On a chilly Saturday evening, all cozied up with a hot bowl of homemade chilli, I finally watched John M. Chu’s Wicked (2024), four months after its theatre release. Don’t judge me.

I was already somewhat familiar with the original Broadway play that opened in 2003 with Idina Menzel and Kristin Chynoweth, starring respectively as the Wicked Witch of West, Elphaba, and the Good Witch of the East, Galinda (Glinda). I also just discovered it was based upon Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, a novel published in 1995 and written by Gregory Maguire.

However, I was unprepared for the rollercoaster of emotions that the movie put me through. It’s always interesting to see how one experiences the same work of art at different stages of their lives.

When I was first introduced to Wicked, the musical, my first impression of it was very superficial. The political undertone of the story was completely lost on me, although I always understood that Elphaba was ostracized because she was “different” and Glinda was loved because she was always “just right.” 

This time around, I saw Wicked for all its realistic and dark glory, and came to the conclusion that Elphaba isn’t just a green witch. Elphaba is an icon and inspiration for all women of colour.

Elphaba’s journey throughout the movie is nothing surprising to the women of colour who do not conform to the delicate, petite and pixie-like beauty standards revered by society. Her looks, however, are not the only thing that people run away from. It is her unapologetically loud and deviant attitude, in addition to her powerful nature.

Having grown up shunned and hated by her father all of her life, Elphaba is no stranger to society casting her out. However, she doesn’t act meek. Quite the opposite — she is quippy and sarcastic, beating everyone to the punch.

Upon everyone’s first impressions of her, Elphaba simply answers with, “Fine, might as well get this over with, no I’m not sea sick, yes I’ve always been green, no I didn’t eat grass as a child.”

Her green skin represents an allegory for anything in one’s appearance considered “different” or “out of the ordinary” (whatever that means!): a slightly bigger nose than average, a darker complexion, freckled skin, textured unruly hair … the list goes on. In modern world terms, ya ain’t white.

People only seem to start noticing Elphaba more positively when Glinda gives her a makeover so she can be “popular” among her fellow students. Elphaba starts wearing her hair down in a half-updo, just like her blonde counterpart, even going as far as emulating Glinda’s signature hair flip to seem quirky and cute.

But what really struck me wasn’t the physical makeover, nor was it the change in the students’ attitudes once Elphaba and Glinda started becoming close.

It was Madame Morrible’s treatment of Elphaba.

Madame Morrible — powerful sorceress, headmistress of Crage Hall at Shiz University and cohort of The Wizard of Oz — in all her grey haired glory, takes Elphaba under her wing for the entirety of the film, after first witnessing the latter’s powers at Shiz’s great hall.

As the story goes, we are made to believe that Madame Morrible is just honing Elphaba’s craft so she can become a better sorceress. But upon closer inspection, Madame Morrible doesn’t teach her anything. She just taunts her student, trying to gauge how her powers work and what can activate them, like when she reminds Elphaba of the hateful message left on Dr. Dillamond’s board to see if the anger will get her to cast a spell.

This all comes to a head in the final moments of the movie, when Elphaba and Glinda go to the Emerald City to see the wizard. Elphaba reads a spell in the Grimmerie, giving wings to the monkeys against her will. Once she realizes she’d been used, she rebels and runs away, leading Madame Morrible to vilify her in front of all of Oz, painting her as a wicked witch.

The moment becomes a brilliant depiction of what happens when you defy the system, when  your talent does not serve them anymore. Madame Morrible used Elphaba’s powers for her own agenda, but once she realizes Elphaba could not be subdued, she decides to shift her focus to what she could control: the reputation around the Green Girl.

And it got me thinking just how many women of colour throughout the years have been  villainized and criticized. Because they refuse to conform to the system that was oppressing them, denying against  their own erasure. It got me thinking how many times those same women are still villainized in everyday life, but become praised when shown on the big screen, mimicking the irony of it all.

So this is for all the Elphabas out there as this Women’s History Month comes to a close. Keep on defying gravity –  even if you’re flying solo, at least you’re flying free.

The post Elphaba Defies All Gravity appeared first on The McGill Daily.

Fueled by dopamine and celebrity glitz, young college men are among the prime targets for these marketing machines. Beneath the game’s thrill lies a user interface (UI) built to maximize profits, obscure odds, and encourage risk. I focus on DraftKings, though similar tactics and designs apply across different sports betting platforms.

The DraftKings platform is not just for entertainment purposes. The use of relentless, misleading notifications and promotions for high-risk parlays and samegame-parlays (SGPs) nudges users toward riskier choices that drive bookmakers’ profit margins while downplaying the true cost of betting. Parlays and SGPs, both types of multibets, have a much more complex calculation for their true price, as it compounds based on various single bets, referred to as legs. This may lead to an inequitable experience, especially for those between the ages of 18 to 22, as well as economically vulnerable households, as they are encouraged to partake in these risky, addictive behaviors and constantly lured into the broader world of gambling. The result? DraftKings creates an uneven playing field where casual bettors are at a disadvantage and addiction is embedded within the UI.

Understanding sports betting’s behavioral impact requires a social lens. Recently, wagering has become a “sports ritual,” much like having a beer during a game, normalizing the behavior. A successful bet can serve as cultural capital within social groups, reinforcing male identity. This social framing, especially among young men, shapes perceptions of betting and creates pressure to participate.

I invite you to take a step inside the DraftKings app. Immediately, Shaquille O’Neal pops up in the center of your screen with a big smile and bright green colors that contrast against the dark background — “Shaq’s Boost of the Week: Player Rebounds Parlay Boost!” You keep scrolling on these colorful deals, seeing more parlay and SGP boost deals. At the end of the deals is a widget that reads “It’s more fun when it’s for fun,” a meek reminder to bet responsibly. And at the bottom right, a pop-up widget that redirects you to play blackjack on the app lurks on your screen as you visit any page.At first glance, the app appears to seamlessly blend entertainment, special deals, and celebrity endorsements. However, once you leave it, the bombardment of notifications leaves no space for breathing as DraftKings urges you to participate in a “special deal.” Multibets are designed to enhance prices for bookmakers while the true price paid for the deal is much larger than what it might seem at first glance. There is no option to specify which type of notifications you would like to receive, and there is no apparent way of knowing the true price of a multibet deal, which may especially put inexperienced young bettors at risk of reducing welfare. Moreover, the constant prompting to play a casino game may serve as a way of getting casual bettors to spend more time and money on DraftKings by developing a more serious gambling vice. After all, DraftKings openly admitted to hoping to create “higher customer lifetime value” after acquiring a leading lottery app in the US.

Just as some people may be more prone to developing addictions, the particular “structural characteristics” of objects can contribute to speeding up or starting an addiction. Time-sensitive “special” offers and hidden costs in DraftKings’ notifications, combined with ads promoting a betting culture, reinforce the normalization of sports gambling. These design choices create a social fabric where betting feels routine. This normalization works side-by-side with the design of notifications and promotional multibet deals on DraftKings by reinforcing the notion that gambling is exciting while ignoring the consequences of gambling.

Given DraftKings’ profit driven model, removing multibets and casino features is unlikely. However, the platform has a moral obligation to design a UI that protects young users from addiction. Generic warnings are not enough, nor are they effective. DraftKings should implement transparent pricing for multibets by displaying a clear breakdown of the total price calculation for a multibet, along with a clear breakdown of the odds of each leg, to reduce the risk of the development of vicious betting habits among young men. Additionally, it is important that DraftKings creates more detailed mobile notification settings upon download, allowing for displays of bet losses, which currently do not exist. Also, there should be a notification option to show money and time spent betting if it is classified as “risky” in accordance with public health guidelines.

Although the causes of addiction are extensive, and warnings about true odds may be more useful as preventative measures, the solution must extend beyond UI alone. Design choices can help prevent vulnerable young populations from developing a “casual bet” dynamic into a long-term addiction. For these design changes to be enforced, policies must be pushed to ensure sports betting apps have less predatory designs.

The post Hooked by Design appeared first on The McGill Daily.

