In response to Bill C-18, Meta has begun to block the content from the accounts of news outlets for Canadians on their platform
Bill C-18, the Online News Act, received Royal Assent in Jul. 2023. The bill was developed to encourage fairness in the sphere of Canadian digital news and it would require social media and other tech companies, such as Meta, to pay media outlets for use of their news content on any of companies’ platforms.
The Government of Canada introduced this bill in the hopes that it would ensure news outlets are being paid for their work. The government had predicted the act would give companies a total profit just over $300 million per year.
However, the act has sparked much conversation and controversy, particularly following the the reactions from Google and Meta.
Both Google and Meta had indicated their disapproval of the bill from the time it was first proposed. They believed that the revenue that they bring in as social media platforms justifies not being required to pay news media outlets.
Google in particular mentioned that referral from having links on their platforms has an annual revenue of $250 million.
When the bill was passed, Meta announced they would stop sharing Canadian news on Aug. 1 and would be continuing to do when the act came into effect in December.
When the bill was passed, Meta announced they would stop sharing Canadian news on Aug. 1 and would be continuing to do when the act came into effect in December.
The companies have since begun blocking Canadians from viewing news on their platforms. People in Canada can no longer see any Canadian news content on Instagram or Facebook, including the Silhouette’s content.
Additionally, people in Canada can also no longer see any news content from any international news outlets, such as the New York Times or BBC News.
As October begins, it has now been three months since the Meta's ban has impacted Canadian's abilities to view news through social media platforms.
The government is in talks with Meta and Google with the goal of coming an agreement some time in the coming months.
This is an ongoing story.
Aided by the amplification through social media, “hustle porn” encourages unhealthy work habits
C/O Prateek Katyal on Unsplash
By: Kimia Tahaei, Contributor
Social media has definitely been fruitful in the past decade with influencers sharing their expertise, educating others and promoting positivity. However, some influencers, such as Gary Vaynerchuck, advocate for “hustle porn.” A freshly coined phrase, “hustle porn” refers to the fetishization of extremely long working hours in the entrepreneurial world.
Influencers such as Vaynerchuck, the “self-made” entrepreneur millionaire and internet personality, have taken social media by storm by yelling words of “encouragement” at their cameras. I assume there is an adrenaline rush in recording yourself and demanding your followers to quit their "normal" jobs. Although there is absolutely nothing wrong with following your passions and leaving your day job behind, individuals shouldn't be pushed to this decision because of influencers.
Although there is absolutely nothing wrong with following your passions and leaving your day job behind, individuals shouldn't be pushed to this decision because of influencers.
Influencers often use manipulative tactics such as showing off their wealth in the background and making false generalized claims to push their relatively young audience to leave academia behind in pursuit of entrepreneurship and business. Vaynerchuck also often forgets to mention how he built off his empire based on his parents’ $3 million wine company.
Such important details often go unmentioned and all we see is the money raining over a Bugatti in a 15-second Instagram post. Time and again, this embarrassing boast is followed by wanting their naive followers to sign up for a business class or buy a marketing book of theirs.
I wonder if there are any pure intentions of wanting others to actually succeed behind these books and classes or if the focus is more so on developing another source of income? In addition, they encourage a strangely unhealthy lifestyle that is detrimental to one’s mental health.
Instead of promoting a “grind-like” lifestyle, influencers need to realize that continual hard work is not necessarily the answer and it can result in drastic mental exhaustion. As if this wasn’t enough, influencers like Vaynerchuck also encourage individuals in their 20s to completely leave behind any sort of leisure and relaxation.
Surely since Vaynerchuck spent his twenties “grinding”, he now has time to relax in his mid-forties and read Bertrand Russell’s short essay, “In Praise of Idleness.”
Russell argues that “[l]eisure is essential to civilization.” Not only does he claim that leisure is a necessity, but he also elaborates on the production upsurge that can be achieved through a reduced workforce. According to the British philosopher, if half of the population is overworking themselves, then the others are most likely unemployed.
However, if everybody contributes a normal work time to their community, the quality of everyone’s lifestyle will improve and people can enjoy “time to be civilized.”
