Archive

ODT Watch | Issue 9

Posted 4:56pm Sunday 29th April 2012 by Staff Reporter

ODT watch headed into the Regions section this week: Critic suggests beans bags, xboxs and flat screens. They really love that hump The entire Otago region definitely needed to know about that. Not only is this song going to get Critic Read more...

Uncle Howie | Issue 9

Posted 4:56pm Sunday 29th April 2012 by Uncle Howie

Dear Howie, I’ve started dating this new girl, and she’s pretty high class – private schools, dad owns a yacht, all that jazz. I’m a bit worried that my humble upbringing is going to be a problem for her. You’re a classy cat; how can I turn on the class myself and make sure I don’t loose this Read more...

Geekology | Issue 9

Posted 4:56pm Sunday 29th April 2012 by Robbie Masters

Science is an awesome thing! The whole process begins with a simple hypothesis (a prediction). Researchers will then design an experiment to test their hypothesis, often using some extremely clever techniques and manipulations. It is in most cases a long, slow (and let’s not forget, fun!) process. Read more...

Straight Up | Issue 9

Posted 4:56pm Sunday 29th April 2012 by La Dida

Before anyone assumes anything. I am a (gender)queer guy who also loves vaginas. I think they are amazing and powerful. After all without the gifts of generations of women none of us would be here in the first place. I really hate the rubbish that some gay bois express around women’s bodies/people Read more...

Me Love You Long Time | Issue 9

Posted 4:56pm Sunday 29th April 2012 by Lovebirds

Dunedin is renowned for many things, but its dating scene is not one of them. Getting boozed and pashing people on the dance floor is hardly anyone’s idea of romance, so Critic wants to sort you out. Every week we’re sending two loveless loners on a blind date to Tokyo Gardens (with a bottle of wine Read more...

Diatribe | Issue 9

Posted 4:56pm Sunday 29th April 2012 by Gus Gawn

Who is your new favourite basketball team? It’s the Breakers, isn’t it? You love them. You got all excited last Tuesday night and watched the whole game. It was exciting, tense, close, and the good guys won. Now you like basketball. I am here today to tell you why you should never watch the Breakers Read more...

The Tory Templar | Issue 9

Posted 4:56pm Sunday 29th April 2012 by The Tory Templar

It has been claimed that the words “lest we forget” are misused. Instead we should say “lest we remember”. That’s what it’s about they say, the memorials and the two minutes’ silence, because there is no better way of forgetting something than by commemorating it, they say. They lie. We Read more...

Red and Starry Eyed | Issue 9

Posted 4:56pm Sunday 29th April 2012 by Red and Starry Eyed

What do we celebrate in Anzac Day? Anzac Day is celebrated with pride every year. Like zombies, the old and young wake up before the sun has even set its alarm; we congregate around cenotaphs under artillery siege. There are the trumpets we have come to associate with war and the smell of Read more...

Editorial | Issue 9

Posted 4:56pm Sunday 29th April 2012 by Joe Stockman

It is Rape Awareness Week this week. Nobody needs to be told that rape and sexual violence exist, but the extent of the problem is something that far too many people are ignorant of. The statistics are so shocking they are incredibly hard to believe: One in four women will suffer some form of sexual Read more...

Presidential Column | Issue 8

Posted 5:04pm Sunday 22nd April 2012 by Logan Edgar

Hey there everyone, ANZAC Day means many different things to many different people. For me it’s a day of remembering those who fought for us so we can live the awesome lives we live today. I try to put myself in those who served our country and think what it must have been like, it’s all Read more...

Te Roopu Māori | Issue 8

Posted 5:04pm Sunday 22nd April 2012 by Lisa Pohatu

E Ngā ākonga, E ngā mana, e ngā reo, E ngā karangarangatanga maha, Tenā koutou katoa. Te Mana Ākonga is the National Māori Tertiary Student Body which emerged after the protest movements in the 1970s. It is a voice for tauira Māori and Read more...

Objection Overruled | Issue 8

Posted 5:04pm Sunday 22nd April 2012 by

The scarfie flat is a rite of passage for Otago students. Fraught with mould, colder inside than out, and bathrooms laden with more E Coli than a Chinese food outlet, we’ve all seen and experienced some shockers. But below-par living conditions form only part of the wondrous composite: Seemingly Read more...

Classic Film | Issue 8

Posted 5:04pm Sunday 22nd April 2012 by Jane Ross

Director: Richard Linklater Have you ever had a chance encounter with someone who you felt a real connection with? You might have even caught yourself daydreaming about an idyllic future together, but for reasons outside of your control you reluctantly had to part ways. Was it just a matter Read more...

