This immersive art experience held in Powell Park highlights the stories of those living unhoused and the value of community

From Oct. 17 to 19, Hamilton-based non-profit Helping Hands Street Mission transformed the parking lot of Powell Park, located near Barton St. E. and Birch Ave., into an immersive art experience. Entitled “We’re All Neighbours Here," this event featured 13 artists who each portrayed a different experience with housing insecurity or instability.

Located at 349 and 351 Barton Street East, HHSM provides friendship-based support for people experiencing poverty. Proceeds from the event went towards paying the artists and supporting various initiatives at HHSM such as their free cafe, clothing store and social programs. Tickets were sold in advance for $25 and at the door for $30.

Lauren Galenkamp, the executive projects assistant at HHSM spoke to The Silhouette about the inspiration for the event. “A lot of the stories that I’ve heard from a lot of the friends at Helping Hands have shifted the way that I view a lot of things. It’s made me more compassionate. It’s made me softer as a person. It also has made me realize that not a lot of people get a chance to listen to those stories, so I wanted to make a space for our friends to tell their stories and for people to come and listen,” said Galenkamp.

A lot of the stories that I’ve heard from a lot of the friends at Helping Hands have shifted the way that I view a lot of things. It’s made me more compassionate. It’s made me softer as a person ... I wanted to make a space for our friends to tell their stories and for people to come and listen

Lauren Galenkamp, Executive Projects Assistant
Helping Hands Street Mission

Ten different stations were set up, each depicting a different person’s story. Works included photography, paintings, sculptures, spoken word, and dance. Attendees were encouraged to walk through the exhibit at their own pace. “Art is this incredible bridge and storytelling is this incredible bridge that makes it easier for us to think about things and to sit with things and wrestle with things,” said Galenkamp.

One of the artists is Sarah C., who shared her story through an essay that was both displayed and read aloud. "Community is important because it makes you feel seen, heard, and like a human being who belongs in society, instead of just being another statistic for homelessness," wrote Sarah.

The exhibit featured interactive components, including a station called “Tapestry” with writing prompts about the meaning of home. As attendees exited the exhibit, they were invited to write reflections on a large paper banner. There was also a children’s station with various activities.

The name “We’re All Neighbours Here,” was chosen to represent the community-based perspective that HHSM practices. “We all have something to give. We are all neighbours in this space and we all care for this space together. Sometimes people have ways they contribute that don’t look typical to what we would expect, but that doesn’t mean that they don’t have something to contribute that is valuable in community,” said Galenkamp.

We all have something to give. We are all neighbours in this space and we all care for this space together.

Lauren Galenkamp, Executive Projects Assistant
Helping Hands Street Mission

The decision to hold this fundraiser stemmed from a desire to change the annual HHSM fundraising gala. “Our galas always have so much in the program because we want so many friends to be able to share their story that it ends up being a very full evening of just friends telling stories. Which is so great, but is not what people want from a gala necessarily. It made us realize that maybe we should be doing an event that feels more like us and feels like it is more accessible, because galas are expensive,” said Galenkamp.

She added that the event was intentionally held outdoors to encourage people to consider the experiences of people who have to live outdoors, especially in cold and rainy weather.

Galenkamp said that she began planning the event in July and the process was supported by two artist coordinators and a group of volunteer mentors. Vik Mudge, one of the participating artists, discussed his experience participating in the show. “It’s been really interesting to meet folks from many different places and many different backgrounds and many different experiences. It’s been really powerful to talk to people and hear their stories and experiences,” said Mudge.

Another of the artists, Michael Irvine, echoed this sentiment. “Everything’s been very powerful with the friendliness in people. Everybody wants to help you. We don’t label it as love but there’s a lot of love,” said Irvine.

Galenkamp said she hoped that the exhibit would help people move forward with compassion. “What we need in this city pretty badly is more compassionate people in our neighbourhoods. I want my friends to be able to share their stories and for people to see them and be changed by them and be affected by them. I would love for it to have long term impact over the way that we see each other as neighbours,” said Galenkamp.

What we need in this city pretty badly is more compassionate people in our neighbourhoods. I want my friends to be able to share their stories and for people to see them and be changed by them and be affected by them. I would love for it to have long term impact over the way that we see each other as neighbours.