The truth is, the workaholic “grinding” lifestyle is not designed for everyone. Leaving a stable job and a university education behind is a risk not many can and should take. Nothing against risks because they can be great at certain points in life, but the glorification of it can lead to irreversible damages. The entrepreneurial “leaving university” lifestyle isn’t a universally good choice that anyone with motivation can follow through with.
The truth is, the workaholic “grinding” lifestyle is not designed for everyone. Leaving a stable job and a university education behind is a risk not many can and should take.
Studies have shown that a university education is valuable and the value of a degree is annually growing. Ultimately, life shouldn’t be defined by a masochistic obsession of unremittingly wanting to push yourself forward, so don’t let these wannabe “economists'' define your worth by your work hours.
Give yourself frequent breaks, gift yourself when you need to and don’t spend your 20s locked up in your room (well, at least after COVID is over). Enjoy trips, sneakers and fun events as much you can and don’t get intimidated by hustle porn’s senseless mantra. Following your passion doesn't mean sacrificing everything for it.
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When it comes to texting, there are two kinds of people: those who reply right away, and those who don’t. I’m a pretty strong advocate of the former. I like to think replying in a timely manner, particularly when someone needs something from you, is the courteous thing to do. Sometimes, however, that isn’t the case.
As much as I hate the archetypical teenager who’s glued to their phone in literally every family movie ever, it used to be a fairly accurate representation of me. I had a friend who lived on the other side of Canada, and since visiting each other was out of the question, our favourite form of communication was through iMessage. We loved talking to each other so much that we texted each other constantly throughout the day. We dreamt up fictional universes, shared our insecurities and when one of us wanted to rant about something, the other one of us was always there to listen.
I became so absorbed that my parents made a rule prohibiting phones at the dinner table. In retaliation, I would sneak away to the washroom, just so I could text her back. Whenever I smiled at my phone, my parents would know it was her. “What’s the hurry?” they would ask, chiding me. “Why can’t it wait?” It was never that I couldn’t wait. I just didn’t want to.
Although I had every intention of carrying through with our connection, transitioning to the demands of university was too much for me to juggle. My friend proved less than understanding to this change. If I didn’t reply, it meant that I didn’t care. Any response that took longer than 10 minutes was too long. One-word sentences like “nice” were disingenuous; “lol” seemed unengaged. We agreed to stop using “lmao” in our conversations because it seemed too “passive aggressive.” “Okay” meant things were not at all okay. They became words we used when we wanted to hurt each other–to make the other person doubt themselves.
I became antsy checking my phone dreading the exact moment she’d text me good morning. I started making excuses, desperate to find anything that could explain my inevitable lapses. I was taking a shower. I forgot to charge my phone. I passed out for a nap because class had exhausted me. I was exhausted — but not from class, from talking. Even the mere sight of an alert would give me bouts of anxiety.
Our friendship had no happy ending. The more we argued, the more I drew away. My friend went off to university herself the following year, and she got caught up in her life, much like I had in mine. The damage we had done to each other, however, was irreparable. It was impossible to part amicably, to check in every once in a while. So we cut all our ties.
Deleting her as a contact was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done, and knowing I could never reach out to her again made me feel incredibly alone. But it also helped me realize that texting each other constantly had been neither normal nor healthy. Texting was meant to be a convenience, not a hindrance. We shouldn’t have gone out of our ways to put texting first, and we should have never come to depend on each other in the way that we did. Life came first. When you were busy, the people you texted were supposed to understand.
I still get anxious when people don’t reply to me quickly, and the truth is, I could spend a lifetime worrying about why people take their time to reply. I always consider the possibility that people are making excuses, because I kept on making them myself. I always wonder whether I’m being exhaustive, because I felt that way so often trying to keep our conversations going. I’ve become hypersensitive to cues that indicate people are unhappy with me through text, because I was always expected to recognize the signs without ever being explicitly told.
Worrying, of course, does me no good. I remind myself of that every day. I tell myself to remember why I’m friends with people in the first place, because of their personalities and not because of the way we choose to phrase our texts. I tell myself to remember that if someone has an issue with me, I have to trust they’ll take it up with me in person. Texting isn’t meant to be a replacement for talking. If there’s something important to be said, then we have to speak up about it with our phones down.
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There is a certain relationship between students and professors that makes students wary of approaching the people at the front of lecture halls.
