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SEPTEMNER 15, 2022
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Trek and Labour Struggles (Image courtesy taylor)
HOUSING FOR ALL The image on the cover is on a wall in Winnipeg. It reflects the ideation of thousands of people who fought for the right to decent lives and the struggle to attain the means in a fair and just way. The richest people were determined to keep wages low, to exploit the people and continue enriching themselves. The ideas of social justice could not be stifled by putting those fighting for same in jail. In the Downtown Eastside the fight for the rights of people to have decent, safe, affordable housing has been and remains the underlying struggle for what's right. Once a person has stable housing life can improve. Fear and uncertainty begin to fade when the primary question is no longer "where will I sleep tonight?" The ideas at the forefront of this housing crisis are up against the questions that the rich and powerful dismiss as out-of-our-hands. Where will all this housing go? There are empty buildings in the DTES that can be either refurbished or torn down to make housing. New construction could be limited to social and low-cost housing as more units are built. Who will build it? Governments have great power to both incentivize and compel housing construction, through zoning (municipal) regulation (provincial) and increasing taxation on the megarich (federal). Who will pay for 'it? This can be the crunch point until the taxation schema makes the wealthy pay their fair share. The quality of your housing should meet increasingly higher standards only partially contingent on personal income. It is 100 times harder to get-money from those who have too much than it is to provide those with too little the purchasing power to afford the basics. There are so many innovative and brilliant ideas on what can be done to ease the housing crisis. Going with the status quo isn't working. It takes maybe 2-~ years to get highrise condos built while anything non-market for low-income people takes 5 - 7 years. More co-op housing is a must. Housing opportunities for immigrants cannot be last. Every branch of all governments need to make housing an urgent priority. As matters stand now the threats to people un-
housed will not end well unless housing is provided. There is nowhere else to go. Jail is not housing. ByPAULR TAYLOR
OPPENHEIMER
PARK MOVE
A crow is eating a dead rat City crews moving stuff cleaning up A woman obstructs Ends up in handcuffs Settles down Police let her go upon agreement she won't go back to tent that's not her squat What to sort what to pack What to move what to take what to leave When equipment sum total is a shopping care Already you basically got nothing After this you'll have even less What's next when what's left is a foamy a sleeping bag two pop crates and a couple of blankets on a piece of sidewalk • or worse your bedroom bare concrete and all you own the clothes 00 your back and a paper cup for spare change Not that owning stuff is the way to happiness But a little more comfort for broken bodies damaged brains lost souls and just people down on their luck losing battles for the almighty buck wouldn't cost the rest of us all that much In fact costs less when we all got a home Even rats got dry holes in dirt around tree roots .for shelter from storrns Gilles Cyrenne
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GATHRINGHOPE
OTES GRANDMOTHERS COLLECTIVE
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Dalannah Gail SdWen Rosemary Geofgeson Savannah Walling Sharon Jinkerson-Brass
Canadian Human Rights Commission National Housing Strategy MANDATE The Federal Housing Advocate is an independent, nonpartisan watchdog, empowered to drive meaningful action to address housing need and homelessness in Canada. The Office of the Federal Housing Advocate, housed at the Canadian Human Rights Commission, helps to promote and protect the right to housing in Canada, including the progressive realization of the right to adequate housing. The goal of the Advocate's work is to drive change on key systemic housing issues and advance the right to housing for all in Canada.
