not allowed to protest, you will appreciate taking the time here to write a letter to the newspaper here.

KR: What inspires you to keep going?

NY: Two people. My grandmother and my son. My grandmother lived hand-to mouth, but she was always out helping people. She brought me up and never once in my entire life do I recall her saying, ‘there is no food tonight’. There was always something to eat at the end of day, it could be just soup, some vegetables, but she never complained. She allowed us to be children, free of worries, in spite of abject material poverty. She was a sharecropper. When there was a harvest, we would help in the harvest, get a share and that would be what we lived on. She would say “I’ll be gone for the day,” and we’d ask her where she’s going. “I’m off to the next village” and she would be going to advise and counsel some people, usually families who were having trouble. She wasn’t paid…and she had nothing, no assets. But she was very highly respected in the village. She was an incredible woman.

And now my son… he changed us. He really believes that his generation can change things. So you know, you want to kind of hope for him. After Copenhagen, he was really disappointed, and he realized that it has to be a longer-term struggle. He said we have to be in education, we have to look at changing consumers. He was in Africa for seven months, volunteering in an orphanage, and it really changed him…I say the youth should go. Not even overseas, go North and learn from the native communities, work with the homeless in our cities, learn from them.

recycling, some for other garbage. There doesn’t seem to be a relation between the garbage and the places to put the garbage. The garbage is everywhere; only sometimes is it in the containers. And so I’m pissed off. We decide to let food and drink into the Library. Students like it. Eating and studying go together. We like to make studying more effective. Besides, we like food too. But garbage is unsightly. And it can smell. And it attracts bugs. Yuck. We still think food & drink & studying are good so we work with Custodial Services to clean the Library. They complain to me about the food policy but they like students too. They tell me about trying to clean carpets, pick up food, keep the Library in good shape.

And I tell them about my favourite food stories. Like the

student we discovered on the third floor in one of the individual carrels. We found him because the smell was …wonderful. He had

staffed. It’s hard to keep up. And so far I haven’t even mentioned the washrooms. Don’t get me started on the washrooms. We can do this; we

how important this is. They will be handing out free coffee coupons to you if you are spotted putting your garbage where it belongs. Redeem your coupon and you will be entered into a draw for an iPod (courtesy of Custodial Services). And, yes, I too have spilled an entire cup of coffee on the Library’s carpet. Shame. Shame. The Custodial Services staff had words with me. So come on folks. This can work. We can continue to allow food and drink in the Library. But we are going need your help. If it works, maybe one day I’ll even get my dream of a Wine or Shooter Bar in the Library … just kidding.

Michael Ridley is the Chief Information Officer (CIO) and Chief Librarian at the University of Guelph. Contact him at mridley@uoguelph.ca or www.uoguelph.ca/cio.

Rashaad Bhamjee

Dr. Nonita Yap is a professor at the School of Environmental and Rural Design. Her research, volunteer and professional activities have taken her to close to 20 countries.

There doesn’t seem to be a relation between the garbage and the places

to put the garbage. The garbage is everywhere; only sometimes is it in the

containers.his electric wok plugged in and was happily making a stir fry. Yum. Sort of. Eating is one thing; playing Gordon Ramsay in Hell’s Kitchen is quite another. But back to the folks in Custodial Services. They do their very best; they are short

can agree to be good to each other. It’s easy. Eat, drink, study … and put your garbage in the containers. Clean up after yourself. And if you are lucky we are going to catch you. The cleaning staff are wearing special t-shirts to remind you of

OPINION 21THE ONTARION 161.10

ANDREW T KNOWS SOMETHING ABOUT DINOSAURS

What’s the deal with vlogs?

A misguided buzz word

Good Morning Angels,So today I’m in a bit of a funk

that I don’t know how to get out of. Why? Because I’ve been thinking about Vlogs all day. Ugh. Vlogs. The name even disgusts me. If you were in this room right now, you’d see me grimacing. I want to puke in my mouth. It’s the worst.

