The Tribune

You may recall many professors, in the last days of the fall semester, prostrating themselves before Canada Goose-clad undergraduates, begging shamelessly for feedback – any feedback – via Minerva-submitted course evaluations. A philosophy professor offered to bring in cookies of indisputable quality should at least 60 per cent of students submit evaluations.

As a recent graduate of McGill, I’ve been reflecting on the time I’ve spent over the past five years trying to organize for social change in a university context. I have heard people say that universities are fertile ground for this kind of activity, and it’s not hard to see why: thousands of young people in close social proximity to each other, many of them in a new place, encountering new ways of thinking about the world.

Contrary to what some of you may believe, proroguing parliament is not the “democratic travesty” that many are making it out to be. Canada is supposedly stirring with “grassroots fury,” according to the Toronto Star. More than 100,000 people have now joined a Facebook group in opposition to Stephen Harper’s decision to prorogue Parliament, united by their hatred of our prime minister.

Dear Diary, Over the winter break, I was called a hipster for wearing a high-waisted skirt and glasses and then found out that Joey Jeremiah only asked me out as a joke and I totally fell for it. I was so embarrassed!! I just wanted to DIE. My life is so sucky.

2009 was a wretched year. On a personal level, it was full of injury, emotional rollercoasters of human interaction, far too much time spent on academics, and the deaths of some very special people to me. And for the world, 2009 saw the entrenchment of superficially humanized global American military domination with the coronation of Emperor Obama.