PEOPLE Marie-Josee Houle was appointed as Canada's first Federal Housing Advocate in February 2022, marking a new chapter in a career defined by her work in the affordable housing and homelessness sector. Ms. Houle is an experienced leader who is recognized for her community activism, expertise in human rights, and extensive knowledge of the housing and homelessness system. Prior to her appointment as Canada's first Federal Housing Advocate, Ms. Houle has held a number of roles that inform her broad experience, including frontline work in housing co-ops, consulting and project management for affordable housing development, by-law review, housing-related research projects, developing educational programs for housing co-ops and non-profits, and senior leadership roles. Most recently, she was the Executive Director for Action-Logement, an Ottawa housing loss prevention organization, where she did extensive work in research, education, community partnerships, and on developing tools to support successful tenancies in spite of intensified inequity, growing failures and human rights violations in the housing system. Ms. Houle was also formerly the Executive Director of OCISO Non-Profit Housing Corporation (now caIled Unity Housing Ottawa). She has also worked as a development consultant and project manager on seven new and existing housing co-operatives and non-profit housing corporations. Ms. Houle has been actively involved in advocacy work at a national, provincial and community level. She has advocated for tenant rights and the non-profit housin~ sector at all three levels of government. She has worked with diverse partners in the sector to foster innovation and entrepreneurship, improve efficiencies, influence-key opinion leaders, leverage strategic partnerships, and address gaps and human rights violations related to housing and access to housing. Building a sense of community among diverse partners is particularly important to her. Ms. Houle has been a member the National Right to Housing Network, the Ottawa Alliance to End Homelessness and the Canadian Housing Renewal Association. She sat on the Ottawa Homelessness Community Advisory Board, the Ottawa Social Housing Network Steering Committee, and eo-chaired both the City of Ottawa's Housing Loss Prevention Committee, and the Refugee 613 Housing Task Force. A supporter and amplifier of marginalized voices, Ms. Houle promotes respectful and inclusive dialogue, creating a space for disadvantaged people to be heard, and applies an intersectional and anti-racism lens to her advocacy work. She has liaised with Indigenous housing providers, developers and tenant support organizations to devise ways to be a better aIly, support their work and amplify their voices. The Advocate is responsible for making recommendations to improve Canada's housing laws, policies and ., programs so that they enable people and families in Canada to have access to adequate, affordable and safe housing that meets their needs. The Advocate's mandate is guided by a human rights-based approach, which values participation, accountability, non-discrimination, equity, transparency, empowerment, and respect for human rights laws and obligations. {Ms. Houle was in Vancouver recently. This overview of her work and qualifications is from the National Housing Strategy web site. She met with members of the Carnegie Community Centre Association in light of the ongoing housing crisis in the Downtown Eastside.
WORK Driving change on systemic housing issues: The Federal Housing Advocate holds governments to account on their obligations to address housing need and homelessness across Canada. The Advocate makes recommendations to the government and other decision makers to improve Canada's housing laws, policies and programs. Receiving submissions: The Advocate receives submissions from people across Canada on the systemic housing issues they are facing, and makes recommendations on how to address them. The Advocate may both undertake their own review of a broad systemic housing issue, or request that the National Housing Council establish a Review Panel to hold a hearing to review any systemic housing issue within federal jurisdiction. Review Panels consist of three members from the National Housing Council, and provide members of affected communities as well as groups that have expertise in human rights and housing an opportunity to participate. The panel then prepares a report with conclusions and recommendations for the Minister responsible for housing, who must respond within 120 days and table that response in the House of Commons and the Senate. The findings and recommendations brought forward by the Advocate and the Review Panel will help to identify solutions and necessary reforms to laws, policies and programs that affect housing and homelessness in Canada. This mechanism is a way to target the most critical systemic issues, as well as urge the government to take action on them -.It also gives members of affected communities an opportunity to be included and participate in the process, and to contribute to housing policy and solutions. Amplifying people's voices: The Advocate raises awareness on the most common and critical housing issues that people across Canada are facing. The Advocate plays a key role in amplifying the voices of those impacted by housing need and homelessness. Public engagement and input is critical to informing the work of the Advocate. " Monitoring the right to housing: The Federal Housing Advocate is responsible for monitoring and reporting on the right to housing and systemic housing issues in Canada. This work includes stakeholder engagement, analyzing and conducting research, initiating studies, and consulting on systemic housing , issues. The Advocate can initiate studies as they see fit into economic, institutional, or industry conditions in federal jurisdiction that affect the housing system. The Advocate is also resppnsible for monitoring the progressive realization of the right to adequate housing in Canada, and assessing the impacts of legislation, policies and programs that affect housing. This includes the National Housing Strategy Act and the related National Housing Strategy. The Advocate monitors the progress, goals and timelines of the Act and the National Housing Strategy, and is directed to pay close attention to their impact on groups and people in greatest housing need. A realistic approach to housing must include municipal, provincial and federal input. The need for funding and zoning and regulations and policies to provide long-term solutions has to be coordinated and leadership cannot be partisan.
