Sunday, 31 May 2020

 

Toronto says NO to Inequality and Racism


Thousands of Torontonians took to the street on May 30,2020 to protest the latest fatalities in the continuing outrage of violence by established Canadian and American authorities against the racially oppressed, who are, not at all coincidentally, the economically disadvantaged. Both recent victims, George Floyd in the U.S.A. and Regis Korchinski-Paquet in Canada, have the sadly predictable features of racial and economic exclusion. The evidence has long been available to those who wish to see it. As always, the challenge is action and mass demonstrations like todays are important steps in the pressure to foment it. As one chant had it today, "this is not an accident, it was designed that way." Undesigning the mainstream economy is what TorontotheBetter is about and, as this recent report - https://evonomics.com/science-flow-says-extreme-inequality-causes-economic-collapse/ - confirms extreme inequality, like racism, causes economic collapse. There are many ways of turning back "pandemics", whether economic, environmental or biological, our challenge is to seize the moment before it (and we) are too late.     
            


# posted by Taodhg @ 12:44 am 0 comments

Wednesday, 27 May 2020

 

Long term care: much condolence, less care

The herartfelt tears, embarrasssed out of many responsible by the recent undeniable statistics of death by COVID in Canada's largely private long term care sectoor, may be genuine, but will action follow the contrition? Public enquiries or commissions will embarrass a few more but the only long term solution is government action, the kind of action few of Canada's neoliberal minded leaders are currently likely to take. To ensure universal inclusion TorontotheBetter proposes a charter of aged rights and the inclusion of all homes, private or public, in the Canada Health Act. 
# posted by Taodhg @ 7:29 pm 0 comments

Saturday, 23 May 2020

 

Free Transit Now!



It is one of the best supports for the environment, as well as the poor and disadvantaged, in fact everybody. It is happening now in several  Ontario cities, but we should not need a pandemic to do this right/wise  thing in Toronto, or anywhere.  
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_public_transport



# posted by Taodhg @ 3:26 pm 0 comments

Friday, 22 May 2020

 

Rebuilding Collaboratively : COVID Crisis as Opportunity


If not now, in the middle of a pandemic, when will be the right time? The Network of Wellbeing https://networkofwellbeing.org/ hosts a free webinar about reconstruction on Tuesday  May 26 at 7.30pm.
 
# posted by Taodhg @ 2:53 pm 0 comments

Sunday, 17 May 2020

 

Why COVID is NOT a "tragedy of the commons"


Though the phrase was catchy and supported by various market interests after the 1968 article that popularized the phrase there never was a tragedy of the commons, except as an idea. But to apply the phrase to the COVID pandemic is wrong for another reason too. COVID is a fundamentally a biological affliction, arising from the nature of the virus. Its rapid spread everywhere around the world is associated with the typical everyday indiscriminate travel and social mingling of people in many countries, but the inability to control it quickly likely had as much to do with the inability of societies to act with a united (aka common) approach that, if need be, curtails previous individual license. Either way, the problem is not just that of people coming together, it has been a problem of a public policy failure to coordinate, compounded by the reduction of public investment, as promoted by neoliberal economists, in societal resources like Personal Protective Equipment.

One major point of Elinor Ostrom's famous Nobel honoured work on what we may call "the comedy of the commons" was that successfully managed commons were, and remain, sustainable. It is individualism, competition and austerity that underlie COVID related breakdowns. A community of Milton Freidman wannabes are unlikely to sustain a successful commons. That's their problem, not the commons'.                   

# posted by Taodhg @ 9:42 pm 0 comments

Saturday, 16 May 2020

 

CORONAVIRUS: Million peso pledge to support the Zapatista Response



You can help save lives Zapatista communities and their heritage of progressive struggle during the Coronavirus pandemic!
On March 16, 2020 the Zapatistas wrote: “we exhort everyone everywhere, (men, women, and transgender people) in Mexico and the world, to take the scientifically-based sanitary measures necessary to allow us to move forward and get through this pandemic alive.”  Click here to read the Zapatistas’ words about their Coronavirus pandemic response (now translated into various languages).
Schools for Chiapas applauds the insightful analysis and rapid decisions made by the Zapatista movement to control the Coronavirus; in response, today Schools for Chiapas pledges one million pesos to support the Zapatista health System during the crisis of the Coronavirus pandemic. Schools for Chiapas will donate all funds directly to the Zapatista health system. 
Please support the rural autonomous Mayan communities of Chiapas, Mexico in addressing this public health challenge where the lack of running water, poor nutrition, and limited access to medicines make the Coronavirus particularly difficult to control and survive.  Help us to quickly reach our goal of One Million pesos for the Zapatista Health System. 

https://schoolsforchiapas.org/store/gifts-of-change/million-peso-pledge/

# posted by Shawn @ 10:56 am 1 comments

Friday, 15 May 2020

 

Pandemic or not, the cruise ship industry keeps rolling along


No sign of masks in the marketing images, but there may be a few behind the scenes.

https://www.fastcompany.com/90503385/what-pandemic-carnival-cruise-bookings-soar-600-for-august-trips?partner=rss&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=rss+fastcompany&utm_content=rss&fbclid=IwAR1Duh8RVEy6n2lCAy1ap5jgVg0Kj9wkwXzsfxaBg8c67zkheyS5ujlT_vE



# posted by Taodhg @ 5:55 pm 0 comments
 

More dangerous than COVID -.environmental Activism takes another life - a better world is possible, but it isn't easy



In some countries there are greater dangers than viral pandemics. Student activist Eugui Roy was recently shot dead in Oaxaca Mexcico for his activism in favour of our mother earth.The best memorial for the the slain is to honour what they died for.
 https://www.democracynow.org/2020/5/12/headlines/21_year_old_oaxacan_environmental_activist_eugui_roy_assassinated


