Herizons articles from December 1998

Herizons archives from December 1998

Canada taken to task at UN on human rights (Covenant on economic, social and cultural rights).
December 1, 1998... Prime Minister Jean Chretien's Liberal government has been accused by a United Nations committee of balancing its books on the backs of the poor by the United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Observations and...

First female infantry officer to advise military.
December 1, 1998... Sandra Perron, Canada's first female infantry officer, who left the military in 1996 because of sexist treatment by her male colleagues, was named as the head of an advisory board that will report to Defence Minister Art Eggleton. The...

Fire under fire.
December 1, 1998... The Canadian film Fire was targeted by extremists in India when it was released there earlier this winter. Filmmaker Deepa Mehta vowed to fight the backlash orchestrated by Shiv Sena, an extreme right wing political group, which objected to...

(Henry) Morgentaler undeterred.
December 1, 1998... Weeks after the murder of Dr. Bernard Slepian, a Buffalo physician who performed abortions as part of his practice, Dr. Henry Morgentaler opened his newest clinic in Frederiction, New Brunswick. The clinic opened as a private clinic, but is...

Fewer women die.
December 1, 1998... According to the latest Statistics Canada figures, fewer women are dying at the hands of spouses and former spouses. In 1997, 61 women were killed by a current or former spouse, with an additional 12 killed by a boyfriend or exboyfriend. In...

Women out of the ball park in media survey.
December 1, 1998... The latest content analysis of Canada's daily newspapers shows that male newspaper reporters, photographers and newsmakers still outnumber women by over 3 to 1 in Canada. "News is perceived as defining who and what is important,"...

Equality essays wanted.
December 1, 1998... The National Association of Women and the Law invites women to submit essays on a topic of their choice on Achieving Equality: The challenge of the New Millennium." The essay should address an issue of importance in dismantling the barriers...

Aboriginal justice uses healing approach.
December 1, 1998... (WINNIPEG) The word `diversion' describes the rerouting of a waterway. At Aboriginal Ganootamaage Justice Services of Winnipeg, the analogy couldn't be more appropriate. "Think of our program as a river," says Ganootamaage Executive...

Fury for the Sound documents Clayoquot women.
December 1, 1998... "Blow the bridge down, blow the bridge down From the dead of the night, sink it into the ground For the sake of the soul of Clayoquot sound Take a deep breath and blow the bridge down." The Wyrd Sisters: "Farewell to...

Dear sir or madam ... (letters of complaint to politicians).
December 1, 1998... Next time you send a politician a letter, be sure to do more than tell them they are wrong. These types of letters are easy to ignore. Try explaining what's wrong with the minister's/cabinet's/MPs stand, and be sure to send a letter that...

Getting the lead out of toys.
December 1, 1998... It was a small victory for children when Health Canada issued a precautionary warning in November that soft teethers and rattles made with softened polyvinyl chloride (PVC) may pose health risks when chewed or sucked on. A coalition made...

Show us the money.
December 1, 1998... The Federal Court of Appeal has overruled a pay equity ruling favouring management at Bell Canada. The Muldoon ruling, as it was known, was cited as the basis for the federal government's appeal in its own pay equity case, heard by the...

Saying no to FGM (female genital mutilation).
December 1, 1998... Senegal is the latest African country to officially ban the practice of female genital mutilation. The United Nations Children's Fund estimates that 130 million African and Asian women are affected by the practice, which varies in severity...

Slavery in Canada?
December 1, 1998... RCMP laid 26 charges under the Immigration Act against owners of a company in Red Deer, Alberta which brought women from Hong Kong and the Philippines to work as nannies in Canada. Police said most of the women paid their own airfare and an...

Divorce report a recipe for chaos.
December 1, 1998... (OTTAWA) And you thought divorce could be ugly. The Joint Committee on Child Custody and Access' final report would turn Canada's Divorce Act into a tool for chaos for women and children in high conflict families, say women's legal...

Ounce of prevention (Violence Prevention Pipeline).
December 1, 1998... Women's studies students from a Victoria high school launched a pipeline on preventing violence and hooked up with the Ministry of Women's Equality web site. It includes a model for involving communities in prevention strategies, information...

Make that two (Men Against Violence).
December 1, 1998... Toronto's Metro Men Against Violence has published an anti-violence handbook for young men's workshops on preventing violence. The handbook includes exploring violence as a continuum that starts with examining power and attitudes, exploring...

Ms back in (Gloria) Steinem's hands.
December 1, 1998... Ms magazine has been bought by a group formed by the magazine's original editor and founder, Gloria Steinem.

50-year search for justice: war crimes against (Korean) comfort women.
December 1, 1998... Kim Soon-duc fled to the hills as a young girl, but was unable to escape being kidnapped. Fifty years later, she has become an international spokeswoman on behalf of the estimated 200,000 former Korean comfort women. Five years after...

Wise blend of old and new knowledge.
December 1, 1998... Only a decade ago, herbal remedies were, for most, no more than an interesting idea. Now, they can be found in the majority of Canadians' medicine cabinets. Why suddenly a mass `discovery' of ancient remedies? Maybe it's the influence of a...

Examining the examiners: what's ailing Canada's Health Protection Branch?
December 1, 1998... Last year, health food stores in western Canada were raided by police for selling food bars containing DHEA, or dehydroepiandrosterone. A three-month investigation by Health Canada's Health Protection Branch culminated just as an issue of...

Same planet, different worlds: the Vancouver International Film Festival.
December 1, 1998... My apologies to Thelma and Louise. But unless you live near that neat video store or you happen to be taking a women's studies course on women and film, it is very difficult to see films by or about women. Not to mention films that are...

