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Contents
Contents
Students
fi
le lawsuitagainst U of OOverthrowing EMIStill alive
Knock-knock
News
News
Arts
Arts
Sports
Sports
Feature
Feature
p. 4
p. 4
p. 9
p. 9
p. 15
p. 15
p. 12
p. 12
Plaintiffs claim university “derailed” research by closing Rancourt lab.
p. 4
Students organize a well-attended debate onabortion.
p. 5Peter Henderson
and
Nick Rudiak
look into Cherrypeel.com and digital music distri- bution.
p. 9Justin Farinaccio
reviews the GladstoneTheatre production of
Doubt
.
p. 9
Women’s basketball to make
fi
rst trip tonational championship since 2004.
p. 15
Sandy Hill Winter Classic features some pondhockey for a good cause.
p. 15
Who’s there? An article about comedy in Ot-tawa. Knock-knock jokes are stupid.
p. 12–13
You’ve spent a year in residence sleeping with your
fl
oormates, and things are getting hairy.
Di
can help.
p. 20
Cowardly coverage
Re: “U of O bans pro-Palestinian group’s posters” (News, Feb. 25)
I AM WRIING this letter in re-sponse to your very fawed articlesregarding the banning o the IsraeliApartheid poster by the university.News editor Emma Godmerewrote in a column that, while she haslittle knowledge o the intricacies o the Israeli-Palestinian confict, shebelieves the posters are infammatory and seemingly supports the univer-sity’s decision. She claims that IsraeliApartheid Week will continue to hap-pen, so what’s the problem with ban-ning their poster? Well, these postershave the ability to reach a broader au-dience than the simple event or thisweek, since oentimes, as everyoneknows, these events tend to largely amount to preaching to the converted,whereas the uninterested and unin-ormed, such as Godmere, may noticethe posters hung up around campusand take enough interest to nd out i what’s depicted on the poster is in acthappening, as Godmere should havedone. What’s really missing is thebrave mention that over 400 childrenwere killed in the recent Israeli “inter- vention” in Gaza, making the poster’simage pure act, multiplied by 400!But what would be still more im-portant to address is this question o whether depicting the sort o crimecommitted by the Israeli orces incitesanti-Semitism, which is what the uni- versity is insinuating. Did we ban thear more provocative images o Iraqi victims in
Fahrenheit 9/11
, which wasshown at the university when it cameout, because they would provoke an-ti-Americanism? Or do we reuse toshow lms o Holocaust victims be-cause they would promote anti-Ger-man discrimination? O course not!Tat would be horrible censorship o historical act. Yet, this is the classiccry o Israel supporters who wish todefect criticism o their policies; acry you are ultimately echoing.Tough I ully appreciate that re-garding this issue people will rag onyou rom either side no matter whatyou write, I think your coverage wascowardly. More courageous coveragemay have oended a historically hor-ribly oppressed group that has unor-tunately seen a part o its populationtransormed into terrible oppressorsin Israel (which many Israelis cou-rageously oppose). On the side youchose however, you are complicit inmarginalizing comment on the kill-ing o more than 400 innocent chil-dren. Some things are worth receiv-ing angry mail over.
Jonathan WilliamsSecond-year international development student
Te wrong approach
Re: “Staying Safe in Sandy Hill” (News, Feb. 25)
I WAS DISAPPOINED that, in itsreporting on the prevalence o sexualassault in Sandy Hill, the
Fulcrum
chose to ocus on policing and re-stricting women’s reedom o move-ment and agency over their ownchoices. Te article suggests tips onavoiding sexual violence, which in-clude walking along in pairs along a“planned route”. As a 20-year-old uni- versity student, I should eel capableo walking mysel home rom class onstreets that I did not take time to mapout beorehand. Te act that I couldbe at risk o attack is not because Ihave not taken the proper precau-tions to keep mysel sae, but becauseo the systemic issues o male violenceand sexual assault. Yet nowhere in thearticle was there discussion o the po-licing o the perpetrators o the crime;perhaps men should be advised tostay indoors, avoid parties, and bewalked home by authorities to avoidthe possibility o raping women.I also take issue in advising womento “monitor their alcohol consump-tion”, which not only leads to theshaming and guilting o assault sur- vivors, but alsely suggests that themost signicant barrier in convictingrapists is inadequacy o the victim’stestimony. Unortunately, there is noway to protect onesel against rape; itoccurs ar too requently and indis-criminately. o insinuate that thosewho have suered attacks is by aulto their own carelessness is alse, de-grading, and counter-productive.
