Celebrating 10 Years of Action

(Geneva, 2009)

On March 15, 2003 I participated in my first anti-war protest. It was a bitterly cold day, I was 16 and to say that my mother wasn't happy with my decision, is a tremendous understatement.

Two weeks earlier I had attended a youth peace vigil against the Iraq War in Mississauga with some of my highschool friends. We carried signs, lit candles, listened to a speech by Jack Layton and made the evening news. 

It was at the peace vigil that I heard about the anti-war protest for the first time and I was game. Most of my friends in my grade didn't really get what the big deal was. The prospect of a war in a far away country with whom they had no connection to didn't seem to trouble them, and I suspect they were growing tired of listening to me talk about it. Fortunately I had made some friends in my grader 12 history class (I was in grade 11) who invited me to come with them to the protest in Toronto.

Despite my mom's misgivings she drove me to my friend's house and we took the GO train downtown (this might have been my first time downtown without adult accompaniment). Once we arrived at Yonge and Dundas Square we were surrounded by other protesters. It was invigorating to know that I was standing against something I didn't believe in with more than 10,000 people in Toronto and hundreds of thousands of people around the World. We chanted slogans, held our signs high, and marched to city hall. On my way home I remember seeing news footage of the protests from around the world playing in Union Station. The protest was winding down but I was just beginning.


 (A picture from March 15, 2003. Source: http://tamarind18.com/shock-and-awe-the-war-we-could-not-stop)

In the days that followed the protest, then Prime Minister Jean Chretien refused to allow Canada to become involved in the War in Iraq, a small consolation to the Iraqi civilians as the bombs started to fall. I never would have imagined that 10 years later I would be working with refugees who escaped the same war. 

A year and a half later I moved to Ottawa where I started my B.A. in Human Rights and Law. In the first semester I attended two anti-Bush protests, one less than 100 people and one over 1000. My distribution of flyers for the second protest raised ire in a couple of my floor mates in residence who covered my door with propaganda in favour of the Iraq war. I returned the favor but denied any involvement until the event passed into being just a funny story.

For some time after that I went through a quieter phase and focused on my academic endeavors, developing the knowledge I would need to be an effective activist.

And then there was facebook. 

I got facebook in late 2006 to maintain contact with the friends who I met on exchange in the Netherlands. In June 2006 I inadvertently got sucked into CBC's great Canadian Wish List. The Great Canadian Wish List encouraged Canadians to make a wish for Canada's 140th Birthday. I was curious about the project so I checked it out, and was soon dismayed to learn that the top wish was to end abortion in Canada. Naturally I made a counter wish, wishing that abortion would remain legal and figured that some more important issue would take the lead. I guess abortion was the more important issue. My wish eventually received over 8,000 votes and the opposing wish had close to 10,000. The event received limited news coverage, likely because of the sensitivity of the subject, however I was on both TV and on the radio to mark the event. 

At the same time that I was leading an online campaign for something that I consider to be a fundamental women's rights, I was also getting my first taste of the importance of participating in community development as a component of activism. That summer I volunteered at the Dixie-Bloor Neighbourhood Centre which supports immigrants, where I supported a settlement worker and trained all of the settlement workers in the office on human rights mechanisms in Canada. This was a really wonderful experience for me and I learned a lot about the importance of sharing knowledge and ideas at the grassroots level and I also learned a lot about issues facing refugees. 


(With the staff at the Dixie-Bloor Neighbourhood Centre)

I've continued to try to contribute to social change through working and volunteering at the grassroots level since that time. This is most evident through my work with refugees and as a fundraiser. 


(Building a Shack in the North-West Province in South Africa)

I've also dedicated a great deal of my academic work to human rights, activism and social change. I wrote my M.A. thesis on the causes of the demand for small arms and light weapon in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. I worked with Congolese refugees living in South Africa and recorded their stories of violence, heartbreak and hope which I amalgamated into the final draft of my thesis. While I was writing my thesis I had hoped that it might contribute to better peacebuilding and development practice in the DRC but I wonder whether anyone has read it beyond my peer editors (thanks again guys!) and my thesis committee.

Since I finished my M.A. I've also had a number of opportunities to engage in public speaking events. As passionate as I am about my work I still find it absolutely terrifying to stand up in front of groups and deliver my message. I guess it's an area to work on.

Above anything else, I think my experience in Uganda has made me appreciate my ability to engage in this kind of work more than anything else. Aside from the somewhat humourous anecdote of avoiding being teargassed in a number of protests in Canada only to be caught in the cross fire of some during a riot in Kampala, being in Uganda really helped me to develop a strong appreciation for democracy and a healthy civil society. I've written before in this blog about the tiredness of many of the young people who I met in Uganada, and their acknowledgement that their system wasn't working but that they couldn't imagine a way out. I'm also aware of the accusations of torture and other forms of violence against political dissidents in the country.  

(Idle No More)

Over the last ten years I have emerged as a young adult who truly believes that you need to work towards the change that you want to see in your community, country and world. I've also have developed a strong appreciation for the importance of human rights education. I am incredibly greatful that I've had the opportunities to engage in the human rights issues that concern me most including armed violence, equal opportunity and women's rights. 

I hope to bring the same passion and enthusiasm with me into my next 10 years of action. 

If you'd like to start engaging with issues that matter to you here's somewhere to start:

1. Get Informed - read books, news paper articles or anything you can get your hands on so that you have your story straight.
2. Write a Letter - If you're short on time you can always write a letter or send an email to a politician about an issue that's of concern to you. Just remember it's important to research who you're writing to ahead of time, since I have the experience of being on the receiving end of such letters as a student working for the government.
3. Vote - vote in local, provincial and national elections. vote in student elections. vote any time you can. It's one of the most effective ways of making you voice heard. When you do remember all of the people around the World who don't get the chance to.
4. Go to  a protest - keep it peaceful if you can.
5.  Share your knowledge or skills - you could be a volunteer, give a presentation or even write a blog! The best way to get other people on your side is to share with them!
6. Be the Change - You might think this is totally cliche but leading by example, whether it's being a vegetarian, buying sweat shop free clothes or simply not littering, is a great way to reach people

Wait! Just one more thing. There's still a war going on in Iraq. It's not front page news any more but people continue to die as a result of sectarian violence and the American need for hegemony and oil. Many of the clients at Reception House, who are government assisted refugees have been displaced as a result of the war. Nothing separates our lives from those living war zones except the chance of where we are born.

Iraq Body Count Estimates that up to 120,000 civilians have died in the Iraq War.

http://www.iraqbodycount.org/