Is it just me, or was May a really weird month?

Saturday, June 09, 2012

Times & Transcript

By: Isabelle Agnew

Location: F3

Topics: Miscellaneous

Is it just me, or was May a really weird month?

Over the past week or two, it seems like there have been three incidents that the citizens of Moncton have been discussing: the public funding of Crandall University, Luca Magnotta, and the 'zombie apocalypse.' I figured I'd give my two cents on all three subjects.

Firstly, Crandall University, for anyone who's unaware, is a Baptist university that is receiving public funding. Honestly, I have no problem with a university receiving public funding - I mean we need to support post-secondary education.

But, the fact that our government is funding a university fines students for not attending church, and that states on its website that it does not hire anyone who is homosexual to be a teacher, kind of disgusts me.

My stepbrother's girlfriend, who attended Crandall last year, but does not consider herself Baptist, was fined at the end of the school year for not going to church every Sunday. Sure, that might not seem like a problem to some, but she currently works three jobs so that she can afford rent, the necessities and university, so an extra $200 is a lot.

I have a major problem with the fact that taxpayers are paying for a university that discriminates based on religion and sexual orientation.

If you're going to ask for public funding, you should follow the Human Rights Act.

Then, the stories about accused killer Luca Magnotta have been a popular topic of conversation among Monctonians.

For those who have been living under a rock, last week the torso of a man was found in a suitcase in the city of Montreal. Later that week, a human hand was discovered in a post office in Ottawa that had been sent to the Liberal headquarters.

Then, a human foot was found at the Conservative headquarters in Ottawa. Late last week, police confirmed that the torso, foot and hand had all belonged to the same man: a Chinese student attending university in Montreal.

Luca Magnotta was named as the number one suspect and an international warrant for his arrest was issued. This week, Magnotta has appeared in the Times & Transcript daily. First, they discovered the man in an Internet café in Berlin. They arrested him on the spot and now he's waiting to be deported back to Canada for a trial. Now police are releasing statements saying that Magnotta may have eaten a part of the man's body after killing him.

This suspected cannibalism leads me to my last popular story of the past few weeks: the zombie apocalypse. Obviously, there isn't a real zombie apocalypse, but there have been a few reports of cannibalism over the past few weeks, that have led some to believe that the zombie apocalypse is coming.

From what I've heard, there is a drug that goes by the name of 'bath salts' that is causing the craving for human flesh. The story I heard was that a man in Florida took the drug and began gnawing on the face of another man. Currently, there are no laws against taking, selling or fabricating bath salts, so, taking them will not put this man in jail. Because of this incident, the governments of both Canada and the U.S. are trying feverishly to get one in place.

Is it just me or was May a weird month? The news stories have been odd. I've never seen kids my age more interested in the news than they have been this week. Between the debate surrounding Crandall affecting us locally, Luca Magnotta affecting us nationally, and the cannibalism affecting the whole continent, it's been a pretty busy few weeks.

I guess it can only go up from here.