CONTENTS
CALLS TO ACTION
Let’s win paid sick days!
The federal government has committed to legislating 10 permanent paid sick days for federally-regulated workers within 100 days of their re-election, and convening the provinces to close the paid sick days gap across the country.They must keep their promise, and all provinces must follow suit so that no worker is left behind. We cannot afford any more delays.
decentworkandhealth.org
EVENTS
Adult Secular B’Mitzvah
When: October 12th – May 2022Tuesday evenings, 6:30 – 9:00 pm
Are you an adult seeking a Jewish learning experience? Did you miss the opportunity to have a bat/bar mitzvah? Were you unable to have a bat/bar mitzvah because of gender or were you misgendered at your bat/bar mitzvah? Did you have a bat/bar mitzvah but are seeking a different experience? Do you have a Jewish family member and want to learn more?
Welcome to this opportunity to build your personal relationship to Jewish life! We’ll explore our unique, progressive (Jewish) identities in the twenty-first century as responses to what came before us and the kind of world we want to build.
This course will be held on Zoom. Each class meeting will include learning activities that invite you away from the screen for breaks, to help counter our collective Zoom fatigue. Study of texts, artworks, and historical documents will be accompanied by creative, mindful, and collaborative prompts that will get you making digital co-creations, art, writing, stretching, and possibly cooking apart together!
Facebook event
Beyond Nature: Animal Liberation, Marxism and Critical Theory
When: October 21st, 12 pmOriginally published in Italian in 2011, Marco Maurizi’s Beyond Nature: Animal Liberation, Marxism, and Critical Theory was one of the first books to deal with the intersection of Marxism and animal liberation and remains indispensable for understanding the problems of animal liberation in the context of Marx, Hegel and the Frankfurt School.
Animal Liberation Currents is pleased to host the book launch of the new English translation with author Marco Maurizi!
eventbrite.com
Censure U of T: Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop
When: October 21st, 12:30pmJoin us to celebrate, reflect, build… with Nahla Abdo, Nick Estes, Fred Moten, Ananya Roy.
Facebook | zoom.us
Rally to Raise the Rates
When: October 21st, 4pmWhere: 438 University Ave
Join Ontario Coalition Against Poverty/ OCAP to deliver a letter and demand to meet with the minister for Children, Community and Social Services, Merrilee Fullerton.
Facebook event
Viva Palestina!
When: October 21st, 7pmJoin Spring for this special roundtable discussion on the history, achievements, challenges, and opportunities of the Palestinian national liberation struggle, featuring a multi-generational panel of leading Palestinian and solidarity activists: Issam Yamani, Nadia Shoufani, Chandni Desai, Moe Alqasem, and Tara Alami.
The roundtable will cover a wide range of questions, including: Is Oslo still relevant? What would a one-state solution look like? How has BDS transformed the movement? What is the role of the Palestinian left, and what are its prospects for renewal? What is the role of the Arab working class across the region? And more!
Please DM Spring for more info and the Zoom link.
Facebook event
TTCriders Book Club
When: Oct 21(intro to chapter 5), Oct 28 (ch6 to ch11), Nov 4 (ch12 to epilogue); at 7pmJoin TTCriders as we read and discuss Human Transit by Jarrett Walker. We are meeting three times. You should attend even if you haven’t done the reading.
Please contact info@ttcriders.ca if you have difficulty borrowing the book to read from the library.
Facebook | zoom.us
Alternative Shabbes: Cooking Together For a Future
When: Friday 22 October, 6:30pmJoin the Morris Winchevsky School and the United Jewish People’s Order for a night of schmoozing and connecting to land, culture, and food justice through an interactive, intergenerational cooking night. The event will include a live interactive cooking lesson with Jewish Chef, Sari Papular, RNCP who will be guiding us on how to cook Moroccan Chraime and Couscous for shabbes! We will also be joined by a very special guest speaker, tattooest Joey Ramona, who will talk about food insecurity in Toronto and ideas for action that all of us can take, building on the mutual aid groups that have sprung up in the shadow of the current pandemic.
zoom.us
Standing on Guard For Whom?
