Posts tagged Racism

On behalf of Black man murdered by police and other injustices Egbert Gaye Since Saturday, March 19, Black Lives Matter-Toronto have been mobilizing outside of the headquarters of the city’s police headquarters building a protest against a decision by Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit (SIU), not to recommend that charges be brought against a police officer who shot and killed Andrew Loku, a 45-year-old Black man. Loku, a father of five, was shot last July after an altercation with him and a neighbor brought the police to his apartment building. When the police arrived they found Loku with a hammer in …

So many years ago Jackie Robinson told the world he never had it made The Barbershop was crowded, everybody was talking or texting… The Genius walked in with his briefcase, rested it on a chair and signaled the Professor to tell everybody to be quiet. Professor raised his hand, got everyone’s attention and said, “Stop texting.” He continued, “Everybody should be proud of our new Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, who is a very close friend of Marc Miller, M.P. for South-West Montreal, and Lisa Montgomery, political attaché for Marc Miller.” Professor paused, then started again. “Did you know that Florida …

 Giddens tells stories with musical freshness “Tomorrow Is My Turn” – Rhiannon Giddens – Nonesuch Records Greensboro, North Carolina native Giddens made quite a mark for herself as a lead-singer, violinist and banjo player with Carolina Chocolate Drops. Now as a solo artist, Giddens has a brand new palette to paint musical paintings of American life through her own eyes as a Black woman from the south, whose eyes and ears on her debut solo outing have obviously seen and heard much. Veteran producer T-Bone Burnett makes beautiful choices of musical blueprints as he weaves a potpourri of sounds and …

Former city councilor now living in the Lanaudière region claims she was racially profiled By Contact Staff “I’ve been around white people all my life and I don’t go screaming racism for every little incident. But I know when I’m being racially profiled,” so declares Sonya Biddle, a former city councilor who is crying foul after she was followed and intimidated while trying to shop at an IGA supermarket in St. Felix de Valois, in the Lanaudière region about an hour or so northeast of Montreal. Biddle, who represented the Notre Dame de Grace district in City Hall between 1998 …

Mactar Mbaye is above Egbert Gaye When the racist Montrealer called 911 on February 18 to tip them off that Mactar Mbaye might be a pimp trying to recruit a young white girl into prostitution as they sat in a Tim Hortons in Laval, there’s a lot that person didn’t know. He or she didn’t know that the 23-year-old Mbaye is a lifelong entrepreneur trying to take his construction estimation business to the next level by hiring someone to help him deal with clients as he tries to grow his enterprise and work on other projects. The racist didn’t know …

Mauritania Roots… Belgium Born… Montrealer and Alternative Punk Rocker by Choice See her in her little girly dress traipsing around Montreal and Fatima Ba is the picture of innocence, as if primed to participate in a nice little pageant somewhere. But see her on stage at alternative punk rock venues, mesmerizing crowds as the lead singer of one of Montreal’s up-and-coming alternative rock bands, Still To Find, and you get a sense of whom Fatima really is. “Yes I love wearing my little girly dresses when I‘m on stage. I probably have more than a hundred of them,” she told …

He’s getting paid, but in some minds and eyes P.K. Subban is too colourful for the league All P.K. Subban was doing a few weeks ago out in Denver, Colorado, was, as some people say, “playing his arse off”— as he always does—for his team, les Canadiens de Montréal. That night, with the game tied 2-2 and about 2:30 minutes to play in the third period, then tragedy… Given the sad state of the Montreal Canadians since late last year, the team needs more than fans religiously going to the Bell Centre. Once in their places, they should not only …

Marc Miller: the first hundred days in Parliament Egbert Gaye One hundred days into his stint as a parliamentarian, Marc Miller has already decided that this might be the best job in the world; certainly, he sees it as his dream job. Before winning the riding of Ville Marie-South West-Nun’s Island in the last election, Miller was one of those perceived high-flying corporate lawyers plying his trade in New York and Europe. But these days as a rookie parliamentarian he is driven by what he sees as an amazing opportunity “to be a spokesperson for fairness and quality of life.” …

Here’s Black History It’s cold out there, but the barbershop was crowded. They were talking: about music, about Celine Dion, about Black history. Genius was talking about Celine Dion and Peabo Bryson and the duo winning a Grammy in 1992. That’s when the 411 came that René Angèlil, the husband of Celine Dion, had passed away. Professor put his hand up and said, “[…] Celine’s husband was a good guy. No one ever said a bad word about him. He made Celine an international superstar. Another good thing about him is that he never forgot his friends. He gave big …

An Epic Documentary on   The Sir George Williams Affair   Egbert Gaye These days, names such as Terrence Ballantyne, Rosie Douglas, Kennedy Fredericks, Valerie Belgrave, Lynn Murray, Hugo Ford, Mark Chang, Rodney John, Bukka Rennie, or even Perry Anderson for that matter, do not mean anything to the average person in our community or the average Montrealer. But there was a time, about 47 years ago to be exact, when these individuals were front and centre in a struggle that laid bare the ugly underbelly of institutionalized racism and police brutality in Montreal, following a standoff between a group of …