Lauren Galenkamp, Executive Projects Assistant
Helping Hands Street Mission

After the event, Galenkamp expressed that she was proud and grateful. "Each of the artists were able to feel proud and present their art, and ultimately their story, in a dignified way. We are so grateful for the [over 200] people who came and listened to their stories. It is because of our community showing up that continues to remind us that making space for our friends to tell stories is always a valuable use of time and resources," stated Galenkamp.

If you are interested in hearing people’s stories, HHSM has several videos on their Instagram and Youtube pages including their “Let’s Talk About Barton,” series and “Chris’s Story.” To learn more about HHSM and the supports they provide, you can visit their website.

Photos from Silhouette Photo Archives

Hamilton is a city of stark inequalities. As the city’s economy booms, many Hamiltonians are swept to the sidelines as a result of a housing crisis and employment insecurity. Compared to other cities in Ontario, Hamilton also has a high proportion of working class people, disabled people and refugees, who are often the first to feel the brunt of these changes.

Health outcomes over the past decade have been bleak, and according to many disability justice and healthcare advocates, show no signs of changing unless bold steps are taken to support Hamilton’s marginalized populations.

 

The Code Red Project

In 2010, the Hamilton Spectator released Code Red, a project that mapped the connections between income and health across Hamilton to explore the social determinants of health. Using census and hospital data from 2006 and 2007, the report showed strong disparities in health outcomes between the Hamilton’s wealthiest and poorest neighbourhoods.

The Code Red project shows that social and economic inequalities lead to health inequalities. The lower city, which experiences disproportionately higher rates of poverty, also has significantly poorer health outcomes.

In February 2019, an updated Code Red project was released using data from 2016 and 2017. The updated Code Red project found that in general, health outcomes in Hamilton have declined and inequalities have grown.

Since the first Code Red project in 2010, the average lifespan in parts of the lower city has declined by 1.5 years. Furthermore, the gap in lifespan between Hamilton neighbourhoods has grown from 21 to 23 years.

 

Hamilton: the past 10 years

These results come as no surprise to Sarah Jama, an organizer with the disability justice network of Ontario. According to Jama, given the lack of political change coupled with changes in the city of Hamilton, it was inevitable that poverty would worsen and inequalities would deepen.

Jama notes that health care and social services tend to be compacted into the downtown core, which has tended to have a higher concentration of people who rely on these services.

However, rising costs of living within the downtown core has meant that the people who access these services are being priced out. According to a report by the Hamilton Social Planning and Research Council, eviction rates have skyrocketed in the past decade. As a result, the people who rely on these services have to make compromises about whether to live in a place with supports available close by, or a place that is affordable.

“The more compromises you have to meet with regard to your ability to live freely and safely in the city the harder it is to survive,” said Jama.

Denise Brooks, the executive director for Hamilton Urban Core, works directly with people at the margins of Hamilton’s healthcare system. Brooks noted that the 2010 Code Red project was a wake up call for many.  

“For me one of the biggest takeaways [from the first Code Red project] was even greater resolve that this really is a political issue and that it hasn't been looked at and is not being looked at as a crisis,” stated Brooks.

The 2010 Code Red project sparked projects including the Hamilton neighbourhood action strategy and pathways to education program. According to Brooks, while these initiatives were beneficial, more robust policy is needed to substantially address poverty.

“... [C]an we see any change in policy orientation? Did we see a reallocation of resources? Did we see a redistribution of priorities in any way? I would have to say no,” said Brooks.

 

Looking ahead

The updated Code Red project calls for a restructuring of the traditional health care system to include social and economic programs that contribute to people’s overall health.

However, recent political changes have led many health advocates to worry that the coming years will see change for the worse. Matthew Ing, a member of the DJNO research committee, notes that provincial cuts to a slew social assistance programs threaten to further exacerbate the existing inequalities in Hamilton.

In November 2018, the provincial government announced reforms to Ontario Works and the Ontario Disability Support Program that aimed to streamline social assistance and incentivize people to return to work. Among many changes, this includes aligning the definition of disability to align with the more narrow definition used the federal government.

According to Jama, narrowing the eligibility requirements for disability support makes it likely that people will slip through the cracks. They will put the responsibility on the municipality to provide services, meaning that care is likely to differ between providers.

“The onus is going to be on individual service providers on all these people to really decide who really fits this idea of being disabled enough to be on the service versus it being like sort of supervised by the province,” stated Jama.

