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Magazine
The myth of police as “embattled heroes”
The Winnipeg police union says officers are constantly under attack by everything from “gang members” to video games to bedbugs. It’s a strategy to persuade the public that the only solution is more police and more money.
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Magazine
Looking for change after Black Lives Matter
Nearly two years after the summer of 2020, donations and public support for Black police abolitionists on the Prairies have dried up. Meanwhile, police budgets keep growing.
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Online-only
Alex Vitale on the policing of insurrectionary far-right protests
For professor Alex Vitale, author of The End of Policing, “when we embrace the use of repressive political policing, we’re mobilizing the tools that will primarily be used against our own movements.”
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Magazine
The C-IRG: the resource extraction industry’s best ally
In British Columbia, a little-known arm of the RCMP is dedicated to enforcing injunctions for resource extraction companies. Interviews with land defenders, a C-IRG commander, and an anonymous source reveal details about their history, training, and practices.
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Magazine
The labour movement is stronger without police in it
It’s time for unions to expel police from their membership, because a strong labour movement can only be built on a foundation of safety for Black and Indigenous members.
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Magazine
Parasitic Solidarity
Unions are meant to defend their working-class members against unfair criticism and wrongful termination. But in Winnipeg, the police union is working to obstruct accountability for police officers who kill and abuse people.
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Magazine
A new crisis service
Amid calls to defund and ultimately abolish the police, we spoke to the people who are already working on replacing the police with crisis workers in Canada.
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Online-only
Mental health professionals are not the solution to racist police violence
While mental health interventions have been touted as an alternative to policing, the mental health field has a long history of perpetrating racist and colonial violence.
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Online-only
Police across Canada test out military equipment at private supplier ‘range day’
Experts say rising police militarization is a consequence of mixing police and military vendors at equipment expos
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Magazine
“Defund the police” means “defund the police”
It’s a demand that’s easy to understand and easy to fight for, which is important because we’ll need a lot of people to help us win it.
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Online-only
It’s time to talk about police in our unions
Toward an abolitionist approach to decent work for all
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Online-only
Disarming the people without disarming the state
When you factor in the long history of Black people, Indigenous people, and people of colour using guns to defend their communities against police, the military, and white supremacists, gun regulation takes on a different meaning.
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Sask Dispatch
Does Saskatchewan need a citizen watchdog for the police?
A fatal police-involved shooting has prompted calls for Saskatchewan to create an independent citizen oversight body. But what if most civilian committees aren’t made up solely of civilians at all?
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Magazine
“Azaadi”
71 years ago, India promised to let the people of Kashmir choose to join India or Pakistan. In the absence of the referendum, protestors in Indian-occupied Kashmir are voicing their desire for freedom by showing up in the thousands to the funerals of separatist militants. But 2018 has been the bloodiest year in a decade inside Indian-occupied Kashmir.
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Magazine
Fatal encounters
Cops may kill fewer people in Canada than in the U.S., but it’s clear that the same racism and lack of accountability underpins police shootings as in the U.S. The only difference is that, in Canada, it’s accompanied by less transparency and a paucity of data.
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Magazine
Sending Josephine home
Josephine Pelletier was shot to death by Calgary police in May. Her life and death shed light on the complicated interplay between colonialism, incarceration, and police brutality. This is her story.
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Magazine
Distinct histories, shared solidarity
Black and Indigenous people cannot look to the state for protection or systemic change. Instead, our movements have to recognize the differences between our oppressions, and stand beside each other while building new, shared spaces to exist.
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Magazine
The Anti-Somali Feedback Loop
The feedback loop between harmful media representation and legislation has imposed a massive burden on Somalis who arrived in Canada to escape war. For 30 years, it has impacted employment prospects, access to education and housing, and the freedom to swiftly rebuild lives.
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Magazine
Mexico’s Education Standoff
When Mexican teachers went on strike to protest President Enrique Peña Nieto’s neoliberal education reforms, the state, backed by major financial institutions, cracked down in a bloody attempt at democratic suppression. What does the teachers’ fight signal for the future of public education?
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Magazine
“We Continue to be Magical”
Five young Black folks speak to the challenges and strategies for building and sustaining the Black liberation movement.