news // no. 4

theotherpress.ca

Then and now: The ‘Other Press’ of the ‘80s

» A conversation with New West—Burnaby MP Peter Julian

Bex Peterson
Editor-in-Chief

 

¢ ‘Ais time, Douglas College was just

series of trailers at the corner of
McBride Boulevard and 8th Avenue in
New Westminster,” said MP Peter Julian in
an interview with the Other Press earlier
this month. “That temporary campus was
where we would put together the Other
Press—sometimes working all night to get
it right.”

Peter Julian has been a Member
of Parliament representing the New
Westminster—Burnaby riding since 2004.
A community activist and prominent
member of the NDP, Julian has been
described by The Georgia Straight as “one
of the region’s hardest working politicians.”
Julian is also a Douglas College alumnus.

“T played basketball for Douglas
College,” said Julian. “I was in a jazz quintet
as well [...] and, very proudly, was one of
the sports reporters for Douglas College's
the Other Press and the Chair of the Board
of the Other Publications Society.”

Julian was encouraged to write for the
paper in the early 80s by former editor
of the Other Press Ian Hunter, a personal
friend of his.

“T just got really attracted to the idea
of having a student newspaper that had the
guts and the courage that the Other Press
has,” said Julian. “Being an independent
student newspaper, I thought, gave a lot of
scope to tackle issues such as social justice
and economic justice as well as reporting
on the life of the college community.”

Julian experienced the transformation
of the school and its paper firsthand, as
Douglas College moved from the trailers to
a brand-new campus.

“Tt was quite nice to see the growth
of Douglas College and the growth of
the Other Press, and the professionalism
that was instilled in the publication as we
moved to a campus that was really worthy

of Douglas students,” said Julian.

The early 80s were a tumultuous
time for BC politics. The dominant party
of the era was the now somewhat defunct
BC Social Credit Party, a right-wing party
that governed the province from 1952 to
1991 with only a three-year break in the
’7os during which the NDP took control.
Under Bill Bennett in the late ’7os and early
Bos, the “Socreds” put forward a “restraint”
package of bills along with a new budget
that cut social spending for the province.
This resulted in a union-led resistance in
1983 called “Operation Solidarity.’

“Provincially, we were seeing
a pushback against the cuts and
compressions that led to poorer service
and ultimately has contributed to a lower
quality of life now if you look 30, 40 years
later,” said Julian. “Some of the cutbacks we
were seeing from the federal and provincial
government in the early 1980s have led to—
as everyone predicted—more struggles for
regular families.”

This was one of the many issues the
Other Press covered during this time,
as well as resistance against widespread
nuclear proliferation, cuts to affordable
housing projects across the country, and
rising costs for post-secondary education.
If this all sounds a little too familiar,
according to Julian, it’s because many of
the issues we're facing today have their
roots in the political actions of the 80s.

“When I was working for the Other
Press, about 16 percent of our housing
stock in Canada was social housing or
affordable housing, cooperative housing,”
said Julian. “In Germany it was a similar
level. And now, 40 years later, Germany’s
still maintained this 16 percent of housing
stock that’s being used for social housing,
cooperative housing, affordable housing,
subsidized housing, and in Canada it’s
fallen to about three percent.

“That is the genesis of the crisis, that
we are lacking—easily—half a million to
a million affordable housing units that

should have been built over the last 40
years and weren't. That’s why so many
students and so many others are struggling
to get affordable housing, and to find
affordable housing now.”

Although he said he enjoyed his time
with the Other Press, Julian went on to
complete his bachelor’s degree in political
science at the Université du Québec a
Montréal and did not continue pursuing
journalism.

“Oh, I knew that I could not bea
journalist!” Julian said. “To bea really
effective journalist, I believe you have to be
nonpartisan, and I felt adeep commitment
even then to social change and social
justice. I was already starting to get
involved in the NDP, so I thought to myself:
To be really good at being a journalist, you
still need to have that passion, but you can’t
have a membership card in the NDP or the
Liberal Party or any other party for that
matter”

Julian said that working with the
Other Press gave him “a real respect for
journalism that led me not to go into
journalism; and that I think is actually a
high level of respect to understand where
the dividing line is between journalism and
partisanship and understanding that I was
on the other side.”

