What kind of campus do we want?A university offers classes, funds research and grants degrees. A campus is the culture that binds that place together, making it more than just a stepping-stone to a career. The most vibrant campuses, those that make a university more than simply the sum of its parts, are those where students lead what happens outside of class. Where they take charge and organize events. Where those with a project and passion can do just about anything.

But to make UBC that sort of campus, we need to have the means to do so.

That’s the choice you face this week when you vote in the referendum. There are ques-tions on the U-Pass—which obviously need to be extended—and other questions on bylaw changes and tuition policies for the AMS. But the main question is changing the student fee structure. It would raise fees by $5 for full-time students and $19 for those that opt out of the health care plan.

We urge you to vote yes.

The AMS’s membership fee of $12.50 is the lowest in Canada for any university over 20,000 students. Almost no other school comes close. It’s a fee that hasn’t changed since 1982.

And when UBC was still expanding, and your student union had a near-monopoly on food and catering services, this was fine. They piled up profits year after year from their businesses, which in turn made low mandatory fees financially feasible.

Those days are long gone. The AMS ran a six-figure deficit last year, will run another this year, and is cutting services to the bone. Voting yes would take their fee to $21—and take your student union out of financial crisis.

It may seem like a lot, but three years ago, students decided they wanted a better campus when they voted to fund a new $110 million Student Union Building. That building will be ready in September 2014, but will the group running it be able to offer more than just minimum services inside of it?

Your student union isn’t perfect. You only have to glance at our front pages to see that. They aren’t asking for money they want, though—they’re asking for money they need. Without this increase, they’re going be less and less effective in advocating for students, administrating services and overseeing clubs.

This fee increase isn’t just about empowering the AMS. It’s about empowering students to do more.

Voting yes gives clubs access to an annual $70,000 pool of money, and if you’ve ever been part of a campus club, you know that a little money goes a long way. This fund would be there for you.

Voting yes creates a $100,000 sustainability fund, the same type that exists at UVic, SFU, Queen’s and McGill, allowing even one student with an idea the chance to make our campus a more sustainable place in a direct way.

Voting yes transfers $1 from every student to a childcare endowment fund, supporting student-parents by creating quality, affordable spaces right here at UBC.

Voting yes means more affordable tutoring from AMS Services, free DJ lessons from CiTR, and 24/7 news reporting from The Ubyssey.

And voting yes means that we are taking an active step in shaping this university by directly funding organizations and ideas that we believe are important.

All this, for $5. Even if you opt out of the health plan and pay $19, it’s still a good deal, and a deal we badly need.

Without it, building the new SUB will putter along and students will still come together to put on events. Life will go on per usual.

But this week, you can make a choice for change.

There are times where UBC students have risen up to shape our campus—saving the UBC Farm, building the new SUB, funding construction of War Memorial Gym, even convincing the government to start construction on the Point Grey campus in 1924. This week could be one of those times.

Let’s make this happen. U

The

Uby

ssey

UYesVo

te

on the fee question

2 / U b y s s e y. c a / e v e n T s / 2 011 . 0 3 . 0 7

Canada Post Sales Agreement

#0040878022

march 07, 2011volume xcii, no xxxix

editorial

coordinating editor Justin McElroy : coordinating@ubyssey.canews editor Arshy Mann : news@ubyssey.caassistant news editorKalyeena Makortoff : kmakortoff@ubyssey.casenior news writer Micki Cowan : mcowan@ubyssey.caculture editorsJonny Wakefield & Bryce Warnes : culture@ubyssey.casenior culture writerGinny Monaco : gmonaco@ubyssey.caculture illustratorIndiana Joel : ijoel@ubyssey.casports editor Marie Vondracek : sports@ubyssey.cafeatures editorTrevor Record : features@ubyssey.caphoto editorGeoff Lister : photos@ubyssey.caproduction manager Virginie Ménard : production@ubyssey.cacopy editor Kai Green : copy@ubyssey.camultimedia editorTara Martellaro : multimedia@ubyssey.caassociate multimedia editorStephanie Warren : associate.multimedia@ubyssey.cavideo editorDavid Marino : video@ubyssey.cawebmasterJeff Blake : webmaster@ubyssey.ca

Room 24, Student Union Building6138 Student Union BoulevardVancouver, BC V6T 1Z1tel: 604.822.2301web: www.ubyssey.cae-mail: feedback@ubyssey.ca

business

Room 23, Student Union Buildingprint advertising: 604.822.1654 business office: 604.822.6681web advertising: 604.822.1658e-mail: advertising@ubyssey.ca

business managerFernie Pereira : business@ubyssey.caprint ad salesKathy Yan Li : advertising@ubyssey.caweb ad salesPaul Bucci : webads@ubyssey.caaccountsAlex Hoopes : accounts@ubyssey,ca

contributors

Karina Palmitesta Kait BolongaroWill MacDonald Dylan WallNick Frank Amelia RajalaMike Dickson Drake FentonJon Chiang Ragnahild Marie ValstadDavid Elop Richard LamChris Borchert

Front cover graphic by Paul Bucci

legal

The Ubyssey is the official student newspaper of the University of British Columbia. It is published every Monday and Thursday by The Ubyssey Publi-cations Society. We are an autonomous, democrat-ically run student organization, and all students are encouraged to participate.

Editorials are chosen and written by the Ubys-sey staff. They are the expressed opinion of the staff, and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Ubyssey Publications Society or the Universi-ty of British Columbia. All editorial content appear-ing in The Ubyssey is the property of The Ubyssey Publications Society. Stories, opinions, photographs and artwork contained herein cannot be reproduced without the expressed, written permission of The Ubyssey Publications Society.

The Ubyssey is a founding member of Canadian University Press (CUP) and adheres to CUP’s guid-ing principles.

Letters to the editor must be under 300 words. Please include your phone number, student number and signature (not for publication) as well as your year and faculty with all submissions. ID will be checked when submissions are dropped off at the editorial office of The Ubyssey; otherwise verifica-tion will be done by phone. “Perspectives” are opin-ion pieces over 300 words but under 750 words and are run according to space. “Freestyles” are opinion pieces written by Ubyssey staff members. Priority will be given to letters and perspectives over free-styles unless the latter is time sensitive. Opinion pieces will not be run until the identity of the writ-er has been verified. The Ubyssey reserves the right to edit submissions for length and clarity. All letters must be received by 12 noon the day before intend-ed publication. Letters received after this point will be published in the following issue unless there is an urgent time restriction or other matter deemed relevant by the Ubyssey staff.

It is agreed by all persons placing display or clas-sified advertising that if the Ubyssey Publications Society fails to publish an advertisement or if an error in the ad occurs the liability of the UPS will not be greater than the price paid for the ad. The UPS shall not be responsible for slight changes or typographical errors that do not lessen the value or the impact of the ad.

events

Send us your events on Wednesdays and Sundays before noon! That’s the deadline!

events@ubyssey.ca

Utheubyssey.ca

ClASSifiedFound: Black iPod Video near SWNG Building. Contact Daniel at macho_man_dan@hotmail.com to identify.

ongoing events

Ubyssey Production • Come help us create this baby! Learn about layout and editing. Expect to be fed. • Every Sunday and Wednesday, 2pm.

resource grouPs • Are you working on a progressive project, but need funding? Do you have an idea, but can’t get it off the ground? Apply to the Resource Groups for funding! Come in, pitch your idea to us and we will consider fully or partially funding your project. • Every Monday, 11am in SUB 245 (second floor, north-east corner). For more info email resourcegroups.ams@gmail.com.

monday, mar. 7

citr radio volunteer orientation • Interested in getting involved with CiTR? Swing by our monthly volunteer orientation session. It’s a chance for you to learn about what’s going on for volunteers at CiTR, and get to know people in-volved with the station. • 6:30–7:30pm, CiTR Lounge, Room 233, SUB. For more info, email Andrew at volunteer@citr.ca.

ubc beads and craFts Fundrais-ing sale • The UBC Beads and Crafts Club is holding a fundrais-ing sale with large bouquets of foam roses, cute sushi cell phone straps and a large choice of ear-rings. You can even customize your own earrings! • Mar. 7–8, 10am–4pm, SUB, in front of Blue Chip Cookies. Go to ubcbead-sandcrafts.com for more info.

tuesday, mar. 8

uniceF ubc: casino royale • Unicef UBC and Deke are hosting their charity event, “Casino Royale.” There will be poker, blackjack and a cash bar. All of the pro-ceeds will go to the Pakistan Re-lief Fund. • 6–11pm, UBC Global Lounge, email unicef.ubc.ams@gmail.com for more information.

wednesday, mar. 9

coastal First nations dance Fes-tival • This festival highlights the richness and diversity of tradi-tional First Nations dance groups from coastal BC through public performances, ticketed events and special school programs. • Runs until Mar 13, 10am–5pm, Museum of Anthropol-ogy, $14/$12 + HST. For a full schedule of events, please vis-it moa.ubc.ca/events or contact (604) 822-5978 or programs@moa.ubc.ca.

ubc Film societ y screening: tangled • The UBC Film Soci-ety will be showing Tangled, the latest film from Disney. The magically long-haired Ra-punzel has spent her entire life in a tower, but now that a run-away thief has stumbled upon her, she is about to discover the world for the first time, and who she really is. • Runs un-til Mar 13, 7–9pm, Norm The-atre, SUB. $2.50 members, $5 non-members.

roommate meet uP • Moving off-campus next year? Still looking for that perfect room-mate? Speed Renting and UBC Residence Life are pleased to offer UBC students a unique and personalized roommate meet-up event. These events offer an informal, relaxed atmo-sphere where you have the op-portunity to meet and mingle

with fellow students! Free food and refreshments provided. • 5:30–7pm, Marine Drive Resi-dence Commonsblock, $8 en-trance fee.

thursday, mar. 10

hungry 4 change • Oxfam UBC presents Hungry 4 Change, an annual dinner organized and hosted by UBC students that gathers together the commu-nity for a taste of the reality of food distribution inequality. Featuring speakers from Ox-fam Canada as well as a spe-cial guest. • 6:30pm, Heritage Hall, 3102 Main St, $25, $15 for students. For tickets, visit ox-famubc.rezgo.com or email ox-famubc.h4c@gmail.com.

issues on reFugee he alth • STAND UBC is hosting an ex-citing upcoming event, “Issues on Refugee Health,” a presen-tation and discussion on the health of refugees in Darfur. This seminar will also feature guest speaker and Sudanese refugee Abit Adit Elizabeth. It will open with an introduction on the health situation of Dar-fur, followed by a case study on the impact of the forced re-moval of humanitarian workers. • 5–6pm, Global Lounge, Ma-rine Drive Bldg 1, free.

Friday, mar. 11

ubc Film societ y screening: CHROnICles OF naRnIa: VOyage OF tHe daWn tReadeR • The UBC Film Society will be showing The Chronicles of Narnia: Voy-age of the Dawn Treader, the third film in the Narnia series. Lucy and Edmund Pevensie re-turn to Narnia with their cousin Eustace, where they meet up with Prince Caspian for a trip across the sea aboard the royal ship The Dawn Treader. Along

the way they encounter dragons, dwarves, merfolk and a band of lost warriors before reaching the edge of the world. • Runs un-til Mar. 13, 9–11pm, Norm The-atre, SUB. $2.50 members, $5 non-members.

cultural night • The Liu Insti-tute will be hosting a cultural night with the Africa Aware-ness Initiative, showcasing cul-tures from around the world with an emphasis on Africa. Bring traditional dishes! If you bring a dish for 7-8 people, you get in free. • 6–8:30pm, Liu In-stitute for Global Issues, $10 non-members, $7 members, $5 VIP members.

saturday, mar. 12

amnest y international ubc conFerence • Amnesty Inter-national UBC is hosting their conference, “When is a De-mocracy not a Democracy?” This small scale conference provides the perfect environ-ment for discussion and net-working amongst students, professors, speakers and oth-er members of the communi-ty. Dress code is business ca-sual. • 1:30–6:30pm, Lillooet Room (301), Chapman Learn-ing Centre, Irving K Barber. Or-der tickets via eventbrite.com.

hugh masekela • The Indepen-dent legendary South African trumpeter Hugh Masekela is an innovator in the world mu-sic and jazz scene and is ac-tive as a performer, compos-er, producer and activist. His tour in support of his latest album, Phola, brings him (on flugelhorn) to UBC, where he will combine with five other superb South African musi-cians to explore his incredi-ble musical history. • 8pm, Chan Centre, $55.25–$73.25.

