6 Opinion November 23, 2005 + Over the Edge Editorial The Paris Flambe Recipe for Disaster ANDREW KURJATA NEWS EDITOR France is a country well known for its culinary arts: its wine, cheese, bread, and fruit are known the world over, and few people dream of visiting the coun- try without imagining a visit to one of the many cafés and restaurants that of- fer a taste of authentic French dishes. The latest trend that is sweeping across the nation is the “Paris Flambé,’ a sur- prising yet not altogether unexpected movement which has been causing a great deal of excitement in the country's BENKAl DEN HAAG ‘The trendiest treat of the season is the Paris Flambé and you can make it yourself by following Over the Edge's own special recipe. night life. It is the result of the Muslim inhabitants of Paris suburbs explod- ing onto the consciousness of the older Caucasian population. The French, al- ways sticklers for tradition, have long kept these two ingredients separate, insisting that the best way for them to mix was to distill the newcomers until they retained little of their traditional flavour. This way only the appearance of the dish would be altered without challenging its substance. Unfortunately, this distillation has taken longer than expected, and it turns out that when left to stew with- out proper care and attention some of the ingredients may be explosive. This has resulted in various outbreaks of riots and violence throughout France in the last month, including one night which saw 1400 cars get torched. This outbreak has caused many to think France may finally have to change its flavour and find new ways of mixing African and Arab immigrants into its society. It is not recommended that other countries attempt to make their own versions of the Paris Flambé with- out proper supervision, as the results may be undesirable. But, for reference's sake, here is the recipe: Take one (1) largely heterogeneous population and place in a 545,630 square kilometer-sized country. Let settle for fifteen hundred (1500) years. During this time period take meas- ures to slowly remove the outer layer of Christianity from the ingredients. Take great care to have them retain the ap- pearance and substance of Christians, but upon being asked they should deny that Christian beliefs affect the way they govern their society. After all the ingredients have been properly assimilated, begin adding vis- ible minorities. In the French case it was North African Muslims, but it is likely that any other minority would have worked. The important thing is that they do not mix easily into the dominant culture due to appearance, beliefs, or history, If the recipe has been followed prop- erly, it will initially appear as if the minority group is going to be mixed in without problem. However, the older ingredients will fail to account for cul- tural and historical differences when trying to absorb the new group, and will ultimately reject them until they take on more of the characteristics fam- iliar to French society. Some of the new groups will attempt to change their makeup in order to join the older groups. Though they may meet with limited success, they will ul- timately fail in making a full transition. This will result in frustration coupled with further rejection. As you add more minorities, they will begin to clump together in some of the less desirable areas of the mix- ing bowl. This will largely be a result of the failure to find a way of incorporat- ing them. It will also be due to some of the newer additions rejecting attempts to be incorporated and insisting on retaining traditional flavours, much to the chagrin of their elders on both sides of the bowl. Remove jobs, All ingredients should. begin moving towards the remain- ing careers until about ninety percent (90%) have one. The remaining ten percent (10%) will be primarily young and disproportionately from the Mus- lim group. However, both groups will blame the other for taking their jobs. Allow the situation to simmer for ten (10) to fifteen (15) years. = Add a catalyst. The exact nature is not important, though it should high- light the divisions between the two groups. If all directions have been followed properly, the situation will quickly boil over. This will result in riots and fires, and voila! Paris Flambé. Note: The Paris Flambé is extremely messy, and will likely take years to clean up. It is important to look out for ele- ments of the Paris Flambé when work- ing with other countries, as many of its ingredients are present around the world. On the Digital Front Internet Providers Spy on Users JEREMY JOHNSON STAFF WRITER Very interesting news happening this week in the digital world and, in gener- al, the information highway as a whole otherwise known as “The Internet. A quick background: in order to connect to the internet, you need a service that allows you to access the internet. These services are generally known as an ISP or Internet Service Provider. ‘They indirectly watch over all the traffic or basically the internet activities. Since most agreement deals say that infor- mation will not be given out to a third party, this has been the haven for inter- net users who are big on privacy. Unfortunately, all good things, have to come to an end sadly. As of Nov- ember 14, it seems as though a lot of power placed onto the consumer ori- ginally has transferred itself onto gov- ernment and. “other interest groups’. What happened was that any country who is apart of a thing called the Ech- elon which so far has been the US, the UK, Australia and Canada. It seems the Department of Justice, the FBI and the Drug Enforcement Agency has been concerned over new forming technologies on the internet that “were making it increasingly dif- ficult for law enforcement agencies to execute authorized surveillance.” The scary part is the fact that the FBI have made a number of arrests on behalf of the MPAA and some of these ar- rests were made outside of the United States, So as of November 14, all ISP’s and VoIP (Voice over IP) services are com- pelled to include backdoors to allow police and other interest groups to ef- fectively spy on all the respective users by April 2007. While this legislation is being forced through the UN, two separate legal challenges have been mounted by EFF, Comptel, pulver.com, The Center for Technology and Democracy and the Electronic Privacy Information along with the American Council for Educa- tion. Preliminary hearings are said to happen at any time. So an interesting question might arise from this, what ever happened to pri- vacy? How can large interests groups have the power to change the laws into their favour? Sure it may provide some security in the long run, but at’such an expense for major countries to eaves- drop on law abiding citizens? This is certainly not the first invasion of privacy. It is quite possible to wire- tap a phone conversation and not only record, but transcribe the conversation in full. To this day, it seems as though not much has changed, However, one should realize that anyone can hang up a phone. One cannot just turn off their high speed internet connection at all and one can do more then just talk on the internet. The internet holds sys- tems that include SIN numbers, credit card numbers, drivers licenses, shop- ping habits and other very personal information. These are all the elements needed for social engineering or iden- tity theft (and quite a bit more). If one organization can do it, what is stopping someone from finding these same back doors and doing the exact same thing? CHRISTINE DOMNING Perhaps creepy men in hats won't sneak into your house to spy on your internet use, but police will soon be able to spy on people through internet providers. “| may not agree with what you have to say, but 1 will defend to the deat! your right to say ee ~ Voltaire The opinions expressed in editorials or letters to the editor that are submitted to Over the Edge are not the opinions of Over the Edge or UNBC. 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