By Paul Esau (The Cascade) – Email
Print Edition: March 21, 2012
Let me first of all say that I am deeply grateful to the 339 of you who filled out our survey on MyUFV. Ironically, that’s roughly as many responses as there were votes csurveyast in the last SUS election, but you know what they say about dead horses. The editors and I here at The Cascade have studied your responses carefully, we have laughed, we have cried, and we have, in certain instances, been very, very confused. Yet overall, you’ve given us some very useful input which we plan to act on immediately. Some of you will be happy with our action, some of you won’t be, but I’m going to try my best to explain the logic behind our decisions.
The Sex Column
Contrary to what some of you were fearing (or hoping for), the question about the appropriateness of the sex column does not betray a desire to remove it from The Cascade’s content. Violet Hart’s column is an obviously controversial part of our publication, and we simply wanted to give UFV students an opportunity to directly comment on the matter. The result, for those who are curious, was roughly two to one in support of the column and its content, which was about what we expected.
Those who considered the column inappropriate by and large argued that the column violated a standard of decency and professionalism to which The Cascade should be holding itself. I’ve discussed this in previous articles so I won’t go into detail here, but the fact of the matter is that a “standard of decency,” much like the argument concerning an uncrossable “moral line,” is entirely relative. If The Cascade were to conform entirely to my moral line, there would be no sex column nor a single F-bomb in this publication. If it were to conform entirely to the moral line of Violet Hart or Johnny Roddick… what you hold in your hands would become a remarkably different paper. The Cascade is a forum in which a number of standards, moralities, and ideologies mix. It is a compromise, and, as with any good compromise, it is going to leave all parties a little frustrated.
The Hard Cash
One of the questions in our survey asked what our paper should spend money on if we had more money. While finances are always tight in student organizations like The Cascade, this is not our subtle way of asking for more money from the student body (nor would we buy yachts if we did). We simply wish to know how to prioritize the funds we do have. For example, if you compare the publication before you to those of March 7 or earlier (anything but the one with the Kony 2012 cover) you will discover a significant difference in the quality of the paper upon which it is printed. We accomplished this upgrade by renegotiating with our printer, and we’ve found that it provides a noticeable improvement in image definition and color quality.
This semester we’ve also maintained a consistent 20-24 page weekly publication that averages 4 pages longer than last year’s Cascade from the same period. Overall, we are working hard to do our best with the resources we have.
Environmental Questions
Many of you who took our survey expressed concern over the environmental impact of The Cascade, and especially the number of copies that find their way into recycling bins every week. Regrettably, part of the nature of print journalism is a high amount of paper waste by consequence of the short lifespan of each issue. Yet I would argue that The Cascade and International Web Express (the company which prints our newspaper) are attempting to make print journalism as green and efficient as possible. Web Express currently holds FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) certification, which means that it and every company handling the product in the “chain of custody” between the forest and the printing press meet strict environmental standards. The company also fosters a commitment to recycling all paper, cardboard, wooden pallets, plastics, aluminum plates, and ink used in the printing process.
Similarly, we here at The Cascade make sure that every copy of our paper that we replace with the newest issue is immediately recycled. Having a physical paper is integral to our organization, yet we are also strive to be as eco-friendly as possible.
Weasel Jokes
There are some of you out there who were very supportive of our inclusion of weasels in our survey, and some of you who said very unkind things about our professional abilities. I’m sorry you feel this way, but there are times when the sacred duties of journalism call us to write surveys about weasels. We are, after all, a subversive campus newspaper.
Final Notes
Your survey responses have also given us a number of other goals to move towards in the coming weeks, including incorporating content from UFV faculty and community members into the paper, and really focusing on covering campus events (this weeks cover is evidence that we are listening). We’re sorry for not including “abstention” options on the appropriate multiple-choice questions (this made things difficult for some of you), or a “I’m a celibate nun” option to balance the “monk” in the question about the sex column.
Finally, I personally am sorry for the article on the Cascades basketball teams in the February 29 issue, in which the two CIS teams are said to have been playing in the “Pac-West finals” instead of the “Canada West finals.” I’ve been aware of that particular mistake since March 1, but I was under the illusion (an illusion your survey responses have deprived me of) that nobody else had noticed.
