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In this economy, getting a degree in Finance-Engineering-Sitting Behind a Desk and Crunching Numbers may seem prudent. But hey — why not throw caution to the wind and get an Arts degree, learning valuable skills like problem-solving and communication along the way? Holly Adams defends an education in the humanities.
Of course, the hope of graduating with that magical piece of paper is that you’ll be able to afford a house down the line. This is perhaps a distant dream if you live in the Vancouver area, so ‘tiny houses’ have been cropping up as mini solutions to the unaffordability crisis — and they’re on wheels! But these mobile experiments are like putting a Band-Aid on an axe wound. Michael Stewart gives a dose of real estate realness.
A fierce debate erupted this week after Makayla Sault — a First Nations child who was taken off chemotherapy in favour of traditional Indigenous medicine to treat her leukemia — tragically passed. Conservative publications like the Toronto Star maligned Makayla’s parents and her doctors for apparently ‘allowing’ her to die. Jesse McLaren explains why this vitriolic reaction contains echoes of colonialism, and why Western healthcare should not always prevail.
Another death caught the media’s attention this week: that of King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia. Obituary after obituary has hailed him as a modern leader and reformer of human rights. Huh? The same guy under whom women had been arrested for driving, and a blogger was sentenced to 10 years with 10 000 lashes for good measure? J. Baglow reminds us that death does not suddenly make a tyrannical leader a saint.
This week, after a tumultuous election, the leftist party Syriza has been voted into government in Greece, indicating that the Greek people have rejected austerity as a means of pulling the country out of economic devastation. The win is a significant one, as it is the most left-wing party to triumph in Europe in 30 years. Micheal Laxer breaks down what Syriza’s win means for social democracy, and Tara Ehrcke outlines what a Canadian Syriza can do at home.
At the University of Victoria, a debate that would be at home in the 1950’s is playing out: a pro-life group vs. pro-choice activists on campus. This week, the pro-choicers prevailed when the B.C. Supreme Court ruled that the charter right to free expression does not guarantee that the pro-life group can hold their grizzly events on campus, featuring large-scale images of aborted fetuses. See that story here.
Finally, we all know the Wounded White Man type, right? That insufferable guy who, as Anne Theriault puts it, ‘Kool-Aid Mans’ his way into most conversations? Well, New York Magazine dedicated precious space in their publication for a WWM to air his oh-so-important grievances – which, let’s be honest, are pretty damn boring.
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Nick Seebruch, editor
