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a, News, SSMU

Tensions run high over freedom of dress at SSMU GA

by Cece Zhang on

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The Winter General Assembly (GA) of the Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) featured extensive debate regarding freedom of dress within the SSMU Building. Held on Feb. 5, the event met quorum, with over 100 attendees throughout most of the night.

Freedom of dress

Developed by the engineering student group the Plumber’s Philharmonic Orchestra (PPO), this motion sought to prohibit limitations on dress in the SSMU building, as well as to lift all existing bans on any group’s choice of dress.

“This comes out of the realization that SSMU actually has the power to unilaterally put a blanket-ban on any particular item of clothing,” said Morgan Grobin, a U2 Engineering student who presented the motion. “If they really think something is offensive, it should be decided on a case-by-case basis.“

Audience members questioned how efficiently SSMU would be able to monitor clothing on a case-by-case basis, with references made to numerous offensive incidents at Four Floors, the annual SSMU Halloween party.

“If you’re following the SSMU Equity Policy, and there are complaints following the policy, do you believe the complaints will be resolved in a timely manner if we follow this on a case by case basis?” asked a student who could not be identified

Grobin responded by saying that it would be difficult with the current policy, but that SSMU should find ways to address it.

Following questioning from SSMU Vice-President University Affairs Joey Shea, Grobin explained that the motion was influenced by a ban of lab coats worn by members of the PPO. The SSMU executive deemed the coats offensive for displaying inappropriate images and banned them from the SSMU Building during the 2012-2013 school year.

“For me, the most important part was enlightening the GA about the backstory of the motion, as it wasn’t included,” Shea said.

Shea explained that to her, the backstory behind the motion was just as important as the motion itself.

During the voting period for this motion, the assembly could not meet quorum; however, the motion passed as a recommendation to Council, where it was passed the following day. It was, however, ammended to include a clause to allow denial of freedom of dress under reasonable circumstances, which would be determined by the Equity Commissioner.

Motion Regarding Inclusion of Academic Assessment Rights on Course Outline

This motion sought to ensure compliance with the University Student Assessment Policy by faculties and professors, and to increase students’ awareness of these policies by their inclusion on course outlines.

“Since 2011, McGill has had this Assessment Policy that states a professor is not allowed to give you an exam worth more than 75 per cent of your final grade without giving another option,” said Claire Stewart-Kanigan, Arts Senator and mover of the motion. “There’s been a lot of students saying professors just haven’t been doing this. So a good way of enforcing this is to have this included in the course outlines, have a small section of academic rights.”

The motion will require student senators to work with the McGill administration to accomplish these changes

The motion passed without debate.

Motion Regarding 

Sustainability at the SSMU

This motion mandates the Ad-hoc Committee on Sustainability to make a recommendation on sustainability to SSMU Council by the end of the 2014 Winter semester.

SSMU President Katie Larson mentioned that since the SSMU Sustainability Commissioner position was cut due to budget constraints last semester, there have been difficulties with the sustainability committee, primarily due to a lack of interest and people not showing up to meetings—problems which she hopes to account for with the motion.

“I wrote this GA motion to address, for the Ad-hoc Committee on Sustainability, certain organization and scheduling problems,” Larson said. “It’s important to very publicly make a point, [that] the Sustainability committee will report on this,”

The motion was passed.

Motion Regarding the Timely Distribution of Course Information

In order to decrease stress on students in terms of scheduling and buying textbooks, this motion calls for SSMU to lobby the McGill administration to distribute course information in a more timely process.

“You don’t have time during add-drop period to make informed decisions [on buying textbooks], especially for multiple courses,” Shea said. “Considering as well that many students don’t have time to attend all the courses they may want to register in during add-drop, we wanted to make this as accessible as possible.”

The motion passed.

The Motion Regarding TPP and CETA 

This motion required SSMU to officially take a stance against two trade agreements: the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and a Canadian-European Union Free Trade Agreement (CETA), which contain provisions on pharmaceutical patents, potentially increasing drug costs in Canada.

As it was a motion on a topic external to the workings of SSMU, however, it required a quorum of 500 people, which the GA did not meet.

The motion was tabled.

a, News

Conference on fossil fuels interrupted by occupation protesting lack of representation

by Jessica Fu on

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McGill’s Petrocultures 2014 conference faced criticism last Friday, when participants were forced to relocate following an occupation of the Faculty Club by a group called “LockOut Petrocultures.” Later that day, student campaign group Divest McGill demonstrated outside the conference as well.

At 8:00 a.m., approximately 30 members of the Montreal community group occupied the Faculty Club, interrupting nearly one and a half hours of the conference. Due to the occupation, the conference was temporarily relocated to Redpath Hall.

