Category Archives: Canada

Why we need to pause before claiming cultural appropriation | Ash Sarkar

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The debate, tied up with racial oppression and exploitation, is a difficult one. Yet not every interloper is a colonialist in disguise

Is Gordon Ramsay allowed to cook Chinese food ? Is it OK to dress up as Disney’s Moana? Can Jamie Oliver cook jollof rice despite plainly not knowing what it is? Exactly what is cultural appropriation? To take a glance at Good Morning Britain, the ITV show that never takes its finger off the pulse of Middle England’s clogged arteries, you’d think it’s a question of white people seeking permission to have fun. And in return, new media outlets have guaranteed traffic from anxious millennials by listing things that fall into the category of problematic when white people adopt them (blaccents, bindis and box braids).

Related: Gordon Ramsay defends new restaurant in cultural appropriation row

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Canada says Facebook broke privacy laws and ‘refused to act responsibly’

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Top watchdog promises to force change following Cambridge Analytica scandal as New York announces new investigation

Facebook broke Canadian privacy laws when it collected the information of some 600,000 citizens, a top watchdog in the country said on Thursday, pledging to seek a court order to force the social media company to change its practices.

Canada’s privacy commissioner, Daniel Therrien, made his comments while releasing the results of an investigation, opened a year ago, into a data sharing scandal involving Facebook and the now-defunct British political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica.

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Canada’s Greens eye victory on Prince Edward Island

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Party sets sights on upsetting status quo on the front line of climate change

Canadians on Prince Edward Island are preparing to vote on Tuesday in a regional election that could lead to a Green party forming a government for the first time in the country’s history.

The party leader, Peter Bevan-Baker is a Scotland-born dentist who has transformed a routine election into a closely watched race as he seeks to upend expectation and precedent on 23 April.

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Provincial election losses may help Justin Trudeau’s green agenda

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Rightwing provinces fighting his carbon tax could be a boon to embattled Canadian leader

For months, Canada’s prime minister Justin Trudeau has been dogged by an ever-deepening political scandal that has dragged down his popularity and threatened his re-election prospects. In yet another blow, Trudeau last week lost one of his most important allies in the country’s fight against climate change in a bitterly contested regional election in Alberta.

But for the embattled Liberal prime minister the loss might be an electoral blessing, allowing him to shift messaging in anticipation of the October federal election, deploying fresh lines of attack against an opposition with little apparent interest in tackling environmental issues.

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Ancestry pulls ad that appears to romanticize slavery after backlash

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In the genealogy company’s commercial, a white man gives a black woman a ring and says they can ‘escape to the north’

Ancestry.ca, the Canadian outpost of the genealogy site Ancestry.com, has taken down an ad that was criticized for appearing to romanticize slavery. It was deemed an irresponsible retelling of an already reprehensible history.

ooooh my god LMAOOO who approved this ancestry commercial??? pic.twitter.com/Isy0k4HTMA

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Three mountaineers killed in avalanche in Canada

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Parks service says no chance of finding David Lama, Hansjörg Auer and Jess Roskelley alive

Three of the world’s most accomplished and well known mountaineers have been killed after an avalanche in the Canadian Rockies.

The two Austrian climbers, David Lama and Hansjörg Auer, and the American Jess Roskelley, had been missing since going to attempt a climb on a remote face of Mount Howse in Alberta’s Banff national park earlier this week.

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Trump’s new Cuba crackdown puts US at odds with Canada and Europe

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US will allow lawsuits against firms using property nationalised by the revolution, cap remittances and restrict ‘non-family’ travel

Donald Trump has taken another step towards reversing Barack Obama’s historic rapprochement with Cuba with a measure that earned swift criticism from allies in Canada and Europe.

The US announced on Wednesday that it would enable lawsuits against foreign companies that use properties nationalised by the communist government after Fidel Castro’s 1959 revolution.

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Canada’s legal weed struggles to light up as smokers stick to black market

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Six months after legalisation, licensed producers are unable to keep up with the demand or quality of neighborhood dealers

When Melissa, a resident of Halifax, Nova Scotia, went to one of Canada’s first government cannabis stores, she wasn’t impressed. “You can’t look at what they have. You can’t smell the product,” she said. “It’s too expensive.”

And so she, like tens of thousand of other Canadians, went back to their old habits: buying from neighbourhood dealers.

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Canada: police hunt fake deliveryman who shot woman with crossbow

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Suspect injured woman with a crossbow in a ‘premeditated, targeted’ attack, police say, in November 2018

Police in Canada are hunting a suspected hitman who they say disguised himself as a delivery person to carry out a “premeditated, targeted and isolated attack” on a woman, gravely injuring her with a crossbow.

Details of a brazen murder attempt were released to the public Monday morning by police in Mississauga, Ontario. The attack on the 44-year-old woman occurred late on 7 November 2018 in an area north of Toronto.

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Alberta election is key test for Rachel Notley and Canada’s carbon tax

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The Liberal party ended 40 years of conservative rule in the oil-rich province four years ago but an energy crisis could change that

When Canada’s leftwing New Democratic party launched a manifesto promising carbon taxes, coal plant closures and welfare spending in the heartland of country’s oil industry, few thought they could win.

But in 2015, the party ended 40 years of conservative rule in the province of Alberta with an unexpected victory that seemed to mark a seismic shift in Canadian politics.

