We love to hear from you! Send your questions and comments to voice@ausu.org, and please indicate if we may publish your letter in the Voice.
Dear Voice Editor:
As a member of Council, I am pleased to see The Voice invite feedback from AUSU members regarding what members want to hear about recent Council events. However, I became concerned when I read the following: “I’ve respectfully asked AUSU council to shut their well-meaning traps and let the students have their say!”
I think that phrase sets the tone of the invitation and invites and provokes the negative. I believe that by that statement, The Voice is projecting an image of Council as a group of empty-headed “trap flappers” who mean well, but who speak without substance and without hearing our members. I hope that I am pleasantly surprised by the feedback that The Voice receives, but now, I fully expect member feedback to be only negative.
Perhaps The Voice meant to interject some humour into what could be tense feedback from our members. However, I believe that if a member wrote to The Voice and said that Council needs to “shut its well-meaning trap,” that is an unbiased opinion from a member. If The Voice writes that Council has been asked to “shut its well-meaning trap,” then I believe that statement biases the tone of the responses, whether the bias is intentional or not.
Council should always be receptive to feedback from its membership. I would prefer that member feedback be solicited in as unbiased a manner as possible.
Teresa Neuman
Ottawa, Ontario
The comment in my last editorial was indeed meant as a joke, but in retrospect the word choice was poor and I revised this article when it became apparent that several council members had been offended. I would like to apologize to AUSU council for my comments, and assure council and the readers that I did not intend to denigrate council in any way.