Mona Luxion, an Urban Planning Ph.D. candidate and media relations officer for LockOut Petrocultures, said that the group planned the disruption to question the effectiveness of the conference.

“Staging a debate [where] fossil fuel company executives have equal say as potential critics is reinforcing the status quo; it’s not moving us forward,” she said. “We really wanted to challenge this idea that this is a debate that should be happening, and really push towards concrete actions that gets [McGill] out of the business of fossil fuels.”

Petrocultures was hosted by the McGill Institute for the Study of Canada (MISC), which organizes conferences on a wide variety of topics, changing from year to year. This year’s event drew participants from the arts, social sciences, sciences, and engineering from across Canada to speak on the consequences of reliance on fossil fuels and to discuss responsible alternatives

“Petrocultures 2014 will bring together leading figures to discuss and debate the role of oil and energy in shaping social, cultural, and political life in Canada at present and in the future,” the conference program reads. “[The] event involv[es] a diverse group of speakers from across Canada.”

Members of Divest McGill, a student campaign group against university investment in fossil fuel industries, attended the conference as participants but also expressed support for the occupiers. In the Divest McGill demonstration that same day, protestors chanted in support of divestment and invited members of the community to envision a future without reliance on fossil fuels.

“[The conference] purport[s] to be really non-partisan, but in reality they had two hour-long sessions from people from oil companies or from energy boards, and had very clear, vested interests,” Bronwen Tucker, Divest McGill coordinator, said. “There was not a single grassroots Indigenous activist. They just didn’t do a proper job at representing the whole spectrum.”

However, William Straw—professor and director of the MISC—noted that 17 of the 26 speakers at the conference were activists. These included five people from Indigenous communities who work on the impact of fossil fuels, although two had to withdraw at the last minute due to personal reasons.

“To the accusation that the conference offered a false ‘balance,’ I will simply point to the overwhelming representation of environmental activists,” Straw said. “To the accusation—made before the conference had begun—that we were going to debate ‘climate change’ as if it were an unsettled issue, I will note that no one at the conference, with the possible exception of [one attendee], challenged the reality of climate change.”

Luxion said the occupation achieved their goals of critiquing and interrupting the conference.

“I think we led people to question the starting point [of the conference], in addition to actually having a material impact in terms of forcing the conference to move,” she said.

Straw said that he was disappointed that attempts to communicate with the occupiers were ineffective.

“We hoped to talk to the occupiers, and several participants […] made an effort to speak to them,” Straw said. “That wasn’t successful.”

Straw maintained that he was pleased with the conference’s turnout this year, and that the protests would not impact future conferences.

“Building a conference is a multi-month process of awaiting responses, last minute withdrawals, pressures from various quarters, and disappointments,” he said. “Given all this, I’m pleased with what we came up with.”

a, Opinion

Course cuts: rolling with the punches

by Lauren Konken on

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Once again, Arts is cutting courses.

On Jan. 28, the Faculty of Arts Committee (FAC) convened for the second time this academic year. The primary announcement that emerged from the meeting was another 5 per cent reduction to all existing Arts courses, equating to the cancellation of another 50 classes between all Arts departments for the Fall 2014 and Winter 2015 semesters. This cut follows the reduction of 100 courses last winter in the face of steep provincial budget cuts and a restructuring of McGill finances to overcome a projected deficit of over $40 million. Although McGill’s deficit was reduced to $13.1 million as of December, it’s been forced to make further cuts, making dollars an ever-precious commodity.

Attendance to the FAC meeting was low, which sadly is the norm. Departmental chairs expected the cuts but were not aware of their extent. As an individual often tasked with liaising between students and administrators at the faculty and departmental level, I anticipated tight finances in the coming year, but not an additional slashing of classes. Overall, the distribution of course cuts will vary between departments.

The political science department had considered the possibility of  further cuts, and course planning for the coming year was made with this in mind; core courses will be preserved, leaving the sessional lecturer budget to be cut back. This budget is a set of funds used to hire non-tenure track professors, and is often used to pay for additional thematic courses. Following the 2014-2015 cuts, it was halved, and the department anticipates it will likely be halved again. Knowing this, the department is looking to add new content to existing core courses, both to refresh them with modern content while also to preserve what is being lost. How the burden is being carried out by other departments is still being determined; which courses are cut will ultimately be decided by the department chairs once they know how many they are faced with losing.

Cuts are only temporary, but to a degree, we saw this coming. With tuition once again frozen and provincial funding severely slashed following mass student protests in early 2012, it became obvious the status quo wasn’t going to stick. Less funding and no increases in tuition equates to fewer courses and sessional lecturers. At the same time, the Faculty of Arts faces a steep hiring freeze, with only a handful of positions being opened in a small number of departments at the dean’s discretion.

