FEBRUARY 14, 2007

THE CADRE «2

EDITORIAL

New Cadre Printing Dates!

(Due to unforeseen circum-

stances, The Cadre is changing its publication dates. Apolo- gies for the inconveniece.) Issue #10

PTET EDK i) MMe em\y eee

Creative Issue! Open to any- one at UPEI, taking anything PION Mam UME NM ee BITS

Cadre!

DIE names

Printing March 21

Issue #11 Deadline March 23

Printing March 28

Issue #12 Deadline April 5 Printing April 11

How do you like your Cadre? Did something piss you off? Want to see more of ...? Bored out of your mind?

Then e-mail us! UPEICADRE@GMAIL.COM

ee Walker Editor in Chief

(Editor’s Note: Apologies for the Christmas article running again in Jan. while I was in BC. I had another one written but that’s what got in, unfortu- nately.)

While showing a friend some articles on wikipedia.org (the worlds foremost repository of knowledge) and the dif- ferent functions available to it, ] came across the section for UPEI.

Last year, the Media sub-section included mentions of the MacLean’s ranking from the previous years, David Weale’s dismissal issue, the professors _ strike and of course the cartoon contro- versy. In October of this year, someone removed all of that information and added a one-paragraph bit of info on how UPEI’s MacLean’s ranking has im- proved. From 379 words to 62.

Thanks to the beauty that is Wikipe- dia, I was able to resolve the IP address

Melatie Beraaed

Managing Editor

I wanted to try something new this past week, after being enlightened about some things on our trip to Vancouver for the conference put on by the Ca- nadian University Press. I actually left there with some good ideas about what I wanted to try with the Cadre. My

"first idea stemmed from a roundtable

discussion I attended about gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender (GLBT) issues. The people in the group discussed trouble they had on campus with spread- ing awareness on GLBT issues and writ- ing stories that involved GLBT students. When it was my turn to talk about some issues I had with our newspaper, I told

Right Here and Now

(which tells me what computer was used to change the entry) of the computer used to edit this entry to 137.149.138.57. A quick reverse-dns lookup (fancy term for finding out what actual computer was used) resolved to kpc07.stu-kelley. upei.ca. So basically, someone from the Kelley building removed any and all con- troversial subject matter from the UPEI Wikipedia page.

I have since reinstated that information along with a note linking back to that IP. While the ‘stu-kelley’ probably means a

~ student changed it, I remain dismayed

that a large chunk was taken out of wiki- pedia without them noticing,

In other news, UPEI has the opportu- nity to host next year’s national Canadian University Press conference. This would be a great chance for UPEI to come to the forefront in student journalism, bringing more credibility to our school and newspaper as well as increasing the schools overall profile. For the record, the winning bid comes with $138,000+ in funding from CUP so funding isn’t really an issue. This money is to host the conference, fly in 300 student journalists from across Canada, fly in guest speakers for seminars and keynote addresses, food

and a hundred other things. But I'll tell

the group that we hadn’t written any- thing on GLBT issues since I started working here in September.

The group was shocked. I told them I was from UPEI and they seemed to un- derstand a little more, as everyone knows PEI. is a conservative kind of place. I spoke up a lot in the other roundtable discussions at the conference, but this time I just sat there and listened.... be- cause it was all I could do.

I decided that when I got back to P.E.I. I would look into the groups we have here at UPEI that could help me organ- ize some stories and get the GLBT com- munity involved in the paper. I got a list of contact information for all the groups on campus, and to my dismay, did not find any groups dedicated to the GLBT community.

It was time for me to be in shock.

So I talked to students and a few profs and found out that there had been a group called the Rainbow Alliance on campus... had been.... How disappoint- ing. One prof led me to the women’s centre in search contact information for this group. This is where I found out they were thinking about shutting the group down. I was saddened by this news. How can a university group dedicated to GLBT issues have to close down? How many people on campus are gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgendered?? Enough to keep this group going, that’s for sure.

Where are all these people?

you, ’'m wary of co-ordinating this thing without the full support of the student union and administration. I’m going forward with it, because my reporters worked hard this year and deserve the chance to host this thing, but I really hope I won’t spend all next year banging my head against walls.

In other bitching and moaning, did you know that a resolution was passed by the student union in 2004/2005 to prevent The Cadre from running advertisements from any bar other than The Wave?

It’s not as though we make much mon- ey in the first place (although we’ve been doing really well in ads this year, thanks to Advertising Manager Stacey Murray), apparently now we have to curtail who can advertise with us. Is The Wave so hard up for cash and customers that they are afraid of even having ads in competi- tion with them? It’s not like people don’t know about Hunters trivia or dancing at Piazza Joe’s, the only thing it does is cut into our meager profit margin.

There are very few places that students spend their excess cash on, bars being one of them, and it’s unfair for us to have to censor who we sell ads to. We'll be trying to get this changed at the next student union meeting, wish us luck.

Why wasn’t anyone going to the meet- ings the group used to hold?

Who is going to be there when new students come to UPEI in hopes of finding people they can relate to and share ideas with? ~

Listening to the other students at the roundtable talk about all the events they host and all the fun they have made me wonder why a group like this on my campus had to die out. I can’t help but wonder about the people who tried to keep this group together. How do they feel right now knowing that the group they tried to keep together has to die out because all of a sudden having pride is not a cool thing to do anymore? I know PE.I. is a tough place to live and a lot of people fear being singled out and made fun of... but leaders are needed. This group is needed.

Not everyone comes out when they are 15 and in high school. Even the high schools are thinking about putting programs in place to help students with coming out. Why can’t UPEI have a group as well? Not everyone comes out when they are 15, Some people have more trouble with it than others, so where is the support going to come from?

I encourage people to help save this group. Read the story on the Rainbow Alliance written by reporter Martha MacIntyre for more information about the group.