• Liberals win majority government as Ryerson profs lose in Toronto and B.C.

    Photo: Liberal MP Adam Vaughan speaks to supporters after defeating Ryerson professor and former mayoral candidate Olivia Chow in Spadina-Fort York Monday night (Kira Wakeam/Ryersonian Staff). 

    By Arthur White

    Justin Trudeau’s Liberal party won a resounding victory on Monday in a political sea change that could deliver bigger grants and delayed interest payments to students across Canada.

    By winning 184 seats out of the 338 in the House of Commons, the Liberals will form a majority government. From only 36 seats heading into the election, the party increased its representation more than fivefold in one of the most stunning comebacks in Canadian political history.

    The Conservatives shed 60 seats, finishing with 99 nationwide. The party saw a massive collapse in support in the Greater Toronto Area, where the Liberals won 46 of 52 ridings. Stephen Harper delivered a concession speech in Calgary and will resign as leader of the party after nearly a decade as prime minister.

    The NDP also had a tough night, dropping from 95 seats to 44, driven by a poor showing in their Quebec stronghold. The Liberals won 40 seats in Quebec, mostly in and around Montreal.

    The Liberals ran on a platform that promised lower taxes for the middle class, massive investments in infrastructure and a new, more collaborative approach to government.

    On post-secondary education, the new Liberal government has promised to increase Canada Student Grant payments from $2,000 to $3,000 and defer interest payments on student loans until graduates make more than $25,000 per year. Trudeau also promised to create 40,000 new youth jobs, invest federal funds in apprenticeship programs and contribute $2.6 billion over four years to aboriginal education.

    The party also plans to legalize and regulate marijuana.

    The Liberals swept every riding around the Ryerson campus, and across Toronto as a whole. Businessman Bill Morneau took Toronto Centre, while the old Toronto Centre MP and former journalist Chrystia Freeland won in University-Rosedale.

    In Jack Layton’s old riding of Toronto-Danforth, the Liberals narrowly edged out his successor, Craig Scott. Olivia Chow, a former MP, lost to Liberal Adam Vaughan by nearly 15,000 votes in Spadina-Fort York.

    NDP candidate for the Spadina-Fort York riding Olivia Chow talks to the press after losing to Adam Vaughan and giving her speech to the volunteers. Photo taken at The Garrison in Toronto, Ontario on election night, October 19, 2015.

    Olivia Chow talks to the press after losing to Adam Vaughan and giving her speech to the volunteers. Photo taken at The Garrison in Toronto, Ont., on election night, Oct. 19, 2015 (Photo: Lee North)

    Other candidates with Ryerson connections also had a bad night. Jacqui Gingras, a sociology professor running for the NDP in North Okanagan-Shuswap, lost to the Conservative candidate.

    Recent graduate Linh Nguyen came in fourth place for the Greens in her riding of Mississauga Centre.

    Compared to 2011, this year’s election saw a seven percentage point increase in voter turnout, which reached 68.5 per cent. No figures for youth turnout were immediately available, but before the election, Ryerson students waited up to two hours to vote in advance polls on campus.

    Students in residence, some deterred by the long lines in advance polls, came back to vote at the International Living/Learning Centre on Monday. Elections Canada officials on site told The Ryersonian that everything was running smoothly as of Monday afternoon.

    In his victory speech, Trudeau commended NDP leader Thomas Mulcair for his “vigorous campaign,” and paid his respects to the defeated prime minister.

    “Stephen Harper has served this country for a decade,” he said. “And as for anyone who has devoted their life to this country, we thank him for his service.”

    He said that the Liberals had run a positive campaign based on a “hopeful vision.”

    “Politics doesn’t have to be negative and personal to be successful,” Trudeau said. “You can appeal to the better angels of our nature and you can win while doing it. Tonight, my very good friends, we proved that.”

    In a campaign dominated — at least for a few weeks — by a debate over the niqab and what the Conservatives called “barbaric cultural practices,” Trudeau, in the final minutes of his speech, told the story of a Muslim voter who handed him her infant child and explained why she was choosing the Liberals.

    “She said she’s voting for us because she wants to make sure that her little girl has the right to make her own choices in life and that her government will protect those rights.

    “A Canadian is a Canadian is a Canadian,” he said.

    With Files from Jordan Mady

     

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  • Apathetic, indifferent or cynical: youth need to realize the power of their vote

    By Nicole Abi-Najem 

    Rebecca Kogon is a Toronto-based publicist who says she has never voted in a federal election.