Federal Housing Advocate Feels Homelessness Impacts at Carnegie Meeting Last August 31st Marie Josee Houle, the Federal Housing Advocate met with some Carnegie Board members and other activists from the Downtown Eastside. In 2019. Parliament passed the National Housing Strategy Act which recognizes housing as a human right and commits the Federal Government to further the progressive realization of the right to housing. The Federal Housing Advocate is housed at and supported by the Canadian Human Rights Commission. Ms Houle's work involves advising the government about what needs to be done to meet Canadians' housing needs. She is not a civil servant bureaucrat; she has been appointed as an advocate and her job requires her to be critical of government policy. During our meeting she listened carefully to our stories about conditions in SRO's - bedbugs, cockroaches, rats, mice, beyond filthy bathrooms with no toilet paper - stories about landlord negligence and profiteering; she listened to our experiences and reports about homelessness and she also heard about the caring and creativity present in our community. Concerns were expressed that we would just end up with another report gathering dust in some Ottawa filing cabinet, as has happened to commitments about helping Indigenous people, but she assured us that she is committed to advocacy and committed to doing something about creating better housing conditions for all Canadians. Support from the Canadian Human Rights Commission, now that the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act received Royal Assent on June 21,2022, expands (I believe) the advocate's mandate to push government to implement the Declaration's objectives and take all measures necessary to align federal laws with the Declaration. This has to include ending homelessness, which disproportionately impacts our Indigenous brothers and sisters. When we held hands at the end of the meeting, in recognition of National Overdose Prevention Day, and named people we knew who had died of overdoses, Marie Josee was moved to tears. I feel this is a meeting she will remember.
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On June 21, 2022, the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act received Royal Assent and immediately came into force Developed with Indigenous Peoples, this Act creates a legislative framework to implement the Declaration in Canada. It requires the Government of Canada, in consultation and collaboration with Indigenous Peoples, to develop an action plan to achieve the Declaration's objectives and take all measures necessary to align federal laws with the Declaration.
Please don't blow or scatter me away I don't want to burn out Yet I'm somewhat consumed And spent, kaput. Destroyed. I feel squandered and played out Exhausted, after this recent life, exhausted I need to rest, to be restored to be saved please gather me into your protection in an unselfish way accumulate in me only good things and I will hoard precious moments Virtuous shall be my days And in the end All is as it should be Allan Marters / Fireside writers
Through My Children's Eyes Their unrestrained laughter and excitement permeate my heart as we play together. I'm learning to be less over-protective, , less controlling of their every move. As they run carefree in the pJirk I both admire and envy • the valiant spirits they are.