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Who polices the cultural appropriation gatekeepers? | Kenan Malik

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Indigenous musicians in Canada are at one another’s throats over the Cree artist Cikwes’s use of a traditional Inuit singing technique

Another week, another row over cultural appropriation. But this one is different. It’s not a white artist being accused of appropriating the cultural forms of a minority community but an Indigenous Canadian artist being condemned for using the musical style of another Indigenous community.

Connie LeGrande, who performs under the name Cikwes, was nominated at the Canadian Indigenous Music awards in the best folk album category. LeGrande is a Nehiyaw, or Cree, one of Canada’s First Nations. On her album Isko, she uses katajjaq, a style of throat singing culturally and historically linked to Inuit groups. First Nations are Indigenous groups south of the Arctic Circle, Inuits those who live in the Arctic.

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Canada may regulate social media companies to avoid election meddling

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Firms are not doing enough to combat potential interference, minister said after report found foreign meddling is ‘very likely’

The world’s major social media companies are not doing enough to help Canada combat potential foreign meddling in this October’s elections and the government might have to regulate them, the cabinet minister in charge of ensuring a fair vote has said.

The democratic institutions minister, Karina Gould, spoke shortly after Canada’s electronic signals spy agency said it was very likely that foreign actors will try to meddle in the election.

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Canada: ex-cabinet members expelled from Liberal party amid scandal

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Jody Wilson-Raybould and Jane Philpott ousted after bribery controversy, as Trudeau says ‘trust has been broken’

Two former Canadian cabinet ministers have been expelled from their party after Justin Trudeau said they could no longer be trusted, as a bitter political scandal continues to inflict political damage on the ruling Liberal party.

Jody Wilson-Raybould, the country’s former justice minister and attorney general, and Jane Philpott, the former president of the treasury board, were expelled on Tuesday, following a vote by members.

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‘It’s no longer free to pollute’: Canada imposes carbon tax on four provinces

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Trudeau cited international commitments to fight global warning as premiers to say they would challenge the measure

Canada has imposed a landmark carbon tax on four provinces which had defied Ottawa’s push to combat climate change, prompting unhappy premiers to say they would challenge the measure.

Related: How to make a carbon tax popular? Give the proceeds to the people

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Quebec’s religious symbol ban targets minorities in the name of secularism | Martin Patriquin

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Bill 62 is the fruit of over a decade of institutionalized animus directed towards the province’s religious minorities

The government of Quebec, Canada’s second-most populous province, wishes to assure everyone that its newly proposed religious symbol ban doesn’t target hijabs, kippa, kirpans and the like. Rather, by outlawing the wearing of such accoutrements by certain government workers, it is ensuring that those who police streets, judge defendants, guard prisoners and teach children do not betray even a modicum of faith to those in their care – “a concrete affirmation that the Quebec state is secular”, as Quebec’s immigration minister, Simon Jolin-Barrette, put it recently.

Related: US woman kidnapped in Afghanistan says husband's abuse was just like captors'

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The Rolling Stones postpone tour due to Mick Jagger’s health

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Singer ‘devastated’ but expects to make full recovery and tells fans to keep tickets

Sir Mick Jagger has said he is “devastated” to let down fans after the Rolling Stones announced they were postponing a tour of the US and Canada while the frontman seeks medical treatment.

The singer, 75, has been told by doctors that he cannot go on tour at the moment but has been advised that he is expected to make a full recovery. No further details of his condition were given.

A statement from the group said: “Unfortunately today the Rolling Stones have had to announce the postponement of their upcoming US/Canada tour dates – we apologise for any inconvenience this causes those who have tickets to shows but wish to reassure fans to hold on to these existing tickets, as they will be valid for rescheduled dates, which will be announced shortly.

“Mick has been advised by doctors that he cannot go on tour at this time, as he needs medical treatment.

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US woman kidnapped in Afghanistan says husband’s abuse was just like captors’

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Caitlan Coleman says her Canadian husband, Joshua Boyle, was violent towards her before, during and after their kidnapping

A Canadian man who was kidnapped with his wife in Afghanistan was controlling and violent towards her before, during and after their five-year hostage ordeal, she told a Canadian court on Friday.

Caitlan Coleman, 33, gave testimony for a second day at the trial of Joshua Boyle, 35 who faces 19 criminal charges, including sexual assault, unlawful confinement and uttering death threats.

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Mosquito-spread diseases may endanger millions in new places due to climate change

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Study finds that places where people have never had the diseases could see bad outbreaks if they aren’t prepared

Half a billion more people could be at risk from mosquito-transmitted diseases within 30 years as a result of the warming climate, according to a new study.

Canada and parts of northern Europe could be newly exposed to the threat. People there could come into contact with yellow fever, Zika, dengue and chikungunya, as well as other emerging diseases.

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Grizzly bear that killed Canadian mother and baby was desperate for food

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Government investigation concludes the attack on Valérie Théorêt, 37 and Adèle, 10 months, was unpreventable

The grizzly bear that killed a Canadian schoolteacher and her infant daughter was injured and desperate for food, according to a government investigation which concluded the tragic attack could not have been prevented.

Valérie Théorêt, 37 and Adèle, 10 months, were killed in November by a male grizzly bear in an unprovoked attack as they walked close to the family’s remote cabin in the Yukon.

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