If you didn’t know already, the Howard Ferguson Dining Hall is the food facility for residents at University College. Affectionately known as “Fung” by residents of UC, this is a burgeoning hub of resident life where many of us come to dine and relieve our “funger.”
I write today not to complain about the lack of healthy menu choices or high cost of food that sometimes makes eating in the Annex a more affordable option. I will even avoid mentioning how food often runs out an hour before closing and that the lettuce in the salad bar is frequently frozen or brown. Rather attention needs to be drawn to a new initiative — “Beefless Tuesday” — which the University College Residence Council “proudly presented” at the end of January. The concept for this event is as straightforward as it is ridiculous. Every Tuesday, members of the UCRC harass students not to eat beef. While the meat is still available in Fung, the initiative tries to reduce the amount of beef consumed to help reduce UC’s carbon footprint. The event page on Facebook also includes a laundry list of other reasons to go beefless, predominantly religious and dietary in nature.
Don’t get me wrong. I think student councils serve an important role in providing services for students. However, I think they overstep their bounds when they take on the advocacy campaigns for special interest groups.
Banning beef creates an institutional precedent for actively lobbying student’s consumption habits. It’s the beginning of a process that takes away a student’s ability to choose what they put in their bodies. It also makes the uncomfortable suggestion that accommodation for special interest groups simply is not enough. Apparently, accommodation also involves limiting the freedom of choice for others. I have no problem with Fung providing halal and kosher options, even if it raises the cost of food. As soon as you take away my steak, I know there’s a problem.
As an out of province student with close ties to Alberta, I also resent the residence council taking aim at one of the key industries that still supports many of my family members.
I lived through the mad cow scare that caused the crash of cattle prices and demand for Canadian beef. Ranchers are the backbone of our country’s cattle industry, an industry that supports thousands across the prairies. Beefless Tuesday creates an unsafe space that alienates everyone supported by Canada’s cattle industry, both directly and indirectly.
Beefless Tuesday is not only offensive, it’s illogical. While farting cows certainly contribute to global warming, methane gas makes up a very small part of all greenhouse gas emissions. While a successful boycott would certainly lead to unemployment and economic collapse for Canada, it won’t substantially help our efforts to reduce emissions. If student politicians were truly committed to improving environmental responsibility on campus, they would be working with administration to find critical solutions. How about advocating for seasonal and local produce or portion options to reduce food waste?
If you go to Fung you have the option of broccoli or no broccoli. Hoping to have a half portion of broccoli that you can pair with a salad? Either bring your elastic waist pants or get ready to waste some food. In the wonderful world of student politics, irrational ideology always overpowers pragmatic solutions. The standard political hack response to complaints such as mine is that a student government is a representative democracy and individual students cannot be consulted on every single decision. While this argument is applicable to municipal, provincial, and federal governments, voter turnout that floats in the single digits, and with the only awareness of student politicians being a smiling poster during campaign season, we can see that this kind of logic is flawed. Representative democracy is little else but a dream. If student politicians want to impose ideologically driven reforms they have the responsibility to include them in their campaign message, or at the very least host a town hall and plebiscite.
The fact that this article is even being published is indicative of what is wrong with the student experience at U of T. Student politicians are the first to point to Simcoe Hall as the source of the crummy student experience at this otherwise topnotch school. Ideologically driven students forcing their special interests upon their peers are equally to blame. Students should be using their positions in office to do some hard thinking on how to build some unity on campus and get the majority of students to care more about the school they are educated within.
Trying to force dietary choices upon students is simply a step in the wrong direction.
