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On October 24 there will be a global day of action on climate change. Check out the 350.org website or this video for more information. You can enter your postal code to find events in your region.
Today the David Suzuki Foundation posted the link to this new TckTckTck campaign video, a project designed to raise awareness about Climate Change. In this video Lily Allen, Youssou N’Dour, Hawksley Workman and others have teamed up to produce a Band Aid-type production.
(Is Duran Duran the only band that was involved in both projects?)
On a related note, I will forever wish I’d been in attendance during this performance by Midnight Oil at the 1993 Clayoquot Sound protests.
As we celebrate car-free day I can’t help being saddened by this news coming out of Niagara-on-the-Lake. Another cyclist killed in a car-bicycle accident, and this is especially tragic since the Niagara Regional Police have not yet been able to identify this man.
Cycle safely my friends.
I’ve been a fan of Georges Laraque since he first started playing with the Edmonton Oilers. I remember watching one of his first games and being rather impressed. I was even more impressed to learn that he had played with an injury, but didn’t let that stop him as he tried to break into the regular lineup.
I have recently learned about Georges Laraque’s commitment to animal welfare and how he has adopted a vegan lifestyle. His dedication to these issues impresses me more than his best game on the ice ever could.
Go Georges!
The good folks over at GCAST (The Garden City Alliance for Sustainable Transportation) are urging Niagara Residents to participate in “Car Free Day” on Sept. 22nd.
For more details, see this article from the St. Catharines Standard.
On my travels through and near UVic I’ve found a number of great examples of graffiti. In addition to the example I blogged about the other day I found two more activist-themed examples on and around campus. The third example comes from Botanical Beach. I’m loving the West Coast Graffiti — keep up the good work!
I’ve posted before about the interesting things that can be found scrawled on the walls of bathrooms on campuses or other student hangouts, so I want to share this wonderful example from The University of Victoria.
Does it still count as graffiti when it is scrawled on a sticker instead of directly on the wall?
I’ve not been doing such a good job of keeping up with this blog over the past little while. I have been busy with things like grading, the Niagara Social Justice Forum, a sick kitty (who is now on the mend, thankfully!), spring cleaning and various other activities. But as spring unfolds it is time to find new routines, ones which include time for blogging and creative writing. I know it sounds funny but making time for these types of writing is beneficial to my academic writing process.
Spring also means that it is time to start thinking about gardening. Over the past few weekends we’ve spent time cleaning up the yard, raking up leaves and turning over the soil. The bird baths and the picnic table have come out of the shed, the BBQ has been used a few times. I’ve got several trays of seeds going in the living room — wild bergamot, spinach, carrots, tomatoes, chives, onions and other such goodies. I want to get the seed potatoes and the sweet peas in this weekend.
It is Earth Day today. There is an interesting article by Elizabeth Kolbert in The New Yorker about the history of Earth Day, a discussion of how Earth Day has “lost its edge,” how it has become a mainstream occasion instead of a radical, fringe effort. I’m not sure this is entirely a bad thing, but I do agree with Kolbert’s conclusion that grass-roots activism is essential for continuing to imagine ways in which society can change. (Update: just saw this interesting article on the topic in the Toronto Star)
There seems to be more consideration of things “eco” and “green” in many aspects of our lives these days. You can’t listen to the news without hearing mention of the environment. But are things really changing? Certainly there seems to be a higher level of awareness of environmental issues, and that is a good thing. I am heartened by the attention being paid to the environment in places like the grocery store — the cloth shopping bag has finally gone mainstream! However, as this article points out, we can’t simply shop our way to environmental salvation.
I will celebrate Earth Day at my desk, working on manuscript revisions. (The subject of the manuscript is ecocriticism, so that counts, right?) Earth Day, of course, is only one day of the year. While celebrating Earth Day has its significance, of greater importance are the choices we make throughout the year. For instance, I’ve been making a real effort to reduce the driving I do. I’ve blogged before about what an adjustment it has been to even have a car, how in the two previous cities I lived in it was actually more convenient not to drive. My long-term goal is to go back to being car-free, but for various reasons that isn’t terribly practical right now. I can, however, reduce the amount of driving I do. In recent weeks I’ve been making efforts to walk, bike, ride transit or car pool more than I previously have. The recent announcement that GO Transit will (finally!) be making its way to Niagara is wonderful news on this front and will surely help more of us to reduce our dependency on our cars.
I just got back from a conference in Montreal — it was a very interesting event and I’d like to blog about it in more detail once I’ve unpacked and had some sleep. As I unwind tonight, however, I want to blog about graffiti. Specifically, I want to blog about how interesting graffiti in the bathrooms of campuses can be. I’m not talking about the boring “AB + DC = 4-EVER” kind of graffiti but, rather, the scrawled dialogues about politics, the environment, gender, etc. that are often found in campus bathrooms. (Perhaps this happens in other locales too, but in my experience this tends to be a university or college phenomenon.) It is especially fascinating when one person’s scribbles spark a whole range of replies. I remember one particular bathroom at the U of A in which two sharpie-wielding members of the campus community carried on an extensive debate about abortion for weeks. It was fascinating — more so for the venue and manner in which this debate was carried out than in what was specifically being said.
I noticed this weekend that the bathrooms at Concordia had some pretty interesting material as well. Environmental politics seem to dominate these bathroom walls at the moment — a reflection of the greening of political debates in a wider sense? As I read the Concordia graffiti it struck me that I haven’t encountered this sort of thing at Brock. At first I wondered if it was maybe a phenomenon exclusive to large urban campuses, but then I remembered that Queen’s University had its fair share of politically-engaged bathroom graffiti. Now, I’d never suggest students vandalize campus property, but I sure am curious about the reasons for this absence. Maybe it happens, but just not in the parts of the campus that I tend to frequent. Perhaps I don’t see this kind of graffiti because we have an especially diligent custodial staff at Brock. Are Brock students finding other fora in which to express their political views? I believe I may have to conduct some research into this.
The first-ever North American Veggie Pride Parade was held in New York City this weekend. It was modelled after the Veggie Pride Parade held annually in Paris. The event even featured the wedding of Penelo Pea Pod and Chris P. Carrot. Veggie activism and fun all rolled into one — I love it! (and speaking of veggie fun, check out these costumes!!)