Sea Cliff is the epitome of small-town living. A unique enclave amidst the landscape of Levittowns and highways on Long Island, it was originally founded as a German Methodist summer campground. Marketed as a brisk getaway from the hustle and bustle of turn-of-the century New York City, it was a literal shining city on a hill overlooking the Long Island Sound. I can’t stress enough how that era has shaped my hometown. Upkeep of Victorian-era buildings, maintaining a family-friendly reputation, rallying against housing developments, and stern independence from other municipalities. It’s the Jeffersonian dream: a self sufficient, proud, independent village that prides itself on said independence. Life is all about “Keeping Sea Cliff Weird.”

Yet, Sea Cliff’s admirable tenacity runs only skin-deep. The village only gets more expensive the more yuppie, Brooklynite families move in. Its roads are more packed as its nineteenth-century planning stretches to accommodate Long Island’s car culture. It becomes ever less diverse and less weird. Economic disparity joins the list alongside a long-standing lack of racial diversity. It’s an impasse between old and new. It can be seen in the transition of businesses in the last five years: the old hardware store turned into a beauty parlour, three new slick coffee shops in place of a single café, and the increasing presence of RXR real estate “luxury” developments surrounding the village. Sea Cliff’s position is similar to many across the country, finding itself perpetually shifting amidst the political shocks of an insecure nation. What’s passed down from this national political zeitgeist that champions vigilantes and the destruction of bureaucracy — a philosophy that fueled the January 6 riots — is the encouragement to localized action. If local politics reflects that of the nation, Sea Cliff is no different in its struggle for equilibrium. If there’s one flaw in the ideology of the small town, it is its resistance to change, and no better example could be found than that of local business owner Robert Ehrlich and his recent coup d’état.

On the morning of Monday, March 10, Ehrlich and three colleagues walked into Village Hall and pronounced themselves the new governing body of Sea Cliff, declaring that every current village employee was fired. These proclamations arrive nearly a week before the Village’s mayoral elections, which Ehrlich has already proclaimed “fully rigged and meaningless.” After an hourlong standoff with municipal staff and a half dozen police officers, Ehrlich and company were escorted out of village hall by county police.

As a follow-up to an official village statement, Ehrlich replied in a now-deleted Facebook post, “We have a new entity,” declaring an end to “this racist antisemitic group that wishes to control every aspect of our lives and our businesses. With zero experience and success in their lives except to maintain phony made up power. (sic)” In an interview with the Long Island Herald, Ehrlich stated he had accrued 1,800 signatures to dissolve the Village government (supposedly in accordance with the NYS Citizens Empowerment Act) and had been invited to the White House. Additionally, Ehrlich stated, “I’m interpreting the law any way I want, the way Trump would interpret laws as he sees fit… It’s called trickledown politics, which is what we’re doing.”

Robert Ehrlich may be Sea Cliff’s embodiment of Trump. A “rags-to-riches” story of his establishment of Pirate Brands (of Pirate’s Booty fame), based in Sea Cliff, made him an amiable example of smalltown success. However, after the expansion of Pirate Brands, Ehrlich sued his co-founder, Mike Repole, for 195 million USD, claiming that Repole attacked his “self-confidence and entrepreneurial spirit,” despite making an estimated 70 million USD from Pirate Brands alongside him.

It was just “Rob being Rob,” Repole said. “You would think that someone who made over 70 million USD would be very happy.”

Since 2015, while his village properties remained dormant and his business thriving, Ehrlich became increasingly active in politics, protesting the Village’s alleged lack of transparency and corruption. Recently, however, he was only able to cite inadequate outdoor seating and “limits on creativity” as the standing government’s current flaws. As noted by colleagues like Repole, Ehrlich may have a troubled relationship with facts; in a deleted post by Ehrlich, the businessman claimed he had met with New York Governor Kathy Hochul and had been given the “go-ahead” for his coup d’état plan. According to the Governor’s office, this meeting never happened. Ehrlich, without large sums of money and international recognition, might otherwise be labelled a small-town eccentric.

In pursuit of protecting a Village (or a country) from change, the reaction of the privileged is despotic. In the vein of those like Ehrlich and Trump, their ends justify their means — if they perceive something as “wrong,” “they don’t go and ask for permission, they just do it.” In small towns like Sea Cliff, across the US, individuals are emboldened to actively defy the rule of law for their own benefit. It’s an ideology that emboldens behaviour like that of March 10 or January 6, all resulting from the trickle-down of Donald Trump and entitled personalities like Ehrlich.

The post “It’s Called Trickle-Down Politics” appeared first on The McGill Daily.

In 1969, at the ironically named Second Congress to Unite Women, co-founder and then president of the National Organization for Women (NOW) Betty Friedan campaigned for women to enter “into the mainstream of American society, now [in] fully equal partnership with men.”

With this goal in mind, and a position at the top of America’s largest women’s advocacy group at the time, she became the “mother of second-wave feminism.”

“Homosexuality is not, in my opinion, what the women’s movement is all about.”

Friedan was given free license by the public to speak on behalf of all women’s interests, and with that power, she made amazing progress in terms of asserting women’s rights across America.

All except queer women, that is.

“They are a lavender menace to women’s rights.”

With the word “lavender,” Friedan was referring to a slang term for “gay,” which first originated in the 1930s. Queer people at the time would wear light purple lapels to signal their sexuality to other homosexuals. Over the years, this covert method became public and lost its safety as a sign of silent solidarity. It became either a term for closeted (as in a “‘lavender marriage”’) or, in some cases, a reclaimed colour of pride.

Friedan was also alluding to the “red menace” phenomenon during the Cold War, wherein Americans were increasingly suspicious that their neighbours were secretly undercover communists. Friedan clarified this connection, stating that if lesbians were publicly mentioned in NOW’s directive, feminists as a whole would be seen as “a bunch of bra-burning man-haters.”

Despite what Friedan wanted the public to believe, NOW had a very close and beneficial relationship with the Daughters of Bilitis (DOB), a San Francisco based lesbian activism group named after Sappho’s courtesan on the Isle of Lesbos.

The DOB started as a social club. Gay bars were often raided by police, so the DOB organized meetings at confidential locations. Two of its founders, Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon, said the club started as a safe space to slow dance, as doing so with the same sex in public was illegal. A member would be assigned to door duty, greeting each new participant with the phrase “I’m [name]. Who are you? You don’t have to give me your real name, not even your real first name.”

Though the group was formed to avoid police, it nonetheless attracted the attention of the FBI. Undercover agents were sent to meetings to report back on the group’s activities. Eventually, they concluded that the goal of the DOB was “to educate the public to accept the Lesbian homosexual into society.” Russel Wolden, former City Assessor until his arrest for conspiracy and bribery in 1967, criticized San Francisco’s government by describing the city as a “haven for homosexuals.” In a City Hall Hearing, he warned the public of the “danger” of the DOB:

“You parents of daughters — do not sit back complacently feeling that because you have no boys in your family everything is all right … Make yourself acquainted with the name Daughters of Bilitis.”

We know that NOW was well-acquainted with the DOB, having been sponsored by the group for years. Despite this, they refused to put the DOB’s name on their list of donors, in order to further distance the feminist movement from that of gay rights.

Regardless of how hypocritically Friedan denied lesbian participation in feminism, her sentiment was echoed by the movement as a whole. The message was simple: lesbian issues aren’t women’s issues because lesbians aren’t proper women. Or, as Friedan put it: “We want feminine feminists.”

The effect of this statement was immediate, and NOW began its goal of removing lesbians from feminism, beginning in their own organization. Newsletter editor Rita Mae Brown was fired for being a lesbian, along with all other openly queer women employed by NOW.

In response, Brown created a new group for women who had been excluded by mainstream feminism due to their sexuality, which she called “Lavender Menace.”

The original members, seventeen in total, were made up of previous NOW advocates and women from the Gay Liberation Front (GLF). Both groups had similar complaints about lesbian issues being sidelined in their organization and yearned for an advocacy group where their demands wouldn’t play second fiddle to either straight women or gay men.

Brown created Lavender Menace with that exact goal in mind, finally offering queer women a space where they wouldn’t have to shout in order to be seen. Their first directive was to remind NOW of the power they’d lost in excluding lesbians from the women’s movement.

So, about five months later in May 1970, they hijacked the Second Congress to Unite Women. Friedan had just taken the stage to introduce the event when several crowd members stood up abruptly. They tore off the shirts to the audience’s shock, only to reveal a second shirt underneath which read Lavender Menace.

