Canada Marks a Grim Military Anniversary On February 25th, we Canadians marked the 30th anniversary of a military massacre committed in our names that many in the West are completely unaware of – with critical details buried by the press at the time and little to no media or political attention since. The assault, launched by combined US, Canadian, French and British forces, resulted in the...
The concept of blind justice is fundamental to the ultimate aspirations of true justice itself: where all members of a given society are treated equally by the rules and laws of that society, irrespective of who one happens to be, and what position in society they happen to occupy. If we conceptualize our system of rules and laws as the concrete foundation on which the rest of our society is...
Connor Campbell is an articling student at McMillian LLP in Toronto, Ontario, and Editor Emeritus of Obiter Dicta. Connor previously served as a staff illustrator for Obiter during his 1L year at Osgoode, before serving as Editor-in-Chief during his 2L and 3L years. Connor was also the staff cartoonist for The Varsity, the school paper at the University of Toronto. Connor graduated from Osgoode...
If the theme of the 2016 US election was rage in the electorate – rage against a changing country, rage against globalism, rage against corporatism, rage against capitalism, rage against immigration, rage against racism, rage against sexism – the theme of the 2020 US election is undoubtedly rage in the media. On a daily basis the news media – from the corporate broadcast...
A Public Diary Entry from Corey LeBlanc The start of a new school year can always be a stressful time. Doubly-so in the high-pressure environment that is law school. And so further in the COVID-era. Consequently, the fact that my September was going to be a little rocky was to be expected. However, the extent to which my little karmic ship was hammered by the proverbial open-and-stormy waters...
The COVID-19 pandemic has affected all of our lives in ways both big and small; from wearing PPE around on our day-to-day dalliances to lining up outside the grocery stores to purchase household staples. And, for many Canadians, the closing of most international borders is a particularly harsh reminder of our new inconvenient reality – especially as we enter fall and with winter on fast...
From Dr. Theresa Tam to Osgoode Hall’s Faculty Council When the pandemic first became a reality late last spring, it was not obvious what the world would look like six months down the road. Many – including myself – were expecting a shut-down of at least a couple months, but nobody could have predicted that we would still be practicing social distancing on a society-wide scale in mid...
Osgoode Hall Law School Has Survived Challenges Before, and Will Survive Them Again The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent shutdown of most of Canadian society, including the cancelling of all in-person instruction here at Osgoode Hall Law School, is not how I envisioned the end of my 2L year going. I am worried for my family, I am worried for my friends, I am worried for our...
Everything You Need to Know About the COVID-19 Pandemic In an effort to assist Osgoode Hall Law Students during these unprecedented times, the Opinions Section publishes this COVID-19 explainer: What is Coronavirus? What is COVID-19? Are they the same thing? A: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is an infectious disease caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)...
From Trent University to Wet’suwet’en Territory, Respect and Understanding Needed I completed my undergraduate studies in economics at Trent University, a small research-focused school situated on the banks of the Otonabee River, just outside of Peterborough, Ontario. Trent University is known primarily for both its beautiful campus and world-class professors. However, Trent University also has...
Lessons in Cause-and-Effect; from Walkerton to the Novel Coronavirus The interesting thing about disaster is that it generally surprises when it strikes, yet it is often revealed to have been entirely predictable and preventable in hindsight. Take the Walkerton E. coli disaster of 2000 as an example: more than two thousand sick, six people dead, and an entirely predictable and preventable...
Time for the Republic of Canada I consider myself to be a bit of a traditionalist. I grew up in a family where my grandmothers on both sides were (are) enamoured by our monarch, the Queen of Canada, Elizabeth II. Somewhat an oddity considering my late-grandmother on my Father’s side was of Polish-German descent, and my grandmother on my Mother’s side is French-Canadian – neither, of course, being...
The CBC and US President Trump Both Learn Hard Lessons Over the Holidays in Cause-and-Effect Christmas holidays did not come and go without controversy, predictable of course, for these times we live in. Specifically, there was a notable online backlash against Canadian public broadcaster, Canadian Broadcast Corporation (“CBC”), after they aired a slightly edited version of the classic...
As a lover of video games, I have always been enamoured by the earliest days of gaming. I grew up with an aging Nintendo Entertainment System in my household – the old grey-and-black box one would use to play the classics of the late 1980’s like Super Mario Bros. or the original Legend of Zelda – and have ever-since had a passion for retro games and gaming. However, until very...
Conservative MP on the rural-urban divide, firearms, and the role of law students in a democracy Jamie Schmale (CPC), the newly re-elected Member of Federal Parliament for the rural Central-Ontario riding of Haliburton – Kawartha Lakes – Brock recently sat down with Obiter’s Opinion Editor, Corey LeBlanc, to speak about rural – urban issues, firearms, and the involvement of law students in the...
and One Easy Way to Do It Given the past few months in both Canadian politics and culture, one can be forgiven for thinking the wheels have started coming completely off the proverbial cart. Almost daily we turn on the six o’clock news to hear lurid stories about the Prime Minister wearing blackface, leading politicians ranting and raving about the illegitimacy of gay marriage, Canadian cultural...
Representative Democracy protects us from runaway majoritarianism On the evening of election day November 7th, 2000, then-Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush won the White House by carrying 30 states and their 271 electoral college votes. His Democratic opponent, Al Gore, won only 20 states and their 266 electoral college votes – despite receiving over 500,000 more votes in the...
With exam season quickly approaching, assignments, readings, and extra-curricular responsibilities beginning to pile-up, and stress levels around campus reaching critical mass, I think it is important for everyone to take a deep breath and provide ourselves with some perspective. The importance of our performance as students in law school cannot be overstated, yet, to succeed academically...
Our imperfect political leaders represent an imperfect Canada ‘May you live in interesting times’, goes the purported ancient Chinese proverb; and considering the options available to Canadians casting a ballot in the upcoming federal election, interesting times we live in, indeed. The leader of the Liberal Party, our incumbent Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, has recently been found to have had...
Click-Bait Journalism is Damaging the Industry’s Credibility Initially, the internet was supposed to save journalism. The internet provided journalists, and the newsrooms that employed them, what seemed like an effective counter-punch to the on-the-minute breaking stories found on cable news and talk radio, which had so wounded the relevance of print media through the 1980s and 90s. Yet...
The UFO Phenomenon Breaks Into the Mainstream Widespread contemporary interest in unidentified flying objects, popularly known as ‘UFOs’, is agreed to have been sparked by the 1947 Roswell incident, in which an object described by witnesses as looking like a ‘flying disc’, or ‘saucer’, is reported to have crashed at a ranch outside of the sleepy city of Roswell, New Mexico. This incident sparked...
The people of Hong Kong have been under some form of political subjugation since at least 1842, when Qing China formally ceded Hong Kong Island to the British Empire with the signing of the Treaty of Nanking. The Treaty — which came as a consequence of the Qing defeat in the First Opium War — formalized Hong Kong Island as a Crown colony “in perpetuity” and began an era of colonial control over...
Corey Robert LeBlanc – Opinions Editor When Obiter’s Editor-in-Chief asked each of us section editors to pen a welcome message to each of you for the 2019-20 school year, I admit that I found the exercise a bit hokey. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to introduce myself, or that I am uninterested in outlining my intentions for this section, but rather that I simply believe that it is a boring...