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Their innocence and their simplicity touch a delicate chord in my soul. How can any mother harm or neglect her child? I'm mending from the pain and void I knew throughout my childhood. Those rather-be-forgot memories are being replaced with soulful love, laughter and friendship. The woundpd child within me heals as I experience life through my children's eyes. © Jacqueline Angharad Giles
1 am a eae:le Flying so high Start to swoop down from the sky. As I get closer to the ground I get afraid of what is there so I fly back up to where I feel safe from all the pain and despair Although I know the day must come where I fold my wings and land for ifI don't I will never know happiness and love as I so deserve Carol V You know when to stop, Yon know when to go, You know when to care. Just listen, just listen, What do you hear People , People. Rat a tat tat Rat a tat tat Into the doom. Open your eyes Don't look away We may go astray. Just take a breath, Smile a smile "Life" The Journey Still continues Gerry Maynard
A new library and hub for Vancouver's Black community has opened in Chinatown Bernice Chan . CBC News· Posted: Sep 04, 2022 7:00 AM PT
I Last
Updated: September 4
Vancouver has a new library in Chinatown dedicated to books written by people of colour. Located on Keefer Street near Gore Avenue, the Vancouver Black Library will also serve as a community hub for events like poetry and book readings, performances and exhibitions, says Maya Preshyon, founder and executive director. "It's a library in the sense that it has books, but it's also a library in that it connects people to people as much as it connects people to information," she told Early Edition host Stephen Quinn. She says the Chinatown location was chosen because of its proximity to Hogan's Alley, the historic Black neighbourhood that was demolished in the 1970s to make room for the Georgia and Dunsmuir viaducts.
People are pictured during the official opening ofthe Vancouver Black Library, located on Keefer Street near Gore Avenue, on Friday. (Ben Nelms/CBC) "Its main focus is to bring people together from the Black community so they can feel welcome and have a space for them, and its other focus is to educate everybody who wants to learn about Black culture in British Columbia, Ctnada, Vancouver," the 21-year-old said. "It's just a place for everybody to learn about one another and just become closer to one another through learning each others' experiences." Six months ago, a crowd funding campaign for the library helped raise $10,000 in less than two weeks - exceeding its $6,000 goal. The library, which has a collection of donated books, is also meant to create access to resources for people who tnight otherwise be unable to afford it. "Another thing that we're totally focused on is creating opportunities for people to connect with one another and access resources and skill sharing, just so that everybody can have low-barrier access to bigger opportunities," Preshyon said. "We also plan to lend software to do anything to create anything. We want to lend music equipment and we want to also connect people ... So we are offering all these skill-share programs and subscription usage and school sharing and music and creative equipment at a low barrier, totally free access for anybody who would be
otherwise unable to use it." Preshyon, an undergraduate at the University of British Columbia, says the library follows the tradition of minority communities who decide they need to collectively do something to address unmet needs. "It all kind of happened on a whim. It helps that it's related to my degree somewhat in social work and Indigenous studies so community organizing in this way felt relevant. I convinced myself that it was qualified work experience for my program," she said. Netaremy Brisay, communications co-ordinator for the library, says it helps serve the Black community, which has been underserved. "Here is where you can come and find specific books, literature and resources that are for Black people that are unheard of in Vancouver and I love the passion behind it because the community has really come to support us because they are really looking for this kind of space." The Vancouver Black Library is located at Unit #072 on 268 Keefer St.. Friday-Sunday, llam-5pm {Security guard opens the gate. Walk in, turn left, take elevator to LG, right to blue door, walk through, left down 2 corridors and find #072.]
DONATION DAY l} .:~H1~'1.~~."o to dlatl'!
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A huge thank you to our customers who supported our first Donation Days campaign! We appreciate your support as we get this new initiative up and running. Thanks to you V·le were able to donate $700 to Out iJJ Schools/Out on Film. We're excited to announce our second campaign with The Vancouver Black Library a new local organization offering resources and workspace by and for POGo Visit them on Instagrarn to see more about tileir important work.
Our next Donation Day is Tuesday September 13th . On the second Tuesday of each month, we will be donating a percentage of our ., sales, both in store and online, to a local charity or organization. For the months of September, October, and November, we \lvilt, be making a donation to The Vancouver Black Library
Going a little off the beaten path! (But oh So Worth it!) :-) A bit of extra Adventure
that requires traveling a little distance outside our neighborhood
Location: Parks with ponds are all over the city which includes, Trout Lake, Lost Lagoon in Stanley Park & memorial South Park on 41st Ave at Prince Albert St.
