Rating: NNNNN
Don’t believe La Senza
la senza’s lawrence lewin claims his company pulled out of its supply factory in Thailand where workers’ rights are being violated because protestors leafleted his customers in Canada (NOW, May 8-14). In fact, La Senza cut and ran from the factory in question in April, days before the May 1 actions. Seems Lewin is looking for a scapegoat to blame for his company’s irresponsible action. Don’t be surprised if there are more protesters at La Senza stores, this time demanding that Lewin’s company resume orders with the factory and help clean up worker rights abuses.
Tullia Marcolongo, Maquila Solidarity Network, Toronto
Confounded bridge
pat capponi (now, may 8-14) writes about her experience on the Bloor Street viaduct without answering the questions she asks: What advice could we have offered in our afflicted, mind-sick states that would equal or counter the weight of the opinions of psychiatrists, our family members, city councillors or architects? What could we possibly know that they do not?The creation of physical barriers to prevent further suicides is simply that: a physical barrier.
Those who choose death by their own hand (many, of course, in reality helped along by others) are not threatened by the destruction of their mind and spirit. The spirit has already been broken long before.
Douglas Helliker, Toronto
Radical idolization
for three reasons, i hope you continue to publish Uri Avnery’s diatribes against Israel (NOW, May 8-14). First, your readers should know what kind of a cruel “peace” group Avnery heads. It dismisses or ignores the relentless, heinous Palestinian suicide bombings of Israeli civilians.
Second, these extremists, and their Jewish allies in the diaspora, represent a journalistic phenomenon – members of an ethnic group vilifying their ancestral homeland. The fact is, they are a tiny minority among Jews.
Finally, these radicals, in their idolization of Palestine, make us Jews remember other Jews who worshipped false gods, who sold their souls to the Soviet Union.
Jacob Mendlovic, Toronto
Jews didn’t build walls
while i myself do not like walls and have mixed feelings about the one being erected by Israel, I am writing about Uri Avnery’s penultimate paragraph, where he says Jews erected the walls around their ghettos in Europe. This suggestion is incorrect and outrageous! In fact, the Jews were forced into those ghettos because they were not allowed to own land or live anywhere else in the cities that created those ghettos. The walls were erected to keep the Jews in, and, in fact, the gates to the ghettos were locked at night. Although there is indeed an irony here, Avnery should get his facts straight.
David Grader, Toronto
Scary Star Wars
re sucked in by star wars (now, May 8-14). It’s scary to think the U.S. military already controls the plasmic wave.In fact, one only need read Planet Earth: The Latest Weapon Of War, by Rosalie Bertell, to realize that Star Wars research and electromagnetic weaponry have already begun to take their toll on our fragile ecosystem.
Reading the U.S. military’s Vision 2020 will send chills up your spine. Finding the research paper titled Weather As A Force Multiplier: Owning The Weather In 2025, presented to the U.S. Air Force, will make you wonder if global warming is “natural” or part of some great experiment run by mad scientists.
Read Planet Earth if you dare. Our future may depend on it.
Lynn D. Fairweather, Toronto
The good in Iraq invasion
ok. i have to concede that some very positive and good things have come from the invasion of Iraq. Specifically, relative freedom for the Iraqi people and the removal of a tyrant.This does not negate, however, how this war was imposed upon the world by a very pushy and arrogant Bush administration.
Those weapons of mass destruction have yet to be found (NOW, May 1-7). Iraqi leaders insist those weapons were destroyed – just as former head weapons inspector Scott Ritter tried to tell the world four months ago.
Bruce A. Gorcyca, Mississauga
SARS cash well spent
re high-flyin’ tory (now, may 1-7).I am a big Up Front fan, but have you ever flown overnight to Europe? If you have serious meetings on arrival – as health minister Tony Clement did – then first-class is the better way to go.
Leg room, you know. Comfort to sleep, work, etc. I humbly suggest that the extra $5,000 was well spent. In fact, it would have been better spent in early April if our halfwit politicians had grasped the severity of the situation then.
Dave Ebner, Toronto
Blunt facts about baseball
in roll with the jays (now, may 1-7) you claim that smoking doobies at the Skydome will result in “heavy-lidded fans (who don’t) mind the game’s plodding pace.” Believe me, I know from experience that smoking a spliff before a baseball game makes it the slowest and most tiring experience. Yes, even more so.
Julian Reids, Toronto
Puck stops here
re square to nowhere (now, april 24-30). As anyonewith even the slightest interest in cooking (or the ability to perform an Internet search) can tell you, renowned chef Wolfgang Puck is Austrian, not German.
Victoria Fulford, Toronto
Inspiring Priest
re patrick rawley’s slag of robert Priest (NOW, May 1-7). It’s always great to read Priest in Now magazine. He truly is an extraordinary talent.Not only is he an inspiring poet, but he’s also someone who’s shown great generosity of spirit, not only to me, but to many others in this country.
It’s not hard to imagine his detractors. I smell envy, the downfall of all journalism here, in England and particularly Australia, which I believe indirectly influenced the suicide death of INXS’s Michael Hutchence. They certainly strangled any sense of his hope! Mister MacPriest’s Now stabber is cursing the light that put him in the shade.
Alannah Myles, Toronto
Racial hyperbole
benito camelo has a long way to go to convince me on racial profiling (NOW, May 8-14). Claiming to speak for every immigrant will not sway me. What ever happened to the European, i.e., white, immigrants?I hate to sound like a fucking jerk, yet perhaps Mr. Camelo is indulging in hyperbole and is thus his own worst enemy.
C.R. LaCoursiere, Toronto
Getting the Goods
i just wanted to write a quicknoteto say how much the Goods section has improved. I usually skip this section because it’s sorta dull and not very extensive. I can see that Emma Medeiros (NOW, April 24-30) actually put some effort into researching her product, and it shows in the variety of wallets she was able to pull together. I might actually go and get one of them now! Keep up the good work, and I’m looking forward to seeing more articles by Emma!
J. McCormick, Toronto
Question of style
every thursday, i read now online before I ever pick it up in print. I read Savage Love first, then My Style. I usually get a kick out of seeing what my peers are doing style-wise. I like finding out about cool items I haven’t heard about and where to get them in Toronto. Thing is, it seems that lately no one featured actually shops in Toronto. They get their hoop earrings in some market in Bangkok and their work shirts in Denver. It just seems so bloody pretentious. I suppose if I were lucky enough to travel the world I’d have my non-indigenous baubles as well. But here it just seems flaunted.
Why feature someone whose style is supposed to be the best of Toronto when there’s nothing from Toronto to be found? Just my two cents.
Lindsay Forde, Toronto
Night at the Opera
athena towers, general manager of the Opera House, wrote a letter a few weeks back (NOW, March 27-April 2) defending her security staff in response to Max Turnbull’s complaint about being unreasonably ejected from the venue by a security guard. She suggests that Turnbull is a liar, and ends her letter by saying, “So who’s the asshole here?”
I attended the Fat Wreck tour with Mad Caddies on March 12, where I witnessed security guards treating crowd-surfers with disrespect and aggressive abuse. On several occasions I saw them pick out crowd-surfers and proceed to throw them into the mosh pit head-first. Gee, that’s safe.
Tasha Taylor, Toronto
Desperately seeking
you were on a flight from London, England, but you were coming from the United Arab Emirates. You go to University of Toronto and flew British Airways. We landed Sunday, March 2. Wish we could have said more – like our names. Please forward… to anyone reading this at U of T who knows somebody from the UAE.
Glenn Stants, Toronto