2 0 1 1 . 0 3 . 0 7 / U b y s s e y . c a / n e w s / 3

News editor ARSHY MANN » news@ubyssey.ca assistant editor KALYEENA MAKORTOFF » kmakortoff@ubyssey.ca

senior writer MICKI COWAN » mcowan@ubyssey.ca

arshy mannnews@ubyssey.ca

The Province has made chang-es to laws surrounding Special Occasion Licenses (SOLs) which are certain to have a large im-pact on the way liquor laws are enforced at UBC.

An SOL is a license that is giv-en to any group that wants to hold either a private or a public event that will be serving alco-hol. Therefore, any campus par-ty that is not held in a licensed premise such as the Pit or Ko-erner’s must have an SOL.

According to a press release from the liquor control branch of the Ministry of Public Safety, SOL holders will be subject to the same enforcement penalties as permanent license holders such as bars and restaurants.

This means that instead of the event simply being closed down if it’s found to be violating liquor laws, the group running the event can be fined between $5000 and $10,000—much more than most clubs or undergradu-ate societies can afford.

“It certainly puts a lot more onus on the person that’s tak-ing them out to make sure ev-erything is complied with,” said Staff Sergeant Kevin Kenna, the head of the university division of the RCMP.

However, the AMS is legally liable for all clubs and under-graduate societies, which make up a large portion of SOLs ap-plied for on campus.

“All clubs and organizations on campus are legally under the umbrella of the AMS, so as an organization we take liabil-ity for SOLs,” said AMS Presi-dent Jeremy McElroy.

He went on to say that the AMS is currently meeting with their lawyers, the university and the RCMP to figure out the implications of this new legisla-tion. They hope to come to a con-clusion by the end of the week.

McElroy said that the AMS was only informed about the changes two weeks ago, despite the fact that the Ministry of Public Safety sent a letter to UBC in November regarding the new legislation.

“[We’re] quite frustrated with the lack of communication here, both between the liquor board and UBC, the liquor Board and the AMS, as well as UBC and the AMS,” said McElroy.

The AMS has yet to inform clubs and constituencies about the changes, but will do so af-ter the legal implications are made clear.

According to Kenna, a l -though the new legislation is much stricter, there have been very few SOL violations over the past few months.

“It’s been some time since we’ve had any [violations] of any significance and we check a lot of places,” he said. “For the most part, most of them have been pretty damn good about it.”

Kenna said that the RCMP will continue to have discre-t ion in implement ing t his new legislation and approach each situation on a case-by-case basis.

He went on to say that the new laws will go into effect immedi-ately. U

Liquor law changes mean massive fines for violators

An open keg may become a very rare thing on this campus. geoFF lister Photo illustration/THE UBYSSEY

micki cowanmcowan@ubyssey.ca

After successfully getting 1200 student signatures within only a few hours, a new question will be added to this week’s refer-endum—”Do you think that the AMS should lobby for lower tu-ition for domestic and interna-tional students?”

Ashley Zarbatany is one of the students who were gather-ing the necessary signatures to qualify the question for the ballot. An active member of the Social Justice Centre, she said that lowering tuition should be a priority for the AMS.

“[Students] are too busy jug-gling all the demands of having student loans and having work, so they can’t go out and protest and lobby for themselves. They obviously want an AMS that will do that for them.”

But AMS President Jeremy McElroy said that voting yes for the question won’t directly af-fect the AMS’s decision-making.

“Students aren’t voting on a policy. They’re voting on a ques-tion that will ultimately shape policy,” he said.

“It’s just a question. Whether it passes, fails, meets the quo-rum threshold or not, it’s an indication to the AMS of what

students ultimately want them to do. At that point it’s up to Council to revisit its policy on tuition, and essentially just to have that conversation.”

McElroy feels the question is more about semantics, as the AMS has already been lobby-ing for lower tuition.

“We’ve been advocating fed-erally,” said McElroy. “We’ve had an advocacy arm for in-creased access and more af-fordable education. We’re al-ways lobbying for [lower tu-ition], whether explicit ly or implicitly.”

However, former AMS Pres-ident Blake Frederick said

the referendum question is a chance to send a message to the government and university.

“We need to stand up in a unified voice and make it quite clear that we need financial re-lief,” he said. “It’s about send-ing a message to the student society, sending a message to the provincial government. There are roughly 46,000 stu-dents who attend UBC—that has a huge political impact when the government is making deci-sions around education policy.”

During his presidency, Fred-erick filed a human rights com-plaint to the United Nation about the cost of education.

He was subsequently censored by Council for acting without their consent and was nearly impeached.

Zarbatany said that students were enthusiastic to sign the petition.

“In a few hours we got over 1000 signatures,” she said.

“As soon as we said the words ‘lower tuition,’ every-one jumped on board. I talk-ed to about 450 students and maybe 30 of them were against it,” she said. “Everyone else, when they heard that they were shocked—’How could anyone be against it’—I’ve heard that multiple times.”

A similar question was sup-ported on the referendum bal-lot last year, but failed to meet quorum.

McElroy said the problem is not the AMS’s position on tuition, but that the current political climate is not recep-tive to reducing tuition due to “passing of the buck” between federal, provincial and univer-sity bureaucracies.

“Lobbying could be a phone cal l, a postcard, a letter, a march, a rally, an online cam-paign—but who do you direct it at?”

Frederick disagreed.“We can, if we want to, ef-

fectively convince the govern-ment to change their stance on higher education,” said Fred-erick. “We just need a student society that will step up to the plate and recognize that’s one of the most important things facing students today.” U

—With files from the AMS VP External Office

Referendum question brings tuition to forefront

201020001990198019701960195019401935

5000

4000

3000

2000

1000

0

Adjusted for inflation

Actual Dollars

The changes in tuition rates, both in nominal and real terms, since 1935. geoFF lister graPhic/THE UBYSSEY

AMS uncertain what effect changes will have on campus parties

4/Ubyssey.ca/naTional/2011.03.07

NatioNaleditor ARSHY MANN » news@ubyssey.ca

robyn travis & arshy mannnews@ubyssey.ca

The controversy surrounding UBC’s animal testing program is moving east to Kelowna.

Amidst an escalating activ-ist campaign against UBC’s an-imal testing program, a new care centre is under construc-tion at UBC’s Okanagan cam-pus. The In Vivo Research Fa-cility is being built in the base-ment of the Arts and Sciences II building and is scheduled to be open by September.

According to Scott Reid, a professor of biology at the Okan-agan campus and the acting fa-cility manager of In Vivo, the university wanted to keep the project low profile in order to protect the safety of the facili-ty and researchers from those opposed to animal research.

“The animal care facilities on any research campus are de-signed with a couple of things in mind; one is to ensure the health and safety of the ani-mals in the facility and also the health, safety and security of the people that work in the facility,” he said. “You normal-ly would not find such facilities labeled on any map, for the pro-tection of both those things.”

The construction of an ani-mal research facility must go through many processes, with all aspects being overlooked

by organizations such as the Canadian Council on Animal Care (CCAC).

Reid said that although it is not well known, animal re-search is already happening on the Okanagan campus.

“We have an existing animal care facility and we have stu-dents who work with animals at all levels. We have students who work with wildlife…ani-mals, just not in the research facility on campus.” According to Reid, the new facility’s con-struction is meant to meet the growing needs of this educa-tion and research experience.

Scott Macrae, director of UBC public affairs, could not be reached for comment before press time.

This growth of UBC’s animal testing capabilities comes at a time when the university is once again coming under fire for its research programs.

Last week, The Vancouver Sun ran an article detailing a re-search project that will see the killing of a number of endan-gered sea turtles.

“They were brought in for these experiments [at UBC] and as part of those experi-ments, it requires harvesting the tissues,” Bill Milsom, head of UBC’s zoology department, told the Sun.

“The final experiments re-quire major surgery,” he said.

They are necessary to “help us understand why these animals have such high mortality when caught in trawl nets in warm-ing oceans.”

The turtle experiments have garnered international atten-tion and were featured prom-inently in The Huffington Post.

Last December, UBC Pres-ident Stephen Toope told The Ubyssey that he isn’t concerned by the level of media attention that UBC’s animal research pro-gram is recieving

“Top universities around the world, in order to accomplish what they’re trying to [do] in re-search, sometimes have to use animals,” he said. “UBC is no different than a thousand uni-versities in that respect.

“Frankly, what tends to hap-pen with animal rights activ-ists is they go around and tar-get different institutions at dif-ferent times.

“It happens to be our time, but universities throughout the US and UK and Europe have all experienced this. Frankly, it’s nothing unusual, and I don’t think the university needs to overreact.

“I actually think the system is not broken, it functions ex-tremely well, it’s very rigorous and we’re meeting all of our ob-ligations, so I would simply say I don’t think there’s any need for further regulation.” U

Animal testing facility being built at Okanagan campusUniversity tight-lipped about project due to safety concerns

The location of the prospective In Vivo Research Facility. robyn travis Photo/THE PHOENIx

Bunnies chased off of University of Victoria campusdorian geiger & Jon-Paul ZachariasThe Martlet

VICTORIA (CUP) — The Uni-versity of Victoria will soon be rabbit-free.

Over the winter months, the campus’ rabbits have under-gone a noticeable population decline. In fact, the universi-ty reports that less than ten rabbits remain on campus to-day—quite a decline from the estimated population of 1400–1600 who called UVic home just a year ago.

The university’s grounds workers have been diligently working to capture the few elu-sive rabbits that remain. Pri-vate individuals have permits to remove and relocate the an-imals up until March 31.

Rabbits are Schedule C wild-life—invasive species—accord-ing to the Ministry of Environ-ment, and regulations prohib-it their relocation without per-mits, sterilization and fencing.

The two principal permit holders are Laura Leah Shaw, who facilitated the movement of about 285 rabbits to White-house, Texas, and Susan Vick-ery, who moved over 500 to her own property in Coombs, BC.

The first action to decrease numbers was a cull of 102 rab-bits in May 2010 after incidents of athletes twisting their an-kles in rabbit holes. According-ly, the cull sought to eliminate

all the rabbits in the athletic fields. No other parts of cam-pus were affected.

Many community members opposed the cul l, result ing in a local effort to relocate a large port ion of t he rab -bit populat ion. A plan was formed in June 2010 to move the rabbits off campus. UVic agreed to t rap the rabbits,

leaving the responsibilit ies of transport, sterilization and eventual housing to the per-mit holders.

Trapping began in Septem-ber 2010. Tom Smith, facili-ties management director at UVic, said the university want-ed to begin in the summer be-fore residence students be-came attached to the rabbits,

but legalities delayed the trap-ping until after classes had begun.

Before the trapping com-menced, Vickery made her pro-posal for relocating the rab-bits to her property, but stat-ed that she would only be able to do this if community sup-port existed.

“My first wish was for a trap-and-release plan,” said Vickery. Such a policy would have seen sterilized rabbits re-released on campus. “But the problem was creating the community pressure to push for this.”

The university initially of-fered potential support for a continuing rabbit population of about 200 on campus, and invited volunteers to manage such a population. The UVic communications website post-ed notices to this effect.

“But no one came forward,” Smith said.

Despite rumours to the con-trary, Smith said culls by the university administration did not occur prior to 2010.

“Never,” he said. “Garden-ers who found them… would capture them and then release them to the opposite side of campus, even though they usu-ally just came back.”

Support of rabbit removal also came from nearby resi-dents, who would sometimes call the administration and re-quest that rabbits be removed from their yards.

The university’s communi-cat ion’s website now states that any rabbits found on cam-pus after February 28 will be euthanized.

“Well, we’re going to use common sense,” said Smith, including not killing any baby rabbits that are emerging from their dens.

“The grounds staff know where all the remaining rab-bits are,” Smith said, adding that the plan is to have these rabbits relocated via permit holders.

