• • Activist Report
  • News Flash

  dear jim, please make poverty a priority

  January 21, 2009 • Andrea Hoang

  2009 marks 20 years — the span of an entire childhood — after the Canadian Parliament made a promise to end child poverty by the year 2000. Currently, 1 in 9 Canadian children still wonder where their next meal will come from, if they will have school supplies, and if they will have a warm bed at night. The promise was broken.

  Campaign 2000 (named after the broken promise) is an organization dedicated to the advocacy of eradicating child poverty in Canada. Every year they write report cards to assess the nation’s progress in improving the state of child poverty. Sadly, the 2008 report reveals that “the nation’s child poverty rate is almost what it was in 1989 when Parliament unanimously resolved to end child poverty by the year 2000.”
  
  That’s why activists have been vying to get Finance Minister Jim Flaherty to make poverty a priority on the upcoming budget. There is still time to sign an anti-poverty petition backed by these organizations before parliament resumes on January 26.

  (more inside…)

• • Comics are for Everybody

  GAY TEEN SUPERHERO TV SHOW, KA-POW!

  January 20, 2009 • Tiina Johns

  The internet is a-buzzing with the news that Stan Lee is developing a new TV show about a gay superhero. Stan “the man” Lee is, of course, the godfather of Marvel comics and co-creator of basically every Marvel character you know, including Spider-Man, the X-Men, the Fantastic Four and Daredevil.

  The Telegraph reported last week that Stan Lee was “to create world’s first gay superhero.”

  Um, no. Not even close.

  There are tons of gay superheros, and have been for years. And not like, five. Hundreds. Gayleague.com offers a pretty comprehensive list.

  There’s Midnighter and Apollo—Batman and Superman-esque characters, who first appeared in The Authority comics, and then in Midnighter.
  

  

  They are totes in love, and have an adopted daughter.

  Both teams of Marvel teen superheros boast queer couples: Karolina Dean & Xavin of Runaways and Wiccan & Hulkling of Young Avengers.
  
  Renee Montoya from Gotham Central, who became the new Question, is a lesbian. And she used to date Batwoman.
  
  Northstar, of the Canadian Superhero team, Alpha Flight, is probably the most well known gay superhero. He had what so many queer characters in all sorts of fiction have—a controversial outing and an unfortunate death.

  (more inside…)

• • News Flash

  Obama Envy?

  January 20, 2009 • Stark Koenig

  So it’s the big day for America! Buh-bye, Bush! And good riddance, right? Now if we could only do the same with Harper. That seems to be the sentiment of a lot of Canadians, who are registering some serious Obama-Envy.

  I found myself wondering after Obama’s election win in November whether the results of Canada’s election would have been different had ours come after the U.S. election instead of before. Considering the disappointingly low turnout of voters in Canada’s election (around 55%, can you believe it?) and the level of inspired hope exhibited by Canadians after the U.S. presidential election, I do wonder if the polls may have shown a little more determination and a little less resignation.

  (more inside…)

• • Activist Report
  • News Flash

  Good Morning America

  January 20, 2009 • Stacey May Fowles

• • In My Opinion...
  • Media Savvy

  Atwood book considered more disturbing than war or Grand Theft Auto

  January 18, 2009 • Mir Verburg

  So, this week has seen a flurry of activity centered on one angry father’s desire to keep The Handmaid’s Tale off his son’s high school reading list. Robert Edwards has a problem with Atwood’s novel because he feels that the book depicts scenarios and uses language that is not appropriate in a high school environment.

  While trying to get some sense of the novel’s impact on young people, I did a search on YouTube and discovered a pile of school projects devoted to The Handmaid’s Tale. Young people’s own creative exploration of Atwood’s themes do more to explain why the book belongs in school than anything I can say, so I’ll augment this post with media projects from around the globe. They’re interesting, weird, and one in particular is kind of hilarious. All take The Handmaid’s Tale and translate it from Can-Con literary classic to 5-7 minute YouTube specials.

  This one is by Alwaysnothin and was posted in Feb 2008. It’s a succinct 3 minute synopsis that makes use of The Bloodhound Gang and Queen among myriad other musical references:

  (more inside…)

• • Media Savvy

  Note to Ad Execs: Women Like Beer (in fact, some of them LOVE beer)

  January 17, 2009 • Michelle Schwartz

  The latest advertising abomination (adbomination?) to make the rounds is a campaign for Israel’s Gold Star beer. These ridiculous ads, structured as cartoony flowcharts, trade on the old trope that men are low-maintenance sex hounds who just want to drink beer and get laid, while as women are high-maintenance fashion lunatics who spend five hours obsessing over what shoes they wear before going out for girly cocktails in hopes of meeting a knight in shining armor who will marry them so they can pop out baby after baby and live happily ever after. The tag line for this lovely campaign? “Thank God you’re a man.”
  