The Golden Weeping Willow! Golden Weeping Willow is an elegant tree with cascading yellow branches offering grace and color even in the winter! The Park-Popular beauty is from parents native to Western China but carried far beyond their range, beginning with ancient silk road traders! The Weeping Willow's ability to grow so quickly and become so breathtakingly beautiful is definitely ifs way of of inviting us, to be their friend to prune and care for their branches, bark, and leaves! Like a bonsai it's just looking for the right magic touch from the human hands of love to form and shape its Majesty! And I cannot possibly see how such a wonderful invitation of friendship, love, attention and bonding can be so easily ignored? It is my experience and times with the Willow trees that led to my interest in trees everywhere and how alive they really are and how they have personality of their own. They can feel and express love and communicate in their own way through the nature of things around them and where they've been placed to stand and be at home on this earth of God's majestic Glory and love for all to see! Thus resulting in this little nature series about trees, and their uniqueness & beauty, and the benefits each of them has to offer and of course how they came to be here in this Wonderful Urban Forest, we know as the City of Vancouver? In writing these I hope to encourage more awareness of the splendor & experiences that await us just from the simple act of slowing down and being more observant, taking that much needed time to enjoy the very nature of nature itself that does still exist and live all around us, in all those long walks and time outdoors in Parks, gardens, sanctuaries there are to enjoy! It's time to go back to slower, simpler days & times of life, time to find a ~~althy way to detach from computers, tablets, cell phones, T.V. music, movies, and or just noise pollution and distractions in of themselves. We need to get away from all those forms of unhealthy addictions brought on by modernization & the use of so much technology! Stepping back, never could I have imagined coming to live in a world where one has to go to treatment for WIFIICABLE/ tablet/Cell phone addiction? Seeing this growing crisis spreading around the world made me realize just how lucky I was for discovering the WILLOW TREE at the exact perfect time in MY LIFE I needed to! And it's that luck & good fortune I hope to share with you in writing encouraging words to help others find their way back to nature too! Discover the absolute truth of this tree's Uniqueness for yourself and why I saved it as my last one to share with you; the loyalty and best-friend that is right there for everyone to discover and bond with, grow close too, and know you, that you can come back to again and again and rely on for yourself to learn about, the Dr. and counselor that will always listen and never tire out on giving you all that you need from each and every visit, that you take the time away from busy life, technology and pollution to come to enjoy! Like as soon as you finish reading this article & go out exploring the willow tree along with all the rest that awaits your discovery in your neighborhood, on your city streets and in your parks & forests around you! Enjoy the remainder of our wonderful warm & sunny season & don't forget to use Sunblock and Stay Hydrated! Jennifer Coolevl www.futureproductionsonline.com
Psychiatric Inpatient Unit! Fish Do Cry for Janet Frame Rate your mood from one to ten, the nurse says. And I want to give her a poem, so the nurse writes non-compliant and I say pi. And that makes me even less compliant. It was the closest I could get to saying a poem. A patient asks if I'm writing memoirs, poems, a to do list. All of the above? None, I say. I hope that one day he reads this. Though that would be against hospital policyto write this to begin with. A chess game plays, the patient and the guard. I try hard to resist saying that Nabokov explained that Lewis Carroll based Alice on a pedophile chess riddle where the pawn is queened by sacrificing her protector. And which I think is the pawn in this game and which the pedophile. The patients pace around in blue and green pajamas. A painting from someone I know hangs on the wall. A patient says she has voices rather than hears them. I hear friends rather than have them. A worker asks if I will read this poem. I laugh. I tell him I will find something--if I can find something that won't get a note on my chart. I never get back to him. Outside the hummingbird feeder hangs for birds that will never come to fetid. Rain falls-tell us your favourite thing about rain, they ask us. I want to say how it foams at the mouth but then it will be another year until discharge. I grab onto the leg that wants to run but can't and grab the other that wants to get comfortable. Every institution is a playground for reliving childhood tr uma. I used to have a roommate who said fuck off to no one. Now I am that roommate in a room with no one in it. They still haven't fucked off. And they probably never will. The volunteer' comes at three with the therapy dog that's afraid of people. This poem won't fuck off. They come to my room frequently with pens and lists, doing the rounds, Santa says you've been good, Simon says swallow this. Now go play in the sandbox.