When: Sunday October 24th, 2pmWith Yves Engler, author and historian, and Vanessa Lanteigne, Voice of Women for Peace. We Stand on Guard for Whom? is the first book to present a history of the Canadian military from the perspective of its victims. In his eleventh book, Yves Engler, the prolific author and critic of Canadian politics, exposes the reality of Canadian wars, repression, and military culture despite the mythologies of Canada as an agent for international peacekeeping and humanitarianism.
zoom.us
Metro Days of Action – 25 Years Later
When: October 25th, 7pmJoin us as we celebrate “When we walked on sunshine” with music, words, and inspiration, including:
– Video greetings from MDA co-chairs Linda Torney and Margaret Hancock
A discussion on the lessons for today:
– Panel moderator – John Cartwright, former Labour Council president
– Karen Brown, Elementary Teachers Federation of Ontario
– Vicky Smallman, Canadian Labour Congress
– Ilian Burbano, Community activist and SEIU staff
– Bill Howes, Chief Marshal for Metro Days of Action
labourcouncil.ca
Testimonio Virtual Book Launch
When: Monday Oct 25th, 7pmCo-editors Catherine Nolin and Grahame Russell will be discussing their powerful new book, Testimonio, on the date of its publication, along with several of the book’s contributors.
Testimonio draws on over thirty years of community-based research and direct community support work in Guatemala to expose the ruthless state machinery that benefits the Canadian mining industry—a staggeringly profitable juggernaut of exploitation, sanctioned and supported every step of the way by the Canadian government.
eventbrite.ca
Solidarity Rally for Six Nations Land Defenders
When: October 26th, 11amWhere: 130 Queen St W (Please meet by the east side of the building, above the parking garage.)
All out to show the Federal and Provincial governments and courts that we support Indigenous Land Defenders from Six Nations of the Grand River!
As the courts continue to uphold a racist colonial justice system that is stacked against Land Defenders, we need to show that Indigenous Peoples and allies alike will not stand for this miscarriage of justice. We demand that courts end the weaponizing of injunctions to criminalize and remove Indigenous Land Defenders from their lands and to respect Indigenous Sovereignty.
Come out to the Ontario Court of Appeal to demand Justice for Six Nations Land Defenders and their right to decide what happens on their traditional territory.
Facebook event
Rally at City Hall for Affordable Housing NOW!
When: October 26th, 12pmWhere: City Hall, 100 Queen St W
Join ACORN members as we finalize our push for affordable housing in all new developments. We’ve been fighting for YEARS for a policy called ‘Inclusionary Zoning’, which forces new developments to include affordable units.
We’re close – but developers are pushing back and weakening the requirements while also delaying the rule being enforced. We don’t need affordable housing years from now, we need it NOW!
Facebook event
Learning About the Truth
When: October 26th, 7pmPlease join us for our October webinar, featuring Karen Littlewood, President OSSTF/FEESO, as our moderator; and distinguished guest speakers Jane Hubbard and Andrew Bomberry from Legacy of Hope; Dean Smith, Member of Pictou Landing First nation and Indigenous Education Consultant with the Kawartha Pine Ridge DSB; Marilyn Robitaille, Lead Teacher with Kawartha Pine Ridge DSB and Citizen of The Metis Nation of Ontario; Seneca Dueck, co-founder of Roots of Resilience Education Foundation and a member of the Salteux/Assiniboine raised in the ways of the Nakota people of Treaty 6 territory, discussing their truths and their vision of reconciliation.
zoom.us
Dismantling White Supremacy in Healthcare
When: October 27th, 4pmJoin us for a community conversation focused on dismantling white supremacy in healthcare. Learn from our community medical experts and survivors of medical racism. This will also be an opportunity to talk together about healing and transforming healthcare.
