We take a look at what what's being left out of the shiny rainbow picture
Dorian Fraser
2019 marks 50 years since the Stonewall rebellion, now regarded as the watershed moment in American and even global (Euro-American-centric) queer liberation. A hot summer night at the mafia-run Stonewall Inn in New York City became a six-day-long riot after queers refused to submit to police violence, and its anniversary is now celebrated as the […]
Debut novelist explores themes of masculinity and representation
Nadine Bachan
When Omar, a cook working for cash-in-hand at a Toronto restaurant, learns about the suicide of his ex-girlfriend Anna, he becomes caught in his grief and rage and is unwilling to accept what he’s been told: she didn’t leave him a note. He finds some respite from his woes when he meets an attractive and […]
The Green Party brings what they've learned from their provincial successes to the national playing field
Rob Csernyik
In the spring of 2019, Newfoundlanders Adam Denny and Jonathon Brown came together after learning they both had a similar vision in mind: a provincial Green party. Their province, which was hit hard by the cod fishery collapse in 1992, has increasingly been focused on developing an offshore oil industry. Even though that too has […]
Mainstream media only shows us a handful of issues, but federal leaders should be held accountable to much more
Sarah Ratchford
6. Islamophobia The face of Zunera Ishaq, the niqab–wearing woman who resisted Stephen Harper’s attempted niqab ban during the citizenship oath ceremony, consumed front pages during the last federal election. A shameful amount of effort, media attention, and public resources were funnelled into this thinly veiled Islamophobia-forward campaign. Justin Trudeau condemned Harper’s agenda and promised […]
Abstaining is both important and inherent to me; here's why
Andrea Landry
“Indigenous nations are their own sovereign nations.” It’s a rhetoric stated consistently in a variety of arenas, both political and non-political. It is a truthful rhetoric at that. Being Anishinaabe, and also raising an Anishinaabe/Nehiyaw/Nakoda daughter, has further affirmed the truth that we are, 100 percent, our own sovereign nations as Indigenous Peoples. It has […]
Mainstream media only shows us a handful of issues, but federal leaders should be held accountable to much more
various
1. The Rise of the Alt-Right Andrew Scheer formally addressed the United We Roll convoy in February, a protest that began as a pro-pipeline demonstration and grew to represent racism and xenophobia characteristic of the worldwide yellow vest movement. In May, Conservative MP Michael Cooper read a passage from the New Zealand shooter’s manifesto […]
Helping voters become informed on climate change issues
Talia Wooldridge
What happens when two bio-medical science graduates, a philosophy PhD candidate, and an arts major commiserate over climate change in Canada? Positive activism is born. In April 2019, a group of University of Guelph students and recent graduates, Manvi Bhalla, Janaya Campbell, Taro Halfnight, and Cameron Fioret, were commiserating over Canada’s response to climate change. […]
After four years of the current PM's leadership, we look back on past promises and party lines
Kaila Jefferd-Moore
In 2015 Canadians broke a record: 88 women were elected to the Canadian House of Commons. Fifty women were among the 184 Liberal MPs elected. Trudeau went on to appoint his cabinet with gender parity. Because it was 2015. But a male appointing an equal cabinet with representation based on the binary does not a […]
Dear Citizens, They’re coming for you. For your brains. You hear that and you think of George Romero. Dawn or Day or Night of the Living Dead. But this is worse. I’m not talking about zombies. I’m talking about politicians. Zombies will come for you and they’ll chew on you for a bit, but that’s […]
In the dirty game of politics, here's what people think about truth and transparency
Deborah Heslop
As Green Party Leader Elizabeth May prepared for the upcoming federal election, she realized she had a shortcoming: managing inevitable smear campaigns from opposing parties. Earlier in her career, May had told a group of Ontario nuns that she’d talked women out of abortions, and it raised questions about where the Green Party stood on […]