Any new rabbits that appear, however—such as newly depos-ited pets—will be killed.

“We cannot be a pass-through for people who are abandoning pets,” said Smith.

A total of 927 rabbits, includ-ing the 102 that were killed, have been removed by the uni-versity administration.

“Initially, we’d catch up to 60 per day, and sometimes 3 at once,” said Smith.

As the rabbits became less numerous, as few as two were caught in one day. Smith be-lieves the remaining 400-600 were killed by predators.

Smith said the rabbits will never return to campus. Part of the reason is their presence on campus, as invasive spe-cies, was always technically illegal, he said.

“If people bring rabbits here again, we’ll have no choice but to kill them,” he said. “And that’s what we want to avoid at all costs.”

Poor, poor bunny. gemma karstens-smith Photo/THE MARTLET

2011.03.07/Ubyssey.ca/adverTisemenT/5

6/ U bys sey.c a /c U lT U r e /2 011. 03. 07

culture editors BRYCE WARNES & JONNY WAKEFIELD » culture@ubyssey.casenior writer GINNY MONACO » gmonaco@ubyssey.ca

illustrator INDIANA JOEL » ijoel@ubyssey.ca

bryce warnescul ture@ubyssey.ca

I am not the caviest of men. There are few benefits of liv-ing in a civilized society that I could go without. Roads? Essen-tial. Electricity? A must-have. HBO? Couldn’t live without it.

So the paleo diet didn’t seem like an obvious fit for me. It tries to emulate the nutrition-al intake of humans before the invention of agriculture. Just thinking about the fact that agriculture had to be invent-ed rearranged my perspective on food. Grains, dairy, sugar, legumes and the sweeter va-rieties of fruit are all parts of my daily diet that originated 12,000 years ago with some dudes near the Tigris and Eu-phrates figuring out how seeds worked. Suddenly, Breaking Bad seemed less fundamen-tal to my way of life.

I’d gotten into the habit of grabbing lunch or dinner at work or between classes, usu-ally something from the Delly or another SUB food outlet. But the kinds of food I could grab on the go don’t fit into hunter-gatherer feeding habits, so I started pre-paring food every night for the day to come. I might make a cou-ple of hamburger patties to put in the fridge, which I could fry in the morning and take for lunch, plus a salad of spinach and toma-toes and an avocado (Tomatoes are a no-go, say some paleo-di-eters, because they’re from the New World and wouldn’t have

been available to our ancestors. I say they’re Eurocentric). Avo-cados were a godsend: porta-ble pockets of complex fat that didn’t need to be cooked. I’d never been a fan of the fruit outside guacamole, but that changed over the course of this experiment.

Early in the week I slow-cooked a pork shoulder and roasted some carrots and beets. That chunk of pig kept me going for three days, serving either as lunch, dinner or both. Fat gives meat a lot of its flavour, but I’d never actually made a point of eating it as a source of energy. With most of my calories com-ing from animal protein and the

few carbohydrates I could eke out of root vegetables, I began going out of my way to eat the squishy white bits of the animal.

I’d feel full for about half an hour after eating a plate of eggs, a slab of pork roast or a couple of hamburger patties; after that, though, I’d be han-kering for something else to eat. The greatest change I no-ticed from this diet was the way my blood sugar stabilized. Following my regular eating habits, I tend to spike violent-ly—maybe a little hypoglyce-mically—between stuffed and starved, with little room in be-tween. With the paleo diet, I was faintly hungry most of the

time, but not in a way that was distracting or sapped my ener-gy. According to a July 2010 ar-ticle from the Globe and Mail, the first two weeks on a paleo diet are the most uncomfort-able, after which point appe-tite begins to wane and it be-comes comfortable to go long periods without eating. Since this experiment fell well with-in that time limit, I can’t speak for the long-term effects of a caveman diet.

Also, you’re not supposed to drink alcohol when you’re on the paleo diet. I gave up on that part early on. You’d be amazed by how much a few shots of vod-ka can make you not care about abstaining from sandwiches. Avoiding booze is supposed to be better for your health, but teetotalling has ulterior bene-fits. When you’ve been drink-ing, it’s easier to bend the rules. I ruined my almost flawless re-cord by sneaking a bag of Dori-tos while having beers at the Pit.

Paleo is the Fight Club of di-ets. Nutritional theories aside, most of its appeal is built on the fact that it harkens back to a mythical proto-masculinity that revolves around physical mas-tery of one’s environment and killing things with sticks. Even the most devoted paleo disci-ples are buying their grass-fed hormone-free heirloom beef products from Whole Foods or enviro-conscious butchers, and kicking it with their cave-pals at the local CrossFit gym rath-er than crouching around a fire

ringed by the shining eyes of predatory animals.

The reported effects of the pa-leo diet are subjective at best, and there’s no evidence that it benefits a human’s health in the long-run. Cutting refined sug-ars and processed food from your diet and limiting your in-take of starches while exercis-ing on at least a semi-regular basis is bound to have positive effects on your health. You’ll probably lose weight, too. But a radical change in “lifestyle” isn’t necessarily, well, neces-sary. If you’re really attached to the idea of a pre-agricultur-al lifestyle, you could try chas-ing down a young deer and blud-geoning it to death with a sharp rock, living in a tent made of hides and dying of a nosebleed at the age of 24. Personally, I’d rather just avoid eating junk food and go for a run once and a while. That’s the civilized way to go about it. U

Keeping up with the Flintstones

Pork shoulder generally tastes better than it looks. david marino Photo/THE UBYSSEY

Judging CiTR’s new vinyl comp by its coverginny monacogmonaco@ubyssey.ca

It began as a clandestine meet-ing at Dairy Queen.

On Februrary 24, CiTR and Mint Records released Pop Alli-ance Compilation, a vinyl collec-tion of Vancouver indie bands. Work on the project started last July as a discussion between Dun-can McHugh and Shena Yoshida over Blizzards.

“The vinyl was ... unique,” says McHugh, host of CiTR’s Duncan’s Donuts. “It’s been a long-time dream of CiTR record nerds to try and put out a record, but it’s quite expensive. [Mint] had some funding and so they bankrolled the whole thing. They said, ‘You guys pick the bands and we’ll take care of the expenses.’”

The final selection includes Fine Mist, No Kids and Slam Dunk, groups that can often be heard on McHugh’s show. “The whole idea was that there is a tremendous metal scene in Vancouver, there’s a great noise scene, a great hardcore scene. There’s so many bands doing all sorts of niches that we want to fo-cus on pop.”

There is no doubt that the vi-nyl record as a medium is expe-riencing a resurgence. McHugh feels it is more than an Urban Outfitters novelty. “There’s a warmth to records that you don’t get any other way. There’s just a permanence to putting some-thing on vinyl that doesn’t exist in any other format.

“Music fans are flocking to it and it’s not because it’s easy to walk around with records. You have to want to own a record to buy one.”

A large part of McHugh’s love of the record format is the art-work and, coincidentally, that’s where Pop Alliance Compilation has drawn the most criticism. David Barclay’s cover art features an appropriation of the Ellen Neel Kwakiutl totem pole out-side Brock Hall. The image is su-perimposed with the likeness-es of Dan Behar, Tim Hecker, Nardwuar and other notable fig-ures from Vancouver’s musical community.

Each copy of the record in-cludes Barclay’s artist state-ment, which begins, “For over 50 years, ‘college rock’ has been dominated by an elitist cultural

lexicon, reinforced by the insti-tutionalized racism of the post-secondary education system in Canada and the US.”

Barclay goes on to speak of CiTR’s support for “unlikely ar-tistic voices that have become iconic local anti-corporate, an-ti-racist figures.” The statement then suggests to people, “Contact

the UBC President Stephen J. Toope about the university’s di-versity, land use and artifact re-appropriation.”

As to the criticism, McHugh says, “They’re entitled to their opin-ions. I stand by the art. I certainly had hesitations about using that symbol but he convinced me it was a worthwhile use of it.” U

ragnahild marie valstad Photo/THE UBYSSEY

SerieS

muSic

Paleo staPles

Unprocessed meat

Seeds

Avocados

Spinach

Part two of our series on lifestyle eating: the paleo diet

“Representing the CiTR community as a Northwest Coast-style totem pole...is a deliberate combination of both the uneasiness and the splendor of the station’s contemporary cultural history. CiTR has encouraged and supported unlikely artistic voices that have become iconic local anti-corporate, anti-racist figures (Joey Shithead) and important songwriters and musical innovators (Dan Bejar)...”

a r t is t ’s s tat e men t, dav id barclay

2 011. 03. 07/ U bys sey.c a /c U lT U r e /7

Radio station banned from BC universityVancouver Island University says rowdy party was enough to give station the boot

danielle PoPe CUP Wes te rn Bu reau Ch ie f

VICTORIA (CUP) — One Brit-ish Columbia university has received a lot of static as of late after its student radio sta-tion was banned from hosting events on campus.

Radio Malaspina Society (RMS), known in Nanaimo as CHLY 101.7 FM, was recently banned from campus for host-ing a party last October that resulted in “the destruction of property, trespassing, ille-gal alcohol and drug use, dis-respecting security and gen-eral debauchery,” according to Vancouver Island Univer-sity officials.

On December 8, Ric Kelm, VIU infrastructure and ancil-lary services executive direc-tor, sent the station an offi-cial letter saying they would be banned from campus for one year, with the organiza-tion’s standing on campus un-der review.

“Radio Malaspina was is-sued written requirements, verbally and via email, regard-ing expected conduct at this event,” Kelm said in the letter. “The signature on the contract indicates that expected con-duct and behaviour were made aware to all parties involved.”

Because RMS operates at an off-campus office, the sta-tion is not being physically re-moved from any on-campus facility. Still, the inability to host student events could se-verely impact the station in a number of ways—namely, the ability to draw their needed 60 per cent student represen-tation on the RMS board of di-rectors, which would breach the BC Society Act and possi-bly jeopardize the station’s li-cense to broadcast with the Ca-nadian Radio-Television Tele-communications Commission.

Simon Schachner, president of the RMS board of directors, thinks the university is being heavy-handed with the issue and that many of the prob-lems have stemmed from a lack of clarity surrounding the incident in question.

He a lso says t he nature of such an event—a Hallow-een dance that was approved by VIU officials to run until 4am—should have been an in-dicator to the university that rowdy behaviour was possi-ble and that people may con-sume alcohol before coming to such an event.

“It seems like the univer-sity was not prepared to host an event like this on campus, which is a learning experience for all of us,” said Schachner. “We do understand their con-cerns, and we’ve learned that their space is not appropriate for nightt ime events. But I think it would be more appro-priate to say, ‘No more night events’ than to ban us from campus altogether.”

In addition to the October party, the radio station also hosts day t ime communit y concerts, DJ and film show-cases, sponsor and fundrais-ing events and student-par-ticipation activities, all tra-dit iona l ly on campus. The station also offers students a chance to get involved with broadcast radio and even host their own shows.

Toni O’Keeffe, communica-tions director for the univer-sity, maintained that because the event was approved as a no-alcohol activity, station mem-bers both broke and disregard-ed their agreement.

“We have many third-party organizations use our facili-ties, and never before have we seen our property left in such a disarray,” said O’Keeffe. “We have verbal reports from staff and students saying the whole thing was a gong show.”

While VIU officials have list-ed the accounts against the sta-tion, when RMS asked the uni-versity to provide evidence for the allegations, the university refused to do so.

“We don’t have to prove to them this evidence was true,” said O’Keeffe. “It’s all right there, and we have testimoni-als from our staff and security.

“This is a private property, and they broke the agreement to use our property in a re-spectful manner. It’s their own actions that got them here.”

O’Keeffe says the ban is, in part, to take a stance against “inappropriate behaviour” the university does not agree with.

“We have a responsibility to rent our facilities to organi-zations and groups with like-minded values, and we don’t want to convey that we sup-port these destructive values,” O’Keeffe said.

She said the university does recognize the station’s value on campus and added that VIU officials have offered to meet with the station to fur-ther resolve the issue, though no meeting had occurred as of press time. She said removal of the ban will be based solely on the results of such a meet-ing and a declaration of good-wil l from RMS towards the university.