My little gods, monopoly top hats, I should be playing bingo, I should be being social. the bell tolls: One fish, two fish, fuck fish, blue, I type, You know you're in a psych ward when, the nurse says; privacy is a privilege level so high, no one has yet seen it. Away from the nurse's glare a patient tries to molest me then cries. And I tell him I'm sorry because I really am. I try to colour in the lines but I can't so I go back and forth with a crayon over a drawing of an owlI call it Owls Do Cry For Janet Frame, saved from a lobotomy because her book won a prize. Fish do cry too. Which is the front door and which is the back? One patient keeps asking and I keep sayingThere's no differenc~ut she just keeps on asking. I should just point and say, this one. The patients flock to the windows and meal trays like crows. They know that it isn't actually their last but one of many, too many-bleached white pamphlets of listings of ingredients. Turnips and chili-:,--onepacket of tea, one packet of pepper. I can't help it, I explain. That's what we're here for, they respond. To beat you down like a puppy. Fatten you up, dissect you. Look, a brain and a heart, we'll fix that. You must tell us your secrets or we'll pry them open from you. Where your tonsils are, we'll take those, a gown for you. Restraints and a rocking chair. We'll be mommy, daddy, physician, nurse, spiritual aid. Open up. There's still plenty left inside you. Simon says-we'll beat the poet out of you. unsigned
Hasty Rant I'm as disappointed with the word "community" as I am with many polite platitudes. The reality is that many individuals are struggling just to get their basic needs met. We have competition for dwindling resources and the back-stabbing that goes along with that. Systematically, resources get gobbled up by the elites who have the purchasing power & authority that goes with that. We have witnessed the demolition of buildings to make way for condos and a skytrain being built. Yet many citizens cannot afford transit fares. Welcome to Canada's socalled progress. For Whom? The use of the word "community" hooks some people into a wishful & positive magical-thinking. These people want to avoid "negativity". Have u met people who ask "how r u?" while they r walking away? Do u get the feeling that these pollyanna types r all talk with little substantive action? Or, even worse, their actions are not congruent with their words? Talk is cheap - especially when it comes to the outright spreading of lies in the form of gossip & propaganda. Narcissists thrive on presenting themselves as the benevolent do-gooders. They wear a mask of purity - as if they have no flaws - which they project unto others. I've experienced that it only takes one liar to instigate a slander/smear campaign.Perpetrators pretending to be victims. In the psychology of narcissism there is the term "flying monkeys". These r the people who believe gossip from one person without asking for her or his victim's side ofthe story. Every story has a counter story. This is evident in the dominator's/Settlers writing of native history The phrase "terra nullius" was a convenient way of portraying Turtle Island to be uninhabited. Then "terra nullius" was used to justify the legislation of the Christian Doctrine of Discovery as a cover up for the theft of communal native lands. Who is foolish enuf to offer the Pope a feathered headdress? This is not a gesture otSo-called "forgiveness" but a wishful longing for a reconciliation that cannot happen without substantive restitution which requires more than an apology. How about the Churches giving back their tax-free land so that more low-income housing can be built? How about implementing that Mansion Tax? Did shitty hall
accept Councillor Swanson as a mere token of their so-called benevolence towards impoverished communities? Swanson works so hard to truly care about the community. The hypocrisy of the phonies amongst us is devastating & overwhelming. Hence, we get pretensions of caring kindness and charity instead of justice. I wonder why one person's story (rendition of past events) becomes the go-along-with trend against the victims of gossip & distorted histories. This facade of caring is not my recipe for working on the idea of community. I don't have the solutions for the intersections of malaise & misery created by neo-liberal capitalism & Imperialism which create homelessness - amongst its many perversions of justice. Corporate agriculture is responsible for hunger & the wasted leftovers that go to garbage instead of offered at a lowered cost. Is gossip a by-product of racism & propaganda or is it a habit of meanness which gets glossed over by the pretensions of niceness? Pretty words that mask the lived realities of native & mixed-race peoples of co'our. I've resided in different locations of different cities over my many years of chasing the dragon of affordable rent. My son resides in our nation's capital, Ottawa, where he pays $600 for a room the size of a jail cell. People without children can only pretend that they care about future generations. Rampant individualism negates any sense of collectivity in this idealism of community. I've not experienced a truly caring community. . Perhaps we need to recognize that, as Sara Schulman says in her book entitled "Conflict is not Abuse"; conflict resolution is hard work. Genuine resolutions do not happen by avoiding negativity. Narcissistic perpetrators of abuse paint themselves as the victim in order to present themselves as the benevolent ones. Phonies who lie. Governments, corporations & power-hungry people spin tall tales.