    For Kogon, choosing not to vote isn’t about a lack of knowledge, or about sending a direct message.

    “This is not something I’m proud about,” says Kogon, “I’m just fairly apathetic.”

    Kogon is not alone.

    The Council of Canadians’ website states almost two out of three young people did not vote in the last general election, making them the age group with the lowest voter turnout.

    According to a 2011 Labour Force Survey published on Elections Canada, 30 per cent of youth between 18 to 24 said they did not vote during the 2011 federal election because they were not interested. Twenty three percent cited being too busy as their reason for not voting, and 11 per cent stated they didn’t vote because they were away or out of town.

    Kogon says she took a quiz on the government’s website to better inform herself. The problem, explains Kogon, is that the questions weren’t targeted towards the general population.

    “The quiz takes too long, around 45 minutes,” says Kogon, “and it was too specific. At the end, it said my values most aligned with the Green party, but I don’t agree … if it was catered to the apathetic voter, that would simplify it.”

    Kogon says she plans on voting in the future, but wants to first educate herself about the parties’ stances.

    Neil Thomlinson is associate professor in the department of politics and public administration at Ryerson University. Thomlinson says he isn’t buying apathy as the reason why young Canadians aren’t voting.

    “I don’t think most youth are apathetic or indifferent.  What they are is cynical.  They don’t believe that there’s much difference between parties, local candidates, and leaders.”

    “They don’t believe that their participation will make any difference,” he adds, “and they don’t really understand the system very well at all, so that the expressed cynicism is often a cover for their lack of knowledge.”

    Thomlinson lists four main reasons for why younger people should vote:

    1. Most issues that affect everybody also affect young people, even if they don’t now, they will in the near future.
    1. “Almost all polls show a significant disjuncture between the political views of younger people and older people,” says Thomlinson. “By not voting, youth are letting the views of the older folks prevail.”
    1. Voting determines the country we will all have to live in. “Somehow,” asserts Thomlinson, “I don’t believe that young people don’t care about that.”
    1. There are issues that will affect youth personally, like post-secondary education, jobs, day care, and while Thomlinson says that that will affect everybody, it will affect young people more because “they’ll be around longer to enjoy – or suffer with – the consequences.”

    Apathy, indifference, cynicism, whatever it is, Thomlinson says that young people just need to realize their power. Even if one vote won’t change the government, together, youth can have a radical impact on how our country is governed.

    “The mathematical reality is that, if young people voted in anything approaching the same proportion as their elders, they would change the election result,” he says. “They would get a government that would deliver something closer to their policy preferences and, at the same time, they would piss off a lot of old people who would find their preferences ‘outvoted.’  One would think that combination of benefits is a pretty good incentive to vote.”

  • 12 ridings we’re watching this election

    By Arthur White

    More than ten million Canadians in 338 ridings across the nation will head to the polls on Oct. 19 to help elect a new government. Every seat matters, but some contests are worth taking a closer look at. Several cabinet ministers, a few star candidates and even two party leaders might be at risk of losing their seats. We examined 15 unpredictable ridings that promise to be razor close, signals of broader trends or just plain exciting.

    We used data compiled from local and national polls by threehundredeight.com, together with past results from elections Canada. Though some of our choices had wide margins in 2011, times have changed, and regional trends have closed what might have seemed like insurmountable gaps four years ago. Other races, like Etobicoke centre, where the Conservatives beat the Liberals by six votes in 2011, seem like sure things for the surging Liberals this time around. These 12 ridings are out best guesses for where you should focus your attention on election day.

     

    Halifax

    Argyle Street in Halifax, N.S. (Courtesy Thorfinn Stainforth/Wikimedia Commons)

    It might seem strange to pay any attention to a riding where the incumbent MP won by more than 12,000 votes in 2011. The NDP’s Megan Leslie captured more than half the ballots in that election and went on to serve as one of the deputy leaders of the party. But the Liberal vote, traditionally very high in the Atlantic, tanked in 2011. Now it’s back up to more than 50 per cent, while the NDP has slipped to about 30 points behind. Add to that Leslie’s troubles with expense claims for plane trips, and the NDP may be at risk of losing the seat that belonged to former party leader Alexa McDonough. Whatever happens, Halifax will be a good gauge of Liberal strength in the cities of the Maritimes.