  

  Click here to see a larger image, along with the rest of the campaign (it only gets worse).

  (more inside…)

• • Picks from Planet Venus
  • Playlist

  Duchess Say What?

  January 16, 2009 • Anna Leventhal

  Duchess Says, whose first full-length album I chose as one of my favourite releases from 2008, have put out an awesome video of their song Tenen Non Neue for Mange Ta Ville, a web-based television show about arts and culture in Montreal (Mange Ta Ville means “eat your city” - it sounds snappier in French. Really). They set up their instruments at the St. Michel flea market in east-end Montreal and quite likely freaked out (or delighted) any number of shoppers out for antique lamps, ashtrays with pictures of the Olympic Stadium, and steamees.

  In true post-Velvet-Underground rock ‘n’ roll style, the video starts with a good minute or so of fuzzy electronic whine. But hold steady, it’s worth it when you get to A-Claude’s robot-gone-berserk singing and dance moves. I’m not sure what it is about female-fronted Quebecois punk bands who sing in made-up languages that sound like a stew of English, French, German and what-all (see, for instance, Les Georges Leningrad and the obscure and legendary La Gerantole) - is it a kind of Esperanto meant to bridge the language gap? Possession by demons? - but I like it. A lot. I hope you will too.

• • On The Job

  Blogging Carnival at kickaction.ca!

  January 15, 2009 • Jessica Yee

  

  From our lovely friends over at Power Camp (now Girls Action Foundation!):

  Bloggers Wanted!

  Kickaction.ca is looking for guest bloggers for our annual Blogging Carnival!

  What’s a Blogging Carnival, you ask?

  A blogging carnival is when a bunch of bloggers are brought together on one site to write about a given topic, allowing readers to read a variety of outlooks on that issue.

  To celebrate the Girls Action Foundation National Day of Action on February 14th, kickaction.ca will be hosting a blogging carnival! The carnival will be four weeks long, between the Day of Action and International Women’s Day, with a theme each week. The themes, based on discussions that came out of the National Retreat in October, will be:

  Feb 9-14: Let’s Talk About Sex(ual health)
  Feb 16-20: We need to talk!: Race & Gender
  Feb 23-27: Indigenous Feminism: Remembering the past, reclaiming the present & celebrating the future
  March 2-8: ‘Hypersexualization’, Pop Culture & Media: Who do they think we are?

  We would like to have 2-3 guest bloggers each in French & English.

  (more inside…)

• • Shameless Women

  Sarah Kramer: Vegan Vixen

  January 15, 2009 • Desirée O

  Every Thursday I profile a new incredible woman, each from a different walk of life. Different professions, causes, backgrounds, ethnicities, orientations, and anything/everything else!

  So without further delay, let me introduce the deliciously wonderful Sarah Kramer…

  

  
  

  Known for her “sassy vintage style”, Sarah Kramer is a “vegan cookbook superstar!” I first wrote about her amazingly delicious collections a few months ago when I found out about her new travel-size book, Vegan A Go-Go! Winner of multiple awards and arguably the most famous vegan author around, Sarah’s journey all began with a home-made cookbook zine to give as presents to family and friends, proving her belief “that it only takes one tiny spark to start a fire and she has a pack of matches and is ready to burn!” How wonderfully shameless is that?!!

  (more inside…)

• • Activist Report

  Victory, valentine and vagina.

  January 15, 2009 • Andrea Hoang

  That is what the “V” in V-Day stands for. V-Day is an international organization dedicated to ending violence against women and girls. With chapters all over the world, V-Day has raised over $60 million in the past ten years.
  Here are some awesome sounding events the Toronto V-Day crew is hosting:

  Congo Teach In
  V-Day is holding a public lecture tonight in the Ryerson campus about the Democratic Republic of Congo and its current crisis, where women are being used as weapons of war.
  When: Jan. 15, 5:30pm - 8:30pm
  Where: 55 Gould St. Toronto, ON
  Room: Ryerson University SCC115 (Student Campus Centre)
  Cost: Free!
  
  Mr. Vagina-Friendly
  Those fleshy folds of pinkish skin can sure be hard to navigate sometimes. And only after 21 years of owning one, I can finally say I’m somewhat vagina-friendly. It’s not something anyone can say, but a bunch of guys will claim themselves to be friends of the vajayjay on Friday, at V-Day’s Mr. Vagina-Friendly competition. Who will reign supreme and who will succumb to phallic-guided fallacy?
  When: Jan. 16, doors open at 8:30, pageant starts at 9:00
  Where: Ram in the Rye, 63 Gould St. Toronto, ON
  Cost: $3
  Music: Punjacian
  Admission: All ages!

  (more inside…)

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