6 THE VOICE, THURSDAY, OCTOBER 17, 2013 EDITOR WARREN JANE lewpoints Older children showing young new Canadians the ropes in life inding yourself in a strange country F:: a child is bewildering, above and beyond the usual terrors that occur during childhood. Our south Vancou- ver schools seem to recognize this and that’s where the “cultural buddies” pro- gram comes in. The program is aimed at introduc- ing a child to bi- zarre North Ameri- can customs such as Halloween and Easter. The pro- gram pairs up first -generation immi- grant children with first-genera- tion immigrant young adults. These older “men- tors” guide their younger counterparts, smoothing out culture-shock, alienation and all of the other fun stuff that comes with being introduced to a new environment. With immigrants making up 40 per cent of Metro Vancouver’s population according to StatsCan, this couldn’t come at a better time. One should note that the program is not like the system used in residential schools. The aim is to acclimatize chil- dren to their new environment, not make them more “Canadian.” This is a wise choice, because there is no Cana- dian cultural identity. Not in any tradi- tional or stereotypical way, at least. Canada is a blank slate, on which a mosaic of plural identities lies. This country is home to the hyphenated identity - we are Irish-Canadians, Ital- jan-Canadians, Chinese-Canadians and Indo-Canadians. Our identity comes with a prefix that modifies norms and habits we’ve developed in our exposure to other people in the mosaic. As opposed to the American model, which is aimed at transforming differ- ent ethnic identities into the “Ameri- can” identity, our multicultural country actually accepts difference. This is one of the reasons why the proposed Que- bec charter is ridiculous along with be- ing racist — what’s a pure Quebecois look like? White, Catholic and Franco- phone? How can one immigrant popu- lation, cut off from the motherland by centuries of time and the Atlantic Ocean, lay the guidelines for how other immigrant groups should behave? Other than a shared desire to differ- entiate ourselves from Americans, we are mostly united by the fact that we’re different. Not only are we different, we also generally respect each other’s dif- ferences. The buddies program has endured as a community-connections program, and that’s something that I, as a Cana- dian of mixed ancestry, take pride in. There’s always room for more people on our blank slate. OPINION GLEN TRUAX We want to hear from you Did we get a fact wrong? Tell us. Got a different point of view? Write to us. Problems with something we've said? Let us know. Journalism instructor Nicholas Read oversees The Voice. Email him at nread@langara.be.ca BlackBerry is going extinct nce upon a time, BlackBerry was the largest cell phone company in the world, with a majority share of the market. But unlike most stories that begin this way, very few of the characters in this story will get to live happily ever after. BlackBerry is in trouble, but why? Two words, folks: Thorsten Heins. BlackBerry’s new president and CEO is running the company into the ground. Just this week, BlackBerry’s Halifax of- fice closed, leaving more than 350 peo- ple without jobs. The once-popular cell phone giant is slowly circling the drain. Heins, along with a few other BlackBerry shot call- ers, stand to reap huge benefits in the event that the company is sold. With a $9.1 million annual salary for the 2018 fiscal year, you’d think Heins would want to keep this gravy train rolling. But if BlackBerry gets sold, Heins gets a $55.6 million severance package for his troubles and then he’s a free agent again. Not a bad parting gift if you ask me. So that covers the motive, but sad- ly for BlackBerry’s shareholders, the murder is still in progress, so there’s no closure for them yet. It’s obvious that the 30 per cent nosedive BlackBer- ry’s stock took in the last month is a pretty accurate weather vane for the impending shitstorm on the horizon. Let’s not forget that in 2008, BlackBerry (known as Research In Motion at the OPINION WARREN JANE time) stock was selling for almost $150 a share, so this tailspin started a while back. The beginning of the end was when RIM failed to respond to the release of the iPhone 4. The BlackBerry’s lack of apps and delayed release of their first touchscreen model, the BlackBerry 10, have only helped facilitate the compa- ny’s demise. Heins is just the final nail in the coffin. To the loyal investors who think they can continue to parlay their shares into a life on easy street, all I can only tell you is cut and run. Things are going to get a lot worse before they get better. Nobody wants to play for the losing team. Blind loyalty is a foolish concept and lifeboats wouldn’t exist ifrats were the only ones smart enough to flee a sinking ship. MARTIN LUFF photo/WARREN JANE photo illustration Not happy with LSU election results? You should really try voting next time “Elections belong to the people. It’s their decision. If they decide to turn their back on the fire and burn their be- hinds, then they will just have to sit on their blisters.” - Abraham Lincoln looks like we’re going to have to wait and see if our behinds blister in the coming months. All unopposed candidates were suc- cessfully voted into their positions. This is unsurprising given the lack of students who even bothered to cast their vote. The LSU election results indicate that fewer than 300 people turned out. Langara has approximately 10,000 stu- dents, which means less than three per cent of the student population voted in the election. Last week I wrote an article pertain- Ae student elections last week it ing to LSU campaigning restrictions that fueled a lack of voter awareness. Although this was a major issue, the LSU can’t be fully blamed for the poor turnout. The candidates that ran neglected to promote their platforms, partially because of restric- tions, but mostly because they didn’t need to. When you're running un- opposed there’s no pressure to run a large campaign, particularly be- cause victory is almost entirely guar- anteed. In fact, the burden of the shameful turnout lies with us, the students. = Ne OPINION TYLER HOOPER I want to be clear that I’m not in any- way slamming the candidates who were elected. The couple of candidates I did chat with seemed very excited and enthusiastic and I wish them all the best in their new positions. However, my point digs at a much deeper issue: If we, as students, want to hold the LSU accountable for the hun- dreds of dollars each of us pay to them every semester we need to spend more time becoming political, and socially engaged, on campus. It’s easy to stand on the sidelines and let others make decisions for us, but when we do that we become part of the problem, not the solution. Have we been burned? Only time will tell, but ifin the coming months we do start to feel the pain of our blisters, we will have only ourselves to blame for our scorched behinds. Fil fay ce) The Voice is published by Langara College's journalism department. Editorial opinions are those of the staff and are independent of views of the student government and administration. We welcome letters to the editor. All letters must be signed. They may be edited for brevity. Names may be withheld in special cases, but your letter must include your name and phone number. HOW TO REACH US PHONE 604-323-5396 FAX 604-323-5398 E-MAIL thevoice@langara.be.ca DROP-IN Room A226 Langara College There is a mailbox at the entrance to the journalism rooms. SNAIL MAIL The Voice 100 West 49th Ave. Vancouver, B.C. VSY 226 WEBSITE wwwilangaravoice.com EDITORIAL STAFF THIS ISSUE: MANAGING EDITOR/ PAGE 6 Warren Jané PAGE EDITORS PAGE 1 Puneet Dhami PAGE 2 Jacqueline Langen PAGE 3 Angela Holubowich PAGE 4 Niall Shannon PAGE 5 Quinn Mell-Cobb PAGE 7 Kelci Nicodemus PAGE 8 Deanna Cheng WEB EDITORS Ben Bulmer James McLaughlin Garin Fahlman Kayla lsomura Kristen Harpula Brenna Brooks Jana Minor Dana Bowen REPORTERS Andrea Anthony Nick Eagland Tammy English Bill Everitt Gavin Fisher Tyler Hooper Amy Jones Jesse Lam Tricia Lo Jenny Peng Nadim Roberts Vanessa Szpurko Glen Truax Contact us: Online at langaravoice.com Twitter at @langaraVoice