When I was 13, my mother told me that she would kick me out of the house if I got a tattoo, or if I married non-Jewish. Her first fear never came to fruition, and her second was something I supported—if not ideologically—at least pragmatically. I grew up in a[Read More…]
Off the Board
The allegory of Trump in Canada
As an American student at McGill, many of the things I’ve heard some Canadians say about the United States—particularly its politics—have been false, absurd, and, on occasion, hypocritical. More concerning, however, is the apparent failure of many Canadians to understand American politics and learn from our mistakes. In my experience,[Read More…]
Stand-up comedy has a sensitivity problem—here’s what you can do about it
“Be sure to check any and all political correctness at the door!” read the press release for one two-week running show at Montreal’s 35th annual Just For Laughs comedy festival. As though the industry has developed a reflex against audience members they perceive to be overly sensitive, it’s not uncommon[Read More…]
Responding to hate: The danger of condemning without conversing
On Aug. 12, a peaceful protester named Heather Heyer lost her life and many others were injured by the senseless rage of a 20-year-old white male at a white supremacist march in Charlottesville, Virginia. Following the abhorrent scene, on Aug. 13, GoDaddy, the web hosting company of an American neo-nazi[Read More…]
Why it pays to slow down this summer
Remember your elementary school summers? When school was out and the living was easy? Goodbye, long division–hello ice cream sandwiches, sleepover camp, and Saturday morning swimming lessons. As an undergraduate student, summers are sort of like those swimming lessons. Except instead of learning to float on your back, someone just[Read More…]
The rationale behind feeling
When at a crossroads, one may turn to confidants, religious texts, philosophy, or even the dubious self-help book section in search for answers to the problems of life’s minutiae. Along this vein, the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) has become my latest interest in popular psychology. Its dichotomies based on Jungian[Read More…]
It’s not just humans who can be biased
The tech industry has long been a demographically homogeneous place, and there has been a lot of conversation about how to make the industry more inclusive for people who don’t fit the stereotype of the Silicon Valley tech bro. However, making the products themselves more inclusive hasn't received as much public[Read More…]
The slow science of personal and professional development
As undergraduate students, it’s easy to get caught up in thinking we need to have our professional trajectory entirely figured out before graduating. It doesn’t help that we’re encouraged to scramble for internships in order to beef up our resumes, or that some girl from your high school already has[Read More…]
We need to keep asking stupid questions
In my first high school political science course, I had a friend who was very clever and well-informed—the kind of self-identified young intellectual that read the New York Times like scripture. One class, he got into an argument on electoral reform in Canada with another very clever and well-informed student.[Read More…]
Is there an upside to the O’Leary candidacy?
It’s been an odd political year. As news from the United States continues to descend into absurdity, in Canada the Conservative Party leadership race drudges on, complete with a cast of characters large enough to carry a Marvel movie. The Conservative race came to McGill on Feb. 13, as TV[Read More…]
