"36ec68b2-a354-4872-9c8a-541f0f944d3e"@en . "CONTENTdm"@en . "http://resolve.library.ubc.ca/cgi-bin/catsearch?bid=1213576"@en . "Kinesis"@en . "2013-08-15"@en . "1996-07-01"@en . "https://open.library.ubc.ca/collections/kinesis/items/1.0046861/source.json"@en . "application/pdf"@en . " JULY/AUGUST 1996 NAC's new president... pg 13 CMPA $2.25 ^ Sgecial\u00C2\u00A3yiectioii2J>erfg Women of Courage Photos from Ottawa: National Women's March storms Parliament Hill \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Saying No to Drugs: Commentary on Women and Psychiatry \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Jewish Women in Film \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Art in the Suburbs and much, much more... KINESIS #301-1720 Grant Street Vancouver, BC V5L 2Y6 Tel: (604)255-5499 Fax:(604)255-5511 Kinesis welcomes volunteers to work on all aspects of the paper. Our next Story Meetings are Tues Aug 6 and Tues Sep 3, at 7 pm at Kinesis. All women welcome even if you donl have experience. Kinesis is published ten times a year by the Vancouver Status of Women.lts objectives are to be a non-sectarian feminist voice for women and to work actively for social change, specifically combatting sexism, racism.classism, homophobia, ableism, and imperialism. Views expressed in Kinesis are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect VSW policy. All unsigned material is the responsibility of the Kinesis Editorial Board. EDITORIAL BOARD Fatima Jaffer, Lissa Geller, wendy lee kenward, Agnes Huang, Alex Hennig PRODUCTION THIS ISSUE Dorothy Elias, Sandra M., Agnes Huang, Judy Miller, Andrea Maenz, wendy lee kenward, Dorcas, Fatima Jaffer, E. Centime Zeleke, Persimmon Blackbridge, Joanne Namsoo, Andrea Imada, Michelle Sylliboy. Advertising: Sur Mehat Circulation: Cat L'Hirondelle, Audrey Johnson, Crystal Fowler Distribution: Fatima Jaffer Production Co-ordinator: Laiwan Typesetter: Sur Mehat FRONT COVER Lilia Blasetti (centre) and Nadiya Jina (right) receive congratulations from NAC president Joan Grant- Cummings after being presented with the Women of Courage Award [see page 4]. Photo by Agnes Huang. PRESS DATE June 27,1996 SUBSCRIPTIONS Individual: $20 per year (+$1.40 GST) or what you can afford I nstitutions/G roups: $45 per year (+$3.15 GST) VSW Membership (includes 1 year Kinesis subscription): $30 per year (+$1.40 GST) SUBMISSIONS Women and girls are welcome to make submissions. We reserve the right to edit and submission does not guarantee publication. If possible, submissions should be typed, double spaced and must be signed and include an address, telephone number and SASE. Kinesis does not accept poetry or fiction. Editorial guidelines are available upon request. DEADLINES All submissions must be received in the month preceding publication. Note: Jul/Aug and Dec/Jan are double issues. Features and reviews: 10th News: 15th Letters and Bulletin Board: 18th Display advertising (camera ready): 18th (design required): 16th Printing by Horizon Publications. Kinesis is indexed in the Canadian Women's Periodicals Index, the Alternative Press Index, and is a member of the Canadian Magazine Publishers Association. ISSN 0317-9095 Publications mail registration #6426 JULY/AUGUST 1996 Inside kin \New3 About ' News Report back from the NAC AGM and federal lobby 3 by Agnes Huang New legislation on disclosure of records 4 by Agnes Huang Protestors confront Reform Party 5 by Andrea Maenz Madeleine Gould loses human rights case 5 by Krista James New statistics on women and HIV/AIDS 6 by Fatima Jaffer and Nancy Pang A gathering of community-based researchers 6 by Zara Suleman Features A feminist analysis of DNA evidence 11 by Julie Kubanek Making a case for the Canada Pension Plan 12 by Ellen Woodsworth Interview with NAC's new president: Joan Grant-Cummings 13 as told to Agnes Huang Jewish women and political activism 18 by Justine Davis, Faith Jones, Sarah Leavitt and Rachel Rosen Centrespread Photos from Ottawa: National Women's March Against Poverty.... 14 compiled by Agnes Huang NAC AGM.. Commentary mzm* 0TW3H* AMC! RUOY* 3MOH RUOY* Feminist analysis of DNA.. Women and psychiatry . by Irit Shimrat Arts Review of Ding Xiao Qi's Maidenhome 20 by Karlyn Koh Reviews from the Vancouver Jewish Film Fest 21 by Faith Jones Lesbian and gay subtext in Yiddish cinema 21 by Faith Jones Review: Three solo shows at the RAG 22 by Lizard Jones Powell Street Festival honours Asian Canadian women 23 by Eileen Kage as told to Laiwan Regulars As Kinesis Goes to Press 2 Inside Kinesis 2 International What's News 7 compiled by Lissa Geller, Fatima Jaffer and Andrea Maenz National What's News 8 by Lissa Geller, Fatima Jaffer, Andrea Maenz and Heidi Walsh Movement Matters 10 compiled by Joanne Namsoo Letters 24 Bulletin Board 25 compiled by Alex Hennig PAssfoviAte ^bovit women's issues! Jewish women talk 18 Want to sec those 155VIC5 i\u00C2\u00BB1 thcSC pA\u00C2\u00A3CS? Come to our Storvi Meetm$s Tuesday August 6 and at #301-1720 Gr Tuesday September 3 at 7pm ant Street, Vancouver. Telephone: (604) 255-5499 Kathy Ross at the RAG.. A lot of things seem to have been going in the political scene across the country over the last month\u00E2\u0080\u0094a march on Parliament Hill, new federal legislation, a national consultation on violence against women... As Kinesis goes to press, many women have just returned from the month-long National Women's March Against Poverty [see centrespread.] Women in Canada were not the only ones marching for equality and justice. About 10,000 US women turned up in Los Angeles for a march that saw the participation of just about every socially progressive sector in the country [see What's News page 7.] Throughout and following the NAC AGM, there was a spate of vitriolic articles, editorials and letters critizing NAC's choice of a new president, showing the mainstream newspapers are unrelenting in the NAC-bashing. It also shows women don't have to be storming Reform Party headquarters to set off a string of negative attacks. One editorial inT/ie Globe and Mail was particularly hateful: if one closed one's eyes, one could imagine the editorial writer's veins popping out of his head over the fact that NAC was able to get so much national and local media coverage. The Globe followed the editorial with an even more spitefu! front page cartoon the next day\u00E2\u0080\u0094a NAC coffee mug with the caption \"Black no sugar.\" On the provincial scene, BC premier Glen Clark recently recalled the legislature and announced a new cabinet. Essentially, the cabinet faces are the same as those preelection. Mostly, what Clark did was to merge a few portfolios and shuffling cabinet ministers into different jobs. With regards to the Ministry of Women's Equality, Clark kept his pre-election promise to women and left it as a stand alone ministry. Sue Hammell was re-ap- pointea as minister. In other cabinet actions.. Joy McPhail, the Minister of Social Services before the election and when the NDP government brought in its much despised changes to social assistance last fall, was shifted over to the health portfolio. Relative cabinet newcomer, Dave Streifel, was dropped into the social services hot seat. As Kinesis goes to press, we have just learned that Penny Priddy, the minister of tourism and small business and former MWE minister, will leave provincial politics temporarily to take care of her health- Priddy has been diagnosed with breast cancer. As well, as Kinesis goes to press, Glen Clark essentially re-released the budget announced before the NDP were re-elected. He made two concessions to his \"critics\"-- one: to halt all new construction projects, and two: to conduct a comprehensive review of all government programs. More on the provincial politics scene...last month, Ontarians mourned one year of Mike Harris' right wing policies. And just when everyone thought the Conservative government had done all the damage it could (don't we say this every month,) Harris and company came up with another regressive policy. In late June, he essentially stripped the tenancy rights legislation of all its teeth. Among the changes was the removal of rent controls (which ironically, were brought in by the last Conservative government.) The changes also basically cleared the way for landlords to evict tenants at whim, to turn apartments into condominiums, and to leave tenants with little recourse from exploitation and abuse by landlords. Across the country, there has been debate on alternatives to the deficit hysteria and slash-and-burn policies of the right- wing, that try to maintain social programs and national standards, and create jobs, stimulate the economy, and address the deficit. One example offered by the Social Planning Council of Kitchner, Ontario criticizes the Ontario government's assertions that cutting taxes would stimulate the economy and that private businesses will actually create real jobs. Instead the Council stresses that using the revenues from taxes to create jobs through the non-profit sector. The debate shows the right-wing approach is being scrutinized by more and more sectors. \/ A INT C O U Our appreciation to the following supporters who became members, renewed their memberships or donated to Vancouver Status of Women in June: Elizabeth Bristowe \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Janet Berry* Inez Curl \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Joyce Arthur \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Tanya DeHaan \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Erlene Gladstone \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Sharon Costello \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Melanie Conn \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Pierette Boily \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Patty Moore \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Faune Johnson \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Claire Kujundzic \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Becki Ross \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Wendy Scholfield \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Mabel Seggie And a special thank you to our donors who give a gift every month. Monthly donations assist VSW in establishing a reliable funding base to carry out our programs, services and Kinesis throughout the year. Thanks to: Eha Onno \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Barbara Curran \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 T.. Gibson \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Jody Gordon \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Barbara Lebrasseur \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Neil Power \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Elaine Everett \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Erin Graham Thanks to volunteers who helped with our recent direct mail campaign: Elizabeth Geller \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Andrea Imada \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Karen Joseph \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Joanne Namsoo \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Madeleine Mclvor \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Jennifer Johnstone Speaking cf alternatives...at the NAC lobby of federal politicians, women challenged Finance Minister Paul Martin on his claim that Canada cannot afford to spend $50 million on feminist strategies to end violence against women. One NAC delegate told Martin he could use the monies planned for the creation of the proposed DNA databank (at a cost of hundreds of millions) which women don't want [see Page 11.] Within days of rejecting women's demands for funding, mainstream newspapers reported at least four cases where a woman had been murdered by her abusive male partner or ex-partner. How much does it take before Canada can \"afford\" to stop women from dying. On a happier note...congratulations to Janine Fuller, manager of Little Sister's, Vancouver's lesbian and gay bookstore [which is making a long overdue move to a bigger and wheelchair accessible space in July] and Press Gang Publishers. Women from Press Gang, Fuller, and co-writer Stuart Blakely, just returned from Chicago after receiving a special Lambda[lesbian and gay] Literary Award jury prize for their book, Restricted Entry, which documents Little Sister's fight with Canada Customs. Hey, on the local Vancouver scene...in case you haven't caught it already..is a relatively new bi-weekly Vancouver Sun column offering a selection of items from \"the local ethnic and community press.\" Last month, Kinesis' coverage of the Women's Election Agenda coalition's mobilizing around the BC election was mentioned in the column. Women called to find out about \"Vancouver's women's newspaper,\" surprised that they hadn't oiKinesis before and thrilled to make a connection with the women's movement through the mainstream media. That's all for this month. We'll be back after a month-long break with the September issue. Have a good summer and happy reading. Where in the heck can I find Kinesis? Vancouver Banyen Books, Women in Print, Duthie's on 10th, Duthie's on 4th, Duthie's @ Library Square, Capers on 4th, Little Sister's, Manhattan Books, Spartacus Books, People's Co-op Bookstore, Magpie Magazine Gallery, Eastend Food Co-op, Mayfair News, and UBC Bookstore Victoria Everywoman's Bookstore Brooks Books Qeattle Red and Black Books Everywhere else Kinesis is distributed to stores all across Canada by the Canadian Magazine Publishers Association (CMPA), so ask your local alternative bookstore or newstand to carry Kinesis for you. And here's our monthly weather report from Kinesis HQ: fair, lots of sun, right- wing weather over east with strong rightwing winds over Alberta. Tomorrow, less of the same, with more feminism and sunshine expected all over the world due to high pressure from out Left. Well, actually, it's just kinda sunny over Vancouver as we pore over text, scanned images and chamomile tea. We've got some not so sunny news this month: Robyn Hall, who has been a member of the Kinesis Editorial Board for just over a year is leaving the board to focus on a new (paying) job and other pursuits. We will miss you, Robyn. Thanks for the dedication and keeping us on our toes regarding Kinesis' exposure and visibility \"out there.\" Robyn has reassured us that she will continue to volunteer and join us for our chocolate fiestas or guilt-ridden jogs. We've got an update regarding our Kinesis annual benefit and raffle: we had initially planned this exciting event for August, but have been forced to move it to September due to logitistical difficulties (not the weather). We will announce a date and venue as soon as it's been firmed up\u00E2\u0080\u0094 through a back-page ad in the September issue oiKinesis, and (in Vancouver) through posters on the Drive or at your closest wom en's centre or bookstore. Wherever you hear or read about it, don't miss it: it's one of the best parties women put on in Vancouver each year (and that's not just our bold, biased and brazen opinion!) Big hellos to new voices in this issue: Eileen Kage, Rachel Rosen, Justine Davis, Julie Kubanek, Joan Grant-Cummings, Karlyn Koh, Irit Shimrat, Krista James and Andrea Maenz. Thanks also to ex-Ed Boarder and writer Heidi Walsh who came back to Canada from Germany long enough to say hello, write a What's News item, and make some much appreciated editing suggestions. Finally, we'd like to remind Kinesis readers that the Kinesis office will be closed for the month of July, to give our exhausted editor, production staff members and volunteers a rest. Please direct only urgent advertising inquiries to the Vancouver Status of Women at (604) 255-5511. We'll be back in August, refreshed and ready for the revolution so stay with us.. .and if you want to start the \"new year\" as a budding reporter, photographer, proofer or production pal, call 255-5499 (in August) or come to our next story meeting on Tuesday, August 6th at 7 pm. No experience necessary. Take the plunge...you'll never look back! JULY/AUGUST 1996 NAC's annual general meeting: News Women vote for unity by Agnes Huang Women arriving in Ottawa June 13 for the National Action Committee on the Status of Women's annual general meeting knew they'd have a busy weekend ahead of them. Not only would they be dealing with the election of a new president, a booklet full of resolutions, and financial reports, they would also be participating in the jubiliant arrival of the National Women's March Against Poverty on Parliament Hill [see page 14.] Throughout the weekend, women scrambled back and forth in the warm Ottawa sun from the Citidel Hotel\u00E2\u0080\u0094the site of the AGM\u00E2\u0080\u0094and the march's Tent City at Le Breton Flats. Because of the activities surrounding the march, this year's AGM was allotted less time than usual. Only one and a half days were set aside to deal with all the business at hand. The AGM started early Friday morning, June 14. Outgoing NAC president Sunera Thobani and Canadian Labour Congress (CLC) vice president Nancy Riche opened the plenary session with their thoughts and assessments of the month- long March across Canada. Riche read from some e-mail letters received from women during the march\u00E2\u0080\u0094a few, she said, were hostile, but most, supportive. Delegates also heard from the two candidates running for NAC president: Joan Grant-Cummings, NAC's Treasurer and an anti-racist, pro-choice health activist from Toronto, and Catherine Laidlaw, a relatively unknown feminist from Montreal. Later in the morning, delegates went to workshops to discuss questions and concerns with the resolutions. But less than two-hours time was structured in for this work, and the deadline for submitting emergency resolutions was noon, Saturday. After a lunch break, it was off to Tent City to await the arrival of the marchers. The rest of the day was filled with a rally, some workshops and an evening concert. Saturday morning did allow a bit more time for constituency groups\u00E2\u0080\u0094Aboriginal women, lesbians, young women, women with disabilities\u00E2\u0080\u0094and women from the different regional groupings to meet and work out final versions of emergency resolutions. But by 1 pm, women set aside their AGM business, and readied themselves for the big march on Parliament Hill. The only full day for AGM business was Sunday. Some women arrived looking tired, others seemed tense, but for the most part, women seemed to be in good spirits, still on an emotional high from the day before. The AGM gave delegates a chance to say thanks and goodbye to Sunera Thobani, and for Thobani to hand over the reins of the presidency. In her final speech as president, Thobani talked about what it has been like to be the first women of colour president of NAC. Twelve young women, who are all still in high school, were chosen from across the country through an essay contest and flown out to Ottawa for Tent City and the NAC AGM. [Some are pictured above.JThey were instrumental in getting NAC to support a new young women's caucus. Delegates gave a Thobani a ten minute standing ovation, chanting, \"Women united, will never be defeated,\" as she made her way through the room past delegates and back around to the podium. Women who had worked with her in NAC\u00E2\u0080\u0094Carolann Wright, Vuyiswa Keyi, Maureen Trotter, Laurie Kingston and Judy Rebick\u00E2\u0080\u0094paid Thobani an emotional tribute. Just before lunch, the polls had closed and the ballots were counted\u00E2\u0080\u0094it was time to announce the new president of NAC. Despite being billed by the mainstream media as a race based on \"race,\" the election did not split votes between white women and women of colour. Nor did there seem to have been any concern that the media's predictions would be realized. Joan Grant-Cummings received more than 90 percent of the vote, leaving Catherine Laidlaw to gracefully acknowledge defeat. While there was some concern from women on the floor about the insensitive way the election results were announced, almost everyone in the room seemed elated by Grant-Cummings' victory and gave her a standing ovation. The presidency was the only position contested. All other members elected or reelected to the NAC Executive were acclaimed. Fay Blaney, a First Nations woman from Vancouver, became a two-year vice- president, as did Vuyiswa Keyi of Toronto's Women's Health in Women's Hands. They join Miche Hill and Marianne Roy as vice-presidents. Amy Go of the Chinese Canadian National Council (CCNC) retained her position as secretary for a second term, and Meenu Sikand-Taylor, a computer consultant and disability rights activist from To ronto, replaced Grant-Cummings as treasurer. Cenen Bagon, who stepped down as NAC-BC South/Central regional representative, Jennifer Chew of the SouthAsian Women's Centre in Montreal, and Jon Leah Hopkins from Vancouver, who had previously been a member of the NAC Executive, were all acclaimed as members-at- large, joining Nandita Sharma. A highlight of the AGM was the presentation of the 1996 Women of Courage Award. This year, a decision was made to recognize the collective work of women. Usually, it is individual women who are honoured. The Women of Courage, nominated by the CCNC, are the 60 women laundry workers of the Calgary General Hospital, most of whom are women of colour and immigrant women. Last fall, when Conservative premier Ralph Klein announced cuts to health care funding and plans to contract out their work, the women, members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) local 8 and the Alberta Union of Public Employees (AUPE), decided enough was enough and went on strike. (Two years ago, they had agreed to take a $2 an hour pay cut and reduction in their holidays and benefits in exchange for job security.) Their strike sparked solidarity protests across Alberta, and forced Klein to back down. Lilia Blasetti with CUPE and Nadiya Jina withAUPE accepted the award on behalf of all the laundry workers [see front coper photo.] In honour of the Calgary laundry workers, delegates broke out into a rendition of the Ode to Working Class Heroes, which was sung (to the tune of You are my Sunshine) by the striking laundry workers. The rousing chorus is: \"We did the laun dry, the dirty laundry/We did it each and every day/Now Ralph has told us he doesn't need us/ And he thinks we'll just fade away.\" Less than half the resolutions were debated and voted on that day by the membership. Among key resolutions was the designation of one of the vice presidency positions to an Indigenous women-a position now being held by Fay Blaney. As well, delegates agreed to support a resolution that there be a Young Women's Caucus within NAC that would meet twice a year. An Executive member is to be designated to maintain contact with the young women. However, a definition of \"young women\" remains unresolved, with some women saying under-20, others under-25. There were several resolutions concerning accessibility and accomodation for women with disabilities, which was an issue during the march and at Tent City, and on the role of women with disabilities in influencing NAC's policies and positions. Another resolution passed directed the Executive to look into changing the NAC Constitution to allow individual memberships with voting rights in the organization. A recommendation will be brought back to the membership at the 1997 AGM. When it came time to vote on this year's Priority Campaign-Equality and Democracy, a lot of discussion ensued. The Campaign involves continuing to press for the demands of the Women's March Against Poverty, as well as focusing on the democratization of political structures by mobilizing the women's movement for the upcoming federal election and constitutional talks. Some women questioned why, given the success of the march, the focus did not remain \"Bread and Roses, Jobs and Justice.\" Others raised concern and confusion over the meaning and use of the term, \"democracy.\" In the end, delegates agreed to support a Priority Campaign of \"Equality and Democracy: Bread and Roses, Jobs and Justice.\" The AGM ended with a final round of the March's anthem, Bread and Roses. Delegates stood up, held hands around the room, and joined Arlene Mantel in singing the song. The following day, over 300 women packed into the room reserved for NAC's annual lobby of federal politicians. The women were scheduled to meet with the Bloc Quebecois, the New Democratic Party and the Liberal government. Twelve BQ members, three NDP members and 32 Liberals showed up to the lobby. Notably missing from the Liberal caucus were Prime Minister Jean Chretien and Human and Resources Development Minister Doug Young. As well, true to form, the Reform Party did not show up...although, they almost Continued on next page JULY/AUGUST 1996 News Sex discrimination in the Yukon: One more for the boys by Krista James Madeleine Gould's nine year battle against sex discrimination in the Yukon ended when the Supreme Court of Canada (SCC) ruled that the men-only membership policy of the Yukon Order of Pioneers was not a violation of women's human rights. The purpose of the Order, according to its constitution, is \"the advancement of the Yukon Territory, the mutual protection of its members, and to unite these members in the strong tie of brotherhood; and to preserve the names of all Yukon Pioneers on its rolls; to collect and preserve the literature and incidents of Yukon history.\" In practice, it records the history of Yukon pioneering and of the Yukon generally. Its constitution requires that its members meet three criteria: they must have lived in the Yukon for a minimum of 20 years, be of good character, and be male. When Gould applied for membership in the Order in 1987, she was turned down. The 75-year old woman was a pioneer by trade: she had mined the Klondike for 40 years. And like many Yukon women, she had done a lot of work for the Order. She had entertained children at Order events and cooked and served food at Order dinners for years. According to Gould, \"I thought that if we were doing all that work, we might as well become Pioneers.\" Gould responded to the Order's decision by filing a complaint of sex discrimination with the Yukon Human Rights Commission. The Commission found in her fa- vour, ruling that the Order's action amounted to prohibited sex discrimination. The Order appealed the Commission's decision to the courts, and at all levels, the courts ruled that the Yukon Human Rights Act had not been violated. In March, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that there was no question the Order's men-only rule amounted to sex discrimination. However, the SCC further said that the bare fact of sex discrimination is not enough to establish a violation of the Yukon Human Rights Act. This is because the Act does not prohibit sex discrimination under all circumstances. Every human rights statute makes a distinction between the public and the private, and the law only regulates what people do in public. The SCC was concerned with whether membership in the Yukon Order of Pioneers was sufficiently public that the Order's actions were regulated by the Act. Only then, would the discrimination against Gould on the basis of her sex constitute a human rights violation. The Yukon Status of Women Council intervened in the case to support Gould, arguing that the male-only membership policy discriminated against women because it cuts women off from the benefits of membership, excludes women's input from Yukon history, thereby contributing to misconceptions of pioneering as a male- only practice, and denies women pioneers recognition for their work. The Council fur ther argued that membership in the Order met the Act's requirement of being a service provided to the public, because members of the Order acquire a number of benefits and the purposes and functions of the Order are public. According to Nitya Iyer, one of the lawyers for the Council, the Gould case is important because it addresses the kinds of exclusion women are supposed to be protected from. \"When is a club really private and when does it have sufficient public or social existence to lose that immunity from scrutiny under human rights laws?... The question is how far are we going to go to remedy sex discrimination; how much do we care about it,\" says Iyer. She adds that: \"For women, as for pretty well every other marginalized group in this society, a lot of oppression takes place in the private, most personal sphere\u00E2\u0080\u0094 in the family, for example. From the perspective of oppressed groups, it is a very important question how far into the domain of the private the law will reach.\" The majority of the SCC judges found that the \"service\" the Order provides is making available materials on the history of pioneering in the Yukon and that there is no discrimination in the provision of this service, because the materials are available to the general public. Membersmp, they said, is not the public service in this case. They saw the Order as a social ciub. As has been the case in a number of recent Supreme Court decisions, the two women justices disagreed with die men. The women found that the Orde; s actions amounted to a prohibited form of discrimination In the dissenting opinion, Justice Beverly McLachlin stated that \"membership in the Yukon Order of Pioneers provides sufficient benefits of a public nature and importance that membership itself constitutes a service to the public,\" and noted that the Order's role in the community was so prominent that denymg a woman access to the Order amounted to denying recognition of her work as a pioneer. In response to the male judges' fixation on the value of boys' clubs in facilitating male bonding, McLachlin pointed out, \"if male camaraderie suffices to render the Human Rights Act inapplicable any organisation that excludes women from membership could make a convincing case for the perpetual exclusion of women.\" After almost a decade of hearings, Madeleine Gould says she is quite relieved the whole thing is over, but she doesn't seem bitter about how things turned out. Says Gould: \"It was worthwhile. In years' time, someone will try for it and get in.\" Still, she says she is amazed that the men fought so hard to keep her out. \"All I wanted was to be recognized as a pioneer.