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By Katie Kish, May 11, 2009 11:36 am

Because of the oh-so-wonderful strike York isn’t done its exam until the end of May. I’ll be finished on May 20th…But until then I have an exam today, three essays, a “campaign plan” (whatever the frick that means) and then another test. Words fail me to describe my hatred and anger toward York and the TAs. Curses.

So here is something I don’t understand. Well, I understand it, but I don’t agree with what they did.

The Tamil Tigers protesting on the expressway. With hundereds of Tamils on the expressway traffic came to a complete hault for over 5 hours. The tamils have been protesting in Toronto for months hoping that someone in Canada will help call for a cease fire in Sri Lanka. Their desperation rose to this illegal and unsafe demonstration after the news that came that there had been an all-night atrillery barrage i Sri Lanka killing more than 370 people forcing others to shoddy safety shelters along the beech. Their demonstration continued until Michael Ignateiff’s government assured them that they would make a statement about the issues today.

The Tamil race is being wiped out. In Sri Lanka, even in safe zones, people are being killed. Protestors claim that 4000 are dead, but official sources say 400. But with no media allowed into the area, it’s hard to say for certain what the number is.

It’s a hard issue. While I don’t agree with people blocking road ways, setting people back hours upon hours and disrupting the peace…I would be right up there with them if it were my culture that was going through a genocide. But I agree with Dalty, that despite passion and anger people need to protest legally. Not to mention the fact that some people honestly do not care about the issues that the Tamil’s have protested against, but now instead of politely sitting on the fence and ignoring them – they have anger towards them and completely disagree with their protests. That’s how people work – the Tamils have gotten the attention from those drivers, but not good attention. There is in fact probably no better way to lose supporters, alienate friends and create enemies than closing down a highway in Toronto on Mother’s day.

If this was an attempt to create sympathy for the cause they have sucessfully achieved the opposite. If they’ve gained anything it is intolerance for their disruptful protests that have been going on in Toronto for months, and have no obviously started to effect those who have nothing to do with their issues. The Tamils are protesting against genocide, while deliberately ignoring the rights of Canadians. Good job Tamils.

It’s a valid questions as to why the police didn’t start charging and arresting people. And if their protests keep escalating like this, will we see violence in the future? Probably not, a lot of them seem pretty scared hiding behind their women and children. Granted their issue is pretty bad…children getting killed and their race being threatened. But they still have no right to block roads and traffic like that… especially if someone were sitting in their car with their child with an incredibly high fever. Or your wife who has just gone into labour. Or some other medical emergency.

Anyway, good luck with Ignatieff who has made it clear that you can break the law if you’re a visible minority protesting and that disruption and mobs interupting people’s lives is an effective way to get government attention. But that’s besides the point that he’s not actually in power, so good luck Tamils on negotiating and talking to the liberals, maybe they’ll put a good word in for you to Harper.

(As a side note: USA, UK, Australia, EU and Canada: all countires that have proclaimed the Tamil Tigers to be a terrorist group… WOOHOO!)

Comments (4)

By Katie Kish, January 22, 2009 1:03 pm

AH hahahahahahahhahahahahahahah

The article is totally bullshit, we’re not “rival” groups… and we don’t hate each other. …But Pat O’Brien compared atheists to Stalin, which is just disgusting and unfair. The guy who wrote the article found one tiny little angle that he had to blow out of proportion. …

-_- press.

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By Katie Kish, December 23, 2008 4:18 am

The Best and the Worst of 2008

It’s that time!

CDs

5. Sarah McLachlan – Closer: The Best Of … I’ve always loved S.M. I used to joke with Sam that I have a “Sarah Sense” because I’d always seem to find her music on the radio. She has probably been the most consistently admired and loved singers since I was like 10.
4. Josh Martinez – World Famous Sex Buffet …I love a little hiphop
3. Mr. Scruff – Ninja Tuna
2. Bright Eyes – Cassadaga
1. Girl Talk – Feed The Animals …I read an article recently about “girl talk killing music” because he uses clips of essentially illegal bits to make his music…but gets around it because they’re all online samples and stuff. …His mixes are amazing.