Additionally, in February 2019 the provincial government announced plans to streamline and centralize the health care process. Under the proposed model, Ontario Health teams led by a central provincial agency will replace the existing 14 local health integration networks across the province.

Brooks noted that this has not been the first time that the province sought out to reform healthcare. Having worked in community health for years, Brooks remarks that the changes that are made to healthcare frequently exclude people on the margins.

“It's always the people who are the most marginalized, the most vulnerable, the socially isolated and historically excluded that remain on those margins all the time regardless of the change that go through,” said Brooks.

Currently, patient and family advisory committees work to inform the work of LHINs. The government has not announced whether PFACs will be retained under the new model, but Ing worries that a centralized model would leave patients and families out of the decision making process.

However, Ing recognizes that the current system is far from perfect, noting that disabled communities were not adequately represented on PFACs. According to Ing, this speaks to the much larger problem of political erasure of people with disabilities.

“Disability justice means that we must organize across movements, and we must be led by the people who are most impacted,” writes Ing.

The DJNO was created in order to mobilize disabled communities and demand a holistic approach to healthcare reform. According to Jama, this includes seeing race, income, and disability as fundamentally interconnected.

However as social assistance measures are cut at the provincial level, the future for disability justice is murky. The results of the updated Code Red project paint a sobering picture of the state of health inequality in Hamilton. Given the direction that healthcare reform is taking on the provincial level, health and poverty advocates worry about the future of healthcare equality in Hamilton.

 

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Photos C/O Trevor Copp

By: Jackie McNeill

Tottering Biped Theatre, a Hamilton-based theatre company founded by Trevor Copp, has reached over 600,000 views on a TED Talk about ‘liquid lead dancing,’ a gender neutral form of partner dancing.

Several McMaster alumni are involved in the theatre company, particularly with their summer Shakespeare work held at the Royal Botanical Gardens.

The theatre is social justice-focused, devising works that have addressed issues like poverty, same sex marriage and mental health and different interpretations of Shakespeare.

However, as prominent as the theatre’s work is, it is not what Copp is arguably best known for.

In 2015, he and his colleague Jeff Fox delivered a TED Talk in Montreal on a dance concept they developed called ‘liquid lead dancing.’

Liquid lead dancing, a form of gender neutral partner dance, was born out of Copp’s discomfort with the systems and rules he was perpetuating as a ballroom dance teacher.

As explained in their TED Talk, the strictly gendered partner dancing promotes a relationship shaped by dictation, where the man leads and the woman follows.

He and Fox developed liquid lead dancing to turn this dictation into a negotiation.

“It proposes a system where lead and follow are exchanged throughout the course of the dance regardless of gender,” Copp explained.

This change of form will hopefully become normalized as a dance and help to normalize healthy relationships outside of partner dance as well.

The liquid lead dance between Copp and Fox morphed into a play about creating the first dance for a same sex wedding.

After a successful run of the play, a former student contacted Copp about presenting their dance form as a TED talk.

Copp and Fox’s TED talk was picked up by TED.com, and has over 600,00 views to date.

Despite the success of the TED talk, Copp admits that it has not been all smooth sailing promoting liquid lead dancing.

“Most people are comfortable with their given role, and, even though they aren't particularly traditional in their thinking, allow it to decide their roles as dancers. There's comfort in the familiar. I don't begrudge it at all. I just think that if you're going to recreate a culturally outdated form you should be conscious of it by making a choice to do so as opposed to sleepwalking your way through the dance form.”

Acknowledging that the work he had done with liquid lead dance is not that well-known in Hamilton, Copp is aiming to work harder at spreading the dance form in the future.

As explained in the TED Talk, liquid lead dancing is not about dance alone.

By addressing the strict roles perpetuated in partner dancing, Copp and Fox have begun to address the erasure of non-binary people and same-sex couples in dance, in addition to the exclusion of Black, Asian and other non-white bodies.

By bringing these issues that are prevalent within ballroom and partner dance to a wider audience with the TED Talk and Copp’s theatre company, the same issues that are prevalent in everyday life stand a better chance at being addressed.

Copp has performed liquid lead dance at conferences throughout Ontario, New York and Ireland and is looking forward to next presenting at a conference on consent and sexuality with Planned Parenthood in Virginia.

