Students drop Shinerama fundraiser for illness targeting Caucasians.
Carleton student council to rethink Shinerama cancellation.
Oh the brilliance of CUSA reaches an international audience.
CUSA – the Carleton University Students Association – was just slightly to the left of Chairman Mao when I attended Carleton in the late 90s, so I’m entirely not surprised to see something like this make the news.
I love this quote:
“By no means do we want anyone to think that our council or students at Carleton don’t support research for cystic fibrosis,” (President of CUSA, Bittany) Smyth said. “It’s definitely a very worthwhile charity and we want to clear up that confusion.”
Oh well how could we be so foolish as to get this out of the wording of the motion:
“Whereas Orientation week strives to be inclusive as possible
Whereas all orientees and volunteers should feel like their fundraising efforts will serve their diverse communities
And whereas cystic fibrosis has been recently revealed to only affect white people, and primarily men
Be it further resolved that: The CUSA representatives on the incoming Orientation Supervisory Board work to select a new broad reaching charity for orientation week.”
Of course, cystic fibrosis does affect mainly caucasians, but not just “white people”; Caucasians, as the Canadian Cystic Fibrosis Foundation correctly point out includes people of European, Indian, and Middle Eastern descent. Who knows where they got the “primarily men” from as the disease affects both sexes equally.
Boy, when someone brings forward a bunch of muddled facts for the student union to vote on, better not do any further research! This is a bloody institution of higher learning! Heck no, don’t bother, we’ll base all our decisions on blind faith and political ideology. (Actually, considering the actions of Australian Senator Stephen Conroy, they’ve got brilliant political careers in front of them!)
So the question is: based on the wording of this motion, specifically the implication contained within that any fundraising efforts undertaken by CUSA must benefit the entire community, will they cancel AIDS fundraisers based on the fact that HIV/AIDS is more prevalent among the homosexual community in Canada? Or any Breast Cancer events? Yeah, I didn’t think so. (Nor should they, that’s not my point, in case you missed it.)
Come on CUSA, you blew this one, big time. You’re an embarrassment. Reverse this decision.