That category is always the hardest, other bands who released beauties: Tokyo Police Club, cat power, tv on the radio, the walkmen, mates of state, british sea power, …and others. sigh.

Movies

5. The Dark Knight – I’m still having a hard time deciding if I like this movie because it was so entertaining and so like…comic book looking, or if its because Heath Ledger died so there was a huge hype around his acting. I’ll say this – he did a great job. But some people were saying he should be given an award for it…even though he’s dead. I don’t really think that’s necessary. Anyway, I think the movie was really good. It was dark, but it was also a lot like the Batman with poison Ivy in it – it had that cool comic book feel to it.
4. The Strangers – this movie was weird.  …I love Liv Tyler and it scared me to death.
3. Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian – i think CON are really cute stories. Despite the obvious religious undertones to them, I really really like them.
2. Sex and the City – much anticipated and not disappointed …although I don’t think I’ve ever cried so much in a theater as I did when I saw this movie. It may have been the fact that we were drinking wine in the front row, so we were a little tipsy, or it just could have been that it was so tragic to see the girls is such sad situations. Sigh.
1. Wall-E – not only was it mine and John’s first date movie…it has a great message about the environment and mocks our consumerism. Which I always like It was by far the best movie John and I could have seen on a first date. Robot love? Seriously, it doesn’t get any better.

Books

5. In Search of Time by Dan Falk
4. The Forever War by Dexter Filkins
3. A Madman Dreams Of Turing Machines by Janna Levin
2. Hurry Down Sunshine by Michael Greenberg
1. Factory Girls by Leslie T Chang

Gadgets:

5. Nokia N95 8 gb – My new phone! 8 GB worth of space, Wifi, 5 mp camera with carl zeiss optics, radio, mobile e-mail, vision tv/radio, a gorgeous screen with DVD like video capabilities, 35mm headphone jack, 8 gb internal memory, gps with preloaded maps… and best of all, it doesn’t have a full keyboard. I was so sick of the full keyboard, bulky shape and “smart phone” look of my blackberry. The Nokia looks like a normal phone, but totally does more. Its great.
4. HTC Diamond – my brothers phone… it’s sleeker and more easily customizable thank the iPhone. The only reason I didn’t get this over my phone is that it is a touch screen. They seem to be all the craze right now, but I just don’t like them.
3. Flip MinoHD – a tiny HD camcorder for only like $200… mostly because it only has 4gb worth of space…
2. The nikon D90 – *drools* an HD camera. …
1. Optoma Pico PK-101 – the MP3 player projector… I really need to get me one of these. Its the size of a regular iPod, plugs in and plays your movies on the wall. …awesome.

Games
I dont really do a whole lot of game playing…

5. Wii boxing…i played it once
4. Rock Band …I pretty much rock at everything except the drums. But…i’ll get to those in 2009
3. I started playing WoW a couple days ago, i’ve played twice
2.Sims!…one of the expansion packs came out this year, i dont remember which one. But thanks to john i have ALL the expansion packs and have WAY too many options. Its awesome.
1. Spore…. cooool

Hits of the financial crisis:

5. AIG’s credit fiasco
4. No more Fords and Chevys – the Detroit big three went belly up! the earth is happy, but hummer drivers are not.
3. Citibanks 75 000 job cuts
2. Greenspan – people are living in tents!
1. Iceland …is broke, needing to take billions of dollars from the IMF, Sweden, Germany, Denmark and Finland.

Sciencey Stories:

5. The Invisibility Cloak
4. Bigfoot is a rubber suit with dead animals inside of it
3. a squid with elbows
2. something tugging at the universe
1. The Large Hadron Collider

Absolutely Hilarious

5. The McCain green screen challenge – McCain did an interview in front of a green background, prompting Colbert to challenge his audience to come up with the best scenes to put McCain into
4. Letterman to McCain “You don’t show up for me, America doesn’t show up for you!”…after McCain stood up Letterman, and was shown at another interview instead, it was the core of Lettermans jokes for weeks.
3. The writers strike… so many late night talk show hosts were SO strapped for content. …hahahaha suckers.
2. is america ready for a woman president? – Samantha Bee as Carrie Bradshaw
1. Tina as Palin…and she didn’t change any words.

