Rob Ford needs a reality check

It will be an ecstatic day for Torontonians and a somber day for writers such as myself when Rob Ford decides to finally shut up.

Back in February, while the 2014 Olympic Winter Games were still being held in Sochi, the City of Toronto decided to raise a rainbow flag outside of city hall in support of LGBTQ athletes. This caused a stir in the media since our wonderful mayor yet again put his foot in his mouth by voicing his opinion on the matter.

Ford believes that the flag should be removed and replaced with the Canadian flag because, “This is about the Olympics, this is about being patriotic to your country”. Well Mr. Mayor, did it not occur to you that supporting our oppressed athletes while they are away from home is patriotic? Of course not. It should also be noted that the Canadian flag already flies outside in Nathan Phillips Square.

Ford’s attitude has brought on plenty of speculation from members of the city council as well as from the general public. It is believed that Ford is masking his homophobic beliefs with the claim that, “[He] feels that their Olympic spirit is supposed to be non-politicized” (as expressed by the mayor’s chief of staff, Dan Jacobs).

This is further enforced by Ford’s recent statement claiming that he will not be attending the annual Toronto pride parade due to “personal reasons”. It is absolutely ludicrous that the leader of the largest city in Canada should not be attending a major citywide event, particularly since this year’s Toronto pride parade is also in celebration of World Pride. This celebration will include not only LGBTQ community members and supporters from Canada but also those from around the world.

If Ford believes that stating: “I’ve never gone to a Pride parade. So I’m not going to change the way I am.” excuses him from his duties as mayor and a decent human being, I’d be more than happy to excuse him from his high-paying position. Who’s with me?

 

– Lily Maase

Why we vote: admendium

After my previous ranting post about how people don’t vote even though they should, it has occurred to me that rather than wailing at the unfeeling brick that is our political system I should instead change my stance and instead address the voter-ship. Along that line I have composed this post to make a pseudo-impassioned plea to those active users of social media who are still on the fence about the whole ‘political engagement thing’.

There are several basic facts that need to be state before we processed: firstly; that voting is undeniably and integrally important, secondly; that the federal parties in this country do not care about the youth vote, Thirdly; that we (referring to the youth populace) have a tremendous amount of power in the political system regardless of how we or the political parties regard ourselves. The first is somewhat of a given so I am not going to spend further time elaborating on it. The second fact warrants closer inspection however.  It seems rather bold to state that the federal parties don’t care about the student vote when no politician in their right mind would ever state such a thing. In order to understand this statement you have to take a closer look at the parties behavior. During the last two federal elections all of the big three parties had a multitude of campaign speeches directed at any and all special interest groups that you can think of, with one notable exception; the student population. It seems to be an accepted fact amongst the political figures of this country that the youth just don’t vote and as such can be safely disregarded. During the leadership debates at the last two federal elections education was not even mentioned once. The third point is directly related to the second; political parties regard us as having no significant influence on the system because we don’t vote. If that were to change however, we could have a tremendous and permanent impact on the political architecture of this nation. There are over a million post-secondary students in Canada, that number grows to almost 3 million if you include all of the non students who are in the 18-25 demographic. Youth represent almost a tenth of the Canadian populace. If in the next election students and young people from all corners of this nation voted then the political parties of this country will never disregard us again. That is not the only way to garner attention however, there are other ways to foster political attention.

This is where the prevalence of youth on social media comes in to play. Politicians may have a legendary ability to ignore vast outcries of the populace but even they have begun to pay a degree of attention to social media platforms to gauge their current public standing which provides a wonderful opportunity for young Canadians to get their voice heard. The members of generation Y are, as s generalization, more tech literate than almost any previous generation, we can use this to our advantage by spreading content that is relevant to issues that we find pressing. By getting the conversation going on the teeming multitude of social media platforms that we are well versed in it creates a culture of political engagement. This in turn allows the political figures of our country to come to grips with the fact that the youth of our nation have a voice and are tired of being disregarded by our leaders. This concept of using social media to engage special interest groups is not a new one, back in 2012 to bring awareness to the global issue of child soldiers in third-world countries the Kony 2012 campaign was launched and garnered an unprecedented amount of media notoriety. If we can take those principals and apply them on a considerably smaller scale to the Canadian social landscape then the amount of political attention payed to, for example, debt reduction or tuition costs will drastically increase overnight. By taking basic the basic elements of a social media campaign and having the majority of Canadian youth spread and engage with political issues using social media as a platform we stand to gain no only a voice in the current political climate but also a more engaged populace for years to come as the youth grow older and raise children of their own.

