CategoryNews

On 24 October 2023, Iceland held a twenty-four-hour strike supporting gender equality. The rally was organized by forty-five organizations and saw thousands of women and non-binary people across Iceland standing in solidarity. Prime Minister Katrín Jakobsdóttir joined the cause, stating that she and all the women in the cabinet would not work on this day. The rally holds great significance after...

The Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in Sudan have been in a state of war since April 2023. An estimated 9,000 people have lost their lives in what has become one of the worst humanitarian crises on the African subcontinent in recent years. According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, about 5.8 million people have been displaced internally...

Making Canadian Competition Akin to the EU “Let the past die. Kill it, if you have to. That’s the only way to become what you are meant to be.” This line from The Last Jedi, spoken by Kylo Ren, is wrong because you cannot reshape the future without understanding the past; breaking away requires what went wrong and trying to fix it. This is why Rey was the heroine of the film. But wait… this...

This year marks the third annual National Truth and Reconciliation Day recognized across Canada. Every year on September 30, the National Truth and Reconciliation Day and the Orange Shirt Day honour Indigeneity and calls for reflecting on the intergenerational trauma of residential schools. This day was made into a federal statutory holiday in 2021 to uphold the Truth and Reconciliation...

Katalin Karikó’s initial disbelief in winning the 2023 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine alongside her partner, American immunologist, Drew Weissman, reflects her humility and modesty, despite the significant impact of her contributions on global health. While you may not recognize her name, you are undoubtedly aware of her accomplishments.  Karikó and Weissman pioneered research on...

An inside scoop into how an old moot was given new life. The Eureka Moment On a hot June summer day, as I was furiously working away on a legal memorandum that was poised to be blacklined into oblivion by one of my supervising partners, I decided to take a quick break in the Lax O’Sullivan Lisus Gottlieb LLP lunchroom. As I downed my third Diet Coke of the day, I received an email from the...

Have you tried OpenAI’s ChatGPT lately? OpenAI, an artificial intelligence (AI) research company originally founded by Sam Altman amongst others, have the mission to develop AI tools to, as stated on their website, “ensure that artificial general intelligence benefits all of humanity.” ChatGPT—which is an AI-powered chat robot—was launched by OpenAI in November 2022, and its success has led many...

On 17 February, The Globe and Mail released their investigation of Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) documents which revealed China’s strategy to influence the 2021 election. Since assuming office in 2012, President Xi Jinping has taken a more aggressive foreign policy approach, yet the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) still claims it adheres to the international custom of non...

Premiers and territorial leaders across Canada may be able to finally take a collective sigh of relief as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau tables a funding offer to help Canada’s struggling health care system. The provinces are already scheduled to get a 9.5-per-cent increase in healthcare transfers this year, amounting to $49.4 billion from the $45.2-billion in projected payments in the 2022-23...

As of 31 January 2023, the British Columbia government plans to decriminalize possession of up to 2.5 grams of certain drugs by those over 18, which is the first exemption of its kind in Canada. Given the overdose and drug crisis that is occurring in the province, the government’s response in decriminalizing the possession of small amounts of these drugs is aimed to reduce barriers and stigma...

Irreversible environmental harm, nonsensical urban planning and accusations of corruption After a mere thirty-day public consultation period, the Ontario government has officially decided to go ahead with its plan to remove 7,400 acres from the protected Greenbelt. This announcement came just last month, ten days after the public consultations on the initial proposal had closed. The government...

With the House of Representatives returned to the hands of the Republicans, almost two dozen GOP governors have imposed the long overdue ban on TikTok over the past five weeks, ranging from restricting government employees’ access to the application to removing it altogether from government internet networks. While the majority of the left-wing Democrats are still living in their illusory vision...

In 2016, Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) was legalized in Canada. This allowed for doctors and nurse practitioners to use medication to cause a person’s death at their request. When the bill was first introduced, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau stated that the Liberal government was focused on, “respecting Canadians rights, defending their choices…while at the same time, protecting the most...

Should the money be going elsewhere? Now that the municipal elections are over, one of the main issues to be addressed is what to do regarding the huge $857 million deficit in Toronto. While a lot of the deficit can be attributed to the COVID-pandemic costs, it is important to think about how the mayor will attempt to balance the budget. Will they increase taxes? Will they cut services? Perhaps...

Scientists discover genetic variation that offers largest evolutionary advantage found in humans A study published in Nature two weeks ago identified a genetic variation that gave certain people a 40% chance of surviving the Black Death—the largest evolutionary advantage found in humans.  The Black Death, a plague that spread throughout Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa ravaged the...

A congressional letter that urges President Biden to negotiate directly with Vladimir Putin to end the war against Ukraine, signed by thirty liberal democrats, was withdrawn by the Congressional Progressive Caucus on 25 October 2022.  The House Democrats pointed out that the incrementally painful consequences are becoming increasingly far-reaching and are reflected not only in Ukraine but...

The Canadian housing market has been retreating due to increased interest rates over the past year. What was once a dominant sellers’ market has slowly become buyer-friendly as current homeowners cannot keep up with the rising interest rates. However, within this mayhem and the worrying housing price bubble, a niche area of housing financing is booming, particularly for a specific religious...

The Energy Charter Treaty (ECT) has been making headlines this week following the announcement from French President Emmanuel Macron that his country would withdraw from the investment treaty because it did not align with the Paris Agreement. This follows announcements from Poland, Spain, and the Netherlands that they were pulling out of the agreement as well. The ECT is a multilateral investment...

Are the current laws unconstitutional? Back in 2013, my Law and Morality professor had a sex worker speak to the class about the issues that she and her colleagues faced due to the sex worker laws that were in place at that time. Those next few weeks, our tutorials were discussions about the morality of being a sex worker, and a classmate asked something along the lines of, “Laborers sell their...