Personal Worsts:

5. Working in retail – even though I was the boss, i hated it. i hated bending over backwards for jerk ass customers and seeing people spend 800 dollars on clothes. I hated fitting plus women for bras in the summer when they smelled funny and I hated answering to my overly bitchy and micromanaging district manager. She treated me like a moron. I hated that job.
4. I miss a lot of people including Shaneka, Mark, Caitlin, Torrie, Ashley, Dan, Patrick, Karl and family
3. My currently housing situation – my roommates are annoying, they turn the heat up to over 30 (literally!) and leave messes in the kitchen all the time. My door doesn’t really lock and I’m an hour out of the city. I can’t walk around with no pants on and I have to pay to wash my clothes.
2. The York U strike…dont even get me started
1. My grandma died and it was the sadest of all sad.

Personal Bests:

5. Working at acculink where I met Christine and Stacey – two of the best women I’ve ever met in my life. Plus it made me value the 4/10hr shifts a week thing, and loved being on midnights.
4. Moving to Toronto in June. Although I had to shack up with Allen for quite sometime, I love living here and will be sad if I ever have to move out of the city.
3. Getting a job at CFI… my job is to advance science and secularism in society. How cool is that?
2. I’ve lost 20 lbs in the past 2 months! woo!! i love weight watchers…except now the skin on my belly feels really weird, like loose. its kinda gross.
1. June 24th – John and I had our first kiss and were a “couple” by the next day. awe, <3

Comments (3)

By Katie Kish, May 8, 2008 3:23 pm

she looks like an anorexic ghost… a little…

Apparently a new drug to battle obesity would have effects on children’s brains…

Other researchers have found that cannabinoid receptor blockers interfere with neural connectivity in rat brains — a phenomenon that in humans is associated with depression. The Food and Drug Administration has refused to approve Acomplia because it appears to cause anxiety, depression and suicidal thoughts.

…

This is especially troubling because the mice were young. “The juvenile stage of mice is parallel to what we know as the infant stage in humans, when the brain is plastic and prone to modification,” said Liu.

Beyond interfering with neurological development during the critical stage of infancy, could cannabinoid receptor blockers also keep adult brains from developing?

Alright now. Seriously. Diet drugs that could cause you to commit suicide? Cause anxiety? Stunt the growth of the brain? Is it really THAT HARD to stop eating fast food and eat a salad instead? To the point where we have to keep throwing money into this sort of ridiculous research?

I’m sure I could think of at least 100 other things that the money that goes toward this sort of ridiculous research would be better off put into. It’s like all the energy being put into being angry at at that Miley Cyrus girl.

I’ll admit – I didn’t even know who she was until about a week ago when my mom told me about her and her vanity fair “scandal”. The girl, who is am American teen icon, takes a hardly even sexualized photograph and the entire world turns upside down on her.

The two almost go hand in hand – we keep shoving money into diet research while showing off our under aged daughters perfect little bodies to create more media attention and to push more people to the need to use diet pills. …Okay, im stretching it a bit – but you see what I’m getting at right.

This world is f#$@ed! We put these girls up on pedestals idealizing their bodies. Then for some reason get angry when we sexualize these bodies… This is the world we live in – people get sexualized. Then we have girls trying to be like her going batshit insane because they’re using a million and a half different diet pills causing anxiety and depression. WTF.

So in the name of my generation. I vow never to diet or idolize Miley Cyrus. It’s a long road ahead, but I feel like I can make it.