– xoxo Cedar

Why Politicians Should Tweet More

 Twitter is one of the most popular social media platforms around, with over 500 million registered users. That’s more than 14 times the population of Canada. Twitter is even phasing out newspapers. I’m not saying that Twitter is the soul reason for the decline in the newspaper business; I’m just saying the rise of social media in general has had an obvious impact on the decline of traditional media forms.

Canadian politics is mostly run by middle-aged males. I would argue that these middle-aged males aren’t exactly avid social media users. However, the younger population of the country makes use of social media eagerly. The middle-aged politicians mostly use traditional forms of media to put out their news and messages, whereas the younger generation mostly uses social media to get their news.

In order for politicians to get young people more interested in voting, they need to improve their social media usage. A great way to do this is through Twitter. Twitter only allows 140 characters per tweet, so this means that attention span isn’t an issue. Twitter also has high spreadibility, with retweets at just the click of a button. 

Emma Zernask

Rob Ford and the (In)Effective use of Social Media

As our readers know, we focus on trying to improve the image of politics in the social media world. Although Toronto Mayor Rob Ford may have failed in the improving of his image, he has definitely made his mark. Rob can take personal credit for putting Toronto on the map.

Many people believe that what he has done is a disgrace to Toronto, and by association also to Canada. As a disclaimer I have to say that I do agree with those people. But I also would like to point out that he has made effective use of social media to promote himself. He has Ford Nation, he was on the Jimmy Kimmel show, and there are hundreds of memes of his face.

Although indirectly, since he did not post most of the social media things himself, the amount of social media attention he has received from his crack stunt has helped him more than hurt him. Rob Ford still holds 33% of the popular vote in Toronto, and that hasn’t showed signs of wavering. People love to see a celebrity train-wreck, and that is what Rob Ford has successfully become. I personally believe that his celebrity status is what is keeping him in the race for mayor, and the fact that he still has a chance isn’t a reflection on him or his judgment, but rather the people who are still supporting him. Toronto needs to take a step back and really think about what they want for their city before they make their vote in the Fall.

 

Emma Zernask

Galifinakis hosts Obama – Funny or Die

Between Two Ferns, a popular web series featured on Funny or Die staring Zach Galifinakis,  recently hosted Barack Obama. One would think that Galifinakis would at least fake some kind of interest towards what the President had to say, but as usual, he maintained his usual straight-face and humorously rude composure.

Obama needed to promote the new health care plan to a younger audience, and he chose to do so through this comedy show. Obama used the media brilliantly, he knew he had to change his marketing strategies if he wanted to reach the younger audience, and what better way to do so than through an online comedy show.

The show not only reached his target audience but has reached audiences who had previously never even heard of the Funny or Die comedy show.

Zach made light of the topic by asking “Is this what they mean by drones?” when Obama began to discuss health care plans. Zach’s uninterested attitude could have easily been mistaken for the often uninterested, younger voters Obama was trying to target. But the fact that they interview was done in such a humorous way was what made it so effective. ‘Hangover’ fans all around America, and the various other countries that viewed this clip are now being informed of America’s Affordable Care Act.

Obama’s potentially risky tactic seems to have paid off!

 

-Kira

Why we vote

The response to the titular question seems fairly self evident, assuming you live in a democratized nation and are in fact literate, we vote because it is our best and only way of ensuring that the way our nation state is run is in the best interests of those who live there. Yes I understand that it is more complicated than that but the core concept is remains. If is so blatantly obvious that voting is an important and necessary part of western culture then the pressing question becomes why in the name of Jesus-Dahli-Lama-Christ do only about two thirds of Canadian youth vote?

