News, Events & Comments

Whatsup bloggers? Over the past little while, I've been finding partner organizations to all our companies listed in the directory. So far, I have found numerous linking businesses to Big Carrot, Mountain Co-Op, Blue Moon, Sequel Restaurant and many, many more. Since Valentine's Day just passed, I thought I'd share with you this illustration to remind you that when staring into the sky, love should be boundless and that time can stand still when you've met your soulmate. Thanks for reading, stay tuned.

Maury

Slow food Toronto members  try to keep digestions (and lives) healthy

There's a reason everybody's short of time these days. Markets increasingly run on E-time while humans cannot. Not only does such frenetic and uncontrolled speed contribute to the kind of economic disaster the world experienced in 2008 but the toll on workers trying to maintain electronic production speeds is showing itself in an epidemic of stress related occupational injuries. There is no solution but adoption of the principle of slowness proposed by Slow Food Toronto [http://slowfood.to]  and related movements. If we are to survive we must slow down. We were not built for the pace of today's post-industrial economy as it chases even greater returns in the same unit of time. Charlie Chaplin's  famous movie Modern Times, if updated, would a worker trying, and inevitably failing once again to keep cognitive pace with a computer chip, rather than, as in the original, a factory conveyor belt.   

And here's an example of how to do it.
        https://media.giphy.com/media/nLAHHLbJWl6lW/giphy.gif

*Saturday March4, 2017 @2pm. Join TorontotheBetter at the Really Really Free Market at Campbell Park (225 Campbell Ave. north of Bloor and Lansdowne) for our book commons featuring a wide selection of free high quality books by progressive authors.


* Saturday March 11,2017 @ 2,3Opm. PWYC Movie screening: "Women of the Forest" (at OISE - 252 Bloor St. West Room 5-240). Proceeds after costs to Nepalese NGO Himawanti

.Nepal is one of the highest (and poorest) countries in the world. Canadian student movie maker Anna Desmarais found there women who maintain one of
Nepal's natural treasures, her forests, and documented their work to preserve the commons for their country, and us..
The movie will be followed by a discussion with the director
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-TorontotheBetter www.torontothebetter.net is  a non-profit dedicated to building Toronto's (and the world's) social economy. Our original social economy directory
has been online  at www.TorontotheBetter.net since 2004. The "free" market economy let us  down again in 2008. Let's try the social economy for a change.

This Polish store "Nagie z Natury" (means how it sounds except the connecting z) shows
how: http://www.ekonsument.pl/spacerownik/m531_nagie_z_natury.html
Know of others?
Time for all incomes to have the chance for quality goods. 

TorontotheBetter recently met in the Kitchener, Ontario market with Matthew Piggott of TorontotheBetter's Kitchener-Waterloo fraternal co-operative enterprise Community Carshare and Tom Slee, author of "What's Yours is Mine:Against the Sharing Economy" (see Friday Jan.27, 2017 book review on this blog) to discuss the opportunities and the dangers of what is now commonly, and misleadingly, called the "sharing economy", that is: materially light and communications heavy enterprises featuring multiple participants.
Predatory, regulation- and accountability- avoiding commercial enterprises like Uber were recognized by all  parties to the conversation as growing threats to community solidarity and there was broad agreement that greater awareness of the social/ethical options available in today's new technologically enabled economic spaces is necessary and possible  through linkages such as the one undertakenhere. That Kitchener-Waterloo, Canada's own technology hub and location of the famously pacifist Mennonite social economy was the site of the conversation represents future hope for a more progressive alignment of the new technology enterprise wave that is transforming economies worldwide. Public presentations on the subject of social economy are planned in the near future to bring these issues directly to a broader local  audience. We seek  partners from communities in Ontario and beyond in this initiative.         

*Tom Slee's book is published in Canada by Toronto publisher BTL [Between the Lines]. For purchase information email postmaster@torontothebetter.net with Slee in the subject line.
*For carsharing in several major cities in southern Ontario see www.communitycarshare.ca.

  

Here's a fun image I put together to support the Cruyff project. If you have anymore inquires about Cruyff Court Toronto or want to enlist your kids to play soccer, please contact me at maurycheskes@yahoo.ca or burnscurr@gmail.com.

Thanks,

M.C.

Historically the target of much political phobia from some quarters, unions are in fact forces for equality because they ensure there can be at least some justice in the relationship between capital and labour. And co-ops are also forces for good by ensuring  that there can be some balance in the relations between workers/producers and their companies  (in a worker coop) or between buyers and their suppliers (in a consumer co-op). Non-profit TorontotheBetter is a programme of a diverse worker co-op Libra  Knowledge and Information Services. Since we started up in 2004 we have probably numbered among our members atheists, moslems, Jewish, Hindus, Buddhists and Christians. Why probably? At Libra/TorontotheBetter we don’t ask and usually don't know.

In our unionized co-op it is one person one vote; our interest is in our values and what we/you do, not what gods we/you celebrate… or don’t.  Take a look at socially progressive states like Canada and Singapore (a pioneer of multiculturalism) and we see a record of prosperity through inclusion. Diversity and inclusion work, phobias don’t. Chewing gum regulations and the like look like a small price to pay for the benefits of justice-based inclusiveness. No more ethnic phobias! Let's hope after recent protests like the one below
at the U.S. consulate in Toronto that the current president of the U.S.A. and his like are soon consigned to the garbage-bin of history where should lie racisms of all stripes.

Hey there readers,

For the past few months, I have been working with Toronto the Better updating our local listings and communicating with our affiliates. I received a lot of good feedback on how to improve our mission statements and imagery of the website to make it more appealing to our viewers. We now have each listings' Facebook and Twitter accounts, changed locations, new hours of operation and all additional services. With our enhanced website, we will further boost the economy of local book stores, cafes and online stores to better serve the community. Please feel free to comment on this post and tell me what you'd like to see differently in months to come.

Thank you,

M.C.

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The almost inevitable entertainment personalities are signing on to the "little library" idea;  one of the latest "UN-housed" is in Toronto's Liberty Village (for the record by no means one of Toronto's most deprived areas). It looks like the library idea, at least its quaint "little" version has achieved its latest five minutes of twenty-first century fame...