By Basics Editorial Committee “Nobody in the world, nobody in history, has ever gotten their freedom by appealing to the moral sense of the people who were oppressing them.” – Assata Shakur On Saturday March 26th, over a thousand people gathered for #BlackOut Against Police Brutality to demand justice for Andrew Loku and Alex Wettlaufer …
By: Nooria Alam On the afternoon of July 16th protesters from the Black Lives Matter Toronto Coalition disrupted the Toronto Police Service’s monthly board meeting, demanding answers directly from the Mayor as well as the Chief of Police in the aftermath of the death of Andrew Loku at the hands of a Toronto Police Officer a …
By Nooria Alam On June 24th, the Toronto Baha’i Centre hosted a public forum called “Conversation on Carding”, where community members came together to discuss the Toronto Police Service’s’ policy on carding, lately a hot topic in Toronto media. Conversation focused on recent appearances by new TPS Chief Mark Saunders, who has defended carding as …
by the BASICS Editorial Committee Dennis Edney has spent the last decade of his life defending Omar Khadr. He may have done more than any living person to rescue Khadr from the racist collusion of the Canadian and American governments, which together sought to keep him locked up in military prisons for the rest of …
by Ellie Adekur-Carlson When Mark Saunders and Peter Sloly were shortlisted as candidates for Chief Bill Blair’s job, it struck up a city-wide dialogue around diversity and the role of a Black police chief in tackling issues of anti-Black racism within the Toronto Police Service. Communities were proud to watch, for the first time, as …
In December 2014, BASICS people’s journalists Shafiq Aziz and Steve da Silva travelled to Mishkeegogamang First Nation, a remote Ojibway reserve located 7 hours north of Thunder Bay as part of a serve-the-people project launched by the First Nations Solidarity Working Group of union local CUPE 3903. Through a look at the housing situation on the reserve, BASICS …
by Nathaniel Jote, Shafiqullah Aziz, Steve da Silva Concerned residents and community members gathered at a vigil on Christmas eve for Jermaine Carby, a Brampton man who was shot and killed by Peel Regional Police three months earlier. The gathering rallied about 50 members at the location of Carby’s murder, near Queen and Kennedy, where …
Michael MacIsaac was killed by Durham Region Police last year on December 2nd, 2013. His sister Joanne MacIsaac was in the studio with Radio Basics on December 1, 2014 to talk about the blatant lies, disrespect and cover ups that the province’s Special Investigations Unit and the Durham Police took part in to ensure that …
Provincial Judge upholds constitutionality of bylaw that criminalizes the poor. By: Aiyanas Ormond “Don’t kick us when we’re down,” said Susan Aleck, standing in front of the provincial courthouse in Vancouver. “Let us get up and make ourselves better. Give us some space.” Aleck is one of four members of the Vancouver Area Network of …
Radio BASICS August 25/2014 In this feature interview we talk to inmate Ryan Jordan about systemic racism, racial discrimination, racial divides between administration and inmates and a racial division between who gets privileges and who gets punishments within Canada’s “Correctional Institutions”. Incarcerated since 2003, Jordan speaks from his experiences as a grievance clerk for other …