\" Krista James is a law student at the University of British Columbia. Confronting the Reform Party by Andrea Maenz On Saturday, June 8th, about 200 people convened on the steps of the Vancouver Trade and Convention Centre to demonstrate against the Reform Party, whose delegates were inside, midway through their national convention.The action, sponsored by many women's, community and activist groups, including Act-Up Vancouver, Downtown Eastside Residents' Association, Iranian Women's Independent Society, the Vancouver Status of Women and the New Socialists, was organized to confront the sexist, homophobic and racist policies of the Reform Party. The initial chanting was enough to draw out a few white Reform men in suits, whose reaction seemed to be a combination of amusement and confusion.The Reform Party then responded by sending out two other delegates in a futile attempt to defend the men. One delegate who was sent out, a woman of colour, did try to speak above the yelling, while holding up her Reform ID tag, yet she appeared to be quite uncomfortable being used as a shield. Photo by Andrea Maenz. fif&rS W* / Book& W\"* Art Emporium Western Canada's Lesbian & Gay Bookstore Open Daily 10am to 11pm Our Books/Our Issues Gay Fiction Lesbian Fiction Our Magazines & Journals AIDS/Health Humour Erotica Queer Theory Feminist Theory Biographies, Essays, Poetry Religion & Spirituality Art & Photography Community 1221 Thurlow(at Davie), Vancouver, B.C. Tel:(604)669-1753 or Fax:(604)685-0252 JULY/AUGUST 1996 News Women and HIV/AIDS: Taking on the myths by Fatima Jaffer and Nancy Pang The 11th International Conference on AIDS takes place in Vancouver July 7-12. This will be one of the largest AIDS conferences ever. The conference will not just bring together academics, medical \"experts,\" researchers, pharmaceutical companies and professional HTV/AIDS service workers, but people living with HIV/AIDS, grassroots activists and community resource people from all over the world. One of the key issues AIDS activists will bring to the table will be the need for medical researchers, academics and governments to continue to look for a cure, not just drugs that aim at making AIDS a chronic, manageable disease. Most importantly, the conference will bring together an unprecedented number of women, both those working on issues of HIV/AIDS and HIV-positive women. While more men than women have HIV/ AIDS, women have become the fastest growing group being diagnosed with HIV. In North America, more white and First Nations women have HIV than any other group of women. Black and South Asian women are the largest groups among women of colour in BC testing positive for the HIV virus. In the US, it is Black and Hispanic women. The most common age group at which women are diagnosed is 30-39. In BC, more people are infected with the HIV virus through intravenous drug use than for any other reason. There are numerous risks for women sex trade workers. Heterosexual women are at greater risk for the virus through sexual contact. The numbers for known lesbians with HTV are still relatively small, though the risks are greater if they sleep with men or use intravenous drugs. Women have traditionally been considered at lower risk for the HIV/ AIDS virus than men. As such, they have been misdiagnosed or not encouraged to take HIV tests. The symptoms of HIV for women are different than for men, though this is only recently being recognized. Often women are diagnosed with HTV when the virus has been in their systems for several years already. They die sooner after diagnosis than men. Even if they receive early diagnoses, they tend to live shorter lives with the virus than do men. Women are subject to different opportunistic, AIDS- related illnesses than those that afflict men. Some women die of AIDS never having been diagnosed with HTV/AIDS. Women with HIV/AIDS are more likely to live in poverty than are men. More AIDS/HIV service organizations cater to HIV-positive men than to HIV-positive women. Most of the above information is relatively new, not commonly known and is being brought forward by women, who are challenging the myths about HTV/AIDS that put them at greater risk and leave them with fewer resources to cope with the virus. Women's organizations have also been slow to respond to the isolation and many realities facing HIV-positive women. In future issues, Kinesis hopes to carry coverage based on interviews with women from various parts of the world attending the International AIDS Conference. In particular, we will be looking at the role of women in HIV/AIDS prevention /service work, the differences and similarities in the ways HTV/AIDS affect women/peoples in the \"third\" versus \"first\" worlds, the activism of women H3V/AIDS workers, and why HIV/AIDS is a women's issue. On page 25, a calendar lists some of the events specific to or of interest to women taking place concurrently with the AIDS Conference. Most of them are free. All are open to the public. Fatima ]affer is a regular contributor to Kinesis. Nancy Pang works at Positive Women's Network in Vancouver. About the XI International AIDS Conference \u00E2\u0080\u00A2A Community Forum will precede the AIDS Conference. Only 500 people from all over the world will be able to attend the Forum, 100 from each of the five regions of the world. The Forum will take place at the University of British Columbia. Delegates will discuss strategies, policy statements, and regional action plans to take to the AIDS Conference. \u00E2\u0080\u00A2Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien has not committed to attending theAIDS conference, and it is unlikely he will do so. As a result, South African President Nelson Mandela, who was initially expected to attend, will not be coming because protocol does not permit it. \u00E2\u0080\u00A2It costs almost $1,000 per delegate to attend the International AIDS Conference if you applied before February. After February, the cost of registration skyrockets. \"Scholarships\" have been given to some \"first\" and \"third\" world delegates to enable them to attend. It is unknown what criteria were used to select the delegates who received scholarships. \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 TheAIDS conference is the largest conference ever to be held in Vancouver. Workers at Vancouver hotels have been given \"sensitivity training\" by AIDS Vancouver staff. \u00E2\u0080\u00A2Police are also being given sensitivity training. However, hundreds more police will be posted in Vancouver to deal withAIDS activists protesting during the conference. Violence against women: A gathering of researchers by Zara Suleman On April 20, community-based researchers came together for a two-day forum in Vancouver called the Gathering. It is organized by FREDA, the Feminist Research Education Development and Action Centre. The researchers who participating in the forum had each worked on one of 15 projects funded by FREDA, which focused on violence against women and children. FREDA was established in 1992 with joint funding from Simon Fraser University (SFU) and the University of British Columbia (UBC), and is one of five violence against women and children research centres in the country. FREDAprovides seed funding for community research initiatives and is active in helping community groups formulate proposals and access information on violence against women. It also houses a resource library, a catalogue of feminist researchers, and provides a host of other services such as advocacy and a strategic researchers program. The scope of partnerships fostered by FREDA includes working with community groups andfeminist academics with participation from both SFU and UBC. Day one of the Gathering allowed community-based researchers to network, exchange information, and support and share strategies with each other. Women said they found it extremely valuable to be able to come together and discuss the hurdles and difficulties in the field of research and in working with communities on the issue of violence against women and children. Researchers also found it useful to discuss where to obtain more funding for projects, as well as how to access a variety of published resources. Many researchers who participated in the forum said they believe that having grassroots community involvement and input was essential in creating research that is ethical, accountable, community-driven, challenging and action oriented. Women from community groups also expressed that it was critical to produce research that with an action component so that research does not just create more \"books on shelves.\" All agreed that action components need to be incorporated in the research funding to bridge the theory and data gap in order to create concrete services, protocols, lobbying and education. Some of the obstacles to community- based feminist research identified were: building trust within communities for research; backlash against feminist research; difficulties translating research into action, and demystifying the research process and \"academic\" language. Participants brainstormed ways in which FREDA could play a role in promoting research and feminist reseachers. On day two, researchers and community members had an opportunty to meet with and recommend actions for change to representatives from several federal, provincial and regional government departments. Representatives from the BC Ministry of Women's Equality (MWE), Status of Women Canada (SWC)-BC/Yukon Region, Human Resources Development Canada, the Immigration and Refugee Division, and the Vancouver Health Board were just a few of the external guests present at this part of the forum. Women were able to question representatives about their funding practices and their proposal requirements for research, and to advocate that research on violence against women be produced from the initiative of grassroots, feminist, community agencies. Participants presented the government representatives with a list of recommendations which emerged from the forum. The recommendations were focused particularly on the BC Attorney General, MWE, SWC, and all funders of research on violence against women. The Gathering was an incredible opportunty for researchers to offer information and share resources with one another, and was quite timely. The Gathering followed both the SWC's consultations in the BC/Yu- kon region on research and a consultation with the MWE on violence against women. SWC has a research budget of approximately $1.8 million which is intended to be distributed for research projects in the 1996/ 97 fiscal year. [The money was transferred to SWC after the federal Liberal government announced in its 1995 budget that it was closing down the Canadian Advisory Council on the Status of Women and merging its responsibilities into SWC] How the research fund will be administered is still being discussed. The Gathering was a forum that gave women the opportunity to discuss the needs, priorities and assistance that researchers and community groups believe are necessary for research on violence against women and children. Having representatives from SWC and the MWE present was key in informing those funders of the needs of community groups. FREDA hopes to hold more gatherings in the future to enable researchers to further work together against violence against women. If you are interested in finding out more information about FREDA please contact FREDAat: 515 W. Hastings St. Vancouver, BC V6B 5K3; tel: (604) 291-5197; fax: (604) 191- 5189. Zara Suleman is an independent feminist researcher who has currently finished research on \"Young Women and Sexual Assault.\" The research is available through FREDA. ~Z8\u00C2\u00A3 \" ' %7**\"N \"world. JULY/AUGUST 1996 International ->y Lissa Geller and Fatima Jaffer Profiting from breast cancer gene Almost 200 organizations, including 30 international women's groups, are backing the International Coalition to Protect the Human Genome in its attempt to stop a US firm from patenting a human gene linked to breast cancer in women. The gene, known as BRCA1, is contained in the genetic makeup of approximately 85 percent of women who get breast cancer. It was \"discovered\" by Myriad Genetics, the US-based biotechnology firm that is now applying for a government patent and monopoly over the gene. Myriad's intentions are to charge about US$850 for breast screening tests that will identify the gene's presence in women. \"Myriad did not invent the breast cancer gene \u00E2\u0080\u0094it merely discovered a gene that has long existed in the human genetic pool. To claim it as an invention is as incredulous as laying claim over the discovery of a chemical like chlorine,\" said a spokesperson for the Coalition. If Myriad gets its way, it would effectively deny millions of poor and working women access to the costly test and open the door to patenting thousands of other genetic traits. The Coalition is seeking to have the patenting of human genes made illegal. As well, the Coalition is concerned that US health insurance companies would use the test to discriminate against women. They are seeking legislation in the US that would ensure companies cannot require this test as a way to deny health insurance coverage and that, if a women chooses to have the test, the results will be confidential. For more information on the legislation, contact the International Coalition to Protect the Human Genome, at 1660 L Street NW, Suite 216, Washington, DC, 20036, USA; (202) 466-2823. Women's Party in Ireland In six short weeks, women in Northern Ireland organized a political party which took one percent of the vote in recent elections. This finish, which was ninth overall, guaranteed the Northern Ireland Women's Coalition Party two seats in the 110 seat, all-party peace talks. While the all- party talks' credibility is suspect as the British continue to exclude the Irish Republican Army's political wing, Sinn Fein, the victory is a step towards shattering \"the mould of politics in Northern Ireland,\" a key objective of the women's party. The new party attracted both Protestant and Catholic nationalists, and stands on a broad platform calling for a Bill of Rights. \"If the established parties took women's issues and women seriously, we probably wouldn't exist as a party,\" noted Kate Fearon,one of the party's chief organizers. Women in Northern Ireland are severely underrepresented in traditional politics. None of the 17 parliamentary seats in the country are held by women and only 12 percent of seats on local councils have women as representatives. Meanwhile Sinn Fein member Chrissie McAuley is critical of the women's party as being too middle-class and not nearly as diverse as its organizers claim. Nonethe less, she welcomed the spotlight the party has put on the debate about women's issues and the dearth of women in politics. Maternal deaths on the rise In the first comprehensive survey in ten years that looked at maternal deaths around the world, Unicef, an arm of the United Nations, reports that 600,000 women will die this year in pregnancy and during childbirth, many of those needless deaths. As well, as many as 300 million more women will suffer debilitating illnesses or lasting injuries as a result of pregnancy and childbirth, while millions more children will die each year because their mothers are too sick or weak to care for them in their first weeks of life. \"It is no exaggeration to say that the issue of maternal mortality and morbidity, fast in its conspiracy of silence, is in scale and severity the most neglected tragedy of our times\" says the report. The figures, released in June, are 20 percent higher than previous Unicef estimates and were compiled in conjunction with the World Health Organization and Johns Hopkins University in the US. The survey blames a lack of adequate obstetrical care in many nations, proper medical training and a lack of midwives to assist in prenatal, post natal and delivery care, as well as women's poverty. Human rights abuses in Turkey raised at Habitat II Activists, women's groups and other non-governmental organization (NGO) representatives to the United Nations Summit on Human Settlements (Habitat TI) are calling for world condemnation of systemic human rights violations in Turkey, the site of Habitat II. In Canada, returning delegates from Habitat n are calling on the Canadian government to take a public stand and strong action in light of blatant violations of the rights of protestors, unionists, Kurdish people and women during Habitat II. According to a press release sent from Habitat II, by members of the Canadian youth delegation, \"The events that have taken place in Istanbul during the Habitat Conference have made a mockery of the goals of the last UN Conference of this century.\" In particular, the Canadian delegates refer to two incidents on June 8th within walking distance of the UN Conference site. In the first, the Saturday Mothers, a group of mothers, relatives and friends of Kurdish people who have disappeared or been killed while in the hands of Turkish security forces, were holding their 53rd peaceful sit-in with participation from some women from the NGO Forum of Habitat n. About 3,000 police in full riot gear violently swarmed over the 50-60 protestors. Nita Kapoor, a feminist activist with the Norwegian People's Aid who was in Istanbul for the NGO Forum, was mistaken for Kurdish and detained for two hours by Turkish security forces. The following day, members of the Saturday Mothers joined with NGO Forum participants in organizing a press conference and holding a mass action to protest the brutality of the security forces. The second inciden also on Tun^ 8th; took place within blocks from the sit-in, where a demonstration by members of the Turkish Confederation of Public Sector Employee's Union was also violently crushed by security forces. Prior to the dem onstration, the police arrested protestors arriving from Ankara. During the demonstration, the police detained hundreds in efforts to clear the area. About 311 were still in custody at the time of press. Turkish and Habitat II activists say the June 8th actions by the Turkish government and its security forces are typical of the disregard for human rights in Turkey. During the NGO Forum, the streets were lined with riot police, military and undercover cops, military vehicles and weapons. About 1,500 people in total are said to have been detained. Over the last five years, Turkey has destroyed over 2,000 Kurdish villages, leaving about two million people seeking refuge in the cities of western Turkey. The press release points out that, \"while hosting a conference aimed at improving human habitat, the Turkish government has systematically destroyed the habitat of its citizenry.\" US women take on the radical Right Tens of thousands of activists in the United States travelled to California in April to join the March to Fight the Radical Right in San Francisco, organized by the US women's coalition, National Organization for Women (NOW). The march had two major agendas\u00E2\u0080\u0094to build coalitions between various socially progressive movements in the country and to draw attention to the rise of right-wing parties and politics in the US. It succeeded in meeting both the agendas, drawing the participation of more than 850 organizations, from labor unions to religious groups, in an unprecedented show of unity. Speaker after speaker drew attention to the recent waves of violent attacks on women, immigrant bashing, anti-affirmative action campaigns, anti-gay legislation, poor-bashing, and other right-wing attacks on marginalized groups of people in US society. They also denounced the hypocrisy and bigotry that characterizes right-wing politics in the US. Speakers included Katie Quan of the Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees, Delores Huerta of the United Farm Workers of America, Peggie Reyna of the LA Commission on Assaults Against Women, Pat Ireland of NOW, and feminist Gloria Steinem. Divorce (still) legal in Ireland Women celebrated a Supreme Court ruling in Ireland last month that upheld a referendum decision in 1995 which scrapped the country's 70-year ban on divorce. Anti-divorce campaigners had claimed the government had unfairly influenced voters during the referendum campaign. But the five Supreme Court judges unanimously rejected the last bid to stop divorce becoming legal in Ireland. There is no further legal recourse for the anti-divorce minority. California's th-ee strikes yaw strikes out Judges m California ha ve oeen told they do not have to impose life sentences on people who commit three or more :nmes if ihev think the sentence is too harsh, the California Supreme Court ruled in June. The decision could affect 'housands of cases in California. The three strikes law. enacted in 1994, made it mandatory for judges to imoose a 25-vear sentence on all those who had two prior convictions, irrespective of ne crime. Only The prosecutor the state) vid the authority to ask for a more lenient sentence. The ruling gives judges rhe same rights as prosecutors. It also allows prisoners sentenced under the law since 1994 to ask he sentencing judge to review trie sentence New rights for homeworkers The International Labour Organization \u00E2\u0096\u00A0TLO) signed a convention at their annual conference last month laying down international standards for home workers, who are among the world's least protected workers and predominantly women. The ILO, which gives power to worleers, employers and governments, voted 246- 14 to ratify the convention. I: obliges governments to adopt national policies on home working to improve the situation of home workers, with a view to creating \"equal treatment of home workers and other wage ear v Togo woman granted asylum A ruling from the US Board of Immigration Appeals on June 13 has granted asylum for Fauziya Kasinga, who fled her home in Togo to escape genital mutilation. Female circumcision is routinely performed women in Togo at age fifteen. Kasinga avoided the practice because her father opposed it. After his death, it was arranged for Kasinga to be married and be circumcised. Kasinga was able to flee to Germany, obtain a false passport and get to the United States. During her stay in the US Kasinga was detained in prison for over a year, and in August her initial claim was denied by an immigration judge on the basis that her story was not believable. Kasinga's is the first case involving the threat of genital mutilation to be heard by the Board of immigration Appeals. Last May, the US became the second country (after Canada; to make genital mutilation grounds for refugee status. The Board's decision to grant asylum to Kasinga will hopefully prevent other women fearing persecution, from being detained in prison, and their cases dismissed as unbelievable. continued on next page OCEANSIDE ACCOMMODATION SALT SPRING ISLAND (604) 537 2727 JULY/AUGUST 1996 What's News by Lissa Geller and Fatima Jaffer Challenging Ontario's \"Spouse in the House\" rule The Women's Legal Education and Action Fund (LEAF) has been granted intervenor status in an Ontario Divisional Court to argue the case of Falkner v. Ontario which deals with Ontario's so-called \"Spouse in the House\" rule. The case is a constitutional challenge to the General Welfare and Family Benefits Regulations in Ontario passed by premier Mike Harris Conservative government, along with other welfare cuts, last October. The regulations changed the definition of spouse for the purpose of receiving social assistance. Under the new definition, women who live with a man in the same dwelling will now be presumed to be spouses, and therefore become ineligible for welfare as single people or sole-support parents. Previously, a recipient of social assistance could live with whomever they chose for up to three years before they were assumed to be spouses (which is the definition for common-law spouse under all other areas of the law, such as Ontario's Family Law Act.) The regulation is also unique in that the onus is on the recipient to prove that no spousal relationship exists the instant she moves in with a man. To date, over 10,000 people have been declared ineligible to receive benefits and 89 percent of those are women. Falkner v. Ontario was launched by four single mothers whose welfare benefits have been cut off despite their protests that the men they are living with bear no financial responsibility for her children. Martha Jackman, LEAF's lawyer in the case, is arguing that the regulations clearly discriminate and overwhelmingly affect women. \"They are founded upon two biased assumptions; either a women who is living with a man must be financially dependent upon that relationship, or the woman is of inferior moral character and therefore undeserving,\" she says. \"In both cases, the woman's right to receive an income in her own right to meet her and her children's needs is ignored.\" In 1986, LEAF was instrumental in launching a challenge to a similar regula tion in Ontario. \"As a result of our actions, the Ontario government publicly admitted that the rule was arbitrary and intrusive and held consultations, which led to the three-year rule,\" says staff lawyer Carissima Mathen. \"LEAF is dismayed that the present government would choose to go back to a rule which was universally condemned as both unfair and ineffective.\" Harris' welfare changes also included cuts to most welfare cheques by 21.6 percent, and tightening eligibility requirements. The government say the cuts amount to up to $1 billion a year, which will go towards deficit repayment to banks. Same Sex Benefits Lesbian and gay rights groups across the country welcome a recent federal Human Rights Tribunal ruling which ordered the federal government to extend health benefits to the partners of federal employees in same-sex relationships. While it stops short of ordering the extension of pension coverage, it also ordered three government departments to prepare a list within 60 days of laws, regulations and directives that deny lesbian and gay employees other employment benefits, such as the definition of \"spouse\" in the Income Tax Act, which could lead to pension coverage for partners of lesbian and gay federal employees. The human rights decision comes on the tail of the federal government's recent passing of Bill C-33, which says the federal Human Rights Act should be read to include sexual orientation as a prohibited ground of discrimination. However the ruling is unrelated, because the amendment to the Human Rights Act merely formalizes previous court and tribunal rulings that have been reading sexual\" orientation into the Act anyway. \"This decision underscores the hypocrisy of the federal government in pretending to favor gay rights by amending the Human Rights Act to add sexual orientation, while at the same time fighting against us in this case,\" said barbara findlay, a Vancouver lawyer and member of the December 9th Coalition. The December 9th Coalition is the largest BC group of lesbian and gay activists. Although the federal government has the right to appeal the ruling, it is considered unlikely that it will do so. Sexual harassment in the NWT Several women have complained to the Northwest Territories Council for the Status of Women about a sexist remark made by a male member of the NWT parliament to another MP, Jane Groenewegen. MP Michael Miltenberger made remarks in March about Groenewegen's participation in a hockey game, claiming that she came to support them by watching them undress after the game. Groenewegen dismissed it as a sick attempt at humour, but Miltenberger persisted and referred to her as \"thunder-thighs.\" On numerous occasions, he made other disparaging comments directed at her. Bonnie Denhaan, one of the women who wrote the protesting letters, notes Miltenberger's behaviour is symptomatic of widespread sexism in the North. \"The northern attitude is still extremely male- dominated and there is not enough pressure being put on anyone to do something about this kind of behavior.\" Women's groups continue to demand an apology. Miltenberger has refused to apologize and claims it's all just in good fun. Groenewegen meanwhile says she is anxious that the controversy will not permanently damage her relationship with other members of parliament, who are all independents and operate by consensus. Workfare hits Ontario People receiving social assistance in Ontario will now have to work for their benefits under the Ontario Conservative government's mandatory workfare program called \"Ontario Works\" introduced last month. While the exact details of the program have not been made clear, the program will require all able-bodied welfare recipients, including single mothers with children older than age three, to work for their cheques or give up the money. The government claims it legalized workfare in Ontario because it will help people break the cycle of welfare dependency by motivating them to work. Their reasoning is unsound and is based on the assumption that welfare recipients are lazy bums who are getting something for nothing, says Jamie Kristensen, an activist with the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP). It is not a lack of motivation that keeps people dependant on welfare but..\"a shortage of jobs.\" Various forms of workfare programs in Canada as far back as 1955 and the Great Depression of the 1930s have never worked. Nor have similar programs recently introduced in the United States. Academic studies have also shown that workfare programs fail to deliver major benefits to governments in the form of smaller welfare caseloads. Nor do they move recipients into the permanent workforce. Ontario Works and a program similar to it in Alberta, which force welfare recipients to work, do nothing to train people for employment, says an OCAP press release. \"The jobs [in Ontario Works] are low-skilled and do not have any long-term employabil- ity attached to them.\" The \"jobs\" include work such as removing old logs from rivers, assisting at seniors' drop-ins, and helping with breakfast programs at schools. The Ontario government has been unable to give any estimates on the amount of permanent work which may come out of the program for those forced to participate in it. In fact, workfare is expected to undermine the job situation in Ontario in a number of ways. It will redirect resources from job creation, displace paid employees, and push down wages. As well, it is unclear whether welfare \"workers\" will be allowed to unionize, or what benefits they will be eligible for under the Ontario Works program. Sid Ryan, president of the Ontario division of CUPE (the Canadian Union of Public Employees), predicts that the plan will lead to job losses in the community among people who now perform work for pay that is to be done by welfare recipients for substandard amounts of money. Some \"jobs\" under Ontario Works include painting park benches, maintaining parks and recreation areas, maintaining snowmobile trails, and tree-planting. There are two parts to the Ontario workfare scheme: an employment program intended to place people in private sector jobs, and a program run by service clubs and social service organizations where people on welfare can work on community projects. continued on next page International News continued from previous page by Andrea Maenz Victory for US lesbians and gays In a 6-3 ruling, the US Supreme Court struck down Colorado's homophobic Amendment 2, which prohibited governments from passing anti-discrimination legislation to protect gays and lesbians. In the majority decision, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy cited the US Constitution's 14th amendment, which gives all citizens equal protection under the law The court ruled that: \"A state cannot so deem a class of persons a stranger to its laws. Amendment 2 violates the Equal Protection Clause.