     

    Madawaska—Restigouche

    Edmundston, N.B. (Courtesy P199/Wikimedia Commons)

    Rural New Brunswick was a stronghold for the Conservatives in 2011, but as the red wave washes over the Atlantic provinces, Indian Affairs Minister Bernard Valcourt could be one of the first casualties from the Conservative cabinet. Valcourt beat sitting Liberal MP Jean-Claude D’Amours in the last election, and now D’Amours is back for a rematch. With Valcourt attached to the Conservatives’ controversial handling of First Nations issues, and the Liberals showing strength in French-speaking parts of the province, the Liberals have a good chance of throwing him out.

     

    Portneuf-Jacques Cartier

    Saint-Basile, Que. (Courtesy Harfang/Wikimedia Commons)

    The suburbs and rural areas around Quebec City have always been more hospitable to the Conservatives than elsewhere in La Belle Province. If Conservative candidate Joël Godin can take this one away from NDP incumbent Élaine Michaud, in a mostly rural riding just north of the provincial capital, then they’re sure to have a good night in Quebec. A dozen or so seats here could help compensate for expected losses elsewhere in the country, and with NDP support well below where it was at the beginning of the campaign, they’ve got a good shot.

     

    Laurier-Sainte-Marie

    Place des arts in Montreal, Que. (Jeangagnon/Wikimedia Commons)

    When Gilles Duceppe lost this riding in eastern Montreal to the NDP’s Hélène Laverdière by about 5,400 the veteran politician and strident Quebec nationalist resigned as leader of the Bloc Quebecois. But now he’s back for another battle, with riding polls published on threehundredeight.com suggesting a tight race. If the Bloc can’t win here, they’re unlikely to have a good night anywhere around Montreal. But if they do have a good night, Quebec could turn into a complicated, highly unpredictable four-way jumble.

    Outremont

    Rue Bernard in Montreal, Que. (Jeangagnon/Wikimedia Commons)

    Could NDP leader Thomas Mulcair lose his seat in the heart of Montreal? The fact that he ever won this riding, which had voted Liberal in every election save one going back to 1935, is something of an anomaly. Now, the Liberals are polling very high in the western part of the island, and local polls show they’re starting to make inroads in this highly urban riding just west of Boulevard Saint-Laurent, the historic dividing line between French and English. According to threehundredeight.com, Mulcair is less than three points ahead of his Liberal challenger. If he loses, it will signal likely disaster for the party.

     

    Kanata-Carleton

    Kanata, Ont. (Courtesty Jelsova/Wikimedia Commons)

    The Liberals have brought in a soldier to take over this newly created riding in a Conservative bastion. Just west of Ottawa, it includes farmland and the booming suburb of Kanata, and was cut out of old ridings where the Conservatives led by over ten thousand in 2011. A retired Lieutenant-Colonel in the Canadian Forces, Liberal candidate Karen McCrimmon was the first woman in Canada to command a flying squadron, and now she’s looking to take out businessman Walter Pamic. With the Liberals trending up across the province, this one could switch from blue to red. It should be a signal for what will happen in the suburban ring around the nation’s capital.

     

    Ajax

    Ajax, Ont. (Courtesy P199/Wikimedia Commons)

    Immigration Minister Chris Alexander has had a hard run since coming into the cabinet. After sustaining criticism on the Syrian refugee file, he made matters worse during a horrific performance on CBC’s Power and Politics early in the campaign. Mark Holland, who lost to Alexander by just over 3,000 votes in 2011, is back for another round. Look to this one as a clue about Liberal strength in the seat-rich 905 region.

     

    Spadina-Fort York

    Spadina2

    Downtown Toronto seen from the CN Tower in Spadina-Fort York (Courtesy Agunther/Wikimedia Commons)

    This newly created riding on the shores of Lake Ontario is one of the most hotly contested in the country, with mayoral candidate and Ryerson professor Olivia Chow facing off against popular Liberal MP and ex-city Councillor Adam Vaughan. Thomas Mulcair and Justin Trudeau have made frequent visits to this riding, which is at the heart of a battle for downtown Toronto. In the 2011 election, Chow beat her Liberal challenger by a whopping 20,000 votes. But when she resigned to run for mayor, Vaughan beat one of her protégés in a byelection. This time, the Liberals are riding high across the province. But in Spadina-Fort York, local issues and the force of personality make this one nearly impossible to call.

