We at The Ubyssey have to deal with a large number of people who have strange and illogical ideas about obscure and irrelevant things. Sometimes, and unsurprisingly, these people are part of your student society, the Alma Mater Society of UBC.

As a newspaper, we strongly believe that our function is to try our best to uncover corruption, create accountability and inform students. We know that our work is never done, and we must always push harder and further for what we can access, who we can talk to and what we can discover.

So, to be absolutely clear, we strongly believe that it is part of our mandate as media to be aggressive and subversive as much as we can.

In light of that, we’ll admit that there is an issue that we have been keeping quiet about for a long time: the AMS communications policy. This year’s enforcement of the policy has decidedly stopped dialogue on campus that should have happened, though it hasn’t stopped embarrassing press releases.

The current incarnation of the policy is designed to direct AMS opinions about the AMS through one person only to ensure homogeneity and avoid embarrassments due to miscommunication.

Well, that didn’t work so well, did it?

So why are we bringing it up now, when elections are almost upon us? Honestly, we thought it was too “inside baseball” to bring up before. Now we’re seeing the effects of restricting communication in a real, direct way, as the AMS cracks down on political candidates being allowed to speak.

Even though nominations for elections closed last Friday, there are a whole ten days between then and when they’re allowed to campaign. Given that the actual election period is only 12 days long, it seems like a pretty stupid decision. Especially given that they’re not allowed to do much of anything public right now.

It is the current interpretation of code that if we publish something said by a candidate that could be construed as the candidate campaigning before the official campaign period has begun, the candidate could be punished.

Here’s an example of what we were told this weekend we couldn’t print, lest we harm a candidate:

The Ubyssey: Hey, totally fake long-time student politician who we will refer to as “Mr B,” why have you decided to run for president after so many years?
Mr B: Because I want the AMS to be strong.
Elections Administrator: That is campaigning, and you will be lashed 30 times and be disqualified from the race. Sorry!

So, Elections Administrator Isabel Ferreras, if your argument is that that won’t happen, issue a public statement saying that—because candidates think that it will. If you don’t believe that, explain why we are getting frantic phone calls late at night asking us to please please please not publish comments.

If your argument is that we should just wait until you decide that it is a good time for us to start printing candidates’ opinions, let us remind you that we are an independent media organization, meaning that we are not a part of the AMS, and could care less about your timelines. For some reason, we think that when we’re deciding who will be the president of the largest student union in Canada, seven days of campaigning before voting begins is too short of a time to have a real debate.

But feel free to start punishing student politicians for talking to the media, a very natural thing for them to do.

So, from now on, let it be known that The Ubyssey is printing anything and everything candidates talk to us about until elections are over. Either people will stop talking to us, or you’ll have to deal out a whole lot of punishment.

Game on.

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