\" US President Bill Clinton said he supports the decision in a statement from the White House. However, at the same time that lesbian and gay rights advocates celebrated the decision and praised the White House for its endorsement, Clinton indicated he may sign a bill introduced into Congress in May by conservative Republicans, that would prevent the recognition of such marriages. This would allow states to decide whether or not to recognize same-sex marriages, but would defines marriage under federal law as a union between a man and a woman. According to a White House spokesperson, Clinton feels that same-sex unions undermine families, at a time when \"we need to do things to strengthen the fam- ily.\" Malaysian activist arrested A human rights activist who challenged the Malaysian government for its abuse and torture of illegal immigrants in detention camps has been arrested and is on trial in Malaysia. Irene Fernandez, director of the Malaysian human rights organization Tenaganita, is being charged with \"maliciousle and falsely\" accusing prison guards. In 1995, Tenaganita published a report, with accounts from prisoners who described overcrowded and filthy conditions, sexual assault and beatings, and bribery. Fernandez contends that the abuse lead to the death of 71 prisoners from Indonesia, Bangladesh, Pakistan, India and Thailand. The Malaysian government has acknowledged the deaths, but maintains they were caused by diseases brought in from other countries, not by any wrongdoing by authorities. Although Malaysian law guarantees free speech, Fernandez has been charged under a law that prohibits the publication of \"malicious allegations\" against the government. If convicted, she faces up to three years in prison and a fine equal to $19,000 Cdn. A conviction could also threaten the rights of other activists to speak out. Human rights supporters worldwide are calling for and end to the trial and an investigation into the treatment of migrant workers and prisoners. To support Irene Fernandez, send letters and faxes to the Malaysian Prime Minister demanding that charges against Fernandez be dropped: YABH Datuk Seri Mahathir Mohammed, Perdana Menteri Malaysia, Pejabat Perdana Menteri, Jalan Datuk Onn, 50502 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Fax: 60-3-238-3784. SOURCES: National (NOW) Times; Nita Kapoor (Norway) and Anisha Susanna George (Malaysia) from Istanbul Habitat II; off our backs; The Barnard-Baecker Centre; Sojourner, The Vancouver Sun; The Globe and Mail; and various press releases. JULY/AUGUST 1996 What's News continued from previous page Many community volunteer agencies have already decided to boycott Ontario Works' mandatory job placements. The national United Way, which has been warned CUPE will discontinue all fundraising on United Way's behalf if the charity participates, has declined to get involved. As well, United Way of Ontario is recommending to organizations receiving funding from United Way that they should not participate in the programs. It is unclear whether the government will withhold funding from groups receiving government funding that refuse to go along with Ontario Works. Ontario Works will cost taxpayers $150 million, and will begin this summer in 20 communities across Ontario. The whole province is expected to be participating in the program by 1998. Canada loses its number one ranking Canada's ranking internationally has fallen as a result of higher child poverty rates, suicide rates and a lowered commitment to foreign aid, according to a United Nations report released in June. The Unicef Progress of Nations report ranked Canada as average or below average in several key areas, in stark contrast to the ranking Canada received in 1993 Canada was ranked as leading all other nations in life expectancy, education and standard of living. \"It's fair to say that in critical areas like child poverty, suicide rates and foreign aid, Canada's situation in 1995 is as bad as it was in 1990,\" said deputy executive director of Unicef, Stephen Lewis, a Canadian. The report notes that Canada has the second-highest number of poor children among 18 industrialized countries, with more that one in seven living in poverty. (According to Statistics Canada, that number is one in ten.) As well, the country ranked 24th out of 34 for suicide rates among young females and 22nd for young males. Dr. Denise Avard of the Canadian Institute on Child Health points out that, \"For Canada, the big shame is the Aboriginal children. We have a Third World problem in our midst and Aboriginal issues need to be addressed.\" She says that among First Nations people in Canada, poverty is much higher than that of other Canadians, the suicide rate is seven times higher, infant mortality rates are twice as high and the high school drop out rate is 50 per cent. Battered women seek justice The Ontario courts are being swamped with requests for a review of sentences given to women who are in prison or on parole for murdering their abusive partners. Ontario court justice Lynn Ratushny says she has received almost 100 requests for judicial review since she was appointed by the Justice Minister Alan Rock following a Supreme Court ruling which modified the understanding of self-defense in the case of Angelique Lavallee. Lavallee was initially acquitted of killing her common- law husband with a rifle shot through the back but the Crown appealed the decision. The Supreme Court upheld the acquittal and recognized that Lavallee had been so battered that she feared for her life when she pulled the trigger, even though she was not in immediate danger. Ratushny said the federal government had originally anticipated there would be 15 to 20 cases for clemency. But she is currently reviewing the records of 44 women who are incarcerated and another 50 women who are on parole and seeking to have their names cleared. \"We have a lot more cases than anticipated. And the facts that come out of almost every file is that these women had terrible lives and have suffered a lot of abuse that has greatly affected them.\" Ratushny has the power to recommend early release and new trials for women and is expected also to make recommendations regarding the self-defense provisions of the Criminal Code. In all the cases however, the final decision rests ultimately with the Justice Minister. by Heidi Walsh BC ends welfare wait for refugees Refugees landing in BC will no longer be subjected to a three-month residency requirement before being able to apply for welfare benefits. In early June, the newly- reelected New Democratic government announced it was easing a controversial ban whereby newcomers to BC would have to wait three months before being eligible for social assistance. Holly Whittingdon, executive director of Mosaic, a Vancouver-area organisation for refugees and immigrants, says the easing of the restriction is welcome news. She says the original residency requirement had in some cases caused hardship for the refugees, who are not allowed to work in Canada without a welfare permit. The residency requirement will still apply to everyone else, including women fleeing abusive male partners from another province. Women's and anti-poverty groups are continuing to call for the entire removal of the three-month residency requirement, saying that it violates the right to access social assistance anywhere in Canada\u00E2\u0080\u0094the only remaining national standard for welfare. BC government first introduced the requirement last year as part of its controversial and regressive changes to social assistance, a program they call, \"BC Benefits.\" The NDP said cuts to welfare rates and restrictions on eligibility were necessary to compensate for insufficient federal funding for social programs. The NDP also hoped to reduce the number of welfare applicants moving to BC, particularly from Ontario and Alberta. The government says the three-month wait was expected to save taxpayers $25 million annually. Ottawa called the move unconstitutional and countered by freezing $47 million in welfare payments to the province. BC has launched a court case against the federal government to regain the money. The case is still before the courts. by Andrea Maenz Canada gets strict NRGT legislation On June 14, federal Health Minister David Dingwall introduced a bill proposing restrictions on several aspects of new reproductive and genetic technology (NRGT). The legislation is the long- awaited response to the 1993 Royal Commission which called for the banning or restriction of a variety of practices pertaining to reproductive technologies. The proposed legislation follows the ineffective \"voluntary moratorium\" on certain procedures introduced last year. Among procedures to be banned are the sale of sperm, eggs and embryos; surrogate mother contracts involving payment; germ-line genetic engineering; and sex-selection for non-medical reasons. Research on embryos will also be regulated, experimental procedures such as cloning of human embryos and animal-human hybrids will be prohibited, and it will be illegal to breed embryos for research. The strict regulations differ dramatically from the United States where most of these practices are unrestricted, but are similar to some European countries. The government says it is introducing these measures because some of the these procedures pose risks to human health and safety; and that the banned practices are those that commercialize reproduction. Tthe same time, the government also released a position paper proposing a management regime to set national standards to regulate doctors performing reproductive procedures. Feminist reproductive rights activists welcomed the legislation as an important first step, but expressed concern that the proposed management regime is still vague. Scab workers in Ontario The latest blow to workers in Ontario from the right-wing government of Mike Harris came in the form or legal use of \"scab\" workers at a labour dispute at the Westin Harbour Castle Hotel in Toronto. Last fall, the Conservative government lifted the ban on the use of replacement workers in repealing most of the progressive labour laws introduced by the New Democratic government. The first big strike taking place under the new labour laws is happening with 600 workers at the Westin trying to protect their jobs and pay. Many of the workers involved and most affected are women, particularly immigrant women and women with children. Women form a significant number of workers in jobs in the sendee industry, such as the housekeepers involved in this strike. At issue in the strike are threats to measures guaranteeing minimum hours of work, and management's desire to eliminate the wage rate for housekeeping duties, in favour of piece work. This could see wages reduced by up to 50 percent. Another recent labour dispute at the Ontario Jockey Club, that also involved using replacement workers, ended only after locked-out clerks agreed to take substantial wage reductions. As the strike at the Westin continues, it has taken on a greater significance. Though the strikers are not members of the Ontario Federation of Labour, the Federation has taken a particular interest in the Westin dispute because it will set a dangerous precedent if hotel management defeats the workers with the use of scabs. SOURCES: The Optimist, Women's Legal Education and Action Fund, and various BC, Ontario and national mainstream newspapers. the back hille guest house for women Explore rural Metchosin. Picnic with a view on our hillside acreage. Relax on the nearby beaches. Visit the provincial museum. Walk the Inner Harbour or tour ' Antique Row. Whatever your choice, the back hills is the place to relax after a day of explorations... Victoria, BC (604)478-9648 email: backhill@islandnet.com http://www.islandnet.com/~backhill i 1 vP&J^fs if * Coming Out * Grief and Emma Tigerheart Lw M ir Loss * Relationship M.S.W. Issues 1 * Childhood COUNSELLING ! Trauma THERAPY Mi J * Family CONSULTATION yj\u00C2\u00BB Wit \Tm Ml Issues | Sliding J Scale Fees Inquiries Call [)i /I l_i w mWH\" 327-4437 Yyf^\u00C2\u00A3im^F i Welcome Vancouver, bo IHtil '/?*? **\u00C2\u00A3LT n JULY/AUGUST 1996 Movement Matters listings information Movement Matters is designed to be a network of news, updates and information of special interest to the women's movement. Submissions to Movement Matters should be no more than 500 words, typed, double spaced and may be edited for length. Deadline is the 18th of the month preceding publication. by Joanne Namsoo Prisoners' Justice Day Memorial Prisoners and their supporters gather each year on August 10th to honour the memory of the women and men who have died unnatural deaths inside Canadian prisons. What started in 1974 as a one-time event behind the walls of Millhaven Prison in Kingston, Ontario, has become an international day of solidarity, when prisoners around the world fast and refuse to work, while supporters organize community events to draw public attention to the conditions inside the prisons. The most recent report from Statistics Canada indicates that in 1994-95, murder, suicide and neglect accounted for 88 deaths in federal prisons and 57 in provincial prisons. This year, the Prisoners' Justice Day Memorial in British Columbia will be held in honour of long-time prisoners' rights activist Claire Culhane, who died on April 28. Culhane was a founder of the Prisoners' Rights Group and helped to organize BC's first Memorial. Throughout her life, Claire Culhane worked nationally and internationally to bring about social changes, and was an inspiration to prisoners and activists alike. This year also marks 20 years since the first BC Memorial was held outside the gates of the old BC Penitentiary. A number of events will be held in Vancouver to commemorate the day: programming on Coop Radio's Stark Raven on August 5th at 7pm; a rally on August 10th at 1pm, in front of the Vancouver Pre-Trial Centre at 275 East Cordova St; and the Annual Rock Against Prisons Memorial Concert at 8pm August 10th at the WISE Club, 1882Adanac St; which will include performances of Daughters of the Wind, Elaine Stef and Eileen Kage, Sandy Scofield and Kathleen Yearwood. For information, contact Prisoners' Justice Day Committee: PO Box 78005, 2606 Commercial Drive, Vancouver, BC, V5N5W1. A room of their own After two years of office hopping, the Yukon's Victoria Faulkner Women's Centre has found a space that they can call home. In October 1994, the drop-in centre and resource service had to be shut down temporarily so staff could focus on finding a permanent and adequate location. The drop-in centre is now once again up and running, and the library will be open in a month. Wheelchair access will soon be in place. Upcoming activities include a series of workshops on Women's Health covering topics such as nutrition, body image, menstruation and ageing. Meanwhile, The Yukon Status of Women Council is actively pursuing the idea of a merger with the Victoria Faulkner Women's Centre, and if the idea gets the go-ahead from members of both organizations, the Status could fold into the Women's Centre as early as this fall. Ironically, the Women's Centre and the Status started out as one group back in the 1970s. When they split, the Women's Centre focused more on being a drop-in, counselling and service oriented organization, while the Status took on advocacy and lobbying work. However, recent funding changes in both organizations have signalled the need for changes. Pauline Au fights for workers' rights An important victory won by women workers in Ontario is under attack. Last November, the Ontario Labour Relations Board (OLRB) ruled that Pauline Au, a former social worker at Lyndhurst Hospital in Toronto, could file her complaint of sexual harassment with them as a health and safety complaint. Au argued that sexual harassment and gender discrimination are just as dangerous to women workers as traditional workplace hazards are to male workers. She won the right to a hearing in a precedent -setting decision. Now, Lyndhurst Hospital has taken both the Labour Board and Pauline Au to the Divisional Court in Ontario, in an effort to block the hearing of Au's case on its merits. The hearing in the Divisional Court is scheduled for September 4,1996, and the outcome will decide whether this important victory can be maintained. The OLRB's decision made Ontario the third province in Canada to accept sexual harassment as a Health and Safety Act violation. Au's victory opened the door for thousands of other women workers to obtain an expeditious and inexpensive remedy in cases of sexual harassment. Already several other workers have filed similar complaints. A fund with a goal of $5000 has been set up to ensure Au has a full opportunity to defend this extension of women's rights in the workplace when her case is heard before the Divisional Court. To contribute to this fund, send contributions, no matter how big or small, to: The Pauline Au Defence Committee, 72 Kerrigan Crescent, Markham, Ontario, L3R 7S7. For more information, call (416) 656-1778. Unite against APEC! A network of groups in Canada are organizing to oppose the implementation of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), a \"free trade\" agreement between 18 Asian and Pacific Rim countries: the Philippines, Japan, Indonesia, Thailand, Taiwan, Singapore, China, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Brunei, Mexico, Chile, Papua New Guinea, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, the US and South Korea. The Network Opposed to Anti-People Economic Control says generally, APEC makes similar \"promises\" as the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA): increased production, more jobs, sustainable development, human resources development and people empowerment. However, thee Network says, experience with NAFTA has shown very contrary results, including a decline in GNP, loss of jobs with decent wages and benefits, cutbacks to social and health services, and privatization of social programs. \"Free trade\" is especially harmful to women, as many are forced into working in low-paying, unsafe, and exploitative situations, and often have to leave their homes to work as migrant workers abroad in order to survive and support their families. The Network says growing protests against globalization and the solidarity among oppressed and exploited people are a direct reflection of the intensification of hardships under \"free trade.\" The timeline for APEC is to create a \"free trade\" zone in the Asia-Pacific region by the year 2010 for the industrialized members, and 2020 for the less industrialized countries. The Network is calling on individuals and groups to say \"No to APEC,\" and lobby politicians to oppose the agreement. APEC countries will be meeting in Manila, in the Philippines, November 18-25 to further discuss the arrangement. The Network is encouraging people to participate in an alternative People's Conference Against Globalization, also to be held in Manila at the same time as the Summit. (The 1997 APEC Summit will be held in Vancouver.) For more information, contact: Center for Philippine Concerns at (514) 842-4047; or PINAY: (514) 631-3898 or Montreal Coalition of Filipino Students: (514) 341-0977. Bangladeshi women continue protests Women in Bangladesh are continuing to call for justice for a 14 year old girl who was raped and killed by three policemen last August, and for several people who were killed in a public protest against her rapists and murderers. The young girl, Yasmin, was raped and killed by three policemen in Dinajpur, a northern district of Bangladesh. Her rape and murder ignited an explosion of public demonstrations in the area, to which the police responded by opening fire, killing seven. In October, the women's movement in Bangladesh, represented by Sammilita Nari Samaj (Collective Women's Front), held country-wide actions to protest against the rape and murder of Yasmin as well as the killing of the seven demonstrators. After eight months of lobbying for justice, in the face of constant administrative road-blocks, the accused were finally brought to trial. In the meantime, similar incidents were reported in other districts of the country such as Bhairab, Chuadanga, Bagerhat and Habiganj. However, the trial of Yasmin's murderers has not yet concluded. Since April 1996, Bangladesh has been under a special nonpartisan government. It was expected that the trial would have been expedited during the course of that administration, but it was delayed throughout. Anew parliament recently was elected and Bangladeshi women will be pressing the new government to see this case is heard in a just trial. They are also appealing to women outside Bangladesh to take action to support their struggle against state violence and to create the international pressure that will help ensure justice for women in Bangladesh. For more information on how to support the campaign, contact: Farida Akhter at UBINIG, 5/3 Barabo Mahanpur, Ring Road, Shaymoli, Dhaka-1207, Bangladesh. Tel: 329620, 811465. Fax: 880-2-813065. E-mail: UBINIG@dak.gn.apc.,org. Thai garment workers form new cooperative Workers from the Eden garment factory in Bangkok met at a three day conference in late March to plan for their future The meeting was sparked by the sub-contracting out of their jobs over the previous month and, in the end, they decided, to form workers' cooperatives. Eden, an Austrian-owned company, began the sub-contracting in February, and 50 workers were ordered to start work at a \"new plant.\" The company employed 2000 workers at the factory. When members of the Garment Workers' Union, which represents the workers in the Eden factory, went to see the the new site, they found that it was a private residence where 50 sewing machines had been transferred from the factory. The workers refused to work in what they saw as a cramped sweatshop. The union lodged a complaint with the management and informed the government of the illegal operation. The union also discovered that the company was planning to lay off many more workers, and force others to work in a network of private residences as sub-contractors. The company later said that it was facing bankruptcy, and would offer workers three months redundancy compensation\u00E2\u0080\u0094half the legally required amount. A thousand workers held a protest outside the gates of the factory and petitioned the Ministry of Labour to intervene. When the Ministry refused, the workers took their protest to the streets, during a meeting of Asian and European countries, and blocked the main highway from the airport into central Bangkok. Following these actions, and after long negotiations involving the union, management and government officials, the workers' demand for compensation\u00E2\u0080\u0094greater than that provided for under Thai law\u00E2\u0080\u0094 were eventually agreed to by the company. The three day conference organized by the Eden Group Union, with assistance from TIE (Transnationals Information Ex- change)-Asia, focused on setting up a workers' cooperative, which would tender for work contracts from the Eden Garment Company. Workers who lost their jobs at Eden have agreed to invest part of their compensation payout to launch the venture. Working groups were set up to investigate the logistical details of the new operation. A food and consumer goods cooperative was established among the workers and will continue to expand. An association of home-based workers was also organized to facilitate the organization and mobilization of workers in the informal sector of the garment industry, and to examine the alternatives to that situation. The Eden workers are requesting international assistance from unions, community and church groups, and any other organizations with a commitment to the development of workers' cooperatives, particularly in the area of finding new markets and investors. To support the Eden workers, contact: TIE- Asia: 273/51 Soi Pongnivet, Prachachuen Rd., Ladyao, Bangkok 10900, Thailand. Tel/Fax: 66- 2-911 1499 Email: tieasia@ksc8.th.com . 10 JULY/AUGUST 1996 Feature A feminist analysis of DNA evidence: Exposing the myths and dangers by Julie Kubanek In 1995, Justice Minister Allan Rock introduced Bill C-104, the DNA warrant legislation. This bill permits courts to issue warrants for the forceful seizure of blood, hair or saliva samples from those accused of certain crimes, to be used in DNA testing. Bill C-104 was voted in by the House of Commons faster than any other bill in Canadian history. It received all- party support, and was accepted within one day. This fall, Solicitor General Herb Gray is planning to introduce another bill that will allocate hundreds of millions of dollars for the establishment of a DNA databank to permanently store the DNA of convicted criminals, in case they are suspected in a later crime. Much to the surprise of the federal government, there is a strong feminist opposition to its proposed DNA databank. The primary objection to the increased focus on DNA evidence in crimes of violence is that there is no evidence it will increase the conviction rate or deter men from attacking women. Most violent crimes that are not routinely \"solved\" are cases of sexual assault where DNA evidence is indeed left at the crime scene. However, in the vast majority of cases of sexual assault, the attacker is known to the victim. In these cases, it is not the identity of the attacker that is in question, but whether or not the woman consented to sexual activity. Generally, a man accused of sexual assault is not denying his DNA is on the victim; he is denying that she objected to it getting there. DNA evidence will not prove lack of consent. In fact, heavy reliance by the courts on DNA evidence may make these consent-related cases look \"unconvictable.\" Crown prosecutors could decide to try fewer cases where consent is the issue, and focus instead on those with strong scientific evidence. Feminist groups committed to ending male violence against women have found support on this issue from many diverse women's groups. The National Action Committee on the Status of Women (NAC), which represents 670 women's groups, passed a resolution opposing the DNA databank. And sixty women's groups that participated in last year's national consultation on violence against women with the Department of Justice also opposed this proposal. Unity on this topic has been developed with Native women's groups, immigrants' rights groups, feminist lawyers, groups that fight for the rights of women prisoners, and reproductive rights activists across Canada. Increasingly, anti-feminist men have been calling for \"justice\" and for the protection of \"victims.\" But certain \"victims\" seem to deserve more attention and protection than others. For example, these men do not defend the right of prostitutes, poor women or Native women to live free of violence. Equally biased is their demand that only certain offenders be treated harshly under the law. In their eyes, those most guilty and deserving of punishment are men who randomly attack women and (especially) girls previously unknown to them. Implicit in this dismissal of wife assault and murder, and of acquaintance rape, is the argument that women who are attacked by men known to them are at least partly to blame. Cases where DNA evidence figures prominently are popular with the sensationalist mainstream media, since they most often involve attacks by strange men on women and girls who can more easily be portrayed as innocent and vulnerable. While these cases are not unimportant, it must be emphasized that they are few in number and that they are already those with the highest chance of conviction. From the attention given by the police and by mainstream media to the rapes and murders of Melanie Carpenter in BC, Tara Manning in Quebec, and Kristen French and Leslie Mahaffey in Ontario, we might readily assume that these women's and girl's lives are more valuable than those of prostitutes killed by pimps and Johns, or of the many women killed by their husbands and ex-husbands each year. A DNA databank could only be truly effective if most violent crimes were committed by convicted repeat offenders. But most sex offenders have never been convicted. Men with the most privilege in society are even less likely to have been convicted. However, we know from the experiences of rape crisis centres that they are not less likely to have offended. At present, Native men, men of colour and poor men are jailed in Canada at a rate way out of proportion with Canadian demographics. Because their DNA would dominate the DNA databank, using such a databank to identify perpetrators of crime would reinforce and even promote more inequality in our current justice system. Not coincidentally, men who have successfully eluded the justice system because of their powerful positions in society would still be out of reach. Another negative consequence of increasing the weight given to scientific evidence concerns the notion of \"reasonable doubt.