This Magazine articles from March 2005

This Magazine archives from March 2005

Whose nightmare?(Letters)(Letter to the Editor)
March 1, 2005... I read "Magical mystery cure" (January/ February) with interest since I was heavily quoted in it. I have a number of concerns about the article although there were many pluses as well. To begin with, the title on the cover of the magazine...

Side effects of psychosurgery.(Letters)(Letter to the Editor)
March 1, 2005... Your article on psychosurgery ("Magical mystery cure") did a good job of showing the potential dangers of these procedures. They all involve massive destruction of significant areas of the human brain and they are virtually certain to have...

Raelians have more fun.(Letters)(Letter to the Editor)
March 1, 2005... As a subscriber to This Magazine since it was about schools, I read with interest "Great byte hope," Andre Mayer's thoughtfully written article on transhuman science and technology, and the implications for the society of the future. I take...

Does Fantino know?(Letters)(Letter to the Editor)
March 1, 2005... Your November/December issue made an impact on my often politically blase fiance (who votes Liberal because that's what all good Torontonians do--whether they want to or not--then kvetches afterward). She was rather shaken by your "Killer cop"...

Engaging and delightful.(Letters)(Letter to the Editor)
March 1, 2005... I really appreciated your letter from the editor in the Year in Review fundraising newsletter that I received in December. I found it engaging and quite delightful. The community aspect of your experience in the North reminded me of...

Correction.(Letters)(Correction Notice)
March 1, 2005... Hetty van Gurp's name was misspelled on the back page of our January/February issue. We apologize for the error.

The class of 2005.(Editorial)
March 1, 2005... It has come to my attention that we haven't been formally introduced. Seems I just appeared in these pages nearly one year ago with little fanfare except for a rollicking party in Toronto held in part to bid farewell to former editor Julie...

Hungary strike: why Canada closed its doors to Hungarian Roma refugees.(Information, Insight & Innovation)
March 1, 2005... For generations, Canada has symbolized a new beginning for immigrants. But this is no longer the case for Gypsies--or Roma, as they prefer to be known because of the way the Immigration and Refugee Board has chosen to judge their cases. ...

Footloose and cruelty-free: leather-look shoes let style-conscious vegans wear their politics on their feet.(Information, Insight & Innovation)(Left Feet animal-friendly shoe store)
March 1, 2005... Steve Fish had kicked around the idea of opening an animal-friendly shoe store for years. A longtime herbivore, he was sick of meat-eaters ridiculing his politics. "The first thing they check out are your shoes or your belt, and your whole...

Pollution probe: why the US wants to pay kids to play with pesticides.(Information, Insight & Innovation)
March 1, 2005... Certain things are inevitable in springtime. Birds will fly north. Flowers will bloom. Pesticide lobbyists will launch into wild-eyed rants. And just as the crocuses poke their heads up out of the dirt, the US Environmental Protection Agency...

Freedom fighters: what the federal government doesn't want you to know about the way it processes Access to Information requests.(Information, Insight & Innovation)
March 1, 2005... For everyone ever labelled a cynic for thinking access to information was less about true accessibility and more about obfuscation and spin-doctoring, consider yourself righted. A seemingly innocuous piece of evidence introduced this past fall...

Fashion victims: the sweatshop has moved out of the factory and into the home, where hundreds of Canadian women are doing piecework sewing in appalling conditions for next to no money.(Information, Insight & Innovation)
March 1, 2005... Think you're supporting fair labour practices when you buy clothes made in Canada? Think again. Sweatshops are alive and well here. Not the Dickensian factories you might imagine in a developing nation--here, at home, new immigrants do...

Battle of the brains: our ranking of leading think tanks shows money really does go to your head.(Information, Insight & Innovation)
March 1, 2005... Narrowing down what it means to be a think tank is a lot like nailing Jell-O to a wall: it's not easy and it usually ends up being quite messy. Essentially, think tanks are organizations that produce publications to influence government and the...

Wave of change: the torrent of coverage of the tsunami tragedy was media herd mentality at its finest. Let's hope journalists continue to use their power for good.(Media)
March 1, 2005... WHEN CRITICS ASSESS THE PERFORMANCE OF THE press, one of their most persistent complaints is the "me too" behaviour of so many journalists. Google "herd mentality" and "media" and you get more than 33,000 hits. But what is infuriating when it...

An old excuse: Ottawa is using the retirement of aging baby boomers to justify its decision to slash social programs. But we've heard that one before.(Economics)
March 1, 2005... POLITICIANS LOVE TO CLAIM THE MORAL HIGH GROUND. They'll often use an emotional issue to justify their least palatable actions. In other words, they find a scapegoat. When governments took money from social programs in the 1990s and put it...

Free at last? How Canada got caught up in Ukraine's Orange Revolution--and helped hijack history.(Cover Story)
March 1, 2005... THE CENTRE OF THE REVOLUTION WAS KIEV'S KHRESHCHATYK Street, in the city's historic Independence Square. At the height of the protest, the population of this makeshift community numbered in the thousands. Tents filled the square and the glow of...