Steven Beasley, V IU stu-dents’ union executive direc-tor, said that while the radio station operates independent-ly of the students’ union, the students are taking a support-ive official stance.

“We support lifting the ban [on RMS] and believe they add something integral to the cam-pus and community,” said Bea-sley. “The university does pres-ent a legitimate case, in terms of their concerns for a high level of safety, but... we think it’s important for student op-portunities that the radio sta-tion maintains a presence on campus.”

Beasley said he believes both sides can come together to solve the problem—and re-move the ban—as soon as the parties sit down and negotiate. However, he said the facilities themselves could be the big-gest problem in the mix.

“The university does not have very good facilities for this kind of event [the October RMS par-ty],” said Beasley. “The cafete-ria where the event was held is a multi-use facility. It’s as much of a classroom as it is a café.”

While Beasley was not at the October event, he believes there should be more trans-parency around the accusa-tions against RMS, and that this should be an opportuni-ty for the university and radio station to find out what type of events currently do and don’t work on campus.

image courtesy radio malasPina society

NewS

8/ U bys sey.c a /c U lT U r e /2 011. 03. 07

mike dicksonContributor

Quick, name the organization that rep-resents a whopping 97 per cent of the volume of beer sold and consumed in Canada.

Exactly.The Brewers’ Association of Canada was

formed in 1943 when brewers realized t here were advan-tages to be gained by banding togeth-er to promote the in-terests of the indus-try, especially when it comes to govern-ment relations.

“We talk with the government about a wide range of is -sues, any t hing we find that can affect our members,” said Andre Fortin, director of Public Affairs for the BAC. “These issues can be every-thing from corporate taxes to labelling initiatives.”

The lobbying power of the BAC was on display recently when the beer industry

dodged a bullet by winning an exemp-t ion to Canada’s new label l ing reg-ulat ions. They require food and bev-erages to show any hidden al lergens, glutens or sulphites in their product—which the BAC successfully argued was akin to stating the obvious for a bever-age made from barley. Wine and spirits are still prone to the new regulations.

Though the Conservatives’ well-pub-licized cutting of cor porat e t a xes has been well-re-ceived by BAC cor-nerstones Labatt and Molson—who, together with Slee-man and Mooseh-ead, comprise the majority of beer volume represent-ed by the lobby—Canadian beer is the second high-

est-taxed in the world.Those worried about litt le-guy micro-

breweries that make up the other three per cent should know that though they stand apart from ‘Big Beer,’ they a lso reap the benefits of the BAC’s activities.

Arguably the biggest advantage they offer is the usage of the industry standard bottle. Bottles are recycled, the glass is re-used and breweries can buy a share in the oper-ation to greatly cut down on bottling costs.

“Smaller breweries often occupy a larg-er portion of the consumer headspace than large ones,” said Mark Simpson, a brewing consultant for Dockside Brew-ers. “I think the Brewers Association of Canada’s activities are positive, a bene-fit to the entire industry and I respect what they do.” U

Jonny wakeFieldculture@ubyssey.ca

There are a couple of key talking points in any discussion of Canadian nationalism: bilingual-ism, multi-culturalism, hockey and beer among

them. The last one has been the topic of a considerable amount of scholarly research, to the point that it seems any introductory politics or histo-ry course requires a discus-sion of Molson’s “I am Canadi-an.” Grant McCracken, author of “Advertising: Meaning or In-formation?” says that consum-ers turn to such ads is search of “concepts of what it is to be...a member of a community or a country.”

So what does it mean when the most persistent answer to that tiresome “what is Canada” question is a ten-year-old com-mercial in which peace, order and good government are de-ployed to sell beer?

It’s a particularly interesting question on an international university campus like UBC, where most of the biggest in-tra-faculty and campus wide events involve kegs, and the occasional Molson sponsor-ship. In the next few articles, we’ll look at the question from a few angles we find interest-ing. In Russia, for example, beer was essentially a soda, classified as a foodstuff. Now Putin is moving to reclassify beer as alcohol. We had UBC professors and students from Russia weigh in on the role of alcohol in that country’s self definition.

We also talked to students who choose not to define the university experience by beer. We spoke to Aiman Erbad, a director of the Muslim Student Association from Qatar, and asked if Canada or the univer-sity environment had tested his beliefs about alcohol. He said no. Kind of an open and shut case there.

And we took a look at the Brewers’ Association of Can-ada, a shadowy trust-like orga-nization that lobbies for 97 per cent of breweries in Canada. They were fairly forthcoming. Still, is this big fish defining beer, and consequently Cana-da, in its own image? Report-er Mike Dickson says maybe.

So sit back and spend a few minutes with these articles. Have a cold one. Or don’t. Re-gardless, cheers. U

The Conservatives’ cutting of corporate taxes has been well-received by the BAC: Canadian beer is the second highest-taxed

in the world.

beer: the real universal language?

For all you do, this

supplement’s for you

Brewers’ Association of Canada: A quick primer

2 011. 03. 07/ U bys sey.c a /c U lT U r e /9

In Russia, beer=food. Until last month.

Jonny wakeField illustration/THE UBYSSEY

kait bolongaro Contributor

In a bill adopted by the Russian State Duma last week, beer will now be classi-fied as alcohol. Since 2005, beer was of-ficially a foodstuff in the former Soviet Union and widely available for purchase at kiosks and near schools. The bever-age is the most popular in Russia due to its widespread availability and it is con-sumed by people of all ages.

In fact, most Russians don’t even think of beer as alcohol.

“Beer isn’t considered alcohol,” said Peter Petro, a professor in the Central,

Eastern and Northern European Stud-ies (CENES) department. “It’s like pop and costs the same [as pop]. Vodka and hard liquors are considered alcohol. If you ask for alcohol on a train, the [stew-ard] will tell you there is no alcohol and offer you beer or wine instead.”

“Ten years ago, people could drink it on the streets,” said Irina Goundar-eva, a Russian-Canadian Masters stu-dent in the French, Italian and Hispan-ic Studies department. “It is very com-mon for people to drink beer, especial-ly in the summer when it’s refreshing on the beach and in the parks. Even in the zoo, beer is sold.”

The Kremlin claimed introduction of the bill was due to a severe health crisis due to the large amount of liquor con-sumed in Russia. The World Health Or-ganization estimates that Russians con-sume 32 pints of pure alcohol per capita per year, more than double the recom-mended maximum.

There are accusations that Putin is simply using new concern over health as a mechanism to increase state rev-enue through higher taxation on beer and create higher profits for beer com-panies in Russia.

However, Petro and Goundareva disagree. “This is a big health concern,” said Petro.

“I don’t see much of a personal agen-da. Russia is the largest natural gas pro-ducer in the world. [Russia] has paid off its foreign debt and is enjoying high economic growth. It’s in a good position compared to other countries who have mortgaged their grandchildren’s future.”

“Putin might just pocket the revenue and show it’s better for the [Russian] peo-ple,” says Goundareva. “[New regulations] are better to protect young people be-cause kids as young as 13 were drinking it and alcohol impacts the development of the nervous system and the brain. If the government cares about the people, they should limit its consumption.” U

ginny monacogmonaco@ubyssey.ca

In North America, many people associate university with books and beer. But the promise of alco-hol that attracts certain students to faculty and AMS events is the very same thing that keeps others away.

“I don’t like those events,” said PhD candidate Aiman Erbad, Di-rector of Education of the Mus-lim Student’s Association. “It throws me off, being in the com-pany of those that are drinking is not something that I usually

do. I think it’s wasting my tuition money.”

Erbad is originally from Qatar, a country that has banned the im-portation of alcohol. It is illegal to drink or be drunk in public, though alcohol is sold in licensed hotel bars and restaurants and is legal with a permit.

Erbad’s first introduction to al-cohol came with his move to the University of Washington in 2004. “It was a big change when I moved to the dorms,” he says. “There is a big drinking culture, especially freshman year. It was a little bit

weird. I shared my room with a roommate and he used to drink. The smell was a little funny.”

Despite his discomfort with al-cohol, Erbad accepts that, for many students, it is a large part of the university experience. His sense of UBC community is fostered through involvement with the Muslim Student’s Association. “I think we can’t really push for people to change simply because we don’t accept it. It’s part of the society that we live in here. But this is something that doesn’t rep-resent us.” U

Not imbibing an easy—and religious—choice for some

10/Ubyssey.ca/referendUm/2011.03.07

u-Pass QuestiondO yOU sUppORt and appROVe a $30.00 mOntHly

U-pass Fee, begInnIng 1 septembeR, 2011, endIng 31 maRCH, 2013?

This question is required by the provincial government for UBC students to join the Lower Mainland-wide U-Pass pro-gram. The fee was negotiated between the AMS, UBC and the provincial government and Translink. UBC does not have the option of keeping the current rate of $23.75 per month beyond August 2011. It will require students to show their student card as well as their pass when entering a bus. Students will also have to pick up a new pass each month.

Full-time students paying all fees will see a fee in-crease of $5 a year; while those who opt out of the health plan will see an increase of $19. With the ex-ception of the Student Legal Fund, Financial Assis-tance Fund and Athletics and Intramurals Fund, all fees will be indexed to inflation.

Under the new structure, three per cent of AMS-specific fees collected will be placed into a fund

so that students with financial need can apply to have their fees reimbursed. Students can opt-out of paying for the Health and Dental Plan, as well as Resource Groups, CiTR and Ubyssey fees. All students will pay the same amount regardless of classes taken should the question pass. If this referendum question fails, the current structure will stay in place.

dO yOU sUppORt and aCCept adOptIng tHe stUdent Fee stRUCtURe as pResented?

Fee Question

1. Executive turnover/Elections: Moving Executive turnover from February to May 1. Moving Exec-utive elections from January to a date between February 15 and March 15.2. Lowering quorum: Reducing quo-rum at general meetings from 1000 students or 2% of AMS members (whichever is less) to 500 or 1% (whichever is more; i.e., quorum will never be less than 500) in the hope of achieving quorum more easily and thereby being able to conduct busi-ness at annual general meetings.3. Removing Executives: Changing the procedures for removing Execu-tives (and also Council Senators) to accord with the Society Act. Elim-inating the power of Council to re-move Executives (and Senate Cau-cus to remove Council Senators). Executives and Council Senators will only be able to be removed by a 75% vote at a general meeting or in a referendum.4. Executive remuneration and sta-tus: Stating that remuneration for Executives (and other elected and appointed officeholders) shall be determined by Council in the Code and deleting references to outdated honorarium payment levels current-ly in the Bylaws. Clarifying that Ex-ecutives are not employees.

FROm nOW On sHOUld tHe ams lObby FOR RedUCed tUItIOn Fees FOR bOtH dOmestIC and

InteRnatIOnal stUdents?

tuition Question

five questioNs, five choices: what you’ll be voting on this week

bylaw Question #2dO yOU sUppORt and appROVe tHe HOUsekeepIng

CHanges tO tHe ams bylaWs as pResented?

Created by petitioners who gathered 1200 signatures, the question asks for the AMS to re-examine their policy on tu-ition increases. Currently, the AMS’s stance is that increas-es to tuition are fine as long as they are due to inflation. If this question passes, it would require the AMS to revisit that policy and lobby both the government and university to reduce tuition. Whether it passes or fails is a message from students on how they want the AMS to handle fees.