How To: Prevent Global Warming

Posted 5:04pm Sunday 22nd April 2012 by Staff Reporter

Global warming is undoubtedly the hottest issue around at the moment. And it’s time that we, as students, and as individual citizens of the globe, take responsibility for what is happening to our planet. With that in mind, Critic presents the top five ways you can do your bit to combat global Read more...

ODT Watch | Issue 8

Posted 5:04pm Sunday 22nd April 2012 by Staff Reporter

Critic managed to get out of bed early enough to to read the weekend issue of the ODT this week. Probably should have stayed in asleep: Blaine’s stomach is also turned by driving north, thinking about things that are in the north, the North Island, and migratory birds that head north. Read more...

No Fringe, No Indie. | Issue 8

Posted 5:04pm Sunday 22nd April 2012 by Sasha Borissenko

Dearest Friends, Foes and Fancies, You are cordially invited to a European party hosted by Master William John Darling III of Roslyn, Dunedin. Beverages shall include: Pinot Gris, Pinot Noir, possibly Vodka (for Pushkin lovers), soy milk, loose leaf teas and disgustingly black and Read more...

Straight Up | Issue 8

Posted 5:04pm Sunday 22nd April 2012 by La Dida

The last few months have been really stressful. I have been constantly worried about a member of my family who has been in and out of hospital since the end of 2011 suffering from chronic medical conditions as a result of her addiction to alcohol. I have been anxious – worried about how the Read more...

Me Love You Long Time | Issue 8

Posted 5:04pm Sunday 22nd April 2012 by Lovebirds

Dunedin is renowned for many things, but its dating scene is not one of them. Getting boozed and pashing people on the dance floor is hardly anyone’s idea of romance, so Critic wants to sort you out. Every week we’re sending two loveless loners on a blind date to Tokyo Gardens (with a bottle of wine Read more...

The Tory Templar | Issue 8

Posted 5:04pm Sunday 22nd April 2012 by The Tory Templar

The National Government has vetoed the idea of six months’ paid parental leave, saying $150 million a year is spent on PPL provisions already and more is unaffordable. This government is not big on extending any kind of benefit, especially in the current economic climate. The Templar believes this Read more...

Red and Starry Eyed | Issue 8

Posted 5:04pm Sunday 22nd April 2012 by Red and Starry Eyed

Bill English’s announcement that National will veto the new parental leave bill that has yet to be debated in Parliament shows National’s priorities more clearly than ever. It does not care for the mothers and children of New Zealand, and it does not care what we think. The National government has Read more...

Editorial | Issue 8

Posted 5:04pm Sunday 22nd April 2012 by Joe Stockman

I ’ve been around these parts for a while now. Apart from a few years there where I dropped out of Uni and wandered aimlessly around the northern hemisphere, I’ve spent most of my adult life in Dunedin. As I rode my incredibly hipster fixie bike around North D last weekend, I was struck by how much Read more...

Every day I’m chapil’n | Issue 7

Posted 3:53pm Sunday 15th April 2012 by Greg Hughson

I’m helping Logan organise our first ever official Anzac Day service on campus. It will be awesome. We start at 1.30pm on Wednesday 25th April. Be there. We will gather on the lawn in front of the Clocktower building, and conclude with refreshments in the Link. Together we will honour all those men Read more...

Diatribe | Issue 7

Posted 3:53pm Sunday 15th April 2012 by Abe Gray

A new battlefront between the law and the public is opening up before our eyes and many don’t even realise. Ominous signals are coming from corporations and governments worldwide as what is to be a global system of militarised enforcement of “intellectual property” laws materialises. Now I’m Read more...

Clubs & Skux | Issue 7

Posted 3:53pm Sunday 15th April 2012 by Olivia & John

Olivia:After benders the previous night John and I weren’t really in the mood to get our skux on. Combined with the fact that both of us might be moving into the serial monogamy zone (John will explain more later), the Passover Seder ended up looking like the perfect thing for us at that time: a Read more...

LILF | Issue 7

Posted 3:53pm Sunday 15th April 2012 by Staff Reporter

An apple (or in this case, an aporo) a day keeps the doctor away … for my sake I hope this old cliché is not true. Nobody who had been taught by Dr Jim Williams would want to keep him away. As well as a cultural experience, studying Maori at Otago turned out to be an experience of a more Read more...