With Arts squeezed for funding, the quality and quantity of our courses is now in serious jeopardy. Cuts are viewed as temporary, but if we can’t get our act together, it may be more permanent than we’d like it to be.

The only benefit of cuts—if there is one—may be the restructuring of outdated core courses. This remains a real possibility in many departments where courses are taught on outdated models and methodologies. To ensure we move forward as an institution and don’t find ourselves in a cycle of permanent cuts, we as students need to be working hard to have our say on what goes and what stays.

 

—Lauren Konken is the VP Academic of the Political Science Students’ Association (PSSA)

a, News

Faculty of Arts faces 50 course cuts due to reduced budget for course lecturers

by Paniz Khosroshahy on

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The Faculty of Arts will terminate approximately 50 courses in the 2014-2015 academic year, as announced on Jan 29.

The decision is a continued effect of provincial budget cuts announced in December 2012, in response to which the Office of the Provost called for a 10 per cent cut in the budget for contract academic staff  (CAS) in all faculties.

CAS are faculty and course lecturers not on a tenure-track. According to Dean of Arts Christopher Manfredi, impact on students would be minimal, as well.

“There is no choice in this matter,” Manfredi said. “Students’ progress towards completing their programs will not be affected, and the impact on average class size will be negligible.”

Justin Fletcher, president of the Arts Undergraduate Society (AUS), said the effects on individual departments would be less impactful.

“Since reductions will take place across many academic units,” he said. “We do not anticipate there being a huge disruption in terms of the number of courses per unit.”

However, Fletcher stressed that faculties with more CAS would be more negatively affected.

“While this cut is across-the-board at McGill, Arts is affected more because many of our courses are taught by CAS,” he said.

In the upcoming weeks, departments will present a prioritized list of CAS-taught courses to the Dean, who will then allocate the CAS budget to departments. Individual departments will make the final decision on which CAS-taught courses will be offered based on this budget.

According to Greenspon, language courses will be prioritized, since they are mostly taught by CAS. The majority of, cuts will take place to CAS-taught courses in large departments such as english, political science, economics, and history, where the large number of tenure-track professors reduces the necessity of hiring CAS, according to Greenspon.

“I would expect [large departments] to have a similar percentage of courses cut as smaller, non-language departments,” AUS Vice-President  Academic Jacob Greenspon said. “But given the number of courses in Political Science, for example, this similar percentage will result in a higher raw number of courses cut.”

This year’s cuts come in addition to 100 courses cut by the Faculty for the 2013-14 academic year. Greenspon expressed concern at the lack of student consultation in the decision.

“While I’m sure there was much conversation in the McGill administration about how to deal with less funding from the government, I believe that this conversation did not involve as much student input as our position as primary stakeholder of the university warrants,” Greenspon said. “[This] demonstrates that the administration’s priorities do not include creating a consensus among [students] for the most important decisions that affect them all.”

Fletcher indicated several ways in which students could become involved in the process, including attending department-level consultations.

“Our plan of action […] is to engage in proactive dialogue with the Dean and Provost to see if there is additional room in the budget and to encourage professors to teach at the standard teaching load of 12 credits per year,” he said. “We encourage our departmßental associations to make sure students are present at department meetings, to ensure priority courses continue to be taught.”

McGill Course Lecturer’s and Instructors Union could not be reached for comment.

a, Science & Technology, Student Research

The puzzle of pain behaviour

by Caity Hui on

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Basil Kadoura, a U3 neuroscience student, has always had pets, so it comes as no surprise that he currently enjoys spending his days in the lab playing with mice. Working under the supervision of McGill professor Jeffrey Mogil, Kadoura is investigating a chemosignaling study concerning how mice respond to male and female experimenters in terms of pain behaviours. Chemosignals—also known as pheromones—are chemicals secreted into the environment by animals, which affect the behavior of other animals of the same species.

“We are looking at olfactory cues with male versus female experimenters and seeing how it is affecting pain behaviours in mice,” Kadoura explained. “Something Dr. Mogil found and published a couple years ago is that mice show pain behavior on their face—how tight they squeeze their nose or mouth or whiskers shows how much pain they are in. We looked at [their behavior] with male and female experimenters. [If our research confirms our hypothesis that mice respond differently to male experimenters], it’s kind of a big deal, because it means male experimenters have been affecting trials and research [with mice] for so long.”

Basically, Kadoura observes the reaction of mice in the presence of male experimenters compared to female experimenters, and records and analyzes their degree of pain behaviour.

Though Kadoura will be completing his undergraduate research project with Mogil, he has worked in other laboratories before. Since his second semester at McGill, Kadoura has experienced a total of five different laboratories, ranging from human trials to mouse work.