When a conflict or questionable story happens, we need to hone our communication skills to enquire about the validity of one person's, or government's, pontifications over the reality of another person's or peoples experience. This is only one guideline along the rough road to some restitution in a complicated & conflict-ridden community. And a mutual conversation requires equal input - not one person's monopoly of time & space. I suspect that my words will get glossed over by the superficial phrases: "I'm sorry u feel that way" and "can't u get over the past?". As if the past is not part of our present. Change can only begin to come when we stop painting over other people's reality by using pretty words like "community". We are not "all in this together" equally. D.LeC. (Natives from the reservation in Quebec were assimilated with French surnames)
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"CH!NATOWN
may be the most important
new opera premiering in Canada this year."
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MiJrgaret Atwocd Christopher
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Tickets:
is a story of farnE,! ,1'1d neighbourhood, fa ism and resisrence. Set in ,961, it pivots to the bUi,ding of the CPF( and forward to our own times, CHINATOWN
It is a Western opera that lncorporates
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Chinese thernes, sounds and sensib'lrties.
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It iiiuminates six characters. two families, a chorus of ghosts - and oorselves today,
CITY OPERA VANCOUVER
Please join us, And bring sorr-eone you love,
www.dtyoperavancouver.cQm
Homeless Camps ... Why? The scene on Hastings Street - several hundred citizens, homeless, living in tents on cement sidewalks ongoing economic boom and bust cycles of insecurity, and catastrophic climate change prove the falsity of neoliberal claims that getting governments out of the way and letting the market's invisible hand do its thing would enrich everyone. Contrary to conservative economists' claims, wealth has not trickled down and enriched everyone; instead wealth has flooded up, made the rich massively richer, has promoted the carbon extraction industry, has created unsustainable inequality and inequity, has increased homelessness and has hollowed out the middle class. Homelessness and climate change are the result of massive market failure. The neoliberal market is not the best way to create a better society. What has been created are lowered expectations, loss of hope, accelerating fear and despair in what is for many a gig economy with no security. This so-called free market has massively increased profits for the minority 2% capitalist ruling class and the 20% owning class. We are not, as conventional economists would have us believe, in a "supply constrained" economy. There is no scarcity of willing and capable workers; nor, as demonstrated by quantitative easing used to bailout banks and insurance companies, is there a shortage of capital. We are in a demand constrained economy. Demands for adequate housing, for more comprehensive health care, for elder care and child care are not being met. Citizens living in more equal societies, as demonstrated by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett in their book, The Spirit Level: Why Equality is Better for Everyone, have significantly fewer social problems including less addiction and less homelessness. More equal societies provide more opportunities for social mobility, have less crime, and easier access to education for everyone. Heterodox economists working in fields such as Modem Monetary Theory are demonstrating that we can always have all the funds we need to produce all the goods and services for productive economic activity without creating excessive inflation. Neoliberal economists claims that if government borrowing becomes excessive, as in a homeowner becoming overly mortgaged, bankruptcy results. The difference is that governments are the issuer of currency and, as demonstrated in the~008 recession, trillions were created out of nothing (quastitative easing); no government bankruptcy resulted, and inflation remained low. Instead of "shock doctrine" capitalism that uses every disaster to create greater profits and consequent inflation, as was created recently by raising energy