How far off is the death of bottled water?

The proliferation of bottled water into all aspects of our lives has possibly been the greatest success of capitalism of the last twenty years. This billion-dollar industry is as ludicrous as the idea of bottling and selling air, while turning a massive profit.

But that is exactly what has been done. People love their bottled water: by the case full, by the single bottle, or by the water cooler. This, despite the fact that bottled water is actually more expensive than gasoline.

It seems, though, that times are changing. Could bottled water be on its way out? Students at Ryerson and across Canada through the Canadian Federation of Students have been working with groups like the Polaris Institute for a few years to build a campaign to kick bottled water to history’s curb.

And it seems to be catching on. London City Council has approved a ban on bottled water in city-run facilities. According to today's Globe and Mail, the move was extremely popular among citizens, and city officials are going to ensure water fountains make their way to the newly dry facilities. Columnist Paul Berton for the London Free Press wrote today that this move is also being contemplated by Kitchener, Charlottetown, St. John's, Vancouver and Nelson, B.C. In fact, David Millar said that Toronto City Council will be contemplating a similar move before November.

City politicians, citizens of London, students across Canada, the Council of Canadians and Pierre Trudeau's son all support limiting the use of bottled water. With so many people on side, who could be opposed?

Other than those crazies at the Maclean's-supported Western Standard, it seems that the only organised source of criticism is coming from the Canadian refreshment industry. In anticipation of the vote, the group sent out a press release arguing that limiting bottled water is not the right solution to London's waste problems.

Their arguments are hardly enough to save this fleeting industry (bottled water is good because the bottles can be made into vests?). The bottled water industry is in trouble, and now more than ever is the time for pressure to be mounted.

Next up… plastic bags.

Turmoil continues at CKLN

It was announced yesterday that Kristin Schwartz and at least five other volunteers have been released from CKLN. Kristin has been a long-time staff person there.

This is the latest attack on a shrinking cohort at CKLN who are fighting the corporatisation agenda of the former Board of Directors.

While the situation there is too complicated for a small blurb, there is a good blog that can catch you up to speed on the situation there.

Visit Take Back Our Radio to get a glance at the struggle that has been unfolding there for months.

Foreign campuses are big business for Western Universities

One week ago, the Toronto Star ran this piece co-written by Canada's favourite feel-good duo Craig and Marc Kielburger. This piece follows their usual trend of advocating a dangerously out-of-touch brand of philanthropy. Titled "U.S. campuses abroad bridge cultural gaps", it argues that international campuses provide an "opportunity to build cross-cultural bridges."

Despite the fact that this trend has caught on with Canadian universities and colleges (albeit in less obvious ways), the Kielburgers focus on American universities, particularly those in the Middle East. Their thesis is simplistic and rosy. Basically, it is good that American universities have created satellite campuses overseas.

However, Craig and Marc's fluff piece brushed over a crucial point. Had the goal of these universities been the cultural enlightenment of a generation of Arab and American students, perhaps this expansion would take a different form. But, as the article states, universities are in it for the money. These campuses take in foreign students to help fund their operations back home. Foreign students are funding American students off their backs. There is something seriously wrong with this.

And, to add to that, the article states that curriculum is virtually the same and K-12 education is being re-vamped to "prepare students for the tough entrance standards of American universities."

It is the belief of many that it should not be the role of the American military to police the world. Nor should it be the role of American universities to educate the world. Education and curricula are highly political and culturally loaded. This foreign intrusion suggests that American education is somehow superior to what is, or could be, offered in other countries. This arrangement also allows governments off the hook for maintaining or creating a domestic and public post-secondary education system. What’s more, it opens the door to cultural domination from a foreign power. Hardly a noble exercise in geopolitical welfare.

Perhaps a better approach would be to encourage exchanges of faculty and students to international institutions while respecting national and institutional autonomy. This, while at the same time adequately funding post-secondary education, would provide a true opportunity for 'cross-cultural bridges'.

In Canada and the United States, international and foreign students are viewed as wads of cash. Students studying at an Ontario university who are International or who do not have status, pay two to three times more for the exact same education as their domestic colleagues. This is despite the fact that they were educated elsewhere, costing taxpayers nothing for their K-12/OAC education.

Craig and Marc could have better used their column to highlight the plight of International students in Canada. Instead, they spewed the same flawed arguments that are used by university presidents who view foreign 'markets' with dollar-signed eyes.

This kind of rhetoric doesn't help students, either foreign or domestic. Nor does it presuppose that education is a right. It undermines the fight for an affordable education for all; something that the vast majority of students have called for time and again, despite citizenship status.

Worth Linking To

Not that we usually do this, but this video is too funny not to post a link to.

In response to John McCain's recent attack ad against Barack Obama, Paris Hilton has accepted her nomination from McCain to run in the 2008 presidential election.

In dedication to our Editor In Chief, here's Paris Hilton, For President:

Could there ever be a Canadian equivalent to this?

Sheldon Levy Visits Israel

The Ryerson Free Press blog recently took a bit of a vacation, and returned to find out that Sheldon Levy, that loveable poster-child of a perfect university president, has also been on vacation. He took a road trip, of sorts, with five other university presidents: David Johnston of the University of Waterloo, Luc Vinet of l’Université de Montréal, Peter MacKinnon of the University of Saskatchewan, Allan Rock of the University of Ottawa and William Barker of University of King’s College in Halifax.

Rather than facing Chinese security during the Olympic lead-up, from where the majority of Ryerson’s international student population hails, Levy and his peers vacationed in the occupying state of Israel.