“That’s why I appreciate my [current] lab so much—because I’ve experienced other labs,” Kadoura said. “I think I’ve been lucky in my research career not to have any horrible experiences, but exploring and being adventurous is important. You can also try a lot of things, from humans to mice testing […] It’s like, if you don’t taste how sour a lemon is, can you appreciate how sweet—I don’t know—a gummy bear is?”

Kadoura appreciates the opportunities he has received from working in a variety of labs, with particular emphasis on the current lab he is in now.

“The social atmosphere of our lab is really great […] you are a part of this lab; your questions will be answered and they will be answered sincerely. As a general thing, it is fantastic,” Kadoura explained. “The other thing is the help I’ve received. Research can be arduous and repetitive; and [so] it’s nice when you don’t have to sit there and watch 20 hours of mice videos, you only have to watch 10. It’s great to have that support and I’m really lucky.”

Some of Kadoura’s other work has included concussion research and establishing a recruitment process for a study. Kadoura particularly appreciates the opportunity he received to see a research project transition from an idea to a publication.

“I helped create a study and this recruitment process for the study,” Kadoura explained. “The paper is now published […] it took two years, but it was worth it.”

Although Kadoura plans to pursue medicine, he sees research as a critical part of his career.

“Research has always been something that I wanted to be a part of my life,” Kadoura said. “I don’t know in what way, but I know it will be there. [When I first came to McGill], I started seeing professors from McGill talking about their research and then I started to volunteer in a lab and work in a lab. It progresses and you figure out what works for you, but I think coming to McGill, one of the main draws was for research.”

 

What’s your favourite job at the lab?

“I do like playing with mice. When you go into a lab where you are dealing with mice you have to go through the training—how to handle a mouse, how to hold a mouse, how to transfer a mouse. They’re actually kind of cute, they’re fun to play with.”

If you could choose a super power, what would it be?

“You don’t understand how much I’ve thought about this. Teleporting, telekinesis, and flying are probably my top three. Can I have three? And freezing time—oh, that’s four.”

Advice for other students applying for a lab job?

“My advice would be to email professors […] I would spend the time to look into their publications and see what they are doing. One of the other pieces of advice is that it is also important how well you fit with that lab. You need to find [a lab] where you are going to enjoy your time, because otherwise, research is not going to be a good experience for you. As an undergrad you don’t want to be picky, but at the same time you don’t want to be miserable. If this is someone who you are seriously thinking of doing graduate school with, you want to appreciate the lab that you’re working in.”

If you were a mad scientist, what would you do in your lab?

“I’ve thought about this a lot too. [It’s] tough, because I have studied [many areas of research], so I’m into a lot of different topics. There is sleep—I’m really interested in sleep—sexual development, that’s really cool, and I get to work on pain in the Mogil lab [….] So, I think, if I were a mad scientist, I would do it all. I would figure out a way to look at various different things at once. I would have a PhD student looking at sexual development, I would have a PhD student looking at lucid dream—kind of like world domination as a scientist.”

a, McGill, News

Ethical economics: assessing the effectiveness of university divestment campaigns

by Samiha Sharif on

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Divestment campaigns at universities have targeted a diverse range of issues in the last several decades, varying from South African apartheid in the 1970s to companies involved in fossil fuels today

Divestment is the reduction or elimination of investment in a particular company or sector for ethical and social reasons. In the last few years campaigns have sprung up at universities across Canada and around the world, including student group Divest McGill’s campaign for the university to divest from certain companies with connections to fossil fuels.

This week, the Tribune takes a look at university divestment campaigns to understand the ideas behind divestment and the arguments for and against it.

Historical instances of divestment

In the past, university divestment campaigns have focus on several different issues. One campaign that is often cited as a success was against companies that did business with apartheid-era South Africa in the ‘70’s and ‘80’s. Hundreds of universities and other institutions around the world took part in this campaign, including over 20 from Canada.

The campaign against South African apartheid was one of two instances where McGill chose to divest. The second was the divestment from tobacco companies in 2007.

However, McGill’s Director of Internal Relations Doug Sweet said other factors may have contributed to the success of that movement.

“At the same time as divestment, there was also a pretty widespread global boycott against some South African products, like South African wine,” he said. “That probably had more economic impact than divestment.”

Unlike divestment, boycotting is a practice undertaken by individuals rather than institutions.

Effectiveness of divestment

There is an ongoing debate on how effective divestment campaigns really are, and whether or not they are a wise decision for universities.

According to Divest McGill Coordinator Bronwen Tucker, divestment is a good financial decision for universities because fossil fuel companies will decrease in value in the future.

However, John Limeburner, McGill’s executive director of investments, said that divestment would be both inefficient and unwise in the case of their companies because divestment hardly affects the companies financially.