\" Reasonable doubt of guilt should be assessed based on the combination of all the evidence presented at the trial. Until now, this assessment has not been quantifiable. There has not been any declaration as to what statistical likelihood represents the cutoff between guilt and reasonable doubt. DNA evidence now offers us these statistics for comparison. For example, in the past, blood type has been used as part of the evidence accumulated against the accused. The prosecutor might have argued that only 10 percent of the population has the same blood type as both the accused and the crime scene. This was considered a significant piece of evidence against the accused that might convict him, given some supporting evidence. DNA evidence has made 90 percent likelihood of guilt look inadequate. Juries may want a 99.99 percent likelihood before convicting, since that is what DNA evidence supposedly offers. This could mean that in cases where DNA evidence is available, the normal evidence accumulated against the accused will look weak. This includes cases where the victim did not receive medical treatment in a forensic-equipped hospital I've got the deal for you! e'll get you a high interest return by helping you get y Deposit DNA with us, and we'll throw in an extra bonus man!! Waddya say?! within 72 hours of assault (common with sexual assault and with child sexual assault by a family member), cases where the crime- scene DNA is irreparably degraded, or cases relating to consent. In the eyes of the judge and jurors, verbal testimony of witnesses (and especially that of the victim) cannot, carry the statistical reliability of scientific evidence. This can only work against women in the majority of cases. Conservative \"law and order\" groups are makiing many demands on the subject of violence: harsher prison sentences, abolishment of the parole system and of the Young Offenders Act, reinstatement of the death penalty. Widespread use of DNA testing to identify suspects is another such demand. Many countries such as Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States, have already established DNA databanks, and the Canadian government is eager to remain at the \"forefront\" of law enforcement strategy. The direction that other countries are taking clearly violates individual rights. For example, in the UK, legislation paving the way for a national DNA databank was initially introduced as part of a larger bill aimed at increasing police power. In addition to proposing the establishment of the DNA databank, the bill granted police the right to on-the-spot searches and the right to arrest and detain without laying a charge. In Canada, representatives of the police have been among the loudest proponents of the DNA databank. Police power is at the core of this DNA debate, as was already illustrated by the wide scope of the 1995 DNA warrant legislation. The list of crimes for which DNA samples can be seized under this law is long. It includes thirty sections of the criminal code, plus all \"attempted\" versions of the designated offenses. Among the offenses listed are breaking and entering, robbery, and failure to stop at the scene of an accident. This wide range of designated offenses counters the Department of Justice's assertion that this bill is specifically intended to reduce the incidence of violent attacks and to aid in the prosecution of those cases. This contradiction between a bill's supposed intention and its actual content is familiar to women's groups. The \"anti-stalking\" legislation of 1993 was another such case. This bill was meant to deter men from harassing ex-wives and ex-girlfriends. Women warned the federal government that a broad and degendered bill would result in women being arrested, and this is exactly what has happened. It is probable that the DNA warrant legislation and the proposed DNA databank will also be used against women. In Canada, there is already evidence that DNA technology is being used dangerously. SouthAsian and other women's groups have revealed that samples are being taken for DNA analysis from landed immigrants who wish to sponsor relatives coming to Canada. Contrary to federal policy, this is happening in Vancouver and other cities even when there is adequate documentation to prove familial relationship. The sponsor must pay more than $1000 per person tested. In these cases, the biological samples are not being returned, nor clearly destroyed. All levels of government in Canada have used the excuse of deficit reduction to cut public spending. Nevertheless, the federal government is planning to establish a national DNA databank with the public support of many provincial governments. The DNA databank would be extraordinarily expensive to establish and maintain. The reported cost of the storage portion alone of the UK databank for the first five years is more than $300 million (Cdn). The advantages the DNA databank would provide Canadian courts in prosecuting cases of violent crime are limited, considering the relative scarcity of cases where identity is an issue or where other damning evidence doesn't already exist against the accused. Because DNA evidence will only contribute to the conviction of a few men, it is not worth the costs. Police and courts can do their jobs without this technological tool. It has been the lived experience of rape crisis and transition house workers, and of the women who call us, that the police and courts choose not to do their jobs. Every assertion to the contrary must be resisted. It would be wiser to spend the hundreds of millions of dollars earmarked for the databank on the investigation and prosecution of ordinary, common and equally horrific crimes of male violence against women, and on funding feminist rape crisis centres, transition houses and women's centres. Julie Kubanek works at Vancouver Rape Relief and Women's Shelter. JULY/AUGUST 1996 Feature Canadian Pension Plan: Feds stealing our futures by Ellen Woodsworth The Canadian Pension Plan (CPP) is \"under review,\" or rather, it is under attack by the federal government and the media [see Kinesis June 1996.] Legally, the CPP must be reviewed every five years and receive the approval of at least two-thirds of the provinces with two-thirds of the population. The next review is slated to be completed by January 1,1997. In order to \"consult\" with the provinces, the federal government organized three months of public hearings. The committee conducting the hearings consisted of federal and provincial politicians. The committee went to only one major city per province and people were given little notice about the hearings\u00E2\u0080\u0094in BC's case, at the most, four days notice, at the least, less than two hours. In many cases, organizations received no invitation to speak. Due to the hysterical media hype about the crisis that the pension plan is supposed to be in, and due to the narrowly defined areas participants in the hearing were to address, it was amazing that at the BC hearing, there was still almost total condemnation of the government's proposed changes. The key proposals include: reducing the amount given under the CPP; raising the age of eligibility; limiting inflation indexing; more than doubling contributions to the CPP (which are paid equally by employees and employers) from 5.6 percent of wages to 12.2; rolling the CPP Old-Age Security (OAS) and Guaranteed Income Supplement (GIS) into one lump sum payment called the \"Seniors Benefit;\" and basing it on combined family income; limiting spousal pension benefits for surviving spouses; and restructuring disabil- ity benefits paid under the CPP. The federal government has said it also wants to create a huge slush fund that could be invested to cover all future pension costs. Young people are worried they will bear the burden of the changes, since changes to the Canada's public pension system will greatly affect younger generations. Many voung women also say they are afraid of living in greater poverty in their senior years. Most young people say they are concerned about how to pay for the system. But some are buying the Reform and media propaganda that RRSPs\u00E2\u0080\u0094a privatized pension system\u00E2\u0080\u0094 are the solution. The CPP is not in the crisis situation the federal government and media would have us believe. There is still a $40 billion cushion in the CPP fund, which is enough to cover two years' worth of pension payments. As well, the government has known for many years that there would eventually be a disproportionate number of seniors to people in the paid labour force, but has done little to address the real cause of this situation. The problems facing the CPP at present have occurred because the government has allowed the jobless rate to soar\u00E2\u0080\u0094unemployed workers don't pay into the plan\u00E2\u0080\u0094and because the government is not willing to increase the number of immigrants into Canada to offset the increasingly aging Canadian population. (Are they hoping to force women back into the home to work for free producing more babies to replenish the labour force?) At the recent Public Pension Forum held in Vancouver, Monica Townson, a renown feminist economist, gave her analysis of the current situation of the Canadian public pension system. Townson referred often to her two recently produced documents on the pension system: Reforming the Canada Pension Plan: Implications for Women and Our Aging Society: Preserving retirement incomes into the 21st Century. Townson said that \"The federal government has produced no evidence to support their claim that the CPP is in crisis. It is inexcusable that the federal and provincial governments are trying to push through changes to the CPP which will have a major impact on the lives of future seniors. It is inexcusable that they should be doing this without allowing for a broader public consultation.\" She outlined the proposed changes to CPP and explained why they would be so devastating to women. She said that all of these changes would move us toward private pension plans and to the Chilean-type system of mandatory contributions to a privately run RRSP system. These plans benefit financial institutions and wealthy people who can afford to contribute. (Those who can contribute in Chile cover only one-third of the population.) Townson also said that the existing CPP is a good plan for the paid work force for many reasons. It covers everyone in the paid work force; has very low administrative costs; allows for up to seven years to be excluded from the average wage on which the pension is based (which is especially critical for women who most often must stay at home to raise children); is completely portable [transferable from province to province]; is indexed for inflation; is both ?. retirement and a disability benefit, and includes benefits for surviving spouses and dependents of contributors upon their disability or death; and because employees and employers both contribute an equal, small amount. Townson presented information showing that if one compares the Canadian system to other \"industrialized countries,\" it becomes clear that we contribute a smaller percentage of gross domestic product to public pensions\u00E2\u0080\u0094even less than Americans [see chart.] Several proposals were put forward at the forum to address the problem of shortfalls to the funding of public pensions. One solution, raised by Steve Kerstetter of the National Council on Welfare, would be to increase the cut-off earning rate for contributions. Currently, only a maximum of $35,400 of income is counted in calculating contribution to the CPP Kerstetter suggests raising that limit to $70,000. This would preserve safeguard for pensions and promote further social responsibility for caring for seniors. This would also mean that wealthier people would contribute more than lower paid workers and would would reverse the current system in which poor people subsidize the wealthy who get substantial tax breaks when they purchase their RRSPs. Another solution was proposed by BC economist Emil Bjarnason, who recommended increasing the contribution rate of employees and employers to three percent each. Currently the rate is 2.8 percent. (Even the Chief Actuary, the person responsible for reviewing the CPP for the federal government, has suggested a very graduated increase in the rates over the next 25 years.) All of these proposals sound simple and are based on the philosophy that the majority of Canadians want a public pension plan. What we want is to decrease poverty, not to increase it for either seniors or younger people. There are some real problems with the current system that do need to be addressed, but which are beyond the scope of the present proposals being considered by the government. We know that most women are not covered adequately if at all by CPP, nor are they able to save to contribute to an RRSP. Only 26 percent of women in the paid labour force contribute to the CPP, and 56 percent of elderly women who live alone have incomes below the poverty line (Statistics Canada 1993.) The average earnings of women who worked full-time for a full-year in 1994 were $28,423, and approximately 46 percent of women work unpaid in the home and 40 percent of women work in non-standard jobs (defined by Townson as part-time work, temporary work, own-account self-employment, or multiple jobholdings.) The CPP does not keep anyone above the poverty line; it does not cover unpaid work, like housework, child rearing, elder care or farm work. It does not cover immigrants who have been in Canada less than ten years. Participants at the Public Pension Forum unanimously passed two resolutions, which were: 1) To call on the provincial government to pursue a broader public dialogue on public pensions, to oppose any radical restructuring of the CPP, and to support a gradual increase in the contribution rate, and 2) That \"no changes be made to the CPP before conducting and publishing widely a gendered analysis of the proposed changes, and that no changes be implemented that adversely affect women.\" Until a gender analysis of the proposals has been done and women's groups have been thoroughly consulted, any changes to the CPP should not go forward. And fundamentally necessary to eliminate poverty for seniors is a class analysis. For further information of for full copies of the resolutions, which are available for groups to add their endorsement, contact Kathleen Jamieson at Social Policy and Research Council (SPARC) ofBC, 106-2182 W. 12th Ave, Vancouver, BC, V6K 2N4; tel: (604) 736-8118. Ellen Woodsworth is with the Greater Vancouver Seniors Coalition and works with seniors in the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver. Sahara J!e!BtaMux cAffo-uL&L Bootteeping Swiaii & Sd\\u00C2\u00A3mJptoyid \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Monthly Financial Statements \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Government Remittances \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 Payroll. A/P. A/R, Budgets I Will Transform Your Paperwork! (604) 737-1824 email:barb.l@deepcove.coi Are we spending too much on public pensions? Public pension spending as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) among OECD (industrialized) countries in 1991 Country: Percentage: Austria ' 14.8 Italy 14.4 France 11.8 Sweden 11.6 Germany 10.8 Norway 10.1 United Kingdom 9.5 New Zealand 7.5 United States 6.5 Japan 5.0 Canada 4.2 OECD Average Source: The World Bank, Averting the Old Age Crisis, 1994 Bed & Breakfast A Beautiful Place Centre yourself in the comfort and tranquility of B.C.'s Super Natural Gulf Islands. Healthy Breakfasts Hot Tub & Sauna 5 acres of forested foot paths with ponds ocean and mountain views A Memorable Escape (604) 537-9344 1207 Beddis Road, Salt Spring Island, B.C. V8K 2C8 12 JULY/AUGUST 1996 Feature Interview with NAC's new president: A plan for the future Joan Grant-Cummings as told to Agnes Huang On June 15, Joan Grant-Cummings was elected president of the National Action Committee on the Status of Women (NAC) by delegates attending the organization's annual general meeting. She took over the presidency from Sunera Thobani. During the past year, Grant- Cummings was on NAC's Executive Committee as the Treasurer. She resigned from her position as executive director of Women's Health in Women's Hands, a community women's health clinic in Toronto, after she was elected president. Kinesis had the opportunity to interview NAC's new president. Agnes Huang: Can you talk briefly about your background in terms of work within the women's and other activist movements? Joan Grant-Cummings: The first activist work I did since moving to Toronto in 1985 was around Black youth and their access to post-secondary education. That was with a group called Ujamaa, Young People's Association, which was affiliated with the Jamaican Canadian Association. We interacted with the Metro Toronto school boards of edu- cation to get anti-racist curriculum in schools, encouraged Black History Month activities in schools, and initiated mentoring programs for Black youth and other youths of colour. I knew then that I wanted to work on Black women's issues, so I tried to bring a gender-perspective to the leadership of the group, which wasn't welcomed. I started working in 1987 at the Jamaican Canadian Association as an immigrant settlement counsellor. Ninety-three percent of those using the services were women. The women coming in were largely concerned with issues around family reunification, violence, health and racism. Some of them, if they worked outside the home, were also dealing with sexual and racial harassment. Next I went to work with the Immigrant Women's Health Centre, which was the first all-woman work environment I had been in. I was the reproductive health counsellor for the Caribbean community, and eventually for other English-speaking immigrant women. I eventually went to work at Women's Health in Women's Hands. I have also done a lot of volunteer work with Intercede, a domestic workers' rights organization. I have volunteered with the Work and Skills Centre, a training program for new immigrants and with a LatinAmeri- can group called New Experiences for Refugee Women, a skills training program specifically for Latin American women. Huang: That's a lot. Grant-Cummings: It's amazing what you can do in ten short years. But this has all been difficult to classify as \"work\" because what I've done is in agreement with my whole philosophy of where women should be in the world. I've had to learn to recognize that this is work, and that this work\u00E2\u0080\u0094around women's equality issues and the anti-racism work within the women's movement and in service organizations\u00E2\u0080\u0094should be remunerated. Making the health system anti-racist was another big piece of my work at the Immigrant Women's Centre and Women's Health in Women's Hands\u00E2\u0080\u0094we were trying to make it reflect the needs of women of col- The day before she became president... Joan Grant-Cummings moves to the rhythms at the rally and concert on Parliament Hill. Photo by Agnes Huang. our in this province. We started being contacted by women's organizations and health services from across the country about the kind of systems we were building, and our anti-racist perspective in terms of the health sector\u00E2\u0080\u0094how do we do our work from both a gender and an anti-racist perspective? Huang: How did you get involved with NAC? Grant-Cummings: In 1992, one of the Women's Health in Women's Hands staff members, Carolann Wright, started to participate in NAC on behalf of the Centre. Carolann is an outgoing vice-president of NAC and incoming regional representative for Nova Scotia. When you're doing women's work, you need to network not only with people in your local and regional areas but nationally too. We had the idea of setting up a national [women and health] network, and got involved with NAC because NAC plays a major role in uniting women's groups nationally. When Sunera became president in 1993, we became more connected to NAC. [At the time there were three women of colour on the NAC Executive: Thobani, Wright and Fely Villasin (who works at Intercede).] Sunera, Fely and Carolann challenged us. They said, if we're trying to work in the women's movement to make it anti-racist or relevant to all women, we need to make concrete real action and involve ourselves in NAC. The first International Women's Day fundraiser NAC had in 1994 was the rallying point for women of colour, at least in southern Ontario. At the time, it was particularly difficult for the three women of col- our on the Executive. Fely was the Fundraising Committee chair, but her work was not really validated by the Executive, only by the women of colour on the executive. Having an IWD event was Fely's way of saying poor women, women of colour, women with disabilities also want to contribute to NAC financially, and that if we're going to have a movement where everyone is relevant, we shouldn't close the doors on how they can involve themselves in NAC. That fundraiser was the first event NAC had held where, if you looked around the room, it wasn't just food colouring over here or over there, there was a strong representation of women of colour and women with disabilities than ever before. It was more in tune with what NAC was trying to do. After that, I attended a NAC Executive meeting in 1995 and was blown away by the level of hostility and racism. It was then that I realized women of colour had to increase our numbers on the NAC Executive in order to be heard and to make this movement more relevant. The women's movement is just about the last place left where meaningful debates and resistance to the Rightist agenda seems to be taking place on the open stage at a national level. So I decided to run for Treasurer of NAC. Huang: What made you decide to take what is quite a big step, and run for president of NAC? Grant-Cummings: It wasn't something I had thought about doing at all until I realized Sunera had really come to the end of the line, and wanted to leave. The level of racism she had to endure was taking its toll on her. We began to ask, \"Does Sunera have to put herself through all this to work in the women's movement?\" Her challenge again was that one of us had to take up the leadership in the organization. We had to think about whether we were really committed to making this feminist movement strong and inclusive and resourceful. Huang: Did you draw straws? Grant-Cummings: [laughter] No, no. When you work with Sunera, you realize what a powerful leader she is, and thinker and organizer. So you think, \"Who can follow her, who can do this?\" And you get down to saying, \"You can. You can.\" I kept saying I wouldn't leave Women's Health in Women's Hands. I was comfortable there and that's where I wanted to live out my days until I decide to go home [to Jamaica] and do this work there. But Sunera kept on challenging us, saying, \"What have the last three years been about? Think about it.\" Huang: Shall I ask you in a year if you regret your decision? Grant-Cummings: Believe me, I won't. No matter how hard it is, I think it's just too important for women of colour, First Nations women, poor women, lesbians, and young women to risk going back to being \"nice little girls\", \"diplomatic\" and \"non-confrontational,\" and (the other code words being used) \"more mature\" and \"disciplined.\" It doesn't matter how many hits we take, there has to be that voice out there now more than ever because everything shows we're losing it. Even if we may not win these little battles, that voice has to be there so when we look back in history, it will be recorded that women in this country resisted the shift to the Right. People can see what's coming down the tubes, and some of us are already beginning to experience this shift. A lot of \"middle-class women\" are beginning to realize they are only one or two steps above the poverty line. Huang: What are the biggest challenges for NAC, and for the women's movement in Canada? Grant-Cummings: Fighting for space to be a legitimate voice in the face of this really sweeping right-wing agenda, and a media that's largely hostile. The Globe and Mail, particularly since Sunera's tenure started, has gone on quite a campaign to discredit the leadership of women of colour and in the process, NAC. I don't think they're going to stop. It doesn't matter to them how qualified a woman of colour is, they're going to discredit her. We know how people respond to the media hype, and even though we believe they can read between the lines, it still has an impact. So there's that still to deal with. We also have to find a way of ensuring the energy that has been whipped up with the mobilizing of women across the country [with the National Women's March Against Poverty], is maintained. We can't say, \"Phew, the March was a success; we increased our membership, and now more women understand what NAC is,\" and then just sit back. We have to continue doing the work of staying connected to women on the ground, lobbying politicians, and fighting the Right. And we really have to listen when the agenda shifts for women, because if we don't, Continued on page 16 JULY/AUGUST 1996 National Women's March Against Poverty: On June 15, 10,000 women, men and children worked their way through the streets of Ottawa between Le Breton Flats and Parliament Hill chanting such messages as: \"Bullshit, get off it. The enemy is profit.\" \" Sol-sol-sol..solidarite.\" and \"Hey hey, ho, ho, women's poverty has got to go.\" The arrival at Parliament Hill marked the culmination of the National Women's March Against Poverty, an action co-sponsored by the National Action Committee on the Status of Women (NAC) and the Canadian Labour Congress (CLC.) The march was intended to send a clear message to the federal government and to the right-wing that women are strong, powerful and united and \"...will never be defeated.\" The March caravans had made their way through more than 80 communities across Canada, bringing out over 50,000 women, children and men to rallies, street actions, performances, educational workshops, tent cities, and more. The marchers were welcomed on June 14 in Ottawa by delegates to the NAC AGM. The next day, 50 busloads of women arrived from Toronto to join up with the March on Parliament. Over the two days, women participated in workshops, networked and shared strategies, and enjoyed music and sunshine at a Tent City at Le Breton Flats. The marchers shared stories of the various women, communities and actions they had encountered in their long trek across the country. Tent City was disassembled on June 17 as the many women it had brought together left for their home communities inspired and ready to continue the struggle. [A 11 photos by Agnes Huang, unless otherwise indicated. ] Fisherwomen from Burgeo, Newfoundland [pictured] made their way to Cornerbrook to meet up with Eastern caravan.The caravaneers from Labrador and Newfoundland brought with them a 60-foot banner, made up of smaller signed banners created by different women's organizations and women's rights committees across the province. Photo by Jane Robinson. $ The Halifax-based a cappella group, Four the Moment (with a future group member), was among the dozen performers on centre stage during the Parliament Hill concert. Other artists included Jam Lauzon, Assar Santana and Chamel No. 5, Arlene Mantel, Marie Claire Seguin, Djanet Sears and Lillian Allen, some of whom are featured on the compilation tape made for the March\u00E2\u0080\u0094Songs for the Journey: Music from Canadian Women. The tape is distributed through Festival Records (1-800-563-7234). Part of the proceeds go to covering the costs of the March. Over 40 women made the one-month trek on both legs of the March\u00E2\u0080\u0094 d> from the East Coast, starting in St. John's, Newfoundland and St. John, New Brunswick, and from the West Coast, starting in Vancouver, and Burns Lake, BC.The caravan arrived in Ottawa on June 14, the day before the big march on Parliament. They were greeted by about 400 women eagerly awaiting their arrival at Tent City. At the rally at Tent City, the women on the caravan were introduced and presented with roses. One caravaner, Vivian Seagers [pictured,] tells of how she was suddenly inspired to jump into her car and join the March as it passed through her home community of Nelson, BC. The banner carries one of the 15 demands of the March.The women holding the banner in front of the Parliament buildings are with the Toronto Coalition Against Racism (TCAR,) which is calling on the federal government to rescind its racist and regressive $975 landing fee imposed on all adult immigrants. Other NAC/CLC demands include a national childcare program, restoration of funding to social programs and national standards, and $50 million in funding for feminist rape crisis centres, transition houses and women's centres. Meanwhile, federal politicians were nowhere to be seen or heard. Boisterous sounds erupt from a crowded Francophone women's tent. Women cheered, laughed, applauded the speakers, and chanted to the accompaniment of makeshift noise-makers (tin cans with a stone inside.) The Francophone women's tent was among constituency tents set up on site. Others tents included those for women with disabilities, Aboriginal women, Wiser (older) women, women of colour, young women, lesbians and union women. $ Women at the International Solidarity Tent made a multi-coloured banner, with signatures and words from women who dropped into the tent for workshops, networking and information.The banner carriers included women invited to the Tent City as special international guests: Farida Akhter from Bangladesh, Mmatshilo Motsei from South Africa, Bella from East Timor, Tom Tong Pohivun from Thailand, and Amada Villatoro from El Salvador. Like with many of the issue tents, the Violence Against Women tent, organized by Vancouver's Rape Relief and Women's Shelter, was packed with posters, photos, and eduational materials. Other issue tents included Justice, International Solidarity, Environment, Health, Anti-Poverty, Women and Work, and Childcare. Sadly, while women were up at Parliament Hill, someone raided the Violence Against Women tent and stole its contents [some pictured above] including t-shirts, posters, photos, and memorabilia from various rape crisis centres, transition houses and women's centres from across the country. The items were to be donated to the Canadian Women's Movement Archives in Ottawa. Photo by Julie Kubanek. Feature Interview with NAC's new president: Continued from page 13 our relevance and pertinence for women will no longer exist. What NAC does has to be relevant and pertinent to our membership across this country. Huang: What are some strategies for continuing and maintaining that grassroots mobilization? Grant Cummings: A lot of this work is going to lie in the hands of the regional representatives. That's why the regional support through financial and other means is so important over the next little while. There's going to be a lot of activity in the regions. The demands of the women's march to the federal government are going to form the basis for our political platform in the next federal election. Regional reps will have to organize women around pushing for these demands, and coming up with an analysis of what is happening in their regions and what the national executive should take with us wherever we go in Canada. There has to be that two-way communication between the national and the 14 regions as much as possible so women feel they are connected to some centre that makes sense. We also have to start to look at how NAC facilitates the development of concrete programs within the regions that advance women so they become economically independent. For example, in 1994, we started a community economic development program. We wanted to come up with a prototype of how women could use information coming out of that research to really build [alternative economic systems] in their communities, which is a tool women are using in different continents. We need to pick up that work again. Women are also saying we have to come up with a credit strategy\u00E2\u0080\u0094a women's bank or credit union. Those types of things speak to the need to develop an economic base that belongs to women and is controlled by women, so they can have alternatives for surviving in this country. Women's economic security is not going to be achieved through the government job creation programs, especially if the government keeps up its present trend, where a dependence on the whim of transnationals seems to be the only thing the government is thinking about. Huang: Do you agree with what the mainstream media tries to say, which is that the women's movement in Canada is quite fractious at this moment\u00E2\u0080\u0094that we're not very united and there's a lot of dissent? Grant-Cummings: I'd rather put it the other way. For me, debate and disagreement within the women's movement means there is a lot of energy and activity going on. It is only when we start to confront and challenge one another on the various issues that we are going to move forward. I'd be more disturbed if we had a women's movement where everyone knows there are problems but it's never put out there [on the table.] The fact there are differences between us and that we are going to deal with them is a demonstration of the democracy within our movement. Huang: Is anti-racism still a key issue to be contended with internally at NAC? What are some of the other internal issues for the organization? Grant-Cummings: As long as there is racism in society generally, anti-racism must be an issue NAC deals with. Women on the Executive are not disconnected from society; we're all part of society. It's not a 9 to 5 program\u00E2\u0080\u0094anti-racism is not something we do in a three-day executive meeting. It's not some thing we do for a three-year term. It's ongoing work and we're not there yet. Another internal issue concerns ableism. The voices and prograrnming around disability rights is something we have to pay much more attention to. The formation of a disability rights caucus is going to push NAC to be stronger on issues of women with disabilities. There is the whole issue of young women. For a number of years, some Executive members have been saying, \"If we don't pay attention to what is happening with young women, this movement will become defunct and obsolete in another five years.