Last week we learned that the federal government spent $107,749.52 on Nikon DSLR D300s for the G20. For those of you who, like me five minutes ago, don’t know anything about photography let me tell you all you need to know about the D300s: it’s a really good camera. You can check out the reviews […] More »

It’s Word On The Street this Sunday, the national literary street-fair/author-festival/book-signing/all-around extravaganza of the written word. We’ll have our usual booth at the Toronto event, and we would love to meet you. (We’d love to have a booth at all the WOTS events across the country, of course, but, well, we couldn’t possibly afford that.) […] More »

Around the corner from This’ offices the Toronto International Film Festival has set-up its Director’s Lounge. Orange-shirted volunteers stand at the doors and, peering in, I see uncomfortable-looking but fashionable furniture, backdrops emblazoned with government sponsorships and, just maybe, a star or two. Oh, and cameras. Lots of cameras. For 10 days, playing host to […] More »

You may have already heard something of Pride Toronto’s new sign-vetting policy,  its banning of Queers Against Israeli Apartheid (QuAIA) from the parade, and its outlawing of the term “Israeli apartheid” from all Pride-related events.  Or about how, after weeks of public outrage, including the humiliation of having several Pride honourees return their awards, Pride […] More »

Thousands of people who experienced the G20 summit weekend in Toronto have their own individual stories—some of them terrifying, we’ll have some from our own correspondents soon—and Twitter was one of the main ways that the narrative was shaped. Lots of people took their smartphones into the streets to document the protests and the police […] More »

Jonas Naimark took one of the most striking photos from Sunday, showing the demonstrators and bystanders hemmed in by riot police at the corner of Queen and Spadina. This is just a small portion of the image; click to see the remarkable full-size photo on Naimark’s website. One of the most notorious images from Saturday […] More »

By far the most significant video of the weekend was this one, shot by Meghann Millard from her third floor office on Queen St. West, in which the protesters sing the national anthem, and are then charged by a line of police in riot gear. This video received an extra boost when no less than […] More »

Have you been stuck inside working all week? Don’t worry, you haven’t missed much—just the largest and most disruptive set of mobilizations Toronto has seen in quite some time. The Toronto Community Mobilization Network spent six months coordinating with various groups to create Themed Days of Action, which took place between June 21 and June […] More »

Michael Shapcott is the Director of Affordable Housing and Social Innovation for the Wellesley Institute, an independent research institute working to advance population health and equity through policy development. He is recognized as one of Canada’s leading housing policy experts and is a long-time housing and homelessness advocate.  He took some time to talk with […] More »

Although Pride Toronto decided to reschedule its week-long festivities in light of the G20 circus coming to town, the committee for the AIDS Candlelight Vigil, an event associated with Pride Week, decided it would take advantage of the politically charged atmosphere. We took the opportunity to speak with Kay Roesslein, co-chair of the AIDS Candlelight […] More »

While the prime minister has been trying to do damage control for his G20 agenda, activists and organizers of all stripes have been busy building social justice movements. Sometimes movement-building involves bickering over listservs about who gets to the carry the banner, but sometimes it also involves holding massive, multi-day, multi-issue summits. Left Forum might […] More »