“At the end of the day, even when someone divested, there [is] someone else there to buy [the stocks] there at a bargain,” Limeburner said. “When you sell a stock and divest, you are not taking money out of the company’s pockets but out of the pockets of the investors by making the price [go] down, and that’s another opportunity for others to come and buy it at a lower price.”

Limeburner added that divestment would leave McGill in a financially volatile position.

“Taking these sectors out and not investing in them would leave us with an undiversified portfolio,” Limeburner explained. “The risk there is that you have swings of higher volatility, which is what happened in the year of 2008/2009, and that’s what we try to smooth out by having a diversified portfolio to different sectors, countries, and types of assets.”

Tucker argued that the current stock price may not reflect the companies’ stabilitiy.

“The evaluation of fossil fuel companies on the stock market are completely based on them being allowed to burn all the reserves that they have; those companies are not as valuable as their stocks right now,” Tucker said. “It is called the carbon bubble—which is similar to the housing bubble that is associated with the recession. There are a lot of banks coming out saying that carbon investments are risky.”

Since the sectors of energy, materials and financials­—all of which are involved in fossil fuels—comprise of  70 per cent of the Canadian market, if McGill were to divest from these sectors, their portfolio would be severly effected by any fluctuations within the market, according to Limeburner.

However, Divest McGill member David Summerhays said that promotion of university divestment does not primarily intend to financially affect subject companies.

“We expect university divestment to raise a ton of awareness about the problem and not directly harm the share price of fossil fuel companies,” Summerhays said. “McGill and many other institutions divested from tobacco in the past 20 years, and we’ve seen a wave of health-protecting legislation across the world.”

Divest McGill and the campaign to divest from fossil fuels

At McGill, a recent movement has resulted in the creation of Divest McGill, although the group’s campaigns have yet to be accepted by the administration. Its current platform calls on McGill to divest from the top 200 fossil fuel companies in the world by carbon reserve and 36 companies involved in the oil º sands.

Earlier last year, Divest McGill petitioned the Board of Governors to divest from fossil fuel companies in its investment portfolio.

According to Tucker, the divestment movement to prevent climate change began two years ago.

“There have been lots of fledging climate movements in the past, but none of them have been engaging students,” Tucker said. “We’ve known about climate change for 20 years, but there is kind of larger scale change that needs to happen in terms of government and corporate policies.”

Several small colleges in the North eastern United States like Unity College, College of the Atlantic in Maine, and Sterling College have already divested from fossil fuel companies and many of them are focused on climate change.

However, Todd Pettigrew, associate professor at Cape Breton University, argues in his article “Ethical investing isn’t as easy as it sounds” in Maclean’s Magazine that unethical companies are difficult to define.

“There are almost no easy cases—every investment is bound to have its pluses and minuses, ethically speaking,” Pettigrew said.
“So, while ‘no unethical investments’ sounds great at a protest rally, the slogan rings hollow the moment it’s really tested.”

Other universities across Canada and the world also have divestment campaigns—for example, the University of Toronto’s group, Toronto350.

“The threat of climate destabilization is the main driving force behind this campaign,” Toronto350 President Stuart Basden said. “With that in mind, fossil fuels have no place in the liveable future. We are trying to work within the bureaucracy to change things.”

Although McGill currently maintains such investments, Summerhays said he is looking forward to future opportunities to achieve their goals.

“We’re optimistic that we can iron out a concrete way forward that would preserve the divestment impact while keeping a balanced portfolio that would put Limeburner and the [Board of Governors] at ease,” he said.

Errata: A previous version of this article included an infographic that was incorrectly labeled as “McGill investments in various sectors of the Toronto Stock Exchange as of Dec. 31, 2013.” In fact, the data represented the breakdown of the S&P/TSX as of Dec. 31, 2013, not the McGill Investment Pool.

In addition, the table below the infographic stated that 71.8 per cent of McGill’s investments were in sectors that had connections to fossil fuels. This is incorrect. The sectors in question comprised 71.8 per cent of the Canadian market, not the McGill investment portfolio.

The Tribune regrets these errors.

a, Science & Technology

What is the science behind chemical attraction?

by Caity Hui on

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When we meet someone that we like, our heart flutters and we feel short of breath. On a first date, our stomach is full of butterflies. And when we fall in love, we feel a powerful sense of empathy towards our partner.

While poets, novelists, and songwriters have described the feeling of love in countless types of verse, attraction at the biological level boils down to simple chemistry. In fact, falling in love equates to about 79 carbon atoms, 117 hydrogen atoms, 14 nitrogen atoms, 19 oxygen atoms, and two sulfur atoms— all of which comprise four critical hormones: testosterone, adrenaline, dopamine, and oxytocin.