Comments (3)

By Katie Kish, December 20, 2007 4:40 pm

It’s nearly 2008. I think my favorite part about the last couple weeks in December is looking back at the past year, and seeing what came out of it that was definitely worth the time and effort put into it. So here it is – the my tops lists:

Top 10 albums:

1. LCD Soundsystem – 45:33
2. Rascal Flatts – Still Feels Good
3. Craig David – Trust Me
4. Pinback – Autumn of Seraphs
5. Deerhoof – Friend Opportunity
6. RJD2 – The Third Hand
7. Panda Bear – Person Pitch
8. The Six Parts Seven – Casually Smashed to Pieces
9. Elliot Smith – New Moon
10. Arcade Fire – Neon Bible

Runners up definitely – Feist, Radiohead, M.I.A and Of Montreal
Actually, i think this list of top albums might actually destroy mine… Not only is it a good list, but it’s also 100% Canadian. Woo! Feist!

Top 10 songs:

1. Apologize – Timbaland ft One Republic
2. Hot Stuff – Craig David
3. Toy Solider – Britney Spears
4. Alaska – Camera Obscura
5. The Way I am – Ingrid Michaelson
6. Bartender – T-Pain ft Akon
7. +81 – Deerhoof
8. Blueberry Tree Part II – Husky Rescue
9. My Moon My Man – Feist
10. The Past Is a Grotesque Animal – Of Montreal

Top 5 movies:

1. The Lives of Others
2. Little Miss Sunshine
3. Sweeny Todd
4. Amazing Grace
5. Surfs Up… fo reelz

Top 5 personal moments:

1. Moving home from BC… I miss BC a lot, but it is good to be home. And it looks like I’ll be here for a while, and that’s okay.
2. Getting alcohol poisoning. …I know, it doesn’t really sound all that good, but honestly – it made a good story and has terrified me into drinking less and less each time I go out.
3. The CFI leadership conference. It opened my eyes to a lot of things, introduced me to a lot of people and gave me an opportunity to converse with a lot of open minded, like minded people my age for a few days.
4. My first night out with Future Shop folks. Shit. Show. I established quite the name for myself that night. Gah.
5. Getting to meet Baby AJ! The birth of Baby Ella!

Top 3 games:

1. Oblivion!
2. Guitar Hero 2 – seriously, 3 isn’t really that much better. There are some good songs, but… meh.
3. Bioshock!

I hate halo 3 and the orange box. …so i dont even want to hear it. call of duty 4… it’s more than decent though. As is Assassins Creed, but I haven’t played it enough to put it in a top list.

Top 5 TV shows:

1. Heroes!
2. Flight of the Conchords
3. Planet Earth
4. Yo Gabba Gabba
5. The Office

Top 4 under-reported news stories:

1. Somalia … for some reason, few people knew about the + 1 million Somalians fleeing from their homes – while the UN sits back and watches.
2. Mansions in Luanda … Post-Civil war Angola had an economic growth rate 12.5% higher than China’s 11.5% rate. Thank you oil reserves!
3. 100 000 troops … Lined up along the Ethiopian and Eritrea border, just waiting to have at it, much like the crisis that happened there in 2002.
4. More reasons why teachers need to have background checks, character tests and need to be watched closely. Seriously.

Top 5 books:

1. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz
2. Heart Shaped Box by Joe Hill
3. The Debt to Pleasure by John Lanchester
4. Dirt – The Erosion of Civilizations by David Montgomery
5. Busting the Limits of Time by Martin Rudwick

Top 5 environmental stories:

1. Walmarts green appeal. …They’re still not perfect. They still encourage suburban sprawl. They still suck money out of people. They still pay employees shitty wages. But they are doing great initiatives for the environment. That is all.
2. Moving from “environmentalists kill the economy” to creating green jobs to increase economic growth. Creating new economic sectors that cater directly to the hippies. Solar panel companies, organic farms… the new green economy should create over 6 million jobs by 2015.
3. The world’s 15 greenest cities
4. The Great Biofuel Hoax
5. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued its 4th Assessment Report in which it declared that global warming is “unequivocal” and that it was “very likely” that most of the observed warming was caused by man. More than 2500 scientists worked on the report. The panel’s work was recognized with a 2007 Nobel Peace Prize, which it shared with Al Gore.

Top 5 natural disasters:

1. Bangladesh Cyclones

2. Mexico Floods

3. Hurrican Felix

4. Greece Forest Fires

5. Peru Earthquake