The tour was co-hosted by University of Toronto law professor Ed Morgan and York University historian Irving Abella, both of whom have led previous missions, according to the Canadian Jewish News.

The purpose of the trip was “to introduce the Canadians to their Israeli counterparts, to allow them to see first hand the quality of education and research at Israeli universities, and to encourage the creation of joint research and exchange programs” Abella said. He is also the former national president of the Canadian Jewish Congress.

This quite the claim, considering it is normally academics themselves who create ties with universities. New international academic partners are not decided though presidential decree.

And somehow, the ryerson.ca website has missed this story. The Free Press couldn’t find a link anywhere to a report about Levy’s trip. This is despite that the news feed has steadily published on other, somewhat less important issues than a president’s trip to a controversial state.

Perhaps that’s because Levy’s trip happened almost a year exactly to the day that he released this letter. Levy, and a number of other university presidents, were quick to condemn the British University and College Union’s (UCU) motion to boycott Israeli academic institutions. Many students disagreed with this approach and Levy was coerced into a panel on academic boycotts months after. He received a lot of flack on both sides for how the situation was handled.

Maybe the Ryerson publicity machine has learned from last year’s mistakes: from announcing support for the state of Israel without consulting students, staff or faculty, to siding with a professor over expelling a student in the infamous Facebook debacle. Maybe their approach this time was to not say anything at all.

There seems to only be one account of this trip, and it’s from the Jerusalem Post and the Canadian Jewish News.

Of course, Levy, and his jet setting colleagues, are free to travel where they please. But when Levy travels with Ryerson’s banner overhead, he has the responsibility to, at the very least, notify the community. When Levy joined others from Ontario on a trade mission to India, students were informed and the details were more public. Ryerson should at least announce that this trip occurred, and to justify it. If the University is afraid that they can’t justify the trip, then hiding the fact that Levy went isn’t the way forward; he simply should not have gone.

Maybe Levy’s quick condemnation last summer of the UCU boycott wasn’t triggered by a support for academic freedom as was previously stated. Maybe he was just looking for a free trip, to materialize a year later.

For his next trip, perhaps he should look towards Cuba, Scandinavia, Ireland or Sri Lanka. Levy and his buddies could at least get a snapshot of what free university education looks like. That’s the kind of diplomacy that all Ryerson students could get behind.

Are Canadians actually "split on" Omar Khadr's interrogation video?

The mainstream news is buzzing today about a video of Omar Khadr’s interrogation by a Canadian CSIS official at Guantanamo Bay. The video most prominently being played by news agencies is of Khadr weeping and saying “kill me”.

Khadr is being detained for allegedly throwing a grenade that fatally wounded an American soldier. He was also shot three times. There’s no word of the punishment faced by the person who shot Khadr, who, at that time, was 15 years old.

The government has said it will not comment on the video.

It is fair to assume that only public pressure will snap the feds into action on this case. Khadr, who fits the definition of a child soldier, was engaged in an illegal war. However, the Canadian Press has reported that Khadr’s case has somehow “Split Canadians”.

The article uses comments posted on some media websites to argue that Canadians are divided in how they view Khadr. Many of the comments made against Khadr quote things that have been said by his family in the past to argue their case. It’s important to mention that much of what has been written on the Khadr family has been blown up by right-wing editorial journals like Maclean’s Magazine, a rag that has recently been condemned by the Ontario Human Rights Commission for publishing content that can be seen as Islamophobic.

But, if there were truth in the Canadian Press article, what exactly are Canadians “Split On”?

Isn’t the majority of Canadians supportive of the definition of child soldier? Or is this definition thrown out when the child-in-question is complicit in ‘terrorism?’ Or is Muslim? Or is Canadian and Muslim? Is this a definition to be imposed upon other countries with other conflicts, and not a definition that the Canadian government or Stephen Harper needs to uphold?

When framed this way, it’s likely that this video does not split Canadians. It is only when the facts are skewed, when ambiguous and loaded terms like terrorism are used, and when rhetoric and racism are thrown in the mix could the Canadian population look “split” on how Omar Khadr has been treated.

If Canadians hope to hold high heads on the world stage when they declare their country a peace-loving and peace-keeping nation, their government needs to stop being complicit in American foreign occupations and conflict. Canada needs to demand that Khadr is returned to the country of his citizenship.

Canadians to help construct the "Great Wall of Kandahar"

The Canadian Press reported yesterday that Canadian Forces have agreed to help with the construction of a wall that will surround Kandahar University, Afghanistan.

The wall will be “a three-kilometre perimeter of stone, brick and iron around the school campus”. Its main purpose, according to the article, will be to keep out thieves, make it safer for women to attend school and stop sheep herders from using the area around the university for sheep herding and grazing.

This endeavour will cost the Canadians approximately $500,000.

Hasn’t history demonstrated that building walls to keep out various threats instead of trying to develop proactive solutions is not a sustainable practice? Canadians would do well to challenge the use of our resources for this project.

However, if we think hard enough we might be able to imagine some bright sides to this new project: maybe the wall will help protect students from Canadian soldiers who will be building it. With at least 6500 people killed in Afghanistan in 2007, perhaps Afghans will actually appreciate the added security from NATO troops.

However, if the Canadian Armed Forces are representing Canadians overseas and doing it through taxpayers’ dollars, having troops build a fence around a university is yet another example of a band-aid solution that will not go very far in addressing the root problems of the conflict there.

Afghanistan is a nation that has faced occupation after occupation, where today, warlords still control many of its regions. The bottom line is that, with or without Canadian walls, Afghanistan will not find peace while it is occupied by foreign troops.