Turn the beat around (drumming).
December 1, 1998... Move over little drummer boy, girls and women are pummeling the skins too-in droves. And they are discovering an adeptness as natural as their beating hearts. On a personal level, the simple, elemental motion of striking a drum is a...

Women of words: what joining a book club can do for your life.
December 1, 1998... We had candles lit, popcorn popping, wine pouring and lemon pudding cooling. Who would have guessed from that first meeting that the women sharing popcorn with me would become special friends whose interests jell with my own? We share the...

Liberals try to sink NAC.
December 1, 1998... The National Action Commit tee on the Status of Women is facing its most serious financial crisis in decades. The crisis is not due to internal divisions, careless spending or lack of member support. Nine months into its fiscal year, Status...

Got a grudge? Invent a syndrome.
December 1, 1998... Tired of False Memory Syndrome? Bored with the likes of Dr. Elizabeth Loftus, the Queen of the False Memory Syndrome? Loftus, (who writes huge erudite tomes in Camille Paglia type rhetoric) it must be admitted, puts on a great show which...

Feminist bailout on Zippergate.
December 1, 1998... I hope all those star struck U.S. feminists are happy now. Clinton survived. They got what they wanted. But was it worth it? We should have known there was going to be a price to pay as soon as Paula Jones filed her petition. Feminists...

Love ruins everything.
December 1, 1998... BY KAREN X. TULCHINSY PRESS GANG 1998 REVIEW BY MARGUERITE ANDERSEN Under its beautiful blue cover, showing a city scape and the trail of a comet made by pink hearts, Karen X. Tulchinsky's Love Ruins Everything entertains the...

Moons of Palmares.
December 1, 1998... BY ZAINAB AMADAHY SISTER VISION PRESS, 1988 REVIEW BY BEATRICE WATSON I had just finished reading a story in "Spirit of the Middle Passage" about the Portuguese capture of Queen Ninga, a powerful African Queen of Angolan descent...

Who's afraid of feminism: seeing through the backlash.
December 1, 1998... EDITORS ANN OAKLEY AND JULIET MITCHELL THE NEW PRESS, 1997 Once you get past the grammatically-botched, typo-ridden, academic contortions-who are they behaving for?-of the introduction to Who's Afraid of Feminism, you're in for a...

Bitch: in praise of difficult women.
December 1, 1998... ELIZABETH WURTZEL DOUBLEDAY, 1998 REVIEWS BY SARA SHIELDS Once you get past the grammatically-botched, typo-ridden, academic contortions-who are they behaving for?-of the introduction to Who's Afraid of Feminism, you're in for a...

But where are you really from? Stories of identity and assimilation in Canada.
December 1, 1998... HAZELLE PALMER ED SISTER VISION PRESS REVIEW BY UMA PARAMESWARAN The single most common/hurtful/offensive/racist/frustrating question one could ask a non-white Canadian is the title of this volume. Hazelle Palmer, with 32...

She shoots, she scores: Canadian perspectives on women and sports.
December 1, 1998... BY LAURA ROBINSON THOMPSON EDUCATIONAL PUBLISHING 1997 REVIEW BY JOCELYN SMITH The sports section of today's Vancouver Sun contains 13 articles. One describes Kelly Stefanyshyn's 200m backstroke record. Another includes four...

"Bad mothers": the politics of blame in the twentieth century.
December 1, 1998... AMERICA EDITED BY MOLLY LADD-TAYLOR AND LAURI UMANSKY NEW YORK UNIVERSITY PRESS, 1998 In the article "Mother Blaming," Paula Caplan likens the practice of mother blaming to air pollution: you don't realize it's there until...

Gone to an aunt's: remembering Canada's homes for unwed mothers.
December 1, 1998... BY ANNE PETRIE MCCLELLAND & STEWART, 1998 REVIEWS BY ANITA LAHEY In the article "Mother Blaming," Paula Caplan likens the practice of mother blaming to air pollution: you don't realize it's there until you're free of it. She...

New midwifery: reflections on renaissance and regulation.
December 1, 1998... EDITED BY FARAH M. SHROFF WOMEN'S PRESS, 1997 REVIEW BY JANICE PASKEY Can midwives deliver their hallmark of personalized care if they become part of the public medical system? This is the key tension in this broad collection of...

VBAC companion: the expectant mother's guide to vaginal birth after cesarean.
December 1, 1998... BY DIANA KORTE HARVARD COMMON PRESS, 1997 REVIEW BY BRENDA SUDERMAN While I was dealing with hours and hours of back labour in a hospital birthing room, my labour companion overheard nurses in the hall talking about "that woman...

For-giving: a feminist criticism of exchange.
December 1, 1998... BY GENEVIEVE VAUGHAN PLAIN VIEW PRESS, 1997 REVIEW BY PENNEY KOME Gender is actually an economic identity," asserts Genevieve Vaughan, but to her, gender is also a linguistic identity and the two are interwined. In...

Lilith Fair: a celebration of women in music: various artists.
December 1, 1998... NETTWERK/1998 BY CINDY FILIPENKO The Lilith Fair compilation album, A Celebration of Women in Music, is evidence that some very good ideas can go painfully awry. Now in its fourth year, Lilith Fair has become the highest grossing...

Stones: Cori Brewster.
December 1, 1998... REVIEW BY GLORIA BLIZZARD Cori Brewster's new album Stones melds strong musicianship, some wonderful instrumentation and strong production. The result is a delightful mixture of songs that range from the country sounding `Come September'...

Many changes on the Herizons.
December 1, 1998... There comes a time when you begin to ask questions. Big Questions. You know the ones I mean. Why are we here? What is our Purpose? Would it matter if we didn't exist? For publishers, these questions are as mind-boggling as they are for...