Tag: canada

tiger-in-the-flightdeck:

Oh god. I hear them through the open window. The weather has begun to turn mild, bringing with it the familiar, and terrifying sounds of spring. A few at first, then more begin to arrive. Their calls are smug, a reminder that winter had been just a brief reprieve from their chaos and violence. The final traces of snow melts away, and you know. Elsewhere, a softly chirping robin will mark this change of seasons. Not here. No, here we know true fear.

The Canada Geese are back.

Toronto has had a serial killer operating in the gay Village for nearly a decade.

allthecanadianpolitics:

queenalia:

hewson-wehaveaproblem:

Gay men have been going missing in Toronto’s gay village since 2010. Last month, an arrest was made by Toronto police and Bruce McArthur has since been charged with 5 counts of first-degree murder. Today, police announced that six bodies were discovered on his property.

In June, I went to Toronto for the Gay Pride Parade. I spent a lot of time in the Gay Village. The first afternoon I was there, a friend took me aside and told me to be careful because people were going missing from the Village.

“Okay,” I agreed. No questions, no surprise. I went to Pride. My friend and I had a great time. We went out. We stayed out. And we were careful.  

I was in Toronto visiting friends over Christmas. On New Year’s Eve, my girlfriend at the time and I decided to head to the Village with some friends and hang out at a drag bar.

When we made plans, we were all keenly aware of the fact that there were rumors of a serial killer operating in Toronto’s gay village. We knew because we are queer, and we have queer friends, and we spend time in queer spaces.

In other words, we knew because we had to know.

It took me an afternoon of Googling to piece together how many people had gone missing in Toronto. The articles I did find generally came from the families of some of those who had gone missing, desperately searching for information, or from queer voices out of the Village, wondering why no one had bothered to take notice of a serial killer targeting a specific demographic of Toronto.

It was a rhetorical question. We all know why.

To make matters worse, a strong element of racial bias undergirds the entire investigation. The outcry from Toronto’s LGBTQ community details a sickening degree of racism and willful ignorance.  

I should disclose that I live fulltime in Montreal.  But my best friend lives in Toronto. I had a girlfriend there for several months. Two of my closest friends visit their parents in the city regularly. I made it my business to know when my friends were headed to the Village, and to make sure they checked in with me at the end of the night. There are some things that you don’t, as friends, always acknowledge openly. As a gang of queers in our early twenties, we tacitly agreed to keep an eye on another as best we could. Certainly no one else does. We knew that, too.

Toronto had a particularly intense cold snap at the end of December, and the city was offering free public transit for New Year’s Eve, so we gladly avoided walking when we could— we stayed warm, and, I thought, avoided ridiculous Uber fares.

“I wouldn’t want to take an Uber anyways,” one of the local girls remarked as I expressed fascination at the efficiency of Toronto’s streetcar system.

“Why not?” As someone who grew up in a small town with minimal public transit, and pitiful taxi service, I couldn’t imagine not taking advantage of [carpooling services].

“Well, they think the guy abducting people from the village has been posing as an Uber driver,” my friend told me nervously. “So I don’t really want to take an Uber to the Village and back. Just in case.”

By this point, 7 people had gone missing from the village since 2010. The latest victim had disappeared only a month prior, on November 25th, 2017.

On New Year’s Eve, I smoked a joint on Bloor and paraded my drunken self up and down the street with no problem. I did not see a single police car or officer.

Toronto’s police force has been under fire for months for abandoning previous investigative projects regarding the missing men. Despite outcry from the LGBTQ community, Toronto police declared last year that there was no evidence of a serial killer at work in the Village.

Between 1975 and 1978, 14 gay men went missing from the Village. Police suspected a serial killer at the time, but half the cases—in which 7 gay men were brutally and violently murdered—remain unsolved today. McArthur was in his mid-twenties at the time.

It took me a fair amount of research and time and reaching out to put together enough information to realize the scale of silence and avoidance on behalf of media across Canada and the Toronto police department. I don’t wonder why. Dead queers are not headline news. Especially if they aren’t White. Or they’re queer women. I suppose, in the end, a serial killer is only as interesting as his victims.

And so this is Toronto—Canada’s largest city, where the crosswalks are painted in rainbow colors. And this is homophobia. This is transphobia. This is racism. And this is Montreal. New York. Every small town, big city, or backwater village in North America. Rainbow flags in storefront windows do not mean a damn thing when we are being picked off and abandoned. We cannot be quiet. I will not be quiet and pretend like this is not happening merely because it is happening to people condemned to expendability by virtue of their sexuality, ethnicity, or gender.

I’m done hearing things about living in a “post-gay” moment. I’m sick of listening to people whine about tolerance and inclusivity and bathroom policies. “It’s 2018,” people sigh at me. “No one cares about this stuff anymore.”

I’m going to start telling people that they’re right. No one does care about this stuff anymore.

I’m just not sure they ever did.

(source)

–

I wish all the victims and all those affected by the atrocities in Toronto–friends, families, fellow queers, and LGBTQ folks alike—peace, wellness, and justice. Don’t sleep on this. We cannot be silent. 

