In an era in which circulation figures for most newspapers are falling faster than water over Niagara Falls, do newspaper endorsements in election campaigns still matter? At the risk of appropriating the language of click-bait, the answer may surprise you. While the Canadian experience is less immediate and, even among the most politically engaged Canadians, […] More »

Monday October 19 came and went, showing Stephen Harper the door on the way out. Canada’s new Prime Minister is loved, hated, and internationally lusted after apparently (PILF is a thing now, huh). Justin Trudeau, a self-described feminist, talked about women’s rights throughout his campaign; time will tell if the talk goes anywhere. Our new […] More »

Election day is October 19 and women’s issues are being discussed, sort of. Like, one of the discussions is about how major party leaders aren’t actually into the idea of having these discussions. Here’s a glimpse so far: Up for Debate Wouldn’t it be handy if there were a debate specifically about women’s issues? There […] More »

IT’S FROM BEHIND THE PLEXIGLAS BARRIER of the visitor’s cubicle that I wait for Glory Anawa. I’m at the Immigration Holding Centre in Toronto—or, as Anawa and her two-year-old son Alpha have called it since February 2013, home. In front of me, etched in the glass separating visitor and prisoner, is that same word, HOME, […] More »

THE SUN HITS the back of my neck as I kneel over my poster board. It’s a hot summer afternoon in June and I’m colouring with markers, shared with the hands of girls decades my junior, helping with childcare at a sex worker solidarity rally. We’re at Toronto’s Allan Gardens, the day’s setting for lunch, […] More »

THERE IS NO REASON for the federal budget to be balanced at any particular time, argues Jim Stanford, an economist at Unifor and author of Economics for Everyone. The cartwheels necessary to balance Canada’s federal budget, he maintains, actually ensure slower growth and smaller future surpluses. It could, in short, harm the economy—not boost it. […] More »

OVER THE PAST SIX YEARS, Stephen Harper’s Conservative government has—surprisingly—become an outspoken champion of gay rights worldwide. In 2009, Harper arranged a private meeting with Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni to urge him to drop a controversial law that would imprison homosexuals for life. In 2011, Immigration Minister John Baird not only launched a pilot program […] More »

IN 2007, the federal government signed the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Ratified in the House of Commons several years later in 2010, the convention recognizes the rights, dignity, and worth of those with disabilities, while providing a framework for a high-quality, equitable life. This is all great stuff—and yet, the […] More »

WHEN IT COMES TO THE ENVIRONMENT, Stephen Harper doesn’t have a hidden agenda—he’s always been upfront about his healthy-industry-over-healthy-Earth policies. In 2006, for instance, in his first speech outside Canada after he was elected as prime minister, he called Canada an “emerging energy superpower,” suggesting his intention to expand oil sands production. “And that has […] More »

HERE ARE JUST A FEW of the things that keep James Turk up at night: Unapologetic fear mongering; trampling over fundamental civil rights; limiting access to information; an invasive gaze cast over Canadians protesting in public, leading to their arrest; an iron fist that limits Canadians’ ability to move freely across borders; the introduction of […] More »

THERE ISN’T MUCH OF A GROWING SEASON in Old Crow, the Yukon’s northernmost community. Yet a vegetable garden has flourished there for the past three years, thanks to the efforts of the Vuntut Gwitchin First Nation and funding, in part, from the territorial government. In June, residents planted cauliflower, garlic, kale, cabbage, onions, potatoes, lettuce, […] More »