 

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Photos by

By Nina Gaind

Walking through Supercrawl felt different this year. I felt weird about the presence of five Toyota cars positioned directly across from an art installation. I also felt a bit out of place, as many local faces and businesses from the past had disappeared, replaced by shiny new coffee shops and boutiques. The unoccupied lot beside CBC Hamilton was empty, where in past years it has been populated by local artists selling their unique DIY crafts and teenagers hanging out in the back (do you know what I’m referring to?).

Despite these changes, the thing that made me the most uncomfortable was the couple comments I heard from Supercrawl goers, referring to Hamilton and the space they were occupying. I heard people making jokes while in a long time standing James Street North shop, laughing about how outdated and cringe it was. I heard people snickering at the presence of homeless folks, and making a joke out of the poverty in Hamilton. These deeply unsettling comments symbolize a larger problem with the changing scene in Hamilton, and the language people use causes further harm to the people being pushed out of these social spaces.

Growing up in a town on the edge of Hamilton, I noticed ways in which people spoke about Hamilton. People talked about the city’s poverty with disdain, associating low-income areas with crime, rather than compassionately understanding the drive behind the perceived danger. With the recent wave of gentrification, more people from outside of the downtown area have been spending time in in the downtown core, changing how the city is perceived. This is exemplified in streets like James Street North and Barton Street being described as “up and coming”, while not even 2 km away there are some of the highest poverty rates in the country. With this rapid gentrification, Hamiltonians who have historically occupied these spaces are being pushed further and further away from these areas. For example, an affordable housing project in the North End was recently bought out by investors, leaving people who relied on this without homes. As a student who spends time in these spaces, I listen as the language used to describe people of low-income neighbourhoods becomes increasingly harmful and offensive. Local Hamiltonians are spoken about in ways that stigmatize their lived experience calling certain areas “sketchy”, “ghetto” and “ratchet”. These terms are highly racialized and classist, and do nothing but further the marginalization low-income people face throughout the development of Hamilton.

This issue is highly complicated and has many layers to it. Gentrification is not a simple concept, as development in the city has positive and negative consequences. As a student, I want to use my voice and privilege to acknowledge the power I and my peers have when we occupy spaces downtown. Students are positioned in a very grey area when it comes to gentrification and development. On one hand, we are not the people directly investing and developing land in Hamilton, rising rent prices and pushing low-income folks to the margins. On the other hand, we engage and spend time in these new coffee shops and stores, supporting local businesses and enjoying these spaces. While we might think our presence as students is trivial, our identities as students give us social power. Our identities as educated individuals give us more mobility to access physical and social spaces than local Hamiltonians. It is important for us to be mindful of this fact and reflect upon how and why we perceive others to be different from us. This being said, I recognize that university students come from diverse  backgrounds and experience oppression in many aspects of society and this should not be ignored when talking about this issue.

This city belongs to the very Hamiltonians we ridicule. As we continue to spend time in gentrified areas in Hamilton, we should be aware of the language we use when talking about others, specifically marginalized folks who are being negatively impacted by the cities changes. Using divisive language feeds the narrative that people who live in poverty are bad and dangerous, which physically and socially separates people more in society. When we start to change the tone of how we describe others, it can help to create more respectful relationships between people we may deem different from us. We must respect the history of Hamilton and recognize presence of poverty, looking to the root causes of inequality. I am hopeful that we as students can continue to enjoy Hamilton while being mindful of our identities and interact more positively with local Hamilton community members.

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Photos by Kyle West

At Supercrawl this weekend, Hamilton photographer Jessie Golem brought an interactive, human face to the premature cancellation of the universal basic income pilot project through her photo exhibit Humans of Basic Income.

Ten portraits of individuals whose lives had been radically changed by the premature cancellation stood outside Centre 3 for Print and Media Arts on James Street North. Several recipients of the basic income pilot sat in front of the photo display, sharing with passersby their own personal experiences.

Universal basic income was introduced as an experimental pilot project by the provincial Liberal government in 2017 in order to sustainably reduce poverty. Four thousand eligible people from Hamilton, Brantford, Brant County, Thunder Bay and Lindsay received monthly basic income payments to help cover living expenses and improve quality of life.

Golem started the Humans of Basic Income project to humanize the issues associated with cancelling the project through the power of visual storytelling. Prior to this weekend’s exhibit, the photographs only existed online. Golem used Facebook and Twitter to share the photos.

Part of what made the Supercrawl exhibit unique was the ability to have face-to-face interactions with basic income recipients.