Fee oldZ Fees new FeesAMS MembershipStudent Spaces FundResource GroupsExternal and University Lobbying and AdvocacyAMS Refugee Student FundSexual Assault Support Services FundStudent ServicescitRSustainability Projects FundInternational Projects FundStudent clubs Benefit Fundchildcare Bursary FundStudent Legal FundAMS Financial Assistance FundUbyssey Publication SocietyAMS Athletics and Intramurals BenefitAMS Health and Dental Plan FundtotAL

total Fee change

$$$$$$

$

$$$$$$$$$$

$$$$$$$

$$$$$$$$$$

$

12.5015.00

1.503.502.503.00

9.00

----

1.0012.00

5.0021.00

228.37314.37

21.0015.75

1.504.002.503.257.00

2.250.251.501.001.00

12.006.00

21.00214.37319.37

5.00

$5.00

how to

vote

steP 1Log into the Student Service Centre using your Campus Wide Login.

steP 2Click on “web-vote” under the “grades and records” heading.

steP 3Click “vote” on each of the individual questions.

bylaw Question #1

1. Renaming five positions: To com-ply with current practice, the four current Executive positions other than President will be renamed so that they will all be called Vice-Pres-idents (e.g., Director of Finance will become Vice-President Finance). Also, “Secretary of SAC” will be-come “SAC Vice-Chair.”2. Other name changes: “Gener-al Office” will change to “Adminis-tration Office,” “Registration Num-ber” to “Student Number,” and “al-ternate” to “proxy.”3. Gender neutrality: Replacing “he” with “they” or “he or she” or the title of the position held. 4. Minor editing: Changing “the Council” to “Council.” Removing unusual capitals and unnecessary commas. Correcting typographical, grammatical and numbering errors.5. Summer School Association: De-leting references to this defunct association.6. Constituency names: Updating the list of Constituencies to reflect the addition and removal of Schools and Faculties, and changes in their names.7. Clarifications: Clarifying the mean-ing of “Special Resolution” by stat-ing it means a resolution as defined under the Society Act passed by a 75% majority. Clarifying that “the Clerk” means the Clerk of Student Court.8. Using the AMS website and newspapers besides The Ubys-sey: Allowing notices to members to go on the AMS website or other

dO yOU sUppORt and appROVe tHe sUbstantIVe CHanges tO tHe ams bylaWs as pResented?

2011.03.07/Ubyssey.ca/referendUm/11

5. Public relations: Stating that the meaning of “public relations” will be as defined by Council in the Code in order to clarify the scope of the President’s role with respect to pub-lic relations.6. VP Responsibilities: Giving the VP Academic the additional respon-sibility of working on such matters as academic development and cam-pus planning; moving the duty to re-ceive job applications from the VP Academic to the VP Administration; changing the VP Administration to the VP Student Affairs and giving that Executive the additional duties of promoting AMS events and gen-erally improving student life. Also changing the titles of the four Ex-ecutives besides the President to call them Vice-Presidents.7. Records restrictions: Altering the current bylaw allowing all AMS members to view all AMS records to permit Council to adopt a policy pursuant to which records can be kept confidential where disclosure would be harmful to the financial or economic interests of the AMS or the security of the SUB or a com-puter or communications system, as well as where disclosure would disrupt an ongoing investigation, vi-olate solicitor-client privilege, or re-veal in camera discussions.

five questioNs, five choices: what you’ll be voting on this week

bylaw Question #2dO yOU sUppORt and appROVe tHe HOUsekeepIng

CHanges tO tHe ams bylaWs as pResented?

bottom of the barrel: ubc’s student union fees dead last

There are 16 English-speaking universities with more than 15,000 full-time students in Canada that have publicly available detailed information on the amount of money their student unions manage. UBC currently has the lowest fees. The totals were based on a student taking two terms of 15 credits per year and is the total of general student union fees, building maintenance, student newspapers and radio stations, sexual assault support services, resource groups and student services with an AMS equivalent, and sustainability and clubs fees. If the referendum passes, fees at UBC going to student unions/newspapers/radio stations will be the second lowest, after York. See www.ubyssey.ca for a full breakdown of the fees. Ryerson, Carleton and the University of Toronto were not included due to a lack of posted information.

1. McMaster$127.35

2. SFU$117.28

3. McGill$107.02

4. Western$105.30

5. Queen’s$100.60

6. UVic$98.90

7. Guelph$91.78

8. ottawa$89.26

9. concordia$87.90

10. Waterloo$84.50

11. calgary$84

12. Alberta$81.36

13. Saskatchewan$74.56

15. York$53.70

14. Manitoba$73.50

16. UBc$49.50 $17.25

bylaw Question #1

electronic notice boards in addition to the established methods of giv-ing notice. Allowing other campus publications to be used to give no-tice instead of The Ubyssey. Allow-ing the AMS budget to be published on the AMS website or other elec-tronic notice board or any campus publication instead of in the first is-sue of The Ubyssey after approval of the budget.9. Changing when Council members take office: Removing the require-ment that Council members repre-senting Constituencies take office at the time of the AMS annual gen-eral meeting (something that never happens). Stating that the student Board of Governors (BoG) repre-sentatives become Council mem-bers after they attend either a BoG committee meeting, a BoG retreat, or a full BoG meeting (and not just a full BoG meeting).10. Changing the VP on Senate Cau-cus: Changing it from the VP Exter-nal to the VP Academic, Caucus be-ing more connected to the VP Aca-demic portfolio.11. SAC non-voting members: Al-lowing representatives of the Gen-eral Manager and the VP Finance instead of the GM and VP Finance themselves to attend SAC meetings.12. Records: Altering the current bylaw allowing all AMS members to view all AMS records by saying that access will be subject to appli-cable privacy laws and other laws. Also allowing records to be moved out of the main AMS office.

dO yOU sUppORt and appROVe tHe sUbstantIVe CHanges tO tHe ams bylaWs as pResented?

Includes $4 fee for “Sustainable SFU” fund

Includes $2.50 for “Environment Fee” and $4 for “Campus Life Fund”

$110.05 “Organization fee” doesn’t include health care or transit pass

Includes $9.30 for the Gazette news-paper, which prints four times a week

Fees for the Environment Fund and clubs are opt-outable

Includes $5 fee for“Club and Course Unions” fund

Not included are fees for clubs, includ-ing 12 cents to “Science for Peace”

Includes $4 fee for “Sustainable Development” and a $2.12 club fee

At $7.50 each, their sustainability and club fees are the largest in Canada

Their student union is called “FEDS.” There’s no W in that!

Their executives are among the highest paid in Canada, making $35,160 each in 2009.

Not included is the $17.99 students pay towards bursaries

Students also pay a $110 Infrastructure Fee for their new building

Includes $2.50 fee to the University Re-cycling and Environment Group

If UBC passes the fee question, York will will have the lowest fees for their student union in the country

Unlike most schools on this list, UBC’s fees aren’t set to inflation

1 2 / U by s s e y. c a /g a m e s / 2 011 . 0 3 . 0 7

games & comicscrossword

likealittle Weekly ToP five flirTSat buchanan a: Female, Black hair. To the cute asian girl (I know my description sucks), who has a class in the room right after my poli class. I’m too shy to tell you this in person so I hope you see this post somehow. Just seeing you for those few seconds ev-ery Monday, Wednesday and Friday makes attending the lec-ture worth it.

at between irving & koern-er: Male, Redhead. Rupert Grint lookalike, please take the port-key to my heart.

at 41 bus: Female, Brunette. Yesterday, Saturday, I saw you on the 41 and you got off at Cambie before I could get the nerve to say hi. You were wear-ing white headphones over a blue toque and a beige pea-coat. Your wavy hair framed your an-gelic face, my friend also offered you a seat before you got off. I was sitting right in front of you.

at liFe sciences centre: Male, Brunette. You were at the “Choose Your Major” science workshop last night, sitting near

the top, wearing a grey shirt. I was in the row above you and you looked up and we made eye contact and you were sooo cute :)

at chemistry building: Fe-male, Brunette. You have the prettiest eyes and your smile makes me melt inside. I love the way you play with your curly hair. I’m looking for the right oppor-tunity to say hi. You seem like such a genuine person. I’d do anything to get to know you. It’s so hard these days to introduce yourself without being creepy.

suscomic.com, by mike bround

comicmaster, by maria cirstea

PuZZles Provided by bestCROssWORds.COm. used with Permission.

across

1. Spanish river6. Gives up11. Besides14. Icon15. Bloodsucking worm16. It breaks daily17. Turkish title18. Metallic mixture19. Actress Balin20. Lean and sinewy22. Sudden impact24. Roast28. Dull30. Speaks publicly31. Staggering32. Favored33. Capable of being generated37. Bill’s partner38. Band39. Black gold40. Revocation43. Abu ___45. Chairs46. Rubbed out47. Yellowish brown pigment49. Clattering noise50. Italian composer51. Mil. leaders52. Nabokov novel53. Large wave caused by tid-al flow56. Earth61. Convened62. Low point63. Atoll unit64. Chemical ending65. Delicious66. Brahmin, e.g.

down

1. Apex2. Doc bloc3. Beetle juice?4. Exclamation of disgust5. Kelp6. Strongly fragrant sage7. Hard to hold8. Singer Shannon9. Author Umberto10. Unprofessional lawyer11. “Farewell!”12. John Garner13. Aborigine of Borneo21. Conditions23. Hawaiian native dance24. Puccini heroine25. Betelgeuse’s constellation26. Radioactive gas27. Hwy.28. Ready...29. High-pitched tone31. Ages33. Actress Scacchi34. Brag35. Defamation36. Exclude, remove38. Counterfeiter catcher41. Not new42. Not strict43. Severe44. Covering for the head46. Directional ending47. Four-door48. Angry49. Drunken50. Flower holder51. Pluck54. Battery size55. Mdse.57. Conductor ___-Pekka Salonen58. Treasure Island monogram59. Emeritus: Abbr.60. Broke bread

Submit your comics to our website at ubyssey.ca/volunteer/submit-a-comic.

production@ubyssey.ca

Utheubyssey.ca

virginie menard |

solution

blundergrads, by Phil Flickinger (blUndeRgRads.COm)

ski ninJas, by kyle lees (tHe aRgUs)

2011.03.07/Ubyssey.ca/adverTisemenT/13

14 / U bys s e y.c a /s p orT s / 2 011. 0 3 . 0 7

sportseditor MARIE VONDRACEK » sports@ubyssey.ca

marie vondraceksports@ubyssey.ca

The Thunderbirds became the most decorated team in CIS women’s vol leybal l history thanks to a dominating gold medal win over tournament host the Laval Rouge et Or in straight sets (25-16, 25-18 and 25-14).

UBC’s four-year champion-ship run is the third-longest

in history, trailing only the six consecutive banners won by Alberta (1995-2000) and Win-nipeg (1983-1988). It marked the eighth national tit le for the T-Birds since the inaugu-ral CIS championship in 1970, one more than Alberta and Winnipeg.

“Looking back over these last four years, we’re very thankful and very grateful. If you look at it, there were a whole number

of years where we had a repu-tation as a good program with good people but always falling that little bit short,” said T-Birds head coach Doug Reimer. “The success the team is having now wouldn’t have happened without everything we’ve done over the last 15 years. This culture be-gan more than four years ago.”

The whole bench brought something to the table all week-end, a necessary trait due to the

loss of middle Jessica von Schil-ling, who fell to a leg injury in the week prior to the nationals. Rookie middle Mariah Bruins-ma took her place in the rota-tion and received support from her teammates all across the floor throughout the weekend.

“I think we’re growing right now. These last two weeks have been special. It’s absolutely re-warding,” said Reimer, prior to arriving in Québec City. “A lot of these players have had a taste of national champi-onships, and once you have a taste you want more.”

The palate-wetting began with a tough quarter -f inal matchup against the Sher -brooke Vert et Or. UBC jumped out to an impressive start, pil-ing up 15 kills on .379 hitting while holding Sherbrooke to -.091 and just five kills, but the Vert et Or responded with 10 kills on .200 hitting to take the third set 25-23.

“All of the Québec teams, when they get on a roll and play good defence, are tough to play against. We’ve seen it before at nationals,” said Reimer after the match. “The middle part of the match they out-served and out-passed us. They also gained confidence the longer they were playing, so it was important for us to come out with a good effort like we did in the fourth set.”

The T-Birds responded to the challenge with another strong fourth set to take the match 3-1 (25-13, 25-18, 23-25, 25-12). Ray-el Quiring had a big match for UBC with 10 kills on .304 hit-ting to go along with five ser-vice aces.

“I thought Rayel had a very good game energy wise. She did a lot for us,” said Reimer. “She’s just one player that can take a lot of positives away from today’s match. For a lot of our players, it’s their first time playing sig-nificant minutes at the nation-al championship. Even for our veterans, it’s still the first round

and it’s definitely a different at-mosphere here.”

Despite the third set lapse, Reimer was happy that his team showed the character he knew it had. “Our expectation of how the first round should go is some-times not the most realistic and it’s probably better to struggle a little bit and then come back tomorrow even more focused,” said Reimer. “We’re happy that we bounced back from a bad set, like we did in the Canada West final, and that we can be com-fortable making some in-game adjustments.”