Guest speakers include: Dr. Naheed Dosani and Samiya Abdi, and Gloria Small!
eventbrite.ca
ARTICLES
The Latest IMF Bean-Counting Scandal
By Patrick BondAfter a major leadership crisis that further degrades the Bretton Woods Institutions’ number-crunching credibility by revealing a pro-corporate bias – one that in 2017 was aimed at pleasing Beijing’s ‘Communist’ government – yet another discredited managing director rules the International Monetary Fund (IMF). But Kristalina Georgieva was nearly fired, saved only with her board’s grudging, divided affirmation on October 11, in spite of two imperialist powers – the US and Japan – threatening to swing the axe.
Source: The Bullet No. 2479
Make Gig Work Decent Work
By Toronto and York Region Labour CouncilOn most days, Doug Ford’s Conservative government in Ontario does not respond well to problems, or it actively makes things worse. If an election had been called a year-and-a-half ago, Ford would have lost. However, when COVID hit, Ford nearly brought Ontario to its knees. Nevertheless, he managed to deceive some into thinking he managed well. Today, he is barely visible, having prorogued Queen’s Park during September’s federal election to protect his federal Conservative counterparts instead of stepping up to protect Ontarians and help guide our recovery.
Source: The Bullet No. 2480
Postal Banking: Public Banks that Do Not Only Serve the Rich!
By Adrian Murray and Susan SpronkOn Wednesday, August 20, 2021, we caught up with Matt Corbeil and Geoff Bickerton, who both work in the Research Department of the Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW). Matt is a Research Specialist and represents the union on a joint committee with Canada Post that has been discussing expanding financial services at the post office. Geoff is the Research Director, and he has been involved in the campaign for postal banking for over a decade. Thanks to the efforts of CUPW, Canada Post is launching a postal banking pilot project this fall in Alberta, Nova Scotia and in 14 Indigenous, remote and rural communities across the country. The postal bank will provide affordable services to low-income residents.
Source: The Bullet No. 2481
The Climate Crisis, Degrowth and a Global Green New Deal (part 1)
As we move toward the COP26 UN meetings on climate change in Glasgow in November, debate is intensifying over the political coalitions and policy mechanisms to address the mounting climate emergency. The 6th Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released earlier this year, (Climate Change 2021: The Physical Science Basis) documented the global rise in temperature of the land, oceans, and atmosphere from concentrations of greenhouse gases produced by human activities from 1750. Since 2011, concentrations have continued to increase in the atmosphere and are now pushing past 410 ppm for carbon dioxide (CO2) annually alone (not including the rise in methane and nitrous oxide). Compared to any other decade since 1850, “each of the last four decades has been successfully warmer.” Part 1 is a discussion between Pollin and Polychroniou, the former being the progressive economist that is perhaps most central to strategies for a Green New Deal in the US, and the latter a leading journalist and researcher, both in the US and Greece, on the policy regimes of contemporary capitalism.Source: The Bullet No. 2482
The Climate Crisis, Degrowth and a Global Green New Deal (part 2)
As we move toward the COP26 UN meetings on climate change in Glasgow in November, debate is intensifying over the political coalitions and policy mechanisms to address the mounting climate emergency. The 6th Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released earlier this year, (Climate Change 2021: The Physical Science Basis) documented the global rise in temperature of the land, oceans, and atmosphere from concentrations of greenhouse gases produced by human activities from 1750. Since 2011, concentrations have continued to increase in the atmosphere and are now pushing past 410 ppm for carbon dioxide (CO2) annually alone (not including the rise in methane and nitrous oxide). Compared to any other decade since 1850, “each of the last four decades has been successfully warmer.” Part 2 is an exchange between Fitz and Pollin on the contradictions between a transition to renewable energy sources from fossil fuels, jobs, and meeting climate change targets within capitalist markets. Pollin is the progressive economist most central to strategies for a Green New Deal in the US. Don Fitz is a university lecturer, and editor with Green Social Thought, and a past candidate for the US Green Party.Source: The Bullet No. 2483