For those not in the know—and I really don’t believe there are any of you out there reading this that aren’t in the know about what I’m talking about—vlogs are video blogs. Ergo, vlogging is video blogging. And, to be frank, I don’t get vlogs. To be more frank, I understand why people would want to make a vlog, but I don’t really get why people would watch them. To be the frankest, I think vlogs are dumb things on the Internet. Wait…let me clarify:

I appreciate instructional vlogs, where some lovely person shows me how to make my own root beer, or teach me how to shred solos on my ukulele, or give me science lessons about space and neutrons and the future. That’s cool. It’s like having my own private teachers that I can

Let’s play a little round of everybody’s favourite TV game show, Jeopardy.

This country invented cell phones, the Intel chip, cell phone voice mail systems, and instant messaging.

This country is a democratic, pluralistic nation that has one of the largest gay pride parades in the world.

This country has made major contributions to medicine, by developing CT scanners, MRI systems and medical lasers.

This country has opened its doors to immigrants from around the world, even airlifting Ethiopians and Russians to safety when they faced discrimination.

Give up?The answer: What is Israel?The tiny country is one of the 100

smallest countries in the world. Few people know about the countless technological, environmental, medical and security related innovations that Israel has brought to the world. Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East and

ANDREW T

HALEY GOTFRID

be hot for (and I got it bad). For years I’ve been watching Comic Book Club on Youtube, which is a talk/review show about comics. I also do like serialized Internet shows like Wainy Days or The Guild. And while I may not be a huge fan of The Guild, I still value its presence online. To me it represents someone

doing a good job. But you want to know what

represents someone doing a bad job? Vloggers who just make diary videos about their life and their “good time” and “hardships.” Maybe it’s because I’m an uncaring person, but I don’t care about what those people say. I’m not interested in their lives.

There is nothing that they will say that will make me want to watch them. Honestly, the only time I’ve even given someone’s video blog half a notice on Youtube is because I thought they were hot. If that makes me shallow, fine. I’m not proud of it. It was a waste of time anyways.

And this brings me to Chatroulette. For those of you not in the know—and again, I don’t know who you would be. You all seem like the kind of people that are all about ‘the know’—Chatroulette is an Internet thing that randomly links you with another webcam user around the world to you can meet and chat and do whatever. It’s completely random, so sometimes you’ll get a doctor who just wants to share a diagnosis via webcam, and sometimes you’ll get a doctor showing his or her private bits. It’s a mixed bag, to say the least. So, I’m sorry/not sorry to say that I haven’t yet tried Chatroulette. Why? Because I just don’t like strangers that much. If I wanted to meet someone I didn’t know at random, I’d talk to people on the bus. I don’t do that. I walk to school instead. I

avoid the bus.But, you know, I don’t avoid

the Internet entirely. The same way that I find value in taking the bus places (like the big movie theater, am I right? That place is so far away.) there is some fun stuff happening on Chatroulette. Like all of the musicians streaming live concerts to whoever checks in. That’s cool. They’re getting new fans, one rando’ at a time.

But otherwise? Unless you really feel a need to meet someone you don’t know, I see Chatroulette being an opportunity for people to show off to unsuspecting strangers about their lives. Vlogs are like that. If you run a diary vlog, you’re just showing off your life, or how witty your opinions are, or just the fact that you may indeed be hot. Where’s the substance? Where is the beef? I need the beef. Chatroulette has got a lot of meat on it…

P.s. Whenever I say ‘Vlog’ I think about how ‘Blog’ is just a shortening of ‘Web Log’ and that maybe ‘Vlog’ could be shortened ‘Vampire Log.’ That would be the craziest forest ever.

one of the most advanced countries economically in the entire southeast Asian region. It is a country where Jews and Muslims, Christians and Druze, and countless other groups live side by side and contribute to the thriving economy and vibrant democracy.

