Quote of the week

“We don’t have any idea what foods are making us sick in this country.”
—University of Manitoba food safety expert Rick Holley, on Canada’s standards, said to be among the lowest in the Western world.

Election abortions

When the election was called on Sept. 7, pro-choicers had one thing to celebrate: the death of bills C-338, C-537, C-543 and the infamous C-484, all private members’ bills that critics say are designed to subtly open the door to the re-criminalization of abortion. Problem is, with the Tories looking like they’re on their way to forming the next government, they will likely take the same ideas with them.

“Ken Epp, the Edmonton MP who sponsored Bill C-484, has already said that whether he is re-elected or not, someone from his party will be introducing a similar motion,” says Johanne Fillion of the Féderation du Québec pour le planning des naissances.

Bill C-338 would have amended the Criminal Code to make it a crime to “procure a miscarriage after 20 weeks;” C-537 aimed to make it easier for medical professionals to refuse to refer for abortions; and bills C-543 and C-484 would have added a charge against anyone who attacked a pregnant woman for also attacking the foetus she was carrying.

Women’s groups are mobilizing for a national day of action called “No More C-484s.” Montreal’s demo is happening Sunday, Sept. 28 at 1:30 p.m. at Parc Lahaie (St-Laurent and St-Joseph). See www.contrec484.qc.ca for more details.

Con U on air

The 75-foot-tall fiberglass antennae standing on a piece of industrial land in Lachine is finally going to start pumping out the sounds of Concordia on the 1690 AM dial.

“We knew it would take a while, but not this long,” says Chris Quinnell, station manager for Concordia’s campus radio station, CJLO.

The station’s application was accepted by the CRTC in 2004, but it took until now to secure land, set up the antennae and navigate government red tape. While the station can be heard on the AM dial as of Monday, Sept. 29, it officially launches Wednesday, Oct. 15 and Quinnell and his team are throwing a weeklong music festival from Oct. 14–19 to gain exposure. Each night, a different band will play rock, hip hop, electro or world music at a different Montreal venue, representing the variety of sounds people can expect from CJLO.

CRTC rules force Quinnell to ensure that 90 per cent of CJLO’s content has not been on the Billboard top 40 for the past 25 years and 30 per cent must be from Canadian artists. Quinnell says his station is already hitting at least 35 per cent Canadian content. “We take pride in being able to do that,” said Quinnell. For more, see www.cjlo.com.

by Giuseppe Valiante

Haiti’s NGO problem

It never gets easier, it seems, for Haiti. Thanks to the recent hurricanes Fay, Gustav, Hanna and Ike, hundreds are dead and millions more left without a secure source of food. The Haitian state, weak at the best of times, was unable to organize either evacuation efforts before the storms hit, or relief ones afterwards.

Into this vacuum stepped a variety of relief organizations and non-governmental organizations (NGOs), which provided immediate short-term relief. Countless lives were likely saved by their efforts, but, argues Yves Engler, a local activist with Haiti Action Montreal, little has been done to ensure that future catastrophes are averted.

“Foreign intervention has undermined the Haitian state’s ability to maintain itself,” he says. “NGOs have budgets that are larger than most Haitian government ministries’ so they have infinitely more power—but they are not coordinated in any rational sense.”

Engler will host and speak at “Haiti After the Hurricanes: The Politics of an Unnatural Disaster,” with a representative from NGO Partners in Health, next Tuesday, Sept. 30 at 2149 Mackay, 7 p.m. The event is free, but donations can be made to Partners in Health and the Confédération des Travailleurs Haïtiens. See canadahaitiaction.ca.

by Patrick Lejtenyi

ATSA at 10

This week marks the 10-year anniversary of ATSA’s [Action Terroriste Socialement Acceptable] existence, and the organization, spawned by artists Annie Roy and Pierre Allard for the purpose of using “the aesthetics and symbolism of art as tools for effecting social change,” will be celebrating in a host of ways, not the least being the grand opening of “a contemporary retail space” at 4351 St-Laurent called CHANGE.

“CHANGE will be open for 10 weeks”, says ATSA co-founder Roy, “starting from our opening launch Thursday, Oct. 2, at 6 p.m. up until Wednesday, Dec. 20, and it will be a retrospective to show the public all the environmental and social projects we’ve been engaged in these past 10 years. A significant collection of objects, artifacts and archive photos, as well as a line of message-based tie-in merchandise, will be shown and sold there.”

Also going down as part of the celebrations at CHANGE on Oct. 2 will be the unveiling of the organization’s latest bilingual publication, “ATSA: When Art Takes Action,” and a fair, “based on the theme of CHANGE,” which will be taking place right across the street at Parc du Portugal.

For more information, go to www.atsa.qc.ca.

by Chris Barry

Rear-view mirror

18 YEARS AGO - SEPT. 27–OCT. 4, 1990

On the cover: Gary Oldman, Ed Harris and R.D. Call, for Hell’s Kitchen mobster movie State of Grace (co-star Sean Penn’s name appears on the cover, and Call’s does not). Discussing the blood-soaked finale, director Phil Joanou says, “Outside, you see the bright, celebratory side of being Irish in the form of the St. Patrick’s Day parade, and inside, the dark, violent, vengeful and self-destructive side of the Irish which is something their country has been experiencing for centuries.”
•The Page Three photo shows the Reverend Jesse Jackson delivering “a message of support for Mohawk Warriors holed up in a compound in Kanesatake last week.”
•“FIRM bets” at the Festival International Rock de Montréal: Cha Cha & the Chain Gang, Les French B, Dominic Sonic, La Cri de la Mouche, Xutos Y Pontapes, Grim Skunk.
•Slum Dog smells “Boston Terrier,” and follows clueless “tourists from Massa-chusitts” to a brothel, where a hooker tells them, “The owner won’t let ya bring th’dog in with yer john.”

Angel >> Letting Hinzman stay The Federal Court of Canada issued a stay of proceedings this week regarding the deportation of Jeremy Hinzman, a U.S. Army deserter who fled to Canada rather than be sent back to Iraq. The Canadian government has long wanted him out, but the court decided to let him stay while it decided whether to hear his appeal or not. Like countless other volunteer soldiers—including Robin Long, who was deported from Canada this summer and sentenced to 15 months in prison—Hinzman joined the military in the mistaken belief that the war in Iraq was legitimate. For now, he remains in Toronto with his wife and infant son.

Insect >>Missing birds According to the alarmed ornithologists at BirdLife International, an umbrella group of environmental organizations, the population of the most common 20 bird species has dropped dramatically over the past four decades, signalling a serious problem with the environment. Among those at risk are the boreal chickadee (pictured), the rusty blackbird, the field sparrow and migratory birds like the Canada warbler and bobolink. It’s estimated that the populations for some has dropped by as much as 50 per cent. To blame, say most experts, is disappearing habitat. Of the almost 10,000 bird species in the world, over 1,200 are at risk.