| | | Good morning, Passengers.
Today, we have the latest from columnist Nora Loreto, a great article from our archives and another new report to better understand Canada’s political climate.
Enjoy! | | | Nora Loreto | Passage | October 12 | Have you been following the drama with Hockey Canada? Columnist Nora Loreto has, and as someone who became the subject of a national scandal in the past due to her comments on hockey’s toxic culture, she has some thoughts.
Here’s a summary of the scandal so far from her article: “In 2018, a woman was allegedly sexually assaulted by eight men, including members of Canada’s hockey gold medal-winning 2018 World Juniors team. By September 2020, Hockey Canada considered the case closed, with police earlier claiming the survivor didn’t cooperate with investigations. In April, the survivor filed a $3.55 million lawsuit against Hockey Canada, the Canadian Hockey League and the eight individuals, which was settled privately a month later for an undisclosed amount. In June, the federal government called for a forensic audit to ensure no public funds were used in the settlement. Then, in July, it was revealed that Hockey Canada has used something called a ‘National Equity Fund,’ made up in part of minor hockey membership fees, to settle sexual assault claims, among other things. While this is in the news, another case of an alleged group sexual assault surfaces, this time related to the 2003 World Juniors in Halifax. Over the summer and into the fall, calls grow louder for Hockey Canada’s leadership to resign, and now several major sponsors — including Tim Hortons, Telus and Canadian Tire — either paused their sponsorships or permanently ended them.”
Checkout the article itself for her insight into the issues here. (7 minute read) | | | Jordan Foisy | Passage | July 2021 | This is a really great article we published last summer. It was being shared on Twitter yesterday with people weighing in with their own experiences and how they’re reflected in the article, so I thought I’d share it here. I personally relied on Greyhound for about 10 years of my life. It was absolutely awful in many ways. Ticket prices were often too high, and would needlessly skyrocket at busy times. You still needed to print out tickets, and their website was ancient. Buses were almost always late, and often oversold. Proper Greyhound buildings got shut down and commuters were forced to wait in parking lots. The issues go on. At the same time, I needed Greyhound, and since it shut down in Canada, no real alternative has emerged that serves the route I occasionally use (Toronto to Cambridge). Anyways, I’m sure you have your own history with the company, and will enjoy this funny, insightful and touching article.
Jordan Foisy writes, “So, what happens [after Greyhound’s collapse]? What I hope happens is all levels of government use this loss as an opportunity to realize that affordable transportation is a right for Canadians, not a luxury, and so the industry shouldn’t be subject to the capricious whims of the market. [...] What I think will happen, however, is nothing. We know who matters in this country, and it’s not the people who take the bus. Affordable transportation, like affordable housing, will increasingly become out of reach, what used to be banal reality now glittering fantasy. This breaks my heart because bus travel was just that: travel. It was the affordable, albeit uncomfortable and drab, passage for millions of Canadians to new beginnings and old reunions; to loved ones; to adventure; to get back home.” (9 minute read) | | | Rowan Gaudet and Sheryl Nestel | Independent Jewish Voices Canada | October 12 | I have another new report for you today, this one from Independent Jewish Voices Canada (IJV) exploring the suppression of speech on Palestine in Canada. IJV has put out some really good reports over the past while, and this is a great example, consisting of more than a year of interviews and research. The overall findings probably won’t come as a surprise to you (although perhaps the extent of them will) but the details offered here make the report very valuable. These sorts of reports have existed for other countries for quite a while, so it’s good to see something similar for Canada. I’ve linked to the report’s main page, and you can find the direct link to the report there.
Here are some portions of the report’s executive summary: “Focused on the Canadian context, this report seeks to shed light on the wave of suppression of speech regarding Palestine that is sweeping North America and parts of Europe. It documents the impact of reprisals, harassment and intimidation faced by Canadian activists, faculty, students, and organizations in relation to scholarship and activism in solidarity with the struggle for Palestinian human rights. There is a connection to be made here between these attacks and efforts by pro-Israel advocacy groups to market the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance Working Definition of Antisemitism (IHRA), a document that has come under vigorous attack by defenders of academic freedom and Palestinian human rights. While its proponents argue that this definition will not threaten freedom of expression or inhibit criticism of Israeli policies, the findings of this report demonstrate that these basic rights are already under threat and could be further imperilled if the IHRA were to be widely adopted.
[...]
In all, the researchers collected 77 testimonies from 40 faculty members, 23 students, 7 activists and 7 representatives of organizations. Testimonies were collected from participants in Ontario, Manitoba, British Columbia, Saskatchewan, Nova Scotia, Quebec and Alberta. Among the academics responding were representatives of eleven disciplines from 21 Canadian universities.
Interviewees recounted that their experiences included: political intervention into hiring; attempts to prevent access to event venues and the attempted cancellation of public events on Palestine as well as targeting and doxing, including the inclusion of 128 Canadian academics and activists on the website of Canary Mission, an organization which purports to document ‘individuals and organizations that promote hatred of the US, Israel and Jews on North American college campuses.’ Threats of violence and genuine acts of violence were experienced by student activists and these often contained racial and sexual slurs including threats of sexual violence. Students were subject to warnings and disciplinary measures by university administrators whom respondents often described as being hostile to Palestine solidarity activism on campus. Faculty respondents reported restrictions on academic freedom, self-censoring of expression on Palestinian human rights, discriminatory treatment by academic publishing platforms, harassment by pro-Israel advocacy groups and media outlets, attacks from colleagues, political interference by university administration, classroom surveillance by pro-Israel student groups, and anti-Palestinian and anti-Arab racism. Indeed, the suppression of speech on Palestine has significant consequences in academia where it threatens principles of academic freedom and encourages surveillance of critical intellectuals and activists and of the oppositional knowledge that they produce.
As our research reveals, the precarious employment conditions of over half of Canada’s university teachers mean that because of the ‘chilly climate’ around speech on Palestine untenured or pre-tenure faculty are reluctant to pursue academic or activist work in this area for fear of endangering contract renewals or future career prospects including access to publishing platforms so central to the academic tenure and promotion process.” (95 page report) | | | | Previous Digest Editions - October 12 | The wage-price spiral, an NDP mess, mapping Islamophobia - Read here
- October 11 | Danielle Smith, engineering recessions, lessons from revolutionary women - Read here
- October 7 | Doug Ford and the debt, recruiting for the Israeli army, His House - Read here
- October 6 | Ignoring murder, Mahsa Amini and Muslim women, the Quebec election - Read here
- October 5 | MPs and the housing crisis, Legault’s unearned majority, cancelled for criticizing Israel - Read here
- October 4 | Losing money to the ultra rich, nuclear war, the CAQ - Read here
- October 3 | Interspecies solidarity, undermining daycare, social solidarity for exclusion, a coup in Brazil? - Read here
- September 29 | Deleting Palestine, taking Canada to court, xenophobia and horror - Read here
- September 28 | The curse of renters, city councils and police budgets, the Labour files - Read here
- September 27 | Vacancy control, hurricanes, the far right in Italy - Read here
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