Hormones are secreted compounds that are produced by specific cells, glands, or tissues. They travel throughout the body and influence many physiological and behavioural activities, including digestion, metabolism, growth, and, in the case of these hormones, attraction. Though you can’t see or feel them, these tiny molecules have a huge influence on who you find attractive and, ultimately, with who you fall in love.

Testosterone

Commonly known for its role as a male sex hormone, testosterone is actually present in both men and women, and plays a pivotal role in fostering sexual attraction. It’s responsible for increasing sexual arousal and focused attention on the person of interest, making it one of several chemicals guilty of inspiring lust. While testosterone is present in higher concentrations in men, a study published by Northwestern University in 2012 suggests that mutual attraction actually induces a hormonal testosterone spike in both parties.

The study consisted of approximately 200 heterosexual men and women who volunteered to take part in about 2000 speed dates. Participants were required to provide researchers with four saliva samples for hormonal analysis. Two were taken a week before the speed-dates, while one was taken right before and another right after.

The samples showed that testosterone levels remained stable during one-sided attraction, but sharply increased when mutual attraction was experienced.

“Many people think that only men have testosterone, but that’s not the case,” said Eli Finkel, the lead author of the study. “It’s true that men have much more testosterone than women do, but the links between testosterone and social outcomes are similar for men and women, and testosterone is associated with a stronger sex drive in both sexes.”

The study gives rise to interesting questions concerning sexual attraction—how accurate are people at detecting this mutual attraction, and are testosterone levels related to some people being better at detecting it than others?

Adrenaline

When you meet someone new, this fight or flight hormone is responsible for the butterfly feeling in your stomach and racing pulse. According to Reginald Ho, a cardiac electrophysiologist and associate professor of medicine at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, the brain sends a signal to the adrenal gland, which secretes adrenaline to the blood. The hormone then travels until it reaches various organs on which it has a physiological effect.  For instance, when adrenaline reaches the heart, it binds to a specific receptor called the adrenergic receptor expressed on the heart tissue. Binding to this receptor triggers an increase in heart rate. Adrenaline is the same hormone that is released when we are frightened or stressed, which may go to explain the feeling of nervousness we experience when meeting someone we find attractive.

Dopamine

Anthropologist and human behaviour researcher Helen Fisher conducted an experiment where she scanned the brains of young couples to see what areas of the brain lit up when they focused on the object of their affection. One of these areas was associated with dopamine—a hormone that helps control the brain’s reward and pleasure centers. Not only does dopamine enable us to see rewards, it also provokes people to take action to move toward them.

“My prediction is that dopamine is an essential part of infatuation”, said Fisher to Psychology Today. “[The hormone] is already associated with euphoria, sleeplessness, loss of appetite, and a rush of motivation.” In other words, the dopamine response seems to induce all the symptoms we attribute to falling in love.

Oxytocin

This cuddling chemical is the hormone that activates feelings of trust and attraction between people when it is released in the brain during childbirth, breastfeeding, and sex. Unlike testosterone, adrenaline, or dopamine, oxytocin plays less of a role in sparking relationships, and plays a role in promoting monogamy.

According to a study published in the Journal of Neuroscience, oxytocin helps maintain relationships once they have started. The researchers monitored a first encounter between male study participants and a woman in a laboratory setting. When given oxytocin via an intranasal spray, men who had indicated they were currently in a stable relationship kept a greater physical distance from the woman in the lab compared to single men sprayed with the same hormone. This supports the idea that raised levels of oxytocin promote monogamy between partners.

With Valentine’s Day quickly approaching, the spotlight turns to the romantic gestures couples make towards one another. Fisher explains that, based on the chemistry of attraction, these gestures aren’t so crazy after all.

“No wonder lovers talk all night or walk till dawn, write extravagant poetry and self-revealing emails, or cross continents or oceans […] for just a weekend,” Fisher said. “Drenched in chemicals that bestow focus, stamina, and vigor […] lovers succumb to a Herculean courting urge.”

a, Student Life

Social media: both blessing and curse for the lonely

by Laura Hanrahan on

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From Facebook to Instagram to the multitude of dating websites, we live in a digital age where speaking to someone or finding out what they’re up to is just a click away. Social media platforms are built on the premise of being able to instantly connect with others—to share our thoughts and experiences instantaneously. But how does our reliance on technology affect loneliness?

According to a 2009 study from Kent University and Michigan State University, people dealing with feelings of loneliness are more likely to turn to these virtual forms of communications. For example, they view sending a text message as “less risky and easier than face-to-face communication.”

Jui Ramaprasad, a McGill Management professor specializing in online communities, said the ease of virtual communication is a main driver for people seeking online dating forums, such as Tinder and OkCupid.