More often than not, the media focuses on the conflict in the Middle East while neglecting not only the economic but also the political and social successes of Israel. In doing so, they create a one-dimensional perception of Israel and the Middle East which in turn creates an atmosphere where overly simplistic buzz words are perpetuated. Unfortunately, ‘apartheid’ is the current buzz word du jour. This emotionally loaded term is inappropriately applied in order to conjure up horrifying images of another time and place where a governmentally enforced system of racial discrimination and subjugation permeated South Africa - so much so that Blacks and Whites could not live, work or perform day-to-day activities together. World renowned lawyer

and author Alan Dershowitz writes: “The basic evil of South African apartheid, against which I and so many other Jews fought, was the absolute control over a majority of blacks by a small minority of whites. It was the opposite of democracy. In Israel majority rules; it is a vibrant secular democracy...Arabs serve in the Knesset (Parliament), on the Supreme Court and get to vote for their representatives, many of whom strongly oppose Israeli policies.”

Benjamin Pogrond, a South African writer and activist in the struggle to end apartheid, writes that Jewish and Arab babies are born in the same delivery rooms, with the same facilities, attended to by both Jewish and Arab nurses and doctors in Israel every day.

On March 1, 2010, Michael Ignatieff, leader of the Liberal party and respected academic, spoke out against Israel Apartheid Week with a strongly worded editorial in the National Post. He declared: “International law defines ‘apartheid’ as a crime against humanity. Labeling Israel as an ‘apartheid’ state

is a deliberate attempt to undermine the legitimacy of the Jewish state itself.

Criticism of Israel is legitimate. Attempting to describe its very existence as a crime against humanity is not.”

The actions of the government of Israel are not always right; indeed every democratic country does things it should be criticized for. But describing Israel as an apartheid state is ignorant and manipulative. Using a volatile term such as ‘apartheid’ to describe a multi-dimensional conflict demonstrates a lack of understanding of how day-to-day life functions in the democratic state of Israel.

The other main tactic of anti-Israel activists is to promote the BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) movement. The word ‘peace’ never appears in the divestment and sanction petitions, which makes it very clear that the intent of this campaign is not to resolve the conflict but to delegitimize Israel.

Peace in the Middle East will come only from direct negotiations, not through misguided boycott or

divestment campaigns. Campaigns such as this are aimed solely at the destruction of Israel and do nothing to promote any kind of reconciliation. Even after Israel withdrew from Lebanon in 2000 and the Gaza Strip in 2005, these campaigns continued, further proof that a lasting peace is not part of this agenda. The singling out of Israel for special treatment, while ignoring real cases of genuine human rights violations in places like China and Sudan, is further proof that the sole focus is the delegitimization and destruction of Israel.

Israel wants peace. The majority of Israelis wish to live in peace with their Arab friends and neighbours. Israel has already achieved this with Egypt and Jordan.

But that being said, day-to-day life in the Middle East is not conflict ridden. Israel strives to be a nation that seeks innovation, diversity and prospects for peace. It’s time the that the dialogue on North American campuses reflect the realities in the Middle East, not convenient buzz words that do not suit the situation.

CourtesyBut you want to know what represents someone doing a bad job? Vloggers who just make diary videos about their life and their “good time” and “hardships.”

EDITOR'S PAGE22 MAR. 25 - 31, 2010 THEONTARION.CA

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The Ontarion is a non-profit organization governed by a Board of Directors. Since the Ontarion undertakes the publishing of student work, the opinions expressed in this publication do not necessarily reflect those of the Ontarion Board of Directors. The Ontarion reserves the right to edit or refuse all material deemed sexist, racist, homophobic, or otherwise unfit for publication as determined by the Editor-in-Chief. Material of any form appearing in this newspaper is copyrighted 2009 and cannot be reprinted without the approval of the Editor-in-Chief. The Ontarion retains the right of first publication on all material. In the event that an advertiser is not satisfied with an advertisement in the newspaper, they must notify the Ontarion within four working days of publication. The Ontarion will not be held responsible for advertising mistakes beyond the cost of advertisement. The Ontarion is printed by the Guelph Mercury.