“[It’s about] taking what's a political issue and putting a human face to it and saying, well these are the people that are being affected,” Golem said.

The exhibit explores how basic income gave some people the freedom to pursue other passions and interests. Margie Goold, one of the volunteers at the exhibit, was able to take a digital camera course at Mohawk college, an opportunity she wouldn’t have been able to afford otherwise.  

Basic income also allowed Hamilton resident Lance Dingman to pay for his prosthetic leg. This allowed him to save up funds for prosthetics that he will need in the not so distant future. Most importantly, basic income gave Dingman the autonomy to live his life as he chooses.

“Basic income for me has given me the life that I have been striving a long time [for], to make it better, to make it richer, to make it more independent for myself,” explained Dingman.

The original intention was to continue the project on an experimental basis for three years and then assess its effectiveness. However, the Ford government cancelled the pilot program in July and announced that payments will stop at the end of March.    

Through the photographs and experiences being shared during the Supercrawl exhibit, the narrative is consistent. A premature cancellation of the pilot project threatens to uproot the lives that it had helped people to build for themselves.

Recipients made life-changing decisions based on the expectation of receiving monthly payments for the entirety of the pilot program. Scraping the income will lock individuals into leases they can’t afford and disrupt their studies at colleges and universities.

Furthermore, recipients that applied for other sources of financial support on the understanding that they would be receiving basic income payments, are now stuck in between assistance programs, with no certainty about where their financial support will come from.

Lynn Ridsdale, another volunteer at the exhibit, notes that high living costs in Hamilton made universal basic income even more important. In particular, basic income helped her to find suitable, accessible housing, despite the steadily increasing cost of rent in Hamilton.

As Hamilton’s arts scene attracts investment and development, living expenses rise and many can no longer afford to live in Hamilton. New cafes, galleries and condominiums wipe away the visual signs of poverty in the city, and the bustle of Supercrawl makes it easy to forget about the consequences that come alongside the city’s development.

#basicincome gives people stability and dignity.

Heartbreaking stories of what the loss of the program means.

Grateful to have heard from Jessie Golem yesterday, who started the Humans of Basic Income project @HumansBasic. pic.twitter.com/FVoHTDLeQ2

— Kevin (@KevinHLam) September 16, 2018

Golem hopes that the project will help continue the conversation about poverty.

“I don’t want this conversation to die down and just become another political issue…I want people to think about the conversation, think about what poverty looks like,” explained Golem.

The Humans of Basic Income exhibit brings Hamiltonians face to face with the reality of what it is like to navigate life in the city while experiencing poverty. The exhibit’s photographs, media reach and real-life interactions at Supercrawl have created a platform for Hamilton residents to share their experiences with the community at large.  

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By: Sophie Geffros

Someone you know has been homeless.

This can be hard concept to wrap your head around — if you’re lucky, homelessness is something that happens to other people, and we can only conceive of homelessness as what housing advocates call “street homelessness.” According to a 2013 report by the Wellesley Institute, for every individual identified as street homeless, another four are part of what advocates call the “hidden homeless” population.

Think of your high school friend who surfed couches when his parents kicked him out after discovering he was gay. Think of the sibling that struggles with addiction and is in and out of halfway houses. Think of the friend who confessed tearfully that she and her mother spent the summer in a women’s shelter after leaving a violent spouse. The majority of the homeless population is intermittently homeless, and therefore hidden. Even if you don’t know anyone like I just described, I promise you that statistically speaking you have worked with, or attended classes with, or been friends with someone who has been homeless. It’s not the kind of thing you talk about, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t present.

The Degroote School of Business’ “5 Days for the Homeless” both ignores these populations and gives a false idea of what street homelessness looks like. 20 percent of the street homeless population are youth 16-24, of whom at least 40 percent are LGBT and about 60 percent are Aboriginal. When surveyed by Covenant House, they identified the greatest risk to their lives to be physical and sexual assault while sleeping rough or in shelters. Spending five nights sleeping outside the Student Centre gives a false idea of what homelessness is, and is far safer than the conditions street homeless youth actually experience.

It is good to raise money for charity. Nobody is denying that. But donating food to middle class students so they can pretend at homelessness borders on self-parody. If you have a genuine desire to alleviate suffering in the Hamilton community, donate your time or money directly to the Good Shepherd, or the Hamilton Dream Centre, or the Hamilton Community Core, or any of the dozens of other neighborhood food banks and housing programs that assist the vulnerable in our community. The campus OPIRG runs an excellent program called “Food Not Bombs,” and you can begin the process of helping them out without even leaving campus.