In the semi-final 3-0 sweep of Alberta (25-17, 25-15 and 25-22), UBC created a gap that was almost impossible to overcome.

“I was prepared for a very long and tough match—that was my expectation. I don’t have the feeling that Alberta didn’t show up to play. I think we won that match,” observed Reimer after the key win.

With the win, the Thunder-birds earned a seat in the fi-nal game of the tournament for the sixth time in the last seven years, with a chance to be the best in the country and in history.

In the Sunday afternoon final, UBC hit .352 as a team while holding Laval to .034. UBC also out-blocked Laval 8-1. Playing in the final match of her stellar university career, UBC’s Cana-dian national team member Jen Hinze was named game MVP for the winning side. Hinze put in eight points and fellow nation-al team member Kyla Richey led the ‘Birds with points in the fi-nal with 18 points and 16 kills.

CIS player of the year Shan-ice Marcelle added 13 kills in the banner win and expressed exhilaration after the match.

“It’s just an incredible feel-ing to win with 18 of my best friends. Everyone contributed this weekend, it really was a group effort and an amazing end to a great season.” U

UBC wins fourth straight national bannerT-Birds become most decorated CIS volleyball team ever

The T-Birds jump with national domination-sized joy for the fourth straight time. yan doublet courtesy oF the cis

Thunderbird AThleTe CounCil

athlete oF the week

shanice marcelleShanice Marcelle has earned athlete of the week honours for her performance at the CanWest fi-nal four championship last week here at UBC. Marcelle was recently named CanWest MVP and last weekend she certainly proved why. In the semi-final game against Manitoba, the ‘Birds won 3-0 and Marcelle had 12 kills on .440 hitting and an impressive four aces.

In the CanWest final the following night, Marcelle executed some crucial plays to lead the team from being behind at 2-1, onwards to a 3-2 win, earning the ‘Birds their third straight CanWest vic-tory. The team competed this weekend in the finals at nationals in Québec City, where they won their fourth straight national championship banner. U

—Amelia Rajala CIS player of the year. yan droulet courtesy oF the cis

2 011. 0 3 . 0 7/ U by s s e y.c a /s p o r T s /15

drake FentonContributor

Saturday night the UBC men’s basketball team certified its ranking as one of the top pro-grams in the country, defeating the University of Saskatchewan Huskies 107-100 to win the Can-ada West championship.

During the last eight years UBC has been a perennial pow-erhouse in CIS basketball, and Saturday’s victory garnered them their fourth Canada West title in that span. Though the victory was special for the team as a collective whole, the crowd of 1743 people at War Memori-al Gym knew the night truly be-longed to fifth-year guard Alex Murphy and his career-high 34-point evening.

“Alex Murphy...what an unbe-lievable performance,” said UBC head coach Kevin Hanson.

Moments after the game concluded, an ecstatic Hanson pulled Murphy to the sideline for a hug and whispered into his ear.

Chuckling while he recalled the moment, Hanson relayed what he told Murphy: “I asked him if he wanted [the gym] to be renamed ‘The Alex Murphy Court.’”

The praise Hanson loaded on Murphy was by no means undeserved. Along with his 34 points, Murphy added eight as-sists and four steals. More aston-ishing, however, was his spec-tacular 21 for 22 from the foul line. Murphy’s versatility Sat-urday night even extended off the court; at one point, midway through the game, he grabbed a mop and began wiping sweat

off the court. His performance was a fitting end to a five-year career, as Saturday marked the last time he would play for UBC at War Memorial.

“It’s an emotional [experience] more than anything else; I’ve put in a lot of time here. It feels great right now,” said Murphy.

Post-game, Murphy and his teammates may have been emo-tional, but maintaining poise in clutch situations was what de-fined their play for the majori-ty of the contest.

In the third quarter, with 20 seconds left on the clock, UBC held a narrow 67-66 advantage. Following a Balraj Bains foul, Saskatchewan’s Nolan Brudehl stepped to the line with an op-portunity to drain two shots and propelled the Huskies to their first lead of the night.

Perhaps it was the roaring crowd, or perhaps his nerves got to him. Whatever the case, Bru-dehl faltered and missed both of his shots. UBC’s Graham Bath scooped up the rebound after the second shot and moments later he was down the court driving the lane. Bath’s lay-up didn’t find any netting, but he was able to rebound his own shot. On his second chance he capitalized. The basket closed the quarter and put UBC up 69-66. It was the closest Saskatch-ewan came to a lead that night.

Burdehl’s missed foul shots came to define the Huskies’ night. They went 24 for 38 (63 per cent) from the foul line and an abysmal 11 for 20 in the sec-ond half. UBC, on the other hand, went 34-40 (85 per cent) on the evening.

A lack of consistency and poise in the clutch might have hurt the Huskies’ chances at victory, but their all-out effort kept the game within an arm’s reach through-out the night. Guard Jamelle Bar-rett, who was named the con-ference’s MVP the night before, ended the match with 35 points.

“[Barrett] was single-handed-ly keeping them in the game. We tried to double-team him but he got through double teams and he got through triple teams. I was running out of ideas, as a coach, for what to do with him,” Han-son commented.

With stopping Barrett prov-ing exceedingly troublesome and big men Kamar Burke and Balraj Bains both fouled out of the game, UBC responded in the fourth quarter in the only way that seemed applicable—a re-lentless offensive attack.

“We ended up going small ball at the end, with five guards play-ing out there,” said Hanson.

Guard Doug Plumb chipped in 10 of his 18 points in the fourth quarter and 11 of Mur-phy’s points came in the final frame. UBC finished the quarter with a game-high 38 points. The Huskies were unable to match UBC’s pace and the T-Birds’ “small ball” produced lighting quick transitions down court that proved too arduous for Sas-katchewan’s defence.

The Alex Murphy-led ‘Birds will be heading to the CIS na-tional championships next week in Halifax as the No. 1 ranked team in the nation. UBC will be looking to avenge their second place finishes in the previous two years. U

Basketball domination in fourth straight CanWest title

Alex Murphy played the game of his life in his final match as a Thun-derbird at War Memorial on Saturday. geoFF lister Photo/THE UBYSSEY

Harry Jones—an inspiring rugby student-athletedrake FentonContributor

Overcoming adversit y has been something that UBC rug-by product Harry Jones has be-come quite used to in his ath-letic career. He has represent-ed Canada three times at the junior national level as well as playing nationally with the se-nior men’s seven’s roster. Com-pared to the competition over-seas—Australia, New Zealand, South Africa—Canada is not a rugby superpower. Thus Jones has played and battled against opponents with much more in-vested and developed programs.

In 2009, when Harry trav-elled to Japan with the U20 na-tional team which he captained, the skill level of his opposition was readily apparent.

“We played a team from Aus-tralia and a lot of their guys played in Australia’s Super 14 league. That’s arguably one of the best rugby leagues in the world; obviously, playing against guys at that level is tough,” Jones said.

National accomplishments and accolades aside, Jones is first and foremost a UBC stu-dent. He is a fourth-year stu-dent in the Sauder School of Business. It’s with the varsity men’s rugby team during the school year where he has per-haps faced the biggest adversi-ty of his career.

For the last year and half, up until this semester, Jones has been forced to act as a cheerlead-er on the sideline rather than a game changer on the field. He was diagnosed with Osteitis pu-bis—an injury caused by inflam-mation of the joints in the pel-vic region, causing acute and chronic groin pain. Perform-ing sustained physical activity

with this type of injury eventu-ally becomes impossible.

I n it ia l ly, Jones bat t led through the pain and played with the injury. He suffered through it while playing in Ja-pan with the U20 national team, and continued to play with it while representing Team BC (in the summer of 2009) in a senior men’s national competition.

By the end of the competi-tion, Jones had nothing left in the tank. “My body was phys-ically unable to handle it any more,” he said. “After the end of the [Team BC] competition I was unable to do anything for about five months. I couldn’t work out, I couldn’t run, all I could do was rest. During that time watching [UBC games] was really hard and frustrating; I wanted to be out there with the guys.” A year after that, which consisted of nothing but rest, rehab and school, Harry was medically cleared to play again.

Bram Newman, the rugby team’s head medical trainer, described why the injury left Jones out of rugby for such an extended period.

“It is something that has a fast onset with pain, and it is something that can linger around for a long, long time if not treated properly from the get-go. With Harry’s case there were a few road bumps [in di-agnosing the injury] but once we figured out exactly what was wrong we immediately began fo-cusing on getting him healthy.”

Since returning from inju-ry, Jones has proven that his presence was worth waiting for. He has produced tries in three of the four games he has played. His return to the field is one UBC head coach Spence McTavish is excited about. “Har-ry’s always been one of our top

players,” said McTavish. “We’re glad to have him back in the line-up, he’s a big help. There’s a noticeable difference with him out. He’s a guy out there that has some pace and decision-making abilities and that makes him a big addition.”

Yet a successful recovery and a return to rugby is hardly sur-prising in Harry’s case; tough-ness and the ability to overcome adversity run in his blood.

Harry has twin brothers, Ben and Charley, who are two years his senior. For over five years, while completing undergradu-ate and graduate work, each has predominately played for the varsity squad. Like Harry, each has suffered debilitating inju-ries which they’ve had to over-come. Ben has torn his ACL (knee ligament) three times, most re-cently at the beginning of this season. He expects to return to play again next year. Likewise, Charley has torn ligaments in his knee and has also suffered intensive pelvic injuries. On two separate occasions his season has been cut short by injuries. He currently captains the UBC squad.

Charley, who plays in the back line with Harry, is excited to once again be reunited with his brother. “We read the game the same way. A lot of the times we pick what the other person is going to do and feed off that. It really makes it a lot easier to play.” When on the field togeth-er you might compare them to the Sedins—minus, of course, the red hair, goatees and Swed-ish passports.

UBC will shortly enter the heart of its season flying down to California to play archrival Berkeley.

Harry expects to be healthy and ready for the contest. His

plan for keeping his body fresh? It’s not your typical male sports cliché.

“I didn’t want to admit this...but I recently started doing yoga. It rejuvenates the body after the beatings we take on game day.”

Jones’s yoga will come in han-dy as he and his team compete

in the National Invitational Uni-versity Rugby Sevens Champi-onship, which will take place at UBC at Thunderbird Stadium from March 11-12. UBC students with their student cards will get free entry to all matches. For the full schedule, go to www.rugby-canada.ca. U

Jones out of reach of his competition. richard lam Photo/UBC ATHLETICS

16 / U by s s e y.c a /s p orT s / 2 011. 0 3 . 0 7

More sports funding in NCAA move? Probably not.Equal male and female scholarship allowance will create three possible scenariosdylan wallContributor

‘Moving to the NCAA will offer our athletes more opportuni-ty for competition and schol-arship and help keep Canadi-ans from moving south of the border.’ That is the argument to move to the NCAA, but that belief is not shared with all UBC varsity athletes.

Although most believe the switch will foster more com-petition, some disagree that changing to the NCAA wi l l result in more scholarship funding.

“If UBC were in the NCAA there would be more compe-tition, at least for volleyball anyways,” said Garret LaVal-ley, T-bird vol leyba l l play -er. “Our volleyball team has

played games against Hawaii in the past and won, and Ha-waii has normal ly been in the middle of the pack in the NCA A.” Certa in ly it would be more competitive than in Canada, where UBC’s volley-ball program has consistent-ly been one of the best in the country.

But when it came to schol-arships, he was doubtful. “I don’t know whether or not it would change the amount of funding for athletes.”

He has good reason to be uncertain. According to the UBC Review Committee Re-por t , re leased in Ja nua r y 2011, the university spends 80 per cent of its scholarship limit for CIS sports and only 32 per cent for NAIA sports. The limit in the CIS is $5500

per athlete given to a maxi-mum of 70 per cent of the ath-letes in each sport. Similarly, the NAIA also caps its number of scholarships and places a $16,000 limit on each athlete.