EDITORIAL

Hunger is a problem. But not for university students, right?

So it’s Hunger Awareness Week at the University of Guelph.

It’s hard to deny that as soon as we hear the words ‘hunger awareness,’ our minds are filled with images of public service announcements featuring footage of hungry children in the developing world. We think hunger is far away; it’s not. Not in Canada and not in Guelph. And certainly not on the University of Guelph campus. It doesn’t affect university students, right?

If there’s any lesson that something like Hunger Awareness Week can teach us, it’s that while an invisible issue, hunger affects us locally, without a doubt. The focus of the weeklong event, a partnership between Meal Exchange and the CSA Foodbank, is to raise awareness about the effects of poverty and hunger locally. This is an admirable goal, considering the impression that seems to be shared by many on the U of G campus that hunger is not a serious issue facing university students.

One in five people in our

community deal with hunger related issues. This is a fact and the coordinators of Hunger Awareness Week placed a large ‘X’ on the back of one-in-five chairs in the University Centre cafeteria to act as a reminder to students of this fact while they go about eating their lunches. They are raising money for a breakfast program to ensure that Guelph community children have food to eat and a proper start to their day. They are running a workshop to teach students how to cook on a budget. These are all wonderful ways to raise awareness about hunger and poverty issues among students and the community. But at the Ontarion, we feel that there is a larger issue at work here.

Hunger is an invisible issue, mainly because poverty is stigmatized. It is to the point where someone in a difficult financial position is hesitant to admit his or her need, for fear of judgment. This sentiment is echoed by representatives from both the CSA Food Bank and Meal Exchange. Because for some

students asking a friend to buy food for them is not a socially acceptable behavior, many find it difficult to ask for help in this way even from the social services designed to provide this kind of assistance. There is a misplaced sense of shame for some people when admitting they struggle with such a basic need. This stigma makes it easy to forget that there are so many others in the same boat, barely scraping by, and others struggling with taking that extra step and seeking out assistance.

Krista Kermer, the program coordinator for the Food Bank on campus told the Ontarion that close to 600 students access the resources available to them at the Foodbank, but many others either choose not to get help or don’t know enough about the Foodbank to seek it out.

Hunger is an issue everywhere. It affects university students, as well as community members in Guelph. Now is a particularly difficult time of the year for students financially and is a time when many students make use of the Food Bank’s

resources. This week, an Ontarion editor, still struggling to catch up from the financial drain of tuition, books, and rent, turned to the food bank for help to ensure that they didn’t go hungry. This editor faced no judgment and got the food they needed to make it through the week. Not just cans but fresh fruit too. There are no fees to use the CSA food bank. They ask you no prying questions. They are open and available. More people need help in this way than you think.

But perhaps you don’t need the resources that the food bank has to offer. Maybe you have more than enough money to buy food to eat. The best thing to do is consider the message of Hunger Awareness Week, recognize that food is precious, and be thankful that you can afford it. Then, give. Give your time, give food, and give by working to eliminate the stigma around poverty. The person who could benefit from your efforts could be your roommate, your classmate, or your friend.

Dear Editor:

We noticed this past week was ‘Life Week’ on campus. As pro-choice women, we think it’s fine that a group on campus took it upon themselves to showcase life. However, we were fairly disappointed with the showcase in the University Centre on Tuesday and the way it may have made women that have had the difficult experience of having an abortion feel. We think that no one on our campus, or anywhere else, has the right to make anybody feel guilty about a personal decision. We are unhappy that this was allowed to take place in the UC Courtyard. We strongly believe in freedom of expression but we have a problem when this freedom conflicts with the right of women to feel safe in their environment. We think everyone is entitled to their own beliefs and are glad that in Canadian law no one is supposed be able to tell a woman what to do with her body. We have nothing against the campus group that organized the event itself but when anyone begins publicly spreading myths about abortion and guilt-tripping the women of our campus, we take issue.

