For those who may not be aware, the month of February is designated Black History Month. Many excellent events take place throughout the country, the province, the City of Ottawa and even on our very own uOttawa campus! I for one have had the pleasure of attending many of these events in the past! As you will see below, the SFUO's VP Communications Paige Galette voiced her displeasure, via her Facebook Wall (which is reproduced in its entirety below), with the 2 uOttawa INDENPENDENT student-run newspapers, The Fulcrum and LaRotonde for their lack of coverage of some of the Black History Month events that had already taken place (she took exception to the fact that neither newspaper had covered the Black History Month Gala in particular).
If Paige would have made this same comment on February 23, 2012 (The Fulcrum publishes its last edition for the month of February on that day) or on February 27, 2012 (LaRotonde publishes its last edition of the month of February on that day), then she would definitely have raised a legitimate concern. However, it should be noted that her comment was posted to her Facebook Wall on Thursday February 9, 2012. On that day, The Fulcrum had just published its second edition out of a total of three editions that would be printed during the month of February. Likewise, LaRotonde had only published its first edition of the month on Monday February 6, 2012 with two more February editions to come. To be honest, I would also be very troubled and disappointed if neither newspaper had published one single article covering in some way, shape or form Black History Month in any of their four respective editions. However, let's remember that this year is a Leap Year which means that the month of February encompasses 29 days in stead of 28. Therefore, there were 20 days left in the month of February when this initial comment was posted.
This begs the question: Is it fair to have lashed out at the 2 uOttawa student-run newspapers for not yet having covered Black History Month only 9 days into the month of February? Is it really reasonable to make an all encompassing statement such as this only 9 days into the celebration of such an important month? We must remember that the staff members and the volunteers at our 2 INDEPENDENT student-run newspapers cannot be aware at all times of every single event that takes place on our campus. To be clear, I'm not trying to make any excuses for our student journalists. However, it should also be noted that traditionally, during the first two weeks of the month of February, our student-run newspapers focus a lot of time and energy on ensuring that the SFUO elections are covered properly. Again, this isn't my opinion... it's simply reality.
Ironically, according to Google, this list of Black History Month events was posted on CHUO website (uOttawa's THIRD student-run media organization - 89.9 FM on your dial) on Thursday February 9, 2012 (the very day this comment was posted on Facebook by Paige).
Sadly, one comment in particular was made that went unchallenged by Paige that was quite disturbing: "I'm guessing the newspaper are run by only (sheltered) white people?" It should be noted though that one particular journalist from The Fulcrum took exception with the comment and, further down, another journalist pointed out that the Arts and Culture editor at The Fulcrum is a racialised woman.
I want to know what you think! Was Ms. Galette's comment premature or am I completely offside on this one? Let me know by leaving your comments at the end of this post.