This has a much less strait forward question to answer. The main reported reason for youth not voting in the 2011 federal election was recorded as “access issues” (admittedly a somewhat broad category encompassing reasons ranging from not knowing where to vote, to being too busy and much in-between) source. However despite the seemingly broad ranging rationalizations for not voting almost all of them can be filed under the heading “apathy”. Now I acknowledge that apathy is a rather difficult thing to nail down and even more so to attempt to combat. Many people dismiss apathy as simply one of the myriad of problems that accompany the torpid condition that is youth.
It is here that I am going to put forward an idea that may, at first, seem a tad excessive; Compulsory politics. As an idea compulsory voting is not a particularity new one, Australia has had  it in place since the mid 1920’s. The shift I am proposing is a more drastic one than simply implementing a law which makes voting mandatory for all citizens over the voting age (18). What I am proposing is a drastic cultural shift, we have to systematically ingrain in the populace starting from a young age that political changes and elections are not something to ignore, that every person should should have a personal and vested interest in the running of our country. Here in Ontario our public education is mandatory up until the twelfth grade and in that time we cover the Canadian political system in depth in a total of 1/2 of one semester in the tenth grade. I don’t presume to speak for all of you but I find that absolutely deplorable (it brings a tear to my bitter and jaded eye). It is my less than humble opinion that each and every graduate of a Canadian secondary school should graduate with a full understanding of the function, importance, and stance of all levels of the Canadian government. We have mandatory English courses up until grade 12 because we as a culture value the ability to communicate. I see no reason that it could not be the same for political studies courses, understanding how the country functions seems equally as important. I propose that we phase in mandatory political courses into the curriculum. Garnering support for these changes will be no mean feat. In order to create a culture of political involvement we must first change the social norms which will a consorted effort on all fronts. As this is a political-media centric blog I feel obligated to include a comment on the social media aspect; Living in the age of web 2.0 as we all do it is far more possible to engage the masses. The flip side of this is of course that now there are thousands of causes attempting to grab the attention and support of the masses. As for exactly how to provide an effective solution to engage the populace I shall provide an in depth recommendation in the follow up for this article. In the intervening time I only ask that you think about the level of political engagement in your area and if the system could be improved by a social change.

 

– xoxo Cedar

Canada: A little bit gay

With the Sochi Olympic games now in full swing, and many of the governments involved walking on egg shells with regards to Russia’s controversial ‘anti-LGBTQ’ laws, it is high time that we here at OMI took a look at Canada’s response to the whole sordid mess. Whilst many of the governments involved have taken a more neutral stance, Canada has done something rather overt in response to Putin’s position on gay athletes.

This just happened.

Above is a video by the Canadian Institute of Diversity and Inclusion. This video has created quite a buzz throughout the internet, achieving immense spread over the following weeks. The response from the online LGBTQ and ally community has been overwhelmingly positive. This is has been attributed to the expert construction of the video itself. It heavily relies on many of the common visual tropes to present its message. The movements of the athletes themselves contains a heavy metaphorical connection to the act intercourse (ref: thrusting, griping of cylindrical objects, sounds of exertion, ect.). Along with the metaphorical connections, this video is also a prime example of metonymy. The closing words of the video “The Games have always been a little bit gay” imply that not only the games but the governments who participate in them include (and consequently should support) an LGBTQ community.

Long story short, this is bloody brilliant. The fact that Canada, rather than sit in the stagnant political neutrality, has chosen to stand for equality despite the opposition reflects its support of the athletes competing in the games who identify as LGBTQ.

xoxo

Lily Maase, Cedar Leithead, Kira Anderson, Emma Zernask.

An Open Letter to Robert Weide

Recently, allegations that were made against Woody Allen twenty-one years ago have been brought to the media’s attention. These allegations were made by Allen’s, at the time, seven year old adopted daughter Dylan Farrow who claimed to have been molested by Allen. While there was an investigation Allen was never charged. Now, after Farrow released an open letter describing her experiences as a sexual assault survivor, a major debate by the public has begun to determine whether it is believed that Allen is guilty or not.

After reading this article, I wept. It absolutely disgusted me to read how the author, Robert Weide, defended Allen. So in response I wrote an open letter to Weide:

Dear Robert Weide,

I do not care that you know Woody Allen personally. I also am not overly concerned by whether you believe he is innocent or not. What does concern me is your approach to defending Allen.

First of all, using Mia’s sexual history as evidence to discredit her, as well as her children’s’, voices is sexist and cruel. I am in an absolute outrage that you believe that because Mia allegedly “fooled around” while in a relationship with Allen, it is alright that he married her child and most likely sexually assaulted their adopted daughter. What kind of a world do we live in where a mother’s actions make a father’s, no matter how cruel or damaging, acceptable. Mia should be in no way used to forgive or dismiss the horrific crimes Woody has been accused of committing.

You claim that Allen is an ideal reflection of a humble human being. Well then, let me ask you this: if your daughter had been molested by the “down to earth” and “wonderful person” Woody is would you forgive him and just let it go?