ODT Watch | Issue 7

Posted 3:53pm Sunday 15th April 2012 by Staff Reporter

Man I bet you missed the ODT while you were away over Easter. But fear not! Critic has been saving up some of their little gems to settle your ODT withdrawal shattered nerves. You might think that covering a cat show wouldn’t be the number one beat in town. But I’m fairly sure that the ODT Read more...

Uncle Howie | Issue 7

Posted 3:53pm Sunday 15th April 2012 by Uncle Howie

Hi Howie. I went home over the break and saw my girlfriend for the first time since coming to dunners at the start of the year (she didn’t go to uni). It was nice to see her again, but it’s made me realise how little we have in common now, and how much I really just want to be single and have fun Read more...

Geekology | Issue 7

Posted 3:53pm Sunday 15th April 2012 by Robbie Masters

Hello again budding Einsteins! This week you’re getting your science fill from the Psychology department, where Sophie Slater is currently unravelling the mysteries of memory formation. Specifically, Sophie is exploring how a small area of your brain – the dentate gyrus (DG) – can retain information Read more...

Straight Up | Issue 7

Posted 3:53pm Sunday 15th April 2012 by La Dida

The questions I have been pondering this week are: To what extent is desire political? And what are the ethics of proclaiming desire? I am thinking about this with reference to online dating in particular, which is a super common way for queer folks to meet. It has been a while since I have forayed Read more...

Classic Film | Issue 7

Posted 3:53pm Sunday 15th April 2012 by Jane Ross

Director: Richard Linklater From director Richard Linklater comes a perceptive and poignant film about two young twenty-somethings who meet as strangers on a train, sense a connection, and decide to take a gamble on each other. But the clock is ticking. Jesse (Ethan Hawke) and Celine (Julie Read more...

Swillable | Issue 7

Posted 3:53pm Sunday 15th April 2012 by Pilbo Swaggins

Taste: 6/10 Standards per vessel: 1.3 Price: $13.99 per 6 pack I’m not usually a big cider drinker, the last time I bought some was for a bout of Scrumpy hands in second year. Before that it was a friend and I at the tender age of 15 giving the Korean dairy keeper across the road from Read more...

Me Love You Long Time | Issue 7

Posted 3:53pm Sunday 15th April 2012 by Lovebirds

Dunedin is renowned for many things, but its dating scene is not one of them. Getting boozed and pashing people on the dance floor is hardly anyone’s idea of romance, so Critic wants to sort you out. Every week we’re sending two loveless loners on a blind date to Tokyo Gardens (with a bottle of wine Read more...

The Tory Templar | Issue 7

Posted 3:53pm Sunday 15th April 2012 by The Tory Templar

As I write this, and probably as you read it, a despot is killing his people. State violence against rebels in Syria has led to the deaths of thousands of innocent civilians, who only want the freedoms that everyone else has. Kofi Annan has put forward a six-point peace plan that Syria, in anger at Read more...

Red and Starry Eyed | Issue 7

Posted 3:53pm Sunday 15th April 2012 by Red and Starry Eyed

For more than a year now Syria has spiralled into an Arab-Spring massacre. The UN reports that over 9000 people have died in the conflict. These deaths are not all the consequence of President Assad’s hard-hand though. Despite the spin we are receiving, Syria is bound up in an increasingly bloody Read more...

Execrable | Issue 7

Posted 3:53pm Sunday 15th April 2012 by Callum Fredric

Every man has his limits. After half an hour of announcements about people being appointed to committees, Critic, much like any trauma survivor, retreated into a fantasy world. And that’s when someone cracked an inappropriate joke about the early retirement of Ding Ding that had the entire exec Read more...

Editorial | Issue 7

Posted 3:53pm Sunday 15th April 2012 by Joe Stockman

I hate Easter. Hate it. It’s not the idea of having two days off work that I’m opposed to. I am of course, totally down with that. My issue is with ol’ JC and his peeps. If you’re down with Christ, and like to get down with other people that like him too, then man it must be sweet to have the Read more...

Presidential Column | Issue 6

Posted 7:07pm Sunday 1st April 2012 by Logan Edgar

Garoo Scarfies, Fucking tits I’m busy this week. I’ve been getting my campaign to win the two seats on University Council for myself and my Vice-President Jono off the ground so that we can move some mountains. We’ve done a heap of awesome work on Council so far this year with us both already Read more...

Every day I’m chapil’n | Issue 6

Posted 7:07pm Sunday 1st April 2012 by Mike Wright

How hopeful are you? As we race towards Easter and mid-semester break, it might seem an odd question to ask, but before you read on take a moment to ask yourself, “How hopeful am I?” How hopeful concerning local and world events; concerning your academic future; concerning college mates, flatmates, Read more...

