Today is National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women, which also com­mem­o­rates the anniver­sary of the Montréal Massacre in 1989. I am hon­oured to have been asked to read one of my poems at the Toronto Candlelight Vigil to mark the anniver­sary of this tragic event.

The fact is that vio­lence against women is an everyday reality for mil­lions of girls and women around the world. There are many kinds of vio­lence. The word “vio­lence” is related to the word “vio­la­tion” – and each time a woman’s right to be a full, self-determining human being is vio­lated because she is a woman, vio­lence against women is com­mitted. From media and adver­tising depic­tions of women as vapid damsels in dis­tress worthy of little more than objec­ti­fi­ca­tion for men’s plea­sure, to domestic abuse, work­place sexual harass­ment, date rape, mar­ital rape, the misogyny of reli­gious fun­da­men­talisms, and sexual assault and gender-based vio­lence, women, girls and trans people are still much more likely to be at the receiving end of vio­lence and vio­la­tion. These prob­lems are usu­ally worse for women who are not white, not from the upper-middle classes, and those of us who straddle mul­tiple social-cultural iden­ti­ties as immi­grants and chil­dren of immi­grants. Continue reading ‘National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women’»

This was written as part of a response to Martha Nussbaum’s opinion piece found here: http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/07/11/veiled-threats

I’d like to share my per­sonal view on the burqa (face mask) con­tro­versy. My views are not based on the black-and-white, binary, false dichotomy pre­sented too often by both sup­porters of the face-mask ban and those who wish to defend the garb.

Continue reading ‘The Burqa/Niqab ban controversy’»

Have you ever said, “I’m not gay, but…” or “I’m not bisexual, but…” as a dis­claimer before expressing how much you are attracted to someone of the same gender as you?

If you are pro­gres­sive, lib­eral, and you stand for LGBT rights, have you ever won­dered why you need to give a dis­claimer like that before expressing feel­ings that might qualify you as being bisexual?

I have.

First of all, as a bisexual woman (I prefer the term queer) who has been in rela­tion­ships with both men and women, and who is in a happy, long-term rela­tion­ship with a woman, I find it hurtful when some of my friends still qualify their own sexual desires for people of the same gender by first sep­a­rating them­selves from people like me. There’s nothing wrong with being het­ero­sexual, but there is some­thing very wrong with being het­ero­sexist, which is the idea that het­ero­sex­u­ality is the default, nat­ural, normal thing to be, and that it’s a black or white area with no variations.

If you are telling someone how you sup­port gay rights, you don’t need to keep qual­i­fying that with “I’m not gay or nothing, but…”. Similarly, if you are telling people that you are bi-curious, or attracted to someone of the same gender, then those of us who have put our lives on the line to be honest about sex­u­ality, would appre­ciate it if you could stop talking about this matter like it’s a hot potato that you are willing to sup­port in passing, but not willing to own, even when you your­self have feel­ings that would qualify you as bisexual.

Continue reading ‘(I’m not a queer or nothing, but…)’»

Extremist Muslims and Right-Wing Westerners can agree on one and only one socio­cul­tural phe­nom­enon: hating gay people. It’s painful for the mod­er­ates of both sides to accept, but it is a reality that must be con­fronted by intel­li­gent people on all sides before any real, pos­i­tive, pro­gres­sive change can be real­is­ti­cally forged.

“I really believe that the pagans, and the abor­tion­ists, and the fem­i­nists, and the gays and the les­bians who are actively trying to make that an alter­na­tive lifestyle, the ACLU, People for an American Way, all of them who have tried to sec­u­larize America, I point the finger in their face and say ‘you helped this (September 11) happen.’”

–Jerry Falwell (Aug 11, 1933 – May 15, 2007)

…247gay.com
…NPR news

Tories reopen same-sex mar­riage debate.

Poor clue­less Stephen Harper… just doesn’t realize what cen­tury he’s in. As one com­menter on this article put it, “Harper is a com­plete fool. A bigot, prej­u­diced, homo­phobic simple little man.”