A Lavender Menace member took Friedan’s momentary shock as a chance to take the microphone and introduce the group to all the feminists gathered, explaining that their goal was to educate the crowd, not talk over them. She simply announced that outside the building, Lavender Menace was setting up workshops about queerness for any women interested.

They also passed around a manifesto titled The Woman Identified Woman, which contained a resolution to the Second Congress asking feminists to recognize, then and forever, that the movement must:

1. “Be resolved that women’s liberation is a lesbian plot.

2. Resolved that whenever the label ‘lesbian’ is used against the movement collectively or against women individually, it is to be affirmed, not denied.

3. In all discussions of birth control, homosexuality must be included as a legitimate method of contraception.

4. All sex education curricula must include lesbianism as a valid, legitimate form of sexual expression and love.

Each resolution works to give queer women an equal standing in feminism as their straight counterparts. NOW’s biggest pitfall was assuming that all women benefitted equally from the legislation they put forward, completely ignoring intersections of race, class, and sexuality in their platform. In order for feminism to benefit all women equally, the movement must acknowledge the diverse experiences of womanhood, and advocate accordingly.

The post The Lavender Menace appeared first on The McGill Daily.

Over the years, my expectations for comprehensive mainstream war coverage in Sub-Saharan Africa dwindled bit by bit. I lost patience hearing reporters reduce complex conflicts to tribal disputes. I grew tired of reading the gross abstractions about “never ending war” that often accompanies reporting on the Global South. Still, as the current M23 conflict in the East of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has recently begun to receive more coverage from global media outlets, a small part of me expected to see proficient writing on the complexities of the armed conflict.

My hopes were unfounded. The passive reporting of sexual violence in the DRC has instead, left a new sour taste in my mouth; a taste that can specifically be attributed to the lack of structural analysis on root of sexual violence in war, as well as a lack of coverage on the local resistance against this deliberate act of violence. 

A documentary that partly avoided falling into the trap of obscuring wartime sexual violence was the first episode in Gloria Steinem’s “Woman” series, which investigated the instrumental use of rape in Eastern Congo. The episode focused on the Kivu region, a nucleus for conflict, where sexual violence has been weaponised to humiliate its communities and assert dominance. The episode was by no means comprehensive, as it admittedly failed to examine how the legitimation of sexual violence in Congolese society was the basis for its exponential increase during the war. It additionally does not report on UN peacekeepers’ sexual abuse of Congolese women. Despite this, interviews conducted by journalist Isobel Yeoung were still able to give viewers a first-hand account of the distressing toll that sexual violence has taken on Kivu. Yeoung also interviewed activists who worked to address the sexual crimes neglected by the government, covering the community response to the violence. For instance, Yeoung met with the Congolese activist Masika Katsuva, who founded the Association des Personnes Déshéritées Unies pour le Développement (APDUD) in 2002, which has rehabilitated over 10,000 women. The documentary further includes a notable interview with the Nobel peace prize winning Congolese gynecologist Dr Dennis Mukwege, as viewers learn about his role in founding the Panzi Hospital in 1999 aimed to treat victims of rape. 

Almost ten years after the episode was filmed, there is still a clear relationship between a rise in armed conflict and increased sexual violence. In early February 2025, male inmates raped and burned over a hundred female inmates in a prison in the city of Goma following a jailbreak. This attack took place in the midst of the current upsurge of violence between the M23 rebel group on one side, and the Congolese military, vigilante groups, and UN peacekeepers on the other. As of February 2025, the insurgency has resulted in over 7000 deaths and while no reports have linked the mass rape to a political organisation, the attack demonstrates the scale of sexual crimes during warfare.

Mainstream media tends to over-rely on legal frameworks to legitimise any real issue. This results in a lack of meaningful reporting into “unfounded” topics, such as the manifestation of sexual violence in communities. While the legally binding Article of the Fourth Geneva convention (1949) states that, “Women shall be especially protected against any attack on their honour, in particular against rape, enforced prostitution, or any form of indecent assault.”: there was still not enough reportage on wartime rape until the late 20th century. The Rwandan genocide of 1994, among other horrifying wars that took place during the decade, revealed how women are systemically abused in armed conflict.  During the genocide, an estimated 2500,000-500,000 women were raped within approximately 100 days, which gained international attention. Still, sexual violence in war was only considered a threat to peace and security in 2008 when UN resolution 1820 was passed. Since this topic has clearly not been a primary concern of international law, reporting on the roots of the instrumental use of wartime rape has naturally not received enough coverage in mainstream media. 

When these outlets actually address sexual violence during war, they present distorted representations of the women impacted by these atrocities. Rape victims are seen as collateral damage. They are given no name and no agency– as the reigning assumption is that they would surely never dare to resist their situation since it is “all they know.” Leela Gandhi’s essay Postcolonialism and Feminism, discussed this very topic through an analysis of the West’s conceptualisation of the “third world-woman” as she wrote that “such theory postulates the third-world woman’ as victim par excellence—the forgotten casualty of both imperial ideology, and native and foreign patriarchies.” 

Gandhi’s description precisely captures the passivity attributed to women in the Global South. It encompasses how the manifestation of gender based violence is often at best, treated as an afterthought and at worst, completely neglected. Take a look at the BBC article covering the Goma rape. Although no groups have taken credit for the assault, the article still contextualizes the ongoing insurgency and counterinsurgency in Eastern DRC. However, the article never addresses the culture of sexual violence in the DRC, nor does it acknowledge any acts of resistance. It does not mention findings about how “50% of women have experienced sexual violence in a domestic context” nor does it touch on the women’s marches calling for an end to the war. Instead, the use of passive voice treats the topic of rape as an incidental event in the conflict; and once again, rape is characterized as an arbitrary consequence of war. Women are presented as the unfortunate victims of this inevitable issue, with the article refusing to recognize the organized attack on women during war.

Wartime rape is often written about as if it were an individual rogue attack and not a system of violence worthy of political analysis. Yet whether one wants to admit it or not, wartime rape thrives off of government neglect. For example, UN experts on the crisis in the DRC affirmed the Rwandan government’s backing of the M23 group, one that has committed various human rights abuses including rape. The Human Rights Watch reported similar instances of sexual violence committed by Congolese soldiers since 2022. The UN itself confirmed that over 90% of sexual assault allegations against peacekeepers in 2023 originated from The DRC and The Central African Republic. Nonetheless, the consequences of mass sexual violence committed by government and IGO (Intergovernmnetal Organizations) agents lacks thorough investigation. Although there has been an increased recognition of sexual crimes, such as the ongoing trial of soldiers in the DRC accused of rape, governments still fail to take a closer look at the how the culture of sexual violence in armed conflict manifests.

Mass sexual violence during war is not incidental. It is a military strategy that humiliates and demoralizes women with the aim to humiliate and demoralize their societies. From the system of comfort women in imperial Japan to the increased rape in the DRC, women’s sexual subjugation has historically been magnified in military conflict. Therefore, it is entirely necessary for more in-depth analysis into the use of rape as a war tactic to be taken.

Media coverage must take a clearer stance when reporting the violence committed by soldiers and the failures to address the root of these crimes. We must reject the idea that Congolese women are unnamed victims. We must affirm the agency of women in the DRC conflict, as well as women globally. 

The post How Sexual Violence in War Journalism is Treated as an Afterthought appeared first on The McGill Daily.

Every year, countless students escape Montreal’s brutal winter in favour of destinations promising warmth and endless parties. Unfortunately, this form of tourism also generates the perfect playground for reckless behaviour as routines are abandoned, study habits dissolve into weekday partying, and the thrill of rebellion takes over. 

In 2024, The Toronto Sun released an article exposing the disgusting aftermath of spring breakers who left a Georgia beach littered with, well, litter. Initially posted to social media, the coverage sparked outrage, with many commenters criticizing the blatant disrespect shown by student tourists.

While cities anticipate this type of behaviour, preparing for an influx of young party-goers each year, Florida’s beaches have become particularly notorious for such scenes. In preparation for 2025’s spring season, Miami Beach, Fort Lauderdale, and Daytona Beach ramped up police surveillance in an effort to control the state’s annual mayhem. While stricter law enforcement has led to a decline in overall attendance, it has not stopped many students from making the trip south. 