Osamah Al-Gayyali, now a third-year Biochemistry student, decided to do something about this. He got the idea while at the Biochemistry Society’s “Meet the Profs” event in his second year, where he could not shake the feeling of fear when approaching professors. Ironically, the event was held specifically with the goal of fostering student professor relations.
When he saw his first semester professor Karun Singh, Al-Gayyali pulled him aside and took a different approach. He asked Singh if he would take a selfie with him. To his surprise, Singh agreed.
“I take my phone out and all of a sudden I see three other biochem students trying to squeeze in … So, I went on for the next two to three weeks, taking selfies with every single professor I knew. Dr. Yang, Dr. Miller, Eric Brown...” recalled Al-Gayyali.
From a single selfie came a collection, and from that collection Professors of McMaster was born. Inspired by Brandon Stanton’s Humans of New York, Al-Gayyali decided to adapt the concept to showing students that professors are approachable.
Al-Gayyali decided that it was time to move past selfies, recruiting Annie Cheng to take pictures for the page instead. Cheng and Al-Gayyali were already well acquainted. In fact, all five team members behind the initiative were in the same biochemistry group.
“Except for Mohammad [Ali Khan]. He was the outsider,” they joked, clearly at ease with one another.
Already two years in the running, the Facebook page for Professors of McMaster is bound to feature at least one professor familiar to any given student. Each post involves a lengthy process.
“From the interviews, we try to get something out of them that they don’t present during lectures and stuff, so more of their personal side. But sometimes profs are uncomfortable with sharing that side of them,” said Cheng.
“So we ask them questions related to their education and history … their interests,” added Ali Khan.
When asked what is so intimidating about professors, the group joked around, saying “they were old and scary.” On a more sombre tone, it became apparent that the fact that professors hold your marks and sometimes even your future in their hands was a big factor. The other was the fear that professors were too wise and busy to glean any benefit from conversations with students – a myth that professors shot down immediately in interviews with Professors of McMaster.
“Because interviews are in their offices, I was worried it would be boring and look the same. But every prof has a different style, I find, which is interesting to me.”
Keeping things in perspective was another important message that professors seemed to communicate. “You know, at the time, you feel like you’re under a lot of strain but, in the grand scheme of things, like one midterm or test isn’t going to define your future. I think that’s an important message to send out to students,” said Nafis Hossain.
While the interviews follow interesting narratives, Cheng says that the pictures tell a story on their own. “When I first went in though, because [interviews are] all in their offices, I was worried it would be boring and look the same. But every prof has a different style, I find, which is interesting to me.”
In the future, Professors of McMaster hopes to start a webpage, where they can post full transcripts and audio clips of the interviews.
Photo Credit: Jon White/ Photo Editor
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We’ve all heard the criticism regarding social media — that, as a generation, we’ve lost the art of conversation and are too self-absorbed and caught up with our social media accounts to connect with each other. I have to disagree. Social media is not inherently restrictive and isolating; it is the way that you choose to use it that determines how you connect with the outside world. You could just as well isolate yourself by immersing yourself in a novel or movie, so why does social media have such a bad rap among older generations?
Contrary to popular belief, we have not lost the art of conversation, we’ve simply come up with new ways to engage in it. I have a few friends who are international students and use platforms like FaceTime and Skype to communicate with family abroad. Just because the conversation occurs through non-traditional media doesn’t mean we shouldn’t embrace the fact that we are able to stay in touch with people miles away.
Even class assignments make use of social media to improve productivity. Think of how many of your Facebook groups are dedicated to schoolwork. Organizing meetings in person is not always feasible. Of course, in-person interaction is a different experience and does help you form bonds with people you may otherwise forget about after the course is complete. However, the reality is that a commuter student, for example, would benefit from an online meeting through sites such as Facebook or Google Hangouts as opposed to altering his or her schedule. Rather than try to find a different time and potentially cancelling meetings altogether, social media provides flexibility for everyone involved.
I’m not advocating that all contact be limited to social media, because that would really limit our communication. Face-to-face interaction ensures that body language is visible and can be interpreted. It can be difficult to get the same intuitive understanding of how someone is feeling through emojis and text. Despite the fact that video chat is available, it is certainly not perfect. While it is important to be able to communicate effectively in person, why shun technology that works in favour of those who prefer to convey their thoughts through a different medium? Social media not only offers a platform that can accommodate busy and conflicting schedules, but it also serves as a comfortable space for people with more introverted personalities who might prefer to communicate online. At the same time, what social media allows us to share with others is probably one of its most innovative and valuable aspects.