     

    Vaughan-Woodbridge

    Woodbridge

    The annual Woodbridge Fair demolition derby (Courtesy Tom Stefanac/Wikimedia Commons)

    Another signal of Liberal strength in the 905, this riding just north of Toronto could be the place where the embattled career of former Veteran’s Affairs Minister Julian Fantino finally comes to an end. Fantino, a former police chief, won by more than 18,000 votes here in 2011. But he soon become the lightning rod for the Conservative mishandling of the veteran’s file, notably after refusing to talk to the wife of a veteran. Financial analyst Francesco Sorbara could take this one for the Liberals. If he manages it, look for the Conservatives to be pushed out of this key area north of Toronto.

     

    Calgary Centre

    Calgary

    Calgary, Alta. (Courtesy Wikimedia Commons)

    Can the Conservatives lose ground in fortress Alberta, even in Calgary, the heart of the beast? This would be the place to look, especially given the star power in the contest. The Conservatives are running Joan Crockett, a former executive with the Calgary Herald. The Liberals don’t have a single seat in Alberta right now, but they’re running Kent Hehr, a former provincial Member of the Legislative Assembly. Local polls on threehundredeight.com give Hehr a strong lead. Who knew Alberta could be exciting?

     

    Burnaby North-Seymour

    Burrard Inlet north of Burnaby, B.C (Photo courtesy Vranac/Wikimedia Commons)

    This new riding in a suburb east of Vancouver is typical of the three way race in the region. Local polls have all three major parties trading the lead and within a few points of each other. The NDP are setting their hopes on Carol Baird Ellan, a former provincial court judge, while the Liberals are countering with a businessman and adjunct professor. This one could be one of the most unpredictable races in one of the most unpredictable provinces.

     

    Richmond Centre

    Richmond

    Richmond, B.C. seen from Aberdeen Station (Courtesy Grotskiii/Wikimedia Commons)

    With a Trudeau victory on Oct. 19 looking increasingly probable, the Conservatives have started pulling out some dirty tricks in immigrant communities around Vancouver and Toronto, including an ad in Punjabi and Cantonese newspapers claiming that the Liberals would legalize brothels. This riding, with an immigrant population of about 60 per cent, could signal how well that strategy worked out in the end. Alice Wong, the Conservative incumbent and Minister of State for seniors, is battling local businessman Lawrence Woo.

  • Strategic voting: what is it and should you do it?

    By Melinna Miranda

    If you’re a first-time voter, choosing what party to vote for can be confusing. Maybe you’ve never voted because you thought your vote wouldn’t count. Strategic voting aims to make sure that no vote is “wasted.”

    Strategic voting is exactly what it sounds like – voting for a candidate in your riding that is most likely to defeat the candidate that you don’t want to win. This can mean voting for a party you don’t necessarily side with, but instead voting for one just so that the party you dislike doesn’t win.

    Websites such as strategicvoting.ca and votetogether.ca tell you which progressive party to vote for in your riding to push the Conservatives out. They have one goal in mind as their catch phrases, “Vote Harper out! Vote Strategically!” and “Let’s vote together to end 10 years of Harper rule” suggest.

    With Canada’s current electoral system, first-past-the-post (FPTP), a candidate wins a seat in Parliament if they receive the highest number of votes in their riding. Candidates don’t need to have 50 per cent of the vote in order to win, and oftentimes win with less than half of the vote. This can result in vote splitting, where votes are divided between candidates that have similar platforms, thereby increasing the chance of the candidate with a minority of the vote to win. This is an issue because the result doesn’t necessarily reflect the choices of the majority of the population.

    Voting strategically works to avoid splitting the vote. Websites like those mentioned above, encourage voters to choose the New Democratic Party (NDP), Liberal or Green party candidate in their riding that looks best placed to defeat the Conservatives. By inputting your riding, the website calculates which of those three parties has the most support and tells you to vote for that one.

    Green party leader Elizabeth May told CTV’s Canada AM on Friday that strategic voting is “slaughtering” the Green party because people don’t vote for what they want. She encouraged voters to choose the candidate they want, and not the outcome.

    But Daniel Rubenson, an associate professor of politics at Ryerson, says that there isn’t necessarily anything wrong with voting strategically.

    Although Rubenson says it’s not an “ideal” situation, if people want to vote strategically without doing their research, it’s their right to be uniformed.

    “It’s the beauty of the system in which we live,” he said.