The church of please and thank you: the growth of English abroad is putting words in the mouths of students--even changing their identities. "Let's do lunch" and other ways ESL teachers spread the gospel of English overseas.
March 1, 2005... MICHELLE SZABO SMILES ENCOURAGINGLY AS A YOUNG businessman talks about his hobbies in broken English. She is a Canadian teacher at Aeon's language school in Kawagoe, Japan. He is a prospective student she's charged to recruit as part of her...

Trial by fire: they were some of the highest-ranking officers in the Sudanese army and, last year, they became enemies of the state. Their crime? They refused to bomb civilians.
March 1, 2005... A MEMBER OF THE CROWD MUTTERS SOMETHING IN Arabic. "There is confusion" is the best translation. There are about 15 armed men in blue guarding the metal stairs to this Sudanese court. If you look important and scream loud enough you'll be...

Alienation autopsy.(Interview with Gil Adamson)(Need Help)(Interview)
March 1, 2005... I knew it was wrong that I didn't feel anything looking at it, but I didn't. I knew exactly what I should be feeling like a recipe: shock, outrage, pity. But, for a long time, my emotions had been strangely inappropriate. The problem was...

The sound you hear.(3 poems)(Poem)
March 1, 2005... the sound you hear the sound you hear is of a far-off train it is coming into town at a slow pace you've heard the whistle a couple of times you live beside the tracks in the centre of town and it is early in...

Closer to death.(3 poems)(Poem)
March 1, 2005... closer to death I don't remember going to bed last night or taking off my clothes or turning out the lights or falling asleep but all of them happened and then I woke up hungover and closer to death...

Praise.(3 poems)(Poem)
March 1, 2005... praise like most people I love it when it's directed at me the rest of the time it sounds suspiciously like something false

Fang fiction.(This Is Independent Culture)("Venous Hum," a novel by Suzette Mayr)
March 1, 2005... If you think Ralph Klein is the only monster in Alberta, you're wrong. In Suzette Mayr's genre-blurring novel Venous Hum (Arsenal Pulp Press), vampire cannibals on a strict vegetarian diet eschew CanLit's idyllic prairie grass vista for an...

Poison pen: Klank recalls the real-life transfer of women to a federal prison for men.(This Is Independent Culture)
March 1, 2005... Although playwright Araxi Arslanian's new work, Klank, features an all-woman cast in what she describes as a mix of live-action poetry and dance, all resemblances to Chicago end there. "What I wanted to do was see ill could write a rock 'n'...

Boys don't try: the way books are marketed is one reason people think fiction is for girls. The other reason? Many men just hate reading novels.(This Is Independent Culture)
March 1, 2005... IN MARCH OF 1979, I WAS MISERABLE IN MONTREAL. Of course, March can be maddening anywhere in Canada, but Montrealers know the occasional spring-like day is just a tease because the ear-biting cold and sock-soaking slush won't really leave until...

Words are not enough: Stan Rogal and Mark Truscott value words differently. One writer is fast, the other takes his time.(Books)
March 1, 2005... In On Writing, Stephen King's guide to craft, the prolific author of 33 "worldwide bestsellers" advises working writers to produce 1,000 words a day. King himself claims to produce 2,000 words a day when he is in the groove, which is a lot of...

Paint by numbers: how a little financial knowledge can save artists from the garret.(This Is Independent Culture)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2005... Who says artists have to starve? And who says they can't own stocks, register their savings and travel the world with sketch box in tow? Jack Butler doesn't. Butler is a Toronto-based interdisciplinary, international artist who also...

Death from Above 1979, You're A Woman, I'm a Machine (Last Gang Records).(Music)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2005... If you were going on first impressions alone then the name of this album and the metal-head appearance of the band might lead you to expect testosterone-fuelled, alpha-male party anthems. Not so. Death From Above 1979's--the numbers were added...

Gentleman Reg, Darby & Joan (Three Gut).(Music)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2005... Darby & Joan is the third release from Hidden Cameras/Broken Social Scene sometime member Reg Vermue. He obviously picked up a thing or two about the benefits of collaboration because he brings a backing band that draws on members of Canadian...

Damon & Naomi, The Earth is Blue (Sonic Unyon).(Music)(Brief Article)
March 1, 2005... Despite the fact that this is the duo's sixth album, most still recognize Damon Krukowski and Naomi Yang as two-thirds of the now-defunct indie band Galaxie 500. It's a shame really because The Earth is Blue--their first new album in five...

Women's work: Arlie Russell Hochschild explains why no one benefits when women from developing countries migrate to do the jobs Canadians don't want.(Question Authority)
March 1, 2005... NEWSPAPERS HAD A FIELD DAY LAST FALL WITH ALLEGATIONS that then-Immigration Minster Judy Sgro endorsed a visa extension for a Romanian stripper who had worked on the politician's re-election campaign. The brouhaha touched on the growing trend...