Contrary to popular belief, we have not lost the art of conversation, we’ve simply come up with new ways to engage in it.
We all know what it’s like to have an indescribable experience. When I try to describe my summer vacation to my friends, I tend to repeat how amazing, fantastic and wonderful it was, but those words hardly capture the experience accurately. Social media platforms like Snapchat and YouTube take words out of the equation and make experiences shareable without overusing clichéd terms to attempt to explain them. Conversation is important, and contrary to popular belief, millennials do engage in it. Yet, the traditional conversation is not always the best way to communicate. Social media gives us the means to communicate beyond words and to share experiences as they happen rather than after the fact. At the end of the day, social media does not hinder conversation if it is used appropriately. Rather, it connects us with people in unique and valuable ways and enhances our experiences of the world as we share them with people across the globe.
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By: Kyle MacDonald
I am white. When I work on my family’s genealogical records or listen to the folk music that links me to my far-flung relatives, I immerse myself in the stories of white people, but I do not know of anyone who would claim that these are racist practices. We should all be able to engage with our origins and identities.
Unlike these practices, the White Students Unions that have recently surfaced at a number of Canadian universities , including McMaster, are not so benign. The idea of whiteness does not provide a valuable framework within which to understand oneself or the world; rather, it perpetuates violent and divisive untruths that we need to scrub from our discourse. There are better ways to discuss and understand European identities. These White Students’ Unions should acknowledge the lies on which they are founded and disband immediately.
I am not going to retell the history of racism, which has been told many times by people far more qualified. Let it suffice for me to say that white people as a group have little in common that is worth preserving. My ancestors and their countrymen created the notion of whiteness in order to set themselves above their neighbours, for the express purpose of subjugating people of colour by force of arms, in order to carry out the exploitative missions of empire and slavery.
When groups of white students try to create “white spaces,” the standard response is that every space is dominated by white people. This is true, but it misses a point that must be resolved if the whiteness movement is going to die: to white people, common spaces don’t feel white, because being white doesn’t feel like anything. To be white in North America feels largely as it should feel to be human: free to go where one wants and say what one thinks, without fear of violent exclusion. We are numb by design: white people are free to be individuals in public, not forced to represent our nationalities or ethnic groups, precisely because racism designates white as normal. As a result, we are able to forget where we come from.
Despite the legacy of colonialism, European ancestry is not inherently shameful. On the contrary, I am proud of my roots from Ireland and Scotland to Poland and Greece. But I am proud of these places individually, because of my family’s small part in their rich histories, not because they are each mostly white. I have no German ancestry; as such, despite the whiteness of its population, I care about Germany in the same way that I care about Uganda or Thailand: as a historically and contemporarily important nation with a beautiful, complicated legacy that does not directly involve me.
Moreover, I am more Canadian than European. My father’s Scottish ancestors settled in Nova Scotia’s Margaree Valley. Some of my relatives still live there, an afternoon’s drive from Halifax. As a result, I am far closer in history to the eviction of Black Nova Scotians from Africville than to the recent Scottish independence movement.
The idea of whiteness not only obliterates the distinctions between groups of European descent, but also makes arbitrary, indefensible decisions about who is white or European. The truth is that Europe is a construction, like whiteness or like binary gender: useful perhaps for drawing a broad outline of the world, but always doomed to fail when examined closely, and in many cases completely useless even as a starting point. As far as the Mediterranean is concerned, the Danube, the Nile, and the Suez Canal all carry the same water and end up in the same place: as rain over Athens or Tripoli, no colour but that of the sky.
To those white students who feel alienated from their cultural identities, I urge you to ask your grandparents to tell you their stories. Read history books for context. Learn the languages of your ancestors. Learn to cook the food they ate. Sing their songs. Understand the strengths and the flaws of their worldviews. Reach out to other students and community members who genuinely share your heritage. Find ways to rejoice in its beauty together. Use it to make this campus more accessible to those whom racism works to exclude.