\" As a first step, we started an under 20- year group, which doesn't mean the 20-35 group isn't going to get any attention. There is definitely a difference in the feminism of women who are 35 and under and the ones who are over 35. But there is also a difference between teenaged young women up to 20- years, and older young women. We need to encourage teenage young women to start thinking about how they are being socialized within our society. They seem to be most at risk in terms of socialization. But when you look at that age group, there is quite a rising involvement in the feminist movement. If we don't pay attention to them, I don't see how we're going to have a future movement. There is also the issue of the involvement of First Nations women. For the first time, First Nations women are thinking they could really work with NAC. There has been an increase of First Nations women on the NAC Executive and within the indigenous women's caucus. With the constitution, self-government and self-determination issues, their leadership within NAC is key. Huang: Do you believe white women are really feeling alienated by and unvalued within NAC? Grant-Cummings: I don't believe there has been an exodus of white women from NAC or a sense from white women that they are feeling out of place in NAC. There is a small group of women who see NAC as not valuing them anymore. But there are a lot more white women who are excited about what NAC is doing and feeling, \"Yeah, we are really in it.\" In terms of a wider community of women, I think you can see the impact of socialization on a lot of women. Many women do not relate to the Royal Commission [on the Status of Women] study that came out in the 1970s and which lead to the creation of NAC, among other groups. There are women who have overcome some barriers and have progressed, but they're not recognizing that a whole group of women, in fact the vast majority, does't have that same experience. I read a Globe and Mail article which said that since Sunera and I have progressed to the NAC presidency, it meant that \"race\" wasn't an issue anymore. But does having power for one Black woman mean all Black women are successful? Or having power for one Asian woman mean all Asian women are successful? This is the face of racism. The mainstream media doesn't question why it is that NAC has had 13 presidents and only two so far have been women of colour. Huang: When you spoke following your election, you talked about how it is necessary for the women's movement to have a 20-year plan\u00E2\u0080\u0094particularly, given that the right-wing has a 20-year or more plan... \"If we don't pay attention to what is happening with young women, this movement will become defunct and obsolete in another five years.\" Grant-Cummings: ...and they're implementing the plan they put in in the 70s, and we're just like...ah! [laughter] Huang: Can you talk about the need for a 20 year plan and what that plan would look like for the women's movement in Canada? Grant-Cummings: What we need to do is [identify] the major issues we agree with each other on\u00E2\u0080\u0094things like childcare, pensions and violence\u00E2\u0080\u0094and figure out our strategy of how to protect them. Within that, we still have to do the race analysis, the analysis around ableism, and so on. There are some other pieces we need to work on, such as anti-racism, ableism, ageism, and the relationship with First Nations women. If we neglect those, our movement is going to be weakened. Our strength lies in the fact that we can unite sectors together under a common banner. That's what the women in the US are now just beginning to realize. When we met with them, they said they hadn't realized how fragmented the various social justice or equality-seeking movements were until seeing in the last little while the right-wing agenda in the US playing itself out. The right-wing has a lot of power. Feminists in the US are starting the process of uniting the various social justice sectors. That's what we have to do too. And we have to do it globally. That's the only way we will defeat this right-wing shift. We need to concentrate over the next little while on the things that make us the same across movements, [and look at building alliances] with labour and other equality-seeking groups, and within the women's movement itself. We have to come up with ideas of how we deal with our different issues, and figure out who [among progressive groups] will take the lead at different points to push for particular issues, based on the strength of that organization with that issue. We also have to figure out things like, I use the example of, \"family values.\" Feminists have always had family values. But somehow we convinced ourselves that it was a dirty word. Our family values are human rights values; it's the stuff that we fight for\u00E2\u0080\u0094 same-sex benefits, the right of single women to have children and head up their households without being called a \"dysfunctional\" family, the right of women to live free from violence, and so on. Our family values are wrapped up into that, but we don't put that out on the stage so that the vast majority of women can feel validated in terms of the way their family lives are conducted. The same thing with the church. The Right has used the church beautifully to garner support. But with churches, no matter what people think about religion or spirituality, there are women in ecumenical, non- denominational groups who are fighting sexism, racism, ableism, et cetera. They were in Beijing [at the NGO Women's Forum and the 4th World Conference on Women] front and centre like the rest of us, but do we really give them spaces in NAC in terms of valuing their work within that sector? There are all of these pockets where we have people who have the same goals as us, but in terms of doing the uniting at a national level, it doesn't really happen. We need to formally sit down with our partners and develop a 20-year strategy of how we're going to wage this struggle against the Right. The right-wing has over 80 think tanks in the US alone, and if we add the Canadian ones, it's over 100. We don't really have a body where we can garner the resources of feminists or progressive thinkers around particular issues so we can have a platform that our movement uses to propel the country the way we would love to see it go. We need space to do that kind of thinking. We need to have a feminist think tank that comes out with regular briefs. Right now, NAC doesn't have a policy analyst on staff, for example, who can do an overnight assessment of a particular policy or legislation. Instead, we call on women who have been staunch supporters for years, who have to drop their own work to do this stuff. We do good work, but we have to scramble to do it. That's where the NAC Educational and Charitable Trust comes in. [The Trust is an endowment fund set up to assist NAC with its educational projects.] The Trust is supporting the idea of a feminist think tank, and is making it the focus of their work plan over the next little while. They have already contributed money to NAC to hire someone to develop a proposal of what the feminist think tank research body would do. Valerie Oglov bswm a is pleased to announce the opening of her counselling practice at 104-565 17th Street, West Vancouver on Fridays Specializing in: \u00E2\u0099\u00A6 women's issues \u00E2\u0099\u00A6 injuries \u00E2\u0099\u00A6 illness and chronic conditions \u00E2\u0099\u00A6 grief \u00E2\u0099\u00A6 loneliness and isolation JULY/AUGUST 1996 Commentary Women and psychiatry: Or rather, psychiatry and women by Irit Shimrat What is mental illness? Chances are if you've ever thought about it at all, you believe it's an actual disease caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain, possibly genetic in origin. The media-fed notion that science has \"proven\" that chemical imbalances cause mental illness is widely accepted as truth. In fact, the research has been contradictory and open to interpretation, and much of it has been financed by pharmaceutical companies who have a financial interest in the results. Tremendous profits are made on prescription drugs targeted to people with mental illness, which include lithium, antidepressants, and minor and major tranquilizers (tranks.) Lithium is prescribed for manic depression (bipolar affective disorder, or BAD). The \"therapeutic\" dosage is close to a toxic level, so frequent blood tests are necessary. Lithium can cause nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, tremors, weight gain, sexual problems, kidney disease, urinary problems, dizziness, weakness, liver problems, muscle spasms, hallucinations, delirium, confusion and seizures. Anti-depressants can cause nausea, drowsiness, weakness, constipation, sleeplessness, tremors, anxiety delirium, hostility menstrual problems, impotence, liver and heart problems, weight gain, seizures and stroke. Minor tranks (such as Valium and Rivotril) are prescribed for anxiety. They can cause dizziness, slurred speech, seizures, weakness, fainting, headache, confusion, memory problems, agitation, hallucinations, depression, nausea, weight gain, fever, constipation, diarrhea, menstrual and sexual problems, sensitivity to light, blurred vision, excitement, agitation and anger. They are extremely addictive and withdrawal problems can be severe. Major tranks (also called antipsychotics or neuroleptics\u00E2\u0080\u0094these include such drugs as Haldol, chlorpromazine and Modecate), prescribed for schizophrenia, can cause tremors, lack of muscle coordination, stiffness, restlessness, sleeplessness, drowsiness, blurred eyesight, constipation, confusion, urination problems, anxiety, agitation., depression, weakness, fever, headache, spasms, heart problems, immune problems, liver disease, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, impotence, bone marrow poisoning, convulsions and aspiration (vomiting into lungs.) They can also cause exacerbation of psychosis (you get crazier), and withdrawal psychosis when they are stopped. One of the most common effects of long-term use of neuroleptics is \"tardive dyskinesia:\" uncontrollable and grotesque movements of the tongue, mouth, arms and legs. This may only appear after stopping the drug (hence \"tardive,\" or late-appearing) and is likely to be permanent. Major tranquilizers can also produce neuroleptic malignant syndrome, which can be fatal. And people who take these drugs are very sensitive to heat and have been known to die during heat waves. But, you may say, all drugs have side effects. The risks are worth the benefits. Mental illness is a horrible scourge and must be controlled with medications. Undoubtedly, some people go stark raving mad. Some experience alarming mood swings. Some become so unhappy they can't cope with life. (I have experienced all these \"conditions.\") And it's a safe bet that when these things happen, brain chemistry is affected, just as it is when you're frightened, or angry, or in love. But to say these conditions are caused by changes in brain chemistry is exactly like saying that fear is caused by adrenaline. The concept of mental illness is a powerful and useful one. Besides generating money\u00E2\u0080\u0094not only for drug companies, but also for psychiatrists, psychologists, therapists, social workers, mental health bureaucrats, hospital staff and community mental health workers\u00E2\u0080\u0094it absolves people of unwanted responsibilities. Take, for example, the parent who beats or humiliates his or her child. The child eventually goes mad and is labeled schizophrenic or attempts suicide and is labeled clinically depressed, and meanwhile the parent is let off the hook. The problem, we are told, was caused, not by ill treatment, but by bad brain chemis- try! The public, disturbed by some poor bum or bag lady screaming in the street, is off the hook too. No need to put up with the annoyance or be offended by the unattractive sights and sounds\u00E2\u0080\u0094never mind having to try and figure out what went wrong for this person and how it can be fixed. The problem is \"solved\" by calling the police, who deliver the \"nuisance\" to a hospital where experts will make the shouting stop with the forcible administration of drugs. And the person who flips out or is overwhelmed with misery can turn to experts for chemical help for his or her chemical imbalance, and is off the hook for trying to solve, or even recognize, the real problems behind the extreme emotions. I have done time on psychiatric wards. They are humiliating, demoralizing, bad places to be. My experiences took place long ago, but people who get locked up today otten receive exactly the same treatment: solitary confinement, physical restraints, and a shot in the ass with a dangerous drug. It doesn't help to be brutalized like that when you're already freaking out. In fact, doing that to someone sane could drive them nuts. Yet this is the kind of thing those who provide professional help to psychiatric patients are often paid to do. I have nothing against drugs, nor against people choosing poison over pain. I know for some people, psychiatric drugs alleviate emotional pain, just as street drugs have often done for me. But with street drugs, you know what you're getting into There are reams of propaganda informing you about the dangers to body, brain, and life. With psychiatric drugs, on the other hand, the principle of informed consent is routinely violated. The number of people I know who have been informed about all the risks involved before being asked to agree to psychiatric treatment is zero. And often, of course, you're not asked at all, and are told nothing. Fairly or unfairly, you're deemed a danger to yourself or others, and it's the good old shot in the ass for you. Drugs are not the only weapon in psychiatry's arsenal. If they don't produce the desired effect, you may end up getting elec- troshock. Yes, it still happens today, all over the so-called civilized world. People's brains are burned with electricity in order to alleviate their supposed chemical imbalances. This is likely to result in memory loss, often permanent. Psychiatrists deny it, but people who've had shock, and those who care about them, will tell you it's true. Many people feel that psychiatric drugs and/or electroshock saved their lives, and perhaps this is the case. If you believe in psychiatry, it can help you, just as believing in God can. And that's okay. What's not okay is that people blindly trust their psychiatrists, who don't tell them what they need to know about treatments. So, you ask, what's all this got to do with women? Plenty. Some of those who get the worst treatment in psychiatric facilities are Aboriginal women, women of colour, women who don't speak English, and women who reject femininity, especially if we're queer. Women, and especially old women, are electroshocked far more often than men, and women are more likely to be given anti-depressants and minor tranks. Furthermore, we are often brought up to doubt our own judgement and depend on others, so we're more likely to seek professional help when our lives go awry, and to believe it when we're told that the problem is an illness and we'll be okay if we just take these little pills. Psychiatric treatment is not just a matter of biochemical and electrical interventions. It's also about being told to believe you're damaged goods; less than other people; defective. It's being told to believe you're sick, and you're going to be sick for the rest of your life, but the symptoms can be controlled with drugs or by otherwise zapping your brain. This complements and exacerbates a thousandfold the terrible things we've been taught to believe about ourselves: that we're stupid, incompetent, fat, ugly, bad, too sexy, not sexy enough, and so on, ad nauseam. We're hysterical and over-emotional and untrustworthy at the best of times, right? So once we're diagnosed, they've really got us by the short hairs. Every expression of emotion is suspect, and may pose a risk of incarceration and drugging. And of course our credibility goes down the toilet. No one is as easily dismissed as a madman\u00E2\u0080\u0094except a madwoman. Some women get beaten and raped in hospital, sometimes by staff. But if they complain about it, staff can say they were hallucinating. I'm not trying to put down the woman who couldn't possibly get by without her Valium or her Haldol or her Prozac. I myself have had times when I believed I couldn't get by without my pot or my acid. But please, if you're taking or thinking about taking psychiatric drugs, get all the facts from a reliable book like the CPS (the Compendium of Pharmaceuticals and Specialties,) which you can look at in drugstores or at medical libraries. Your doctor probably won't give that level of information to you. And think about starting a self-help group with others who've been diagnosed with mental illness. You might be surprised how much good you can get out of talking about your experiences with other people who've been through similar stuff, who don't have professional training and aren't being paid to take care of you! Irit Shimrat escaped from her third and last psychiatric lock-up in 1980 and has not seen a shrink or taken medications since then. From 1986 to 1990, she edited the magazine Phoenix Rising, The Voice of the Psychiatrized. Between 1990 and 1991, she coordinated the Ontario Psychiatric Survivors' Alliance, and also presented two CBC Ideas radio programs: \"Analyzing Psychiatry\" and \"By Reason of Insanity.\" She is currently working on a book about the psychiatric survivors' movement in Canada, to be published by Press Gang Publishers in 1997, and has recently founded an information network called the Lunatics Liberation Front. sjoroen in Music Pres, %*\e\e(c \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 30 hours of workshops \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 20 hours of musical performances \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 market and networking area \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 gourmet jazz Prunch \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 over 200 women singers, musicians, composers, scholars, and industry professionals in classical, folk, pop, country, jazz, rock, performance art, and electroacoustic music For tickets or information, call 684-9461 Call now! Early bird prices in effect until August 31 JULY/AUGUST 1996 Feature Jewish women and political activism: Feature Drawing on our histories with fresh eyes by Justine Davis, Faith Jones, Sarah Leavitt and Rachel Rosen We met as members of a Jewish Queer Women's group in Vancouver. We began to talk about what our political activism meant to us, particularly to us as Jews. When we decided to write this article, Rachel, Justine and Faith met and taped a conversation. In subsequent weeks, Sarah joined us in editing and organizing the material. Although Sarah's voice doesn't appear in the article below, her suggestions helped the rest of us clarify and strengthen what we needed to say, so we asked her to be listed as a co-author. As political Jewish lesbians and bisexual women, we find strength and insight in the history of Jewish activism. Sometimes we look to our family stories, sometimes to the history of Jewish movements. Because the history of Jewish radicalism is often ignored in discussions of both left history and Jewish history, we are not as knowledgeable as we would like to be about our own past. We know there have always been Jews active in struggles for social justice; we also know we want political Jewish identity to be more visible. This article is our way of making that happen. This conversation is a beginning for us\u00E2\u0080\u0094 there are lots more things we want to talk about (like the connections between homo / lesbo / biphobia and anti-Semitism; the role of \"passing;\" anti-Semitism in the left; Israel... as well as many more!). We welcome other queer Jewish women\u00E2\u0080\u0094not only for talking, but for taking political action together! You can call us at \u00E2\u0096\u00A0 (604) 253-4047. Rachel Rosen: I think it is important to understand our history. Our history and tradition give us strength and insight into the political work we are doing now and the directions we want to go. By learning about the work of radical Jews in the past, we can see what's changed and determine what we need to do in our work that will continue to challenge the entire system. When I was growing up ,all the stories about my Jewish grandparents were about them immigrating to Canada and being involved with the Communist Party and the United Jewish People's Order. They died when I was three, but more than anything what they passed on to me was their political activism. I learned that creating a better world and keeping cultural traditions alive in a political sense was essential for the survival of Jews in North America. So whenever I think about myself as a Jew, it is as an individual belonging to a culture of Jews committed to working for social justice. There's this great story about my great grandmother in Poland before my family immigrated to Canada. My grandfather went out one day to see my great grandmother, Chaya. She was a practicing mystic. She had this huge group of people in front of her. Chaya was spitting on, or cursing, all of the Polish non-Jews who were persecuting the Jews in the shtetls in Poland. Her activism was cursing these non-Jews and giving these great revolutionary political speeches. To me, that was the kind of story that always got passed down\"and that was the association with being Jewish. Jewish Labour activists in New York, 1909:The sign on the left is in Yiddish, written in Hebrew characters. Faith Jones: I guess we have fairly similar families, Rachel. I'm Jewish on one side of my family, and my Jewish grandparents were also in the Communist Party. They left the Party before I was born, but I know for them it was a huge internal struggle to decide if that was the right thing to do. When they met, in the 20s, it was a very exciting time to be political\u00E2\u0080\u0094and I think they lived together before they got married, and did things that were considered quite \"fast.\" They knew all the radicals of that era who are quite well-known in Left history. My grandmother was also an early feminist. She smoked and wore pants, although later she told me she really wore pants because she didn't like her legs. There were stories about my grandmother that my grandfather used to tell with quite a bit of pride. I remember one about my grandparents being at a demonstration in New York in the 30s, probably about the Spanish Civil War, and the cops moved in to beat up the protesters and arrest them, which was standard procedure. Apparently my grandmother mouthed off at the cops so loudly and so long they figured it was more trouble than it was worth and they left the protesters alone. I also suspect from various things in her history that she had a bad abortion and that she secretly helped women get abortions. They were involved in lots of different causes in their political work, but there was always a sense of Jewishness about what they were doing\u00E2\u0080\u0094there were so many Jews in New York who were political, that it was easy for them to become political and not to lose any sense of identity as Jews. I think it probably came quite naturally to my grandmother, because she came from a political working-class family. I have a feeling that there might have been either an older brother or an uncle who was politically active back in what's now Poland. Because in the family stories you get the idea that they had to leave the old country in some hurry. So this is now over 100 years of political activism in my family\u00E2\u0080\u0094and it just feels that that's so much a part of who we are\u00E2\u0080\u0094I can't imagine not having that. Justine Davis: It's amazing to have that strength of political histories in your families! My activism connects to my personal history in a much less overt way Both my parents are 'political' in a broad sense, with a strong commitment to justice. They gave all their children tools to work for social change, as well as some sense of cultural place. But they were not really part of any community. That sense of being doubly outside\u00E2\u0080\u0094outside the 'mainstream' for being Jewish, and outside the mainstream Jewish community for being from a family that was poor and progressive\u00E2\u0080\u0094has had a really strong impact on me and on my politics. It's been a struggle for me in lots of ways to have a Jewish identity because I'm not religious and because I'm not a zionist, and in Australia, which is where I'm from, that's largely what the Jewish community is. In lots of ways I've felt more 'at home' in a 'Left' culture than in a Jewish culture. (Often, in my experience, these are mutually exclusive). So finding all this political strength and all this stuff about social justice in Judaism is really exciting, because it creates the possibility of being integrated and being able to claim all the parts of my history and my identity\u00E2\u0080\u0094both cultural and political. In Australia, and maybe here, political activism has changed a lot. It's not focused on political parties so much. It's become much more issue-focused now. People are much more focused on getting together around something specific they want to change\u00E2\u0080\u0094coming together, then moving apart\u00E2\u0080\u0094so that even the sense of political community is much more fragmented. I know for me that definitely has a really big impact in terms of feeling like I don't have a political community at all, let alone a Jewish political community. Rosen: Even with the history of social justice work in my family, I struggle to make the connection between being Jewish and being political. I grew up in Vancouver in a fairly assimilated family. Being one of the only Jews around much of the time, it was often unsafe or alienating for me to be really 'out' as a Jew, either to myself or others. For many Jews of my grandparents' generation, the work they were doing politically was completely in a Jewish context. All their Left cronies were Jewish, so doing that work was an unquestioned part of their Jewish identity. Because there is a small Jewish community in Vancouver, anti-Semitism, and increasing conservativeness, it has been difficult to make these links with other Jewish women. It is exciting for me to see my work in a historical context and have the support and involvement of other Jews in my community. Jones: Do you think maybe our lack of some kind of group or some kind of systematic way of coming together as Jews is connected to our sense that we are facing no immediate danger? Rosen: I wonder if that threat is one of the reasons my grandparents, who were really active after leaving the pogroms in Poland and the Second World War genocide, strongly made connections with other Jewish activists. Now people are saying, \"We've heard enough about the holocaust, it's in the media all the time,\" or, \"The holocaust is over, what's your problem?