Blog
Currently viewing entries by Chris Webb.
-
Austerity and other euphemisms of G20 economics
The dreaded ‘D’ word looms over this G20 summit like a bloated banker, but what does it mean for us and why should we care about it? The deficit is the difference between what governments spend and what they take in. In times of economic crisis, deficit spending is high. Governments often claim deficits are the fault of social spending that’s too high. But in fact deficits always grow when economic activity slows down or contracts because tax revenue falls while state spending rises. In Greece, we’ve recently seen the enormous social upheaval caused by attempting to cut the deficit. In Greece, Spain and Portugal trade unions responded to the package of layoffs, cuts and tax increases with a mass wave of protests and general strikes. It is utterly irrational for workers to suffer in the name of reduced deficits.
-
Punishment Park: An Eyewitness Report of Police Violence in East Toronto
As we scrambled North along Pape, residents watched aghast from their houses and apartments. Cops had sealed off the intersection at Pape and Queen, but allowed our small group to pass. As we walked back down Queen, a number of vans filled with cops in riot gear filed past toward detention centre. Everything I saw today only proves that the unbelievable violence and fear on our streets is caused by these police and the extraordinary judicial powers they have been granted to seize and arrest anyone without warrant or reason. As we chanted “we are peaceful, how about you?” they charged toward us striking whoever stood in their way. Please forward this on to anyone you know who has accused protestors of hooliganism and violence. After this morning’s events, it is quite clear that the violence lies on the side of those 20,000 armed cops and the politicians who back their brutality; not the 100 of us demanding justice and peace for our friends and comrades.
-
Women, The G8/20 and Maternal Health
When the leaders of the 20 most powerful nations meet in Toronto this weekend—behind the snipers and barricades taxpayers graciously provided—they will draft policies that impact our lives, jobs, families and communities for years to come. One particularly hot topic leading up to the G20 summit has been the health of women and children around the world. With 70 per cent of the world’s poor made up of women, this is an issue that is demanding global attention and action. A handful of powerful—most male—leaders will shape policies that affect those women who are the primary caregivers and food providers for their families and communities.
-
How is Barack Obama like Lindsay Lohan?
Obama’s Peace Prize and Lohan’s PR stunt are essential to the stability of American empire. The fact that while we are perpetuating atrocities—be they personal drug habits or surging troop numbers—we are actually doing good things. And look, we are even being awarded for them! This reverse logic can now be considered the raison d’être of imperial relations, and a defining feature of democracy in western societies.
-
An Inconvenient Party: The Manitoba NDP, Neoliberalism and Poverty
In this economic climate, NDP members chose to elect to the party helm former Finance Minister Selinger. His ascendency speaks to the very nature of the provincial NDP. Selinger’s leadership is essentially the distillation of years of neo-liberal NDP policies. When we look at the neoliberal drift of the party under Gary Doer, in particular in economic policy, it is no surprise that a finance minister who oversaw a decade of ‘fiscal austerity’ should emerge as leader. In the leadership race, Selinger promised no change from the economic policies that have guided the party for the last decade.
-
Brandon Huntley and the Colour of Crime
While crime is not a black only phenomenon, most South Africans acknowledge that black South Africans bear the brunt of violent crime. Which is why I was so surprised to hear the story of Brandon Huntley, the white South African refugee. Being a white South African myself, I have never considered myself a refugee even though my family has been a victim of violent crime. Huntley brought his refugee claim before the Canadian Immigration Board claiming he had been a victim of racial attacks—around 7 in total. The board—whose job description, it seems, would be to stay informed of international social and political issues—showed an astounding ignorance regarding the realities of post-apartheid South Africa.
-
Over The Rainbow Nation: Film Politics and South Africa
What I am glad to see is the proliferation of creative media and visual culture dealing with the struggle against apartheid and tackling the tricky historiography of the revisionist apartheid regime. Engaging with this history in these creative forms can often produce positive moments of self-criticism and reflection. Something that I believe is pretty essential at the current political juncture in the South Africa. One good example of this is the recent release of Pete Travis’s latest film Endgame.
-
Clinton in Haiti
Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere and one of the poorest countries in the world. The Caribbean nation that shares a border with the relatively affluent Dominican Republic has been safeguarded by blue-helmeted UN peacekeepers since 2004 when elected president Jean Bertrand Aristide was overthrown in a coup orchestrated by the US, Canada and other European powers.
-
Support the Migrant Farm Workers of Manitoba
FREE ADMISSION Hosted by the Agriculture Workers Alliance and the UWSA A night to learn about the history and treatment Migrant Workers who come to Canada since the 1960s. There will be a showing of El Contrato This 2003 National Film Board movie documents the inherent problems in the SAWP and the first migrant farm worker support centre to assist migrant farmworkers in Leamington, Ontario. Date: Wednesday, March 25, 2009 Time: 6:00pm - 9:00pm Location: University of Winnipeg - Bulman Centre…
-
Media As Insurgent Art
Through art, create order out of the chaos of living. Make it new news. Write beyond time. Reinvent the idea of truth. Reinvent the idea of beauty. In the first light, wax poetic. In the night, wax tragic. (Lawrence Ferlinghetti) Hi folks. The above words come from the great American poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti and his ongoing (r)evolutionary work Poetry as Insurgent Art. The aim of his book was to make poetry a critical and effective tool for revolutionary change in society,…
- Page 1 of 6 1 2 3 > Last »