Meanwhile, publications continue to cater to spring breakers eager to make the most of their vacation. In March 2025, The Palm Beach Post published a guide outlining alcohol regulations across Florida’s beaches, providing visitors with crucial tips for a trouble-free break. While these efforts to maintain order can be helpful, they also highlight a broader question: how do trip guides contribute to the commercialization of spring break?

An influx of tourists means an influx of spending, and the authors of travel tricks and city guides are well aware of this. While they aim to make student travel as hassle-free as possible, their efforts go far beyond convenience. Travel expenses often go hand-in-hand with fashion purchases, as many students feel pressured to “look their best” on vacation. Packing lists and travel recommendations are frequently designed to push products, reinforcing the notion that a trip will be ruined without certain must-haves. Brands of all sizes capitalize on this mindset, launching spring ad campaigns and exclusive deals to entice buyers.

However, with the rise of social media, companies no longer need to work as hard to drive demand. Influencers eagerly take on that role, showcasing their spring break hauls across YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram. Fast fashion brands like SHEIN benefit from this cycle, offering trendy, budget-friendly pieces that fuel the desire to stay stylish without breaking the bank.

But what do these trends truly offer their buyers? Where do these products end up? And who ultimately profits from student spending? The answer, for many of us, is already clear.

Litter and waste take many forms: empty bottles scattered across sandy beaches from last night’s festivities and plastic bikinis worn once, now sinking to the ocean floor. Spring break is not just a trip; it is a product, commercialized by brands and influencers who sell it as the experience of a lifetime, a week to go wild, the ultimate university vacation. 

Spring break should be a time to unwind, not an obligation to overspend on microplastics and fleeting trends. A good time should not come with a price tag. Corny or not, the truth stands: a trip’s defining moments, the ones that last, are found in the people you are with and the memories you create together. Those must-have sandals? Quickly forgotten.

In an interview with The News Movement, Charli xcx distilled the essence of brat down to just a few essentials: a pack of cigarettes, a lighter, and a white, strappy tank worn with no bra. The album and its aesthetic are not driven by consumerism, but instead prove that style and attitude do not require excess. It remains trendy and accessible without being built on piles of microplastics—though her later collaboration with H&M complicates this message. Her partnership with a major retailer inevitably ties it to an industry that encourages accumulation rather than minimalism, raising questions about the sustainability of its aesthetic ideals.

Nevertheless, Charli suggests that these few items are all one needs to embody the party-girl energy of her music, which speaks to a larger cultural message: you do not need “stuff” to be cool, to have fun, or to fit in. It is about the vibe you bring to the function, the energy you carry inside yourself, and the joy you share with the people closest to you.

So, the next time “Spring breakers” plays or you find yourself reminiscing about a past trip, think about the memories you made. Did the swimsuits you wore define those moments? The essence of spring break lies not in the excess but in the moments that prove you never truly needed it.

The post Spring Break Sold Separately appeared first on The McGill Daily.

The collective sigh of relief that Canada released after the recent Four Nations Face-Off victory highlights how significant this specific game was. Played during the tense geopolitical reality of strained Canada-U.S. relations, the game was not only a historic sports event but also held political symbolism as well.

With U.S. President Donald Trump spewing divisive rhetoric, levying various threats, and imposing economic tariffs, many Canadians feel dismayed — so this decisive win on the ice feels like a political victory as well.

Even before the championship round, the game was politically heated. In the two games the U.S. played against Finland and Canada at the Bell Centre in Montreal on February 13 and 15, spectators booed the American national anthem. In the game against Canada where this happened, the American players immediately responded by initiating four separate fights on the ice within the first nine seconds of the game. While this was largely a performative move to entertain emotional Canadian fans, it speaks to a deeper phenomenon of politics infiltrating sports. The visual appearance of the fights, with one jersey bearing the U.S. flag and the other the Canadian flag, shadowed the image of combatants in opposing uniforms confronting one another. It brings a physical dimension to the current political narrative of the Canada-U.S. conflict, which for now has remained mostly verbal.

This issue of sports becoming politically charged is nothing new. In fact, the stage of a sporting function serves as the perfect platform for political advertising, whether through protest, propaganda, or any other means of expression. Sporting events, especially those carried out in large venues, congregate enormous crowds of people who political actors can address and potentially influence. Mobilizing such large groups of people can be a costly logistical challenge; infiltrating an existing assembly is more efficient, even if politics holds little to no relevance to the function. What matters is the mass of impressionable ears in attendance.

Political infiltration can pose a plethora of problems, and I personally find it an extreme irritant. Fundamentally, sports leagues are critical agents of civil society that unify people from all walks of life around a shared common interest: a passion for sports. This includes people who hold different religious convictions, political beliefs, and social opinions. Allowing politics into this space can have the opposite effect, sowing division and conflict rather than unity and collaboration. For this reason, I believe that politics should be left out of sports altogether, and political activists, regardless of what they are championing, should not be allowed to hijack sports gatherings.

This is not to say that individual athletes should be censored from expressing their personal beliefs or political opinions, as that is their fundamental right. Rather, I argue that others should not exploit their craft to spread a political message. For instance, returning to the Canada-U.S. matchup in the Four-Nations tournament, both teams had the political stresses of their respective nations placed on them, when, in reality, they probably just wanted to get out on the ice and play some good hockey.

The recent research on “football hooliganism” and the far-right influence of football fan clubs in Europe provides a clear image of how politics can destroy sporting environments. Many of these far-right fan clubs, often composed of young, reckless men, simply seek to stir up trouble by spewing racist rhetoric and instigating violence at games. For them, soccer stadiums become a battleground where they can spread their ideology. However, this is not merely a far-right issue. For instance, in their book Fan Culture in European Football and the Influence of Left Wing Ideology, sports researchers David and Peter Kennedy highlight the far left’s use of soccer infrastructure to advocate their ideological convictions. In either case, politics steals attention from the athletes and ultimately threatens the unifying nature of sports.

Similarly, there is a tendency for authoritarian regimes to steal the limelight from major sports gatherings to draw attention to themselves. For instance, political scientists from the realist school of thought would argue that hosting global assemblies like the Olympics allows states to garner global prestige by positively advertising themselves to the world regardless of human rights violations. Most blatantly, the 1936 Summer Olympic Games held in Berlin were hijacked by Hitler to spread Nazi propaganda while his concentration camps hid behind the shadows of the Olympic stadium. Political actors rely on major sporting events — especially those with a global reach — to distract the general public from their harmful policies.

Today, we see an eerily similar pattern of behaviour from President Trump. In February, he made headlines for being the first sitting president to attend the Super Bowl. Just a few days later, the presidential motorcade drove laps around the Daytona 500 track before the actual NASCAR race began. During his campaign in June 2024, Trump visited the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) 302, where he immediately became the centre of attention. Then again, after winning the election, he returned for UFC 309 in Madison Square Garden, where he had an elaborate video tribute tantamount to political propaganda played for him on the jumbotron. In all fairness, Trump was well-known as a sports enthusiast long before he entered the political sphere, so these grandiose excursions aren’t out of character. Nonetheless, we should be wary of political meddling in our sports and entertainment industries.

The Four Nations Face-Off, wherein the geopolitical tensions between Canada and the US influenced the atmosphere and conduct of the games, was ultimately a testament to why we must ensure sports settings are apolitical. Sports is a venue for uniting people, not a platform to sow division. Amidst the politically charged context of US-Canada relations, the Four Nations tournament was an excellent opportunity for Canadians and Americans to unite around their mutual love of hockey. Moving forward, regardless of our political landscape, let’s resist political actors that seek to sow division and instead embrace opportunities to unite.

The post Political Infiltration in Sports appeared first on The McGill Daily.

I am particularly interested in Green Book and its controversy over the depiction of Black characters. My question is: what’s the problem with writing about marginalized people as a non-marginalized person? More specifically to this article, what’s the issue with white people writing about Black stories?

Since the advent of film, Black people have been pivotal in the evolution of the medium and the boom of Hollywood — for the wrong reasons. Represented in tropes like the domineering brute, the servile fool, or loud mouthed comic relief, Black people have been made passive in a film industry fueled by white supremacy. Even as Black people across North America fought for equality in the mid-20th century, their narratives in film remained stagnant. As Black culture gained traction through music, art, and politics, Hollywood continued to reinforce the status quo, aimed at fulfilling the cultural curiosity of an “othered,” or foreign, Black society. Whether it be the era of Blacksploitation or slave-dramas like Roots, Black people continued to have their agency denied and be subject to white exoticisation. Even with Black creators seeing success throughout the industry, film studios only wanted to further the image of Black people that white audiences were used to.