To quote you, “Woody allegedly took Dylan into the attic an, shall we say, ‘touched her inappropriately'”. How dare you take such a serious accusation so lightly, regardless of whether it is found true or not? Why would a child make up such a story? What would be the reason to do so? And what are the repercussions of ignoring such a claim? Particularly the repercussions of letting an A-list celebrity, who influences the attitudes of many, off the hook simply because he just couldn’t have done it?

Apparently your response to my first question is that Mia Farrow used her daughter in order to win a custody battle with Allen. To even insinuate that these claims stem from Mia in order to simply win a custody battle is horrific. Do you have such a poor view of women that you believe that a mother would use her daughter’s traumatic experiences for her own personal gain? And even if she did, did you ever think that maybe Mia wanted to win the custody battle to free her children from a possibly abusive father? The claims made against Allen are simply too serious to brush off with that statement.

To even suggest, as you did, that a woman defending her child’s statement needs to “get over herself” is misogynistic beyond words. Regardless of what happened, a parent should never be condemned for protecting their child’s safety, mother or father.

You say that since the courts have found no evidence against Allen that he is guilt free. Did you ever think that the legal system in North America is absolutely spewing with injustice and bullshit such as your article? Especially when it comes to accusing an A-list celebrity of a crime that could land him in jail for the rest of his life. God forbid we never get another Woody Allen movie because the child he molested was protected and given the chance to properly recover from her trauma.

You are blaming the victim, you ignorant piece of shit. Don’t attempt to sugar coat that or make excuses for yourself. You are fuelling a sexist, oppressive, and unfair view and that makes me sick.

Many child molesters are charismatic, can pass a lie detector test, and lead “surprisingly normal lives”. Just because Allen has successfully been deemed fit to adopt an additional two children does not clear him from the accusations that he molested his daughter.

The only point of yours that I agree with is that it was somewhat inappropriate to use twitter in order to bring this incident back into life. However, in the grand scheme of things, is that even important? No, it isn’t.

I am disgusted and heartbroken to know that I live in a world where not only can a celebrity, and consequently many others in his or her position, get away with crimes so vulgar and traumatizing. Where those in a position of power defend this, and where an established and (questionably) credible source publishes these disgusting sexist opinions. My tears are not only for Dylan but also for the millions and millions of women and children who fall victim to this harsh reality every day.

I think it’s time you revised your article.

Lily Maase

Could social media manage to deport young pop star Justin Bieber?

Young Canadian celeb, Justin Bieber, has long since been the focus of media attention. In recent months he seems to have changed from the youthful boy to the reckless teen by getting himself into a lot of trouble. Immediately following the teen heartthrob’s arrest for drag racing while driving under the influence on January 23, 2014 a petition was created online requesting that Bieber be deported from the United States.

The “We the People” petition stated that Justin Bieber was not only a threat to the people and a bad influence on the youth, but that he was also misrepresenting the citizens of the US and their contribution to pop culture. The petition took off.

Petitions receiving over 100 000 signatures must be addressed by the White House and this petition quickly received over 250 000 signatures. The White House was then forced to address the issue, as the petition gained even more attention by the public and other social media.

Twitter has been a social media site of uproar over Bieber’s convictions. Followers have been trending hash tags such as #WeWillAlwaysSupportYouJustin, which only plays into the ‘haters’ hands by showing the negative influence he has on the younger, more impressionable audience. The following image depicts a few of the tweets from those who support the petition for Bieber’s deportation from the states:

Whether or not the government actually deports Bieber, the attention the situation has gotten is just proof of the kind of impact and awareness social media can bring to a situation.

-Kira Anderson

Earning your 15min of fame.

The past number of years in Ontario have been rife with explosive news stories. We seem to love watching our political figures go up in flames, to the point that we often end up dumping heaps of the metaphorical accelerant that is media attention. News stories featuring political mishaps and failures seem to take on a life of their own, spreading like wildfire through the various social networks. Experts refer to this phenomena as Earned Media, people of their own volition sharing, commenting and spreading a story or piece of media. Earned media is an extremely powerful tool for creating awareness. Unfortunately there is a drawback, once in the public sphere the original creator has little to no influence how people receive and from what perspective they share the content. This creates a paradoxical state of existence wherein having an earned media component can skyrocket a brand or political figure to fame, or send them spiraling inexorably downward into oblivion. Because of the risks inherent in the concept many organizations are hesitant to employ this technique. Sometimes, despite their best efforts to eliminate the spread of scandals, social media manages to bring the debacles to the public’s attention. Without further ado here are five stories that stood out to us.

