Back in April, a friend and I had met up to grab smoothies at a café before going on a lockdown walk. We each ordered, and I pulled out my debit card to pay. “Sorry, cash only,” said the woman behind the counter. I stared blankly at her, then my friend. “I don’t have any […] More »

“We started this because it’s a need,” says Omar Kinnarath. Kinnarath is the founder and one of the organizers of Mutual Aid Society Winnipeg (MAS Winnipeg). The group started in March of 2020, immediately in the wake of the pandemic and subsequent lockdowns. Stores across the city faced severe shortages of necessities: diapers, baby formula, […] More »

“You’re from Scarborough!?” Scarborough rolled off his tongue like a bitter taste he was trying to get rid of, almost as soon as the word left his mouth. This is one of my first memories of someone’s reaction to where I lived. It sounded heavy with the weight of negative stereotypes. I didn’t know I […] More »

Keen to learn how to skateboard, Vancouver resident Jonah Bayley looked for online groups that could connect them with other queer skaters. Realizing that no such group existed in Vancouver, they started Vancouver Queer Skate (VQS) in 2019, a non-hierarchical, community-led collective that fosters allyship and inclusivity at skateparks. “Honestly, it was really surprising to […] More »

Black lesbian poet Victoria Mbabazi’s poetry collection, chapbook, was published by Anstruther Press in January 2021 and is now in its third printing. Their poetry’s No Name Brand design and style was inspired by the advertisements they saw commuting to the University of Toronto’s Scarborough campus last summer, a time when they were also searching […] More »

The other night, my mother sent my partner Jason a text message. It was an innocuous check-in—warm greetings, a few updates on quarantine life, and a request for some items from our next grocery run. But sandwiched between the mundane details of life and the odd joke was an itemized list of true crime documentaries. […] More »

Out of all the games made by queer designer Avery Alder, Dream Askew feels the most like 2021. Table-top roleplaying games like Dream Askew are a medium where game designers invent systems and worlds, and players inhabit them. Think of them like movies: Avery Alder creates the set, the costumes, and the basic outline of […] More »

“So, where is your apartment around?” she asked me. Even before answering, I know where this is going. She isn’t asking because of romantic interest, the subtle hint of inviting herself over. Perhaps she wants to size me up, or maybe it’s just one of those gold-standard small talk questions someone asks, similar to “what […] More »

Growing up in a traditional first-generation Muslim-Canadian family, I constantly struggled to determine what career I wanted to pursue. For years, I faced the dilemma of whether to satisfy the vision my parents had created for me or to go out on a limb and pursue my own interests of joining the entertainment industry, ultimately […] More »

Pop singer Halsey begins her 2020 album, Manic, with a quote from Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind: “I’m just a fucked up girl who’s looking for my own peace of mind.” It’s hard to imagine Katy Perry or even Lady Gaga starting a record the same way 10 years ago, but in today’s music […] More »

Body positivity can be a harrowing but joyful process. Shana Myara made it a life goal. “I gave myself a project where I could fully explore fat liberation with other queers,” says Myara, director of the documentary, Well Rounded. “Particularly from the lens of racialized queers who might also have a critique of how bodies […] More »