Denise Martins and Roisin Lyder

I would like to congratulate the library on its acquisition of HDTVs for use as bulletin boards. It takes a brilliant and innovative institution to look at a chalkboard and think ‘hey, you know what? For six or seven hundred dollars

I could get us something just like that.’ It is good to see that in these times of economic restraint, when the library can’t afford to keep normal hours during winter break and closes early on weekends, that high definition bulletin boards are not outside the realm of fiscal possibilities.

Doug Howat

On March 17, the House of Commons passed a NDP motion, 139-136, which would require that any request to prorogue parliament longer than seven days be put to vote in the House of Commons. Prorogation or the suspension of Parliament has traditionally been used to adjourn the House of Commons at the end of a majority government’s legislative agenda.

Recently, Harper’s Conservative minority government has used prorogation to avoid a confidence motion and an inquiry, which is setting a dangerous precedent for future governments. The Prime Minister is the individual selected by the Governor General to govern our nation. The Prime Minister may only govern if they have the confidence of the House of Commons. Therefore this motion would be an extension of this requirement.

This motion would increase power to the House of Commons and the Members of Parliament elected by the electorate. This motion would also apply to majority governments as well as minority governments. Chretien requested prorogument in 2003,

to delay the Auditor General from releasing the Adscam findings. Eventually, in 2004 he give the Prime Minister position to Paul Martin after a caucus revolt consumed the Liberal Party.

In other words, a Prime Minister cannot hide from the inevitable and must be held accountable to the House of Commons and the people of Canada. Our system of government has been built on a written constitution and unwritten conventions. Because of this sometimes small laws are required to ensure everyone plays by the rules of convention. This NDP motion is a step in the right direction to curb the powers of the Prime Minister and preserve our democracy.

Shayne SangsterPresident Guelph NDP Youth

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CROSSWORD & COMICS 23THE ONTARION 161.10

Across

1- Beastly6- Letters, e.g.10- Counterfeit14- Hawaiian greeting15- ___ boy!16- Colombian city17- Middle East rug18- Capital of Shaanxi province, China19- Slaughter of baseball20- Level21- Self-generated23- Writing space25- Slovenly

26- Annoy27- Guides29- African sir32- National symbols33- Draft org.36- Floe37- Proclaim noisily38- Beams39- Brown-capped boletus mushroom40- Fleshy41- Nucleus of a regiment42- Silk cotton43- Assn.

44- Interlocks47- Waste little by little51- Pretended54- Ascend55- Siouan speaker56- Bloodsucking insect57- Chip dip58- Juniors, perhaps59- Employs60- European viper61- Blunted blade62- Songbird63- Ages between 13 and 19

Down

1- Unadorned2- In play3- Mends a shoe4- Rational5- Sweet potato6- State of confusion7- Arguing8- Golfer Aoki9- Tongue10- Perfumes11- Capital of Vietnam12- For all to hear13- Young girl21- Hunky-dory22- Finishes

24- Song syllable27- South American ruminant28- Tombstone lawman29- Telly network30- Itty-bitty31- Dadaist Jean32- Bungle33- Downcast34- Leb. Neighbor35- Compass dir.37- Heavenly38- Fashion industry40- Hammer end41- Dernier ___42- Curd stuff

43- Metal-bearing mineral44- Bullwinkle, e.g.45- Bar, legally46- Rock47- Bottle48- São Paulo feature49- Ruhr city50- Brings up52- Ingrid’s “Casablanca” role53- Ale, e.g.57- Convened

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EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITIES

Rural Landscapers Needed! Planting small trees on farms across south Ontario. Guelph based, from April 19 - May 15. Excellent rates - earn $150+ per day. Treeplanting experience an asset. bartramwoodlands@sympatico.ca or call 519-836-8774.