Student journalism has been on
the frontlines of several important
conversations throughout the country over
the past few months, especially in Ontario,
where Doug Ford has implemented a
provincial plan to allow post-secondary
students to “opt-out” of certain student
fees. This plan could, according to Vice
reporting on a province-wide survey, result
in approximately 57 percent of students
choosing not to pay student newspaper
fees, leading to a significant decrease in
funding for campus papers.

Julian was unequivocal in his support
for student journalism.

“The Other Press and student
journalists help to speak out against

 

Photo via Wikimedia Commons

[social inequality] in a way that the
commercialized media won't,’ said. Julian.
“Until we have a really well-established
and well-funded independent media

in this country that can stand up to

those entrenched interests, it’s student
journalists—the Other Press and other
publications like it—that will help to
develop that pushback, and that is vital in
a democracy. Otherwise we will slide into
amore and more marginalized society
where there’s just a handful of ‘haves’ and
a whole ton of ‘havenots’ and no way [...]
for people to even get their stories out and
communicated to a broader public.”

As for Julian’s favourite memory
working with the Other Press?

“I think just... two in the morning,
having beers and Hawkins Cheezies and
feeling like over the next couple of hours
we were going get it right and send it to
the printers and we were going make a
difference that week,” said Julian. “I see
the standards [of the Other Press] just as
strong if not even stronger now as they
were 40 years ago, and that’s fundamentally
important because we need the Other
Press in New Westminster, and at Douglas
College, and in fact in Canada. And we
need a lot more Other Presses really
around the world if we're going to try and
get the planet that we all want to see.”

International news: Deadly attack in Kashmir

>» The Pulwama attack in India

Tania Arora
Staff Reporter

 

Ihe Pulwama attack shook the entire
country of India.

On February 14, a convoy of 78
vehicles carrying over 2,500 Central
Reserve Police Force (CRPF) personnel was
attacked when an SUV carrying explosives
rammed into a bus, causing a huge blast.
The incident took place on Jammu Srinagar
National Highway in the Pulwama district
of Jammu and Kashmir, India. The attack
resulted in the deaths of nearly 40 security
personnel and injured many others.

It has been the deadliest terror attack
in the region on India’s state personnel
since 1989. The car carried more than 300
kilograms (approximately 660 pounds) of
explosives including RDX and ammonium
nitrate.

The fight for Kashmir has been
ongoing since the partition of India and
Pakistan in 1947. Since then the region has
been heavily contested. According to local

officials, a Pakistan-based militant group
called Jaish-e-Mohammed has claimed
responsibility for this attack.

Pakistan issued a government
statement claiming that Pakistan was “not
involved in any war, means, or form,” and
that the attack was “conceived, planned,
and executed indigenously.”

The Indian Prime Minister's Office
(PMO) released Prime Minister Narendra
Modi’s statement on the Pulwama attack,
stating that “Our neighbour which is
already isolated by the global community
is ina state of illusion, if it thinks that it
can demoralize India with its dastardly
acts and nefarious designs. Let me
state categorically that it should stop
daydreaming to destabilize India. This
neighbour of ours which is in a state of
economic despair must know that [...] such
[an] attempt is destined to fail and will be
foiled.”

The case has been taken on by the
National Investigation Agency (NIA) along
with Jammu and Kashmir Police.

 

Prachi Gupta, an international student
from India, said in an interview with the
Other Press, “I actually got goosebumps
when I heard about the attack and saw the
pictures online. They were very disturbing.
If I felt that way sitting more than 1,000
kilometres away, no one can even imagine
the grief of the families of the police force
who died. None of the countries can be at
peace as long as such terrorists exist.”

The attack has sparked outrage and
protests throughout the country. People

Photo by Nazil Shah via Wikimedia Commons

are expressing their condolences through
silence at gatherings, lighting candles, and
writing letters to families and are making
contributions by sending funds and
protesting in large numbers.

Modi appealed for donations in
his statement: “130 crore Indian will
give a befitting reply to any such act or
attack. Many big countries have strongly
condemned this terror attack, have stood
behind India and expressed support for
India”