The move from the CIS to the NCAA Division II would allow individual scholarships to increase up to $16,000 and extend from 175 athletes (70 per cent of UBC athletes) to 203.5 (109 for males and 97.5 for females). However, if the limit is expanded, will that ac-tually result in more funding from the university?

Athletes are skept ica l. A football player who asked to remain anonymous said, “I don’t know if it would mean an overall increase [of schol-arship funding]. We haven’t talked about it at all, really.

But I think you may see more money go to star athletes and there will be less left for av-erage players.”

He went on to say the move to the NCAA may attract more American players. And, “in football, there is a stigma that American players are better. I think you may see more schol-arships go to Americans and actually be taken away from Canadian athletes.” This would be counter-productive in trying to keep athletes from moving to the States.

Finally, the NCAA has lim-it s to t he number of male scholarships in comparison to female scholarships. From a distance this looks good: equa l i t y a mon g men a nd women. However, in varsity sports, there tend to be many

more male athletes. This is largely due to football, which at UBC involves almost 100 athletes.

SFU swimmer Sara Pfeifer put it best: “Scholarships for males have to equal those for females. Since there are way more male athletes than fe-males, [UBC] has three options: add female sports, offer more money to females, or cut male funding.” Most schools in the USA have done a combination of the three.

But more importantly, if uni-versity funding does not in-crease at UBC, male scholar-ship funding would have to de-crease. When it comes to sup-porting Canadian student ath-letes, the switch to the NCAA may actually do more harm than good. U

marie vondraceksports@ubyssey.ca

Mike Liambas will be play-ing hockey next year—but he won’t be doing it for the UBC Thunderbirds.

H i s U BC c oac h , M i l a n Dragicevic, confirmed to the Vancouver Sun on Thursday that Liambas would pursue oppor-tunities in the East Coast Hock-ey League (ECHL) and stressed that he was not condoning Li-ambas’s actions. Dragicevic felt that any further penalties against Liambas would be un-fair after his two-game suspen-sion for causing an injury to Al-berta Golden Bears captain Eric Hunter last weekend.

“If this was any other player besides Mike Liambas, if this had happened to anyone else in our league, he would have got the two game-suspension and it would be a done deal,” said Dragicevic. “But because it’s Mike Liambas, with his past and his reputation, they are making this into a big deal. There is nothing in the referee’s report that says Mike did any-thing besides instigate a fight.”

Liambas came to UBC with an infamous reputation, having been banned from the OHL for a hit that resulted in a skull frac-ture for Ben Fanelli of the Erie Otters. After being cut by the Toronto Maple Leafs in train-ing camp last September, he came to UBC for a chance to play hockey while pursuing his education.

“When we recruited him last year, we recruited him because he was a character player,” said Dragicevic. “We understood he was dealing with an extremely difficult situation,” referring to Liambas’s ban from OHL hock-ey. “But he was a leader on all the teams he’s played on and he has a passion to play hock-ey, all of which we are looking for in a player on our team.”

Now that Liambas is no longer a Thunderbird, he has signed a contract with the Cin-cinnati Cyclones of the ECHL, playing in his first game Satur-day against the Toledo Walleyes and racking up two shots and seven penalty minutes—includ-ing one fight. Though Liambas has declined all comment and his teammates have refused to speculate on his motives for

leaving, he has the support of his team.

“He knows what direction he wants to go in, one where he’s pursuing professional hockey in the minor leagues,” said vet-eran fifth-year teammate Max Gordichuk. “If that’s what he wants to do, it’s what he’s gotta do. If he doesn’t want to be in school right now then he needs to do what will be good for him.”

Dragicevic felt that Liam-bas’s time with the ‘Birds had helped prepare him for future hockey endeavours. “Over his six months playing with us he’s really improved on his play. He’s learned a lot and worked his way into the line up, even

playing on the penalty kill and the power play for us.”

Gordichuk expressed joy in playing with Liambas. “He’s an extremely nice guy with a tre-mendous work ethic. He’s also a great student but most impor-tantly, he simply loves hockey.”

Two weeks ago Friday, many described Liambas’ actions as an attack, saying that he suck-er-punched Hunter’s blind side from behind and drove him into the ice, resulting in facial cuts and a ‘concussion.’

On Tuesday, Hunter said to an Edmonton journal report-er, “I think the concussion side of it was precautionary. There were a lot of symptoms when

it happened, subtle symptoms on Saturday and they started to dissipate from there.

“To say if it was a concussion or if it wasn’t a concussion, I’d say it probably wasn’t, just see-ing where I’m at right now. But you have to sort of take those precautionary steps when it happens.”

The details of Liambas and Hunter’s altercation are still contested, since game footage didn’t capture the incident in its entirety.

“Al l you could see is the gloves come off and then the film follows the puck,” Cana-da West men’s hockey conve-nor Bill Seymour said.

“So you don’t see anything. Then (the camera) comes back and Liambas is on top of him…it’s not a very good video; we don’t have six cameras like the NHL.

“Liambas certainly has his reputation and his past will cer-tainly play a part,” he added.

Though he may now be in Cin-cinnati, UBC head coach Milan Dragicevic stood beside his pas-sionate former player. “There was no pre-meditation. Our player got speared, there was no call and he retaliated.

“We support Mike Liambas as a person 100 per cent and we are going to support him through this as well.” U

Mike Liambas leaves UBC for the prosUpon a two game suspension, Liambas pursues ECHL contract

Liambas, number 24, squeezed out of the CIS. david eloP Photo/THE UBYSSEY

2011.03.07/Ubyssey.ca/referendUm/17

on ubyssey and citr bias

This week’s AMS referendum has highlighted serious concerns with the independence of our ma-jor media. Both CiTR radio and The Ubyssey newspaper are tied into the same fee question as the ones for the AMS. Although they are incorporated independently, the fee question on the ballot re-quires you agree to fees for all or none. But why? The radio and the newspaper have a fair amount of influence on campus. If the AMS had separated the fee question for the media, then the media would not have to make a strong case for the AMS fees. But tying them together has already shown that the AMS’s strategy is working.

The CiTR radio has been pump-ing the vote-yes message. The Ubyssey paper has produced a video advertising the random slush funds that the AMS is pro-posing. They know that if students vote against the new fee struc-ture, the media will not receive any funding. But if the media are not covering the referendum crit-ically, do they even deserve extra funding?

When independent media give into bribes by the leadership, the community does not get the criti-cal perspectives it deserves.

The media had the choice of separating itself from the AMS on the ballot and should have done that. I will consider giving them extra funding when they maintain their independence and bring a critical perspective on is-sues on campus. Until then, I am voting yes only for the U-Pass.

— Rael Katz

Quorum should be high

I was surprised to see that the AMS is trying to lower the num-ber of students required to pass bylaws in an annual general meet-ing from 1000 to 500. For an or-ganization that represents more than 48,000 students, how can

the AMS expect to change its by-laws with the votes of merely 500?

Bylaws of the AMS act like the constitution of a country. They pro-tect the community against per-sonal political agenda of the lead-ership. Just like every country has a formula to change its constitu-tion, the AMS’s current bylaws re-quire that at least 1,000 students show up to a special meeting or that AMS runs a campus-wide ref-erendum with over eight per cent of students voting and more than 50 per cent of voters vote in favour.

In the past, AMS has only man-aged to change bylaws by running a campus-wide referendum—a democratic process. That’s be-cause the AMS has never been able to bring 1000 students to a special meeting. But the AMS is now trying to change its bylaw-changing formula to by-pass the uninvolved students.

The AMS is running a refer-endum to get students to reduce the number of students required to pass a bylaw in an annual gen-eral meeting from 1000 to 500. That’s the average number of stu-dents paying attention to the AMS regularly!

AMS is a multi-million dollar organization that levies fees on 48,000+ students and speaks on our behalf to the government and UBC, so it has to be accountable to us all. A mere 500 quorum is too small for changing the by-laws. If the AMS is having trou-ble bringing 1,000 students (that’s less than .02 per cent of us) to a meeting, it should do a better job in communication and making it-self more present instead of just lowering the quorum.

—Rebecca Souchuns

health Plan changes risky

The AMS has delivered on two things very well so far: the U-Pass program and the Health and Den-tal insurance. I am pleased with both, but I don’t like the risks that the proposed fee referendum

exposes our health insurance plan to. Firstly, let me say that I’m disappointed that the AMS has not made it clear in its vote-yes campaign that students don’t have to vote yes for the proposed AMS fees to keep their U-Pass. U-Pass and fees are separate ques-tions on the ballot!

Secondly, the AMS is taking $14 per student out of the cur-rent Health and Dental Plan and shifting it into other funds—some random funds without very good definition or relevance to regular students. The AMS says that it has negotiated a deal with its insur-ance-provider for the same cov-erage at a lower price. Very well-done, but they are not telling us about the other relevant annual negotiation.

The AMS negotiates with its insurance-provider an annual payment based on students’ us-age, which varies yearly. In the past, when the AMS paid the in-surance provider less than the total it collected from students, the rest was saved in a designat-ed reserve fund. In other years, when the AMS had to pay more, it took it out of the reserve.

The new fee structure essen-tially eliminates the designated reserve fund. That means that in a year when students use their coverage a lot more, the AMS has to either cut coverage or in-crease fees in the following year. Unacceptable!

I am grateful for my U-Pass and I am voting in favour of it. I am voting against the new fees, because I am not willing to risk lowering my insurance cover-age in return for random funds that only benefit a small group of students.

—Eric Goldstein

why i suPPort the ams reFerendum Questions

The last general fee increase by the Alma Mater Society of UBC Vancouver occurred in 1982. The fee is not tied to inflation,

meaning it is now worth less than half its original amount. Despite the decreasing value of the fee, services and resourc-es that the AMS runs have in-creased over the past 30 years. In fact, the AMS provides ser-vices that are usually offered by university administrations. From the Sexual Assault Sup-port Centre to the Advocacy Of-fice to the AMS Foodbank, the AMS runs services that help stu-dents in times of need. Addition-ally, the AMS provides space and funding for over 350 clubs, lobbies on behalf of students to create joint programs like the U-Pass, provides subsidies for students in financial need and employs hundreds of students in its variety of food and bever-age outlets in the SUB.

The purpose of the referen-dum is to allow the AMS to main-tain these services and the lev-el of support it provides to stu-dents. It also allows the Society to grow and better meet student needs. The AMS resource groups and the related fee increase are not “slush funds”; they repre-sent and support the diverse backgrounds of AMS members.

If the referendum fails, there will be significant funding cuts to the valuable services listed above. Voting yes for the new fee structure and the more effi-cient bylaws will make the AMS a sustainable organization that can increase the availability of resources students demand.

It’s unfortunate that the im-portant day-to-day work of the AMS has been overshadowed by a few negative highlights in re-cent history. I chose to coordi-nate this referendum because I know that these changes will allow UBC’s student society to function more efficiently and provide the greatest support to students.

—Alyssa Koehn Head of the Vote Yes Committee

vote yes For u-Pass, no For Fees and bylaws

The U-Pass is a great deal and is a separate question on the bal-lot, so you can vote in favour of it while voting against the new fees and bylaws—something that the AMS’s vote yes campaign is not explicitly telling us!

The substantive changes un-dermine democracy as the AMS is proposing to lower the num-ber of students needed to change future bylaws from 1000 to 500!

Allowing the AMS to rely on merely 500 students to change its bylaws, which are fundamen-tal to protecting us against the personal agendas of AMS lead-ers, is irresponsible and undem-ocratic. How can the AMS call it representative for 500 insiders to determine the fate of 48,000+ students?

Having met with the new AMS Executives, I’ve concluded that despite their good intentions, they rushed into creating a fee structure without consulting students. They did consult, but only with those who directly ben-efit from the new funds.

In my investigations, I also learned that the AMS’s so-called deficit is only an “accounting” deficit and not a real one. And even the “accounting” deficit is projected to be at $140,000, so I asked why the AMS was asking for an extra $800,000. It turned out to be a strategy to drum up support!