Cut to 1999, director Spike Lee is disillusioned with Hollywood and mainstream media. Ever since 1989, when his film Do The Right Thing was snubbed at the Academy Awards and Driving Miss Daisy won Best Picture instead, Lee believed the industry only wanted to see Black people in traditional racist stereotypes. Black filmmaking had seen a boom during the period, with the cultural zeitgeist of gangster rap and slavery dramas like The Secret Diary of Desmond Pfeiffer. However, Lee saw Hollywood twisting old negative racial stereotypes into new forms of neo-minstrelsy.

The previous ten years had seen the release of Soul Man, a comedy about a white kid dressing up in black face to secure a college scholarship; the rise of Quentin Tarantino and his co-opting of the N-word and black struggles; and the popularization of films like Boyz n the Hood, depicting gang violence between young Black men. Even as Lee made a name for himself with Malcolm X and Jungle Fever, all the accolades and money were being tossed to projects about Black tragedy or passivity. From his malaise, Lee would create his 1999 masterpiece, Bamboozled.

The film’s premise centers on Pierre Delacroix (Damon Wayans): an astute Black TV executive struggling to launch a successful Black series centered on positivity. He is juxtaposed against his woefully misguided white boss, Mr. Dunwitty (Michael Rappaport), who is arguably a reference to Tarantino. Fuelled by Dunwitty’s desire for a “real” Black show, Delacroix sets out to make the most offensively racist show imaginable, to get himself fired and ruin Dunwitty’s reputation. Recruiting two homeless street performers, Delacroix pitches “Mantan: The New Millennium Minstrel Show” to great amusement from Dunwitty. What ensues is a mix of Mel Brooks’ The Producers and Sidney Lumet’s Network, involving the minstrel show’s meteoric rise and spiral into insanity as both Delacroix and the performers grapple with their dehumanization. Lee’s characters — Delacroix, Manray/Mantan, Womack/Sleep n’ Eat, and Sloan Hopkins — portray different feelings and insecurities about Black struggle, from poverty to family, to performative blackness and self-hatred. Yet, what truly furthers the movie’s message is how Mantan gets approved, produced, and catapulted into stardom.

The fictional TV network, CSN, is entirely white with Delacroix as its only Black writer. Delacroix is Harvard-educated and very obedient to his white superiors, despite harboring a deep hatred for their ignorance. His main concern is working towards a big paycheck. He is a diversity hire, appointed by CSN to meet the need for a new, funny Black TV show – a trend Lee was very keen on in the late 90s – under the supervision of his boss Dunwitty. Dunwitty is an obvious victim of corporatized, misinformed race-consciousness; he has posters of black athletes and actors in his office, he argues with Delacroix that he’s “more Black” than him because he’s married to a Black woman, he rejects projects of Delacroix as “not Black enough,” and throws around the N-word willy-nilly.

When Delacroix runs the idea for his minstrel show in the Caucasian writers room, they are hesitant, feigning their progressivism and tolerance — but they eventually fold with Delacroix’s insistence of “satire” and his identity as a Black writer. Ultimately, blatant displays of racism cause concern in this media order. But as Lee shows, they end up being accommodated by whites under the guise of Black representation. As long as a Black person is okay with it, they won’t mind.

Bamboozled was always seen as a heavy-handed, if not angry, film. Admittedly, the premise of a full-blown minstrel show being adopted by a major network shocked many audiences and critics alike. The film tackles a handful of Black insecurities and cultural stigma in a disparate narrative that varies from raucous laughter to discomforting silence: audiences were overwhelmed.

Yet, in the context of Spike Lee and his experience with Hollywood, the massive shift towards tragic Black stories wasn’t too different from the era of Hollywood that demeaned Black people through minstrelsy. The premise of a minstrel show being put on TV could only exist with non-Black writers and execs like Dunwitty, just as it did during the early 20th century. If we relate Bamboozled to recent films like Emilia Perez, turning to Spike Lee reveals the pitfalls of misrepresentation in film and how its insidious implications plague progress overall for marginalized peoples.

In the same way the producers of Emilia Perez misconstrued the trans community, Bamboozled acts as a blunt, glaring example of misrepresentation in a seemingly enlightened media order. In a zeitgeist that focuses on trans issues, there’s a vacuum for mainstream media to tell and profit off of them. Just as Black issues were exploited with Blacksploitation and the gangster films of Spike Lee’s era, contemporary trans issues are under the same scrutiny with the release of Emilia Perez. The identity politics of both pieces highlights the importance of tolerance versus understanding. While the racial fetishism of Dunwitty could count as “tolerance,” it stems from a complete lack of understanding: an understanding that is, moreover, specific to the marginalized group, rather than being co-opted for the non marginalized as well. It’s this understanding that’s lost on the nearly all-French directing team of Emilia Perez; feigning tolerance, the movie falls flat because of their misunderstanding.

Special thanks to the Black Student Network for their screening of Bamboozled this past February.

The post White Ideas, Black Stories appeared first on The McGill Daily.

I used to love that word back in the day. Fantasizing about how we would do whatever we wanted without adult supervision, no curfew. How we would meet up with friends whenever, however, and wherever we wanted.

Of course, I still love this word. It helps me romanticize all the new responsibilities that adulthood brings. Even though I love the friendships I made in adulthood, some part of me will always miss how things were before.

So how do I deal with this? The constant change and transformation in life and in friendships. Obviously, not by being pessimistic. I try to analyse the transformation and adapt myself to it. Live in the moment. Once, a good friend told me that we can never cherish the moment if we always commemorate the past and obsess about the future. Let me dig a bit deeper. I’m sitting in class with all my friends, talking about our library crushes, yapping about a previous drunk night out, complaining about exams… You have no idea if this is about college or high school right? See, that’s the thing. This description could be applied to any time that you want. What makes an experience an experience is the way you look at it.

In fact, as an international student, I was met with even more transformation in my life. If nothing, I shifted from speaking my native language everyday to speaking English all the time. Yet, it has been psychologically proven that people tend to not use their native language when talking about difficult situations — so I might say this helped me, after all. By leaving my comfort zone, I met amazing people who I never would’ve met if I stayed in my hometown. Back in the day, I would never have imagined sitting in class, as a girl hailing all the way from Istanbul, and casually conversing with a girl from Sydney about how our professor’s hair makes him look like the guy from When Harry Met Sally.

All of this is great. Meeting new people, being exposed to different cultures, conversing in different languages yet laughing at the same jokes: the glory of college. Well, what happens to those people that you used to go to McDonald’s with after school, where you would get some fries, dip them in McFlurries, and talk for hours with about your day?

Nothing, and yet everything. They are still there. Only a phone call, a snap, or a text message away. You may not drop by their house spontaneously during your week anymore, but now you have an apartment in London with a bestie who you can surprise spontaneously. You may not be able to grab a coffee every day, but now you have someone to FaceTime whenever you go to class. It is always hard to adjust to change. But as psychological research shows, the impact of change is strongly correlated with how one feels about said change.

So, we do actually control how we are affected by changes to our friendships. As long as you keep updating your besties about Situationship #13, calling them when you miss them, acknowledging each other’s presence even if you haven’t managed to pick up the phone during finals season — and most importantly, if you keep on loving them, maintaining adult friendships becomes a gift rather than a burden.

The post Adulting Through Life appeared first on The McGill Daily.

One in ten Canadians reported always or often feeling lonely. Among youth aged 15 to 24, almost one quarter experienced frequent loneliness, while 14 per cent of adults aged 75 and older reported feeling lonely. The lasting impact of COVID-19 on mental health has made loneliness an even more pressing issue. According to Vivek Murthy — former U.S. Surgeon General and co-chair of the Commission on Social Connection for the World Health Organization (WHO) — social isolation and loneliness has an impact on health conditions ranging from cardiovascular disease, to cancer, to Alzheimer’s.

