Day of Purple

A Facebook initiative began last month for an international day of wearing the colour purple on October 20th to commemorate the loss of so many young people in the United States recently due to LGBT bullying and homophobia with the added goal of promoting equality for all. Like many people, I am saddened and frustrated over their deaths, and consider myself 110% behind equal rights for all regardless of sexuality or gender. However, I really have a problem with events that attempt to promote awareness through wearing a colour. As this cause is so close to my heart, it frustrated me even more. My dissatisfaction lead me to make a post on Facebook about it, and the response was very intriguing. I had 25 friends "like" it, and underneath a debate began about how messages and events of equality should happen. I started my day saying:

Wearing a colour does NOT instigate change. If you care about equality for all sexualities and genders, put on whatever clothes you want, & go out into the world consciously acting against hate. Speak up when you are around discrimination. Don't vote people into power who refuse to equally represent everyone. Hiding your homophobia behind religion is not a legitimate excuse. Love is love, and love is beautiful.

A few people agreed, but said that wearing purple was a good idea anyways. I argued that the event makes you guess what another person's motivations are for wearing a certain piece of clothing, and excuses the consciences of some people who think that simply putting on a certain shirt in the morning will end this kind of hate. There are still laws at Federal, Provincial, and State levels in North America that discriminate against people who don't comply to the heterosexual norm, and these are more important to me than an awareness campaign that works only if you are around online social mediums. My friend Ben agreed with me, and brought up this point:

While the "wear purple" campaign has a nice sentiment, the world is being saturated by these awareness campaigns to such a degree that people are becoming wilfully apathetic to the cause. The fact that there are so many movements that are, in actuality, doing very little to solve the problem waters down the message trying to be sent to the point that these (insert cause here) day are simply becoming an annoyance. In the days of the internet, if you aren't already aware of some social injustice then chances are you never will be.

The debate continued, and the legitimacy of both sides remained strong. The ultimate goal of everyone involved was the same, which led to a general feeling of discontentment on both sides. My favourite comment against my view came from my friend Ryan, who said:

I agree with your sentiment Danielle, but I don't think the lazy semi-activists, however irritating, reduce the importance of symbolic displays. Visibility is essential to a social movement or political group, especially one you can't always pick out of a crowd.

Since the Day of Purple, Barack Obama has released his own "It Gets Better" video while hypocritically, the Federal "Don't Ask Don't Tell" law for the American Military has flipped back and forth as to whether it will remain in effect, giving homophobes legal fodder for their beliefs and actions. There have been more reported cases of suicides of teens who have identified as LGBT, although I feel that since the media has dubbed this an epidemic of sorts, they are more likely to report suicides that before would never have been news. The event intrigued a small portion of the population, and a few days later things seem to be getting worse.

I'm still anti-purple.

Election Day

Election Day has become a ritual for me ever since I turned 18. During the day I vote and encourage others to exercise their democratic right, and then once the polls close I camp out in front of my television waiting for results to come in.

This election is different. For the first time, I experienced voter apathy. This is saying something for a politically liberal person growing up in Conservative Alberta. During the 2008 general election, I was satisfied that Ralph Klein was finally gone. For the Federal general election of 2008, I barely paid attention to the Conservative incumbent guaranteed to win in my riding, but anxiously awaited the results for New Democrat Linda Duncan.

Of course, our municipal government doesn't function under the party system. Instead, candidates propose their vision for the city when vying for a spot on council. But I don't have a vision of myself in this city. I plan on moving away from Edmonton when I finish my degree next June, and I haven't put much thought into the potential of eventually establishing a life here. Even the ballot itself proved troublesome. Do I vote for a Catholic Board School Trustee, an institution that was responsible for my grade school education, or for the Public Board to reflect my current (non)religious views? Even my anticipation of the Election Day was lessened by the necessity of voting 2 weeks ago- between work and night class I had no time to make it to my polling station today.

With 7.5% of poll stations reporting, CTV is predicting a win for Mandel. Looks like Edmonton will continue to see plans for an expanded LRT system, the potential for Expo 2017, and the closure of the airport. Congratulations Mandel, but I'm dreaming of Ireland.