1. Another Ford Scandal
After Rob Ford’s huge crack scandal he had a television interview with Conrad Black, one would assume after all the scandals he’s starred in lately he would be on his best behavior, but that was not the case.
This past December Rob Ford insinuated, on air, that reporter Daniel Dale was a pedophile. Although he never used the word specifically, it was very clear in the interview what he was suggesting.
The interview quickly spread all over social media, as has all Ford’s previous outrageous claims and scandals. Daniel Dale than said he would take legal action if Ford did not make a formal apology. Even after his weak attempt at an apology, Dale was still outraged and considering legal action. Dale claimed Ford’s accusations were “dead wrong… malicious and defamatory”.
The interview not only created further future issues for Rob Ford and for Daniel Dale but it also had people looking into the past in order to determine whether or not these accusations were true. The media often reports on a time when Daniel Dale was allegedly taking pictures from Rob Ford’s backyard.
Whether or not Ford’s claims were true we do not know, but the fact is he has often used these kinds of accusations as distractions from his current scandals. In making such claims against Dale he may have simply been attempting to focus media attention onto something besides himself.

Attached is an article further describing the scandal as well as a short clip of the interview between Black and Ford.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/conrad-black-defends-rob-ford-interview-1.2460488
–Kira Anderson

2. Ontario Teacher Strike
Early in 2013 the Ontario Government and the Ontario Teachers Union had a very public falling out over the negotiation of contract details for the upcoming four years. The various stakeholders in the negotiations cemented themselves into their positions and thus began a drawn out and aggravating battle where incremental service reductions were implemented by teachers. Where the truly interesting portion of this narrative lies however is in the response of the parents and community members. This proved to be an incredibly decisive issue, and both social and traditional media outlets were flooded with opinions pieces and people decrying the oppositions arguments. What made this story resonate with the media sphere so profoundly is the degree to which it seemed real; what those with an affinity for technical language call “Verisimilitude”. The engagement of the populace was due in large part to the closeness that most people felt to this issue. For the content providers of the Ontario media sphere it was an extremely relevant, real and current issue. It is those three factors that come together to make a story generate as much ‘Earned Media’ as this one.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/education/
– xoxo Cedar

3. The G20 Riots
A protest of over 10,000 people erupted into violence, resulting in more than 400 arrests. This was the first time tear gas was ever used in Toronto. This story is a narrative that created negative earned media, which spread rapidly throughout the news. The narrative takes place in Toronto, during the G20 Summit of June 2010. It took place in the downtown core of Toronto, and resulted in the stopping of public transit all around. The story has a temporal order, because the events took place in real time. The originally peaceful protest escalated to one involving violence and destruction, so much that the Toronto Police felt required to use tear gas to stop it.
This narrative has verisimilitude because it literally is true. The public was appalled at the use of tear gas on the protesters, and this caused them to post angrily all over social media. The use of police force became a topic of debate over many different types of social media. People were able to relate with the story connecting it with the theme of corruption of authority. The reality of the story was found inexcusable to the public, and therefore the impact of the response to it was greatly negative.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/g20-protest-violence-prompts-over-400-arrests-1.906583
http://www.cbc.ca/player/Embedded-Only/News/Archive/ID/1531129757/
– Emma Z

4. Candle light vigil for Kyiv victims

Yesterday, a protest was held by Canadian-Ukrainians outside of Toronto city hall due to the violence in the Kyiv. This violence began after president Viktor Yanukovych passed an anti-dissent legislation, changing the climate of the two-month long crisis. The death toll in the Ukraine from the protests is now 6 after government police allegedly shot 3 protesters this past week. After the protests in Toronto, 200 people gathered into a local Ukrainian Orthodox church for a candlelight service and vigil to commemorate the victims in Kyiv.

The narrative of these articles occurs in both Toronto and the Ukraine. The events spoken of in the first article cover a week of events, however, the second article discusses the crisis in the Ukraine that has been going on for two months.the narrative of both articles, as well as my summary, are non-chronological so as to provide the reader with the most important information first and any background or additional information afterwards.

The articles are a relatively accurate representation of these real world events, especially when accompanied by the pictures. The use of quotes from the individuals affected as well as a description of the candlelight vigil engages the readers’ emotions by providing a connection those affected by these events. These people are both close to home in Toronto (as the audience is mainly Torontonians), and those in the Ukraine. The reader has now placed themselves in the position of both the protesters in the Ukraine and Canada and is empathetic to the pain they are currently experiencing.

(Lily Maase, article 1, article 2)