prices, we need socially innovative quantitative easing that puts money into the real productive economy, not into the FIRE (finance, insurance, real-estate) economy. As we transition into a green economy, we need to focus less on profits for those burning us and the Earth, and we need to attend more to services and resources for the majority who are being trickled on in this increasingly unequal world. Solving the problem of inequality solves the problem of homelessness and solves the problem of climate change. The wealthiest 1% of the world's population are responsible for twice as much carbon pollution as the poorest 50%. (The Guardian, August 25). We have been in the death grip of a wealthy capitalist financial elite minority ever since Keynesian economics, which advocates significant government involvement in the economy, started being dismantled in the seventies. Capitalism is never going to create a more equal, equitable society. Governments only, of the democratic kind, can equalize wealth and create a more fair, green world. It's time to liberate ourselves from the short-sighted, next quarters' profits, greed driven corporate agenda that is taking us to an increasingly hotter world with greater inequality. If this continues, we will have tens of thousands homeless in tents, not just hundreds. With imaginative governance and socially constructive quantitative easing, we can have all the capital we need to build the more beautiful world we know in our hearts is possible, which includes housing for everyone. By GILLES CYRENNE
Sources: Kelton, Stephanie. The Deficit Myth: Modern Monetary Theory and the Birth of the People's Economy, Hachette Book Group, 2020. Stanford, Jim. Economics for Everyone: A Short Guide to the Economics of Capitalism, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, 2015. Wilkinso, Richard, and Pickett, Kate. The Spirit Level, Why Equality is Better for Everyone, Penguin Books, 2010.
From 'the Library After a month break, the Community Death Care Project is back at it with a couple of offerings for September. Thursday, Sept 22nd 5-7, Learning Centre, Death Conversation Game with Angela Fama. Using the Death Conversation Game, creator/artist Angela Fama will be hosting an interactive collaborative conversation on death which you are invited to join! The subjects discussed will be defined through our shared conversation, inspired by questions presented through game (and how you chose to interpret the questions). This isn't a standardized game, where there's a winner or loser, this is instead a eo-created space for exploring ideas, sharing, and listening - as it is, in the moment. Saturday, September 24th 3-4pm, Theatre, Film Screening of Death Makes Life Possible. Death Makes Life Possible follows cultural anthropologist and scientist Marilyn Schlitz, Ph.D., as she explores the mysteries of life and death from a variety of perspectives and world traditions. Sparked by her own near-death experience as a teenager, Schlitz has been delving into the nature of consciousness and death for the past three decades. Please come by tlie library to register (or call at 604665-3010). Thank you all for your help in facilitating this project! Here are some books to get you started for these upcoming conversations: Let's Talk About Death (over Dinner): An Invitation and (;uide to Life's Most Important Conversation by Michael Hebb offers keen practical advice on how to have these same conversations-not just at the dinner table, but anywhere. There's no one right way to talk about death, but Hebb shares time- and
dinner- tested prompts to use as conversation starters, ranging from the spiritual to the practical, from analytical to downright funny and surprising. Dying for Ideas: the Dangerous Lives of the Philosophers by Costica Bradatan explores a cluster of topics that represent the untold, the unuttered, almost the unutterable in contemporary philosophy: death, dying, sacrifice and selfsacrifice. Ours is a culture of 'happy endings' and, in this respect, most philosophers of today are the spokespersons of their time. Bradatan is a dissenter. While the book purports to be about 'dying for an idea,' it in fact sings praise to life. Death, in Bradatan's view, is something that brings new meaning to life, a renewed intensity to the act of livin~. , Danielle, Camegie Branch Head