RIP. 

  • Skandaraj “Skanda” Navaratnam
  • Abdulbasir “Basir” Faizi
  • Majeed “Hamid” Kayhan
  • Selim Esen
  • Andrew Kinsman
  • Alloura Wells
  • Chase Kincaid
  • Tess Richey
  • Majeed Kayhan
  • Soroush Mahmud
  • Dean Lisowick

@allthecanadianpolitics do you know anything about this?

I’ve posted a LOT about this.

You can find all I’ve posted about this disturbing story under the following hashtags: #Bruce McArthur, #Toronto, #LGBTQ, #Serial Killer, and #Homophobia.

Tonight I posted a new disturbing development in this story:

Remains of 6 people found at property tied to alleged serial killer Bruce McArthur

In the next 3 weeks, Canada will make a decision that could save the bees for good

daltongraham:

lgbt-moodboards:

radfemsideblog:

dorianshavilliard:

parttimeperfectionist:

um guys?

canada is currently considering banning imidacloprid, which is apparently “one of the most widely used bee-killing pesticides in the world”. this seems pretty huge, so if you’ve got two seconds, add your name to the list! as of posting this link, they need just over 8,000 more signatures by february 21!

@allthecanadianpolitics

I DON’T CARE IF YOU’RE AMERICAN
PLEASE REBLOG THIS SO THAT OTHER CANADIAN USERS CAN SEE IT

COMPLETELY OFF TOPIC BUT THIS IS IMPORTANT TO ME

@littlebeekeeper

In the next 3 weeks, Canada will make a decision that could save the bees for good

high-quality-not:

hey tumblr,,, i know it’s not as big of a deal to you because it’s not america,,, but canada is having a net neutrality battle too

I think we’d all really appreciate if you signal boost content that explains all of this. We need help! There are more people in California than in all of Canada, but we still need to fight off big corporations like Bell, Shaw, Rogers, Telus and Cineplex, who are trying to steal our net neutrality. The likelihood that this goes through has nothing to do with it, we need to show our government that THIS ISN’T OKAY. THAT WE CARE ABOUT OUR NET NEUTRALITY! C’MON!

canadadoesnotexist:

To my indigenous followers and those who are allies to indigenous people:

Please, I am begging you to make this known, to get the word out there. I am only asking for a reblog. Please help support the people of Skownan (formerly known as Waterhen).

Come Monday morning many indigenous people (elders, adults, youth, and children) will be displaced. AGAIN.

Let me tell you what lead up to the situation they’re in now.

In 1996 families protested against the corrupt chief of Waterhen (now Skownan). Supporters of the chief burned down the band office, destroying information that would implicate the chief and Canada of corrupt business. 

Barricades went up. Police were called in. A month later the protesters and their leader were taken into custody.

Roughly 300 members left the reserve due to harassment and violence. Many of them had their houses burned down, had their possessions seized, lost their jobs, and most of all lost their right to live in the community. 

These people were chased off their own lands by their own fucking people.

Many had to settle in places far from their original homes.

Eventually the Canadian government stepped up and told those who were displaced that they could live in Manitoba housing rent-free until more permanent accommodations could be made. This was meant to be temporary while a relocation process was put in the works to establish a new reserve.

After awhile, the residents had to pay rent which they were okay with since it wouldn’t be long.

WRONG!

As usual, the Canadian government always fucks over its indigenous people time and time again. Canada did not keep its end of the deal, instead breaching the agreements set out.

In protest, the displaced residents decided to not pay rent in order to get the government to listen and keep their end of the deal and address the injustices.

For twenty years these families have had to go through unfair treatment through the legal and justice systems. They’ve been ignored for so long.

Yet again these families (and descendants) will be kicked out of their homes, all because the Canadian government didn’t want to deal with them anymore.

Please, I am asking you to help in any way you can. If you are in Winnipeg, you can join the protests outside of the Manitoba Legislature building.

I am not very knowledgeable but if you know what to do in these kinds of situations, please let me know.

If you want to read more about it, here you go:

article 1, article 2, article 3, article 4

Lesbian escapes Russia by boat and sails to Canada to be with the woman she loves

angryirene:

quickweaves:

girlsmoonsandstars:

dear goddess let there be a movie

I AM LIVING

Folks this is a beautiful story but these two women need help. She has NOT found a safe haven in Canada.

It’s been 10+ years since Elena (the Russian) arrived in Canada. At first she was declared a refugee and was granted asylum. Over the last several years she has been fighting with the Canadian government to become a citizen (as she is the spouse of a Canadian citizen), and has run into about a million bureaucratic and incompetent hurdles, the result of which is that she is now a stranded and stateless person through no fault of her own. Her partner has prepared a press release (http://www.cadenza.ca/index.php/en/news/#pressrelease) that contains the full story. Please read it, and do what you can for them – I don’t know of a way to donate to them, but at the very least spread the word. If you’re Canadian, please RAISE HELL about this.

Lesbian escapes Russia by boat and sails to Canada to be with the woman she loves