The morning of October 26th, workers at health-care sites across the province of Alberta walked off the job. What happened, and how has the broader labour movement responded? Join Team Advantage as we discuss the wildcat strike and the Alberta Federation of Labour’s response. If you’re interested in the AFL’s campaign, check it out at standuptokenney.ca.
A full transcript follows the break.
Documentary filmmakers Marc Serpa Francoeur and Robinder Uppal rejoin Team Advantage to discuss their theatrical-length exploration of the deeply troubled Calgary Police Service: No Visible Trauma. Recent years have seen the Calgary Police Service shoot and kill more people than officers in any other Canadian city, and more than either the New York or Chicago police departments in 2018.
No Visible Trauma can be streamed on demand through the Calgary Underground Film Festival until December 1st. Follow the film on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Please consider contributing to their legal fund (they are being sued by Constable Christopher Harris for $150,000 in damages).
A full transcript follows the break.
Monuments in Canada memorializing Ukrainian Nazi SS divisions have raised questions about the nature of Ukrainian ultra-nationalists and their history in Canada. Writer and researcher Moss Robeson joins Team Advantage to explore a range of questions: who was Ukrainian nationalist Stepan Bandera, and what is the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists? What role have Ukrainian ultra-nationalists played in Canada, and how do their activities contribute to Canada’s current foreign policy commitments in the Ukraine?
Follow Moss Robeson on Twitter @mossrobeson__, and subscribe to his substack at banderalobby.substack.com. Read his work in Passage, Canadian Support For Ukrainian Nazi Collaborators Goes Beyond Statues, and The Grayzone, How a network of Ukrainian ultra-nationalists penetrated Canada’s Conservative Party to lobby for military conflict.
A full transcript follows the break.
Tyler Shipley, author of Canada in the World: Settler Capitalism and the Colonial Imagination, joins Team Advantage to discuss his latest book. How does the violence of colonization become Canada’s “first foreign policy?” How amenable was the Canadian state to Hitler’s fascism in the lead-up to the Second World War? What was the extent of Canada’s involvement in the Korean War? How does Canada’s foreign policy continue to orchestrate invasion, proxy wars, and coups?
Purchase Canada in the World at your local independent bookstore, or from Fernwood Publishing. Follow Canada in the World on Twitter @canadainthewrld, and follow Tyler Shipley @le_shipster.
A full transcript follows the break.
Alberta is the only province in the country that allows charter schools, and Jason Kenney’s United Conservative Party has now removed the cap that had limited their expansion. Joel French, Executive Director of Public Interest Alberta, joins Team Advantage to discuss the first new charter school in Alberta in 13 years, opening about 50km from Edmonton. Why a new charter school— in the same location a public school recently closed? How does this relate to the broader changes that are happening within Alberta’s public education system?
Follow Joel French on Twitter @JoelFrench, and follow Public Interest Alberta’s work at pialberta.org and @PIAlberta.
A full transcript follows the break.
What does horror tell us about our fears and anxieties under capitalism? What do reanimated bodies, vampires, and zombies tell us about what is monstrous about our world? Team Advantage discusses David McNally’s book, Monsters of the Market: Zombies, Vampires and Global Capitalism.
A transcript follows the break.
What’s a strike? Why do they happen? What’s a picket line? How can I support a strike? What is the mass media likely to say about a strike? What role do the courts and labour board play? What dirty tricks might be expected from employers? Team Advantage addresses all this and more in our overview of labour action basics.
A transcript follows the break.
At the opening ceremony for Calgary’s southwest ring road, seth cardinal dodginghorse interrupted the proceedings —in the presence of Jason Kenney, Ric McIver, Tsuu’tina Chief Roy Whitney, and Mayor Naheed Nenshi— and told his story. We’re pleased to have seth join us to discuss the context behind his action, the history of Tsuu’tina and Calgary, the legacy of colonization, and Calgary’s fixation on automobile culture.
Follow seth on Instagram @sadbirthdays, on Twitter @lawrenceteeth, and at lawrenceteeth on Bandcamp.
seth’s installation at the Calgary Central Library (as part of the Tina Guyani Collective), titled “210 Chaguzagha-tsi tina (For 210 Weaselhead Road),” is on display for the month of October, and a virtual sit-down with the artists is occuring on Thursday, Oct. 29th, from 7 – 8 p.m.
UNTUNNELLING VISION | JIN-ME YOON, featuring acoustic experiments by seth cardinal dodinghorse, can be viewed at Truck Contemporary Art until December 12, 2020.
Yoko Ono’s WATER EVENT 1971/2020, featuring seth cardinal dodginghorse, is on display at Contemporary Calgary until January 31, 2021.
In 1961, Saskatchewan CCF Premier Tommy Douglas moved to fulfill a campaign promise to provide universal medical care insurance— an effort that would produce fierce opposition from Saskatchewan’s doctors, culminating in a 23-day doctors’ strike in July of 1962. The program’s success resulted Canada-wide medicare coverage in 1968. What can be learned from this example, where progressive reforms were opposed by a well-resourced and entrenched establishment? Is this labour action by doctors — to defend their profits — an example of a bad strike? Why have efforts to expand medicare to include pharmacare and dental care stalled for so long?
Further reading:
Doctors’ Strike: Medical Care and Conflict in Saskatchewan (1967) by Robin F. Badgley and Samuel Wolfe
Bitter Medicine, Part One: The Birth of Medicare (NFB documentary)
A transcript follows the break.
Andre Goulet of the newly-launched Harbinger Media Network joins Team Advantage to talk about the problem of reactionary podcasts that unfortunately top the charts. How might we expand the reach of fledgling left-wing podcasts and help get our ideas into the mainstream?
To learn more about Harbinger, visit harbingermedianetwork.com and follow @harbingertweets. Follow Andre Goulet on twitter @andremarrgoulet.
A transcript follows the break.