HOUSING

Furnished 4 rooms apartment, near stores & bus stops. Direct bus to UoG. $450/month/room includes utilities & Internet. Offer of “swap rental for work”, ask info. Photos on Facebook “mrscelina guelph”. Celina 519-763-8444.

$1232/month 4 bedroom Apt. 2 living rooms, 2 new fridges, 2 bathroom, parking, free laundry (no coin), large yard with privacy hedges, dog OK, summer sublet OK. 25 Moore Ave Guelph. Clifford 519-853-2799. Cliffo@live.ca

Room - $280 per month, available now. Send resume to PO Box 31054, Shoppers Drug Mart, 104 Silvercreek, Guelph,

THURSDAY MARCH 25

SOFAM presents University of Guelph Jazz Ensemble with conductor Andrew Scott at Manhattans Pizza Bistro and Jazz Club, 951 Gordon St.. 519 767-2440. 8pm. $2 cover at the door. www.uoguelph.ca/sofam/1k_specialevents

Meal Exchange presents Hunger Awareness Week: Cooking on a Budget. 7pm in Lambton Hall Games Room. Learn how to cook a cheap and healthy meal Free. Info: meal@uoguelph.ca.

FRIDAY MARCH 26

SOFAM presents University of Guelph Concert Winds with Conductor John Goddard at Harcourt Memorial United Church, 87 Dean Ave. Tickets: Adults $10, Student/Seniors $5. 8pm. www.uoguelph.ca/sofam/1k_specialevents

Rainbow Chorus Dance, 8pm-12am, Guelph Place Banquet Hall, 492 Michener Road (north of Hwy 7 or Woodlawn Rd. in the Guelph Auto Mall). Buffet lunch, cash bar.

Ontario, N1H 3T0.

SERVICES

STRESS LESS FOR TESTS. Decrease test anxiety. Enhance focus & performance. A 2 session program by the Stress Management Clinic meets April 5 and 7 at 5:30 pm. Details at www.uoguelph.ca/~ksomers.

SELF STORAGE – 1 MONTH FREE. Rent for 2 months & get the 3rd month free. Heated, Safe, Secure, Video Surveillance. Close to U of G. 519-822-2810 www.someplacesafe.ca

DIVERSE STUDENTS & STUDENT OF COLOUR SUPPORT GROUPS. Mondays and Tuesday: One on One Support 10am-2pm, Discussion 1:30-3:30pm. Wed: One on one support, 10am-2pm. Discussion 5-7pm. Confidentiality ensured. Munford Centre, Rm 54. Contact: rmcleod@uoguleph.ca or x53244.

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subjects and levels. Masters and PhD graduates specializing in editing and research. Toll free: 1-888-345-8295. Email: customessay@bellnet.ca Visit us: www. customessay.com

VOLUNTEER OPPORTUNITIES

Volunteers are needed to help sort, move and deliver food (purchased with Skip-A-Meal money) to the 19 local agencies that support those in need in our community. Delivery Day, March 27. 8am and/or 1pm. Info: meal@uoguelph.ca.

Tickets: www.rainbowchorus.ca, call 519-836-0860.

SATURDAY MARCH 27

CJ Munford Centre presents their fundraising Masquerade Ball, March 27 at the Delta Hotel, 6:30pm-12 am. Food included. Tickets: $35/Early Bird, $40/door. Wear a mask to win a prize. Info or tickets: contact Josh at x56911.

Fund-raising social event, 8pm at the Bullring. Proceeds to Guelph-Wellington Alzheimer Society.Great tunes, food, prizes! All welcome. Advance tickets: $20. Contact 519-822-0973 or careerfitz@sympatico.ca

TUESDAY MARCH 30

Blood donor clinic in Peter Clark Hall. 11am-6pm. Bring photo I.D., weigh at least 110 Ib., be feeling well and have eaten, no tattoo/body piercing within 6 months. Book an appointment at 1-888-2-DONATE. www.blood.ca

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