Tag: Toronto

Colonial statues defaced in downtown Toronto

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Last night, for the second time in a week, the statues of John A MacDonald and Eggerton Ryerson were doused with paint.

In case you missed it, last week, activists with Black Lives Matter – Toronto dumped paint and spray painted messages around 3 statues in downtown Toronto; an attack against the symbols of Canada’s violent and ongoing, racist, colonial legacy. That day also resulted in one of the fiery-est, most love and rage-filled anti-cop rallies we’ve experienced in a long time and one of the greatest displays of jail support we’ve seen in this city. Read More …

Ford Escalates Threat of Mass Evictions

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On July 2, the Ontario government voted to amend Bill 184, the Eviction Bill, in a step towards ensuring mass evictions for Ontario tenants who have been unable to pay rent in full during the COVID-19 crisis. All tenants who have been unable to pay full rent, whether they have signed repayment plans or not, will be affected by this predatory bill. Now heading into its third reading, the amended Bill could be passed into law as early as next week. Read More …

10 years ago ~ reflections on the state’s utilization of shame: #MyG20Story

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10 years ago today I was just waking up in Toronto, after a day of the largest mobilization I have ever been a part of to this day. What power it felt to be out in those streets. There were SO MANY COPS and also SO MANY OF US. And now on this morning, 10 years ago, so many of us were in jail. Yet the streets continued to be alive with resistance, and we had another demo that afternoon. Somehow until that moment I had evaded arrest. That later demo, (which was going to be a prison demo) did not end up happening, the area was streaming with cops. Me and some pals were stopped, searched, and arrested, like so many. Read More …

Where do you stand? Pride action in the class war of Toronto gay village

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This pride week, residents of Toronto’s Queer Village woke up to a question they can no longer avoid answering: WHERE DO YOU STAND?

On June 26 2020, an ad hoc affinity group of queer and trans Village dwellers peppered the historically queer Church and Wellesley neighbourhood and the blocks surrounding — our turf — with circular floor decals, a now familiar feature of the pandemic urban landscape. Read More …

The time we spent talking about violence: #MyG20Story

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Back in the leadup to the 2010 G20 summit, the debate around violence-nonviolence felt so important – both externally to other group or the public, and within ourselves as individuals. You couldn’t open your mouth in 2010 without talking about violence, but now that debate doesn’t feel at all relevant to my life. It doesn’t at all feel like a sticking point. The issue still comes up, but the illusory divide around it doesn’t seem real now. Maybe watching the endless series of bodies killed by police, watching all the victims as capitalism has conquered the world has made the debate seem trivial. Read More …

Ambitious Times: On Decentralized regional organizing for the 2010 G20 summit

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I’m based in Hamilton was involved in Southern Ontario Anarchist Resistance, SOAR, in the leadup to the 2010 G20 summit. In the years since, a lot of our conversations about that organizing experience since focus on repression – the undercovers, the mass arrests, the prison time – but lately what stands out to me most about it is how ambitious the whole mobilization was. Read More …

Toronto Tenants: We’re in this Together

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Since March, tenants have been facing hard choices. While being ordered to stay home, people across Ontario have lost wages. Many have lost their jobs entirely. Although CERB was supposed to solve this economic crisis, Toronto tenants know the math doesn’t add up. As bills pile up and work remains impossible for many, people are being targeted by landlords. We’re told that we’re alone and irresponsible. We’re told we can pay up or get out. We’re told that what little money we have isn’t for survival – but for our landlord. Read More …

Justice for Regis: Some critical reflections on the May 30 demo

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On May 30, a few days after Regis Korchinski-Paquet was killed by Toronto police, a demo brought thousands of people together in Christie Pitts to challenge police violence and anti-black racism. Over the same period in the US, combative demos occurred every night in many cities in response to a police killing in Minneapolis, pushing back the police and burning their stuff, as well as attacking businesses, part of the capitalist system that has brutalized and exploited black people since its beginnings. Read More …

From Embers: New Content in Spring 2020

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From Embers is a regular anarchist podcast produced in Kingston, Ontario. We produce a few episodes each month about actions and projects going on in so-called Canada that inspire us, or about topics that we think will be relevant to anarchists living north of the border. We are part of the Channel Zero Anarchist Podcast Network. Read More …