Loneliness also impacts education and the economy. Lonely youth are more likely to drop out of university. Isolated employees tend to report lower job satisfaction and higher absenteeism. Older adults incur greater medical costs. These widespread consequences make loneliness a public health issue.

Luckily, this is preventable. A review of 28 psychological interventions suggested one-on-one support, group programs, and phone applications with psychosocial and behavioral techniques are effective in reducing chronic loneliness. However, most of the current evidence is for individual-level interventions, which are difficult to scale up. Systemic strategies are crucial for managing loneliness on a national level.

The UK has recognized loneliness as a population health concern. In 2018, the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport (DCMS) added loneliness to its portfolio. The department launched a green social prescribing program where healthcare professionals refer patients to nature-based activities. These include local walks, community gardening projects, and outdoor arts and cultural activities. From April 2021 to March 2023, over 8,500 referrals were made, with interim evaluations showing improvements in participants’ mental health. In collaboration with the Department for Transport, the DCSM also made transport more accessible for disabled and older people. Policies now allow non-profits to apply for a community bus permit instead of a full operator’s license, helping to expand transport services that support social connection.

The UK Office for National Statistics has developed two measures of loneliness. These metrics are now part of the UK Public Health Outcomes Framework and are included in 11 government surveys to better understand loneliness prevalence.

Japan followed the UK’s lead by creating its own Minister for Loneliness and Isolation, working alongside with their British counterpart to share data on the impact of loneliness, exchange policy ideas, and raise global awareness.

In Canada, there’s no unified framework to define and measure loneliness. Various initiatives attempt to tackle loneliness, including the Keeping Connected Program, the GenWell Project, and Canadian Red Cross’s Friendly Calls Program. But their impact remains fragmented. We need a national strategy to unify efforts.

“Loneliness and isolation doesn’t only affect people who may be considered a senior,” said Bill VanGorder, interim chief policy officer of the Canadian Association of Retired Persons, when asked about the possibility of a Canadian Minister of Loneliness. “If that’s what it takes to address the impact of isolation and loneliness on Canadians … A minister would make sure that programs are in place to ease these issues [and] other parts of the government would be accountable to them.”

It’s time for Canada to take this public health problem seriously by adopting a national strategy to unify fragmented efforts, aligning with global leaders like the WHO, the UK, and Japan. Without bold action, we risk falling further behind. We must add loneliness to the government portfolio to ensure it is taken seriously.

Madeleine Wong and Christina Zha are MSc public health students at McGill University. Ben Yeoh is a MSc epidemiology student at McGill University who researches urban green space and youth loneliness.

The post Alone Together appeared first on The McGill Daily.

A few months later, back home, I was flipping through channels — just an innocent middle schooler looking to fry my brain — when I landed on the E! Network. There she was again: the woman from the billboard, this time with two women, who I quickly deciphered as her sisters, all yelling at each other. I was instantly mesmerized.

Ten years later, I found myself emotionally invested in people who had no idea I existed.
Like most decade-long relationships, my relationship with the Kardashians has evolved. As a child, I secretly binged the show whenever my parents weren’t home, fully aware that my fascination would be met with disapproval. Even then, I understood that the Kardashians were controversial; I knew they were not the kind of public figures my parents would like me to engage with. Furthermore, I knew that watching reality TV was societally looked down upon. I was aware that engaging in such a low-brow activity would be met with disappointment. But that only made them more intriguing.

Aside from certain fashion choices, I wasn’t watching Keeping Up with the Kardashians for inspiration: I was watching for the drama, the absurdity, the larger-than-life spectacle of it all. Over time, my relationship with them shifted from guilty pleasure to slight obsession, from mindless entertainment to critical analysis. Eventually, I found myself caring less than I ever had before. Before I got to that point, however, I went through every stage of the parasocial rollercoaster.

A parasocial interaction refers to how audiences engage and form connections with celebrities, often perceiving this one-sided relationship as mutual. These interactions are illusionary; media audiences may feel they are building a real connection with personas — such as talk show hosts, celebrities, fictional characters, and social media influencers — while, in reality, the celebrity remains completely unaware of their existence. In a sense, the Kardashians became this “friend” I followed for years. The parasocial dynamic allows audiences to project their own narratives onto celebrities, shaping their perceptions based on personal beliefs, values, and cultural context. For some, the Kardashians represent a refreshing take on the “American Dream”: a matriarchal, multiracial, “modern” family that has achieved remarkable success. For others, they symbolize late-capitalist greed, influencer shallowness, and cultural appropriation. To me, they became a lens through which I analyzed feminism, capitalism, and even race. Undeniably, they became part of my cultural narrative.

At age ten, the Kardashian world was a lot simpler; their lives appeared to be a fantasy of wealth, fame and drama. But as I got older, I began to realize that beneath the glamour and perfectly curated drama, there was a darker undercurrent to their story. In retrospect, the early seasons weren’t all lavish vacations and lighthearted sister fights. Beneath the designer handbags and catchphrases were some surprisingly dark storylines. There was the leaked sex tape that started it all. Kourtney’s struggles with an eating disorder. Her unexpected pregnancy. Khloe’s DUI. An extortion attempt that led to FBI involvement — an incident immortalized in the now-iconic meme of Kris Jenner solemnly declaring, “This is a case for the FBI.” Not to mention Scott Disick’s spiralling substance abuse. And that’s just off the top of my head. The thing is, I was invested. In the early stages of our parasocial bond, I felt myself rooting for them.

As I transitioned into my brooding teenage years, “keeping up” with the Kardashians became more socially acceptable. Kim and Kanye’s relationship catapulted the family into a new era of stardom, and suddenly, I wasn’t the only one watching. No longer hiding from them, my parents — though disapproving — would occasionally tune in, and for the first time, I had friends my age who also kept up.

Kylie Jenner, just a few years older than me, became an undeniable aesthetic influence on my generation. By 2015, her enhanced lips became a spectacle, fueling media buzz and public curiosity. That year, an episode of Keeping Up with the Kardashians aired in which she finally admitted to getting lip fillers, confirming long-standing speculation. Before this revelation, she had insisted that her plumper lips were simply the result of overlining with lip liner. This only intensified public fascination, sparking the “Kylie Jenner Lip Challenge,” a viral trend where people suctioned their lips into small glasses to create temporary swelling (despite no evidence that Jenner herself had ever used this method). I remember walking into class and seeing girls with bruised lips, victims of the infamous challenge.

It seemed like everywhere I looked, I could see Kylie’s influence: Snapchat filters that mimicked her appearance, blue hair becoming the “look of the moment,” and a collective obsession with overlining your lips. Even beyond Kylie, the family’s overall impact became undeniable. They were no longer just reflecting trends in fashion, wellness, and plastic surgery — they were creating them.

With the rise of influencer culture and the shifting dynamics of social media in the early-to-mid 2010s, there was now more than one way to keep up with the Kardashians. The show was no longer the only access point. Fans could now watch the drama unfold in real time through Twitter feuds and Instagram stories before waiting for the show’s polished recap. This shift meant that fans were no longer passive viewers but active participants in the Kardashian narrative. The boundaries between celebrity and audience blurred as social media fostered a sense of direct access, making interactions feel personal, even when they weren’t. At one point, there were Karjenner apps, one for each sister. Their constant stream of content gave my friends and me plenty to talk about. It was the perfect gossip ecosystem: juicy, dramatic, and — the best part of a parasocial relationship — no one was actually getting hurt.

Kardashian-isms infiltrated our vocabulary, “bible,” “iconic,” and “tragic” seamlessly becoming part of my lexicon. Their business ventures, scandals, and feuds somehow felt relevant to my actual life. Who remembers their boutique, Dash? Kim’s coffee table book of selfies, Selfish? The Life of Pablo era? Kimoji?

As I got older, the Kardashians stopped being just entertainment. I was analyzing them like they were a thesis topic. Superficial, seemingly talentless, and famous simply for being famous, they somehow remained oddly relatable. Their sibling feuds, messy divorces, and pregnancies played out before us in vivid detail, blurring the line between spectacle and authenticity. What was real and what was performance? I was never quite sure. They were no longer just celebrities; they had become a cultural phenomenon.

In an era where everyday life is staged for public consumption, this hyper-visible family reflects the world we inhabit. They move between reality and curation, between experience and image — holding up a mirror to how we, too, exist in both digital and physical realms.