To anyone involved in a White Students’ Union: give your head a vigorous shake. Delete the Facebook group and acknowledge your errors. You won’t lose anything by sacrificing whiteness.
*After this article was written it was discovered that this trend was a hoax. Despite this, we still believe this article offers a unique perspective. For more information on the trend, see page 5 of our Issuu.
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By: Mitali Chaudhary
Humans have always marveled at the curves and fine lines of their own faces—thousands of years of portraiture and art can attest to this. But now that we can immortalize our pouts with the simple tap of a button, our inner narcissists have never been more prevalent. This rising trend of taking ridiculous amounts of “selfies,” and meticulously inspecting them for flaws, not only reveals our infatuation with the “perfect body” and ourselves but also displays blatant selfishness and an inflated self-worth, especially when taken in inappropriate places.
Unfortunately, technology only propagates this culture. Facebook, Tumblr, Instagram, and other social media platforms provide the perfect environment to post selfies, where the poster can get instant validation and encouragement to publish more of the same. Another example is Snapchat, in which the whole point is to send innumerable selfies (with one line of text). In fact, recent scientific studies show that some degree of narcissism correlates directly with the number of followers, likes, status updates and, of course, selfies an individual has. Because in this digital age it is wholly accepted to do so, we can easily engage in shameless self-promotion without consequence.
This culture shows its truly ugly side when people are driven to take selfies in extremely inappropriate situations. A few unforgettable examples include “selfie at Auschwitz,” or the one where a woman took a selfie while a man was in the background being talked down from the side of a bridge by the police. There are also the countless selfies taken at funerals. Such behaviour demonstrates callousness and a shift in moral values caused by an increased focus on oneself and, although these cases are few, show a possible path our society can take due to extreme selfie culture.
It’s a given that seeking the approval of others and taking the occasional selfie is healthy and fun, to an extent. Our obsession with being admired by others and believing that the world cares about the details of our lives however, is not. If we, as a society, continue to place our attention on our physical selves, then empathy and the willingness to help others will inevitably decline further. This is a societal problem that we can afford. So, love yourself, but not too much.
In recent weeks my Facebook Newsfeed has been flooded with #nocamerafilter #naturalbeauty #nomakeup selfies. Hundreds of bare-faced people smiling, and tagging he, she, and so and so they haven’t spoken to since kindergarten.
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I don’t care for Facebook trends. I’m rarely nominated and would ignore the nomination if it happened. Still, if people wanted to go out of their comfort zone and display their naked face to the world, go ahead. Make-up, no make-up, I really don’t care. Whatever makes a person happy.
It wasn’t until one of my Facebook friends took a picture of her chest that I had any idea that this craze was for cancer.
I’ll ask the obvious question: How is this helping cancer?
I don’t blame the participants for thinking they are doing something good. It’s like liking that page for Kony 2012 to save the Invisible Children. People hear about something bad or sad and feel obligated to help. It’s too bad that help seems to be a simple click; a simple bare-faced smile that they think makes all the difference. The world will be a better place and cancer will be known (because there obviously is no awareness) and cured because of your naked smiling face.
I understand why the participants think they are helping. Cancer patients often feel embarrassed and self-conscious over their appearance because of the exhausting effects that chemo and radiation. The no make-up selfie then inspires people to feel like a cancer patient, to show their unpampered face and feel the same embarrassment without their make-up to protect them.
In theory it’s a good idea, but in reality it’s selfish. When the no make-up selfie craze began in the U.K. people were hashtagging and smiling their tired face-off, but most people were also donating. In 48 hours the #NoMakeupSelfie campaign earned more than $5 million Canadian in donations to Cancer Research U.K.
Of my 245 friends on Facebook only two have done anything with the selfie that promotes cancer awareness. My mentioned friend above also took a picture of her throat, highlighting the different types of cancers there are to bring awareness. My other friend actually donated to the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation.
Instead of posting no make-up selfies people can do so much more to help spread cancer awareness. People can donate to the various cancer charities that exist, people can volunteer at Jurivinski, people can even knit squares for blankets for cancer patients!
There are so many productive things people can do to actually make a difference.
My mom was recently diagnosed with breast cancer for the third time, and that might allow you to read this article as a personal complaint on a fad. But you don’t need a mother who has fought cancer multiple times to consciously know that there are better ways to advocate for cancer awareness and donations then posting a selfie.