\" It is very easy for me to take that and discount the long history of anti-Jewishness and anti-Jewishness now. Jones: As a lesbian, I have a lot more of a sense that there is an immediate danger than I do as a Jew. As a Jew, I have a sense there's a more long term threat, which is the rise of the Right and the rise of anti-Semitism and racism in this country. But I don't see it as very likely that someone will beat me up in the next few weeks because I'm Jewish. I see it as much more likely that I will be physically attacked, physically endangered because I'm a lesbian. Which is not to say the former is impossible\u00E2\u0080\u0094there have certainly been violent attacks on Jewish buildings in Vancouver over the last 10 years... Rosen: Just in Calgary in May this year there was a letter bomb at the Jewish community centre and a woman was injured. Jones: This may be part of my own internalized oppression, denying the danger that I'm in. Perhaps it's because in my life I've been threatened with physical violence for being a lesbian but never for being a Jew. Maybe it's also because in Vancouver, white people are way more freaked out about other racial groups, Native people and Asian people, that they don't see Jews as so much of a threat because we're such a small group. I also don't have a Jewish name, so I'm not as identifiable as a Jew. Maybe I just don't want to believe I could be in danger because I'm Jewish. Rosen: I have really similar feelings. I find myself fighting inside about acknowledging or addressing anti-Jewishness that happens, even understanding that it is here\u00E2\u0080\u0094in the long term past and, I fear, in the future. But it doesn't feel as physically immediate in some ways. But when I heard on the radio about this bomb at the JCC in Calgary, I started crying. It made me realize how much those feelings or fears of that threat is there, but I deny them a lot of the time. I think partly that has to do with the fact that even progressive or radical groups in Vancouver, in my experience, haven't acknowledged the anti-Semitism that exists. It's completely minimized, ignored, or made invisible. That affects me when I'm doing political work to fight against injustice. Davis: I think choosing to put our energy into anti-oppression work that is not specifically about anti-Jewish stuff is not the same as saying that anti-Semitism is not relevant or important. In working in solidarity with First Nations people or poor people, for example, we can still be aware of and work against anti-Semitism, but it doesn't have to be our main focus. As Jews and radicals, our work is to make this world a better place and to use the tools and energy we have where they are most needed. This is not a way of denying our Jewish identity, but celebrating JULY/AUGUST 1996 Rosen: I think that anti-Semitism is systemic in Canada and this is important to acknowledge and fight. But for the most part the way it is played out by institutions, organizations and individuals is not at a crisis level right now, while a very real threat exists that it will be in the future. At the same time, right now, poor people, First Nations people, and people of colour are being killed systematically through the prison system, addiction, suicide, abuse, and so on. These attacks are at a crisis point. My priority is to do social justice work in these crisis areas, and still acknowledge that anti-Jewishness exists. This acknowledgment will sometimes mean challenging anti-Semitism, working politically with other radical Jews, or being \"out\" as a Jew in order to be able to keep doing the other work. On a personal level, it is about seeing the complexities that make all of us. I need to fight anti-Jewishness to survive. I also need to take responsibility for my class privilege and base my political work in all of these complexities. Jones: I want to reclaim the Jewish communist conspiracy\u00E2\u0080\u0094which is one way Jews have been demonized for being political. It's like being called a dyke\u00E2\u0080\u0094it's a term that gets used against us but it comes from the fear the Right has of us as political people. And I think it's going to be hard for other Jews to hear us reclaiming that. And it's scary for us too, because Jews have lost their lives for being political\u00E2\u0080\u0094like the Rosenbergs [Ethel and Julius Rosenberg were U.S. radicals, convicted of spying on flimsy evidence and executed in the 1950s]. But we have been in the world being political for a long time, and have contributed to making social change, not just in fighting anti-Semitism but in many social movements. Davis: Questions about how and where we work, as Jews, as women, are really important to me. In Australia, which is similar to Canada in terms of ongoing attempted genocide of indigenous peoples, I feel there is an obligation for me to work for justice. It's not an option\u00E2\u0080\u0094it's something I have to do. At every moment in Australia, I'm benefiting from that attempted genocide. As Jewish activists, it's necessary to also talk about Israel. As a non-zionist Jew, my relationship with Israel is much more complicated. In Israel, what's being done is being done in my name. Land is stolen, people are shot, human rights are denied\u00E2\u0080\u0094in my name. But I don't feel like I'm benefiting in any way from it. In fact, so much of what happens in Israel is damaging to me spiritually, emotionally and politically. I feel it is necessary to act in solidarity with Palestinian people, as with all oppressed people, both as a Jew and as a human being, but I still have a lot of questions about responsibility and where we work for change. Rosen: Whatever radical political work we are doing, wherever we are, there are links to what's happening in Israel. We might not be doing solidarity work with Palestinian non-Jews, but by fighting the attempted genocide in this country, I see a direct connection. In fighting Canadian government actions against poor people, I think there are direct connections with what's happening in Israel, in Guatemala, in Australia, in China especially with NAFTA and increased globalization. Jones: The other thing we need to do is to be visible as non-zionist or anti-zionist Jews, for other Jews to see. To me that's one of the scariest things, but it's really important. Otherwise Jews who say things critical of Israel get demonized as self-hating wackos instead of as people expressing an alternate Jewish viewpoint. The community should be listening to us because we are also Jews. Rosen: An important point is that while we are highly critical about the state of Israel and the dispossessing of Palestinian non- Jews, I think we need to be clear on the complex history of the area and the large numbers of Jews fighting the Israeli government in solidarity with the Palestinian people. I am wary of non-Jews who have stated policies of being anti-Israel when these same people do not state themselves as anti- Canada. It's such a glaring obvious hypocrisy\u00E2\u0080\u0094to be anti-Israel and not anti-Canada. While I think the Israeli government has committed horrible atrocities against the Palestinian people, to be specifically against all of Israel and hold all Jews in the world responsible for the actions of the Israeli government reeks of anti-Semitism. Jones: I feel we need a new language for this\u00E2\u0080\u0094we don't even have adequate words for what it is we want to express. What's the difference between being anti-zionist and anti-Israel? What is zionism? We're progressive Jews but we're stuck with a language created by, or in some cases appropriated by, right-wing nationalism. Lots of socialist Jews were Zionists in my grandmother's generation\u00E2\u0080\u0094and they were bitterly disappointed and angered by the way the state if Israel turned out. Even among us now, we have some empathy for people wanting and longing for a homeland. Davis: Even if we don't necessarily agree with or support it. Jones: There's this wonderful Yiddish song from the turn of the century\u00E2\u0080\u0094The Peat Bog Soldiers\u00E2\u0080\u0094which was sung by Jewish prisoners in work camps and concentration camps from the time of the Austro-Hungar- ian empire up through World War II, which talks about the longing for liberation and a homeland. I empathize with what they must have felt, that a homeland would make us safe, though of course I don't agree with it. It hasn't made us safe and the cost of this attempt at safety has been too terrible\u00E2\u0080\u0094that we've turned to oppressing another people. Even so, that song is a source of strength for me, as are a lot of things in Jewish history. It is wonderful and astonishing and beautiful to be part of a culture in which our major yearly ritual is about liberation. [Pesach, or Passover, is a celebration of the Jews' escape from slavery in Egypt in ancient times. Our Jewish Queer Women's group celebrated it together] ' Rosen: This Pesach, sitting around the seder table with 14 Jewish dykes and bisexual women, I just wanted to cry. It was so powerful to celebrate our liberation as Jews and to see this in context of the struggles of many other people now and throughout our history. It was a time that really made clear to me the power and importance of all re sistance movements: Jews in Egypt, First Nations people\u00E2\u0080\u0094who face attempted genocide in this country\u00E2\u0080\u0094and East Timorese people who are fighting for liberation against the Indonesian government. Davis: And part of that is not just celebrating it as an historical thing but reaffirming our commitment to struggling for it now. Until everybody is free, no one is free. One of the things I love about Pesach is that it's so strengthening to say this is something that happened in our own history, and that this is what we still keep fighting for. Jones: I've read a lot of things by political Jews who grew up in religious homes and are trying to reclaim parts of Jewish religion from a political standpoint. They talk about going back to the texts and the rituals and looking at them with fresh eyes, trying to see the historical and political meanings in them. But for me, there only are fresh eyes because I didn't grow up religious. Whenever I look at the texts for different holidays I'm always amazed at how political they are! Also Jewish culture\u00E2\u0080\u0094the interest in the world, the passion, the interrupting each other\u00E2\u0080\u0094all those things about how we act feed into our political commitment. And our nosiness! Jews are so interested in other people, in your business, in how you do things\u00E2\u0080\u0094 it drives you crazy! But the thing about Jews is we're really connected with human beings. For me it's never been a struggle to have to say that this is part of the tradition\u00E2\u0080\u0094because that really is all my tradition. The struggle for me is to be willing to share that with people who aren't Jewish. To be willing to say this comes out of a Jewish tradition, because that makes me feel vulnerable too\u00E2\u0080\u0094I don't want them to think that's all we are. It's not like being political is all there is to being Jewish. Davis: I know that my sense of true connection with being Jewish is a sense of true connection with social justice. One thing I love about being Jewish is ritual and celebration\u00E2\u0080\u0094and community. And at the centre of so many of those rituals is stuff about connection with each other, connection with the earth, celebrating what's good and being committed to changing what's bad, together with other people. That's what social justice is about too. It's not just big complicated political theories\u00E2\u0080\u0094it's about things being good in the world, and working with other people to make sure that they're good... Rosen: ...and always having hope. My tradition as a Jew is that we need to keep working until things are changed, until things are different. With genocide, forced assimilation, anti-Jewishness in North America, and all different types of oppression , I think there's still hope. That commitment and vision of a just world was a part of the union organizing that my grandparents were involved with, as well as the many different types of organizing that radical Jews are a part of. That's how I understand Jews as a people\u00E2\u0080\u0094that we have in the past and will in the future keep on struggling. Jones: And let's face it, you can't really change the world unless you're prepared to be pushy. JULY/AUGUST 1996 /feirWtf/Maidenhome by Ding Xiaoqi: Multi-mirrored reflection by Karlyn Koh MAIDENHOME by Ding Xiaoqi, translated by Cathy Silber and Chris Berry Aunt Lute Books, San Francisco, 1994 Maidenhome is writer Ding Xiaoqi's first collection of stories translated into English. It was first published in Australia (where Ding now resides) by Hyland House in 1993. Ding and one of her translators, Cathy Silber, were in Vancouver in June for two readings as part of the North American launch of Maidenhome, sponsored by the Asian Canadian Writers' Workshop and the Chinese Cultural Centre. The nuanced and uncompromising writing mMaidenhome drew me into the stories Ding weaves of the lives of women in rural and urban China. Apart from \"The Angry Kettle,\" the other four stories and two novellas, written before Ding emigrated to Australia, are set in China. There may be a temptation to tie a collection like Maidenhome together with the growing number of books by and about Chinese women, which creates a certain market-driven supply for the West's consumption. This process in turn conjures a spectacle of a China, and a sense of \"Chi- nese-ness\" that can be pulled out like a calling card from the shallow pockets of a market-place hungry for recycled stereotypes. My reading of female subjectivity and sexuality and the overlapping of gender and class as depicted in Maidenhome reveals an uneasy understanding of the ways in which nationhood and class are entangled in literary discourse in China. Often lost in the traffic of culture within the economy of the West is precisely this literary and intellectual history. But struggles and debates about the role of the revolutionary artist/writer, subversive uses (and limits) of language, representation and subjectivity are topics which continue, in different ways, to be of no small concern in the various efforts to articulate a national literature. The writings of the pro-democracy May Fourth intellectuals (1920s and 1930s), and the voicing of suffering in the raw and brief \"literature of the wounded\" (shanghen wenxue) of the post-Cultural Revolution are but two different examples of the multiple (and historically situated) forms of engaging with the socio-political realm, China's past and modernity. The point of the above preamble is not to contain a writer like Ding within a specific narrative of history. Rather, I want to allude to the unsettled politics of interpretation which confronts a reader like myself, \"seeing modern China\" in the context of what Rey Chow calls \"ethnic spectatorship\" (Woman and Chinese Modernity: The Politics of Reading Between West and East). Hence, unresolved questions about the context of my acts of viewing and reviewing haunt this reading of stories translated and published outside of China. While the stories in Maidenhome are culled from Ding's own life during and after the Cultural Revolution, the writing itself uniquely exceeds a simplistic autobiographical account of life in China, and subtly disallows an innocent distance on the reader's part. What is exciting for me is to continue to encounter the complexities of different forms of cultural struggle, and the challenging re-evaluations of the Cultural Revolution along discontinuous trajectories of the Chinese diaspora. In \"Black Cat,\" one of the stories which Ding remarked as being close to her own life, the writing assiduously traces the psychic lives of a woman haunted by memories of childhood alienation. This story mixes a dazzling series of flashbacks (childhood memories) written in the present tense, with events from the narrator's recent adult life. The narrator is looking after her neighbour's cat and this triggers off deep-seated angers and fears from her early years of being separated from her parents (sent away during the Cultural Revolution to be reformed) and her experiences of being bullied and persecuted in school, as well as bearing a secret shame and terror after being confronted by an exhibitionist. The emotional burden of the story is harrowingly tangible even as the writing itself is acutely surreal\u00E2\u0080\u0094I take this to allude to what Ding calls \"psychological realism.\" Drawing the reader away from her comfortable participation in reading, the second-person narration \"highlights the alienation [the character feels from herself] at the same time that it implicates the reader in [her] experiences,\" as Cathy Silber writes in the foreword. This second-person narration is interwoven with the direct first-person narration, which makes the story resonate with questions about voice and the acts of seeing and interpreting. At the beginning of the story, the narrator describes the liquor cabinet in her friend's apartment where every horizontal surface is glass and every vertical a mirror. So all those glittering crystalline bottles and stuff inside are multiplied so many times it makes your eyes swim. You can't tell which are real and which aren't. Think about it: bottles reflected in the left mirror are also reflected in the right, and the mirror in the back, in addition to its own task of reflecting the bottles in front of it, goes on to reflect the images reflected in the right and the left mirrors as well\u00E2\u0080\u0094my god, I'm worn to a frazzle on behalf of those mirrors. Reality and a rationality that might tell the truth of a self are brought to crises with the sustained exploration of the idea of reflection and sight, putting into conflict the normative ways in which the inner and outer worlds are constructed. What is reflected in this multiply mirrored text? What do you see? You? You're a cat. Curling up your four paws, you lie languidly in the little bed you've made for yourself from old newspaper. I'm not in the mood for them. I'm a slovenly cat. You've given yourself these attributes. The disturbingly gripping scenes where the narrator torments and enacts revenge on her neighbour's cat, are juxtaposed with the equally difficult living memories of fears whose origins are pointedly confused and confusing. Ding's disorientating and beautifully bizarre prose cracks the ways in which reality and time are perceived. Her writing suggests different ways in which trauma and Ding Xiaoqi. Photo courtesy of Aunt Lute Books. psychic pain can be remembered and articulated, rather than pathologized. For example, the narration of battles\u00E2\u0080\u0094physical and psychic\u00E2\u0080\u0094with the neighbour's cat, is continually enmeshed with the thoughts of the child. At what point does the narrator turn into a black cat herself? After her battle with her neighbour's cat? Listening to the cat's cries, now strong, now faint, each one more wretched than the last, my heart was so joyous it seemed to fly from my body. Actually my spine was coated with icy sweat, but I was body and soul positively swimming in an utterly exhilarated bliss. You have died. But more important than your sense that your heart has long since left your body is your unmistakable discovery that you are undergoing bizarre and monstrous changes. . . . You want to shout, this isn't me! I don't want to be like this! But what tears from your throat is the yowl of a black cat. ... You have triumphed at last. You despise what you've become, but you are also delirious with delight over your victory. Now you can stop fearing the night, fearing the black cat. Or is it when she is a child, just before her mother returns to look after her when she falls seriously ill: You hear a voice from far, far away, a voice familiar yet strange\u00E2\u0080\u0094is it calling you? . . . That's right, you remember now, this is your mama's voice. . . . So you want to cry out, to tell Mama you are no longer her beloved little one, you have turned into a cat. . . . She still doesn't know that you've become a cat, a filthy, stinking cat. You open your mouth but nothing comes out, for you know you can no longer say Mama\u00E2\u0080\u0094any sound you make will be a meow. In \"Killing Mom,\" Ding slices intense humour into an emotionally charged and disquieting text\u00E2\u0080\u0094this time focusing on the relationship between a mother and daughter in the context of the one-child policy in China [China rewards parents who only have one child, and penalizes parents who bear more than one child as part of its population control policies.] This story, which begins with the declaration \"I killed my mother,\" fuses intense love with hate. In the process, Ding makes some uncanny and troubling observations of the complex human aspects of official policies and of the family as an institution. \"Indica, Indica\" employs the second- person voice to swivel around and problematize the subject positions of writer and reader vis-a-vis the inner life of an impoverished country girl who is married off to a much older man from a more well-off peasant family. The earlier sequences of the story are told in a calm and observant tone, for example: That day, a man came to the house. He didn't look much younger than Pa. Pa had you call him Uncle. Right away, Ma calls you into the kitchen, says that man lives in the northeast, he's rich, a good man.... You know that if you assent to Ma, she will praise you for being sensible. She will smile, and she rarely smiles. In a sense, this intimate form of narration is double-edged\u00E2\u0080\u0094it draws the reader into some form of identification with the main character, as well as signals most palpably the impossibility of knowing the \"other,\" who is in this context the uneducated peasants, the symbol for various forms of nostalgia and calls to arms for cultural revolution in China. This contradiction is sharply brought out at the end of the story, when a girl student arrives at the country homestead, informing the narrator that she has come to \"draw from life.\" The irony bubbles up as the peasant girl (\"you\") turns the gaze back onto the writer and reader, and reflects on the confident and articulate student: Ai, anyway, people like her are always so good at asking questions. And you've never liked answering them\u00E2\u0080\u0094 \"Are you used to it? Are you homesick?\" See, sure enough, she asks another question, furrowing her brow, staring at you intently, as if she knows what you are thinking better than you do. You and \"you\" are left losing the fingertip grip on the totality of the stable subject. The astutely detailed observations of the lives of women in disciplined Army units and hospitals, coping with the banalities of love and sexuality in situations where desires hide in unknown and sometimes forbidden places (for example in \"Maidenhome\" and \"The Other Woman\"), the strange relationship of unspokenness between a man and a woman (\"If You Were Still Alive\") and the witty critique of life in Australia (\"The Angry Kettle\") are narrated with uneven intensity. The latter story, for example, is whimsical but lacks the twists and emotional range in \"Black Cat and \"Killing Mom.\" Ding writes with an eye to a world that has not grown too small for creative as well as political commitment. Her writing opens up the multiple ways in which one may question and challenge how we understand and relate to ourselves in the world of others. The English translators, Silber and Berry, have done a competent and sensitive translation of Ding's stories\u00E2\u0080\u0094no small feat in the case of a writer with such imagination and narrative scope. I look forward to Ding's forthcoming novel. Karlyn Koh is a graduate student in English literature and is trying to find a dissertation topic. Thanks to Ding Xiaoqi, Cathy Silber and Shan He for their generous conversations with me. 20 JULY/AUGUST 1996 Arts Vancouver Jewish Film Festival: Celebrating cultures and histories by Faith Jones The 8th Annual Vancouver Jewish Film Festival held in May, featured 11 films from Mexico, Belgium, Israel and the United States. Faith Jones viewed and reviewed a number of films directed by women: Rhodes Forever, directed by Diane Perelsztejn (Belgium 1995); Havana Nagila: The Jews of Cuba, directed by Laura Paull (USA 1995);My Knees Were Jumping, directed by Melissa Hacker (USA 1995); and Like a Bride, directed by Guita Schyfter (Mexico 1992). Early in Like a Bride, one of the two main characters tells the other that for her, growing up Jewish in Mexico was \"like being at a party I hadn't been invited to.\" The role of \"tolerated outsider\" is so common for North American Jews that when I heard the comment in the movie I thought, \"you mean everyone doesn't feel that way?\" Several of the films at this year's Jewish Film Festival deal with this precarious balance: the tolerance in a good economic and political climate which can so easily turn to vilification, hatred and genocide when the political mood changes. The documentary Rhodes Forever chronicles how the Jews of Rhodes [a Mediterranean island between Greece and Turkey] lived with social acceptance mingled with garden-variety anti-Semitism (schoolyard name-calling, for example) until the fall of Italy during World War II. When the Nazis took direct control of Italy's former colonies, all of Rhodes' Jews were deported to concentration camps. Those who survived the camps\u00E2\u0080\u0094about 160\u00E2\u0080\u0094chose not to resettle in Rhodes. And so in the space of three years (1943-46), the Jewish population of Rhodes went from 1,700 to none. Their particular culture with its Turkish-influenced food, Greek-inflected Ladino/f/ie language of Sephardic Jews] and Sephardic traditions will not survive another generation as Rhodes' Jews assimilate to their new homes. Rhodes Forever is unfortunately not a good movie: it has a confusing structure and covers a great deal of ground in less than an hour. It also glides too quickly over some interesting topics that may not show Jews at our best. A number of Jews from Rhodes settled in the Belgian Congo. The roles they found themselves in as part of colonial rule, and later during the struggle for independence should be investigated. It does us no good as Jews to only tell our stories when we are in positions of innocence. Our place in the middle-classes during much of this century and in many countries makes us complicit in many different colonialisms. In My Knees Were Jumping, Melissa Hacker interviews her mother and others whose lives were saved by the kindertransport movement, a joint effort of Jews and Quakers in Germany, Austria and England to evacuate Jewish children to England just before WWII. The fear of the children separated from their families, their anger at God for the Holocaust, and their guilt at surviving, are all revealed unflinchingly. Most of the children were orphaned, many were abused or neglected in their foster homes or residential schools in England, and most were completely cut off from Jewish life. Hacker also interviews children of the transported children, who come to realize that their parents, even though they were safely transported away from Nazi Germany and Austria, are nonetheless Holocaust survivors. Hacker's mother, Ruth Morley died during the final stages of making this movie. Hacker did a mitzvah for all of us by preserving her fierce, brave mother, in this excellent film. In Havana Nagila, a number of Cuban Jews are interviewed about their place in Cuban society. Cuba's Jewish population was devastated when 90 percent chose to leave after the revolution. Many of those who remain express a love for the country and the revolution. \"I am not an extreme leftist, but I am of the Left,\" one man says in the film; \"I thought it was the only logical thing for a Jew.\" Another describes the lack of official repression even during the most anti-religious periods of the revolution. Cuban Jews have always received special shipments of kosher food, for example. However, secular Jews have been more integrated into the revolution than religious Jews. Fidel Castro's was the first Cuban government to give government posts to Jews, all of whom were secular Jews. One young man interviewed said he sees his socialist work as more important to his identity as a Jew than religion. It is a strength of Havana Nagila that it doesn't try to be definitive about the Jewish experience in Cuba. One man tells of being denied university entrance; he suspects it was due to his stated religion on the entrance form. Yet a woman tells of choosing to stay in Cuba when her family left since she knew she could become a doctor in Cuba's free education system. The question of popular anti-Semitism is also left to the audience to figure out. While one man describes a complete lack of any oppression in his life in Cuba, others tell stories of casual, ignorant remarks: \"Everywhere I've ever worked I've been called 'the Pole.' Even though I'm Turkish,\" one man says ironically. Lesbian and gay subtext in Yiddish cinema: Feygeleh in film by Faith Jones A Yingl Mit A Yingl Hot Epes A Tarn. Photo courtesy of the Yivo Institute for Jewish Research. A YINGL MIT A YINGL HOT EPES A TAM: Lesbian and Gay Subtext in Yiddish Film clips and quips by Eve Sicular June 1996 Video In, Vancouver, BC New York historian and filmmaker Eve Sicular was in Vancouver in May to show film clips and lecture on the lesbian and gay subtext in Yiddish cinema from the 1920s to the outbreak of World War II. While Sicular is a tad on the academic side, her exploration of gay and lesbian images, jokes and subtexts holds a certain fascination for those with an interest in Yiddish culture. When my grandparents talked about the heyday of Yiddish film, writing and theatre in New York in the 30s, they never mentioned the preponderance of feygeleh (faggot) jokes in certain comedies. Sicular showed clips from American Matchmaker, a screwball comedy about an unfortunate fellow whose fiancees keep leaving him at the chuppa [marriage canopy] for a reason which can't be named. Sincefeygeleh means little bird as well as faggot, the gentleman in question owns a canary. He also has excellent taste in home decor. This gay theme is about as subtle as Edward Everett Horton playing the sissy in Hollywood movies of the same era, and just as much fun. There's also a hint of lesbianism: the feygeleh's sister is very athletic and doesn't care much for men. There's also the classic of Yiddish cinema, Yidl With His Fiddle in which Yiddish stage and screen star Molly Picon falls in love with a man while herself disguised as Like a Bride, a drama from Mexico, tells the story of two young women as they make life decisions in the early 1960s. Oshi comes from a traditional Sephardic family in which her main role is to find a husband; Rifke comes from a more cosmopolitan and more traumatized Ashkenazic family. The two meet at a socialist Jewish youth group. Rifke envies Oshi having grandparents, since her own died in the Holocaust. Oshi envies the dinner-table conversations about world politics and zionism she finds at Rifke's house. Oshi's desire to study art, against the wishes of her family is placed beside the casual assumption of Rifke's family that she will be university educated. This movie shows Jewish cultures and histories in all their complexity and variety. Coming from a Left Jewish family, it was a thrill for me to see that aspect of Jewish history celebrated, and sometimes sent up. In one scene, the youth group leader is giving a talk on Hanukkah. \"At Hanukkah we celebrate the class struggle of the Maccabees against the Greeks,\" he intones. Oshi whispers to Rifke, \"I thought we celebrate the miracle of the oil.\" I could tell which audience members came from families like mine by who was laughing. It is rare to see Jewish women's lives in a fiction film\u00E2\u0080\u0094that in itself was enough to make me want to see this movie. I didn't expect that the film would also cheerfully explore the often strained relations between Sephardic and Ashkenazic Jews; the unexpected support of families when it counts; and how women can find comfort in certain traditions, and at the same time find freedom in breaking from tradition. Like a Bride is the most brilliant, exciting evocation of Jewish women's history I have ever seen. a boy. Sicular was careful to point out that since the audience knows Picon is a woman all along, this is actually homosexuality without the homosexual. Even so it's refreshing to watch a woman of that era dressed in drag and speaking Yiddish. Even more unusual was East and West, in which Picon plays a tomboy rebel and her family is furious with her. There are certainly things to annoy you in the texts and subtexts Sicular has identified\u00E2\u0080\u0094most of the characters associated with homosexuality are cured or killed, as in Hollywood movies, Sicular said. But I was happy to have seen these clips, since they show that Yiddish culture at least acknowledged the existence of lesbians and gays, even if it didn't exactly like it. JULY/AUGUST 1996 Arts Three solo shows at the Richmond Art Gallery- Sacred space in suburbia by Lizard Jones STONE. WATER. WOOD by Karen Cain REDEFINING THE ICON Linda Anderson Stewart APPLE PIE Ka thy Ross Richmond Art Gallery Richmond, BC There's no point in being a snob about the suburbs, as I found out when I visited the Richmond Art Gallery in June. For one thing, the RAG (together the publicly funded gallery acronyms make quite a list: VAG (Vancouver), BAG (Burnaby), SAG (Surrey), KAG (Kamloops))...sorry, the RAG accomplishes a lot that other galleries could only wish for. It is right in the middle of a humming community centre, and seems to pretty well thumb its nose at the remoteness and elitism other galleries fall prey to. Also, you might think that a gallery so firmly planted in suburban culture would never question \"family values,\" but the show I saw there did just that. And though there were comments in the visitors book that said, essentially, \"In Richmond?,\" the overall response seems to have been one of tolerance. Tolerance of what? Let me backtrack. There were actually three solo shows, by three different women, up at the RAG when I went. Two dealt with the sacred, from two very different perspectives. Karen Cain showed a series of acrylic paintings of sacred sites, arranged around a hearthlike centre. Called Stone. Water. Wood, Creating a Sacred Place, this show draws on a host of images from different cultures to explore \"the search for a personal centre.