Programs like 5 Days for the Homeless appeal to us because they sanitize housing insecurity. They make us feel good about ourselves for caring, without having to be confronted with the unpleasant realities of homelessness. Advocates for the campaign will say that it raises awareness of street homelessness, but raising awareness for street homelessness is absurd. If you are honestly unaware that people are sleeping on the streets in our city, you are willfully ignoring the men and women sleeping rough by every downtown bus stop.

Spending five nights sleeping outside the Student Centre gives a false idea of what homelessness is.

I want to ask you a question: do you look at street homeless people when you see them on the sidewalk? How many of you are willing to donate your food and converse with the students aping at homelessness outside of MUSC, but ignore the man at the bus stop asking for change? How often do you justify not helping when you are confronted with the need by saying “well, they’re just going to spend it on drugs anyway?” How often do you willfully look away when you are confronted with suffering? Too many of us fail to recognize the humanity and dignity of others when confronted with their pain. We can all strive to be better at this. Pretending to understand a struggle that is not ours so that we can write heart-warming Facebook posts about what we’ve learned is not the way to go about it. The unkempt street homeless man who asks you for a dollar is just as human as the commerce student sleeping outside the student centre.

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Political activist, author and five-time candidate for President of the United States Ralph Nader visited McMaster this week speaking at an event sponsored by OPIRG McMaster and Bryan Prince Bookseller. Among many other things, Ralph Nader was responsible for founding the PIRG movement. He sat down for a face-to-face with assistant news editor Tyler Welch.

 

The Silhouette: Why are you here? Other than selling books, what message are you trying to get across?

Ralph Nader: The message basically is Canadians have to learn why they have to remain independent of U.S. control. Which is swallowing Canada in so many ways—foreign military policy, corporate policy and so on. And this is why years ago we wrote this book Canada Firsts, it’s all the things Canada led the way with: the first daily newspaper is North America, first credit unions, on and on, science, technology. A lot of it would not have happened if, you know, Canada were just five states or something.

Also, it’s good for the U.S., because we look to Canada as rational to change things in the U.S., like Medicare.

After that, I want to talk about how citizens can become sovereign again, and redirect the country away from its downward slide. It’s almost following the U.S. except in the banking area.

The indicator is more poverty, exporting jobs, shredding public services, cutting back on necessities, giving more tax breaks and subsidies to corporations.

Power is being concentrated in fewer and fewer hands. That spells decay and decline, if not worse.

 

Are things like citizen sovereignty and maintenance of Canada’s independence really possible, or are they just wide-eyed ideas?

It’s easy. What if, suddenly, you were driving on the highway and all the cars stopped because there was a boulder blocking the way, and they all got out of their cars and nobody lifted a finger, and then someone said “Oh this boulder, it’s impossible to do anything about it.” Then everyone agreed except for one, who said, “Have you really given it a try?” Then he tries, and the big boulder doesn’t move. Then everyone says, “See, it doesn’t move!”

But then what if six or them try to move, or sixteen? And they all give it a shoulder, and the boulder rolls away.

See, it’s all about how many people get involved, how smart they are and what the agenda is.

 

How many people does it take for real change?

One per cent, for real change, that would be about 330,000 people in Canada, connected together, in all the ridings, with a full-time staff. They can raise for themselves a few bucks each and have a full-time staff coast-to-coast.

Then they’ve got to ask what institution can make the change the fastest, and seek to influence them. In our country [U.S.] it’s the Congress. In your country, it could be Parliament or Provincial Parliament. But one thing is certain, three hundred thousand people is a lot more than the number of MPs.

 

Let’s talk about the emotional change that is needed for that. Many students focus on earning something marketable and seeking a good career, but you got a law degree from Harvard—pretty marketable, if you ask anyone—yet you still chose the activism route.

There’s a certain immaturity that modern industrial nations ascribe into their citizens until they’re almost 30. In a more simple society, people become adults and take on adult responsibilities at a much younger age.

People have to unlearn a lot of things. Like the free market. Free? It’s rigged in all kinds of ways. Corporations are on welfare—tax breaks, bailouts.

You’ve got to ask: “Is it a strong democracy, a weak one, a middling democracy, or is it really just a democracy in name?”