As their fame and wealth grew, so did the exaggeration of their image: gaudier aesthetics, hyper-curated personas, increasingly contrived plotlines. The Kardashians I once kept up with were gone, replaced by caricatures of their former selves. To some extent, I justified my continued obsession as critical engagement. I told myself I was watching Keeping Up to keep up with the discourse, not just for entertainment. At least, that’s what I liked to believe.

However, as time passed, it became harder to maintain the konnection I once felt with the Kardashians. I mean, what do I have in common with billionaires? At first, I tried to bridge that gap by intellectualizing them — if I couldn’t relate to them, I could at least analyze them. But over time, that excuse started to crumble. Analyzing the Kardashians stopped being fun. As I began to grow up, so did the stakes. What was once a harmless spectacle — frivolous drama, over-the-top antics, and family feuds played out for entertainment — was now something more insidious. Their controversies were no longer just tabloid fodder; they had real-world implications. Whether it was their role in perpetuating unattainable beauty standards or their casual appropriation of Black culture, it became harder to laugh it off. And yet, the faker they became — the more hyper-curated, Face-Tuned, and self-aware — the harder they were to ignore. It was no longer about keeping up with the Kardashians, but keeping up with the consequences of their influence. The line between entertainment and influence had blurred, their impact feeling impossible to dismiss.

Inevitably, I burnt out. The Kardashians don’t know I exist and they never will. The spectacle began to fade. They transitioned from captivating figures to purveyors of a toxic, hyper-commercialized lifestyle, one I no longer found relatable or intriguing. What once was intellectually stimulating and fun now had depressive undertones. Beauty standards, appropriation, and the commodification of culture became central to their narrative, revealing the harmful, manipulative side of their empire. I once enjoyed dissecting their every business move. I used the incessant media surrounding the family to draw conclusions about society, the entertainment industry, and the cult of celebrity. I could write think pieces about their effect on the media landscape. Now? I can’t even keep track. (Kylie has a vodka brand now?)

This realization hit me recently when my friend and I tuned in to the Season Six premiere of The Kardashians, the Hulu redux of their flagship reality show, backed by a reported nine-figure deal. At this point, I had not kept up with the show for a year. In the episode, we watched Khloé reunite with her ex-husband, Lamar Odom. A few years ago, I would have been emotionally invested, hanging onto every awkward interaction. This time, I felt nothing but mild indifference.

What was once a fizzy, fun, and occasionally sombering glimpse inside the lives of America’s most notable socialites has become a glossy, heavily curated ad reel overflowing with product placement, calculated brand promotions, and strategic stinginess about what’s actually revealed to the public. Any real drama feels like an afterthought, carefully repackaged and monetized for maximum engagement. The Kardashian phenomenon was once a mirror of my adolescent fascination with fame and celebrity, but now, I see them as an exaggerated reflection of a world I no longer wish to participate in.

Ten years later, the memory of that Kim Kardashian billboard still lingers, but the billboard itself is long gone, faded, replaced, or simply forgotten like so many headlines that came after it. And as I sat there watching the new season, only half-paying attention, it hit me: my life has changed more than theirs ever will. They will always be rich, famous, and problematic. The only difference now is that I finally don’t care.

The post Keeping Up With My Delusions appeared first on The McGill Daily.

As a queer woman, I’ve heard this complaint too many times from my lesbian friends: straight men manipulating their Tinder identity settings to show up on queer women’s feeds. What’s worse is that this isn’t just about annoyance, it’s about safety. Lesbians already deal with the sexualization and fetishization of their identities in everyday life. Dating apps, which should serve as safe spaces to find connection, are now extending that experience into the digital world.

Tinder, as the largest and most widely used dating app among queer women in Canada, should know better. But here we are.

Although I’ve never used dating apps myself — I’ve been with my girlfriend for nearly five years — I decided to test this problem firsthand. With a friend’s permission, I created a fake profile using her photos and changed all identifying information. I set my gender as “woman,” sexual orientation as “lesbian,” and selected “women only” for partner preferences. Within my first five swipes, two were straight men.

As I kept swiping, it became clear how these men were bypassing Tinder’s filters: they were setting their gender to “woman” while keeping their orientation as “straight.” So much for matching “based on gender and orientation.”

Tinder, like most dating apps, is designed for engagement. The more profiles you see, the more you swipe. The more you swipe, the more likely you are to pay for boosts, upgrades, and visibility. If Tinder strictly filtered profiles to show only what users asked for, people might see fewer matches, especially if they’re in smaller dating pools like queer women. Less matches means less time spent swiping. From a business standpoint, keeping options wide — even if they’re wrong — keeps users hooked.

That said, this kind of speculation is only hypothetical. And I don’t think fixing this issue would shrink Tinder’s user base. In fact, it could do the opposite. If queer women actually felt safe and seen on Tinder, more would join — growing the dating pool for everyone and creating a more loyal, engaged user base. But to make this happen, Tinder would need to commit to a few simple, yet powerful changes.

First, match people based on both gender and sexual orientation — together. Right now, Tinder lets users select these categories, but they are clearly not being honoured. Adding a filter that allows LGBTQ+ users to screen for both criteria would go a long way toward preventing men pretending to be “straight women” from appearing in lesbian users’ feeds.

Second, make better use of the Explore page. For those who don’t know, Tinder has a feature that lets users join groups based on dating goals, interests, and identities, including groups for LGBTQ+ folks. The only problem: these groups are buried and underused. A simple fix would be to prompt LGBTQ+ users to join relevant groups when they sign up — a pop-up that invites queer women to join the “Lesbian” group, for example.

And finally, Tinder needs a way to report people who are gaming the system. When I tried to report the straight men showing up in my lesbian profile, the closest option was “fake profile, scammer, not one person.” There wasn’t even an “Other” box to explain what was going on. Adding a “misrepresentation” option would not only let users flag this problem, but also help Tinder identify patterns — and fix them.

The truth is, dating apps are a lifeline for many queer people. In a world that still makes it hard to find safe, real-life connections, apps like Tinder have become one of the only ways to meet partners. So when queer women are left unprotected on the app that’s supposed to be for everyone, it’s not just a tech problem. It’s a community problem.

Tinder’s website is filled with language about inclusion, diversity, and safe spaces. But when straight men can flood lesbian feeds with no way to stop them, those promises ring hollow.

I’m not asking Tinder to do anything revolutionary. I’m asking them to do the bare minimum: protect the people who use their platform. If Tinder really wants to be inclusive, then building tools that make queer women feel safe isn’t just an extra feature, it’s the least they can do.

And if Tinder takes that step, I can guarantee that queer women will notice, and they’ll finally feel like this app is made for them too.

The post Tinder’s Filters Don’t Work for Queer Women appeared first on The McGill Daily.

After Trump interrupted one of Elon’s responses, the four-year-old left his father’s side, approached Trump, and leaned in to tell him “You need to shush your mouth. You are not the president.” There is no better way to drive home the pecking order between the POTUS, the CEO of Tesla, and the four-year-old son of a man worth over 400 billion USD.

Fears that Musk bought his way into the White House and is now acting as the president while Trump plays golf elsewhere have spread widely since Musk was appointed to two economic advisory councils in 2016. After Trump’s loss in 2020, the two stayed in touch, with Musk referring to himself as Trump’s “tech support.” One of the first decisions Trump made in his second term was to make the X CEO “senior advisor to the President.” With this authority, Musk is apparently permitted to perform press conferences in the Oval Office. A privilege which, prior to 2025, was reserved for the president alone.

Barely two months into Trump’s term, and Musk has already blown through the original limitations of his position. How far he can stretch this power is yet to be seen. Does Musk have more power than the vice-president? How much of this power comes from his appointed role and how much is bought by his billions? Has anyone actually seen J.D. Vance since Trump’s inauguration? What does he spend his days doing now that Musk has made himself Trump’s right hand man? Crying?

The Tesla CEO isn’t the only one of Trump’s new appointees to make headlines. The confirmation hearing for Robert F. Kennedy Junior (RFK Jr.) to be sworn in has been making headlines for the last two weeks. This event offered US senators a chance to vote on whether Trump’s pick would be sworn in.

