Quote of the week:

"I'll melt the ice like a warm chinook/With social justice and a great left hook!" - Ottawa NDP candidate Ed Broadbent, in his bizarre "Ed's Back" rap video, available for viewing on his Web site (www.edbroadbent.ca).

Feds celebrate
Aboriginal Day

Next Monday, June 21, marks National Aboriginal Day in Canada, as brought to you by the federal Department of Indian and Northern Affairs (DIAND). They're offering a package of family-friendly products designed to sell Canada's sweet and wholesome image, including bookmarks ("a colourful reminder of National Aboriginal Day!"), a poster ("promoting Canada's four days of celebrations - National Aboriginal Day, Saint-Jean-Baptiste Day, Canadian Multiculturalism Day and Canada Day") and a pamphlet ("providing background information and thoughts from Aboriginal people across Canada and the meaning of National Aboriginal Day").

DIAND probably didn't consult with Steve Bonspille, a band council chief in Kanesatake, northwest of Montreal and currently in the grips of a seriously nasty internal controversy involving their exiled Grand Chief James Gabriel. Bonspille, never a government cheerleader at the best of times, says National Aboriginal Day leaves him cold.

"It's a nice term to use but if they really want to do something worthwhile they should start with examining the real issues on the reserves and put their money where their mouths are," he says. "Our tax rights, our health rights, our education rights aren't being respected, our treaties aren't being respected - if it's a celebration of anything, it's a celebration that we've survived and will continue to fight for what's ours, just like our ancestors did."

In the meantime, Bonspille is starting an initiative to call a referendum that would force an election on Gabriel's leadership. He's hoping to organize the referendum by late June or early July and hold an election by mid-August. » Patrick Lejtenyi

Art for therapy's sake

For the next two weeks, Montrealers can feast their eyes on some art while pondering the question of women and poverty. Herstreet/La rue des femmes, a shelter for homeless women and women in distress, is putting on an exhibit featuring the works of their clientele as developed in their art therapy workshops.

"Our goal is to give a voice to these women, who often have difficulty finding one," says Herstreet coordinator Suzanne Bourret. "Society really doesn't know these women, so we want to help create a link between them and the community."

Bourret says art therapy helps her clientele develop a sense of self-esteem and confidence that poverty, stress and abuse work to crush. "For these women, just creating something is an action, a goal," she says." According to Herstreet, there are about 3,000 homeless women, over 80 per cent of whom are estimated to be survivors of incest, rape or other forms of violence.

The underlying theme of the works is dreams, in particular those that have been lost. The Lost Dreams exhibit can be viewed as of Friday, June 18, at the Christ Church Cathedral (635 Ste-Catherine W.) until Friday, July 2, every night from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. The paintings are for sale, with the proceeds split between the artist and Herstreet. The money will be used to buy more materials for their art therapy program. For more information, visit www.laruedesfemmes.com. » Patrick Lejtenyi

No opening for L'Ouverture

Perhaps the most unfairly vilified street near the Main is St-Dominique, which earned the nickname St-Dump for its residents tossing trash from upstairs windows onto unpaved oil-stained yards that stink of diesel fumes from adjacent small industry. But the street is looking good now, especially to a committee representing the estimated 80,000 to 100,000 Montrealers of Haitian ancestry who have pegged it as the strip they want rechristened Rue Toussaint L'Ouverture, after the heroic anti-slavery leader who helped the movement to liberate Haiti from French colonial bondage in 1804.

After months of two-way chinwagging, the Haitians are getting a bit ornery about Mayor's Tremblay's failure to follow up on his promise. "The revolution against slavery is a big part in the history of humanity, right up there with the American or French revolutions," says Édouard Staco, a 33-year-old computer analyst who moved here at age 14 and now heads the committee that's trying to get L'Ouverture's hallowed name on the map.

The city is loath to rename an existing street name and has offered a small park outside of the Papineau metro as an alternative. The committee wants something more significant and they want it during this year, the bicentennial of the revolution, an event recognized by the United Nations. "Montrealers know the importance of historical characters, people like Nelson Mandela," says Staco. "L'Ouverture is one of these people who have an importance that go beyond their country of national movement." » Kristian Gravenor

REAR-VIEW MIRROR

15 YEARS AGO THIS WEEK
June 16–June 29, 1989

On the cover: Illustrations of Batman and the Joker, as Batman opens. Marian MacNair speaks to Frank Miller, the creator of the Dark Knight series, about the caped crusader's evolution. "Batman's not destroyed by the changing world, he changes in response to it. But his character doesn't alter at all."

• Long-time two-wheeling and volleyball advocate "Bicycle" Bob Silverman is profiled by Brendan Weston. "I'm not crazy. A lot of people say I am," he says.

• "We'll go down as the most numerate," says 10,000 Maniacs' organist Dennis Drew, as compared to REM being the most literate band producer Joe Boyd ever worked with. By that, he explains to Andrew Jones, "We have a different sense of numbers and time. We talk more about physics than D.H. Lawrence."

• Julie Wheelwright, author of Amazons and Military Maids, a book about women adventurers and soldiers throughout history, says that "Psychologically, [these women] began to identify themselves as men and on some level they denied their female identity."

Angel >> Spammer shutdown Lawyers have their uses, apparently. Following a lawsuit by Yahoo! Inc. last March, Kitchener, Ontario, spammer Eric Head, 25, has shut down his spam operation and will instead devote his life to a career as a rock 'n' roll drummer. Having settled out of court for an undisclosed but reputedly six-figure sum, Head has also renounced his ways - he was accused of sending out 94-million e-mails to Yahoo! clients in one month alone - and is urging other spammers to do the same. Head was the only Canadian named in the lawsuit filed against hundreds of spammers worldwide by Yahoo!, Microsoft, AOL and Earthlink.
Insect >> Floods A report released this week by the United Nations University states that two-billion people will be at risk of severe flooding by 2050, thanks to global warming and other human environmental abuses. Most of the damage will be in Asia, which bears 44 per cent of global flood damages: between 1987 and 1997, floods in Asia claimed almost 230,000 lives and $136-billion (U.S.) in damages. All weather-related disasters now cost the world economy $50- to $60-billion (U.S.) and claim up to 25,000 lives a year. In unrelated news, Stephen Harper has pledged to rescind Canada's commitment to the Kyoto Accord should his Conservatives win the June 28 federal election.