They have to unlearn a lot of things that have been controlling them, controlling their expectations, teaching them powerlessness and encouraging them to wallow in cynicism.  There is nothing that the ruling classes need the most to stay in power than widespread public cynicism. Because that involves a withdraw.  The more you become cynical and powerless, the more power you give away to the few.

 

Many say that young people are the most withdrawn from public life. True?

People say “That’s for the student government to do” or “This other club will work on that.” They wallow in their own narrow routine, everyday. That tends to magnify personal problems, they don’t have a larger framework—they’re looking through a smaller lens—and that makes them more susceptible to addictions, distractions and to that lethal little thing in their hand called and iPhone.

You just have to talk to one another more, that’s how students rose in the 60s—they talked to each other. They didn’t send telegrams to each other. It’s personal, a conversation. It develops a maturity that develops self-respect. They have to believe that they can reshape their country, because they can.

 

Were you ever tempted by the other route? The good job, nice house, nice car, nice family?

No, it just trivialized your life, that route. So what, you get paid more, big deal. You want to make zillions? What’s the point? The price for that is to further the ruling class. Harvard Law School is like a finishing school for corporate supremacy.

 

There’s been a lot written about you living below your means, and giving away most of your income—living on a budget that many people think is impossible.

First of all, when you work as hard as I do, you don’t have time to squander all kinds of money. When you do buy all these extra things, is distracts from the focus. This is serious business, taking measure of these large corporations. A yacht, a fancy car, a fancy house, they’re not compatible with that.

I know somebody that had all these things and more and one day he sold them all. He said, “I bought a lot of things and they began controlling me.”

People are trapped in this pursuit. You know this Snapchat thing? It’s worth $3 billion and they turned it down—they think they can get more. In the meantime, the necessities of life and being ignored; people are going hungry, their housing is bad, their retirement security is shot. You’ve got to get serious, and when you do, you have an incredible increase in quality of life—gratification, joy, challenge, find a different definition of friendship, and by time you’re 65 you don’t have regrets when you look back.

 

You can’t do this forever. For the next generation of activists, what are the most important issues they will face?

There is too much economic wealth in too few hands, and the few decide against the interests of the many. And, of course, there are the global issues: war, peace, poverty, and climate change. There’s a lot of backlog here—centuries to catch up on.

But the biggest thing is to structure community and civic values so that corporate values are subordinate to them. Another way to put it is “Markets make good servants, but bad masters.” Markets need to be servants or a larger framework of human values and human livelihood.

 

Where do they start?

To do that, you have to start with young students. Give them civic values and civic skills. Teach them about town halls, how the courts work, elections and institutions. You’ve got to start at that level. Otherwise, education is just vocation—just trade school with different names.

 

What is something that you wish someone had told you in university?

I wish that people told me, or all the law students, that they were heading for highly rewarding, trivial and damaging work.

Instead, they were told that they were heading for highly prestigious law firms where they would be architects of a dynamic economy, and do all kinds of important and good things.

Many of them are now greasing the way for corporate criminals, allowing the exploitation of fossil fuels, blocking the courtroom door for negligently wounded workers, making us sign fine print contracts, stripping us of any semblance of freedom of speech.

 

Photo Credit: C/O Wikimedia Commons

Alon Coret / Student Health Education Centre

 

During this past Reading Week, I participated in the Mac Serve Program, right here in Hamilton. The six days were densely packed with learning opportunities and exposure to some shocking realities.

Our group explored issues surrounding food (in)security and youth poverty, volunteering at places such as the Good Shepherd, Living Rock (youth center), community healthcare clinics, food drives and more.

One theme that seemed to thread throughout the week was the relationship between health and poverty, and how each affects the other. What I realized more than ever before was that poverty shapes our health in terms of our access to proper nutrition, sanitation and a safe place to live. At the same time, our health affects our financial situation; succumbing to disease and disability may prevent us from being able to work and integrate within society, and treatments can be costly.

A 2010 study known as the Code Red Series (Hamilton Spectator) shows the health-wealth connection better than any other. To determine the health status of different areas in the city, the average age of death was compared among Hamilton‘s neighborhoods. One West Mountain area had an average age at death of 86.3 years (2006-2008), while another near Wellington and Barton stood at 65.5 years. This staggering 21-year difference represents nearly a whole generation, and the main cause for the disparity is income. To put this in context, the West Mountain neighborhood’s life expectancy is five years higher than Canada’s national average. Meanwhile, the low-income North End neighborhood’s life expectancy is comparable to Nepal, Pakistan and Mongolia.