    Second-year new media student Katrina Trantau will be voting for the first time on Monday. She took a test online to see which party her beliefs sided with the most. She says that she rather vote for the party she believes in than vote for one she thinks will win.

    “One specific vote isn’t gonna make a huge difference,” she said.

    Whether or not strategic voting is detrimental or beneficial to the democratic process is open to debate. But for each individual voter, it could be something to consider when casting a vote Oct. 19.

  • The indigenous vote: has it changed the campaign?

    Photo: NDP leader Thomas Mulcair speaks at an Assembly of First Nations forum (Courtesy @perrybellegarde/Twitter)

    By Angelyn Francis

    Improper housing, access to education, youth suicide rate, incarceration rates, unsafe water and missing and murdered women.

    For indigenous voters in Canada, these are the main issues this election. This time around, each of the parties in the running have addressed many, if not all, of these problems in their platforms.

    But up till now, a day before voting day, their points related to indigenous issues haven’t been heard quite as loudly through microphones on the campaign trail.

    Nadine Cuneo, the financial director for the Indigenous Student Association at Ryerson, remembers watching a debate and not hearing indigenous issues being talked about at all.

    In all three English debates, First Nations and aboriginal peoples were referenced briefly with regard to pipelines and Bill C-51 and once when Liberal leader Justin Trudeau pointed out these communities “haven’t been talked about enough tonight” during the Globe and Mail debate. But none of the questions posed by moderators, nor the topics brought up in the open debate portions, related to indigenous issues.  

    “I think that’s to be expected, as a Native person,” Cuneo said. “We don’t expect them to talk about our issues and that’s why so many Native people don’t vote.

    “Our issues are seen as small niche issues, but meanwhile as an indigenous person these are the main issues,” she continued.

    Off the mics, however, indigenous issues have been addressed to various extents in each of the parties’ platforms. The Liberal party and the NDP have dedicated sections of their platforms that individually address closing education gaps in First Nations communities, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and opening an inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women.

    The Greens have presented a specific aboriginal policy, bringing up these major points as well. The Conservative platform mentions access to education, “social and economic development,” and looking at mental health and suicide among First Nations.

    Scott Hillier, a Ryerson PhD candidate in policy studies, says that these mentions mean we are starting to see some of the parties take indigenous issues more seriously, but he agrees that they haven’t been highlighted on the campaign trail.

    “We’ve spent weeks now discussing the niqab issue — an issue that is really a non-issue … when we have over 1,200 missing and murdered or missing indigenous women in this country, and yet we can’t seem to have that discussion on a national stage.”

    The staggering number of drinking water advisories on reserves is another First Nations problem that has been written into platforms, but not really spoken about to voters.

    According to Health Canada, as of July 31, 2015, there were 133 drinking water advisories in effect in 93 First Nation communities across Canada, not including those in British Columbia. Some have been in place as far back as 1999. The list states that many advisories have not yet been revoked.

    Rick Harp, a journalist and clean water advocate in Winnipeg, is pleased that commitments regarding clean water on First Nation reserves have been mentioned as platform points for the NDP, Liberals and Greens. They’ve each specifically referenced the Shoal Lake 40 First Nation, the nation for which Harp advocates, which has been under a boil water advisory for nearly two decades. Both the Liberals and the NDP have committed to building a road to the community, which has been a significant barrier in terms of accessing necessities.

    Harp said, however, that a newly elected government may be in for some surprises regarding the actual state of government finances.

    “Promises are often made assuming a fairly rosy scenario, and when that doesn’t materialize aboriginal issues fall to the bottom of the pile, frankly,” said Harp.

    “I think there’s a lot of well-earned cynicism towards federal governments when it comes to these kinds of promises,” he added. “It really is, ‘believe it when I see it.’”

    According to Hillier, the status of their issues, as well as ideological beliefs — meaning that some Aboriginal groups participate only in their own First Nations and do not recognize the Canadian government as legitimate — have contributed to the low voter turnout from among the First Nations in Canada.

    Based on data collected by Elections Canada the turnout for the 2011 federal election on First Nations reserves was estimated as under 45 per cent, whereas the national average was a little over 61 per cent.

    Hillier noted that the Fair Elections Act may make it all the more difficult for First Nations peoples living on reserves to vote. The new act has made voter identification stricter by eliminating vouching, among other things. Hillier said many reserves do not have street addresses, so in the past, chiefs and band members would vouch for the voter and verify their identity and home riding. With the new changes, these voters will have to find another way.