In the meantime I will be helping my mother cook and clean around the house. I will be going with her to appointments and in my spare time I’ll knit some squares for blankets for Jurivinski.
I want to actively help, and I hope you’ll join me.
Nostalgia can come in all shapes and sizes, provoked by the most mundane of things, and often immediately tugs at the five senses with vivid detail in remembered points of the past. With social media so readily available at the fingertips of the masses, this sensation is very easy to obtain and embrace. Memories of last night’s shenanigans start their upload to take their place next to last week’s, scrolling through weeks, months, and years of your own adventures or highlights from the lives of others, whether they be friends you have long lost touch with or ones you met just recently.
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Though I do not typically reminisce, everything seemed to fall into place for me to do so the other day. A new cover photo based on March Madness brought likes from those I would not have pegged as being basketball fans; I figured that I actually had no idea of knowing as I had not seen some of them since 2007. A quick scroll down the Facebook feed brought up the usual array: some posts from Spotted At Mac, people’s comments on statuses old and new that included some more designed exercises in nostalgia with the #tbt hashtag, pictures of old hookups, friends of all sorts, and artists barely listened to anymore.
I sent a quick message to someone to buy something from their post that connected to media influential to my teenage years. Why not? I figured that I might as well add something new to the old collection.
As thoughts raced about events and memories that pertained to each, individual person or event seen, there was one rather lengthy status from an old friend that created the highest emotional toll. I always thought of myself as not just a friend, but a mentor to him as we both enjoyed performing, perfecting, and discussing music. It was a release for the both of us and most certainly one of the best parts of our day as it was for most of the musicians I knew. While I went onto other pursuits at McMaster, he went onto a prominent music college in the states with dreams far more passionate than mine. Unfortunately, he dropped out due to mental health issues, primarily depression, and moved back to be closer to home and the support system there.
This status in particular was a complete opening up. It revealed rather personal details about his upbringing and situation; he seemed completely willing to expose the less-than-ideal aspects about himself in a way rarely seen done by anyone. While some things may not be desirable to hear, I could not help but feel quite happy for him as he seemed to be progressing towards being happier and letting go of some mental frustrations.
Nostalgia is a very odd emotion in that it can make you happy that you experienced certain events in the past, but maybe a little upset that you cannot go back and relive those moments again. It can fuel our decisions in the present and future to reconnect with people and it can even change our perception of the past over time as any negative aspects of great times are forgotten in favour of the total emotion.
Some memories, however, have to be fully embraced and opened up to release mental strains in any forms of anxiety, regret, or whatever other negative connotation may be associated with the past.
It was Edgar Allan Poe who stated, “It is by no means an irrational fancy that, in a future existence, we shall look upon what we think our present existence, as a dream,” to which I encourage you to make peace with your past and attempt to embrace all forms of nostalgia in an effort to make your present self one that your future can look back on in a positive way.
Labelled as the “first ever app for girls” (I honestly don’t know what that means, does my gender prevent me from enjoying Instagram and Plants vs. Zombies?), Lulu is a virtual ranking system that allows a female-only audience to rank their male friends, lovers, ex-lovers, and crushes on a scale of one to ten based on appearance, personality and habitual behaviour.
While its main intention is to help girls “make smarter decisions” (as explained on their website), it comes across as more of a degrading and insulting forum that encourages people to make quick and rash decisions based on gossip from complete strangers.
The app requires its users to log in via Facebook, where they will then be linked to profiles for their male friends. The interface is compiled of a large collage of faces and profiles which users can tap on, read, and contribute too.
Users have the option to provide men with a number ranking, define what their relationship to them is (i.e. friend, ex, crush), and then describe them using brief sentences and hastags (i.e. #boysgotgame, #disappears, or #cheapasabigmac). In the collage setting, men are given an averaged ranking with a list of their most popular hashtags, while users can click on their profiles and read the full descriptions.
While it is a laugh at times, it can also be sad to see your friends getting low rankings or insulting descriptions, and makes you feel like a massive stalker (especially the “Last Seen At” option). And while it is user friendly for straight female clients, it isn’t very inclusive for other sexualities.
Overall, Lulu has good intentions, but is the creepy neighbour equivalent of apps.