\" In the next gallery were icons, or rather iconlike boxes. In Redefining the Icon, Linda Anderson Stewart reached into her childhood and assembled beliefs and images lying there. \"It was as if signals lay sleeping in my subconscious, causing me to re- Apple Pie by Kathy Ross. Photo courtesy of Kathy Ross. spond in ways that were not always expected or useful,\" she says in her artist's statement. The boxes and frames are small, beautiful, and strange\u00E2\u0080\u0094holding angels, fish, photos, bones and thorns. The pieces are as vivid and enigmatic as memory. In the third gallery was a different kind of sacred space\u00E2\u0080\u0094a \"village \"that makes up Apple Pie by Seattle artist Kathy Ross. Apple Pie is as much a piece of research as it is a piece of art. To put it together, Ross interviewed 18 \"non-traditional\" families from the Seattle area. (I hate that the culturally homogeneous nuclear family, which is a relatively new institution in world history, has now become the traditional family.) The 68 family members in the piece cover a wide range of races, ages, sexes, sexual orientations and abilities, and most importantly a wide range of family structures. \"We need to be free to choose who we are intimate with,\" says Ross. Ross interviewed all these people, cast their hands in plaster, photographed them, and collected their memorabilia and old shoes. The final piece is a town square with 18 addresses and 18 doors. Each door has photos and text on the outside and the in side about the family that \"lives\" there, and opens to reveal a sculpture based on the cast hands of that family. Around the outside of this structure are shoes, and a mailbox for gallery visitors to use to leave their own stories. An audio tape with parts of the interview plays from the middle of the square. The tolerance I referred to was a general acceptance of the people in the show. The information Ross has gathered is important, and it was heartening to see that people recognized this. \"Thank you for sharing this project. Very important and wonderful,\" wrote one visitor. \"I like the house,\" wrote another. \"It was really cool. It was singing.\" I was quite overwhelmed by Apple Pie. I was very glad to see something so overtly politically challenging in an art gallery. I kept wishing the format were a bit different, though\u00E2\u0080\u0094a film, or a book\u00E2\u0080\u0094so I could absorb everything. The depth of information on each family meant that I could only take in the idea of a few of the participants. So I can't tell you all about it, but there were some stories that really stood out for me. For example, the experiences with Canada Customs of a lesbian and her son. Also the story of Lamar, a white women, who found the daughter she gave up for adoption 26 years ago. \"Why are you white, Grandma?\" asks her black grandson. \"I don't know,\" she replies. And the family of young adults who live together co-operatively and challenge the notion that all adults have to live together in pairs based on sexual activity. Apple Pie seems to be a very direct reaction to the stuff we've all been hearing lately about the family, and Kathy Ross has presented us with a series of positive and uncompromising alternative visions. The breaking of any silence is valuable, and I was able to take strength from this one. It was encouraging to see Ross' version of \"today's North American town in which heterosexuals, homosexuals, blacks, whites, and many others of differing age and ethnicity co-exist.\" It was thrilling to see so many examples of not-only-nuclear families in one place, to know that my weird model is not the only one. However, I don't think people like me, a lesbian parent of teens who live with me sometimes, are the audience for this show. The audience is the people who see only a stereotype when they see me. The aim of Apple Pie really seems to be tolerance, the old \"if only you knew me, you wouldn't be willing to beat me up\" idea. Does it work? Certainly visitors to the gallery were moved. For me personally I wanted something more, at least from the families with children. Apple Pie, Part II maybe. I wanted to know that these people screw up sometimes, that they forget to buy lunch food, or that their kids don't have raincoats. I wanted to see some of the cracks. It is not the fact that we (lesbians, mixed race couples, people with disabilities) are perfect parents that means we have the right to raise children. I wanted to hear that these children also say to their crewcut mothers, \"Please, just wear a hat!\" Maybe next time. Lizard Jones is a writer and artist living in Vancouver. 1# 1 l/\u00C2\u00AB # OUR COMMUNITIES! OUR PUBLIC SERVICES! LwME^ A me55a3e from the Public Service Alliance of Canada \u00E2\u0080\u00A2 (604) 430-5631 JULY/AUGUST 1996 Powell Street Festival: Centre stage at last! by Eileen Kage as told to Laiwan Powell Street Festival is an annual celebration of Japanese Canadian art, culture and history held in Vancouver at Oppenheimer Park and surrounding venues. This year's festival will take place on August 3rd and 4th, and will highlight the cultural work of Asian Canadian women. Kinesis had the opportunity to speak to Eileen Kage, president of the board of the Powell Street Festival Society and former coordinator of the Festival. She is also a member ofSawagi Taiko, an all-women taiko group and Bamboo Triangle, a group for lesbian, gay men and bisexuals of Japanese descent. Laiwan: \"Asian Canadian Women\" is the theme of this year's Powell Street Festival. What was the impetus for choosing this theme? Eileen Kage: At a board meeting three years ago, we discussed ideas for possible themes. One member suggested \"women.\" I remember enthusiasm from around the table, the thrill of possibly initiating something controversial in our community. All nine board members at the time were women. We all felt it was time we formalized the honouring of women in our community. Informally, when you look at the history of the Festival, women have been and continue to be the driving force as far as directing, coordinating and volunteering at the Festival. We planned to celebrate \"women\" in the 1995 Festival. However, by early spring, we realized the Festival would fall on the 50th anniversary of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, so we decided the theme for the 1995 festival should be \"peace.\" We agreed to postpone the theme of \"women\" for the 1996 festival, 'which would also be the Powell Street Festival's 20th anniversary. Around the same time the idea for this theme came about, we were also reviewing our mandate to come up with clearer guidelines for participation at the Festival. One purpose of the Powell Street Festival Society is to organize, sponsor, stage and otherwise promote cultural events involving Japanese Canadian and Asian Canadian artists, themes and interests. Although we have always had participation from people and communities outside of the Japanese Canadian community, including other Asian Canadians, we have never specifically incorporated their participation into our main theme. We decided the theme, \"women\" should actually be \"Asian Canadian Women.\" It seemed appropriate; we would be highlighting women as well as acknowledging the fact that Japanese Canadians are part of the broader Asian Canadian community. Laiwan: Did many Asian Canadian women express interest in participating in this year's Festival? Kage: In April this year, we held an event called Fusions, a planning workshop for Powell Street Festival 1996. We spread the word through the grapevine and advertised in local Asian, community and art magazines for Asian Canadian women artists to attend. We needed to find out how The usually strong presence of women at Powell Street Festival is formalised with this year's theme of 'Asian Canadian Women' in celebration of the festival's 20th year. Photo byTamio Wakayama. women, many of whom were not yet familiar with Powell Street Festival, would like to participate. Fusions was a great success. About 40 women\u00E2\u0080\u0094visual artists, writers, performers and musicians\u00E2\u0080\u0094attended. Several cross- cultural and cross-disciplinary projects were initiated, including an ongoing fabric project, an outdoor art installation, a cabaret night, a performance art project, and storytelling sessions\u00E2\u0080\u0094all of which will be presented at the Festival this year. Laiwan: By opening up the Festival to include all East, Southeast and SouthAsian writers, performers and visual artists, what kind of alliances are you hoping will be created? Kage: I hope this will lead to many more alliances being built among the different Asian communities and individuals. As well, I hope it will challenge stereotyped images and biases some Japanese Canadians have about people outside the communities, as well as the sterotypes of Japanese Canadians other Asians may hold. We hope this year's theme will inspire people to get to know one another, to relate and find similarities, discover differences and develop respect for themselves and others, despite our cultural differences. I'm looking forward to seeing what comes out of some of these cross-cultural collaborations. I also hope Powell Street will continue to be a place where artists from different backgrounds can collaborate together in the future, not only at future Powell Street Festivals, but at other events in Vancouver, and even internationally. Laiwan: What kind of responses are you getting? Kage: Everyone seems very supportive of the theme. Many are saying they believe it is healthy for our community to work on our connection with other Asian communities. They also consider the theme progressive and exciting because it is an invitation and an opportunity for everyone, including men, to celebrate and honour the women, and not only Japanese Canadian women but all Asian Canadian women. Some members of the board have been asked: \"Why Asian Canadian women?\" and \"How did this get decided for the 20th anniversary?\" or \"Isn't this exclusive of men?\" The truth is, those men who feel \"excluded\" do so because for once they are not in the limelight and they think they should be. The theme also challenges Asian women who, for whatever reason, feel uncomfortable with this year's theme to think further about sexism in our communities. In fact I am pleased with the dialogue that is occurring around this year's theme. How else would we really get Japanese Canadians to examine the subtle and overt sexism inherent in our community, as well as in the broader community. My impression is that most of us, including the men, are supportive of working toward equality. But I also know this is a challenge for us all because it requires us to be self-critical of how we perpetuate hierarchical structures, in terms of gender, that are ingrained in our cultures. Laiwan: Some media have been critical of this year's theme, which shows how challenging it is for conservatives within the Asian community as well as in the general public to see women at the centre stage. What do you hope this year's Festival will achieve through celebrating, making visible and raising awareness of the cultural work of women? Kage: at first the media did question the so-called exclusionary aspects of this year's theme. Even the Vancouver Sun mentioned this. But the Powell Street Festival Society made it clear that we are inviting everyone, including men, to participate in this collective challenge of honouring Asian women who historically have not been acknowledged. Now individuals as well as leaders in our community are articulating the value of this year's theme to the media. With this focus on the cultural work and lives of women in our communities, I hope certain aspects of our community, which have been silenced in the past and present, will have the opportunity to surface and flourish. There is already an example of how this is happening. The Japanese Canadian National Museum and Archives Society (JCNMAS) has been doing specialized research on the role of sewing and dressmaking in the lives of many Nisei [second generation Japanese Canadian] girls in the 1920s and 1930s. It seems in those days that attending sewing school was considered much more practical than high school. This was because Japanese women were rarely hired by white-owned businesses. It was also because the clothing that could be purchased did not fit our women well. I can barely imagine what it must have been like for those women. One of our directors, who is involved with the JCNMAS, says the project has been met with so much enthusiasm from women eager to share their often first-hand knowledge of this vital part of our history. We are planning a display on the history of sewing in our community at this year's festival. I am personally looking forward to learning more about my community's history as well as about my own identity as an Asian lesbian living in Vancouver in the 90s. For the last three or four years, I and a few people involved with Powell Street have been working hard to increase queer visibility at the festival. Many of us have volunteered and coordinated various aspects of the Festival for years, but there has been little or no acknowledgement of our presence reflected in the festival's content. We are finally getting somewhere, partly because of the regular presence at the festival of Bamboo Triangle, (a Japanese gay and lesbian group), and ASIA (Asian Society for the Intervention of AIDS). And more and more queers, especially Asian lesbians, are participating in other ways every year. An unfortunate thing this year is that the Vancouver Pride Society decided to move the Gay Pride Parade from BC Day Monday to the Sunday, thereby conflicting with one of the days of the festival. Members of the Asian community wrote letters expressing our disappointment at their decision, but they wouldn't change the date back. Now there will probably be less queer visibility at the Festival and less Asian visibility at Pride. Laiwan: What can we look forward to at this year's festival? Kage: There are a lot of fun events, including a cabaret night with performances by Asian women, including the Dim Sum Dykes (Anita Young and Linda Chen from Toronto) with storytelling and music. A fashion show of dresses from the 30s and 40s is also being planned. Other highlights are: a multi-disciplinary performance by artists from Los Angeles using liquid light projection, music, dance, poetry, and video/film; a performance art piece by Jen Lam involving a painter, a live musician and provocative text; Kokoro Dance Theatre Society's multi- disciplinary piece; performances by local taiko groups, including the all-women's group Sawagi Taiko; and traditional and modern dance by women and children. And of course, this is on top of the usual exciting programming of the Powell Street Festival, from the martial arts displays to the great food! For more information about this year's Powell Street Festival or to volunteer, contact Kathy Shimizu, Festival Coordinator, Powell Street Festival, 450-1050 Alberni St, Vancouver, BC, V6E 1A3; tel: (604) 682-4335. JULY/AUGUST 1996 Letters dear re ade r s Kinesis loves receiving mail. Please get your letters to us by the 18th of the month. If you can, keep the length to about 500 words. (If you go way over, we might edit for space.) Hope to hear from you very soon. Love, Kinesis Disturbed by images in Kinesis Kinesis: I was deeply disturbed and disappointed with your item showing photographs of two baby girls entitled \"Guess who these literary baby dykes are!\" featured in the February issue to promote an Asian gathering. Apparently, you obtained permission to publish the photos. Nevertheless, labelling baby photos with captions indicating their sexual orientation is wrong. The sexualization of any child is unacceptable. Please cancel my long time subscription to Kinesis and donate any remaining funds to the Vancouver Status of Women. Yours sincerely, Virginia K.Walker Sydenham, Ontario The Editorial Board responds: The photos were submitted to Kinesis by Asian lesbians to promote Lotus Roots, Western Canada's first Asian Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual Gathering. out west Performance Society presents things lesbians do in bed a comedy wy Sonja Mills coming in August Info/tickets: 293-4424 The photographs do not depict the babies in any sexual way. We therefore assume that your objection lies with the naming of the babies as lesbians. Kinesis feels that identifying sexual orientation is not equivalent to sexualization. The lesbians, who self-identified themselves in the photos as baby dykes, selected individual portraits from their personal photo albums. They were used both in Kinesis and at Lotus Roots, in part to make visibik local Asian lesbian participation in the gathering. Both women are well-known and proudly out as lesbians in the Vancouver feminist, lesbian/ gay, Asian and artist communities. Both challenge homophobia in society. Kinesis stands by its decision to publish the photos and caption. Women with AIDS live in poverty Kinesis: I would like to write about an issue that's rarely discussed. It is an issue that has touched my own life very personally. I am speaking about women and children who live their lives in poverty, who have the HIV virus and AIDS. Not only are these women facing the realization of an early death for themselves and their children, some are living in conditions that are deplorable. Even if these women have degrees, employment is sometimes out of their reach due to misinformation and discrimination. They are subject to government red tape, and live in situations that put them at even greater risk of infections and early deaths. On top of unsafe, unsanitary housing conditions, they also often have to deal with substandard medical practitioners due to inaccessibility of ones who are up- to-date on HIV/AIDS treatments. I know of a woman who was told by her male doctor that her T-cell count wasn't low enough to justify social services paying for medication to keep her count from falling any lower. He neglected to tell her about theAIDS society which could have helped her, or about vitamin supplements, the dangers of increased stress, pet feces, and other very real dangers to her health. Including poverty. As I travelled across the country with the [NAC/CLC] women's march against poverty, I saw the victims and their children in the creeks, streams, flowers and birds that show themselves to us. I saw their faces in the eyes of all women who gather to create change. I see in my eyes anger, frustration and grief. I'm angry with the government for their lack of interest. It's time for women to unite and rally behind women who wake up to this disease every morning\u00E2\u0080\u0094Make a difference every day, not just today. I ask each of you to get hold of your local AIDS Society and ask what you can do, or make them do something to help out women who have this disease and live in poverty. Do something, please. Pam Branson Kamloops Women's Resource Centre We've got a long way to go Kinesis: So here we are in 1996, with four years to the year 2000!: I am told we've \"Come a long way, baby\" (as the Virginia Slims slogan would have us believe). In some people's opinions, there are more perks to being a woman than being a man in this day and age. Upon hearing such comments, I can't help but wonder how it A GATHERING OF WOMEN during the XI International Conference on AIDS Monday July 8th, 1996 5-7pm Vancouver Rowing Club in Stanley Park This social event will be an opportunity for women attending the conference to meet and network with women working in the community. For information and to RSVP please call the Positive Women's Network @ 681-2122 Ext. 200. Hosted by the Positive Women's Network PWN gratefully acknowledges the support of VanCity. is then that: ...One woman is raped every 17 minutes in Canada (Canadian Association of Sexual Assault Centers' statistic, based on reported cases only!). ...Women who are raped, often get the response, \"That's terrible, but she was asking for it,\" based on what she was wearing or where she was. ...Teenagers (yes, those Generation X-ers who are supposed to be free of all those sexiSi pressures!) experiencing dating violence often perceive violence in their relationship as his indication of love for her, which has taken the form of jealousy. However, the truth is, assault is about his power over her, NOT passion! ...Women face resistance from those around them when trying to leave abusive and controlling relationships. ...Police rarely act according to what is required of them through the \"Attorney General's Policy Against Violence in Relationships\" to pursue perpetrators of assault. So the truth is that we've only begun moving forward, and have yet to go a long way. The sexist attitudes and power imbalances still in our society are at the root of the violent acts carried out against women. Recently, there have been demands placed on the Canadian government to fight violence agaist women through providing $50 million to rape crisis centers nation-wide. Our government has refused to make a commitment (a mere $2 per Canadian!) If you believe there is a need to take action, write or call your local MP's office (Vancouver's MP Hedy Fry could do with a wake-up call!) Gwyn Mcintosh Vancouver, BC you re in. 3 days \u00C2\u00B0Fmu*ic 7 StageS all day long .. then there's the Jericho Beach sunset. Don't miss it!! you can DANCE, you can LAUGH, and you can just HANG OUT, and LISTEN to Jane Siberry. Peggy Seeqer. Kate and Anna McGarriqle. unda Tillery and the Cultural Heritage Choir, Kinnie Starr, Mary Jane Lamond, Gwen Swick. Ferron, Sharon Shannon, Pele Juju, Sheila Gostick, and lots more from Celtic music, action poets, storytellers music from around the world and right out of downtown. THE 19TH ANNUAL VANCOUVER FOLK MUSIC FESTIVAL July 19,20 & 21 Jericho Beach Park Tickets available at VFMF office 103-3737 Oak St. Tel. 734-6543. Fax 734-4297 ill 1-800-883-FOLK All rges may apply) straight JULY/AUGUST 1996 News Sexual assault and the justice system: Limits set for disclosure by Ayes Huang Feminists working to end male violence against women welcomed new federal legislation introduced by justice minister Allan Rock, which would limit access to women's personal records in sexual assault cases. The bill, tabled in the House of Commons by Rock on June 12 coinciding with the second day of a national consultation on violence against women, is being hailed by women as a critical step towards ensuring that women's equality rights are balanced with the rights of the accused to a fair trial. For a number of years, feminists have been pressing the federal government to introduce legislation with clear restrictions on disclosure, and last December, they stepped up their campaign, foUowing the SupremeCourt of Canada's decisions on the O'Connor and Beharriell cases [see Kinesis February 1996.] In those cases, the SCC set out broad concepts of what kinds of records could be relevant in trial, and essentially said thatdefensecounsel only had to show \"likely relevance\" to justify their disclosure. Therxssiticnofwomen'sorganizationshas always been that there should be no access to womm'srjeiscff^recordsatanytime. However asafallback position, says Karen Busby, the bill essentially gives women everything they'd been calling for, save some details. Busby, a law pro- fessoratthe University of Manitoba andaspokes- person for the Women's Legal Education and Action Fund (LEAF),saysfhebillmarksacritical shift from the guidelines set out by the SCC, particularly because itis infused throughout with the language of equality. ThebiUprovidesaccmiprehereivedefinition of \"records, as any record containing personal information, and not just restricted to those produced by professional record takers. Records would include such things as counselling, medical, employment, and child welfare records, as well as personal journals. According to Busby, the records most sought after by defense counsel, are child and family services records, which are intended to be used to challenge a woman's credibility and character. The disclosure legislation sets out 10 impermissable-rather than permissible- grounds for releasing records to the counsel of the accused, including that the record may disclose a prior inconsistent statement made by the complainant or witness or may relate to her credibility, and that the record relates to the complainants' sexual activity or to her sexual reputation. Busby says the grounds listed in the bill are essentially the reasons given by defense counsel for seeking records in about 99 percent of the cases. The new legislation also sets out factors judges must consider before agreeing to allow disclosure, including whether or not the production of the record is based on discriminatory beliefs or bias, the impact of disclosure on the reporting of sexual assault, and the integrity of the trial process. Women are also pleased that the bill requires judges to consider the grounds for disclosure and the factors before they can even look at the records. \"The bill attempts to do what the SCC failed to do which is to protect the equality rights of women, and ensure that the accused's right to a fair trial-which we absolutely support-does not override women's constitutional rights,\" says Busby Anne-Marie Aiken of the Ontario Coalition of Rape Crisis Centres says the legislation is long overdue. Aiken knows well the adverse impact of broad disclosure criteria on women filing sexual assault charges and on rape crisis centres. In 1992, the Barrie sexual assault centre where Aiken works became the first such organization tobesubpoenedtotum over counselling records. Since then, she says, thecentre has been handed over 50 subpoenas. Karen Busby says the bill attempts to challenge the myths and stereotypes of women who report sexual assault, such as \"they are prone to lie in sexual assault matters, and that counsellors have an agenda to push, and they illegiti- mately influence women to haveunfounded be- Hefsthattheyhavebeen sexually violated.\" She adds that to date, every case on disclosure is founded on one or both of those myths. Thebill also affordswcnnmprotection from Crownkwyeiswhostrikedealswimthedefense and agree to disclosure certain records, says Busby. ThebiUessentMy says the Crown cannot use any records unless the complainant has expressly waived the rightto the application process. ''ThebiUmakesitdearthatthecomplainant has the right to object [to disclosure,] so that the records cannot be used without either her consent or without this process of detenriining admissibility beingused,\" says Busby. Even though the bill isavictoryforwomen, women should not rest easy. The bill has only been introduced for first reading and still must pass through all the stages of readings and committees and the Senate, before becoming law. Busby says she expects defense counsel and, particularly, advocates of \"false memory syndrome\" wiUtomountacarnpaign to waterdown orevendefeatthebill. 'Tfsimportantweremain vigilant\" Agnes Huang attended the national consultation '.women in Ottawa. NAC's annual general meeting: Continued from previous page did. The Reform has always said it would not meet with NAC, but this year Reformer Jack Ramsey said he would participate. However, two days before the lobby, he pulled out. In the session with the BQ, women applauded the party for their progressive stances, but pressed them to take a stronger role, as the official opposition, in defending social programs and not only when they affect people in Quebec. The BQ was also challenged on their position on Aboriginal rights in Quebec. The Liberals did not offer much for women to celebrate, particularly as Finance Minister Paul Martin kept quoting from the \"deficit bible.\" Martin was jeered for saying there was no room in the budget for $50 million to fund feminist strategies working to end male violence against women, even after NAC delegates presented ideas on where the monies could be diverted from. All the political parties were asked to support the demands of the March. Only the NDP has given its endorsement. No NAC lobby would be complete without the recent tradition of spoofing the right-wing parties which refused to participate\u00E2\u0080\u0094the Reform and the Conservatives. NAC delegates staged the marriage of Conservative leader Jean Charest and Reform Party leader Preston Manning. The wed- During NAC's federal lobby, women held up signs listing each of the 15 demands of the National Women's March Against Poverty in French and English. Photos by Agnes Huang. ding was officiated by \"David Frum,\" a Toronto journalist and ardent proponent of unifying the right-wing political parties. After the \"wedding\" ceremony, Charest (aka Lorraine Michael) and and Manning (aka Sarah Kreindler) broke out into song: \"Vote regressive conform/And let's unite the Right.\" The mainstream media reported that women had \"walked away empty handed\" after the lobby. But Joan Grant-Cummings, whose first job as president was to facilitate the lobby, says the contrary was true. She says NAC won some significant victories, including an agreement from Paul Martin to meet with women's groups to discuss source-monies within the budget which could be re-allocated to feminist rape crisis centres, transition houses and women's centres. As well, Grant-Cummings says she was encouraged the Liberals agreed to the idea proposed by women for a task force to examine the federal-provincial jurisdictional barriers to the creation of a national childcare program. She adds that the large number of number of federal politicians who turned out to the lobby and the fact that no doors were shut completely, are signs that NAC is a strong political force in this country. \"The very next day, for the first time in his tenure, the prime minister said 'eradicating poverty is a priority of this country/\" said Grant-Cummings. \"That, for me, is a clear demonstration that NAC has the ability to influence the government.