As you can see from the fee table, it creates random slush funds without any detailed def-inition on who will decide how the funds will be spent and for what—contrary to how the AMS’s previous funds in previous ref-erendums were presented. Most notably, all fees are tied togeth-er so students can’t choose. This forces those benefiting from the funds to push for them. The Ubyssey newspaper is already pumping it strongly as they’re receiving fees. The total fee adds up to $19/student, which AMS considered to be unappealing to voters. So they transferred $14 out of the Health and Den-tal plan to these new funds in order to reduce the payable ex-tra fee to $5—although you’ll pay the full $19 if you opted out of the insurance plan.

But this shift of funding se-verely exposes our Health and Dental plan coverage to the risk of being cut substantially in the future. I’ve explained it in detail on www.noQuickBuck.ca.

Additionally, discussions at AMS Council confirmed that most funds have no plans at-tached to them. Most discussed was the sustainability fund ($100,000), present because students are said to care about “sustainability.”

Finally, the AMS wants more money for its services but it has not optimized them recently. For example, the cost of Safewalk is currently higher than transport-ing the same people in a limou-sine! Why has AMS not found a better way of addressing safety? Or running Safewalk with vol-unteers like the rest of Canadi-an campuses do?

The AMS needs to start over and create a better fee structure in consultation with students.

Details on my investigation and an entertaining video of an AMS President impersonator are at www.noQuickBuck.ca.

—Nick FrankHead of the Vote No Committee

reFerendum leTTerS

The “no” side out-lettered the “yes” side five to one this week

(the other two will be posted online). Can the yes side recover?

Tune in Thursday! Or, alternatively, email us your 300-word or less

letter to feedback@ubyssey.ca.

Justin McElroy coordinating@ubyssey.ca

U theubyssey.ca

18/U byssey.ca /feaTU r e/2011.03.07

Jonny wakeFieldculture@ubyssey.ca

Like any student, Joanna Chiu was nervous when she was entering university. She was anxious about doing well, about living on her own and about meeting new people. She lived in Vanier and started going to parties around rez.

Things started to get heavy. “I started drinking and experi-menting with drugs for the first t ime,” she said. “It was very overwhelming.”

Joanna, who said she was shel-tered during high school, was un-sure of how to control herself in an environment she called a “hook-up culture.” She was sexually assault-ed and developed an eating disor-der. For Joanna, all the stresses of university were compounded by an overwhelming sense of guilt. By the middle of second year, she was at the end of her rope and felt like dropping out.

“It led to a prolonged emotion-al hangover,” she said.

More students than we may think find themselves in similar situations. Recently, a pair of stud-ies looking at mental health on university campuses revealed just how common problems of depres-sion and stress-related mental ill-ness are among students.

The National College Health As-sessment (NCHA) generally gets the most attention. The NCHA is a comprehensive health survey for university students compiled by the American College Health As-sociation and usually has around 300 schools in the US and Cana-da participating. The numbers are startling.

Across the board, students re-ported feeling more and more de-pressed each year, with the num-bers for UBC students notably high. Thirty-six per cent of UBC students who took the 2009 survey said that in the last year they had felt so depressed that it was difficult to function—compared to an aver-age of around 30 per cent for uni-versity students in general. Fifty-seven per cent of UBC respondents said they had felt that things were hopeless—the survey–wide aver-age on that question was around 45 per cent.

The numbers for students diag-nosed with depression are increas-ing as well. In 2000, ten per cent of NCHA respondents had been diagnosed with depression in the last year. In 2008 that number was 18 per cent.

Why are today’s university stu-dents showing such high levels of depressive symptoms? And why does it seem as though students who go to UBC are more depressed than at other universities?

dreams unFulFilled, graduate unskilled

One theory is that increased stress and depression is due to a per-ceived lack of opportunity after graduation. The National Post sug-gested that “the reasons behind the problems may include the pres-sures of a society that no longer

guarantees success to young university gradu-ates,” when discussing the NCHA.

Dr Elizabeth Saewyc, a professor at the UBC School of Nursing and an author of a survey on the men-tal health of students who used campus health services, said that stress definitely is a factor.

“There’s a lot of pressure on do-ing well in university,” said Saew-yc. “Long-term, it does affect your abilities—moreso than ever.”

However, she said that anecdot-al evidence that students become more stressed when they draw closer to graduating wasn’t vali-dated by her study.

“We didn’t find that. We actu-ally found higher rates of depres-sive symptoms among those in the first year of going to university.”

Saewyc said student depression may be largely due to another ail-ment—homesickness. “When dis-tressing things happen [as a new student], you don’t have your so-cial network that has been there immediately at hand,” she said. “You’ll be developing a new one—but that will take a while. And that can be stressful.”

Cory, a third-year Arts stu-dent, struggled with depression in his second year. He said that the culture in Gage Towers made it difficult to develop a support-ive network.

“First year, you’re really inte-grated and the RAs try and get you into stuff,” he said. “But as soon as you hit second year and you’re out-side of that environment...there’s no social aspect to university.”

stigma

Dr Patricia Mirwaldt, head of UBC Student Health Services, said that rates of depression—which appear to be up across all facets of soci-ety—could be explained partly by reduced stigma. In essence, it may be that the number of individu-als who suffer from depression has remained the same but there is a higher rate of reporting now.

“Fifteen years ago if you were depressed it was pretty unlike-ly that you would see a doctor for it,” said Mirwaldt. “People would really suffer in silence.”

Though society at large has per-haps made strides towards under-standing depression and anxiety, for those who experience these disorders, the stigma is still very real. Joanna said that this stigma was a major factor for her in de-ciding whether or not to seek pro-fessional help.

“I think depression and anxi-ety problems are very misunder-stood,” she said. “In general, peo-ple think it’s kind of a privileged [person’s] disease or disorder—something that people should get over and not even have to seek help for.”

Cory agreed that the stigma sur-rounding depression was intense and made it difficult to seek help. “You’re pretty much alienated. It happened with my roommates. As soon as they found out I went through these periods where I

didn’t want to talk to anyone, they just kind of shut down.”

W hen Saew-yc saw that UBC’s rates of actual ly diagnosed depression were higher than the NCHA aver-age—16 to 17 per cent compared with 11 to 12—she argued it’s pos-sible that it could be connected to this kind of reduced stigma.

“What that would sort of sug-gest is that UBC is a little better at reaching out and getting help for their students,” she said.

reevaluating

Saewyc’s study found that those who used campus health clinics were twice as likely to consider suicide than the rest of the stu-dent population. Partly because of this, UBC is in the process of re-evaluating how it deals with stu-dent mental health.

According to Cheryl Washburn, head of Counselling Services, the UBC VP Students office made mental health a priority in 2009. They’ve implemented a number of new programs focused on preven-tion, including a website, livewell-learnwell.ca, and an early alert sys-tem so students, faculty and staff can report students who seem to be struggling.

Additionally, the system for ap-pointments and referrals has been streamlined—the vast majority of counselling appointments are now same-day, she said. Counselling Services employs a total of seven full time counselors and six part time, some of whom are pre or post-doctoral interns.

other schools

Other schools are having a very difficult time meeting the demand for counseling services. Dr Ellen Taylor, head of Counselling Ser-vices at the University of Wash-ington, said they are now oper-ating at full capacity following a huge increase in first-time users. From fall of 2009 to fall of 2010, first-time appointments went up 30 per cent.

“It was at 30 per cent but I think that’s because we couldn’t get them in any more. It was a tremendous increase,” said Taylor.

The result is increased wait times for appointments.

“During our peak time, [wait times] get up to three to four weeks for a first appointment,” she said. “That’s unacceptable to most health care professionals, students and staff.”

stretched to the limit

With huge cuts to the social safe-ty net in Washington looming, UW is just trying to maintain current levels of service. “UW has consis-tently tried to prioritize that safe-ty net for students, but in the cur-rent budget climate, I think it’s trying to hold as steady as possi-ble,” said Taylor.

The numbers suggest that UBC Counselling is also operating at capacity. Both Washburn and Tay-lor said that increases in staff are followed almost immediately by increases in the number of stu-dents accessing services. So with so many students in crisis, why don’t universities simply allocate more resources to their counsel-ling services? Taylor said that the argument isn’t that easy.

“Trying to identify the actual demand is almost impossible, be-cause it is so influenced by our ca-pacity to meet that demand,” she said. “It’s a matter of weighing pros and cons, because if you give resources to mental health then you’re not giving them to some-thing else.”

“I think that [Counselling Ser-vices] is doing a really excellent job with the resources we have,” said Washburn. “We certainly would benefit from increased resourc-es, there’s no question about that.”

visibility

When it comes to getting help for students who are struggling with depression, providing resources is only half the battle.

Student depression on the rise: How is UBC coping?

continued Page 19...

2011.03.07/U byssey.ca /feaTU r e/19

Volunteer at The Ubyssey: only twelve more issues left this semester!

justin mcelroy | coordinating@ubyssey.ca Utheubyssey.ca

For one, students need to know that those resources exist. Many students struggle with mental health con-cerns without even knowing that the university offers counsellors free of charge to students. Cory said a com-bination of stigma and lack of knowl-edge of university services led him to rule out speaking with a counsel-lor as an option.

Students also have to feel like the treatments offered are worth their time. When Joanna was feeling es-pecially distressed, she made an ap-pointment with a UBC counsellor. It didn’t go well.

“I talked to a Masters student, and I [felt] he wasn’t that professional,” she said, adding that the counsellor seemed ill-equipped to discuss sexual

assault and eating disorders. “That first experience with a counsellor has to be really good for the student to want to continue treatment. I didn’t see anyone after that. I didn’t think it was helpful.”

structural concerns

Giving students resources can only do so much. There may be something about UBC itself that makes students more stressed, anxious and depressed.

For one, the majority of UBC stu-dents have to commute to campus. Both Washburn and Taylor acknowl-edged that a commute can be a major cause of stress.

“I think that students who live on campus would have more ready access to connections with other students

and resources,” said Washburn. “We may be less successful at effectively connecting commuter students to re-sources and supports.”

Commute lengths may also be a part of UBC’s higher rates of depression and depressive symptoms, she said.

“[The commute] takes a certain amount of time out of your day. It lim-its the degree to which you can engage in some of the activity that you might otherwise be able to take advantage of on campus. It’s a very real kind of challenge.”

UBC’s status as an international school also makes it hard on some students, said Saewyc, whose study found Asian males had a higher risk of depression. “[UBC has students] moving from totally different coun-tries. Struggling with culture, strug-gling with being very far away from all your friends and family can cre-ate some challenges.”

the cost

Though more students are reporting feeling depressed, many are still not getting help.

“In our study, of those who report-ed enough symptoms that they would probably qualify for depression, a third had not gotten help,” said Saewyc.

The costs of not getting help are high. “Diagnosed depression [has

been] associated with everything from increased risk of self inflict-ed injury, dropping out, attempt-ing committing suicide and accu-mulation of credit card debt,” the study found.

The university has its own con-cerns. The NCHA has found that stress, depression and anxiety are consistently ranked in the top ten factors negatively affecting academ-ic performance.

“Depression isn’t something you have to live with, but it can have a big impact on your schooling, your ability to get a good job, if you don’t get help for the distress you’re feel-ing right now,” said Saewyc.

Both Cory and Joanna said they no longer feel depressed. A f ter weathering the storm of universi-ty pressures, they said they were able to find a better mental bal-ance. But succumbing to the anxi-eties of university is an increasing-ly common story, and Saewyc said she is worried that not enough is being done.

“If rates of depression and distress are increasing in university‚then ob-viously we need to do more to figure out what’s going on that makes uni-versities a more stressful place than they used to be,” she said.

“Doing well in university costs more. There’s more on the line.” U

according to the Fall 2009 ncha, students rePorted that over the Past 12 months they:

Felt so dePressed it was diFFicult to Function

Felt things were helPless

had been diagnosed with dePression

survey-wide average

30%

45%

12-13%

ubc

36%

57%

16-17%

20/Ubyssey.ca/oUr campUs/2011.03.07

our campus

Justin mcelroycoordinating@ubyssey.ca

Branding itself as “North America’s largest indoor triathlon,” UBC Rec held its annual Triathlon-Duathlon. The winner in the overall Olympic Triathlon was Ben Cotter, who fin-ished the 1.5 km swim in 22:06, the 40km bike route in 1:04:54 and the 10km run in 39:26 for a total time of 2:06:25.6. U

chris borchert Photo/THE UBYSSEY