Concert Review: Broken Social Scene

Any band who starts a show by playing two of their biggest singles holds a confidence in their performance ability and catalogue of great songs to carry the rest of the set. Broken Social Scene successfully proved this when they opened their October 9 concert at the Winspear with 7/4 Shoreline and Texico Bitches, and had nearly everyone in the audience out of their seats and dancing within the first ten minutes.

Each song saw musicians rotating off and on stage depending on the need for their instrumental or vocal additions. Kevin Drew's haunting solo of Lover's Spit echoed into the depths of the Winspear sending chills down my spine. Other songs saw a total number of 11 members playing a song, reminiscent of the the large collective of musicians who have toured with the band and contribute to the records (Wikipedia currently has band members listed at 25).

Lisa Lobsinger was the sole female on stage, but held her own easily. She always seemed to float across the stage regardless of whether she was singing or playing an instrument. She performed Anthems for a Seventeen Year-Old Girl well, but I personally didn't think it measured up to the live version by Emily Haines, who performed it in Edmonton at the acoustic Metric show last year. Lobsinger's voice truly shone when she sang All to All, a performance that still hasn't gotten out of my head a week later.

I thought the extended jam/dance session of Meet Me in the Basement should have been moved to the end of the set as a great upbeat finale, but when Kevin Drew asked if the audience wanted more, the encore was delivered so brilliantly that when I left the Winspear, I was still dancing across Churchill Square.

HUB

It's class change time at the University, and HUB Mall is swarmed with people. Most of them follow the unspoken rule of "keep to the right", and are continuously joined by people coming through the numerous side doors that line the mall on both sides. The natural flow of walking has been disturbed by the construction in the mall. The website for HUB says that the construction is working towards replacing the roof, but that doesn't explain the month long paint job users of HUB have endured. Parts of the mall are blocked off by construction tape, and loud mechanical ladders emit a shrill beeping noise whenever the workers attempt to move the ladders closer to where the next layer of paint should go, a seemingly useless noise that interrupts the normal ambient noise of conversation prevalent in the main atrium of the mall that spans 4 city blocks.

This morning I came up into the mall through entrance 8908 to avoid the horribly engineered detour for the Daycare park that came into existence last April. As usual, I avoided using the handrails due to their slick, slightly sticky feel that always has me reaching for my hand sanitizer. Climbing the steps, the unique Aroma of HUB that I'm not sure everyone would identify as food slowly became more and more poignant, until at last I opened the door to the main atrium and the same horrible yet comforting mix of spices and scents swirled up into my olfactory senses reminding me of the comfort of the familiar.

HUB is not a place that anyone would properly 'take in' after a short amount of time. There are multiple spaces on ground level for things like the Art and Design studios and International offices. The stairways up to the second floor and above pass student residences. I don't know anyone living in HUB, and so the people who live there and the rooms they inhabit have been reduced to what they put in their windows- whether it's the blue Mario mushrooms from this years Week of Welcome, beer bottles, or my personal favourite - a portrait of Queen Elizabeth II.

This is my fourth year at the U of A, and as I sit in Rutherford Lounge to write this, I wish I had first attempted to describe the unique features of HUB while sitting on my bed at home. I'm staring out at the mall and nothing seems to jump out at me that I've never noticed before. I do remember a lot of times that I did notice something for the first time. The Telus mural on the wall that borders the pedway to the Tory/Business Atrium, the seemingly out of place shoe repair shop, and the four upper level lounges all escaped my awareness for a year despite walking the length of HUB many, many times. Other things only reveal themselves if you spend a lot of time in the mall, like which stores are open for your early morning classes, and which are open late for studying into the night. Other things are more unique. The custodian who has no problems hitting you with her cart if you cut too close in front of her, or the HUB bird that likes to fly down to some of the lounges and hop around the tables seem more like mall legend, but I have experienced both. At first I was frustrated that I couldn't see anything new when I looked down HUB, but then I embraced it. I feel like the next time I walk down the mall, I'll see something new that would have made for a much easier writing assignment. As it is, I'll accept that HUB wasn't ready to give up another one of it's secrets just yet.