Opinion
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Mexican myth-busting
Hey gang! I hope you all had a great holiday. I sure did!
I spent the week after Christmas in Mexico with my girlfriend and her family. The weather was really great and we all had tonnes of fun.
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Silencing the other
In the Nov. 26 edition of The Uniter, an article appeared which was written by Ashley Faintuch who had visited Sderot, Israel. The student wrote how the residents of Sderot live in constant fear from terrorist rocket attacks.
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The ultimate crime against humanity
Fifteen genocides have been committed since 1900.
To paraphrase Article Two of the United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, genocide is any act committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group. Genocide includes killing members of the group, causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group, deliberately inflicting on the group conditions aimed at a group’s physical destruction and forcibly transferring children of the group to another group or preventing births.
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Prorogation nation
A year after the word “prorogation” came into vogue after the great coalition fiasco of ’08, nostalgia seems to have gotten the better of Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s judgment. Hours before the calendar turned to 2010, Harper decided his last act of the first decade of the 21st century should encompass everything his legacy has been indicative of to this point.
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Lament for a bookstore
I’m another one of the many people who are sad and disheartened that McNally Robinson at Polo Park is gone. Personally, I would have preferred to see Chapters Polo Park leave the area because I, like many Manitobans, have a soft spot for McNally. But when I take a step back to compare the two bookstores, there’s really not that much difference between the two.
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When unicorns attack
Lately, there has been a lot of advice bandied about regarding the best way to survive a zombie attack. I’m not against having a little fun, but I’m getting really sick of all this zombie-related advice.
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The MTS Centre has not revitalized downtown
You might have noticed a glossy brochure in the Winnipeg Free Press recently promoting the success of the MTS Centre during the five years it has been in operation.
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The state of philosophy at the U of W
It is inevitable that, at some point, every philosophy student must answer this question: “Why study philosophy?” This is usually followed by a second common question: “What kind of job does that degree get you?”
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Disputing the legitimacy of ‘enhanced interrogation’
Recently, The Uniter ran a comment article asserting that enhanced interrogation does not qualify as torture and should therefore be used as a legitimate method of forcing information from detainees. While it was not written by a student at the University of Winnipeg, I still felt compelled to write a response to such a downright ignorant assertion.
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Corrupted Christmas
I’m not sure about you, but I think it’s a little strange that most people, regardless of religious affiliation or lack thereof, have adopted Christmas as their own personal gift-giving holiday.
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’Tis the season for conspicuous consumption
Last Christmas, I witnessed a random but inspiring political protest at the Polo Park mall. It happened on Dec. 23, the busiest shopping day of the year.
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Harry Potter and the Scourge of Douchiness
For some reason, I’ve been getting a lot of e-mails recently, all asking me the same question.
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A pitfall of cultural appropriation
Recently in Phoenix, Arizona, 19 people became sick and three died after attending an “aboriginal” sweat box. At least, that is what some of the local media referred to it as.
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Fifteen seconds in Sderot, Israel
This past August I happened to find myself in Sderot, Israel, a city located one kilometre from the Palestinian territory of Gaza. At first it seemed like a normal Israeli city, but I quickly realized there was no one walking the streets, there were very few cars driving and the playgrounds were empty.
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The simplicity of the CBC debate
CBC Television recently underwent a makeover. Apparently, the reasons for the brand update were the result of, in the words of Friends of Canadian Broadcasting spokesperson Ian Morrison, “moving in the direction of the private sector,” where the style of news delivery frequently overtakes its substance.
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It’s the economy, stupid
Karl Marx. Maybe there should be three Xs after his name, because I’m sure I’ve lost (or gained) a lot of readers already.
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Remembering the Montreal Massacre
Twenty years ago this Dec. 6, Marc Lépine raged through the hallways of École Polytechnique in Montreal, yelling “I want women” and threatening students with a .22-calibre rifle.
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Setting the comedic bar low. Real low.
Superstar comedian Dane Cook performed in our fair city this past week. Unfortunately for me, I did not get the chance to go.
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Lest we forget
On Nov. 11, Canadians gathered to remember those who have fallen for their country. On the very same day, Kurds in Iran remembered a young political activist whose three-month strike ended when he was hanged without any regard to the due process of law at the death gallows of Sanandaj central prison in the province of Kurdistan in Iran.
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Military priorities
As I was going through the newsfeed last week, I came across a government press release announcing that the federal Conservatives have released a brand new study guide for the citizenship exam, which must be passed by newcomers to Canada. The press release celebrates the expanded scope and content of this new study guide, which apparently had not changed much since 1995.