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Fall 2024

When we disappear

Emily Yu

For us acrobats, it was a circus rule to choose our primary apparatus at the age of thirteen. The doors opened to the Big Top and I entered alone. The leftover sawdust on the floor stuck between my toes, the air scented with rain, instead of the usual smells of animal dung and stale popcorn. […] More »
Fall 2024

Losing their religion

After leaving the faith, many ex-Mormons need to find community again. Psychedelics offer a way forward

Sam Firman

Aaron Campbell was 37 when he walked away from his world. For 27 years he had been told that leaving would jeopardize the chance of eternal salvation for him, his wife, and their four children. Yet salvation was just what he needed, and immediately. “Ultimately, I said, ‘If I don’t [leave], my mental health is […] More »
Fall 2024

The right to read

Canadian libraries may be in danger as calls to ban books get louder

Asha Swann

Ronnie Riley learned through social media that their first novel was facing censorship. Riley was scrolling late one evening when they saw what appeared to be a leaked school memo. Their middle-grade book about a non-binary pre-teen named Jude was one of four 2SLGBTQIA+ books that Ontario’s Waterloo Catholic District School Board was trying to […] More »
Fall 2024

Catering to capitalism

How the informalization of hospitality labour is hurting workers

Lital Khaikin

A pharmaceutical company reportedly linked to tax evasion to the tune of over $4 million through offshore Cyprian accounts gathers for a lunch and cocktail at Montreal’s Old Port. Initiation into the event is coat check, where a cascade of rented racks too janky for winter coats topples over to the sound of a shrieking […] More »
Summer 2024

A love letter to Brown people in Vancouver

During this spike in racism, I hope we look out for each other

Shanai Tanwar

Dear Brown people in Vancouver, Do you feel it too? The way those who don’t look like us seem to slip their distaste for us “subtly” between sentences? The fact that irrespective of our immigration status, fluent English, accomplishments, education, upbringing and value systems, we are still… unwanted? The barely concealed microaggressions and scarily racist […] More »
Summer 2024

The Gala Date

Michelle Poirier Brown

We met them first near the hot food. The catering staff were serving a dim sum shrimp dumpling on a bed of rice at the near end of the table. The caterers must have brought hundreds of ramekins to the venue that night, there was an endless stream of them, a new one for each […] More »
Summer 2024

On the plus side

Rather than relying on fast fashion, fat folks are creating their own clothing economies

Megan Hunt

In the summer of 2020, for all the obvious reasons, I didn’t have much to look forward to—aside from the packages of clothes. Online shopping was a popular crutch during the harsh days of COVID-19 restrictions, but I felt adamant that my situation was different. I was nothing like the social media influencers showing off […] More »
Summer 2024

Muscling through

Invasive mussels could soon enter B.C.'s waterways. If they do, it would be a disaster

Neha Chollangi

Merely the size of a fingernail, with a striped pattern on their shells, zebra and quagga mussels have a powerful grip. They make their way into new bodies of water by clinging to the hulls of boats and ships. Once they invade a water body, they attach themselves to native mussels, causing them to suffocate. […] More »
Summer 2024

Skate culture

How one collective is empowering Indigenous youth

Ayesha Habib

Rosie Archie knew she wanted to be a skater when she was 12 years old. Her older sister Charmie was already good enough to land tricks, and Archie was not far behind. There were no skate parks in Canim Lake, a Tsq̓éscen̓ First Nation reserve in interior B.C., so the sisters would travel to nearby […] More »
Summer 2024

Liar

Waseem Haja

When I was eight years old, my parents entrusted me with $16 in the form of eight $2 coins, an allowance for a school field trip to La Ronde, Montreal’s amusement park. Until 1996, the year during which the $2 tender in Canada was converted from a paper bill to a coin, my parents would […] More »
Summer 2024

Rebranding the ring

Pro-wrestling lays the smackdown on bigotry

Jamie Burke

Let’s start with acknowledging the obvious: pro-wrestling is “fake.” I know. The storylines are scripted. The costumes are as beautifully designed as any Broadway production’s. The match outcomes are predetermined. But that doesn’t make what happens any less real for the people who step into the ring. Some of that realness is compounded for wrestlers […] More »