The hearing spanned over two days and lasted over four hours. Many senators criticized Kennedy’s track record, questioning his competence as Secretary of Health based on his past statements, such as:

2013: “To me, [mandatory vaccinations for children] is like Nazi death camps. […] I can’t tell you why somebody would do something like that. I can’t tell you why ordinary Germans participated in the Holocaust.”

2021: “A hundred percent of the people who died — the first thousand who had AIDS — were people who were addicted to ‘poppers’ […] They were people who were part of a gay lifestyle, where they were burning the candle at both ends.”

2021: “We should not be giving Black people the same vaccine schedule that’s given to Whites because their immune system is better than ours.”

2023: “COVID-19 is targeted to attack Caucasians and Black People, the people who are most immune are Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese.”

2023: “I do believe that autism does come from vaccines.”

At the hearing, Bernie Sanders questioned how RFK Jr. can claim to be pro-vaccine while selling baby onesies that read “Unvaxxed Unafraid” online, as part of his company known as the “Children’s Health Defense.” The website sells merchandise and publishes articles on theoretical “dangers” of vaccines. Some of their most recent headlines are “‘Earth-rattling’: COVID Vaccines Linked to 113% Higher Risk of Underactive Thyroid” and “Pfizer Vaccine From ‘Highly Lethal Batch’ Likely Caused Man’s Death 555 Days Later.” Kennedy stepped down as the organization’s chairman in 2023 to begin his run for president. Prior to that, he was making over 20,000 USD a week from the website.

“Your organization is making money selling a child’s product to parents for 26 bucks, which casts fundamental doubt on the usefulness of vaccines. […] Now that you are pro-vaccine, will you have your organization take these products down?” Sanders asked.

“I’m supportive of vaccines,” RFK Jr. responded.

The onesies are, of course, still for sale – with versions reading “No Vax, No Problems” being sold, despite the fact that over two-thirds of the American children who died of COVID-19 from 2020-2022 were unvaccinated.

Skeptics have also questioned RFK Jr.’s alleged stance on vaccinations based on his response to the prompt, “What would you do if you could go back in time?”

“I would avoid giving my children the vaccines I gave them,” Kennedy said. “I would do anything for that. I would pay anything to be able to do that.”

This has to be the most wasteful use of a time machine ever uttered on camera.

Despite mountains of evidence to the contrary, Kennedy states that he has never made any racist or antisemitic remarks. He also claims that he’s not, and never has been, anti-vaccine, referring to his beliefs as “pro-safety” instead.

After the confirmation hearing, RFK Jr. was successfully sworn in with 52 senatorial votes in his favour and 48 against. With his position secured, Trump states he’s going to “let him [RFK Jr.] go wild on health. I’m going to let him go wild on the food. I’m going to let him go wild on the medicines.”

Kennedy’s new platform will allow him to spread conspiracies stating that there are links between vaccinations and autism, water quality and queerness, and antidepressants and school shooters. It is no accident that Kennedy separates the “Jews” from the “Caucasians,” and that he preaches categorical biological differences between races. These beliefs will have serious social and legislative consequences for all minorities targeted. What exactly RFK Jr. will accomplish with free rein is anyone’s guess, but it’s safe to assume it will cost thousands of citizens their lives.

What Kennedy and Musk have in common is a place in the President’s Cabinet and the privileges that go along with it. This power gives both men the ability to market whatever conspiracies or businesses they so choose. That is how the White House’s platform, a nation-wide stage that can be bought through funds or theories alike, is utilized to its most effective degree. Trump has given this power to men intending to spread misinformation like the plague, and the resulting injustice will put forward policies that take America back decades in the span of four years.

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Although it may seem discouraging to some that people may drift apart during their college years, try to remember that friendships come and go. It is eventually up to you which friends you want to keep close. Sometimes, even if you don’t spend a lot of time in person with your friends, it may still be enough to keep your friendship alive.

The post Maintaining Friendships in College appeared first on The McGill Daily.

I was taken aback. Nothing about our situation seemed complicated. We were long-distance friends who happened to hook up whenever we were in the same city. No dreadful “situationship.” Nothing overwhelming, at least to me. It started to sink in that this was the end of what I’d found to be a rather enjoyable tryst.

“Do you want to hook up one last time?” I asked, internally devastated.

Afterwards, Ben walked me to work. We hugged as we went our separate ways – I cherished every second, hanging on for a few moments longer than our usual goodbyes. I was crushed.

I didn’t understand what went wrong. We seemed to have a good thing going on. Ben and I had been friends for a little over a year. Our affair started when he kissed me at a music festival, which led to a longer make-out session. While I found it funny, sources told me Ben had found it stressful.

We hooked up later during Thanksgiving weekend. I remember flirting with Ben all night, only to be met with little reciprocation. I was upset, frustrated and felt rejected. After all, he had kissed me first.
It was only at the end of the night that Ben seemed to get over his internal conflict — and that’s when it really began.

We saw each other periodically, but rarely talked in between. I guess it felt awkward to try to change our dynamic. He had just moved to Toronto; I was in Montreal. We couldn’t hang out regularly anymore, and we rarely texted. In hindsight, maybe I was too scared to get closer to him. Maybe I knew that I would catch feelings.

As I spiralled in the moments after our goodbye, I began to wonder why I was so devastated. Was I not a fun, casual hookup? Even worse, was I so gutted by this loss because I… had a crush on Ben? Had I had feelings all along?

I began to rewind and realized it had been a minute since I last had a proper crush, with my last crush being my math tutor in the fall of 2023. It’s no secret that the “crush economy” has been low. Soon I was feeling that familiar rush of euphoria I hadn’t felt in a really long time. I was excited, flustered, and eager. Suddenly, Ben was the perfect man for me and no one else could compare. In an instant, it seemed like he was one of the most nuanced, intelligent, sexy, and soulful people I had ever met. But then the harshness of my reality set in. After all, what was there to be eager about if Ben had just broken off our relationship? My heart was shattered.

Amidst my heartbreak, I began to scramble for a solution. What could I possibly do to keep him in my life? That’s when I realized I had to tell him — and the nausea set in. Should I wait to tell him in person? No, that wouldn’t be for another month. I had to tell him right then and there.

So, I decided to send him a text: “I think there might be some feelings I’ve been suppressing, and I think I really like you…”

I was ready to throw up at any second. In retrospect, writing that line made me feel irredeemably tacky.

I sent it. Then I waited.

Waiting for a text back is quite possibly one of the worst feelings of all time. I felt dread, adrenaline, and a weird sense of giddiness. I began to fantasize about what it would mean if Ben liked me back. After all, there was already a mutual attraction between us. What if when he said he didn’t want to be casual, he actually meant he wanted to be exclusive? Would he want to be my boyfriend? I’m aware I was leaping when I should’ve at most tip-toed. My God, my crush had led me to reach a point of lunacy.

“…I think I just see you as a friend, but I admit the circumstances and the distance led me to never really consider anything else, so I’m sorry about that,” he wrote back.

I felt it then: the beautiful feeling of release. Truly, Ben’s reply felt like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders. Not only was I immediately okay with it, I also felt relieved. As I analyzed my feelings, I found this sense of relief to be both refreshingly depressing and surprisingly hilarious. I had expected further heartbreak, pain, and sorrow if things hadn’t gone my way. I didn’t want to go home and bang my head against the wall to forget his existence. In fact, I felt grateful for it. And then I realized: this was the first time in my life I had ever told anyone that I liked them.

Though I hadn’t experienced a crush in a long time, thanks to the current dismal “crush economy,” this brief experience reminded me of the unique thrill that comes with liking someone. The butterflies, the “what-ifs,” and even the heartache are all a beautiful part of being human.

In the end, I highly recommend telling someone you like them — it’s a liberating act of honesty. As adults, it’s no longer cute (or sustainable) to silently destroy ourselves over the fear of rejection. Handling romantic rejection well means embracing the vulnerability of putting your feelings out there, accepting outcomes beyond your control, and finding gratitude in the growth that comes from the experience. With this newfound wisdom, I can only hope Ben and I have a strong enough foundation to continue our friendship. After all, love isn’t a conquest, and nothing truly belongs to us. All we can do is appreciate the connections we’ve had and the lessons they teach us.

After reflecting on my experience, I absent-mindedly checked the time. It was 4:53 p.m. Ben and I had left my apartment at 1:00 p.m. My crush had only lasted four hours.

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