\" Agnes Huang attended the NAC AGM and Lobby as a delegate for the Vancouver Status of Women and as editor o/Kinesis. JULY/AUGUST 1996 Bulletin Board read t h i si INVOLVEMENT Bulletin Board listings have a maximum of 50 words. Groups, organizations and individuals eligible for free space in the Bulletin Board must be, or have, non-profit objectives. Other free notices will be items of general public interest and will appear at the discretion of Kinesis. Classifieds are $8 (+$0.56 GST) for the first 50 words or portion thereof, $4 (+$0.28 GST) for each additional 25 words or portion thereof and must be prepaid. Deadline for all submissions is the 18th of the month preceding publication. Note: Kinesis is published ten times a year. Jul/Aug and Dec/Jan are double issues. All submissions should include a contact name and telephone number for any clarification that may be required. Listings will not be accepted over the telephone. Kinesis encourages readers to research the goods and services advertised in Bulletin Board. Kinesis cannot guarantee the accuracy of the information provided or the safety and effectiveness of the services and products listed. Send submissions to Bulletin Board, Kinesis, #301-1720 Grant Street, Vancouver, BC, V5L 2Y6, or fax: (604) 255-5511. For more information call (604) 255-5499. DR. PAULETTE ROSCOE NATUROPATHIC PHYSICIAN HOMEOPATHY COUNSELLING DETOXIFICATION HYCROFT MEDICAL CENTER 108-3195 GRANVILLE ST. VANCOUVER, B.C. V6H 3K2 731-4183 WANNA GET INVOLVED? With Kinesis'? We want to get involved with you too. Help plan our next issue. All women interested in what goes into K/nes/s-whether it's news, features or arts-are invited to our next Story Meetings: and Tues Aug 6 and Tues Sep 3 at 7 pm at our office, 301-1720 Grant St, Van. If you can't make the meeting, but still want to find out about writing for Kinesis, give Agnes a call at (604) 255-5499. No experience is necessary. Childcare subsidies available. CALLING ALL VOLUNTEERS Are you interested in finding out how Kinesis is put together? Well...just drop by during our next production dates and help us design and lay out Canada's national feminist newspaper. Production for the Sept 1996 issue-our summer double issue-is from Aug 21-27. No experience is necessary. Training and support will be provided. Call us at 255-5499. Childcare subsidies available. ABORIGINAL WOMEN'S NETWORK The Aboriginal Women's Action Network (AWAN) holds regular monthly meetings at VSW, 301-1720 Grant St. We work towards equality and justice for Aboriginal women. Workshops and projects will be developed for Aboriginal women in the Eastside. All Aboriginal women are invited to participate. If you have any questions, please call Terri at (604) 255-5511. VSW PROGRAMMING COMMITTEE All women are invited to join Vancouver Status of Women's programming committee and become involved in planning community activities, such as the Women's Film Series and Single Moms Day in the Park. It's fun. It's important. It's cool. Interested? Call Terri at 255-5511. The next committee meeting is Thurs Jul 11. INVOLVEMENT ABORIGINAL WOMEN'S DROP-IN The Aboriginal Women's Action Network (AWAN) will be holding a drop-in for Aboriginal women every Tues from 12-2:30pm at the Vancouver Status of Women, 301-1720 Grant St. Activities such as healing circles, traditional storytelling and workshops will be featured. Come and find out what AWAN is all about. For more info, call Terri at 255-5511. VSWWANTSYOU! Want to get more involved but not sure where to begin? Join us--become a volunteer at Vancouver Status of Women. VSW volunteers plan events, lead groups, raise funds, answer the phone lines, organize the library, help connect women with the community resources they need, and get involved in other exciting jobs! The next volunteer orientation will be on Wed, Jul 17, 7pm at VSW, 301- 1720 Grant St. For more info, call 255-5511. Childcare subsidies available. EVENTS WOMEN IN PRINT BOOKS & OTHER MEDIA Discountsfor book clubs 356<5 West 4th Avenue 4 Vancouver BC Special orders Voice 604 732^128 welcome Fax 604 732-4129 10-6 Daily \u00E2\u0099\u00A6 12-5 Sunday THE KEEPERTM (MENSTRUAL CUP) 3-month money-back guarantee life expectancy of 10 years no chlorine used in its produ( over 97% satisfaction rate Distributed In Canada by Eco I.oglque lnc Fax (613) 820-1626 / lnternet:ciU59fr<*nrt.carlelo (Lowest Canadian Mall Order Price) ~~\"^-~\u00C2\u00AB*tfii 1-800-680-9739 Relationship Therapy DANA L. JANSSEN R.M.T., M.Ed, psych.. R.C.C. Counselling - Therapy Integrative Body Work Massage Therapy Oak & W. 8th Ave. Vancouver, B.C. Tel: (604) 731-2867 MALAIKA Canada's hottest four women a cappella group, Malaika, performs attheVancouver East Cultural Centre, 1895 Venables St. Wed Jul 3 as part of their CD launch national tour. Opening for Malaika is Vancouver's comedic sensation, Janice Ungaro. Doors open at 7:15pm. For tickets call the Cultch at (604) 254- 9578.This is a BLT Enterprises Production. FIRST NATIONS ARTISTS art & aids: First Nation's Expressions, a premiere exhibition of expressions by First Nations artists and writers from across North America sharing their feelings on the effects of AIDS, will open Mon Jul 1. art & aids will be shown daily during the XI International Conference on AIDS at PoP's Gallery, 1134 Granville St, Vancouver until Jul 12. Featured artists include Michelle Sylliboy, Margarite Laliberte, Rose Spahan, Mary Longman and George Littlechild. For more info call (604) 687-5557. POWELL STREET FESTIVAL The 20th annual Powell Street Festival, a celebration of Japanese Canadian culture in Vancouver, will be held Aug 3-4 from 11:30am each day at Oppenheimer Park (400 block of Powell St). The theme of this year's Festival is \"Asian Canadian Women.\" Featured performers will include the Dim Sum Dykes, Jen Lam and Sawagi Taiko. For Festival details call (604) 682-4335. PANCAKE BREAKFAST The Positive Women's Network in Vancouver is putting on a pancake breakfast Sat Jul 6 from 9am-1pm at Harry's off Commercial, 1716 Charles St. All proceeds to PWN. For more info call (604) 681-2122 ext 200. CO-OP RADIO OPEN HOUSE Open house party \"Across the Cultures Info Blitz\" to kick off \"Walk In Speak Out\" at Co-op Radio 102.7FM. Jul 5 from 5-9pm, 337 Carrall St. Food, beverages, djs, art displays, giveaways etc. Drop in and drop off a Food Bank donation. All welcome. Call (604) 684-8494. NUESTRA VOZ Nuestra Voz, a Guatemalan women's organization based in Vancouver, is holding a fundraising dinner and update on women's organizing in Guatemala Wed Jul Out and around the XI International AIDS Conference: Calendar of events The 11th International AIDS conference will be coming to Vancouver July 7-12. [see page 6] A number of public events being held concurently are listed below. For a fuller listing of the Satellite Symposia, which are free and open to the public, call the XI International AIDS Conference office at (604)668-3225. We are unable to give info on some free events because pre-registra- tion deadlines have expired. A Gathering ofWomen The Positive Women's Network (PWN) is hosting a gathering for women attending the conference to meet and network with women working in the community. The Gathering takes place Mon, Jul 8, from 5-7 pm at the Vancouver Rowing Club in Stanley Park. Admission is free. For more info and to RSVP, call PWN at 681-2122, Extn.200. Women inTreatment Activism (Satellite Symposia) This symposia will follow the Gathering of Women on Mon, Jul 8. It takes place at theYWCA Hotel from 7:30-9 pm and is sponsored by PWN and the European AIDS Treatment Group in Berlin. OneWorld Screen Festival This film festival will highlight full-length JULY/AUGUST 1996 feature films, documentaries, and short films/ videos on the many issues surrounding HIV/ AIDS. The festival will run for eight evenings, from Fri, Jul 5, to Sat, Jul 13. Venues are the Robson Square Media Centre's Judge McGill and Judge White theatres, and the Pacifique Cinematheque at 1131 Howe Street. For info about ticket prices and programs, call 606-7812. Public Forum Series A working group at the International AIDS Conference is holding six free, community oriented forums which will be moderated by CBC broadcasters. FORUM ONE on Mon, Jul 8 from 7-9:30 pm, is co-sponsored by AIDS Vancouver and BC Peersons With AIDS (BCPWA) and looks at \"AIDS: Past, Present and Future.\" FORUM TWO takes place on Tues, Jul 9, from noon to 1:30 pm and deals with \"Sex, Safety and the Single Women.\" It is co-sponsored by PWN, theYWCA, and the Vancouver Women's Health Collective. FORUM FIVE on Wed, Jul 10, from 7-9:30 pm, is co-sponsored by YouthCo, and is titled, \"Youth Talk to Youth about AIDS.\" FORUM SIX is at noon-2 pm on Thurs, Jul 11 ,and is co- sponsored by. AIDS Vancouver, St. Paufs Hospital and the BC Medical Association. This forum will give people unable to attend the Conference an opportunity to hear \"The Conference Wrap-up: Key Research Results presented at the XI International AIDS Conference.\" AIDS, Medicine and Miracles This is the name of a US-based non-profit organization that coordinates holistic retreats for people living with HIV/AIDS. They will be holding a retreat in Vancouver during the Conference. For cost, registration or more info, call 1-800-875-8770. Indigenous Peoples'Working Group (Satellite Symposia) A gathering for Indigenous peoples only, it takes place from 8:30 am to 3:30 pm on Sun, Jul 7 at the Sty-Wet- Tan Great Hall, First Nations House of Learning, University of British Columbia. The Gathering will continue on Wed, Jul 10, at the Robson Square Media Centre from 7-9 pm. Call Linda Day at 666-1898 for more info. A Dialogue between the Sexes (Satellite Symposia) AIDSCAP/Family Health International presents \"Men, Women and AIDS: A Dialogue between the Sexes\" at 4:30 pm on Sat, Jul 6, at the Sutton Place Hotel. The contact is Mary Kay McGeown, available through Conference staff. InternationalWornen's AIDS Caucus (Satellite Symposia) International women will meet at the Vancouver Public Library from 10 am to 2:30 pm on Sat, Jul 6 and from 10 am to noon on Fri, Jul 12. The contact is Mabel Bianco (Argentina) available through Conference staff. BC Coalition of People with Disabilities (Satellite Symposia) BCCPD will be hosting a symposium on Fri, Jul 12 from 9 am to 4:30 pm at the Westin Bayshore Hotel. They will be looking at \"Strategies in HIV/AIDS Prevention Education for People with Disabilities.\" Call Geoff McMurchy at 875- 0188 for more info. Asia Pacific Alliance Against AIDS (Satellite Symposia) The APAAA presents a symposia titled \"Private and Public Partnerships for HIV Prevention in the Asia Pacific\" on Sun, Jul 7 from 8am to 1'30 praat the YWCA Hotel on Beatty Street. Contact Ann- Marie Kimball through Conference staff. Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual Caucus (Satellite Symposia) The International AIDS Society Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual Caucus will meet to discuss \"Multiple Risks, Multiple Threats\" at the Vancouver Library from 7-9 pm on Tues, Jul 9. Contact Clint Gould through Conference staff. Compiled by Nancy Pang and Fatima Jaffer Bulletin Board EVENTS EVENTS GROUPS GROUPS 10 at 7pm at Mount Pleasant Neighbourhood House, 800 E. Broadway, Vancouver. The event will include a delicious Guatemalan dinner, crafts, music, and a raffle in order to support Nuestra Voz' work both in Canada and Guatemala. Suggested donation is $10. Please call to confirm your participation at 877-8601 or 872-0297. GATHERING OFWOMEN Positive Women's Network is hosting a Gathering of Women during the XI International Conference on AIDS in Vancouver Mon Jul 8, 5-7pm at the Vancouver Rowing Club in Stanley Park. This social event will be an opportunity for women attending the conference to meet and network with women working in the community. Admission is free. For more info call PWN at (604) 681-2122 ext 200. COMEDY FESTIVAL The 10th Annual Vancouver International Comedy Festival will be held from Jul 25- Aug 4 in various venues on Granville Island. There will be public outdoor events and ticketed evening events, including the premiere of a new bleakly humourous work entitled Too Little, Too Late, Too Loaded by Christine Taylor, author of Man on the Moon, Woman on the Pill. For more info call (604) 683-0883. DYKEWORDS Dykewords: readings by local dyke writers is held every second Thurs at 9pm at The Lotus, 455 Abbott St, Vancouver. Jul 4 features Nancy Richler, Russell Baskin, & Louie Ettling. Jul 18 features Terrie \"Cookie\" Hamazaki & Wendy Putnam. Admission $1-4 sliding scale, everyone welcome. For more info, call (604) 685-7777. QUEER WORDS Queer Words, Gay Pride readings and performances, will be held Thurs Aug 1 at the Lotus, 455 Abbott St, Vancouver. The event features Nadine Chambers, James C. Johnstone, Darcy James McFadden & Helen Mintz. For more info, call (604) 685-7777. SEATTLE RUMMAGE SALE Radical Women, a socialist feminist group in Seattle, is holding a rummage sale Jul 20-21 at the New Freeway Hall, 5018 Rainier Ave, Seattle. Housewares, sports equipment, collectables, furniture, books, clothes, etc. Sat 10-6pm, Sun 10-2pm. Goods half-price on Sun. To donate or for more info call (206) 722-6057. PARADE YOUR PRIDE A celebration for gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and transexual people, their friends and family. Sun Aug 4 from Denman St. to Sunset Beach, Vancouver. Call (604) 73-PRIDE. CARIBBEAN DAYS The Trinidad and Tobago Cultural Society of BC presents the 9th annual Caribbean Days Festival Jul 27-28 in Vancouver. On Sat Jul 27 from 5pm-1am, the 3rd Annual Plazarama, Carnival costume parade and dance will take place at the Plaza of Nations and will feature soca, reggae, steel bands, hot latin tempo and limbo fire dance. Admission is $20 advance, children $10. Tickets available from TicketMaster, 280-4444; Roots & Culture, 436-3992; or the Patty Shop, 738-2144. On Sun Jul 28 from 11am-7pm, a free, fun-filled Caribbean Festival will be held at Waterfront Park in North Vancouver. The event will feature arts and crafts, Caribbean food and music, and rides. For more info call 303-1455. RANDOM ORDER Come groove to the energetic sounds of Toronto-based Random Order Thurs Jul 11 at the Railway Club, 579 Dunsmuir St, Vancouver. On their first cross-Canada tour, this upbeat and political band is sure to inspire diverse audiences with the eclectic mixture of ska, reggae and more. The eccentric, confrontational and extrememly funny Sheila Gostick will be opening. Random Order will also be perforning at the Harrison Festival of the Arts. For more info call (604) 681-4374. WITT POTLUCK PICNIC Women in Trades and Technology (WITT) is holding a potluck picnic Sun Aug 11, 1 pm at Trout Lake in Vancouver. Meet near the concession. For more info call Lower Mainland WITT at (604) 688-9499. AMAZING GREYS GATHERING The 4th annual Amazing Greys Gathering is happening in Parksville at the Island Hall Oct 25-27. The event is a celebration of the energy, creativity and wisdom of mature women Willing to explore the opportunities of age with joy, curiousity and openess. For more info contact Shelagh Wilson at (604) 954-2395. HARRISON FESTIVAL Hear the blues of Swamp Mama Johnson, the a cappella rhythms of Aya and Malaika, the voices of Faith Nolan and Irene Farrera at this year's Harrison Festival of the Arts. The annual event is an intimate little festival of theatre, dance, music and visual arts on the shores of Harrison Lake in British Columbia held this year from Jul 6- 14. A complete schedule is available by calling (604) 681-2771 in Vancouver or (604) 796-3664 in Harrison. Want to see your services listed on these pages? Call (604)255-5499 So when is that i queer film/video festival anyway 4t | August 8th-1 7th, 1996 the 8th Annual Vancouver Queer Film/Video Festival FOR VOLUNTEER OPPORTUNITIES CALL 879-9296 NOW! LESBIAN SURVIVORS Looking to form a lesbian-only consciousness raising/discussion group for survivors of girlhood rape. No s/m, drink, drugs please. Contact Anne at P.O. Box 315 916 W. Broadway Vancouver, BC, V5Z 1K7. BIG SISTERS Big Sisters of BC Lower Mainland and the Positive Women's Network are looking for women to become Big Sisters for children of HIV+ mothers. You must be 20 years of age or older, and willing to commit for a minimum one year match with a Little Sister or Brother, and be able to spend 3-5 hours each week with them. For more info, contact Bronwyn at 681-2122 ext 200 orTai Holley at 873-4525. RAPE RELIEF VOLUNTEERS Vancouver Rape Relief & Women's Shelter needs women who are interested in volunteering for their 24 Hour Crisis Line and their Transition House for women and their children. Training sessions Tuesday evenings. For more info and a training interview, call 872-8212. WOMENVISIONS Pat, Shauna, and Jan on WomenVisions axe looking for more women to become involved in producing this feminist show on Co-op Radio, CFRO 102.7FM in Vancouver. Interested, call them on Monday evenings 8-9pm or leave a message for WomenVisions Mon-Thurs noon to 6pm at 684-8494. UNDERTHEVOLCANO Under the Volcano Festival, an annual festival of art and social change held in North Vancouver, is calling for coordinators and volunteers for this summer's festival. Under the Volcano relies on a volunteer base of 150 people to pull this innovative one day event together. If you want to learn about festival production, meet and work with great people in an atmosphere of music and politics, then call 254-7057. There are five areas in which we still need coordinators: Environment, Craft Circle, Food Services, Front Gate, and Bookkeeper. Honoria are offered for these five positions. POWELL STREET FESTIVAL Powell Street Festival, an annual celebration of Japanese Canadian culture in Vancouver to be held this year Aug 3-4, is looking for volunteers before and during the Festival. If interested call Kathy Shimizu at (604) 682-4335. WAVAW VOLUNTEERS Women Against Violence Against Women (WAVAW) rape crisis centre in Vancouver needs women to do rape crisis work. WAVAW offers extensive training in counselling & crisis intervention, advocacy & liaison work, and providing information on medical, police and legal procedures for rape crisis work. The next training begins on Sept 14 for 12 weeks, on Wed 7-10pm and Sun 11am-5pm. Childcare and transportation subsidies available. Sign language interpreters will be provided if needed. For more info, call 255-6228 or TTY 254-6268. WOMEN AND AIDS A new women's support group in Vancouver for women living with AIDS will be held every other Sat from Jul 6-Oct 26 at the Downtown Eastside Women's Centre, 44 E. Cordova St. The group will be facilitated by Wanda from Healing Our Spirit and Nancy from the Positive Women's Network. The group is confidential and attempts will be made to ensure the group is safe and accessible. Refreshments and snacks will be available. For more info call Nancy at 681-2122 ext 200 or Wanda (604)-973-7282. MABEL LITTLE LEAGUE Outdoor games and sports for kids of all ages. Facilitated and organized by queer moms and other dykes too. Easy going, non-competitive. Bring equipment if you have it but no matter if you don't. Every Thurs evening at 5:30pm at Grandview Terrace School playing field at the corner of E. 4th and MacLean (three blocks west of Commercial Dr.) All kids, women and queer dads welcome. For more info call Maureen at 251-9063 or Terra at 254-1588. AFRIKAN WOMYN'S GROUP Womyn of Afrikan descent who are female friendly are invited to meet for conversation, support and get togethers for mutual interest and activities. For more info call (604) 873-6069. WOMENWITCHES Cella Training Program for Women Witches, an ongoing study circle in BC, is looking for new members. Cella is an intensive yet self-directed training and study program for priestesses in one or more of six specialities. For more info call Karen at 873-6301, Marga at 251-1142, or Jillyann at 929- 3342. LEGAL CLINIC FOR WOMEN Battered Women's Support Services and UBC Law Students Legal Advice Program, are co-sponsoring free legal clinics for women to be held every Wednesday from 2-8 pm until Aug 14. For more info or to make an appt, call (604) 687-1867. APPREHENSION SUPPORT GROUP Have your children been \"apprehended\" by the BC Ministry of Social Services? If so, you may want to find a safe place for you to share with other persons who have or are living a similar experience. An independent peer group is now meeting on Mondays at 1 pm at the Carnegie Centre, 401 Main St, Vancouver in order to give or receive support and information around these issues. For more info call Pat Biddau, 253- 2198 or Myles Macintosh, 254-9636. BWSS TRAINING Battered Women's Support Services will be offering volunteer Group Facilitator, Peer Counselor/Advocate training in the fall of 1996. If you are interested in working with battered women as a volunteer at BWSS and would like to be considered for the training program, please call (604) 687- 1868 for an application form. QUEER JEWISH WOMEN Calling Nice Jewish Girls for food, socializing, politics, 'zine-making, and fun with other queer Jewish women. For more info, call (604) 254-6807. LEARNING RESOURCES Learning Resources Society (LRS) invites women to participate in regular monthly meetings held on the third Wed of each month at 7pm at the Women's Centre, Room 2730 at Douglas College in New Westminster. LRS is a non-profit organization concerned with issues affecting women's ability to make informed choices about their education and work. For more info, call (604) 527-5148. GRASSROOTS WOMEN'S GROUP The Grassroots Women's Discussion Group in Vancouver has been meeting to make connections between theory and practice and to organize for change. Women interested in joining the discussion group, please call the Philippine Women Centre at (604) 322-9852. Want to advertise? Call (604)255-5499 JULY/AUGUST 1996 Bulletin Board The Winter 1996 issue of Canadian Woman Studies/les cahiers de la femme is committed to an exploration and a celebration of women and spirituality. Submissions should be typed and double-spaced, maximum 7-12 pages (2500 words), and include a short (50 word) abstract of the submission and a brief biographical note. Please include a disk if word processed. We give preference to previously unpublished material. If possible, submit graphics and photos to accompany submission. We cannot publish fiction. Write or call ASAP indicating your intention to submit your work: CWS/cf 212 Founders College, York University, 4700 Keele St, North York ON. M3J 1P3. Call (416)736-5356, fax (416)736-5765. Deadline is Aug 30. BEIJING PHOTOS The Vancouver Assoc of Chinese Canadians and the Burnaby Art Gallery are collaborating on a photography exhibit of the 1995 4th World Conference on Women in Beijing. If you were at the conference, and have photos you feel are especially representative of your experiences, please send a maximum of 10 b/w or colour prints. Include a one page statement about your experiences at the conference along with contact information, and a SASE if you want your prints returned. Contact Grace Thomson, Burnaby Art Gallery, 6344 Deer Lake Ave, Burnaby, BC, V5G 2J3, or call (604) 291-9441. Deadline is Sept 27. WOMAN/SISTER/FRIEND/GIRLFRIEND A call for submissions from heterosexual women who have friendships with lesbians and lesbians who have friendships with heterosexual women. Send testimonies, essays, photos, recipes, interviews, poems and stories to Sister Vision Press, PO Box 217, Stn E, Toronto, ON, M6H 4E2. Deadline is Sep 1. HOT AND BOTHERED Arsenal Pulp Press is accepting short short fiction for an anthology of lesbian erotic stories. For full guidelines send SASE to: Hot and Bothered, 1036 Odium Drive, Vancouver, BC, V5L 3L6; or e-mail kxt@descon.mlnet.com. Deadline is Aug 31. THIN LINES OF COMMUNICATION Women who have had anorexia and/or bulimia are invited to submit poetry, short fiction, personal non-fiction, and black and white visual art to the anthology Thin Lines of Communication, forthcoming from gynergy books. Send up to 20 pages, a brief biography, and a SASE to: Thin Lines, PO Box 1164, Saskatoon, SK S7K 3N2. Deadline is Nov 1. barbara findlay B.A. MA. LIB. is delighted to announce that she is now practicing law with the law firm of Smith and Hughes 321-1525 Robson Street Vancouver Tel: (604) 683-4176 Smith and Hughes offer a full range of legal services to the lesbian, gay and bisexual communities of Vancouver. Initial consultations are without charge. COUNSELLING SERVICES FOR WOMEN Offering group, individual and couple counselling with a feminist philosophy, Hakomi techniques, art and gestalt therapy. Sliding fee scale. Please contact Miljenka Zadravec, M.Ed, Sydney Foran, MSW, Fran Friesen, M.Ed, or Elli Tamasin, M.Ed at 304-1720 Grant St, Van, or call 253-0143. WOMEN'S SELF-DEFENSE Women Educating in Self-defense Training (WEST) teaches Wenlido. In Basic classes, you learn how to make the most of mental, physical and verbal skills to get away from assault situations. Continuing training builds on basic techniques to improve physical and mental strength. By women, for women. For info, call 876-6390. KARATE FOR WOMEN Karate for Women Shito-ryu karate taught by female black belts. Learn a martial art for self-defense, fitness, self confidence! At the YWCA, 535 Hornby St, Van. Mon, Tues, Thurs, 7:15-9pm. $45/month. Beginner groups start Jul 4, Aug 1, Sept 5, Oct 2. Call 872-7846. CITYVIEW CO-OP Cityview Co-op has one, two and three bedroom suites for $565, $696, $795 per month and refundable share purchase. Carpets, blinds, appliances, parking and laundry room. Children and small pets welcome. Please send a business size SASE to Membership Committee, Cityview Housing Co-op, 108-1885 E. Pender St, Vancouver, BC.V5L1W6. GATHERING INTHE GREEN Earth, Air, Fire & Water, an ecofeminst camp deepening ecological awareness/remembering the Goddess, will take place Aug 25-31. Various presenters, interactive circles, ritual and more in rural island setting! $350-$475. For info please forward a SASE to Women and the Earth, c/o Fireweed, Denman Island, BC, V0R 1T0. COUNTRY HOLIDAY An invitation to a country holiday. Affordable, safe and peaceful women's farm in Coombs on Vancouver Island, BC. $7.50/ night for small cabin or exchange three hours a day of labour for food/lodging. Can arrange to meet Nanaimo ferry. Call 248- 8809. The farm gals are also looking for a \"hired hand\" with animals/gardens. Inquire. LOOKING FOR SPACE Lesbian social worker and mother of one great young adult is looking for 900-plus square feet of living space in a house or apartment with hardwood floors in East Vancouver. We require 2+ rooms, and either a yard or porch by Aug 1. Call Leda Rose at 984-3232. PRO-CHOICE PRESS Subscribe to Pro-Choice Press, the BC Coalition of Abortion Clinics' quarterly bulletin with news and information on the fight for abortion rights. $10 per year for individuals; $25 for groups-includes membership in the Coalition. To subscribe, write to 219-1675 W. 8th Ave, Vancouver, BC, V6J 1V2; call (604) 736-2800; or fax: (604) 736-2152. WHO'LL BE AT THE FOLK FESTIVAL?! Among over 150 performers coming from all over the world, the Vancouver Folk Music Festival will include Canada's own Jane Siberry (above left) with her brand of elusive songwriting, as well as LindaTiliery (above right) and her Cultural Heritage Choir performing African-American acapella. Other highlights include Kate and Anna McGarrigle; Peggy Seeger; Mary Jane Lamond; Sharon Shannon and her band from Ireland; dub poet ahdri zhina mandiela; stand-up comic Sheila Gostick; Hilary Peach; Sheila and Backwater Blues; Pele Juju (\"the Bay area's hottest all-woman world- beat band\"); and many, many more. So don't miss the Vancouver Folk Music Festival at Jericho Beach Park on July 19,20 and 21,1996. Phone (604) 734-6543 for information or tickets. Photos courtesy of the Vancouver Folk Music Festival. LAIWAN small, medium and not large: books & collages 382 to present From collecting bus transfers to painting books, to cutting up books, to using lots of liquid paper \u00E2\u0080\u0094 Laiwan takes het daubiing out from her suitcase and into one room. Laiwan is an interdisciplinary artist who was born in Zimbabwe of Chinese origin. On display will be new work as well as pieces from the pasi that show her interest in playing with language, structures and perception. Come to the opening reception on Tuesday July 16th at Spm.The show will run from July 16th to August 8th, 1996 at the grunt Gallery, 116\u00E2\u0080\u0094350 East 2nd Ave, Vancouver. The gallery hours are Wed to Sat: noon to 6pm. This exhibition at the grunt Gallery is also part of this year's Powell Street Festival whose theme celebrates the cultural work of Asian Canadian Women.The Powell Street Festival will be held on August 3rd and 4th at Oppenheimer Park. For more information call the grunt Gallery at (604) 875-9516. Photo by John Fukushima. CLASSIFIEDS CLASSIFIEDS ONE BEDROOM BASEMENT SUITE COUNSELLING FOR WOMEN FOR RENT Quiet, non-smoking, mature lesbian preferreed for suite in older, well-maintained house and garden in the Mount Pleasant area. Rent is $360 per month including hydro. Call Diana at 876-1465. A feminist approach to sexual abuse, depression, grief and loss, sexual orientation issues and personal growth. Sliding fee scale. Free initial appointment. Susan Dales R.P.C. at 255-9173. JULY/AUGUST 1996 One year D$20 + $1.40 GST D Bill me Two years D New D$36 + $2.52 GST \u00E2\u0096\u00A1 Renewal Institutions/Groups D Gift D$45 + $3.15 GST D Donation Name. D Cheque enclosed For individuals who can't afford the full amount 3 for Kinesis subscription, send what you can. Free to prisoners. Orders outside Canada add $8. Vancouver Status of Women Membership (includes Kinesis subscription) D$30+$1.40 GST Address\u00E2\u0080\u0094 Country Telephone _ Postal code. Fax Published ten times a year by the Vancouver Status of Women #301 -1720 Grant Street Vancouver, BC V5L 2Y6"@en . "Preceding title: Vancouver Status of Women. Newsletter.

Date of publication: 1974-2001.

Frequency: Monthly."@en . "Periodicals"@en . "Newspapers"@en . "HQ1101.V24 N49"@en . "HQ1101_V24_N49_1996_07"@en . "10.14288/1.0046861"@en . "English"@en . "Vancouver : University of British Columbia Library"@en . "Vancouver : Vancouver Status of Women"@en . "Images provided for research and reference use only. Permission to publish, copy, or otherwise use these images must be obtained from the Digitization Centre: digitization.centre@ubc.ca"@en . "Original Format: University of British Columbia. Library. Rare Books and Special Collections. HQ1101.V24 N49"@en . "Women--Social and moral questions"@en . "Feminism--Periodicals"@en . "Kinesis"@en . "Text"@en . ""@en .