BLOGDIAL : We are the best

This evening I went to a big meeting of the members of our University's newspaper.
Our newspaper, The Gateway, is the largest NON-AUTONOMOUS student newspaper in Canada. It is also the ONLY large non-autonomous newspaper in Canada. It is currently owned and financed by the Student's Union. The paper has been trying to gain autonomy for over 30 years, and now we are really really trying hard to get this done.
The problem with being owned by the Student's Union (SU) is that there is a conflict of interest. The newspaper cannot accurately or unbiasedly watchdog the SU, as they are owned part and parcel by them. The SU executive is a very self-important and conceited body, and will not stand for any sort of harsh criticism. Free speech and free press are therefore DENIED.
The chief editor and the line editors are paid a sum of money as they have almost full time jobs with the paper. They are hired by the SU, as the SU runs the paper financially. Several editors have had their jobs threatened due to publishing criticism about the SU - perfectly valid for a newspaper - but the SU is not pleased by it. They think they're total hot shit, and can do no wrong. They do not want anyone thinking that they have done something wrong, as they are conceited lame-asses who talk about cookies and in-jokes during weekly congress. They see their job as little more than a game.
So, the desire to acheive autonomy is perfectly logical. The Gateway will become autonomous by becoming a not-for-profit organization. All assets owned by the SU and meant for the Gateway, basically everything in the current Gateway offices, will be transferred to the not-for-profit organization. The SU will have to host the offices in some way or another, be it in the student's union building or elsewhere accomodating. This may sound weird if the SU would no longer own the paper; but the paper is a student service, and it is like this in most other Universities in Canada.
Now the main hurdle is to get this motion set to referendum. First, a petition needs to be signed asking for the right to hold a referendum. That starts on monday, with 2500 sigs needed. The legalese on the petetion and the bylaw statements of the Gateway are impeccable, and the SU honestly can't fuck with anything here.
But, a new development has sprung up. For a completely unrelated reason, the SU has decided to push new legislation of how to handle referenda. This legislation is basically completely illegal, yet most people will not see it because they're smashed it in 15 pages of whining and very bad legalese. Why is it illegal? Because this bill says that any referenda proposal must go by a panel as outlined in the bill - a panel that is completely composed of the SU executive. If this panel doesn't like the proposal, the referendum gets trashed, LEGAL petition or not.
This disgusts me. The SU, the organization that's supposed SERVE the student body and reflect it's needs, is effectively DENYING the student body's voice and is effectively serving it's own biased, conceited view. This is a complete violation of free speech, University campus or not.
And the real sick thing is that if we were not alerted of this, this bill would pass. It might still pass. The reason for this is that not average student gives a shit about what goes on in the SU congress. No one knows about bills, motions, anything, they're completely apathetic. The upside to this is that it won't be hard to get a reaction from the student counsellors - NON-executive members of the SU who act sort of like MLAs. They are those who vote on bills and they are those who the students go to speak. Students never go to speak to them, which is the reason that if one of us newspaper staff goes to talk to them about this ridiculous legislation, they'll sit up and fucking listen. At least that's what we hope, or else our newspaper's hope for the right to have free press will be once again dashed.
This student's union makes me ashamed to be a member of this University. But I will do something about it, dammit. No one can just fucking get away with something like this.

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