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Sunday, June 25, 2017

Grenfell, the LCBO, Québec Solidaire and more -- The Left Chapter Sunday Reading List June 18 - 25

This week's list of articles, news items and opinion pieces that I see as must reads if you are looking for a roundup that should be of interest to The Left Chapter readers.

This list covers the week of June 18 - June 25. It is generally in order of the date of the article's release.

1) Colin Kaepernick, Philando Castile, and the Lost Wisdom of Roger Goodell’s Father

Dave Zirin, The Nation

The need for radical voices has never been more pressing. Defending voices that are being silenced is a task for all of us.

Read the full article.

2) Two women feared dead in Grenfell Tower were 'threatened with legal action' after questioning fire safety

Samuel Osborne, The Independent

Two women feared dead in the Grenfell Tower tragedy were allegedly threatened with legal action after they campaigned for improved fire safety.

Read the full article.

3) Science is still sexist. I know from my own experience

Kirsty Duncan, The Globe and Mail

When I was teaching at a university, a fellow faculty member shot a question at me during a staff meeting: When did I plan on getting pregnant? On other occasions, I was asked how I wanted to be treated: as a woman or as a scientist. Later, when I asked a university official why I was being paid in the bottom 10th percentile, I was told it was because I was “a woman.”

Read the full article.

4) How human traffickers trap women into domestic servitude

PBS Newshour 

More than three million women are forced into servitude as domestic workers every year, often lured to other countries in the Persian Gulf or Middle East under false pretenses. Special correspondent Fred de Sam Lazaro reports on ways some advocates are working to protect workers, as well as women in low-income countries who may be vulnerable to human traffickers.

Read the full article.

5) LCBO workplace the 'complete opposite' of Ontario's proposed labour laws, say employees

Nick Boisvert, CBC News

With just days to go before a potential strike, employees at the LCBO are blasting the province for alleged mistreatment and accusing Premier Kathleen Wynne's government of hypocrisy over its proposed changes to labour laws.



Telesur

Canada’s foreign policy interests in the region drive its actions against Venezuela, solidarity activist Raul Burbano told teleSUR.



Kevin Ovenden, Morning Star

Islamophobia — anti-Muslim racism — is being described on much of the broadcast media as a form of “extremism” or of “hate crime.”
But there is something distinct about Islamophobia. Not distinct in that it is in some way worse to be the victim of anti-Muslim violence compared with, say, anti-gay violence.
It is distinct in that Islamophobia has been central to the policy and legitimising ideology of the again expanding “war on terror” and of every major state and government in Europe and the US.



Kathryn Joyce, The New Republic

Are Protestants concealing a Catholic-size sexual abuse scandal?



Philip Authier, Montreal Gazette

Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois continues to shake the political tectonic plates in the province. His Québec solidaire party is now tied with the Parti Québécois in Montreal and within four percentage points of evening the score provincially, a new poll shows.



Robert Benzie, The Toronto Star

A Progressive Conservative government would be forced to change labour laws in order to derail the $15-an-hour minimum wage increase that takes effect six months after the June 2018 election.



Mark Steel, The Independent

Sometimes the terms used in politics, such as Marxism and capitalism, can be confusing. So it was helpful for Tory MPs such as Andrew Bridgen to offer a simple explanation this week. He suggested the proposal of Jeremy Corbyn, that survivors of the Grenfell Tower fire should be housed in properties left empty by speculators, “fits in with his hard Marxist views”.



Mark Chandler, The Evening Standard

Residents of a luxury housing block have been slammed online after complaining that the arrival of Grenfell Tower survivors will lead to a fall in property prices.



Kimberly Lawson, Broadly Vice

North Carolina is the one state where the law explicitly says you cannot revoke consent once it's given. A bill that would remove this "unacceptable loophole" has little traction.



Ira Wells, The Nation

Instead of fighting for the scraps of the political centre, the left can score a victory by returning to its principles.



 Lee Berthiaume, The Canadian Press

NDP Leader Tom Mulcair is foregoing the celebration and raising red flags following reports that a Canadian sniper in Iraq shattered the world record for the longest confirmed kill.



Anna Fisher, Morning Star

A debate is opening up surrounding Amnesty’s pro-pimp policy – but not everyone is willing to allow the full evidence to be discussed. ANNA FISHER reports.



Toby Helm, The Guardian

Government goes back to drawing board after deciding that cost-cutting rules ‘would have been a disaster’ in light of Grenfell Tower disaster.



David Kirkpatrick, Danny Hakim and James Glanz, The New York Times

The doorbell woke Yassin Adam just before 1 a.m. A neighbor was frantically alerting others on the fourth floor of Grenfell Tower about a fire in his apartment. “My fridge blew up,” the man shouted.

Residents of Grenfell Tower had complained for years that the 24-story public housing block invited catastrophe. It lacked fire alarms, sprinklers and a fire escape. It had only a single staircase. And there were concerns about a new aluminum facade that was supposed to improve the building — but was now whisking the flames skyward.




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