    For this election though, Hillier said he thinks he’s starting to see attitudes change toward voting.

    “We’ve had many leaders in the indigenous community come out and say we must vote, we must make a change.”

    This year’s Mrs. Universe, Canada’s Ashley Callingbull from Alberta’s Enoch Cree Nation, has been speaking out and urging First Nations to vote. The Assembly of First Nations National Chief Perry Bellegarde has made statements the importance of First Nations peoples “making an informed decision at the ballot box.” And in total there are 49 indigenous candidates vying for a seat in the House of Commons.

    Post-election, Hillier said that people need to maintain pressure on the federal government to hold true to the promises they have made for indigenous communities.

     

  • How much do looks matter on the campaign trail?

    Photo: Liberal leader Justin Trudeau and his wife, Sophie Grégoire at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2008 (Richard Burdett/Wikimedia Commons)

    By Caitlin Martin Newnham

    “Nice hair, though” is the catchphrase of Canada’s 2015 federal elections. But it’s not just the phrase used by the Conservatives to attack Justin Trudeau’s luscious locks. The phrase represents the importance that citizens place on appearances when deciding who should lead them.

    The emphasis of physicality in politics is a convention common to both Canada and the U.S. throughout history. Nelson Wiseman, the director of the Canadian studies program at the University of Toronto, explained that “physical appearance is very important (and) comes right down to the colour of the tie you wear in the leaders’ debate.”

    Harper proved this theory several times during his incumbency. For example, Wiseman said, “On the ‘Three Amigos’ summit (a meeting with the leaders of the U.S. and Mexico), he was wearing a safari outfit and some fun was made of that.”

    “Since then he’s picked up someone who lays out what he’s going to wear,” Wiseman said.

    Clothing is an important factor in the appearance of politicians, but this election has highlighted one highly criticized feature of the candidates: hair.

    Facial hair has been a focal point of appearance controversy in politics, so much so that Wikipedia dedicated an entire page to listing whiskered former U.S. presidents.

    Abraham Lincoln was the first president of the United States to have a beard. His decision to abandon his smooth face for a chin curtain was allegedly influenced by Grace Bedell, an 11-year-old who wrote to Lincoln before he was elected. Grace told Lincoln his face is too thin: “All the ladies like whiskers and they would tease their husbands to vote for you and then you would be president.”

    It’s clear that not everyone agrees with Grace because, as Wiseman pointed out, “Much has been written about Nixon’s five o’clock shadow during the presidential debate with Kennedy.” Kennedy was clean-shaven and composed in front of the cameras, whereas Nixon was uncomfortable and haggard-looking following his stay at the hospital for a knee injury. Kennedy won the debate.

    Tom Mulcair, the leader of the New Democratic Party, has a neatly groomed beard that would have been commonplace during the inception of Canadian governance. Out of the 25 delegates at the Charlottetown Conference, 19 sported facial hair. In the context of the last century, however, the last whiskered prime minister was Louis St. Laurent who only had a whisper of a moustache.

    Amongst Canadian Prime Ministers, the prize for most impressive mutton chops undoubtedly goes to Charles Tupper (Courtesy Wikimedia Commons)

    Amongst Canadian Prime Ministers, the prize for most impressive mutton chops undoubtedly goes to Charles Tupper (Courtesy Wikimedia Commons)

    But Wiseman does not think Mulcair’s beard is necessarily bad for his campaign.

    “Some women think beards are sexy,” Wiseman said, but some think facial hair is unpleasant. “(Mulcair’s) just being himself — if he changes people will ask, is he hiding something? … I think you’re best off being true to yourself, unless people say you look goofy.”

    Justin Trudeau, the leader of the Liberal party, may be clean shaven, but the hair on his head ignited the recent conversation about the importance of hair in politics.

    “(Appearance) influences a lot subconsciously, and sometimes consciously,” Wiseman said. “The reason why the Conservatives in their ‘just not ready’ ads used a picture with Trudeau and his long hair is because of his youth.” The Conservatives intended to emphasize Trudeau’s youth in the attack ad’s photograph and strategically followed the image with, ‘He’s just not ready.’”

    But there is no reason for Trudeau to get a trim. “If you’ve been to your hairdresser and you don’t like what they did, you’ll feel awkward for the rest of the day,” Wiseman noted. “You exude more confidence and poise when you’re being yourself.”