# posted by Taodhg @ 5:45 pm 0 comments
 

Prepare for Global de-Growth Day on June 6th



No excuse not to reduce our consumption, now that COVID is reminding us that shopping can be bad for our health. See https://www.degrowth.info/en/globalday/ for how to participate.
# posted by Taodhg @ 5:32 pm 0 comments

Tuesday, 12 May 2020

 

Scale of wealth

The link below is a fantastic infographic illustrating the profundity of the wealth gap in the United States. It also proposes a fair solution to this vast inequality.



https://mkorostoff.github.io/1-pixel-wealth/




# posted by Shawn @ 3:45 pm 1 comments
 

PROGRESSIVE INTERNATIONAL to be launched


Though in 2020 the title should probably be Progressive Global the recent announcement ( https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Chomsky-Sanders-Others-Launch-Progressive-International--20200511-0012.html ) of a united front against continuing neoliberalism and timid or coopted state media offers the possibility of a counter news narrative to what became many years ago the new normal of austerity and nationalism. Will the economic sea-change of social investment that we need accompany PI? TorontotheBetter certainly hopes so.

For an introductory PI video see: https://youtu.be/AcMNhl7SlEc
       

# posted by Taodhg @ 12:35 pm 0 comments

Monday, 11 May 2020

 

Nature as economic model -> time for mainstream economics to learn from some indigenous sources?

https://www.yesmagazine.org/issue/nature/opinion/2013/01/18/inside-the-down-to-earth-economy




# posted by Taodhg @ 6:04 pm 0 comments
 

Who owns nature? - Nobody. Manoomin (Ojibwe wild rice) is not to be tampered with

A recent court ruling gives legal rights to Manoomin (Ojibwe wild rice). Of course, all legalized rights are at the mercy of the most powerful (those who can pay for lawyers), so the rights can always be challenged and chiseled, but it’s better to have rights than not.   

https://www.yesmagazine.org/environment/2019/02/01/the-white-earth-band-of-ojibwe-legally-recognized-the-rights-of-wild-rice-heres-why

and for more on Nature's independent thinking see other recent TorontotheBetter blogposts.



# posted by Taodhg @ 2:30 pm 0 comments

Sunday, 10 May 2020

 

Pandemic, unemployment, hunger, inequality: nothing to worry about [for some]

COVID and economic collapse are just more wealth opportunities for some as neoliberal minded governments continue to use unaccountable outsourcers like Jeff Bezos' Amazon. A social economy alternative is available from enterprises like those in our TorontotheBetter directory and for a green economic transformation that is the alternative opportunity that matters.        
# posted by Taodhg @ 7:40 am 0 comments

Friday, 8 May 2020

 

Thankful goodbye to Sidewalk Labs


In an era of rampant neoliberalism private corporations are seizing opportunities to take control of public land and institutions, if public representatives allow them to. Fortunately, in the case of Google offspring Sidewalk Labs it is the corporation that has pulled the plug and Toronto's still relatively un- commercialized lakefront path will remain as a location for lake viewing rather than high-tech (which can be done anywhere, remember). The official reason for Google's abandonment of Sidewalk Labs, its originally much hyped new world-ish waterfront project in Toronto is the COVID pandemic, now becoming a convenient rhetorical tool for many ill conceived initiatives. Google has the hubris that comes from a huge asset base and a futuristic identity but we do not live by information alone and effectively yielding control of key parts of the city to unaccountable corporate interests should remain a no-no for temptation prone public officials. 

For detailed news about the Sidewalk Labs announcement see https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/07/world/americas/google-toronto-sidewalk-labs-abandoned.html


         

# posted by Taodhg @ 9:47 am 0 comments

Tuesday, 5 May 2020

 

COVID is not a "war" (video) - Vandana Shiva advises us to improve our language (and behaviour)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6kCDu_LjsNE


# posted by Taodhg @ 11:03 pm 0 comments

Saturday, 2 May 2020

 

COVID - workers are victims in long term care homes and meat packing plants



Whether they are the poorly paid and overworked staff in Long Term Care homes or poorly protected labourers in meatpacking plants like Cargill, workers are, predictably, the most victimized by the COVID pandemic. Beyond time for a new look at workplace health and safety protection.
   
Anyone who knows staff from the long term care homes now experiencing the greatest toll of COVID deaths are probably aware that these workers  are usually well-intended immigrants from cultures with extended families and respect for the eldely but with few job options in Canada, so employable at low cost for LTC for-profit operators. Since profit is the corporate motivation in many such homes reducing cots to a minimum, insluding wages, is key to eheir profitability. It comes as no surprise, then, that protective measures for patients and staff are not high priorities and if external surveillance is minimal because of laiser-faire neoliberal policies governments are complicit in the diaster, Public owneship and/or serious government stabndards and oversight are the necessary measures fo avoid more COVID-type disasters in future. TorontotheBetter calls on Torontonians to demand strong government action to take ownership of the long term care industry and provide the frail and elderly with the quality care those responsible declare to be their purpose.  

The LTC havoc in Montreal (and elsewhere) may have been missed by some but here's a sad reminder:  https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/covid-19-quebec-april-21-1.5539291  

# posted by Taodhg @ 8:42 pm 0 comments

Friday, 1 May 2020

 

COVID May Day 2020 - the struggle continues for Amazon workers


We didn't sign up for this says Amazon worker:  
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/03/nyregion/coronavirus-nyc-chris-smalls-amazon.html?auth=link-dismiss-google1tap&searchResultPosition=1
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What do they want?
-Hazard pay
-Protective equipment
-Shutdown of infected sites

When do they want it? 
-NOW
https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=909233356136496&id=197461743711006&source=44
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# posted by Taodhg @ 10:08 am 0 comments

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