Quote of the week:

"We believe this application amounts to a civil search warrant." - Jim Shaw, chief executive of Shaw Communications, vowing to fight the Canadian Recording Industry Association's motion to order Internet service providers to hand over the names of 29 suspected large-scale file-swappers.

Puking queers make splash!

A group of queer radicals calling themselves les Panthères roses are claiming responsibility for a series of vomit attacks on Gay Village businesses on the night of Feb. 14. Several high-profile establishments, including video/sex toy vendor Priape and Wega Video, were vomited on to protest, according to an e-mail sent out by the group, the commercialization of St. Valentine's Day. Panthère "Olivier" - a pseudonym, as he acknowledges his acts are illegal - says that "L'Opération Pepto-bismol SVP!" was also a blow against the capitalist patriarchy currently ruling life in the Village.

"These businesses are hypocrites," says the self-described anarchist. "They make lots of money because they say that they're the heart of the community, but they keep all the money for themselves. They don't share any of it. And, if you look at the Gay Chamber of Commerce, it's 90 per cent white male."

Those who had to clean up the puke weren't happy or impressed.

"I found it very unpleasant," says Martin, a salesman at Priape. "I got in Sunday morning and found something gross in the entrance and I found this letter. Why do this at night when no one's around? What's it going to change?"

The management at Wega concurred. "If they have a problem, they should call the people who make the videos," a representative said. "They say they want to give people all these rights, but what about the rights that they're taking away? What about the people who enjoy the videos?" » Patrick Lejtenyi

Recognizing L'Ouverture

There's nothing that gets Montrealers steaming up more than a renaming controversy. Megawatts of energy could be generated by harnessing the headshaking provoked by various name switches, whether it be René-Lévesque Boulevard or Trudeau Airport, not to mention former mayor Pierre Bourque's proposal to rechristen Old Montreal streets à la hi-tech or the preposterous renaming of Côte-St-Luc's parks after bumbling ex-councillors. Now the city is considering getting some of that chattering started anew by renaming a downtown public space after Toussaint L'Ouverture, a heroic liberator and icon of our 80,000 local Haitians.

"We thought it would be a good idea on the bicentennial of his death, not only because we have a big local Haitian population, but also to recognize his contribution and the contribution of the minority of African descendants in North America," says UQÀM sociology professor Franklin Midy.

Midy, who has worked on the committee to negotiate the issue with the city, originally wanted St-Dominique or 13th Ave. renamed for the Haitian hero, but Mayor Tremblay suggested a downtown space. Ville Marie borough Mayor Martin Lemay is working on the file but his flak says it's too early to say if a familiar landmark might be renamed.

The city passed a resolution in 1987 to name a street in a new development in Rivière-des-Prairies after L'Ouverture, but the steamrollers never touched the tarmac. Had it happened, current rules would have prevented a second location from being named after him. » Kristian Gravenor

Niocan wait still on

The proposed niobium mine near Oka still isn't up and running, but the citizens, farmers, environmentalists and natives in the area aren't giving up the fight against it any time soon.

Members of the Comité de citoyens d'Oka and the Coalition Eau Secours!, a clean-water advocacy group, are going door to door in the village distributing flyers with anti-mine information. They charge that the mine will pump out 1,547 litres of water a minute, 24 hours a day for 20 years and turn the Lake of Two Mountains into a chemical soup, and that the dynamite used for digging will crack the foundations of the region's houses and release natural radioactive radon gas into the atmosphere. They're pressuring the province to block mine developer Niocan's plans.

André Chaput, a member of the Comité de citoyens d'Oka, says that the project needs to be studied by an independent body. "We want the BAPE (Bureau d'audiences publiques sur l'environnement) to do a study," he says. "Everybody who's involved in this - us, the natives [of the nearby Kanesetake reserve] and the Union des producteurs agricoles - we all believe it would be the best thing. All we ever get are figures from Niocan, and they're always perfect, saying nothing bad will come as a result of their mine."

Chaput says the recent uproar on the Kanesetake reserve - and their lack of money - has taken them temporarily out of the fight, but he believes widespread public anger will eventually get the desired results. » Patrick Lejtenyi

REAR-VIEW MIRROR

16 YEARS AGO THIS WEEK
Feb. 19-Mar. 3, 1988

On the cover: CBC news anchor Yvan Huneault, whose "ability to maintain his journalistic credibility while making straight-faced jokes has made him a minor cult figure in Montreal." "I love his twisted irony," says Holly, 25. "He looks tragically raccoon-like some nights."

• Jenny Ross asks Dead Brain Cells about drugs. "The whole band became coke addicts," says one. "Our manager doesn't want us to mention coke," says another. "Don't mention coke!" yells a third, probably their manager, Norm.

• Alex Cox's "blatantly didactic" film Walker, based on the true story of an American who conquers Nicaragua in the 1850s, is described as "admirable but not endearing." Cox's Straight to Hell, released on video, is elsewhere described as an "unfunny, unappealing bit of trash…with dopey attempts at ‘satire,' a non-existent plot and a surfeit of cameos giving the feel of one long in-joke."

• Athol Fugard's The Road to Mecca attacks "ageist, sexist, racist" Afrikaaner prejudices by exploring the friendship of two unusual women.

Angel >> Kinky, faithful Canadians In a large-scale, international study of sexual behaviour in nine countries, Canadians ranked up there with the most adventurous but also the least duplicitous. According to the study, released by the British group Policy Exchange, 32 per cent of Canadians use some form of bondage technique as a "sex enhancer." Furthermore, only 34 per cent of Canadians report having been unfaithful, compared to 42 per cent of Brits and 50 per cent of Americans. We like our lube too, with 62 per cent reporting using some. And, at 51 per cent, Canadians rank second (behind the U.S., 55 per cent) in using porn as a sex aid.
Insect >> Negative-report-burying pharmaceuticals In a strongly worded editorial published this week, the Canadian Medical Association Journal accused pharmaceutical companies of deception by hiding negative results of drug studies from doctors and patients. Health Canada, the editorial says, is also complicit by keeping quiet about it. Pharma companies also require their researchers to sign non-disclosure agreements that can last up to a decade. The cost of bringing a drug to market - estimated at $1-billion - is at least part of the reason why the drug companies don't want bad news leaked. But, the journal charges, by not revealing important data, these companies are committing flagrant betrayals of trust.