“The boundaries you see offline aren’t necessarily there online,” Ramaprasad says. “You can just pick up your phone and decide ‘I’m going to date right now.’ It gives an opportunity to people who are less inclined to be social in a traditional sense.”

From this point of view, social media seems like a perfectly simple solution to a rather commonplace problem, but ironically, study after study has come to the same unexpected conclusion: social media facilitates loneliness. Current research indicates that it may do so in two ways.

Firstly, the 2009 study showed that lonelier people are at a higher risk of developing compulsive internet-use behaviours—the inability to display self-restraint with online media use. These behaviours often lead to deficits in aspects of life—whether it is in work, school, or social life. Rather than relieving the original isolation, however, compulsive internet-use can escalate the problem, leading to even more loneliness.

“The increased problems might drive them to rely more on their favourite online activity as a means to diminish or escape their augmented troubles, which could isolate them and increase loneliness more,” the researchers state in the study.

Secondly, what people post online is a very small, hand-selected snapshot of their actual life.

“I can see it having a bad side for some if you don’t recognize that people put the best parts of their lives up, and it’s not always the most accurate,” McGill U2 Arts student Breanna Morris says.

Users of social media can think through a post or perfect an image before sharing with their social circle. As a result, viewers of these posts may come to the conclusion that other people’s lives are much more exciting and glamorous than their own.  While this way of thinking can have a negative impact on self-image in general, it is even more detrimental to those who are already dealing with insecurities and feelings of disconnectedness.

“It enhances the way I perceive other’s lives,” Ben Turner, U1 Arts, says. “I think social media makes me believe people are cooler and loving life more than they actually are.”

This same selective infromation sharing may not only glamourize their peers’ lives; it may also drive a wedge between individuals and their peers.

“I think people tend to hate on people that only post positive […] and perfect things because it makes them jealous, thinking that other people’s lives are so much better than their own,” Morris says.

At the end of the day, technology can result in a vicious cycle of secluded people trying to connect through social media, which can increase their loneliness and further increase their social media use. This digitized world can be both a blessing and a curse, but it is by no means a substitute for human interaction.

“I find [social media] extremely useful for reaching groups of people, and for easily keeping in touch with long-distance friends,” Turner says. “Social media is definitely necessary, but I can’t live without real conversations.”

 

a, Arts & Entertainment

The elite eight: Karen Russell’s short story collection shines

by Zoe Hoskin on

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Karen Russell’s new book of stories titled Vampires in the Lemon Grove, published in February 2013, is preceded by a slew of positive reviews and awards from her past publications. With Vampires, Russell once again demonstrates her drive to challenge herself and push the boundaries of her prose and genre.

For her first set of stories, St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves (2006), Russell was named one of the National Book Foundation’s top “5 under 35” in 2009, and won the Bard Fiction Prize in 2011. However, it was her debut novel, Swamplandia! (2011)—for which she became a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2012—that secured her reputation as a master of prose and a moving storyteller. When  the Chicago Tribune asked her about the influence of literary awards on her work, Russell humbly replied, “I think it’s good to be held to a really high standard. It’s wonderful to have this impetus to do good work and feel challenged to push into new frontiers.”

In this collection of eight unified stories, Russell inhabits diverse human and animal perspectives from around the world. She writes these characters with a level of cultural detail that a reader couldn’t possibly verify without travelling to these distant countries, boarding with a local family, and maybe spending a decade in each one.

In addition to her rich settings and personae, Russell’s prose begs to be read slowly and enjoyed; her language contains all the poetry and mysticism of a haiku. In each sentence, words are arranged in inventive ways so that magic seems to ooze from the cracks between the real and the solid.

Likewise, her plots and story set-ups tend to combine realistic problems with streaks of magical intervention. One may reasonably wonder how Russell is able to so fully imagine and transmit the visceral experience of transforming from a young girl into an enslaved worm in a Japanese silk factory, as she does in “Reeling for the Empire.”

With empathic grace, Russell lights up her stories using international, cross-gender, and cross-species experiences tied together by the thread of forgiveness from past guilt. Russell is an expert at targeting pivotal moments in her characters’ emotional evolution and colouring them, pushing them to tension until they buzz. She ends each story with a single sentence that provokes multiple questions inside the reader’s head: What is freedom? What are we bound by? Are we defined by our pasts? Whom and what do we live for?

Russell plots her animals in the trajectory of guilt and forgiveness. In almost every story, the animal’s characteristics cause it guilt yet, when seen in a different light, they allow the animal to free itself through forgiveness. In the opening story “Vampires in the Lemon Grove,” an ancient immortal vampire bat regrets his blood-drinking youth; and after discovering that he does not need blood, he instead goes to live off of a lemon grove in Italy. In another story, the former American presidents have become horses that are trapped in a pen (possibly in heaven) but can jump over the low fence once they are mentally strong enough. Russell’s collection of stories is unified through themes of guilt and transformation, and animal symbolism.