No Fringe, No Indie. | Issue 6

Posted 7:07pm Sunday 1st April 2012 by Sasha Borissenko

“No Fringe, No Indie” aims to sketch the trials and tribulations of different sub-cultures at Otago University. This week, ladies and gentlemen, we are going to look at that strange breed that generally congregates around the Sale/Black House, otherwise known as the “Heavy Metaller”. Read more...

Clubs & Skux | Issue 6

Posted 7:07pm Sunday 1st April 2012 by Staff Reporter

We trawled Facebook trying to find a fun society to visit when we came upon an invite to the Otago University Debating Society opening function, to be held at Monkey Bar of all places. Sold. John:The number of people at the event impressed me. By the law of large numbers I knew there had to Read more...

Objection Overruled | Issue 6

Posted 7:07pm Sunday 1st April 2012 by

Student drinking habits have again been in the glare of the media. Otago University’s Psychology Department recently released groundbreaking research, revealing previously unknown truths about the detrimental effects of getting OTP. The findings showed that students’ cognitive functioning was Read more...

World Watch | Issue 6

Posted 7:07pm Sunday 1st April 2012 by Sumantra Maitra

Hola! Whassup folks! What a week we had! A siege in France, can you imagine?! A young disillusioned French of Algerian descent, who killed three Jewish kids, a rabbi and three Muslim French paramilitary troops was finally cornered in downtown Toulouse … and bang! The drama starts! Did he surrender? Read more...

ODT Watch | Issue 6

Posted 7:07pm Sunday 1st April 2012 by Staff Reporter

Critic is going to be fair to the ODT. We hate to do it, but their coverage of the Hyde Street Keg Party was actually pretty balanced. Sure they interviewed two landlords and tried to make it sound like every property owner on the street was calling for the party to end; but generally they talked to Read more...

Swillable | Issue 6

Posted 7:07pm Sunday 1st April 2012 by Pilbo Swaggins

Taste: 4/10 Price: $22 Standards per vessel: 21 Percentage: 9% ’Twas the night before Hyde Street and I needed some horse juice for the big day ahead. I made a trip to Cumby Super Liquor to pick my poison with only one real option. I needed something that could go the distance while Read more...

Classic Film | Issue 6

Posted 7:07pm Sunday 1st April 2012 by Matt Chapman

Director: Howard Hawk Private dicks, classy dames, grifting, shooting, and a whole lot of fedora hats, Howard Hawk’s The Big Sleep is a smooth cocktail of intrigue, romance and suspense. Far removed from the Red Bull attitude of modern cinema, this classy cocktail should be savored and Read more...

Straight Up | Issue 6

Posted 7:07pm Sunday 1st April 2012 by La Dida

“Queer” is often used as a composite term for sex, sexuality and gender non-normative communities in Aotearoa. It is commonly used as an alternative to “LGBT” in order to be more encompassing of identities/behaviours outside this acronym. Questions about queer often come up from both outside Read more...

Me Love You Long Time | Issue 6

Posted 7:07pm Sunday 1st April 2012 by Lovebirds

Dunedin is renowned for many things, but its dating scene is not one of them. Getting boozed and pashing people on the dance floor is hardly anyone’s idea of romance, so Critic wants to sort you out. Every week we’re sending two loveless loners on a blind date to Tokyo Gardens (with a bottle of wine Read more...

The Tory Templar | Issue 6

Posted 7:07pm Sunday 1st April 2012 by The Tory Templar

A case is currently in front of the Waitangi Tribunal looking into the running of Maori-language preschools. These centres claim they need more funding and separate legislation to ensure that the language survives. This raises an interesting question – what role should Maori language and culture Read more...

Red and Starry Eyed | Issue 6

Posted 7:07pm Sunday 1st April 2012 by Red and Starry Eyed

At the beginning of the 20th century, many New Zealanders hoped Maori would die out. Their numbers were declining quickly, but a hundred years later we claim to be Aotearoa – a multicultural, bilingual society. We may be multicultural, but our society has very little Maori left in it. And our Read more...

Proctology | Issue 6

Posted 7:07pm Sunday 1st April 2012 by Bella Macdonald

Critic was told this week of a venerable young man whose dismal attempt at self-defence landed him at the Proctor’s office. When a wasp approached the chap, he grabbed a glass bottle and threw it in an act of pre-emptive protection from the mighty beast. He soon found that the body mass of a wasp Read more...