While visiting a community health center on Rebecca Street (Hamilton Urban Core), we learned about issues pertaining to medical services, specifically within the homeless and welfare-dependent demographic. It turns out, universal healthcare is not always so universal: most family physicians are paid on a fee-for-service basis, and often choose not to deal with more ‘problematic’ patients – the elderly, the homeless, the mentally ill or the severely handicapped. These groups mean more work for the physician, so it’s more efficient to take on young, healthy patients. Moreover, many Hamiltonians living in deep poverty do not have health cards. The majority of these are homeless individuals who could not replace a lost card, simply because they have no permanent address. To assist this demographic, the Hamilton Urban Core provides monthly health card replacement sessions (through the Ontario Health Ministry), and allows the homeless to use the center’s address as their own. Additionally, the staff working at the Urban Core are salaried, meaning they are paid the same amount irrespective of the number of patients they see. This is an important difference that separates them from other healthcare providers as there is no incentive to quickly ‘process’ as many patients as possible. Instead, the staff can tend to the complex problems of their target population. Common issues include mental illness, intellectual disability, physical handicaps, STIs, addictions or perhaps a combination of these.

Another key health-wealth connection was evident in the food banks we visited. Despite the immense quantities of food being donated, quality and variety appeared to be major issues: it’s always the same brands, the same foods and the obvious lack of fresh fruits and vegetables. Food banks house piles of Kraft Dinner and canned tuna, but these nonperishables do not meet our nutritional needs. It is not easy, of course, to supply fresh produce and dairy products given quick expiry and the need for refrigeration. Nevertheless, I could not stop thinking about the lack of quality food for populations in need. Even the hot meals served by food banks seem to play variations on a theme: pizza, pasta, tasteless salad, some meat and pastries (carbs, carbs, and a bit of protein). Clearly, living off the food bank diet is not good for long-term health.

Our minds, our bodies, and our social position are all intertwined; taking away from one can have serious ramifications on the others. The Romans were keenly aware of this connection – mens sana in corpore sano (a sound mind in a healthy body). When thinking about poverty, it is important to keep in mind its consequences beyond material well-being.

Rob Hardy / Silhouette Staff

Now that 2012 has finally come and gone, and we seem to have survived the prospect of the end of the world, it’s time to put the party favours and hollering away and get serious about the state of our world. Even though we have lived to see another day, the beginning of this new year sees a whole mess of tremendous problems in need of attention.

One of the biggest problems we need to face is the marginalized segments of our population, as well as those who are in fact homeless. Few really deeply think about our fellow Canadians literally living on the streets, and what an absolute fail this is for our government for whom this should be a top priority.

It may be shocking to learn that estimates of those homeless in Canada count some 175,000 people or more, depending on the source.  We must recognize our responsibility in not having provided enough affordable housing and rental options, at having increased the cost of living by eliminating cheaper alternatives, and in continually denying this group valid representation in all arenas. It’s time we no longer ignored the bigger picture, as we go off the deep end if we don’t have the right smartphone configurations, while others don’t even have shelter from the cold.

Canada has more than enough capital to better acknowledge this problem, and it’s time we face our apathy so we can transition to a higher level of compassion. We’re lucky to actually have the option, as other countries are not as resourceful.

Russia recently experienced the worst cold snap in over 70 years this past Christmas, with temperatures between -25 and -50 degrees Celsius that resulted in the deaths of approximately 200 people, many of them homeless.

As humans we all have basic rights - the most fundamental needs to be satisfied so we can at least have the barest chance at striving for more. Escape from homelessness is one if them.

Much strife is found in how society is being rearranged. It reverts to questions such as who will become a working professional and who will be their servants? How will we view future citizens who might hold multiple degrees but have been funneled into occupations at Starbucks, hotels, retail outlets, or even Walmart or fast food outlets, simply because the market cannot absorb as many lawyers and the like? Should our jobs really provide our main identities or can we be honest and realize that we class people based on their income level and social connectivity, not by intelligence or inherent talents?

Compiled by Aissa Boodhoo-Leegsma and Julia Redmond

McMaster holds annual Remembrance Day ceremony on campus