Militarization of Police Forces

The creeping militarisation of our police https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/futuretense/the-creeping-militarisation-of-our-police/12320236 Police militarization fails to protect officers and targets black communities https://www.pbs.org/newshour/science/police-militarization-fails-to-protect-officers-and-targets-black-communities-study-finds Militarization fails to enhance police safety or reduce crime but may harm police reputation by Jonathan Mummolo, Princeton University (2018) https://www.pnas.org/content/115/37/9181

Ford’s Failure on Long Term Residences

By J. R. Moitessier Will Ford’s failure to protect Long Term Care Facility Residents and Staff during the COVID-19 pandemic be his Walkerton? Earlier posts, as well as mainstream media, have commented on the impact of budget cuts to public health funding, the significant  reduction in inspections of long term care facilities, the disproportionate impact

Films for the Pandemic

LITTLE JOE, dir. Jessica Hausner, 2019. Dr. Troy Michael Bordun, Concordia University and Trent University Streaming platforms released Jessica Hausner’s Little Joe (2019, UK/Austria/Germany) in March. Despite Little Joe’s success at Cannes (Emily Beecham won Best Actress and the film received a Palme d’Or nomination), Hoopla, where I viewed it, didn’t showcase the film on

Apple and Google are living in the past

The French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu has a concept called hysteresis. Basically it means living in the past. An example, is the boss of a factory who doesn’t want to install additional washrooms because… well, it’s just too much trouble. Having to hire an architect, and get a building permit, and all the disruption. Hell, its

Punk Rock Pandemic

Career Suicide, a Toronto hardcore band with Martin Farkas, Jonah Falco, Noah Gadke and Chris Colohan recorded this 7″ vinyl in December 2002. It was issued on Deranged Records in 2003. You can listen to the band on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YJXk8sjeAk QUARANTINED It started with a cough and now your Skin is turning green. The windows

Political Graffiti in the Pandemic

Amazon dot com is a problem

In a pithy commentary published on The Nation website, Mike Davis points out that in previous wars wealthy individuals and corporations were expected to play their part. Income tax was increased on rich citizens to pay for the war. And essential corporations such as railways were nationalized.  In 2014, Paul Krugman wrote in the New

Imagining the Worst: Camus’s The Plague

Dr. Troy Bordun, Trent University and Concordia University In a previous post, I wondered about the sublime and pandemic data visualizations. I wasn’t able to touch upon the role of the imagination in the theory of the sublime, nor how mathematics plays a part (or doesn’t) in that theory. Here, I’ll turn to a novel

News Reporting in the Pandemic

Alan O’Connor, Professor of Media Studies, Trent University Six weeks into the Pandemic, how are news media doing? One thing that is clear is that many of us still depend on daily newspapers, even if we mostly read them online. Clay Shirky’s prophecy that citizen reporters would take over from professional journalists has not come

Coronavirus, Explained Reading List

The documentary Coronavirus, Explained debuted on Netflix on April 26, 2020. It clearly shows that the Coronavirus Pandemic was foreseen as a possibility by medical researchers and social scientists. Political leaders who claim that nobody could have seen this coming need to explain why they made budget cuts to Public Health (which has the job