  • The future of Canadian science: Scientists and students speak out to make science an election issue

    By Evan Morrison

    When Husain Nizami graduated from Queen’s University with his master’s degree in biology, he was shocked at how difficult it was to find a job. Nizami, now in his second year of mechanical engineering at Ryerson, says he changed fields because of a lack of jobs due to a lack of funding.

    “In science, it feels [like] a lot of people are going and getting advanced graduate degrees and your [employability status] depends on what you have published,” said Nizami. “If you are at an institution that is not well funded, which is the case for many institutions in Canada, it’s difficult to generate peer-reviewed articles that will help you get a job.”

    Nizami is just one of the many Canadian science graduates struggling to find jobs in their field. Science has become a major election issue for researchers and scientists across Canada as they have criticized the federal government for cuts to funding.

    The elimination of over 4,000 science-related jobs, the scrapping of the long-form census in 2010 and the decision to phase out the role of Canada’s national science advisor in 2008 have caused the science community to make science a priority in these elections.

    “It’s absolutely stunning and shocking that science has not been a major discussion point amongst any of the parties,” says Imogen Coe, dean of the Faulty of Science at Ryerson. “It’s a terrible thing for a liberal society not to be engaging in those types of discussions.”

    Both the Liberal Party and the NDP have promised to reinstate the role of the national science advisor and to stand up for science in parliament.

    Science and technology expenditures in Canada by the federal government are expected to decline by 5.4 per cent from the last fiscal year. Federal government spending on science and technology peaked in 2011 and has declined annually since that time.

    Funding for science last year amounted to $2.7 billion and is maintained in the 2015 federal government’s budget, but after taking into account inflation and increased competition among graduates, resources have been stretched further for scientists in Canada.

    “I have friends that graduated from Ryerson with their master’s and after seven months they couldn’t find a job,” said environmental studies graduate student Brian Hanna. “It seems the only way to get meaningful employment nowadays is to go on and get your PhD after your undergrad because there are no jobs.”

    The issue many scientists have with the federal government’s policy towards science funding, is that focus has shifted away from basic fundamental science toward research that is more commercialized. The Tri-Council Agencies, Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, and the National Science Foundation, the major source of research funding for post-secondary institutions in Canada, are all geared towards research that is commercialized.

    “The emphasis of translational science is misguided,” says Coe. “It moves funding, support and structures away from basic science, which is absolutely essential if we are going to find solutions for the problems we face.”

    Students like Nizami have also voiced their concerns over the dramatic shift from fundamental research.

    “It doesn’t make sense for the government to be funding something that the industry can make profit [from],” says Nizami. “There’s enough of an incentive to do that kind of research that it will happen on its own. It should be the government’s job to fund that high risk research.”

    Michael Arts, a chemistry and biology professor at Ryerson and former government scientist for Environment Canada, says the changes that have happened in federal funding have made pursuing long-term research a difficult task for scientists.

    “One of the major differences between federal and academic science in the past was that federal science could be done over long periods of time because you had that stable funding base. Academics are limited to much shorter time now because of much shorter term grants.”

    Large cuts to federal funding, Arts explains, decimates opportunities for students to have the luxury to pursue long-term grants.

    “Just recently, a Canadian won the Nobel Prize for his work in neutrino research,” says Blake Glasbergen, Discovery Channel visual archivist and science journalist. “Those kind of achievements are only possible when we give money and set up opportunities for future endeavours like that to happen.”

    The Conservative government unveiled the Canada First Research Excellence Fund last year, a $1.5 billion sum of money that Canada’s universities and hospitals all want a share of, but Coe explains that it’s just not enough to solve the problem.

    “The problems we face are huge,” says Coe. “And it’s going to require science, along with everything else, to solve them.”

    Want more on the story? Check out Reporter Evan Morrison’s multimedia website for photos, interviews, and party platforms on the issue.


    Check out the video below to get a glimpse into the pressures facing Canadian scientists.

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      Anthony Manrique, first-year journalism. "Drake, because he's really influential. A lot of young people like him and that's enough influence to make the country look cool.”

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      Emma King and Adjani Ngako Toussom, first-year journalism. King: "I don't know who yet, but I would choose a feminist. There are a lot of feminist issues we're facing. Can I say Norm Kelly? My answer is now Norm Kelly." Ngako Toussom: “My Grade 11 law teacher. He wasn’t ambiguous and he actually knew what he said. Wait, is Ryan Gosling Canadian? Or can I change my answer to Drake?”

