David Moscrop on young people being left out of the election
David Moscrop
Democracy in Canada is premised on the idea that we vote for candidates who are best suited to exercise their judgment, act on our preferences, or a combination of both. Often, it seems, members of Parliament opt for the third approach. But whose interests get represented? For one, the governing class and the capitalists who […] More »
Social media, store displays, and youth-savvy flavours—behind the smoke screen on how young people are being marketed to
Amanda Lee
“I had a flavour that was Fruit Loops in a gold and matte black carbon vape, and I was in Grade 9,” says Zach Samson (who asked that we use a pseudonym), a 19-year-old student at the University of Guelph. By Grade 10, Samson was a part of a group chat called “e-cigarettes” with […] More »
Two years since the country's first transitional home for LGBTQ youth opened, there's still plenty of work to be done to tackle queer and trans homelessness
Toronto’s Sprott House. Photo by Amy van den Berg. On any given night in Toronto, there are 1,000 to 2,000 homeless youth sleeping on streets or in shelters. Across Canada about 40,000 young people experience homelessness. Among them, approximately 25 to 40 percent self-identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, and queer. These are dangerously high numbers […] More »
Photo by Ailyn Malit Nikki Cajucom can pinpoint the exact moment her trajectory in life ricocheted. It happened when she first set foot in a basement in Toronto’s Kensington Market neighbourhood, reluctantly beginning her first day as an intern at Kapisanan Philippine Centre for Arts and Culture, a community organization that acts as a safe […] More »
Peyton Straker was a five-time high-school dropout when she took a job as an Indigenous support worker at the public school board in Yellowknife. Straker, 23 and Anishinaabe, knew from experience many of the ways the education system failed her. As a youth she felt displaced in schools where she couldn’t see herself reflected in the […] More »
Now Edmonton’s Youth Poet Laureate, Nasra Adem takes to the mic to dole out spoken truths
Erica Ngao
As a teenager, Nasra Adem wrote in her journal about “dumb boys” and watched videos of spoken word poetry and slams on YouTube. Inspired by poets such as Carvens Lissaint of New York’s The Strivers Row, she started posting videos of herself performing, waiting on the courage to do so in front of a live audience. […] More »
Millennials work hard to get their degrees—so why does everybody think they’re brats when they demand meaningful jobs? Hana Shafi deconstructs post-grad promises and the myth of entitlement
The months leading up to my graduation this spring were a mix of excitement and desperation. Excitement, because after four years of journalism school at Ryerson University my love for academia had turned sour—I was aching to be done. Desperation, because I knew once I was done, my unemployment would be more apparent and stark […] More »
Do you know an all-star Canadian working for social justice action? Our upcoming issue will feature Canadians from across the country who are working to make Canada a better, more progressive place. We’re focusing on issues of: diversity and multiculturalism, disability and LGBTQ rights, mental health, women’s rights, youth, poverty and income disparities, housing—and so […] More »
Six months ago, Canada learned that British Columbia’s Ministry of Children and Family Development (MCFD) spent about $66 million on “discussions and engagement” for indigenous organizations without taking strategic action. The questionable spending was highlighted in a November 2013 report titled “When Talk Trumped Service.” Produced by B.C’s child and youth representative Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond, […] More »
If high-school kids are smoking, they’re likely to have used flavoured tobacco products like candy flavoured cigarillos, according to a coalition of health groups that released the findings of their Youth Smoking survey on Monday. More than 50 percent of those who smoked had used flavoured tobacco products, which have come under fire for their […] More »
I’m 22-years-old. I graduated from university in June. I am a girl. And, well, I think Margaret Wente’s Globe and Mail article on “sexual economics” is nuts. Beyond anything else, I’m not really sure what it’s trying to teach me. Is it that young women like me are giving away sex like smiles because we’re […] More »