With her final story, “The Graveless Doll of Eric Mutis,” the Florida-born Russell roots herself in the North American literary tradition alongside writers like Toni Morrison and Margaret Atwood, who explore memories of childhood bullying to take an unabashed look at guilt and repentance. In this piece, schoolboy Larry Rubio teases, shames, and beats up another student, Eric Mutis, who is “paler than a cauliflower” and has a questionable home environment. The final image is of Rubio’s effigy of Mutis, “Mutant,” made of a found scarecrow and a pet shop white rabbit. Rubio looms over the makeshift shrine and concludes, “Somewhere I think I must still be standing, just like that.”

By the end of the collection, Russell has melted her imaginative tales into a wonder that crosses from her fiction into the reader’s world. The things that are identified as magical in her book translate to the invisible, emotional forces of memory and transformation, guilt and forgiveness. As promised, Russell extends her prose and genre to create an imaginative collection of short stories in which creativity meets empathy.

a, Opinion

“Triple-E” Senate: Equal, but elected in error

by Tim Logan on

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On a class trip in high school, I became one of the relatively few people in Canadian history to sit at a Senator’s desk. From the wood-and-leather chair, I admired the richly-adorned chamber that the media often calls useless and old-fashioned. As my  final year of high school progressed, the more politically-inclined among us started throwing around the buzzword of Senate reform advocates in Canada: “Triple-E,” which stands for equal, elected, and effective.

To most people—save perhaps those from Quebec and Ontario—the Senate’s current composition is manifestly silly. British Columbia, with a population of over 4 million, has six Senators, while Nova Scotia’s 10 Senators represent fewer than one million. New Brunswick also has 10 Senators, but a population of only 750,000 people. The current scheme of representation, fairly appropriate in 1867, has over time evolved into a haphazard mixture of representation by region and representation by population, resulting in serious asymmetry between regions. Given that representation in the House of Commons is allocated by population, it seems logical that Senate seats be allocated equally between regions. There are 105 seats in the Senate; we could, for example, give each province and territory eight, filling 104 seats, and the last could remain vacant or be removed.

Past equality, however, Triple-E has little merit: an effective Senate and an elected Senate are in direct opposition.

An effective Senate fulfills four roles: debate, regional representation, protection from tyranny, and investigation. First and foremost, the Senate was conceived as a body of “sober second thought”—insulated from majority dictates and populist currents, it debates without time limits and passes, amends, or rejects legislation only after careful consideration of its costs, benefits, and consequences.

Second, it represents regional interests in federal matters. This role has been severely weakened, and is in real need of reform.

Third, the Senate’s legislative oversight protects against the potential tyranny of a prime minister with a majority government, who could otherwise rule unopposed. This power is even more important today, given the massive centralization of power in the prime minister’s office over the past eight years.

The Senate’s fourth role is to investigate and inform government policy. In this, it has been especially effective, leading some to call it “Canada’s best think-tank.” Its luxury of time allows for thorough research and expert witnesses, while the lack of usual partisan bickering means that Senate Commissions stay focused and make recommendations based on evidence and sound reasoning.

Elections would interfere with all of these roles by removing the insulation the Senate requires—the party politics of elections replace debate and regionality with partisan rhetoric, oversight with overlook, and research with selective hearing. At best, the Senate would become distracted by the next campaign. At worst, it could devolve into a dysfunctional den of division and obstinance, as in the United States.

Longer terms of office could offset this but still end in a year-and-a-half of diminished function in the run-up to voting day. Rotating eligibility—also seen in the U.S.—compounds the problem by ensuring that some part of the Senate is busy campaigning instead of doing its job at any given time. Life terms sidestep this problem but lock in the partisanship of elections.

Many today complain about partisan hacks being appointed to the Senate—but are elections really going to make this better? Or, given the growing polarization of Canadian party politics, are they more likely to result in a divided Senate incapable of anything approaching cooperation?

Critics of Senate appointments come from two schools: those who don’t like appointment and those who don’t like the appointees. The first school results in less-effective government, which I don’t particularly care for. Nor are elections the answer to the second school, since party machines are unlikely to support anyone not a party loyalist. But here’s one possible solution: make membership in the Order of Canada a requirement for new appointees. Who better to fill our upper chamber than those who exemplify the motto “They desire a better country”? The selection committee is apolitical, and the inductees have shown their capability and drive. I can think of no group more qualified or better-suited.

In Canada’s appointed Senate we can have convenient insulation from popular whim and pointless partisanship, something we should not abandon lightly. An elected Senate would be far from an improvement.

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