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      Taylor Patience, first-year nursing. "I'd have to say Pierre Trudeau. Before when he was optimistic and open about Canada. He helped cement French Canadian and English Canadian relationships."

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      Phoebe Leung, fourth-year graphics communications management. “I would say Anne Hathaway. She's my role model. I really admire her. She doesn't have much bad news about her. When she talks it all makes sense.”

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      Bronwyn Turp, first-year photography. “Keith Richards. I feel like he’d keep things interesting.”

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      George McQueen, fifth-year international economics and finance. "Winston Churchill. He’s quite brash.”

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      Anthony Spiteri, first-year engineering. "I’d say Grumpy Cat. Who doesn't like cats?”

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      Stefano Salerno, first-year business management. "Pierre Trudeau. We need a strong leader but a compassionate leader at the same one. We need someone who fits that bill.”

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      Victoria Porco, second-year biomedical sciences; Stefano Martelli, second-year medical physics; and Joanna Tucci, second-year biology. Initially they all agreed on Drake. Porco: "We should have chosen Einstein. Can we switch our answer? Mostly because he developed what we study. He's just a really smart guy with cool opinions on the world.”

    We asked Ryerson students to name their ideal prime minister

    By Robyn Sheremeta

    “Anyone but Harper” is scrawled across the social media timelines of many a disgruntled Canadian. There are websites devoted to ousting the current prime minister by voting strategically and a Facebook event called Stephen Harper Going Away Party, with more than 300,000 confirmed “guests.” But who would you choose to be PM if you actually could oust Harper?

    We asked Ryerson students who they would elect, living or dead, Canadian or not, to lead our true north strong and free, and while some of the answers weren’t surprising at all (an overwhelming number of students chose Drake), others were more unexpected.

    Not many students were willing to be photographed the Friday before a long weekend — probably because they’ve run out of clean laundry — but those who did had some insightful answers.

     

  • Ryerson professors sign letter accusing Conservatives of ‘hate-mongering’

    By Arthur White

    Three Ryerson professors have signed their names to an open letter blasting the Conservatives for what it calls an “unethical” campaign strategy based around the “politics of hate.”

    Signed by at least 587 academics from universities across Canada, the letter claims that, by trying to make so-called “barbaric cultural practices” an election issue, the Conservatives are exploiting dangerous fears and pitting Canadians against each other.

    Two Ryerson English professors, Andrew O’Malley and Nima Naghibi, signed the letter, as did David Hunter, an associate professor in the department of philosophy.

    Naghibi told The Ryersonian that she believes strongly in the points expressed in the letter, which was written and circulated by McGill law professor Daniel Weinstock.

    “I think Canadians have been deeply troubled by the ugly rhetoric embraced by the Conservative campaign,” Naghibi said. “It is undignified for the ruling party to be debasing a democratic campaign in this way.”

    She said that her parents chose to come from Iran to Canada because of its “reputation as a safe and welcoming haven for immigrants.” But now she fears that Canada’s image is being “tarnished.”

    The language in the letter itself is even more forceful than Naghibi’s criticisms, with Weinstock claiming the Conservatives engage in “hate-mongering” and bring “shame to Canadian politics.”

    “The Conservatives seem to have been opting for a particularly nasty form of ‘wedge politics,’” the letter states, claiming their strategy is “cynically calculated to distract and divide citizens by insinuating that some law abiding and peaceful members of the community are freedom-hating barbarians who threaten Canadian society.”

    “Like many sophisticated forms of vicious propaganda, the invocation of barbarism is meant to create fear and anxiety rather than to identify a real problem,” the letter says.

    The term “barbaric cultural practices” was used in the title of a Conservative bill to target child marriage and forced marriage, as well as gender based violence. But as the Oct. 19 election nears, the Conservatives have brought other cultural issues to the forefront, notably by triggering a debate over whether Muslim women should be able to wear a niqab during citizenship ceremonies.

    The niqab issue is one of the main tactics that has troubled Naghibi.

    “The list of things that trouble me about the Conservative campaign is very long,” she said. “The amount of airtime that the Conservative campaign has devoted to condemning a very small percentage of women in Canada who choose to wear the niqab is another example of men telling women what they should be wearing.”

    “In the name of freedom and democracy, the Conservatives are actually denying women the right to choose what they wear,” she added. “The fact that they don’t see this irony is astonishing.”

    The Ryersonian contacted the Conservative party for comment but did not receive a response before publication.