Victoria SandsTird-year women’s studies student
An open letter to the SFUO executive
MARCH 1 WAS a sad day or the stu-dents at the University o Ottawa. Onthat day the Student Federation o theUniversity o Ottawa’s (SFUO) mem-bers voted to condemn the U o Oadministration or banning a poster.Tis poster eatures a warplane withthe word “Israel” written on it ringa rocket at a child who is wearing aka yeh and holding a teddy bear, hisshadow spelling “Gaza”. Tis posterdemonizes several groups o studentson campus, including Israeli students,most Jewish students, and any otherstudent who believes in Israel’s rightto exist and right to deend itsel, im-plying that they support the murdero children.Te SFUO seems to have orgottena key element o their constitution,ound under the heading “statemento principles” which states, “We, theundergraduate students o the Uni- versity o Ottawa, eel the need tospeak with one voice in asserting ourlegitimate needs and, or that pur-pose, we recognize Te Student Fed-eration o the University o Ottawa(SFUO) as the instrument o politicalaction o the undergraduate studentpopulation.” Notice that this doesn’tsay “we the undergraduate le-wingstudents” or “we the undergraduatestudents who are pro-Palestinian”.No, the constitution o the SFUO says“we, the undergraduate students”. Allo us. Te executive seems to haveorgotten that they are accountable toall students, regardless o political a-liation, religious belie, or ideology.So when that same executive electsto put up a poster that demonizes acertain group o students, those very students who they have been electedto represent, we have a problem. TeSFUO needs to understand that they are accountable to all undergraduatestudents and that means that they areresponsible or ensuring that the rightto reedom o speech o some stu-dents does not take precedence overall students’ right to a sense o saety on campus.Te administration, in banningthis poster is not stifing anybody’sreedom o speech. Te parties in- volved are still holding their events,and have been allowed to put up post-ers that are moderately less likely toincite hatred.I would like to applaud the admin-istration or their bravery in banningthis poster. I hope that the SFUOwill be able to put their personal orpolitical agendas aside and do their job properly, representing all o theirstudents.
Rebecca Margel Fourth-year biology student
Free speech?
I FIND I utterly detestable that theUniversity o Ottawa would have theaudacity to disallow the practice o ree speech on campus. I am reer-ring in particular to the administra-tion’s recent decision to ban post-ers promoting the upcoming IsraeliApartheid Week (IAW) on campus.What is even more detestable is theadministration’s reerence to humanrights as a justication or its actions.Te U o O’s communications o cesent a communiqué to the group Soli-darity or Palestinian Human Rights,which reads in part: “A poster romthe campus group Solidarity or Pal-estinian Human Rights has recently come to the attention o the Commu-nications O ce. All posters approved
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March 5–11, 2009
Letters
Frank AppleyardEditor-in-Chief editor@thefulcrum.ca
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What do you think of theU of O’s decision to banthe Israeli Apartheid Weekposter?
Great move:Terrible decision:Unsure:
thefulcrum.ca poll
Last week’s resultsThis week’s question
40%60%
by the Communications O ce mustpromote a campus culture whereall members o the community canplay a part in a declaration o humanrights recognizing the inherent dig-nity and equal rights o all students.Consequently, we will not place thisparticular poster on our campus bill-boards.”In act, the very purpose o Is-raeli Apartheid Week is to speak outagainst human rights abuses and in-orm others o what is taking placein Palestine. Te week is meant to beone o educating the general popula-tion, which is what a university is allabout.I call upon the U o O to recognizethe inherent dignity and equal rightso all students, stop this ridiculouscensorship, and allow the IAW pro-motional posters to be posted oncampus.In the words o the American his-torian Henry Steele Commager: “Teact is that censorship always deeatsits own purpose, or it creates, in theend, the kind o society that is inca-pable o exercising real discretion.”
Shawn SmithFourth-year English student Due to space constrains, we were un-able to print all letters received thisweek. Visit thefulcrum.ca/letters toread the others.
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